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This thesis explores the depiction of doping in the press. My interest in the topic stemmed from an early personal experience in competitive athletics where I was exposed to an in-sports reality that tolerated the use of performance-enhancing substances. However, references to doping in the media appeared to depict it in a different way. In order to investigate the divergence, the thesis analysed the reporting of two Olympic Games, namely Athens 2004 and Beijing 2008. It focused on empirical data and thus all articles that referenced doping were collected one month prior, during and one month after the two Olympic Games. In total 1274 articles were collected and analysed. Adopting a post-structuralist approach, the discourse analysis of the data leads to the identification of journalistic techniques that constructed discursive statements of doping. It was observed that first of all, in the case of highly publicised drug cases, these statements could be understood as constructing a moral panic episode. Secondly, the same discursive statements were circulated in the press even in the absence of positive doping samples. The thesis draws on the theories of moral regulation and governmentality to make sense of the constant presence of doping discursive statements in the press. It argues that inducting doping into sport spectacle makes its depiction seem apolitical and disconnected from society. However, in-depth theorisation of the phenomenon shows that its mediated construction plays an active role in influencing public policy.

In this dissertation I develop a theory of moral judgment as a natural kind. Instead of analyzing the concept of moral judgment, I develop an empirically grounded theory of its underlying nature. In chapter one I argue that moral judgment is a hybrid state of moral belief and moral emotion. The view is supported by a dual systems model of moral cognition and accounts for the internal but defeasible relationship between moral judgment and motivation. In chapter two I argue that in moral judgment moral norms are conceptualized as social, serious, general, authority-independent and objective. The view is supported by empirical research on the moral/conventional distinction and yields an empirical explanation of the possibility of genuine moral agreement and disagreement. In chapter three I explore whether psychopaths have the capacity for moral judgment, and thus whether they are real life "amoralists," individuals who make moral judgments but lack moral motivation. I argue that psychopaths have an impaired capacity for moral judgment and that prominent internalist accounts of moral judgment have difficulty accounting for psychopaths' peculiar combination of deficits.

Moral questions surrounding businesses’ labour practices and the ethical management of working conditions in developing countries are gaining increasing attention. This dissertation is an exploratory investigation on moral imagination amongst managers and union stewards involved in the management of working conditions in the Kenyan tea industry. Semi-structured interviews were used to generate information from participants on their thoughts and experiences as they managed potentially morally-laden issues related to working conditions of lower-tier workers. Thematic analysis was used to examine the accounts participants shared, in order to uncover the deliberative processes participants engaged in as they strived to make sense of these issues. The use of a qualitative approach facilitated a comprehensive examination of the context in which these organizational stakeholders are embedded. The moral imagination framework allows for an examination of how individuals attend to contextual cues as they deliberate on situations of moral import in the work environment. Overall, the findings of this research show that there are diverse patterns of analysis of moral situations among organizational stakeholders. The findings provide empirical support for Bartlett’s (2003) argument that there are many, yet unexplored, intervening processes between problem perception and action when it comes to moral deliberation and decision-making. Among the managers in the study, they were found to include processes of attribution of agency for observed harm, analysis of individual, organizational and social consequences, reflection on conflicts of interest and values, as well as creative imagination in envisioning and enacting actions that could address perceived problems. Among the stewards, they included reflections on principles of justice and human rights, reflection on opportunities for self-development, as well as creative imagination. In addition, the findings suggest role-related differences in the nature of individuals’ moral deliberations. Managers often appealed to an ethics of care in their deliberations on their employees’ working conditions. Union stewards appealed to both an ethics of care and an ethics of justice.

The Department of Education's commitment to transform the South African Education system from the apartheid era to the new democratic era has proved to be a challenging one. Overwhelming evidence indicates that conflict, violence, substance abuse and teenage suicides are escalating. Education has reached an impasse! Moral degeneration is increasing exponentially implying that academic or "book knowledge" alone is inadequate in addressing these issues. It is therefore imperative that existing strategies as well as new approaches in education be closely examined and revisited if necessary in order to reverse the present state of society to one that is safe and acceptable for all life forms. This research seeks to explore what values are being taught or caught at school and how these values are interpreted and expressed both by learners as well as educators within the school. The research has been conducted at two primary schools in the Durban area of Kabuli- Natal. One is a public school that is directed solely by the National Curriculum Statement. The other is an independent school that is directed by the NCS as well as a value-based education programme. This study has used the qualitative approach and is set within the interpretive paradigm. Semi structured interviews were used as the primary research instrument to generate data. In addition to this, observation and document analysis were used. These multiple methods have assisted in triangulating the data received in order to identify commonalities as well as inconsistencies. The analysis indicates that the aspect of human rights, respect and responsibility (3R's) is contained in the National Curriculum Statement and in the South African Constitution. However the major discrepancy lies in the effective promotion and implementation of these values at school. Findings show that learners displayed a clear understanding and appreciation of values when these values are integrated and reinforced everyday. This study concludes with the idea that a concerted effort must be made to promote the teaching of human values at schools. / Thesis (M.Ed.)-University of KwaZulu-Natal, 2007.

This study examined the hypothesis that the moral personality is one in which moral knowledge structures are chronically accessible. A spontaneous trait inference cued-recall paradigm was employed. It was expected that those with chronically accessible moral knowledge structures (N = 61) would spontaneously encode virtue-content information differently than those with less chronically accessible moral knowledge structures (N = 77). High and low moral chronic accessibility participants were instructed to memorize sentences that contained virtue-content implications. Sentence recall was then cued by either virtuous dispositional terms or by words that were linked semantically to the sentences. Within the spontaneous processing condition, dispositional cues prompted twice as much recall as semantic cues among participants with high moral chronic accessibility whereas semantic cues prompted twice as much recall as dispositional cues among participants with low moral chronic accessibility. As predicted, within the deliberate processing conditions, there were no high/low moral chronic accessibility differences. These findings support the claim that the moral personality is usefully conceptualized in terms of the chronic accessibility of moral knowledge structures. / Department of Educational Psychology

Both philosophers and literary critics have championed artworks as necessary to moral education. As a result many of these critics believe that art that is bad or immoral can causally affect our character, resulting in moral harm. Moral harm is the idea that artworks possess a strong disposition to affect our moral beliefs such that we are less able to distinguish between what is good and what is bad. I examine this concept of moral harm and argue that immoral artworks do not have this kind of causal power over our moral beliefs. Proponents of the moral harm thesis are in error to attribute such a power to artworks. Additionally, I propose a definition of immoral artworks consistent with moral harm, as well as discuss the distinction between immoral artworks and artworks that are merely elicit disgust or offense.

This project is primarily exegetical in nature and aims to provide a rational reconstruction of the concept of moral responsibility in the work of Immanuel Kant, specifically in his Critique of Pure Reason (CPR), Groundwork of the Metaphysics of Morals (GR), and Critique of Practical Reason (CPrR). It consists of three chapters – the first chapter interprets the concept of freedom that follows from the resolution to the Third Antinomy in the CPR. It argues that Kant is best understood here to be providing an unusual but cogent, compatibilist account of freedom that the author terms meta-compatibilism. The second chapter examines the GR and CPrR to interpret the theory of practical reason and moral agency that Kant develops in these works. This chapter concludes by evaluating what has been established about Kant’s ideas of freedom and moral agency at that point in the project, identifying some problems and objections in addition to providing some suggestions for how Kantian ethics might be adapted within a consequentialist framework. The third chapter argues that, for Kant, there are two necessary and jointly sufficient conditions (in addition to a compatibilist definition of freedom) that must obtain for an individual to qualify as responsible for her actions.

While not exactly back room political bargaining, the traditional use of cooperation has been by moral theologians attempting to define the level of cooperation for a particular situation. This chosen definition, in turn, may help focus the range of appropriate actions in response to the situation's circumstances. In this customary usage, an organization's associates (employees) may assist the implementation of relevant responses to a cooperation analysis, whether the issue is clinical or organizational in nature. They have not been integral to the decision-making process - until now. <br>Cooperation has been the proverbial candle under the bushel (Matthew 5:15). This paper proposes the involvement of organizations' associates not only for decision-making and discernment, but for their own moral development. The foundation of this thesis is not only that organizations are moral agents, but also that organizations are reflective of the moral development of their associates when they exercise their agency. Using this model, this theory advances a use of the principle of cooperation by interpreting cooperation as a function of moral development for advancing associates. Advancement, in this case, means that, optimally, the process will expose participants to individuals in various stages of moral development, challenge them in appropriate ways, and enhance their moral development as characterized by Lawrence Kohlberg and Carol Gilligan. Even if participants do not advance in their moral development, the model proposed here will form participants in moral decision-making within the Catholic moral tradition. To a lesser degree, it is also a useful ministry discernment tool if appointed to discriminate responses to some of the individual and organizational issues (topics) mentioned above. / McAnulty College and Graduate School of Liberal Arts / Health Care Ethics / PhD / Dissertation

This thesis explores the way a skilled teacher developed and implemented my idea that metacognition could be applied to affect as well as cognition in values education. This idea suggests that teachers can help primary school students to understand the role that affect has played in the development of their values through socialization, and that through this understanding the students may develop a greater capacity to question and develop their values in the future. I call this teaching idea the metacognitive-affective approach to values education. / The review of the literature explores a range of theory, research findings and practical teaching ideas. It looks at the psychological, social psychological, sociological, philosophical, and educational, literature to establish links between affect and cognition in the development and education of values. It also looks at literature on metacognition to establish ways in which metacognition could be focussed on affect and values. / The teacher developed her own understanding of my original idea, and developed, implemented, and evaluated, a teaching intervention based on her interpretation of the idea in a history unit of study over a ten week period with her grade six class. Data were derived from: (i) interviews with the teacher about her understanding of the idea, the concepts, and the issues, before, during and after the implementation; (ii) observations of the teacher’s implementation of the approach in the unit of study, and (iii) the teacher’s written reflections. / The research was an action research-oriented, evaluative case-study using an interpretive, naturalistic approach based on the constructivist paradigm. It employed a hermeneutic philosophical stance that emphasises the way prior understandings and prejudices shape the interpretive process. / The results of the research showed the metacognitive-affective approach to have potential, but, as there was insufficient time to fully implement it, there are still major questions about ways of implementing it, about its practicality, and about how to involve other teachers in trialing it. A conceptual framework for the approach was developed and the thesis concludes with the suggestion that other teachers be recruited to an action-research program to further trial and develop the approach using my framework as a starting point to confirm the value of the approach for practical classroom teaching.