Governance, Ethics and the National Health Service

‘Good’ governance requires ethical issues, such as accountability, responsibility, probity and representativeness, to be addressed. However, there do not appear to have been any attempts until now to examine systematically the links between archetypal forms of governance (hierarchy, market, network, community and relational) and established theories of ethics. This article explores the compatibility of governance forms with four ethical systems: utilitarianism, Kantianism, virtue ethics and an ethics of care. The implications of this analysis are illustrated with reference to the National Health Service (NHS).