Proportionalism

Proportionalism originated from Catholic scholars because they did not like how ethics was too deonotligically rigid. Essentially it was too fixated on duty and nothing else.

Hoose was a supporter of proportionalism and wrote a book called 'Proportionalism; the American Debate and its European roots'. However the Catholic Church condemned proportionalisam because it denies that any aciton be in and of itself be intrinsically evil.

Aquinas: Even though proportionalisam was not formalised, Aquinas' writing demonstrates support for the idea. He believed that 'it is lawful for a man to succor his own need by means of another's property'. Basically he believed that if you were starving, you could steal. However he said that this would not be true for every situation.

Proportionalism is the belief that there are certain moral rules that you just cannot go against UNLESS there is a pretty good reason against it. This is called a proportionate reason against this because it will be in proportion to the rule.

Hoose: 'It is never right to go against a principle unless there is a proportionate reason which would justify it'. This is called the proportionalist maxim and sums this idea up.

Therefore the Deontological Rule says that you can only go against this duty if there is a significant reason why.

The Proportionate reason, as mentioned previously is the unique individual situation of a moral agent (a person) this would contribute to going against a moral rule.

This situation must be of enough magnitude or weight to overturn the rule in Natural Law.

Therefore, to choose whether or an act is moral or not, the intention of the person must be considered. If you do not consider the intention of a person, then this is called an ontic (good/evil) or a pre-moral act.

Pre-moral/Ontic acts

These are the right/wrong physical acts that are not necessarily wrong or right even if they may seem to be. This is because the intention of the person has not been considered, but just the physical aspect that has resulted in the action being taken at face value.

Physically, abortion is not right or wrong, but it is more to do with the intention of the moral agent. Morality, Proportionalism believes, can only be known through considering the intention of the moral agent.

So an ontic good would be a person helping an elderly person and an ontic evil would be a person killing. We have not considered the other intentions. It could be that actually that the intention behind helping the elderly person is to exploit their weakness and take their money, whereas killing could be because it is war and in retaliation towards a government that is brutal towards its citizens.

To discover what the right thing to do is, the proportion of value to disvalue must be considered.

The value is the reasons why the action must be carried out depending on the unique moral situation

The disvalue is why the unique moral value is nto enoguh to justify the action.

Proportionalism as a hybrid

Some see proportionalism as a hybrid of deontological and teleological outcomes.

This is because both believe that the moral rules from both the precepts of Natural Law and Deontology can be broken if there is a proportionate reason to do so.

Right and Good acts

Hoose also made a distinction between right and good acts.

A right act is something that follows the moral deontological rules found such as in Natural Law.

A good act is something that breaks that 'right act' but creates more good than evil whilst doing so.

Many people have said that Proportionalism and SItuation ethics because both are concerned with the teleological view. Both think that it is down to the right end result. A proportionalist may also consider if an act is the most loving as well as the situation and intention when making the value/disvalue moral dilemma.

However Situation Ethics only thinks about the most loving thing to do, whereas Proportionalism looks at not just the love but also intentions, situation etc.