Universalizability, Principle of

The principle of universalizability is a form of a moral test that invites us to imagine a world in which any proposed action is also adopted by everyone else. Most notably, it is the foundational principle for deontological, or duty-based, ethics. For example, if we are tempted to lie, then we have to think what the world would be like if everyone lied, or in a similar vein, if we consider donating to charity, what would it be like if everyone made the same choice. The principle acts like a litmus test by indicating whether acts are morally acceptable or not. Universalizing some actions will lead to a self-contradiction, indicating that they are morally unacceptable. For example, if everyone lied, the notion of truth telling would cease to have meaning, and human community would become impossible. Likewise, universal theft would undermine our fundamental beliefs in property rights. Universalizing [Page 2146]other acts, such as charitable giving, will not lead to a contradiction and thus will pass the benchmark of morally acceptability. Using the test, we can determine a set of general moral principles, sometimes referred to as maxims. Business could not take place without some overarching ideas of universal right and wrong, including a general acceptance of keeping our word and fair dealing, and the intuitive appeal of universalizability suggests that such ideas are derived from a shared notion among all humans about the general principles concerning the way that one should behave.

The principle is based on the idea that moral equality demands equal treatment. It has often been crudely captured in the directive “Do unto others as you would have them do unto you.” It presumes that all moral actors are equal and that we cannot favor ourselves by appealing to the particular facts of a situation. Thus, we have to ask what anyone would do when faced with this moral quandary, rather than what I would do individually granted my specific situation. We cannot develop a principle by saying that anyone from my background with my desires and tastes would act similarly, since with sufficient qualification that would lead to a test where only someone with my exact qualities would act in a given way, leading to individualized results for everyone who asks the question. Instead, we have to look to what a more abstract moral agent would do absent the context of the issue. For example, we cannot ask whether a manager who grew up in a country where women are not active in the workforce may discriminate on the basis of gender, but more what a neutral moral agent should do when faced with that situation, based on our best projection of the result of universal adoption of his views. It would not matter, for instance, if we believed that the other party in a negotiation was bluffing or that there would be a significant payoff if we could persuade the other party of something that was not true; the principle demands that we have to go to the root issue of whether lying is ever morally acceptable.

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