Leadership and Ethics: Utilitarianism
Leadership and Ethics: Utilitarianism
Leadership and Ethics: Utilitarianism
Utilitarianism
Utilitarianism
What is Utilitarianism?
Utilitarianism
Utilitarianism:
◦ The moral philosophy that actions derive their
moral quality from their usefulness as means to
some end, especially as means productive of
happiness or unhappiness.
◦ Applied to civics and politics, the greatest
happiness of the greatest number should be the
sole end and criterion of all public action.
Utilitarianism
Who was Jeremy Bentham?
Utilitarianism
Jeremy Bentham’s Utilitarianism
Recognized as ‘Act Utilitarian’
Right actions result in ‘good or pleasure,’
wrong actions result in pain or absence of
pleasure.
‘Max pleasure/min suffering morality
criticized as “pig-philosophy”
Hedonic Calculus
Utilitarianism
Some have argued lecture, that “the
ends cannot justify the means” in moral
choices.
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