Virtue

 It is a disposition, well embedded in its possessor.

 To possess a virtue is to be a certain sort of person with a certain complex mindset.

Disposition - a quality of character, a habit, a tendency to act in a specified way.

Virtue Ethics - The Theory: An Overview

 Virtue theory is the view that the foundation of morality is in the development of good
character traits, or virtues, not good acts.
 A person is good if he has virtues and lacks vices.
 Typical virtues include courage, temperance, justice, prudence, fortitude, liberality, and
truthfulness.


Four Forms of Virtue Ethics

1. Eudaimonist Virtue Ethics- The distinctive feature of virtue ethics is that they define virtues in
terms of their relationship to eudaimonia.
2. Agent-based and Exemplarist Virtue Ethics. Agent-based virtue ethicists argue that rather than
deriving the normativity of virtue from the value of eudaimonia, other forms of normativity,
including eudaimonia, are traced back to and ultimately explained in terms of moral agents'
motivational and dispositional qualities.
3. Target-centered Virtue Ethics. The starting point for the eudaimonist virtue ethicists is a
flourishing human life;

Eudaimonist: A virtue is a trait that contributes to or is a constituent of eudaimonia and we ought to

develop virtues, precisely because they contribute to eudaimonia.

Eudaimonia: human flourishing or happiness.

Target-centered Virtue Ethics

- is a disposition to respond to, or acknowledge items within its field or field in an excellent or
good enough way"

Platonic Virtue Ethics

 Timothy Chappell: The Handbook of Virtue Ethics (2014)

 Ethics to be that “ good agency in the true and fullest sense presupposes the contemplation of
the Form of the Good.”
 Chappell argues that by constantly attending to our needs, our desires, our passions, and our
thoughts skews our perspective on what the world is actually like and blinds us to the goods
around us.
 Chappell believes that contemplating the goodness of something we encounter is to carefully
attend to it for its own sake, in order to understand it.
Practical Wisdom

 Phronesis- moral or practical wisdom.

 a virtuous person is a morally good, excellent, or admirable person who acts and feels as he
should.
 But it is equally commonly asserted to refer to someone who is generous or honest "to a fault.“

Aristotelian Ethics (Virtue Ethics)

Ethical Work: Nicomachean Ethics.

Eudaimonia: human flourishing or happiness.

 This work is an inquiry into the best life for human beings to live (eudaimonia).

Happiness

- is the practice of virtue or excellence (arete)

- consists in achieving, through the course of a whole lifetime, all the goods — health, wealth,
knowledge, friends, etc.
 (us): a mood or an emotion.
 (Aristotle): an activity—a way of living one’s life.

2 types of virtue

 Character Virtue - Comes about through habit

 Intellectual virtue - is wisdom, which governs ethical behavior, and understanding, which is
expressed in scientific endeavor and contemplation.

Virtue Ethics

 Examples of character virtues- courage, temperance, liberality, and magnanimity.

 Each activity of any particular character virtue has a related excessive or deficient. (ex. Courage:
Rashness, Cowardice).
 Aristotle's advice here is to aim for the opposite of one's typical tendency, and that eventually
this will lead one closer to excellence.

Friendship - is also a necessary part of a happy life.

three types of friendship

friendship of excellence - is based upon virtue. is the least changeable and most lasting form of
friendship.

friendship of pleasure - most changeable form of friendship since the things we find pleasurable or
useful tend to change over a lifetime

friendship of utility - will likely dissolve when it is no longer useful.

Telos

 derived from the Greek word for "end", "purpose", or "goal."

 Teleology: the study of purposiveness, or the study of objects with a view to their aims,
purposes, or intentions.

Natural and Theological Virtue

 Natural virtues are virtues that pertain to the happiness of this life that is "proportionate" to
human nature.
o Moral- are the habits that perfect the various powers concerned with human appetites,
including rational appetite, conferring upon them an aptness for the right use of those
appetites
o Intellectual- perfect the intellect and confer an aptness for the good work of the
intellect which is the apprehension of truth.
 Theological virtues pertain to the beatitude that is not proportionate to human nature, the
supernatural good of life with God.

St. Thomas Aquinas on Virtue - account virtues as excellences or perfections of the various human
powers

Cardinal Virtues

 Prudence is an intellectual virtue since it bears upon the goal of truth in the good ordering of
action.
 Temperance- concerns the moderation of physical pleasures, especially those associated with
eating, drinking, and sex.
 Courage- refers to human commitment and inner strength.
 Justice- governs human relationships and social interaction.

Prudence "is the quality of being wise in practical affairs, as by providing something for the future.“

Aquinas: wisdom concerning human affairs.

(Thomas Aquinas) Prudence - is not simply an act of the mind for it illuminates for us the course of
action deemed most appropriate for achieving our antecedently established telos. It does this through
three acts:

- Counsel, whereby we inquire about the available means of achieving the end;
- Judgment, whereby we determine the proper means for achieving the end; and finally
- Command, whereby we apply that judgment.

2. Temperance: the purpose of temperance is to refine the way we enjoy bodily pleasures.
For Aquinas, temperance has a twofold meaning. In a general sense, the term denotes a kind of
moderation common to every moral virtue. restricted sense, temperance concerns the moderation of
physical pleasures, especially those associated with eating, drinking, and sex.

3. Courage is a habitual disposition to take whatever pains may be involved in doing what we ought to
do for the sake of the good life.

Courage takes many forms:

1. Courage to do what is right,

2. to face one's personal fear,
3. to embrace unpopular decisions,
4. to endure physical or mental pain for the sake of one's improvement,
5. to tell the truth,
6. to push forward through frustration,
7. to change,
8. the courage to act,
9. to trust,
10. to love,
11. to commit.

4. Justice governs our relationships with others.

Two sets of Distinctions:

1. Legal (or general: to govern our actions according to the common good.) and particular justice (the
virtue which governs our interactions with individual citizens), and

2. Commutative and distributive justice

Justice is a general virtue that concerns not individual benefits but community welfare.

Theological Virtues

 They bear upon eternal beatitude and are simply infused by God's gift of grace.
 They cannot be acquired by human effort.
1. Faith - intellectual assent to revealed supernatural truths that are not evident in themselves
2. Hope - is the desire for the difficult but attainable good of eternal happiness or beatitude
3. Love - is the love of God and neighbor in God. It resides in the will.

Justice and Fairness (Political Philosophy of John Rowls)

The original Position

 The idea that all people come together to form a social contract and reach an agreement on
what principles are the fairest and just to be applied to all.
  They are the principles that free and rational persons concerned with furthering their interests
would accept in an initial position of equality as defining the fundamental terms of their
association.
 They specify the kinds of social cooperation that can be entered into and the forms of
government that can be established.

Veil of Ignorance

 John Rawls conducted a hypothetical thought experiment. He asked us to imagine a

hypothetical veil of ignorance that covers all people.
 Among the essential features of this situation is that no one knows his place in society, his class
position, or social status, nor thus does anyone know his fortune in the distribution of the
natural assets and abilities, his intelligence strength, and the like. (Every detail that makes us
individual will be forgotten).
 This ensures that no one is advantaged or disadvantaged in the choice of principles by the
outcome of natural chance or the contingency of social circumstances.
 Once the negotiation is complete, there is no going back. What is agreed upon is agreed forever.

Principles of justice

1. Equal liberty principle

1. Right to vote
2. Right to hold public office
3. Freedom of speech
4. Freedom of assembly
5. Liberty of conscience
6. Freedom of thought
7. Freedom of person
8. Right to hold private property
9. Freedom from arbitrary arrest and seizure

a) Equality of opportunity

b) Difference principle

Rights and Duties

Definition of Right

 A right is that which is just, whether this be a just law, a just deed, a just debt, or a just claim.
 Right is defined as that which is owed or that which is due.
  Subjectively: residing in the one who possesses it, and thus considered, it is a moral power
residing in a person,—a power which all others are bound to respect—of doing, possessing, or
requiring something.
 Right is founded upon law.
 Law (natural or positive) is founded ultimately upon Eternal law, hence, the ultimate basis of
right is the Eternal Law.

Division of Right

 Natural Right to life

 Law
 Human
 Positive
 Ecclesial (rights established by Canon Law)
 Civil (Right to vote)

Divine Right to teach

 Right of property: the power one has of disposing of a thing possessed according to one's own
wish or benefit: to sell, to keep, to lend, to change, to give away.
 Right to jurisdiction: is the lawful power of a duly constituted superior to make laws and to
govern his subjects.
 Right is alienable when its subject (i.e., its possessor) may lawfully cede or renounce it.
 Right is inalienable when its subject is not free to renounce, but must retain it.
 Juridical (perfect): a right that must be respected, allowed, and fulfilled, as a matter of strict
justice.
 Non-juridical (imperfect): when it is founded on a virtue other than justice.

Properties of right

1. Coaction- is the power which right enjoys of forcefully preventing its violation, and of extracting
redress for unjust violation.
2. Limitation- is the natural terminus of right, beyond which it cannot be exercised without
violating the right of another.
3. Collision- is the apparent conflict of two rights in such wise that one cannot be exercised
without violation of the other.

Prevailing rights:

I. Belongs to the more universal order

II. Is concerned with graver matter
III. Is founded upon a stronger title or claim

The subject of right

 The subject of the right is a person. It is not an irrational creature.

 For right is a moral power, and belongs only to those that can exercise moral acts.
  Creatures that have rights, have obligations; and no creature can have rights that is incapable of
assuming and discharging obligations.

What is Globalization?

- It is the process of interaction and integration among the people, companies, and governments
of different nations, a process driven by international trade and investment and aided by
information technology.
- This process has effects on the environment, on culture, on political systems, on economic
development and prosperity, and on human physical well-being in societies around the world.

"Globalization is both an active process of corporate expansion across borders and a structure of cross
border facilities and economic linkages that have been steadily growing and changing."

-Edward S. Herman

"Globalization is the process whereby social relations acquire relatively distance-less and borderless
qualities."

-Baylis and Smith

Reasons for Globalization

 Improvements in transportation
 Freedom of trade
 Improvements in Communications
 Labor Availability and Skills

Salient Features of Globalization

a. Liberalization - It stands for the freedom of the entrepreneurs to establish any industry or trade
or business venture, within their own countries or abroad.
b. Free trade- It stands for the free flow of trade relations among all the nations.
c. Globalization of Economic Activity - Economic activities are governed both by the domestic
markets and the world market. It stands for the process of integrating the domestic economies
with the world economy.
d. Liberalization of Import-Export System - It stands for liberalization of the import-export activity
involving a free flow of goods and services across borders.
e. Privatization - Globalization stands for keeping the state away from ownership of means of
production and distribution and letting the free flow of industrial, trade, and economic activity
among the people and their corporations.
 f. Increased Collaborations - Encouraging the process of collaborations among entrepreneurs with
a view to secure rapid modernization, development, and technological advancement is a feature
of Globalization.
g. Economic Reforms - Encouraging fiscal and financial reforms with a view to give strength to free
trade, free enterprise, and market forces of the world.

Positive Consequences of Globalization

 Access to a wider variety of goods and services

 Lower prices
 More and better-paying jobs
 Improve health
 Higher overall living standards
 Globalization is merging historic distinct and separate national markets into one huge global
marketplace.

Negative Impacts of Globalization

 Globalization operates mostly in the interests of the richest countries, which continue to
dominate world trade at the expense of developing countries.
 There are no guarantees that the wealth from inward investment will benefit the local
community.
 An absence of strictly enforced international laws means that Transnational Corporations (TNC)
may operate in Less Economically Developed Countries (LEDCs) in a way that would not be
allowed in More Economically Developed Countries (MEDC). They may pollute the environment,
run risks with safety, or impose poor working conditions and low wages on local workers.
 Globalization is viewed by many as a threat to the world’s cultural diversity.
 Industry may begin to thrive in LEDCs at the expense of jobs in manufacturing in the UK and
other MEDCs, especially in textiles.

Ethical Issues on Globalization

1. Reduction of protectionism is unfair unless applied fairly.

2. Inequality of power.
3. The gap between rich and poor in the world is still very large.
4. Globalization increases inequality and further impoverishes the poor.
5. Many of the global problems are by-products of the expansion of the global economy such as
pollution or resource shortages; global warming, expansion of global tourism; the spread of AIDS
and other health hazards facilitated by global transport; Internet fraud; and terrorism.
6. Poverty. There are still too many people who die because they are too poor to live.
7. Income gaps have widened both within countries and between countries.
 8. About 820 million people lack adequate nutrition, more than 850 million are illiterate and
almost all lack access to basic sanitation.
9. The World Trade Organization (WTO) does ignore labor rights and the environment.
10. International trade and technological change create a significant decline in demand for
unskilled, semi-skilled, and traditionally skilled workers.
11. Brain drain- it refers to talented or educated people in Third World countries who leave their
countries of origin for better opportunities in First World countries. This leaves Third World
countries lacking homegrown, educated professionals such as doctors and engineers.
12. Natural Resources- Apart from wildlife concerns, the reduction in rainforests will have a huge
effect on oxygen levels for the entire planet.

Solutions to Ethical Problems of Globalization

 Countries must accept shared responsibility for managing the risks that it has engendered. Rich
countries should assist poor countries for them to propel economic growth and development;
 Coordinated action is required to address the problems of poverty and malnutrition worldwide.
 In the case of pandemics, the key is to support countries where outbreaks occur and help those
most at risk of infection.
 Widespread dangers, such as climate change or a new financial crisis, can require the
cooperation of dozens of countries and a broad range of institutions. In nearly every case, an
international effort is needed.
 In confronting dangers such as the Islamic State, Ebola, financial crisis, climate change, or rising
inequality, long-term political expediency is required.

Ethical Challenges for Business Working in a Globalized World

 Ethics creates credibility with the public:

 Ethics helps better decision-making.
 Ethics and profits. Ethics and profits go together.
 Law cannot protect society, ethics can.
 Ethical influence of globalization on stakeholders.
 Business ethics propels the stakeholders of the company towards a higher level of performance.

Utilitarianism Moral philosophy of Jeremy Bentham

Principle of Utility

- That principle which approves or disapproves of every action whatsoever, according to the
tendency it appears to have to augment or diminish the happiness of the party whose interest is
in question.

Utilitarianism
  The theory that we are morally required to do whatever produces the greatest total of pleasure
minus pain.

Sub-Theories

1. Hedonism- the theory that what is good for each of us as an end is pleasure, and what is bad for
each of us as an end is pain.
2. Aggregation- the theory that an outcome is better if the sum of what is good for each person
minus what is bad for each person is greater.
3. Consequentialism- the theory that we are morally required to do what produces the best
outcome.

Utilitarianism

 The theory that we are morally required to do whatever produces (Consequentialism) the
greatest total of pleasure minus (Aggregation) pain (Hedonism).

MILLENNIALS AND FILLENNIALS

ETHICAL CHALLENGES AND RESPONSES

The term 'Millennials' generally refers to the Generation of people born between the early
1980s and 1990s -Merriam-Webster Dictionary. Some people also include children born in the early
2000s.

The Millennial Generation is also known as Generation Y, because it comes after Generation X
- those people between the early 1960s and the 1980s. The publication Ad Age was one of the first to
coin the term "Generation Y," in an editorial in August 1993. But the term didn't age well, and
"Millennials" has largely overtaken it. But the terms basically mean the same thing.

This age group has also been called the Peter Pan or Boomerang Generation because of the
propensity of some to move back in with their parents, perhaps due to economic constraints, and a
growing tendency to delay some of the typical adulthood rites of passage like marriage or starting a
career.

NEGATIVE CHARACTERISTICS OF MILLENNIALS

 Civically and politically disengaged

 Focused on materialistic values
 Less concerned about helping the larger community
 Nonstop feedback and career advice from managers
 Lazy
 Narcissistic
 Prone to jump from job to job
 Want flexible work schedules
 Coddled
  Delusional
 More ‘me time’ on the job

POSITIVE CHARACTERISTICS OF MILLENNIALS

 Open minded
 More supportive of gay rights and equal rights for minorities
 Confident
 Self-expressive
 Liberal
 Upbeat
 Receptive to new ideas and ways of living

THE FILIPINO MILLENNIALS (FILLENNIALS)

 Filipino millennials still differ from other millennials in a sense that their personalities are still
affected and shaped by Philippine culture and society.
 Filipino millennials as the same with the general notion of millennials, also embody traits such as
being optimistic, career driven, socially active and civic oriented.
 They are perceived to be the most active and reactive among all generations as of this date.

THE GENERATION GAP

used to describe the conflict between older people and the youth - has been presented in so many
ways over the years. It has served as the gist of films, popular music, and television shows, as well as a
starting point of discussion for many sociopolitical issues.

In between Generation X and the Millennials, however, Philippine Tatler has noted a niche group:
Generation T. These are people between the ages of 25 and 40 who are filled with potential: a whole
new generation of influencers, creative visionaries, and upcoming leaders who are making names for
themselves and are changing the very face of the nation. A bright mix of youth, idealism, and a wisdom
beyond their years, Generation T is redefining what it means to lead and to affect change in society.

FILLENNIAL MORALITY

Children now love luxury. They have bad manners, contempt for authority, disrespect their elders, and
love talking instead of exercise." These were the words of the Greek philosopher Socrates in a tirade
against Athenian youth during his time, but many older adults in this modern age would use the very
same words when railing against the youth.

Millennials are perceived by their elders as having a rather tenuous grip on morality. While they are
more open-minded with regard to issues regarding sexual identity, pre-marital relations, and the
concept of having and raising children out of wedlock, they are also seen as a little too sensitive when it
comes to reacting to socio-civic issues. The use of social media through which to air their views has been
considered by many as a coward's way out: many people air scathing opinions online instead of in
public, protected, as they are, by a sense of virtual anonymity.
According to Jos Ortega, chairman and CEO of digital media agency Havos Media Ortega, the last thing a
millennial wants to hear is to be told that he or she will be unable to do something. "To them, that is
violating the very being of what they stand for,"

Older generations see them as willful and disrespectful to others; highly interactive online but
completely lacking in interpersonal skills in the real world; overly dependent on technology; narcissistic
and overly materialistic; even fatalistic as many millennials do not seem to have a solid foundation for
their future or even a sense of where to go next.

LOOSENING VALUES OF FILLENNIALS

Millennials are growing up differently from how the previous generations, For one thing, the computer
is the new nanny and it trains millennials to be self-centered and selfish.

Rentoy also called the millennials as the multi-tasking generation that suffers from the inability to focus
during lectures, classes, conversations studying and writing. The level of information may be going up
but their level of knowledge is going down. He added that today's generation has to contend with
religious indifference, divorce, alcoholism, softness (can't deal with life's difficulties), drug addiction and
moral relativism. Instead of looking up to their parents as role models, their heroes and standards of
excellence are celebrities, rock stars, athletes, and influencers.

Rentoy also reported a severe loosening of moral values among adult Filipinos, such that young people
don't seem to know what's right and wrong. As a consequence, about half of them do not see anything
wrong with casual sex, premarital sex, sex with a prostitute, getting drunk, gambling, hazing, abortion,
and suicide (McCann-Erickson Youth Studies of 2000 and 2005). Teen pregnancies are on the rise with
6000 cases in Tarlac in 2014; 26,606 cases in Metro Manila and 28,605 cases in Cavite-Laguna-Batangas-
Rizal.

REASONS WHY FILLENNIALS ARE BROKE

 Lacks financial literacy

 Financially vulnerable
 Burdened with more financial responsibilities
 Stagnant income

HOW TO OVERCOME THEM

1. Be thrifty but not cheapskate - Another way to boost one's income is to cut your expenses to
ramp up your savings.
2. Side hustle - If you want to get ahead financially, you need to start playing to win, instead of
playing not to lose. Start boning up on how to earn extra income.
3. Bargain for a raise - Though a single raise can only boost your salary by so much, when properly
managed, that few hundred or thousand pesos can result in hundreds of thousands in savings
during your entire working life.
4. Educate yourself or better yet, find a mentor - It's never too late to learn, especially financial
management. With the abundance of information online, self-education about personal finance
is easy.