CHAPTER VI:

DISCOURSE
ETHICS
 Learning Outcomes:
DISCOURS  Articulate, why discourse ethics was a necessary

E development.

 Explain the principles of (U) and (D) as the

foundations of discourse ethics.

 Discuss the principles of fair and just discourse

and how these principles lead to the we-shared perspective.

.
“People can judge right
and wrong based on
their common sense”
“HOW CAN WE TELL WHOSE
SENSE OF GOOD AND
WHOSE SENSE OF JUST IS
CLOSER TO WHAT IS
CREATIVELY HUMAN?
 In pre-modern times, it was easier to have a shared-

Part 1:
conceptions of good because people believed that gods
and the cosmos imposed a Natural law and the good
was based on the transcendent order.

 However, when the west began to emphasize the

The
autonomy of human beings from the will and intelligence
of the transcendent God, people lost the basis of the good
that everyone could agree with.
academic
ethical
 The primary task of western men was to find the basis of
the conceptions of the good that did not rely on a
transcendent order.
traditions
 DISCOURSE THEORY –a theory that shows
rational people how to arrive at a shared-
What is
Discours
conception of the good using reason alone.

 Discourse theory sought to articulate the basic

principles for arriving at a consensual
understanding of the good so that people in a
shared world could live with each other.
e
Theory?
 Important
JURGEN HABERMAS
contribution:
- One of the most important
philosophers of discourse theory.
 The analysis of the
He was born in Germany in 1929
emergence of the public
and was formed as a thinker
during the post-world war sphere and civil society, as
reconstruction. He was greatly well as his articulation of
influenced by the so-called discourse theory and
Frankfurt school of thinkers who discourse processes
were influenced by Marxian
thought and a sociologist was  A prolific writer who
very interested in the social analyzed how modern social
critique of the emerging
configurations emerged and
modernity.
how discursive systems
democratized these.
 There are competing conceptions of the good in modernized
societies, which means that societies today are no longer
homogeneous and people have different forms of reason, including
“Competin
moral reasoning.

 Injustice is a particular danger in multicultural societies. A society

g
needs a dominant system to guide free and autonomous people
regarding what is acceptable. The dominant system determines what
Conceptio
ns of the
acceptable behavior is, what can be expected and what duties persons
have to each other and to society.

Good”
“How does a dominant system
come about?”
 A dominant system evolves when
human beings come together, to live
together and survive with each other,
and ways of living together and
doings thing evolve
 Dominant systems- are generally
useful guides for human behavior,
especially in a community. And
dominant systems are not generally
problematic in communities that
share the same perspective on reality
and where general conditions for
human dwelling remain unchanged.
 Simple things such as manner of dressing and everyday
courtesies could be misconstrued to be violations of good
conduct.
 There are very tragic examples of this kind of
oppressiveness. The people who belong to traditional
cultures do not understand the systems of ownership
imposed by the Westernized States of colonized parts of the
world, they are considered squatters in the lands they dwell
in.
 Discourse Theory- was conceived to provide a way of
creating a system of shared conceptions of the good in
societies where there are competing conceptions of the good.
 The basic idea of discourse theory is that human
beings are “Legislating
 rational and autonomous and such as the need to
for autonomous
legislate for themselves their rules of behavior. rational beings”
 People have a need to realize their potential as
free beings.

 In contemporary times, it becomes more difficult

to specify these norms on one’s own.
How do people
Jürgen Habermas
proceed to - One of the philosophers who has helped sort
articulate norms out the principles for formulating conceptions
of human of good in solidarity with others.
behavior?
 Kant formulated “Act according to that
maxim by which you can at the same time
will that is should become a universal law.”
 Jürgen Habermas comes up with a modification of the
categorical imperative: Discourse
 “(U) All affected can accept the consequences and the side
effects its general observance can be anticipated to have for
Ethics
the satisfaction of everyone’s interests (and these
consequences are preferred to those of known alternative
possibilities for regulation.”

 And comes up with the principle of discourse ethics:

 “(D) only those norms can claim to be valid that meet (or
could meet) with the approval of all affected in their capacity
as participants in a practical discourse.”
 SUBMITTED BY:
BASISTO, RACHEL JOY
ALVAREZ, LARAIN PAULA
CHARLES TOMMY
DESIREE DAEL
SUBMITTED TO:
PRINCETON ZAMBALES
INTRUCTOR