Avant-propos - Studia Moralia

256 MARTIN MCKEEVER
serious thing, to say that morality is precisely no code.
Perhaps the key word in Bauman’s ethical vocabulary is
“ambivalent”. His use of this concept is at times quite equivocal.
It not exactly a mind-blowing revelation to observe that human
beings are neither simply bad nor simply good, but rather
morally “ambivalent”. In so far as this phrase denotes this fact it
states an important, if rather obvious, truth. But in order to be
able to say even this, some measure of assessment, judgement
and evaluation is necessary. It is one thing to acknowledge that
human beings sometimes do what is good and sometimes do
what is bad, it is quite another to conclude from this that they
do not or cannot know what is good or bad. It is perfectly possible
to acknowledge the moral ambivalence of human conduct, in
the sense of acknowledging de facto that people do right and
wrong, without accepting that morality is inherently ambivalent
in the sense that Bauman suggests.
As regards the second of the tenets, therefore, it can only be
concluded that Bauman deludes himself in thinking that his
“spontaneous morality” is an alternative to ethics. Ethical theories
are distinguished from one another by the way they conceive
of the good. Bauman’s proposal that the human good is a
matter of spontaneous and ambivalent impulse is one theory
among others, not an alternative to theory. Varieties of moral
scepticism, relativism and nihilism are not peculiar to postmodern
culture but have accompanied moral reflection from the earliest
times. It may be true that they are more in evidence in contemporary
culture than ever before, but this is to describe contemporary
culture not to create a new ethical theory.
The third tenet formulated above reads “The moral self is
constituted by its responsibility for the Other”. As with the first
tenet, there is nothing immediately and obviously objectionable
in this statement from the point of view of a Catholic ethical vision.
Indeed, Fides et ratio reminds us that a good deal of the
personalist heritage of Western culture is owed to the prominence
given to this theme by Christian theology. If this tenet is
understood as emphasizing the centrality of altruism for ethics,
as construing the human being as inherently social and only
conceivable in relation to others and as stressing the mystery of
personhood, then it can be said to converge with the christian
ethical vision. It might be thought of as one of those germs of