Abstract

Is ethics all about rights and duties, or is it about living a happy, flourishing life? For millennia in the West, ethics was about the way to flourish as an individual and a community. The qualities that enable people to live that way are the virtues, and that style of ethics is called Virtue Ethics. In the early modern period, Virtue Ethics went out of fashion and ethics began to focus on right and duties, where rights and duties are demands made against others. In this article I argue that the language of rights and duties has made it almost impossible for people on opposing sides of public policy issues to come to agreement. I defend the return of Virtue Ethics in philosophy, and propose that if it can be adopted by ordinary people, we will have a better chance at overcoming our deep divisions.