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Autonomy, Responsibility, and Health Care is a philosophically rigorous volume addressing central debates in contemporary bioethics and medical ethics. The book critically examines the concepts of autonomy and responsibility as they arise in health care practices, biomedical decision-making, and ethical theory. Contributors explore themes such as embodiment, care, end-of-life decisions, distributive justice, responsibility for illness, and obligations toward future generations. Drawing on phenomenology, moral philosophy, legal theory, and discourse ethics, the volume challenges reductive models of patient autonomy and offers a nuanced account of moral agency, vulnerability, and responsibility in modern medicine. An essential resource for philosophers, bioethicists, medical professionals, and scholars of applied ethics.
Table of Contents
Notes on Contributors
Foreword
1. Autonomy and Embodiment. The Way Back to the Unavailability of the Body
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Autonomy: as Self-determination against, or as Self-transcendence to Others? Anthropological Reflections on the Background of Bioethics
Regine Kather -
Why the Way We Consider the Body Matters. Reflections on Four Bioethical Perspectives on the Human Body
Silke Schicktanz
2. Autonomy and Care from the Perspective of End-of-Life Decision-Making
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Autonomie als Selbstbestimmung und Fürsorge: aufgezeigt am Beispiel der Sterbehilfe
Karl-Wilhelm Merks -
Autonomie und Fürsorge. Die Perspektive des Rechts
Volker Lipp
3. Peculiar Forms of Responsibility?
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The Limits of Discourse Ethics Concerning the Responsibility Toward Nature,
Nonhuman Animals, and Future Generations
Nicolae Morar -
Toward an Ethics of Species. Is There a Responsibility to Preserve the Integrity of (Human) Species?
Bogdan Olaru -
The Principle of Responsibility for Illness and Its Application in the Allocation of Health Care. A Critical Analysis
Eugen Huzum
Index of Concepts
Index of Names
