Beneficence and nonmaleficence are two ethical principles that our society relies heavily on and although they may have similar intentions, they each possess distinguishable characteristics. According to Beauchamp and Childress, nonmaleficence calls for prohibition of harm, is impartial (obligation not to harm people in general) and is often considered the moral basis for law. On the other hand, beneficence is a call for positive action, may be partial (not obligated to help all people in all situations) and, unless it is explicitly required for your profession, is not the moral basis of law (Beauchamp and Childress 205). Beauchamp and Childress also lay out a series of five conditions that comprise the duty to rescue which take into account the necessity and benefit to the person in need, burden to the helper and probability of the result/benefit (Beauchamp and Childress 207). One argument is that if the helper faces a low risk/burden to help someone in need, and such help has a high probability of positively affecting the person in need’s life, the helper has a moral obligation to do so. Situations in which the probability of success is low, there is a high risk for the helper or the help provided is not absolutely necessary to the survival of the person in need, there is no obligation to help this person, but doing so would be considered a supererogatory act.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ufhKWfPSQOw
At the end of class we began to discuss where the principle of beneficence falls in terms of foreign affairs. Do we have a moral obligation to help other countries in need? Should we provide aid to countries in war that are our allies or intervene in countries with corrupt government? Attached to this post is a video of Yeonmi Park, a young woman who escaped from North Korea, recounting some of the horrors she experienced growing up at the One Young World conference. She talks about seeing parents of friends murdered for watching Hollywood movies, witnessing rape and even admitting that when she was younger she believed that the dictator could read her mind and that she could not think anything in opposition to the dictatorship. The stories she discusses are horrible, as is evidenced by the teary-eyed faces in the crowd and the pit in my stomach I felt as I watched the video. At the end of the video I wanted nothing more than to help or for someone to help this girl and other girls like her who are victims of the country they were born in. The conditions of North Korea are terrifying and inhumane, yet not much or at least not enough is done to protect those who are stuck living there.
Does the principle of beneficence apply here? As stated above, beneficence is sometimes partial and not the moral basis of law, so legally we do not have an obligation to help, but should we? Other women and citizens of North Korea like Yeonmi are in desperate need of help and face serious risks everyday; however would actions on behalf of the United States realistically prevent this harm? Are the risks and burdens involved for the United States too great to overcome the potential benefits to the North Koreans?
While intervening in foreign affairs is often controversial, do we as moral beings have an obligation to step in in the name of beneficence? Or is any such action of beneficence to another country considered supererogatory?
Citations
Beauchamp, Tom L., and James F. Childress. Principles of Biomedical Ethics. New York: Oxford UP, 2001. Print
OneYoungWorld. “Escaping from North Korea in Search of Freedom | Yeonmi Park | One Young World.” YouTube. YouTube, 18 Oct. 2014. Web. 14 Mar. 2017.
Hi Gabby!
Your post caught my attention as I just saw this video this morning and had a similar reaction. I think many of us, naturally, feel compelled to help people like Yeonmi. But does this drive to help stem from a moral obligation or does it vary from person to person? While I’d like to say we have a moral obligation as individuals, because of barriers preventing some individuals to help, I think individual acts fall under the category of supererogatory. It would be unreasonable and even dangerous for say, a young female college student like me, to travel to North Korea in an attempt to rescue all of these women. I may be applauded, but no one would reasonably require that of me. However, I do think that we as a society should have a moral obligation to help people like Yeonmi.
As you mentioned, we are not legally obligated to help anyone as average citizens. However, with the resources of a society and an entire nation, I think imposing a moral obligation is reasonable. I think of the Holocaust, the Rwandan genocide, the Syrian War, and Hurricane Matthew in Haiti. In these situations, most of us are compelled to help initially, but we soon lose interest for two reasons. One, we do not feel obligated to help and two, we feel obligated but we do not have the means to help others. But, again, that is on the individual level. I think as a society we should step up to help others – and we already do that to some extent through many philanthropic organizations. This doesn’t mean we should disregard problems at home either. I think one reason some are opposed to lending foreign aid is that they worry about abandoning the issues here in the US. However, there must be a happy medium in order to help many people no matter where they live.
As a side note, this case reminds me of an ongoing argument about “voluntourism.” I recently read an eye-catching article titled, “7 Reasons Why Your Two Week Trip to Haiti Doesn’t Matter.” The author, a former service trip participant herself, discusses the ineffectiveness of short-term service trips to developing countries, arguing that they often cause more harm than good. This is interesting to me as the majority of people who go on service trips sign up on the principle of beneficence. Instead, these trips often end up being “self-fulfillment trips” to gain experience in a foreign country. Al Jazeera America explains, “As admirably altruisitic as it sounds, the problem with voluntourism is its singular focus on the volunteer’s quest for experience, as opposed to the recipient community’s actual needs.” Instead of short trips such as these, the author suggests that we educate ourselves and others on the real issues, send skilled help (such as physicians in Doctors Without Borders), and donate money to the organizations on the ground instead of spend the same money on a plane ticket to Haiti.
I’d like to say we are morally obligated to help others, but not everyone in society feels this way and there are no repercussions for not helping others, for the average Joe. So, while we aren’t technically morally obligated, I definitely think we should be as long as our help is actually helpful. Eager to hear your thoughts!
Stayton, Michelle. (2015). 7 Reasons Why Your Two Week Trip To Haiti Doesn’t Matter: Calling Bull on “Service Trips”. The Almost Doctor’s Channel. http://almost.thedoctorschannel.com/14323-2/
Hi Gabby,
This was a highly interesting and thought-provoking post. The dilemma of humanitarian intervention in foreign countries is one of the most difficult dilemmas that we, as a nation, need to navigate. Your post and the situation it describes remind me of the reactions against American indifference during the Holocaust in World War II. The United States decided not to intervene in foreign affairs, and because of it one of (if not the) worst genocides in human history went seemingly unnoticed. After the war, in the book “Auschwitz Escape,” the author wrote, “The real question is “Why aren’t all the Christians here?” The Holocaust served as a painful reminder of the necessity of beneficence in foreign affairs.
With the specific situation in North Korea, many of the developments are quite similar to those of the Holocaust. The United States is at a point where history is beginning to repeat itself, and it has a chance to make the right decision and intervene out of beneficence for the innocent North Korean people. While it is important to tread carefully with foreign intervention, there is a point where oppression gets so egregious and so horrific that I would argue that intervention would be an act of non-maleficence, not simply a supererogatory act of beneficence.