Starting at home : caring and social policy / Nel Noddings.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Noddings, Nel.

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Altruism.

Caring.

Home--Social aspects.

Home.

Moral education.

Social policy--Moral and ethical aspects.

Social policy.

Social aspects.

United States--Social policy--Moral and ethical aspects.

United States.

Physical Description:

vii, 342 pages ; 23 cm

Place of Publication:

Berkeley : University of California Press, [2002]

Summary:

Nel Noddings, one of the central figures in the contemporary discussion of ethics and moral education, argues that caring -- a way of life learned in homes -- can be extended into a theory that guides social policy. Tackling issues such as capital punishment, drug treatment, homelessness, mental illness, and abortion, Noddings inverts traditional philosophical priorities to show how an ethic of care can have profound and compelling implications for social and political thought.

Instead of beginning with an ideal state and then describing a role for home and family, this book starts with an ideal home and asks how what is learned there may be extrapolated to the larger social domain. Noddings examines the tension between freedom and equality that has characterized liberal thought in the twentieth century and finds that -- for all its strengths -- liberalism is still inadequate as social policy. She suggests instead that an attitude of attentive love in the home induces a corresponding responsiveness that can serve as a foundation for social policy.

Contents:

Introduction: Starting at Home 1

Part 1. Care Theory

1. Caring 11

2. Harm and Care 32

3. Needs 53

4. Why Liberalism Is Inadequate 69

5. A Relational Self 91

Part 2. Our Selves and Other Selves

Interlude 121

6. Bodies 126

7. Places, Homes, and Objects 150

8. Attentive Love 176

9. Achieving Acceptability 189

10. Learning to Care 207

Part 3. Toward a Caring Society

Interlude 227

11. Developing Social Policy 230

12. Homes and Homelessness 248

13. Deviance 265

14. The Centrality of Education 283.

Notes:

Includes bibliographical references (pages 325-337) and index.

ISBN:

0520225562

0520230264

OCLC:

46822321