Abstract

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Title:: Reasons and solutions of difficulties of bioethics principlism in China

Author(s):: CHEN Hua; REN Junhua; School of Health Management, Guangzhou Medical University;Institute of Philosophy, Party School of the Central Committee of CPC

Keywords:: principlism; bioethics; sufferers rights; Confucian ethics; family decisions

Abstract:: In the field of Chinese bioethics, the decision framework of principlism encountered some difficulties in practice. The “congenitally deficient” of rights discourse, the separation of principle of independence and competency modal which ignores peoples actual conditions are the reasons for the difficulties. Western countries take respecting independence as a way to resolve the difficulties, but in this model, independence is a static concept, which has covered the true relationship between individuals and society; due to the different thinking in Chinese culture and the special period of social transformation in China, western solution of the principlism difficulty isnt applicable in China. In the context of China, the Confucian ethics can provide localized moral resources for resolving principlism difficulties, including the moral foundation of “benevolence”, the methodology of “principle”, rational condition for the combination of emotion and reason and the involvement of family.