A Brief Analysis of Moral Universalism in the Modern Society

Moral universalism as a meta-ethical theory has been discussed for thousands of years. Since the Platonism and the Stoicism, people realized that there should have a universal moral principle or a common moral standard recognized by the whole world to deal with multicultural culture and different values. In other words, moral universalism was believed as an effective method to promote the development and prosperity of society. Due to the progress of human civilization, moral universalism has developed to a broader range. With the promulgation of the Declaration of the Rights of Man, moral universalism made further progress to become the effective and powerful method regardless of culture, race, sex, religion, nationality, sexual orientation or any other distinguishing feature, fighting against all kinds of inequity. As the development of globalization, universalism has been the principle that caters to all kinds of methods which help the development of economy. Since the globalization was encouraged from the economic filed, moral factors have to supervise and control the potential damage during the rapid global economic development. Therefore, after thousands of years, moral universalism is still the principle that guarantees the development and prosperity of society. There is no doubt that moral universalism has played an important role in the current manifestation, if moral universalism misses in the development of globalization, there must cause significant loss.

Over the years, globalization did cause a serious of problems, including polluting and damaging environment, causing economic polarization, and increasing contradictory between developing countries and developed countries. Although there are various reasons lead to these problems, ultimately, all the behavior and decisions that caused damage is because they did not put moral universalism into practice. For instance, the reason globalization caused environment destruction is because there is no principle or rule that conforms to moral universalism, in other words, at the same time people pay attention to the rapid economic development, there is not enough attention on environment; when people make economic plans, developed countries are considered as the main beneficiary; the contradictory between developed countries and developing countries due to the unequal treatment to developing countries all the time. As a matter of fact, moral universalism claims the universal moral principle that is suitable for all kinds of situation, in order to achieve the results of fairness and equality. However, none of these problems happened with a standard that caters to all kinds of different situation or keeps a balance of strong and weak relations, therefore, the consequences are unavoidable. Facing with the flaws globalization had, people begun to put moral universalism (as effective methods) into practice. For instance, international organizations like IEPOA(International Environmental Protection Organization Association), WTO, and WDCPO(The City Planning Organization of The Worlds Development Countries) are found, just like the promulgation of the Declaration of the Rights of Man, these organizations make their effort to form a universal moral principle which considers all different kinds of communities’ benefits.

As a matter of fact, although moral universalism has been developed for thousands of years, through perspectives from Socrates, Plato, Kant, Arendt and some other contemporary philosophers, we can see that the central theme has never changed. The reason moral universalism exists is because people use it as an economic or political theory to reduce conflicts in different situations and among different communities, eventually achieving the results of fairness and equality. However, as the development of society, great difference is showed in moral universalism. At the very beginning, moral universalism developed from knowledge and virtue, which was suitable for a small group of people. In the middle age, moral universalism was mainly used in religion. Christian became the only rule that controlled people’s thought and behavior, however, it deprived heretic of rights. In the 18th, the promulgation of the Declaration of the Rights of Man can be regarded as the milestone of moral universalism. However, frequent problems in economy and politics led to wars. In the 21th century, with the development of globalization, the rapid development caused more irreversible consequences in problems like environment and violence. Therefore, it can be concluded that the definition of moral universalism has been leveled up to a broader range and considered factors in all fields to achieve the fairness and equality in both of social and personal development. What’s more, in some cases, especially with the popularity of stock, people believe that bigger risks will bring higher returns, as a result, in order to control and reduce reasonless risks, moral universalism becomes more and more important and necessary. In summary, comparing to the precursors, moral universalism has spread into a much wider field and played a greater role.

Among all the problems moral universalism deals with, one of the most significant problems is the theme of violence, at the same time, wars can be regarded as the most obvious and direct symbol of violence. Since 1660, wars in the world were not mainly about religious faith and transnational interests, their judgment and decision about peace and war were more and more influenced and decided by national interests. In other words, violence mainly aimed at weak and invaded countries or communities. In the 18th century, the oppressed people and colonial countries begun to call to wars to gain freedom and democracy they deserved. For instance, the success of the French War of Independence and American Revolutionary War aroused revolutionary storms and encouraged people’s revolutionary fervor. However, on the one hand, although independent wars helped people gain fairness and freedom, it is a method of answering violence with violence. On the other hand, all of these wars caused the large quantity of death, since rulers and governors witnessed the success of wars, there will always have another war which can help them get what they want in cost of more death. As expected, in the 20th century, violence becomes the non-controversial way of getting sovereignty. Due to the lack of a moral universalism principle, which considers most of the countries’ benefits, two world wars were aroused, violence penetrated into every corner of the world. During this period, wars are considered as both of the reason and solutions of violence. People began to wonder why wars happen frequently? In Sontag’s opinion “People can turn off not just because a steady diet of images of violence has made them indifferent but because they are afraid.” (Susan Sontag) Therefore, the lack of moral universalism principle caused inequality, leading to some groups or communities’ self-defense about the fear, which eventually triggered war. As the development of society, violence was defined as a political noun, which claims that if different political interest groups or communities can’t get their own benefits with a peaceful method, they always use compulsory measures to get the final purpose. Therefore, in the 21th century, the form of violence changes, war is not the main expression of violence anymore. Problems like gender discrimination, racial discrimination, unequal treaty or even environment destruction can be regarded as parts of violence. For instance, globalization brings severe consequences in environment, which even caused more negative influence on developing countries. It is because developed countries transfer pollution industries such as heavy chemical industries to developing countries, as a result, causing the adverse environmental impact on developing countries. For one thing, developed countries turn violent to developing countries. For another, developing countries turn violent to the domestic residents who live or will live in the place they bury rubbish or damage environment. As a result, violence effects on all field of people’s life and will eventually cause severe and invocatable consequences.

As a matter of fact, the theme of moral universalism in violent has become the hottest topics in the world. Therefore, a controversial question was came up with, does violence really solve problems? In Sontag’s opinion “Not all violence is watched with equal detachment. Some disasters are more apt subjects of irony than others.” (Susan Sontag) Which means the aim of violence is to gain their own benefits instead of creating peace and equality, therefore, the best results of violence is to get more personal benefits. What’s more, In Frantz’s opinion “It is violence in its natural state, and it will only yield when confronted with greater violence.” (Frantz Fanon) which means violence can never be solved by other violent behavior, any kinds of formation of violence will lead to greater violent. In summary, violence can’t eventually solve problems. Therefore, it is necessary to make a common standard based on moral universalism, which fundamentally deals with the unfairness and inequality, reducing people’s fear about unfair treatment and avoiding the triggers of violence.