Moral Imagination

The moral imagination is the mental capacity to create or to use ideas, images, and metaphors, not derived from moral principles or immediate observation, to discern moral truths or develop moral responses. Some defenders of the idea also argue that ethical concepts, embedded in history, narrative, and circumstance, are apprehended best through metaphorical or literary frameworks. A variety of thinkers have invoked conceptions of the moral imagination, including 18th-century writers and philosophers, as well as contemporary philosophers and business ethicists.

In his Theory of the Moral Sentiments, first published in 1759, Adam Smith described an imaginative process essential not only to understanding the sentiments of others but also to moral judgment. Through [Page 1421]an imaginative act one represents to oneself the situation, interests, and values of another, generating thereby a feeling or passion. If this passion were the same as that of the other person (a phenomenon Smith refers to as “sympathy”), then a pleasing sentiment would result, leading to moral approval. As individuals across society engage their imaginations, an imaginative point of view emerges that is uniform, general, and normative. This is the viewpoint of the impartial spectator, the standard perspective from which to issue moral judgments.

Edmund Burke was perhaps the first to use the phrase, “moral imagination.” For Burke, moral concepts have particular manifestations in history, tradition, and circumstance. In a passage in Reflections on the Revolution in France, published in 1790, he suggests that the moral imagination has a central role in generating and recollecting the social and moral ideas that, when crystallized into custom and tradition, complete our human nature, stir the affections, and connect sentiment with understanding. In the early 20th century, and with a nod to Burke, Irving Babbitt proposed the moral imagination as the means of knowing—beyond perceptions of the moment—a universal and permanent moral law. Assuming a distinction between the one and the many, Babbitt contended that the absolutely real and universal unity could not be apprehended; rather, one must appeal to the conceptual imagination to develop insight into stable and permanent standards to guide one through constant change. That the conceptual imagination might be cultivated through poetry, myth, or fiction was an idea of Babbitt later taken up by the traditionalist social critic, Russell Kirk.

In recent years, philosophers and business ethicists have shown a renewed interest in the moral imagination. Mark Johnson contends that moral understanding uses metaphorical concepts embedded in larger narratives and requires ethical perception. For example, ethical deliberation is not the application of principles to specific cases but involves concepts whose adaptable structures represent types of situations and modes of affective response. Furthermore, moral conduct demands that one cultivate one's perception of the particularities of individuals and circumstances and develop one's empathetic abilities. To these ends, literature has an essential role. In business ethics, Patricia Werhane has suggested that the moral imagination is necessary to ethical management. Beginning with the recognition of the particularity of both individuals and circumstances, the moral imagination allows one to consider possibilities that extend beyond given circumstances, accepted moral principles, and commonplace assumptions.

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