Virtue Ethics: A Contemporary Introduction

Virtue Ethics Today: A Contemporary Introduction presents readers with an engaging overview of contemporary problems, positions and arguments in this rapidly growing field. It includes debates between virtue ethicists and their critics, as well as debates among virtue ethicists themselves. Each chapter begins with a discussion of a central topic in normative ethics, one that students already will have encountered in an introductory course in moral philosophy or applied ethics. The choice of questions and the discussions themselves challenge the reader to think beyond the ways normative ethics usually operates, and thus clearly demonstrates what is distinctive about virtue ethics.

This volume provides a clear and accessible overview of central concepts, positions, and arguments in virtue ethics today. While it focuses primarily on Aristotelian virtue ethics, it also includes discussion of alternative forms of virtue ethics (sentimentalism and pluralism) and competing normative theories (consequentialism and deontology).

The first six chapters are organized around central questions in normative ethics that are of particular concern to virtue ethicists and their critics:

• What is virtue ethics?
• What makes a trait a virtue?
• Is there a link between virtue and happiness?
• What is involved in being well-motivated?
• What is practical wisdom?
• What makes an action right?

The last four chapters focus on important challenges or objections to virtue ethics:

• Can virtue ethics be applied to particular moral problems?
• Does virtue ethics ultimately rely on moral principles?
• Can it withstand the situationist critique?
• What are the prospects for an environmental virtue ethics?