A Comparison of Four Ethical Concepts and The Declaration of Human Rights

The founding fathers based our constitution off of what they thought the American Society at the time needed in order to make stability in their nation, they used ethical basis and teachings in order to do so. In 1948, a document titled The Declaration of Human Rights was written by the United Nation in order to explain the rights entitled to all humans across the globe; this essay will be reviewing the four ethical concepts that this declaration was based off of, that being; Virtue Ethics, The Categorical Imperative, The Social Contract Theory, and Utilitarianism.
In the Declaration of Human Rights, the first article states that “All human beings are born free and equal in dignity and rights. They are endowed with reason and conscience and should act towards one another in a spirit of brotherhood.” this is related to The Social Contract Theory and The Categorical Imperative because humans are born with rights and freedoms in which they are entitled to at birth that should be followed and allowed by everyone as long a there is reason behind these rights and freedoms. It is related specifically to the Categorical Imperative because as stated by James and Stuart Racheles in The Elements of Moral Philosophy that everyone should “Act so that you treat humanity whether that be in your own person or that of another, always as an end and never as a means only. ,” which in layman's terms this means treat others with the intention that this could be bestowed upon yourself. You would never want to be degraded of your freedom, or your dignity therefore you should never take away someone else's. It also is specifically related to The Social Contract Theory which is defined by the Racheleses as “Morality consists in the set of rules, governing behavior that rational people will accept, on the condition that others will accept them as well. And rational people will accept a rule only if they can expect to gain from it. Thus morality is a mutual benefit,” and this article is overall basically stating the entirety of the definition of The Social Contract Theory. All humans are born with rights that should be followed by everyone as long as others choose to follow them as well.
The second article of The Declaration of Human Rights relates to The Social Contract Theory, and The Categorical Imperative because it states “Everyone is entitled to all the rights and freedoms set forth in this Declaration, without distinction of any kind, such as race, colour, sex, language, religion, political or other opinion, national or social origin, property, birth or other status. Furthermore, no distinction shall be made on the basis of the political, jurisdictional or international status of the country or territory to which a person belongs, whether it be independent, trust, non-self-governing or under any other limitation of sovereignty.” It is saying that everyone is entitled to the rights set forth at birth without judgement of others based on race, sex, language of origin, opinions, religion, national origin, property, birth or other status. This relates to the two ethical concepts because it is something that everyone should follow to gain mutual benefits, which relates to The Social Contract Theory because “Morality consists in the set of rules, governing behavior that rational people will accept, on the condition that others will accept them as well. And rational people will accept a rule only if they can expect to gain from it. Thus morality is a mutual benefit”; and if you want this to be bestowed upon you, you shall treat others with the respect that you wish to also deserve, ie Kant’s Categorical Imperative which states “Act so that you treat humanity whether that be in your own person or that of another, always as an end and never as a means only.”
In the third article of The Declaration of Independence it is related solely to the ethical constraint of Utilitarianism which is defined by James and Stuart Racheles in The Elements of Moral Philosophy as “Humanity should create the greatest amount of happiness given to the greatest number of people,” this relates to the third article because that states that “Everyone has the right to life, liberty and security of person.” This basically means everyone has a right to some sort of happiness, whether that be in life, in liberty, or security of person, everyone has a right to happiness, and if everyone has it, then they are following the principles found in Jeremy Bentham's utilitarianism.
In the Declaration of Human Rights, the fourth article is special because it relates to all four of the ethical concepts; this is because all of the concepts are against slavery which is the topic of the article. This article states “No one shall be held in slavery or servitude; slavery and the slave trade shall be prohibited in all their forms,” every ethical constraint has traits in them that show that slavery is something that is unethical. For example, in The Social Contract Theory it states that “Morality consists in the set of rules, governing behavior that rational people will accept, on the condition that others will accept them as well. And rational people will accept a rule only if they can expect to gain from it. Thus morality is a mutual benefit,” this means that if someone feels that their rights aren’t being taken into consideration that they have the right to retaliate until they feel that it is for their mutual benefit, that is slavery should not exist in a society that has a social contact. Another example of why slavery is considered unethical by these four ethical concepts is the fact that in a utilitarian society there would not be slavery because you want to maximize pleasure and minimize pain to create “the most amount of happiness for the greatest number of people” as the Racheles would conclude to; and enslaving someone would maximize pain, and lead to unhappiness. Slavery also doesn’t follow the ethics of Virtue because someone who enslaves another human is not being compassionate, loyal, generous, tolerant, reasonable, or fair, therefore they are not practicing virtues. Virtue ethics have been defined by James and Stuart Racheles as “A trait of character manifested in a habitual action, and it is good for anyone to have. A virtue is a commendable trait,” if a human can enslave someone of their own kind then they are not a virtuous person, and therefore not practicing virtue ethics.
The founder of The Categorical Imperative, Immanuel Kant did not believe in the teachings of the founder of Utilitarianism but they both followed the teachings of Aristotle, who was the founder of Virtue Ethics, this can be shown in the fact that they all agreed with something, and that being that torturing someone is unethical. This statement is why the fifth article of the Declaration of Human Rights relates to these three ethical concepts. The fifth article states that “No one shall be subjected to torture or to cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment.” This can be proven to be an ethical statement by examining each of these ethical concepts, for example in Utilitarianism, you want to maximize pleasure and minimize pain, simply the act of torture does the complete opposite and therefore is already unethical in itself. Another example of this would be that in The Categorical Imperative it states that “Act so that you treat humanity whether that be in your own person or that of another, always as an end and never as a means only.” If a person would not want the act of torture upon themselves then they shouldn’t be torturing others who are innocent. This is the only ethical way to approaching this situation because elsewise it wouldn’t be the right thing to do.
Another article in The Declaration of Human Rights that has to do with all four ethical concepts is the seventh article, which states “ll are equal before the law and are entitled without any discrimination to equal protection of the law. All are entitled to equal protection against any discrimination in violation of this Declaration and against any incitement to such discrimination.” This has shown to relate to every ethical constraint because, all shall be protected by the law without discrimination. It is related to The Social Contract Theory because as stated by James and Stuart Racheles “Morality consists in the set of rules, governing behavior that rational people will accept, on the condition that others will accept them as well. And rational people will accept a rule only if they can expect to gain from it. Thus morality is a mutual benefit.” The law must be abided in order to obtain protection from it, and everyone must abide by the law in order for everyone to benefit from it, and if everyone abides it then there must not be any discrimination against those who are abiding it because then they are no longer being protected from said law. This also relates to Utilitarianism because as stated by James and Stuart Racheles “[Utilitarianism is defined as] The greatest amount of happiness given to the greatest number of people,” and if people are being protected from discrimination then they are happier than those being discriminated against therefore maximizing pleasure and minimizing pain. This article also relates to Virtue Ethics because when someone’s rights are being protected by the law then those enforcing the law (and therefore protecting those who abide by the law) are showing compassion, loyalty, dependability and so forth. This also can relate to The Categorical Imperative because as stated by James and Stuart Racheles “1). Act only according to that maxim by which you can at the same time will that it should become a universal law. 2). Act so that you treat humanity whether that be in your own person or that of another, always as an end and never as a means only,” protecting someone’s rights is treating them as an end and never as a means.
Based off even the first seven articles of The Declaration of Human Rights, it is clear that the writers in The United Nations based their articles off of the four ethical concepts of great philosophers such as, Immanuel Kant, Jeremy Bentham, Aristotle, and Thomas Hobbes. The rich teachings of each of these philosophers are great on their own but combined together formed great ideals in which shape the way our globe works to maintain stability and honor in our society. I believe that each of these four concepts, when combined would be a major advantage to any society and the writers based the document off of their findings.