The first time in my life that i could retrospect to see which ethical framework i had been using to solve ethical dilemmas that i have ever encountered was in the 6th week of studying ethics. The lecture was presented by Mr Jaime and after the case study that he presented to us, we were then asked to decide which was ethical with respect to our personal ethical frameworks. Only after this exercise that i could really get the concept of ethical frameworks. As we all know there are five major ethical frameworks though the are others but we are looking just five major ones which include:
Divine command framework
Virtuous framework
Deontology framework
Utilitarian framework
Relativist framework
All the above ethical frameworks are good and very applicable. I can not base my judgments using a particular ethical framework. However, most often than not; one is always prone to solve ethical dilemmas using a particular framework. Also, some people may not or never use some frameworks. For instant a deist (in Deism) will never solve his ethical dilemma using divine command he will use some other frameworks because he doesn’t acknowledge the context.
Despite the fact that we have a particular framework that we use, we are expected to know all the ethical frameworks as our framework will never be applicable in every context that we fine ourselves in. Looking at our compose with a rich diversity of cultures a particular framework will not work here because certainly it is going to solve a problem somewhere at the same time it could cause another somewhere else since ethical values are not unique across the globe.
So we should be able to use the five basic tools of reasoning to analyse a particular situation and select the best ethical framework that is going to solve the dilemma in a universally cordial manner. Each framework has its own limitations as well as merits so using a particular framework is not going to solve the problem 100% but try to select the one that will have the best comparative value advantage.
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