The Ethics of Care: A Feminist Virtue Ethics of Care for Healthcare Practitioners

Abstract

In this paper I seek to distinguish a feminist virtue ethics of care from (1) justice ethics, (2) narrative ethics, (3) care ethics and (4) virtue ethics. I also connect this contemporary discussion of what makes a virtue ethics of care feminist to eighteenth and nineteenth century debates about male, female, and human virtue. I conclude that by focusing on issues related to gender – primarily those related to the systems, structures, and ideologies that create and sustain patterns of male domination and female subordination – we can begin to appreciate that true care and bona-fide virtue can flourish only in societies that treat all persons with equal respect and consideration.