Self-respect, Integrity, and a Racially Imperfect World

Self-respect and integrity give moral depth and coherence to a person, and their loss is usually considered a moral failing. Focusing on white identity in a racially unjust society,

I argue that accounts of self-respect and integrity must recognise the non-ideal structures in which most of us are embedded.  Integrity and self-respect require one to admit complicity in injustice. However, it is psychologically and ethically difficult to think of oneself as significantly in the wrong, and to sustain the practical force of that belief. Some sense of oneself as basically decent is also necessary for those ideals of character, and I explore the implications of this conclusion for white privilege.

About the speaker

Samantha Vice is Professor of Philosophy at the University of the Witwatersrand, in South Africa. She has written on many topics in ethics and social philosophy and her most recent work is in environmental aesthetics. Her monograph for Lexington Press, The Ethics of Animal Beauty will be published this year 2023.

Contact

Email: cgcp@soas.ac.uk