Moral philosophy can and ought to be a source of moral wisdom. Wisdom is a special kind of understanding, in particular, an ethical understanding of what it is to be a success as a human being, a healthy and fully formed specimen. Such understanding involves both a delicate grasp of the grammar of moral concepts and an appreciation of their import for a human life, including the philosopher’s. Virtue ethics is an important department of moral philosophy, especially for the philosophical goal of becoming wise. It consists in a careful investigation of the concepts of moral virtues (generosity, justice, the sense of duty, and so forth), both in their conceptual contours and in their importance for a human life.

Final Chapter 9 explains why ‘free’ market competition under regulatory capitalism underlies widespread unrecognized regulatory violence and argues that the cultivation of competitive desire (cf. Girard 2000) succeeds at the expense of what have become ‘sacrificeable’ patients. After a discussion of suggestions of altering the social contract between science and publics, and the observation of the prevalence of competitive desire in the context of political debate in the UK, I explain how, instead of regulatory capitalism based on competitive desire, a vision of caring solidarity applying the generative principle of creative desire (Adams 2000) would be more conducive to policies aimed at medical and public-health targets. I argue that guidelines rooted in ‘caring solidarity’ can largely prevent the violence of regulatory competition that has become endemic to regulatory capitalism. By avoiding high-risk strategies that are oriented on one-size-fit-all solutions expected to generate high-profit margins, the proposed vision of caring solidarity is more conducive to sustainable health. The rudiments of such a model, I suggest, would use the generative principle of creative desire, building on local notions of wisdom incorporating virtue ethics of prudence and justice.

This chapter argues that because judging inevitably requires the exercise of judgment, one of our most critical concerns should be ensuring that the people we select as judges have good judgment. It explores what good judgment might mean and draws on work in both law and philosophy exploring the nature of judicial character. It further explores two components of judicial character, specifically practical wisdom and intellectual humility, and in the case of the latter, surveys a growing body of work in philosophy and psychology that investigates humility’s nature and benefits. It briefly outlines ways in which a renewed emphasis on judicial character might be implemented.

Normative ethics is divided between ethical theory and practical ethics. Three families of ethical theories are consequentialism, virtue ethics, and Kantianism. Consequentialism is the view that consequences determine what we ought to do. Virtue ethics is the view that right actions should be understood in terms of virtuous agents and their character. Kantianism’s central concern is with how rational agents ought to relate to themselves and to each other. Ethical theory is difficult to disentangle from practical ethics, which is concerned with what we ought to do in particular situations, which – along with the question “How should I live?” – is the most important topic in ethics and perhaps all of philosophy.

This chapter explores the connection between ethics and mindful leadership in education by situating the discussion within the tradition of moral and ethical leadership. Drawing on virtue ethics, the concept of virtuous mindful leadership is proposed. This leadership construct refers to the present-moment attention to self, people, and events that reflects the leader’s moral character. This form of leadership transcends a leader’s obligation to adhere to moral rules or ensure good outcomes to the leader’s ethics, conduct, and role-modeling. A virtuous, mindful leader contributes to human flourishing by helping others to achieve eudaemonic well-being. In educational administration, such a leader creates and sustains a school culture of authentic mindfulness, promotes social justice education, and supports mindful collaboration with staff.

This chapter considers the major Abrahamic faiths on a continuum from dynamic to dogmatic. On the dynamic side lies the God of covenant and a life consistent with an open society. On the dogmatic side lies the ruler of the universe and a life aligned with a closed society. Readings of Abraham’s story leaning toward the dynamic end of this continuum are more authentic than those tending toward the dogmatic end. Dynamic readings of Abraham’s legacy are also more ethically robust and their transmission more genuinely educational, conceived as initiation into intelligent worldviews while learning from and about alternatives. This dialogical concept of education, called the “pedagogy of difference,” can lead us out of our current morass in which people of deep difference are increasingly incapable of communicating with one another.

This chapter conceptualises the Confucian legal tradition as a historically extended and legally embodied Confucian argument. The Confucian legal tradition has three features. First, it is jurisprudentially founded on a set of Confucian concepts and principles justifying the importance of good men. Second, the Confucian argument is embodied in structural institutions and legal codes in premodern and modern East Asia (China, Japan, Korea, Vietnam). Third, legally embodied Confucian concepts and principles are historically extended for thousands of years from formation, consolidation, and transnationalisation to modernisation.

Worldviews are defined as combinations of value orientations and belief systems. Both are an inevitable part of the sustainability disourse. Both can be correlated to the worldview dimensions (previous chapter). Values are empirically explored through surveys; several value categories have been proposed. Beliefs tend to be linked to values; they are difficult to explore empirically. Important beliefs have to do with the place of humans in Nature, the roots of good and evil, the role of human ingenuity, the constraints of the collective on the individual, and the balance between coordination and competition. Throughout the sustainability discourse, ethical questions about how to reconcile individual desires with what is considered collectively desirable emerge. I consider here briefly the roots and critique of Modernity ethics, and discuss some alternative and new ethical positions (virtue ethics, development and eco-spiritual ethics).

Chapter seven has two tasks. First, it summarizes the argument and the broad themes of the book. Second, it discusses the character of modernity. My argument is that we should view modernity as a distinct civilization, rather than as a period. This civilization is caught in a complex interplay and tension between the confrontation with uncertainty and the strivings for certainty, unfortunately often conceptualized as ontological absolutes. Although ontologies of uncertainty and certainty are co-constitutive, our culture tends to see the world in either–or terms, which explains the tendency to oscillation between hubris and despair and the difficulty of pragmatic and balanced accounts to enter into mainstream world views. Third, I propose a modest remedy for these modernist tendencies: namely, drawing inspiration from non-dualist traditions and classical virtue ethics.

Engaging in normative discussions about the characteristics and requirements of a good life in a good society, Political Philosophy has a long-standing history in identifying the economic, political and social requirements for turning waged work into a practice that contributes to human flourishing. Meanwhile, a widely shared scepticism towards meaningful work under capitalism is another powerful theme in the field, arguing that the alienating nature of waged work cannot be overcome. This chapter argues that contributions to meaningful work in the realm of Political Philosophy have a strong tendency to incorporate both positions, presenting an ambivalent understanding of wage labour as activity that is burdensome and alienating for the many and emancipatory and meaningful for the few. Discussing two of the most significant schools of thought in this field, virtue ethics and political materialist contributions, the chapter identifies and compares their ontological understandings of work and its nature under capitalism, the conceptualisation of labour agency and the guiding principles of meaningful work that they promote.

This chapter discusses international law in context: how it relates to its political environment as well as to ethical concerns, and how the ethics of individual agents may be of relevance