A Note on Ethical Analysis

To engage in ethical analysis is to answer such questions as “What is the right thing to do?” “What does it mean to be a good person?” “How should I live my life?” Ethical analysis, on its own, is often not adequate for doing the right thing or being a good person—humans, as we know, are subject to all kinds of subconscious or emotional biases as well as institutional and social pressures—but it is an essential element. This note outlines six Western and non-Western frameworks for ethical analysis along with a general method for refining and building out an ethical framework.