Ethics and Global Ethics
Department of Philosophy research theme
Ethics and Global Ethics brings together researchers working in the areas of applied ethics, political philosophy, and moral philosophy. Alongside cutting-edge interdisciplinary research, academics in the cluster are committed to engaging with policy and the public.
We are a hub for issues in global ethics, including gender justice, bioethics, climate change, conflict and security, democracy, distributive justice, and health. Its members explore topics such as: our obligations and rights as global citizens; the parameters of engaging in legitimate killing; ways in which women’s rights can be better protected; and how we might conceptualise, and promote, health and happiness.
In addition, our researchers engage with policymakers and the broader public about our work. Some of our recent activity has spanned the themes of beauty and justice, sex-selective abortion, child soldiers, climate change, ethics of clinical trials, (de-)radicalisation and agency, surrogacy, and genetic selection. Members respond to government consultations, have hosted both public lectures and workshops for practitioners, and sit on, and chair, ethics committees.
Researchers
- Herjeet Marway works on difficult choices in oppressive contexts, specifically from a feminist and critical race perspective. Specific areas of interest include deradicalisation and relation autonomy, global bioethics, and both gender and race justice.
- Wouter Peeters' main interests are climate change, environmental sustainability, social justice, cosmopolitanism, and bioethics. He also works on recognition theory and intersubjective ethics.
- Merten Reglitz looks at internet ethics, global justice, egalitarianism, intergenerational justice, political authority, and Kant’s practical philosophy.
- Alex Silk conducts research in how philosophy of language and linguistics can illuminate broader philosophical debates—in the case of ethics, he has applied it to normative language and meta-ethical discourse about moral disagreement.
- Jussi Suikkanen mainly researches metaethics and ethical theories, specifically the nature of moral properties, moral judgements, and truth in ethics. He has written on Scanlonian contractualism, value and reasons, happiness, and rationality.
- Jeremy Williams works in the fields of moral and political philosophy. His current research is on public reason and its implications for various questions in practical ethics. He focuses on bioethics, the ethics of killing, and liberal political theory.
Recent publications
- Marway, Herjeet. 2018. Should we genetically select for the beauty norm of fair skin?, Health Care Analysis 26, 246-68.
- Peeters, Wouter. 2019. Moral disengagement and the motivational gap in climate change, Ethical Theory and Moral Practice 22, 425-47.
- Reglitz, Merten. 2020. The human right to free Internet access, The Journal of Applied Philosophy 37, 314-31.
- Silk, Alex. 2015. How to be an ethical expressivist, Philosophy and Phenomenological Research 91, 47-81.
- Suikkanen, Jussi. 2018. Judgment internalism: An argument from self knowledge, Ethical Theory and Moral Practice 21, 489-503.
- Williams, Jeremy. 2017. Death and Consensus Liberalism, Philosophers’ Imprint 17.
- Williams, Jeremy. 2021. Anti-Abortion Violence, Philosophy and Phenomenological Research.