In search of a European approach to bioethics : the emergence of a common Euro-Mediterranean bioethical culture

Abstract

Though bioethics developed as a general phenomenon, it would be a mistake not to recognise the particular cultural articulation of bioethics. Bioethics is not the product of reason alone, independent of culture. The fundamental ethos of applied ethics, its methodology and language, its concerns and emphases, and its very institutionalization have been shaped by beliefs, values, and modes of thinking grounded in specific social and cultural traditions. Moreover, bioethics literature reflects and articulates the socio-cultural value system within and through which it operates. It is, therefore, false to assume that bioethical theories and moral views are transculturaI.