Resisting hierarchies through relationality in the ethics of care

2020 ◽  
Vol 4 (1) ◽  
pp. 11-23 ◽  
Author(s):  
Fiona Robinson
Keyword(s):  
Care Ethics ◽  
Ethics Of Care ◽  
Normative Theory ◽  
Gender Essentialism ◽  
Carol Gilligan ◽  
Care Workers ◽  
Gender Hierarchies ◽  
And Gender ◽  
Critical Ethics

This article explores recent charges of Western-centrism and gender essentialism in care ethics. In response to these charges, and informed by the work of Carol Gilligan, I argue for a view of care ethics that regards it not primarily as a normative theory advocating for care and care workers, but as a critical ethics that voices and enacts resistance to Cartesian splits and hierarchies. These are not just gender hierarchies; rather, care ethics resists all binaries that divide people into categories and separate them from others, and, indeed, from themselves.

scholarly journals Intersectionality: Mapping Critical Relations for Quality in Long-Term Care Research

2020 ◽  
Vol 4 (Supplement_1) ◽  
pp. 39-39
Author(s):  
Katie Aubrecht ◽  
Ivy Bourgeault ◽  
Tamara Daly
Keyword(s):  
Long Term Care ◽  
Term Care ◽  
Social Divisions ◽  
Care Workers ◽  
Power Differentials ◽  
Care Relationships ◽  
And Gender ◽  
Relations Of Power ◽  
Status Of Care

Abstract Intersectionality is a useful method (Lutz, 2015) for interdisciplinary long-term care (LTC) research to advance a more critical understanding of how experiences of quality are shaped by mutually reproducing social divisions, identities and relations of power that shape LTC. This paper discusses insights from the “Mapping Care Relationships” stream of the Seniors – Adding Life to Years (SALTY) project, a pan-Canadian program of research examining clinical, social and policy perspectives on quality in LTC. “Mapping Care Relationships” mapped how promising approaches to care relationships are organized and experienced in LTC. From January 2018-August 2019 our team of nine researchers conducted rapid ethnographies in eight nursing homes, two in each of four provinces across Canada. We purposively observed and interviewed workers from a wide variety of positions and backgrounds, informed by an intersectionality approach. We traced how promising approaches in person-centred dementia care (PCDC) in particular may reify the subordinated status of care workers (some more than others) and reinforce inequities within LTC systems. In multiple LTC homes, front-line care workers described experiencing physical and emotional harm in care relationships with residents which caused them distress. However, consistent with a PCDC approach, the harm was attributed to ‘behaviours’ clinically symptomatic of dementia. In framing power differentials from a medical perspective, PCDC makes it possible to interpret harmful experiences as 'part of the job’ and something workers should know to expect, prevent, avoid, redirect, or ignore. Lutz, H. (2015). Intersectionality as method. DiGeSt. Journal of diversity and gender studies, 2(1-2), 39-44.

Medical and Nursing Ethics: Never the Twain?

1995 ◽  
Vol 2 (2) ◽  
pp. 95-101 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ann Gallagher
Keyword(s):  
Health Care ◽  
Decision Making ◽  
Nursing Practice ◽  
Care Ethics ◽  
Ethics Of Care ◽  
Health Care Ethics ◽  
Nursing Ethics ◽  
Nel Noddings ◽  
Shared Learning ◽  
Caring Relationship

Since the publication of Carol Gilligan's In a different voice in 1982, there has been much discussion about masculine and feminine approaches to ethics. It has been suggested that an ethics of care, or a feminine ethics, is more appropriate for nursing practice, which contrasts with the 'traditional, masculine' ethics of medicine. It has been suggested that Nel Noddings' version of an 'ethics of care' (or feminine ethics) is an appropriate model for nursing ethics. The 'four principles' approach has become a popular model for medical or health care ethics. It will be suggested in this article that, whilst Noddings presents an interesting analysis of caring and the caring relationship, this has limitations. Rather than acting as an alternative to the 'four principles' approach, the latter is necessary to provide a framework to structure thinking and decision-making in health care. Further, it will be suggested that ethical separatism (that is, one ethics for nurses and one for doctors) in health care is not a progressive step for nurses or doctors. Three recommendations are made: that we promote a health care ethics that incorporates what is valuable in a 'traditional, masculine ethics', the why (four principles approach) and an 'ethics of care', the 'how' (aspects of Noddings' work and that of Urban Walker); that we encourage nurses and doctors to participate in the 'shared learning' and discussion of ethics; and that our ethical language and concerns are common to all, not split into unhelpful dichotomies.

A Feminist Practical Ethics of Care

2018 ◽  
pp. 558-572
Author(s):  
Fiona Robinson
Keyword(s):  
Care Ethics ◽  
Ethics Of Care ◽  
Feminist Ethics ◽  
Policy And Practice ◽  
Moral Framework ◽  
Human Needs ◽  
Practical Ethics ◽  
Women And Children ◽  
Care Practices ◽  
The Voice

This chapter builds a picture of a critical, feminist ethics of care as a feminist practical ethics for international relations. It focuses on care ethics as a moral framework for addressing the challenges of humanitarianism—in a manner that foregrounds human needs while not depoliticizing or taking for granted the category of “human.” A care ethics approach furthers the transformative aims of feminism, while refusing to cast “women-and-children” as vulnerable victims in need of protection. The ethics of care also offers a substantive focus for policy and practice around diverse and competing needs for care. Far from confining women to their roles as carers, this approach exposes patterns of gender inequality in care practices, while retaining a focus on the contribution of the voice and labour of care—in multiple and diverse forms—for all social groups and communities.

scholarly journals Incest as a private/social conundrum: A brief analysis of Atlıkarınca movie and the mother’s reaction to the incestuous husband within the context of Ethics of Care

2018 ◽  
Vol 15 (4) ◽  
pp. 2257
Author(s):  
Betül Minnet
Keyword(s):  
Social Reality ◽  
Ethics Of Care ◽  
Penal Code ◽  
Law And Society ◽  
Main Theme ◽  
Nel Noddings ◽  
Carol Gilligan ◽  
Dead End

Incest, which is also the main theme of the movie Atlıkarınca (2011) (Merry-Go-Round), has been observed both in ancient and modern societies. As a lathomenon, despite mostly being kept as a secret, it has been one of the most brutal realities and practices of families and societies for centuries. Even though many countries have their own prohibitive laws regarding the issue, in Turkey it is still considered a taboo, and in Turkish Penal Code there is no article openly discussing incest. For this respect, Atlıkarınca can be thought as a brave step for bringing up the topic into the scene as a private and social dead-end and a conundrum. The movie reveals the physical and psychological demolition that incest brings to a family, and leaves questions in the viewers’ minds about whether the mother’s way of handling the situation is righteous or not. Also, since the movie is about a social reality, it serves as a documentary both by reflecting a social reality and symbolic narration. In the light of these, this study aims to analyze the movie in terms of social and legal deficiencies and problems in law and society and seeks to explain the mother’s reaction to the incestuous father within the context of Ethics of Care as developed by the American Feminist writers Carol Gilligan and Nel Noddings.

scholarly journals Digital Asymmetries in Transnational Communication: Expectation, Autonomy and Gender Positioning in the Household

2020 ◽  
Vol 25 (6) ◽  
pp. 365-381
Author(s):  
Yang Wang ◽  
Sun Sun Lim
Keyword(s):  
Information And Communication Technologies ◽  
Participant Observation ◽  
Family Members ◽  
Analysis Tool ◽  
Long Distance ◽  
Chinese Study ◽  
Gender Hierarchies ◽  
Transnational Communication ◽  
Information And Communication ◽  
And Gender

Abstract In contemporary society, information and communication technologies (ICTs) are widely cherished for helping transnational households preserve a coherent sense of familyhood despite geographical separation. Despite ICTs having positive benefits for the maintenance of long-distance intimacies, digital asymmetries characterized by gaps in routines, emotional experiences, and outcomes of ICT use can also emerge between family members of different structural, social, and geographical conditions. Drawing on an innovative “content–context diary”-cum-participant observation, this article investigates the multi-dimensional digital asymmetries emerging from the transnational communication of Chinese “study mothers” in Singapore. Using the data visualization and analysis tool “ecomap,” the findings uncover that study mothers were largely beleaguered by expectation asymmetry and autonomy asymmetry, arising from different expectations to and control over daily transnational communication with their family members. The study mothers were disadvantaged by their relatively isolated life situations in the host society and accentuated gender hierarchies in the household.

Egalitarian ideologies on the move: Changing care practices and gender norms in Norway

2019 ◽  
Vol 29 (5) ◽  
pp. 627-639
Author(s):  
Lise Widding Isaksen ◽  
Mariya Bikova
Keyword(s):  
Gender Equality ◽  
Universal Access ◽  
Full Time ◽  
Gender Ideologies ◽  
The Public ◽  
Life Chances ◽  
Organization Of Care ◽  
Care Workers ◽  
Care Practices ◽  
And Gender

This article explores the complexities and ambiguities in Norwegian families’ interaction with the public childcare system. Public childcare is a cornerstone in the ‘double dividend’, that is, social policies that equalize children’s life chances and support gender equality. The dual earner/dual carer family model interacts with full-time participation in the labour market, gender equality at home and universal access to childcare, and has made contemporary childhood multi-local and mobile. As part of their everyday organization of care, parents have to establish connections between home, work and childcare. Here, we use the concept of ‘care loops’ to analyse how local families ‘do’ combinations of welfare services, family resources, gender ideologies and the labour of migrant care workers. Drawing on empirical research on migrant care workers in Norwegian families and discussing recent studies of majority families’ care practices, the article discusses the paradox that egalitarian norms and ideals might generate extra workloads that in turn create demands for migrant care workers and trigger geopolitical inequality.

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