A critique of the narrowing of morality to justice

Abstract

There are a lot of moral values in the practice of communities and the moral philosophies make different hierarchies among them on the one side, and there are different generalizations of morality (rules, maxims, virtues, principles etc.) which mean the fixed norms of morality on the other side. There is the well-known line of critics of MacIntyre, Michael Sandel, Michael Walzer and Charles Taylor which attacks the moral theory of John Rawls as the reduction of the morality to the justice and which tendency appeared in the most clear form in the theory of Jürgen Habermas. The study tries to show that beyond the American line of thought the critique of this reduction can be based in the genuine German line of thought which appeared in the ethics of Rudolph von Jhering and Nicolai Hartmann. In order to show the consequences of this reduction the study compares the theory of Rawls and Habermas with the ethics of Rudolph von Jhering and Nicolai Hartmann who outline in their theories a lot of moral values and as one of these values the justice is placed among them.