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Applied Ethics: Business, Sexual Ethics and Euthanasia
Year 1 / ASYear 2 / A-LevelAQA, OCR, WJEC/Eduqas, CCEA
Euthanasia, business ethics and sexual ethics applied through Kant, utilitarianism, Natural Law and situation ethics - sanctity vs quality of life, CSR and A* essay technique for AQA 7062 and OCR H573.
🎯 Learning Objectives
Distinguish types of euthanasia (active/passive, voluntary/non-voluntary/involuntary) and apply ethical theories to each (AO1)
Evaluate sanctity of life vs quality of life arguments, with Case studies (Tony Bland, Charlie Gard) (AO2)
Explain business ethics concepts: CSR, stakeholders, whistle-blowing, good/bad practice - and apply Kant, utilitarianism and NL (AO1/AO2)
Explain sexual ethics issues: pre/extra-marital sex, homosexuality, contraception, consent - religious and secular approaches (AO1/AO2)
Apply Kantian dignity, utilitarian outcomes, NL precepts and agape across all three issues comparatively (AO2)
Structure an applied-ethics essay with case anchors, scholars and a justified verdict (AO2/AO3)
📋 Key Definitions and Core Concepts
euthanasia: Good death; intentionally ending a life to relieve suffering - classified as active/passive and voluntary/non-voluntary/involuntary.
sanctity of life: Life is sacred because given by God (imago Dei); human life has intrinsic worth regardless of quality - grounds the religious opposition to euthanasia and abortion.
quality of life: The value of life depends on its quality (pain, dignity, autonomy, capacity for relationships) - grounds arguments for euthanasia and resource prioritisation.
corporate social responsibility (CSR): A business's duty to consider the impact of its actions on employees, consumers, society and the environment beyond legal requirement and profit.
whistle-blowing: Disclosure by an employee of wrongdoing within an organisation; raises conflicts between loyalty, self-interest and public duty (Kant: public duty; utilitarian: outcome).
stakeholders: All parties affected by a business: employees, consumers, shareholders, suppliers, community, environment - CSR widens consideration from shareholders to stakeholders.
consent: Informed, voluntary agreement; the secular foundation of sexual ethics (harm-based consent) and of autonomy-based arguments in euthanasia.
imago Dei: Doctrine that humans are made in the image of God (Genesis 1:27), grounding the sanctity of life and human dignity.
Euthanasia: types, sanctity vs quality of life, theories applied
Types: active euthanasia (deliberate act to end life - lethal injection) vs passive euthanasia (withdrawing or withholding treatment - removing a ventilator); voluntary (at the patient's competent request), non-voluntary (patient cannot decide - infant, vegetative state), involuntary (against the patient's wishes). Legal context: active euthanasia illegal in the UK; Assisted Dying Bill debates; Tony Bland (Hillsborough, 1993) - Law Lords permitted withdrawal of feeding as passive euthanasia since he was in a persistent vegetative state; Charlie Gard (2017) - withdrawal over parents' wishes raised non-voluntary and quality-of-life issues. Spec: AQA 7062/1A section 3.2.2; OCR H573/02.
Theories applied:
Natural Law: active euthanasia is intrinsically wrong (violates defend-the-innocent/self-preservation); passive euthanasia may be permissible via double effect (foreseen but unintended death); palliative sedation permissible; sanctity of life is absolute. Critique: the intended/foreseen distinction is arbitrary - the foetus or patient dies either way.
Kant: suicide is a perfect duty violation - the rational agent may not use himself as a means to escape suffering; but respect for autonomy complicates: a competent patient's rational will to die may be treated as an end - Kant himself still forbids it. Critique: cold formalism ignores suffering; a rigid Kantian outcome is monstrous.
Utilitarianism (Bentham, Mill, Singer): the calculus decides per case - if continued life contains only pain (hedonic calculus: intensity, duration, certainty), euthanasia maximises utility; Mill's harm principle permits voluntary choice; Singer's preference utilitarianism weighs the patient's own preference for death; quality of life over sanctity. Critique: slippery slope - resource pressure may pressure the vulnerable; non-voluntary euthanasia of the disabled violates Singer's own equal-weight principle.
Situation ethics (Fletcher): agape decides per situation - love may require active euthanasia for a suffering spouse; Mrs Bergmeier example (pregnancy in a POW camp) shows Fletcher's willingness to break rules for love. Critique: agape is undefined - conflicting answers are possible.
Debate landscape in full: Dignity in Dying (campaigns for assisted dying with safeguards) vs Care Not Killing (opposes on sanctity-of-life and slippery-slope grounds); Lord Falconer's Assisted Dying Bill (2014-15) and successive attempts - the standard UK context. Sanctity of life in full: the Catholic Catechism - intentional euthanasia is 'morally unacceptable'; the Church of England and other Protestant bodies similarly reject active euthanasia but accept withdrawal of futile treatment. NL double effect in full: palliative sedation and high-dose analgesics are permissible when death is foreseen but not intended and pain relief is proportionate - the standard NL distinction between passive and active cases.
Business ethics: CSR, stakeholders, whistle-blowing, theories applied
Concepts:corporate social responsibility (CSR) - duty to consider impact on employees, consumers, society and environment beyond legal requirement and profit; stakeholders vs shareholders - CSR widens consideration; whistle-blowing - disclosing organisational wrongdoing (raises loyalty vs public duty conflicts); good/bad practice - good: fair wages, honest advertising, sustainable sourcing, worker welfare; bad: exploitation, child labour, bribery, environmental damage, misleading claims. Spec: AQA 7062/1A section 3.2.3; OCR H573/02.
Theories applied:
Kant: humanity as an end in itself - workers and consumers must be treated as ends, never merely as means; misleading advertising uses consumers' rationality as an instrument (deception fails universalisability); exploitative wages and child labour use workers as means; whistle-blowing is a duty to the public even against loyalty. Strengths: dignity-based; Critique: ignores outcomes - a rigid Kantian may condemn a profitable venture that benefits thousands.
Utilitarianism (Bentham, Mill): cost-benefit per decision - pollution permissible if aggregate benefit outweighs harm (hedonic calculus); CSR justified by long-run utility (reputation, sustainability); whistle-blowing right if it maximises utility. Critique: tyranny of the majority - exploited minorities (workers, consumers) may be sacrificed to shareholder benefit; Friedman's objection - the only social responsibility of business is to increase profit within the rules (utilitarian reply: externalities and long-run utility defeat Friedman).
Natural Law: just wage, honest dealing, stewardship of creation (dominion - Genesis 1:28) are secondary precepts; CSR fits the ordered-society precept; bad practice (exploitation, bribery) violates precepts regardless of profit. Strengths: absolute; Critique: 'natural' does not entail 'good' (Hume's is-ought gap); precepts may not fit modern global markets.
Situation ethics: agape per situation - love may require flexible practice (paying above the wage for a struggling employee); but the theory says little about systematic corporate duty.
Whistle-blowing cases: the NHS whistle-blowers (Mid Staffordshire), Financial Sector cases (the 2008 crisis) - the standard examples of loyalty vs public duty. Consumers and good practice in full: honest advertising (Kant: universalisability of deception), product safety (utilitarian: risk calculus), fair trade sourcing (NL: just wage), environmental stewardship (NL: dominion as responsibility, Genesis 1:28; utilitarian: externalities). Kant in full: the dignity of persons grounds the prohibition on treating workers as mere labour costs - CSR's strongest theoretical grounding; utilitarian in full: cost-benefit analysis per decision - pollution permissible if aggregate benefit outweighs harm, which Friedman accepts and critics (externalities, long-run reputation) reject.
Sexual ethics: pre/extra-marital sex, homosexuality, contraception, consent
Issues: premarital sex, extramarital sex (adultery), homosexuality, contraception, consent and age of consent. Spec: AQA 7062/1A section 3.2.4; OCR H573/02.
Religious approaches: natural law - sex belongs within marriage oriented to reproduction (primary precept); contraception and homosexual acts violate the reproductive precept (Humanae Vitae, Vatican II); adultery violates the ordered-society precept; biblical support: Genesis 1:28 (be fruitful), 1 Corinthians 6 (flee sexual immorality), Seventh Commandment. Liberal religious approaches: agape-based (Fletcher) - love decides per situation; premarital sex permissible where love is genuine; homosexuality judged by the quality of the relationship, not the act's telos; Robinson (Honest to God) and the 'new morality' popularised this. Critique: agape is undefined; the theory may license anything.
Secular approaches: harm-based consent - sex is ethical where informed, voluntary and non-exploitative (consent); Kant - humanity as an end: using a person merely as a means (prostitution without consent, deception) is wrong, but consenting adults as ends is permissible; utilitarianism - pleasure permissible if no net harm (STIs, exploitation, broken relationships weighed in the calculus); Singer - preference satisfaction, speciesism parallel for sexual orientation discrimination. Critique: consent alone may not capture exploitation within apparent consent (power imbalances); utilitarian calculus on intimacy is speculative.
Judgement for A*: the decisive questions are (1) whether the telos of sex is reproduction (NL) or relational love (agape) or mutual pleasure (utilitarian); (2) whether fixed precepts or consent best protect people; (3) whether religious frameworks add anything secular consent-based ethics lacks - essays must weigh, not list.
Religious detail in full: Humanae Vitae (1968) - each marital act open to procreation; the Church of England's more permissive line (contraception permissible within marriage) shows denominational variation; Genesis 1:28 (be fruitful and multiply), 1 Corinthians 6-7 (the body as temple; marriage), Hebrews 13:4 (marriage honoured). Secular detail in full: the harm principle applied to sexual ethics - only harm to others may restrict liberty; consent as the criterion (age of consent, informed consent); Kant: deception and non-consent use a person merely as a means; utilitarianism: pleasure permissible if no net harm (STIs, exploitation, relational damage weighed in the calculus).
Exam technique: synthesis and pitfalls
Spec coverage: AQA 7062 Paper 1 Section B sections 3.2.2 (euthanasia), 3.2.3 (business ethics), 3.2.4 (sexual ethics) - applied through the ethical theories of section 3.2.1. OCR H573/02 applied ethics - euthanasia, business ethics, sexual ethics applied through NL, situation ethics, utilitarianism and Kant. WJEC/Eduqas and CCEA include similar applied topics.
Essay structure for applied questions: AQA Paper 1: 10-mark AO1 'Explain...' (set out the issue and one theory's application) then 15-mark AO2 'Critically discuss...' (compare theories, weigh, verdict). Plan: (1) define the issue with one case anchor (Tony Bland, whistle-blowing case, contraception debate); (2) strongest theory application with scholar; (3) strongest critique; (4) comparative application of a second theory; (5) weigh and verdict.
Pitfalls: confusing active and passive euthanasia (act vs withdrawal); asserting sanctity of life without naming imago Dei; confusing CSR with shareholders (stakeholders are wider); treating consent as sufficient without power-imbalance analysis; missing the double effect application in euthanasia (examiners expect it); applying only one theory (applied questions reward comparison); listing theory applications without weighing them against each other.
Examiner tips: memorise one case per issue (Tony Bland for euthanasia, Friedman for business, Humanae Vitae for sexual ethics); quote 'never merely as a means' (Kant) and 'every man to count for one' (Bentham); state explicitly which theory you defend and why in your verdict; use the same theory across issues to show synthesis - e.g. NL's fixed precepts protect the vulnerable but fail in dilemmas, while agape is flexible but undefined; end with a justified comparative verdict, not a summary.
Further pitfalls: confusing CSR with stakeholder theory (CSR is the duty; stakeholders are the affected parties); asserting 'consent is sufficient' without power-imbalance analysis; presenting sanctity of life as purely Christian (imago Dei grounds it, but secular absolute-life positions exist); missing the Assisted Dying Bill context in euthanasia answers; applying only one theory per issue when the mark scheme rewards comparison across at least two.
Spec note: OCR H573/02 expects applied answers to reference meta-ethics where relevant - e.g. whether 'good' in 'a good death' means naturalistically good (pleasure, preference-satisfaction) or non-naturalistically good (dignity, telos); the naturalistic fallacy (Moore) and Hume's is-ought gap are the standard AO2 cross-references. AQA 7062 similarly rewards linking applied issues back to the theories of section 3.2.1 and to sanctity of life as a doctrine.
💡 Worked Example
Exam-style: 'Ethical theories provide convincing approaches to euthanasia.' Critically discuss this claim with reference to Natural Law and utilitarianism. [AQA 7062 15-mark AO2 essay / OCR H573 extended essay]
Mark-scheme logic: AO1 required: types of euthanasia (active/passive, voluntary/non-voluntary/involuntary); NL application (intrinsically wrong, double effect, palliative sedation); utilitarian application (hedonic calculus per case, Mill's harm principle, Singer's preference); case anchors (Tony Bland, Charlie Gard). AO2 required: (1) NL strengths - sanctity of life (imago Dei) protects the vulnerable; double effect permits palliative care without intended killing; (2) NL weaknesses - intended/foreseen distinction is arbitrary; rigid precepts ignore suffering; (3) utilitarian strengths - flexible, respects autonomy and preference, fits pain-centred cases; (4) weaknesses - slippery slope, resource pressure on the vulnerable, non-voluntary euthanasia violates equal-weight; (5) weigh - NL protects but fails in dilemmas, utilitarianism flexes but endangers the vulnerable; conclude with a justified verdict on which approach better serves the dying.
❓ Practice Questions & Mark Schemes
Explain the different types of euthanasia. [10 marks AO1]
Answer: AO1 answer: euthanasia - intentionally ending a life to relieve suffering. Active euthanasia: a deliberate act to end life (lethal injection). Passive euthanasia: withdrawing or withholding treatment (removing a ventilator). Voluntary: at the patient's competent request. Non-voluntary: the patient cannot decide (infant, persistent vegetative state). Involuntary: against the patient's wishes. Case anchors: Tony Bland (1993) - Law Lords permitted withdrawal of feeding as passive euthanasia; Charlie Gard (2017) - non-voluntary withdrawal over parents' wishes. Marks awarded for: all types accurately distinguished, and at least one case anchor correctly used.
'Active euthanasia should be legalised in the UK.' Critically discuss. [15 marks AO2]
Answer: AO1 anchor: types of euthanasia; sanctity vs quality of life. AO2 required: (1) for legalisation - autonomy (harm principle, Mill): a competent patient's voluntary choice may only be restricted to prevent harm to others; quality of life: continued life with only pain fails the hedonic calculus (Bentham: intensity, duration, certainty); Singer: the patient's preference for death should carry equal weight; (2) against - sanctity of life (imago Dei): life is sacred regardless of quality; Kant: suicide is a perfect duty violation - the rational agent may not use himself as a means to escape suffering; NL: double effect permits palliative sedation but not intended killing; (3) slippery slope - resource pressure may pressure the vulnerable; non-voluntary cases (Tony Bland, Charlie Gard) show the boundary is hard to draw; (4) weigh - autonomy and quality-of-life arguments are strong for voluntary cases but the slippery-slope and sanctity arguments protect the vulnerable; conclude with a justified verdict, e.g. legalisation is defensible for voluntary active euthanasia with safeguards, but the non-voluntary boundary is the decisive problem.
Explain corporate social responsibility and one ethical theory's application to it. [10 marks AO1]
Answer: AO1 answer: CSR - a business's duty to consider the impact of its actions on employees, consumers, society and the environment beyond legal requirement and profit; stakeholders (all affected parties) are considered, not just shareholders; good practice: fair wages, honest advertising, sustainable sourcing; bad practice: exploitation, child labour, bribery, environmental damage. Kantian application: humanity as an end in itself - workers and consumers must be treated as ends, never merely as means; misleading advertising uses consumers' rationality as an instrument; exploitative wages use workers as means; whistle-blowing is a duty to the public even against loyalty. Marks awarded for: CSR accurately defined, stakeholders vs shareholders, and one theory applied accurately (Kant, utilitarianism, NL or situation ethics).
'Whistle-blowing is always a duty.' Critically assess. [15 marks AO2]
Answer: AO1 anchor: whistle-blowing - disclosure by an employee of organisational wrongdoing; conflicts between loyalty, self-interest and public duty. AO2 required: (1) for duty - Kant: humanity as an end; the public has a right to truthful information, and deception fails universalisability; loyalty to wrongdoers is complicity; NL: ordered-society precept demands disclosure; (2) against - consequences are uncertain: whistle-blowing may cause greater harm (job losses, collapsed services); utilitarian calculus per case; (3) loyalty - special relationships (colleagues, employer) generate real duties; Williams' integrity objection - impartiality makes partiality irrational, which most reject; (4) Friedman - the only social responsibility of business is profit within the rules; utilitarian reply: externalities and long-run utility defeat Friedman; (5) weigh - whistle-blowing is a duty where wrongdoing is serious and disclosure proportionate, but 'always' overstates it; conclude with a justified verdict, e.g. a qualified duty - Kantian and NL arguments establish it as duty in serious cases, but the consequence and loyalty objections defeat 'always'.
Explain religious and secular approaches to sexual ethics. [10 marks AO1]
Answer: AO1 answer: religious approaches - natural law: sex belongs within marriage oriented to reproduction (primary precept); contraception and homosexual acts violate it (Humanae Vitae); adultery violates the ordered-society precept; biblical support: Genesis 1:28, 1 Corinthians 6, Seventh Commandment. Liberal religious approach (Fletcher): agape decides per situation - premarital sex permissible where love is genuine; homosexuality judged by relationship quality, not the act's telos (Robinson's 'new morality'). Secular approaches - harm-based consent: sex is ethical where informed, voluntary and non-exploitative; Kant: using a person merely as a means (deception, non-consent) is wrong; utilitarianism: pleasure permissible if no net harm. Marks awarded for: NL accurately set out, the agape-based liberal approach, and the consent-based secular approach.
'Ethical theories provide convincing approaches to euthanasia.' Critically discuss. [15 marks AO2]
Answer: AO1 anchor: types of euthanasia; NL, Kant, utilitarian, situation ethics applications; case anchors (Tony Bland, Charlie Gard). AO2 required: (1) NL - sanctity of life (imago Dei) protects the vulnerable; double effect permits palliative care without intended killing; critique - the intended/foreseen distinction is arbitrary; (2) utilitarianism - flexible, respects preference and pain-centred cases (Bentham's calculus; Singer's preference); critique - slippery slope, resource pressure on the vulnerable, non-voluntary cases violate equal weight; (3) Kant - suicide as perfect duty violation protects against hasty decisions; critique - cold formalism ignores suffering; (4) situation ethics - agape is flexible and person-centred; critique - agape is undefined, conflicting answers possible; (5) weigh - NL protects but fails in dilemmas, utilitarianism flexes but endangers the vulnerable; conclude with a justified verdict on which approach better serves the dying.
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