Abstract

Feminists view traditional ethical philosophy as tainted. Women and their ideas have been excluded or devalued. This paper sought to discover the origin and depth of the schism, and when its commensurate, hierarchical, separate virtues arose in order to ascertain whether a separate feminist ethics is justified; and if so, to outline such a doctrine which reflects the work of contemporary ethical thinkers. Using an historical framework, we trace the breach from philosophical antiquity, through the organized church, the Enlightenment, and into the twentieth-century. We examine essentialist and existentialist claims regarding women's morality. After investigating hurdles women must overcome before achieving full moral agency, we outline an alternative epistemology and ontology suggested by a preponderance of feminine and feminist thinkers. Although feminists are certainly not monolithic, most seem to agree that freedom is tantamount to morality, and that, for women, contemporary, patriarchal society lacks gender parity socially, economically, politically, and morally. We examine a range of thinkers who embrace from a redefined underlying principle to no theory at all; from a model based upon mothering to another which argues that such an paradigm is merely "slave morality," as well as a wide range of other issues. Overall, a humanist ethics, derived from interrelatedness, a new definition of self, grounded in experience, and devoid of hierarchies, will render us full moral agents, able to set and reach goals in a caring, non-combative environment. Overall, if caring yields the self-knowledge women so desperately need, and relationships with others can serve as a paradigm for moral relationships, then perhaps we ultimately can devise a non-relativistic ethic grounded in women's experience