Research Article
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Beyond Critique and Polemic: Public Debate On and Offline as a Test for the Ethics of Care

Year 2023, Issue: 17, 61 - 78, 31.12.2023
https://doi.org/10.32739/uskudarsbd.9.17.132

Abstract

This article investigates the state of public communication on and offline as a test case for the viability of care ethics to deal with the fundamental disagreements that characterize our communicative interactions. The argument proceeds in four steps. First, I adumbrate two styles of argumentation that I link with two influential modern ethical theories, the critical-deontological and the polemical-utilitarian. I claim that restricting ourselves to these four terms imprisons us to oscillations between two apparently incompatible frameworks that picture public communication either in normative terms or in terms of power politics. Second, I claim that care ethics offers promising conceptual and normative resources to overcome these oscillations between critique and polemic. Third, I show how this is the case because of the unique way in which care ethics seeks to overcome the opposition between dependence and independence by reconfiguring the standard picture of the separation between morality and politics. Finally, I claim that the real limitation of care ethics is not to be found in its lack of universalizable norms or precise standards, but rather in its insufficient questioning of the extent to which disagreement as dissensus might characterize contemporary politics.

References

  • KAYNAKÇA Card, Claudia. The Atrocity Paradigm: A Theory of Evil. Oxford University Press, 2002. Facebook. “Facebook Community Standards,” accessed August 5, 2023, https://transparency.fb.com/ en-gb/policies/community-standards/
  • Gilligan, Carol. In a Different Voice: Psychological Theory and Women’s Development. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1982.
  • Gürsoy, A. Özgür and Karanfil, Gökçen. “The Afterlife of Critique: The Communicability of Criticism and the Publicity of Polemic Concerning Public Debate in the Turkish Press.” International Journal of Communication 11(2017): 1261–1275.
  • Habermas, Jürgen. Moral Consciousness and Communicative Action. Translated by C. Lenhardt Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 1990.
  • Hellestrand, Ingvil. “On the Messiness of Care: Vulnerability, Responsibility and Community”. Conference Presentation. NECS, Oslo, Norway, June, 2023.
  • Henrich, Dieter. Between Kant and Hegel: Lectures on German Idealism. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2008.
  • Hoagland, Sarah L.. “Review: Some Concerns about Nel Noddings’ ‘Caring’”. Hypatia, 5 (1), (1990): 109–114.
  • Kant, Immanuel. Critique of Pure Reason. Translated by P. Guyer and A. W. Wood. New York, NY: Cambridge University Press, 1990.
  • Kant, Immanuel. Kant: Political Writings (2nd ed.), edited by H. S. Reiss. New York, NY: Cambridge University Press, 1991.
  • Mill, John. S. Utilitarianism. Oxford University Press, 1998.
  • Noddings, Nel. Caring: A Feminine Approach to Ethics and Moral Education. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1984.
  • Noddings, Nel. Caring: A Political Argument for an Ethic of Care. New York: Routledge, 1993.
  • O’Neill, Onora. Bounds of Justice. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 2000.
  • Pippin, Robert. B. Hegel’s Idealism: The Satisfactions of Self-Consciousness. New York, NY: Cambridge University Press, 1989.
  • Puig de la Bellacasa, Maria. Matters of Care: Speculative Ethics in More than Human Worlds. Minneapolis: The University of Minnesota Press, 2017.
  • Rancière, Jacques. Disagreement: Politics and Philosophy. Translated by Julie Rose. University of Minnesota Press, 1999.
  • ____. The Politics of Aesthetics: The Distribution of the SensibleTranslated by Gabriel Rockhill Continuum, 2004.
  • Rawls, John. Justice as Fairness: A Restatement. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2001. Tessman, Lisa. Burdened Virtues: Virtue Ethics for Liberatory Struggles. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2005.
  • Tronto, Joan C. Moral Boundaries: A Political Argument for an Ethic of Care. New York: Routledge, 1993.
  • Twitter. “Twitter Rules,” accessed August 5, 2023. https://help.twitter.com/en/rules-and-policies/ twitter-rules
  • Zamalin, Alex. Against Civility. The Hidden Racism in our Obsession with Civility. Beacon Press, 2021.

Eleştiri ve Polemiğin Ötesinde: Çevrimiçi ve Dışı Kamusal Tartışmalar Üzerinden Bakım Etiğinin Sınırlarının Sorgulanması

Year 2023, Issue: 17, 61 - 78, 31.12.2023
https://doi.org/10.32739/uskudarsbd.9.17.132

Abstract

Bu makale günümüzde çevrimiçi ve dışı kamusal iletişimin bakım etiğine dair sunduğu sınırları incelemektedir. Makalenin argümanı dört aşamadan oluşmaktadır. İlk olarak iki argümansal stil—kritik ve polemik— modernitede etkili olmuş iki etik teorisiyle ilişkilendirilmekte ve kendimizi bu terimlerin kurduğu kuramsal çerçeveye sıkıştırmanın oluşturduğu kavramsal salınımlar gösterilmektedir. İkinci olarak, bakım etiğinin bu salınımları aşmakta ümit verici kaynaklara sahip olduğu iddia edilmektedir. Üçüncü olarak, bu kaynakların merkezinde bakım etiğinin bağımlılık ve bağımsızlık arasındaki zıtlığı yeniden düşünmemizi sağlayan ve ahlak ile siyaset arasındaki sınırları sorgulayan argümanları konumlandırılmaktadır. Son olarak, bakım etiğinin karşılaştığı en önemli sınırın, genellikle iddia edildiğinin aksine evrensel normlar veya kesin standartlar sunamaması değil, günümüz siyasası yaşamını tanımlayan dissensus olarak anlaşmazlığı yeterince sorgulamaması olduğu iddia edilmektedir.

References

  • KAYNAKÇA Card, Claudia. The Atrocity Paradigm: A Theory of Evil. Oxford University Press, 2002. Facebook. “Facebook Community Standards,” accessed August 5, 2023, https://transparency.fb.com/ en-gb/policies/community-standards/
  • Gilligan, Carol. In a Different Voice: Psychological Theory and Women’s Development. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1982.
  • Gürsoy, A. Özgür and Karanfil, Gökçen. “The Afterlife of Critique: The Communicability of Criticism and the Publicity of Polemic Concerning Public Debate in the Turkish Press.” International Journal of Communication 11(2017): 1261–1275.
  • Habermas, Jürgen. Moral Consciousness and Communicative Action. Translated by C. Lenhardt Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 1990.
  • Hellestrand, Ingvil. “On the Messiness of Care: Vulnerability, Responsibility and Community”. Conference Presentation. NECS, Oslo, Norway, June, 2023.
  • Henrich, Dieter. Between Kant and Hegel: Lectures on German Idealism. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2008.
  • Hoagland, Sarah L.. “Review: Some Concerns about Nel Noddings’ ‘Caring’”. Hypatia, 5 (1), (1990): 109–114.
  • Kant, Immanuel. Critique of Pure Reason. Translated by P. Guyer and A. W. Wood. New York, NY: Cambridge University Press, 1990.
  • Kant, Immanuel. Kant: Political Writings (2nd ed.), edited by H. S. Reiss. New York, NY: Cambridge University Press, 1991.
  • Mill, John. S. Utilitarianism. Oxford University Press, 1998.
  • Noddings, Nel. Caring: A Feminine Approach to Ethics and Moral Education. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1984.
  • Noddings, Nel. Caring: A Political Argument for an Ethic of Care. New York: Routledge, 1993.
  • O’Neill, Onora. Bounds of Justice. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 2000.
  • Pippin, Robert. B. Hegel’s Idealism: The Satisfactions of Self-Consciousness. New York, NY: Cambridge University Press, 1989.
  • Puig de la Bellacasa, Maria. Matters of Care: Speculative Ethics in More than Human Worlds. Minneapolis: The University of Minnesota Press, 2017.
  • Rancière, Jacques. Disagreement: Politics and Philosophy. Translated by Julie Rose. University of Minnesota Press, 1999.
  • ____. The Politics of Aesthetics: The Distribution of the SensibleTranslated by Gabriel Rockhill Continuum, 2004.
  • Rawls, John. Justice as Fairness: A Restatement. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2001. Tessman, Lisa. Burdened Virtues: Virtue Ethics for Liberatory Struggles. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2005.
  • Tronto, Joan C. Moral Boundaries: A Political Argument for an Ethic of Care. New York: Routledge, 1993.
  • Twitter. “Twitter Rules,” accessed August 5, 2023. https://help.twitter.com/en/rules-and-policies/ twitter-rules
  • Zamalin, Alex. Against Civility. The Hidden Racism in our Obsession with Civility. Beacon Press, 2021.
There are 21 citations in total.

Details

Primary Language English
Subjects Ethics, Philosophy of Society
Journal Section Research Article
Authors

Ali Özgür Gürsoy 0000-0003-3332-9921

Early Pub Date December 31, 2023
Publication Date December 31, 2023
Submission Date August 12, 2023
Published in Issue Year 2023 Issue: 17

Cite

APA Gürsoy, A. Ö. (2023). Beyond Critique and Polemic: Public Debate On and Offline as a Test for the Ethics of Care. Üsküdar Üniversitesi Sosyal Bilimler Dergisi(17), 61-78. https://doi.org/10.32739/uskudarsbd.9.17.132
AMA Gürsoy AÖ. Beyond Critique and Polemic: Public Debate On and Offline as a Test for the Ethics of Care. JOSOC. December 2023;(17):61-78. doi:10.32739/uskudarsbd.9.17.132
Chicago Gürsoy, Ali Özgür. “Beyond Critique and Polemic: Public Debate On and Offline As a Test for the Ethics of Care”. Üsküdar Üniversitesi Sosyal Bilimler Dergisi, no. 17 (December 2023): 61-78. https://doi.org/10.32739/uskudarsbd.9.17.132.
EndNote Gürsoy AÖ (December 1, 2023) Beyond Critique and Polemic: Public Debate On and Offline as a Test for the Ethics of Care. Üsküdar Üniversitesi Sosyal Bilimler Dergisi 17 61–78.
IEEE A. Ö. Gürsoy, “Beyond Critique and Polemic: Public Debate On and Offline as a Test for the Ethics of Care”, JOSOC, no. 17, pp. 61–78, December 2023, doi: 10.32739/uskudarsbd.9.17.132.
ISNAD Gürsoy, Ali Özgür. “Beyond Critique and Polemic: Public Debate On and Offline As a Test for the Ethics of Care”. Üsküdar Üniversitesi Sosyal Bilimler Dergisi 17 (December 2023), 61-78. https://doi.org/10.32739/uskudarsbd.9.17.132.
JAMA Gürsoy AÖ. Beyond Critique and Polemic: Public Debate On and Offline as a Test for the Ethics of Care. JOSOC. 2023;:61–78.
MLA Gürsoy, Ali Özgür. “Beyond Critique and Polemic: Public Debate On and Offline As a Test for the Ethics of Care”. Üsküdar Üniversitesi Sosyal Bilimler Dergisi, no. 17, 2023, pp. 61-78, doi:10.32739/uskudarsbd.9.17.132.
Vancouver Gürsoy AÖ. Beyond Critique and Polemic: Public Debate On and Offline as a Test for the Ethics of Care. JOSOC. 2023(17):61-78.

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