Human vulnerability in medical contexts

2016

To take into account our vulnerability requires paradoxically our reconfiguring the autonomy of vulnerable and dependent persons such as patients suffering from cognitive and physical impairments. However, vulnerability is not only focused on fragility, it also highlights our responsibility toward the other. Moreover, to assess the primacy of responsibility over liberty means that we depart from any atomistic conception of the self and provide another understanding of subjectivity and sociality. This way of enriching the philosophy of the subject also makes sense when we think of our relations toward animals and our use of nature. It implies that we have to replace the conception of human being that still grounds the philosophy of human rights with another philosophy of the subject. Another way of framing the political question and another contractarianism are at stake in such an inquiry into the critical and political dimension of the notion of vulnerability. We will distinguish th...

Vulnerability has been extensively discussed in medical research, but less so in health care. Thus, who are the vulnerable in this domain still remains an open question. One difficulty in their identification is due to the general criticism that vulnerability is not a property of only some but rather of everyone. By presenting a philosophical analysis of the conditions of vulnerability ascription, we show that these seemingly irreconcilable understandings of vulnerability are not contradictory. Rather, they are interdependent: they refer to the same concept with different likelihoods of manifestation. We argue that the general vulnerability of living beings relies on their having certain types of interests. In health care, those individuals are particularly vulnerable who are more likely to have these interests unjustly considered. They should be afforded special protection in order to receive what is due to everyone, but which they are likely to fail to receive.

2020

Without vulnerability, there would be no need for healthcare, or law, or ethics. Each of these systems owes its existence to the fact that human beings are open, fragile, and fallible. The idea of vulnerability might seem to deserve a prominent place in thinking and writing about healthcare law and ethics, therefore. But what exactly do we mean by ‘vulnerability’ when we refer to it in the context of healthcare law and ethics (HCLE), and what should we mean by it? Must the theory and practice of HCLE adopt an understanding of vulnerability that applies in other contexts too, or should we be seeking a bespoke concept of vulnerability particular to the HCLE setting? The idea of vulnerability has had a chequered history in HCLE literature. It has figured mainly at the margins of the discourse, where it has tended to be associated with risk, harm, and exploitation, and seen as something undesirable to be minimised or eliminated. Since the turn of the millennium, however, there has been ...

Oñati Socio-Legal Series, 2022

The concept of vulnerability is once again assuming a central role in ethical-political-legal discourse. This is the case both in relation to its neo-liberal reinterpretations, aimed at placing the responsibilities and consequences of vulnerability onto the vulnerable subject itself, and, on the contrary, to the theses - the result, to a large extent, of a reworking of the ethics of care – of authors such as Martha Fineman, Judith Butler, Martha Nussbaum, Catriona Mackenzie and others, who use the idea of vulnerability as a basis for re-founding and reorganising liberal policies, freeing them from fictitious concepts such as the alleged basic autonomy of the human being. The article aims to analyse the different meanings and implications that, due to the accentuation of different aspects of vulnerability, add up to produce such a multifaceted concept, in order to try to clarify the conceptual implications and practical consequences that vulnerability may elicit.

Journal of Health Care for the Poor and Underserved, 2019

Understanding universal vulnerability as inherent in human beings raises questions about the use of differentiating and stigmatizing terms such as vulnerable populations, by which individuals are grouped together based on perceived dissimilarity, deviance, or victimhood. Understanding human vulnerability also calls into question concepts, such as individual responsibility and consent, currently relied upon to resolve ethical and legal dilemmas. When normalized, vulnerability provides a powerful and inclusive conceptual tool that can help us define individual, professional, and institutional responsibility in situations of inherent inequality, such as that of researcher/ research subject or doctor/ patient. An appreciation of our universal vulnerability and the limitations it entails encourages richer and more robust policies and practices than are currently afforded by referring to abstract and individualistic concepts such as autonomy, equality, or independence. In particular, recognition of universal vulnerability reveals the ways in which all human beings inexorably depend on social relationships and institutions throughout the life course.

Vulnerability: New Essays in Ethics and Feminist Philosophy is arguably the first collection of philosophical essays to be published on the topic. As such, it invites a moment of reflection on the state of scholarly discourse surrounding vulnerability and its analogues, such as care, dependency, and need. To begin with a series of expansive questions to foster deeper consideration: How has the discourse on vulnerability and associated concepts transformed the philosophical terrain? To what extent has this discourse risen to the level of significance and visibility enjoyed by other leading concepts in moral and political philosophy, such as justice, equality, independence, and autonomy? Does vulnerability have a fitting place alongside these concepts? And finally, and perhaps the boldest question of the group: Are we experiencing a pivotal moment in the discipline, in which the centrality of vulnerability to the human condition will finally receive appropriate philosophical attention? The twelve new essays in Vulnerability start us well on the path to answering these and related pressing questions.

International Journal Of Philosophy And Social-Psychological Sciences

Vulnerability is an inalienable aspect of human existence. In spite of the fact that sufficient groundwork has been done on the notion of vulnerability, it is to be noted that until now, vulnerability has typically been conceived as a negative condition relating to dependency, weakness, fragility, passivity and exploitation. Contrary to this, this paper attempts to re-consider the concept of vulnerability along positive lines by principally focusing upon the moral and ontological roots of vulnerability by employing the Feminist Ethics of Care model. The exponents of Care Ethics extend a normative version of vulnerability with prime emphasis on two aspects, namely, vulnerability as a compositional form of relationality and responsibility. The question that will be addressed in this paper is, ‘How can we construct a progressive and value-laden approach to vulnerability by employing the principles of an Ethic of Care?’ Fundamentally, it will be argued that between the individual and the universal, lies relationships that have been overlooked while discussing the notion of vulnerability. This study therefore, aims to unlock the moral dynamic of vulnerability with ontological implications. Subsequently, an idea of Shared human vulnerability will be authentically introduced in the paper which will help us to think about the power of vulnerability with the existential genesis of Care Ethics. Keywords: Ethic of Care; Feminist Ethics; Relational Ontology; Shared Human Vulnerability; Vulnerability; Vulnerable Subject.

APA Newsletter on Feminism and Philosophy v. 14, no. 2, 2015

2021

Supplemental Material, sj-pdf-1-nej-10.1177_0969733020976180 for Vulnerability: An integrative bioethics review and a proposed taxonomy by Merve Mergen and Aslıhan Akpınar in Nursing Ethics

When thinking about who is at risk in a global public health context, a few preliminary concepts need to be defined. This chapter explores what it means to be at risk and defines risk as being vulnerable to harm. Harm in turn is defined as not being able to protect one’s interest. This first part establishes vulnerability to harm as an action-guiding principle in global public health. In the second part, I distinguish different types of vulnerability that point to different moral obligations. I then apply this typology to contexts in global public health. I argue that we can understand many public health measures as attempts to protect against risks – examples are inoculation campaigns and preventative screening programs. Some vulnerabilities are generated by constraints that define people’s lives – like fees that are levied to have access to vital tests, for example. This is morally problematic since we have a duty to prevent harm from being inflicted. In the third part, I expand the analysis to the global sphere. I show that individuals are made vulnerable to harm if developed countries drain developing countries of healthcare workers. This is a neglect of the duty to not inflict harm. It is also problematic for those who live in countries that do not engage in active medical professional recruitment, because we all have an obligation to prevent harm from happening.