Research in Applied Ethics

Research

The Centre for Ethics, Social and Political Philosophy has a long tradition in studying important issues in the field of applied ethics. Next to more fundamental approaches to ethical theorizing, its researchers also delve into more concrete and specific social and economic issues.

First, there is a strong focus on topics concerning distributive justice. Prof. Antoon Vandevelde and Prof. Philippe Van Parijs examine different theories of social justice and their relation to current societal and policy issues, like globalization, migration, ethical limits to the market, neutrality of the state and so on. They jointly organize the Lovanium Seminar in Ethics and Public Policy.

Second, Tom Grimonprez applies, together with dr. Yvonne Denier, theories of social justice to questions arising from the field of medical ethics. Central to their research is the question what a luck egalitarian approach to the domain of public health care might look like. In addition, Luc Anckaert tackles moral and ethical issues surrounding health care and palliative care from the perspective of Jewish philosophers like Rosenzweig and Levinas. Third, topics in environmental ethics are covered by Stijn Neuteleers whose research focuses on the possibility of environmental duties in a liberal framework. He aims to develop an answer to the question which policies a liberal state can legitimately enforce on its citizens?

The fourth and last field of interested is situated at the borders between ethics and economics. Prof. Luc Van Liedekerke is specialized in business ethics, including topics like corporate social responsibility, Islamic banking and so on. Dr. Bart Engelen works on rational choice theory and its normative implications in fields like Public Choice theory and Analytical Marxism. Jan Willem Lindemans studies the work of Friedrich Hayek and its implications for evolutionary economics and social epistemology.

Projects

Research projects in the field of Applied Ethics

• Private vices and virtues, public benefits and costs: the complex interplay between motivations and policies.
• Justice, luck and responsibility. A philosophical inquiry with implications for health care ethics.

Doctoral projects in the field of Applied Ethics

• The knowledge of rules and the rules of knowledge: Hayek on the problem of social order as a problem of knowledge
• Rechtvaardigheid, toeval en verantwoordelijkheid: een wijsgerig onderzoek met gezondheidsethische implicaties
• Ecological corrections of liberal egalitarianism and of communitarianism: towards a distinct ecological political theory.
• De rol van morele verontwaardiging in een herstelgerichte strafpraktijk