Karen Warren’s ecofeminist ethics: is it a model of genuine environmental ethics?

Abstract

Karen J. Warren presents an ecofeminist ethical perspective, according to which contextual aspects must be considered in the analysis of moral problems and moral situations. Therefore, she rejects the ethical monism of the main animal ethics theories. The aim of this article is to demonstrate, in the light of the notion of vulnerability (proposed as a criterion for moral considerability by Paul Taylor), that Warren’s care-sensitive ethics cannot be considered as a genuine environmental ethical theory. It rather comes near Gary Snyder’s bioregionalism and does not explain in which way a moral consideration is attributed to individual animals. In addition, the article seeks to analyze her possible moral relativism: according to the criteria of James Rachels and Peter Singer, Warren’s proposal does not seem to meet the requirements of an impartial and general ethical theory, and may submit the problems of relativism since her conception of care is limited.