#luhmann

Morale, Ethics and the law are intertwined. While ethics generally describes the academic reflection of morale, ethics-committees don't aim to provide be a neutal reflection in distinction to a specific morale. Their meaning of "ethics" derives from the distinction from the law itself. Ethics committees therefore imply, that next to legal judgements, ethical resoning - as specifically non legal - are instructive for legal contexts aswell.

However, ethics committees are bound to a specific scope within which tejy are allowed to make their judgements. It is legally definied which criteria they can judge on - if they were to make their judgements outsaid of said scope, their argument might be genuinly based on ethical reasoning, but it'd be rejected or at least contestable to be used as a legally instructive argument. The "ethical" judgements of a ethics comittee therefore are still legal arguements in the end.

Allein die strikte Bindung an den gesetzlichen Kanon von Versagungsgründen zeigt, dass die Entscheidung der Ethikkommission sich nach einem rechtlichen Maßstab zu richten hat. Das ablehnende Votum einer Ethikkommission ist genau dann rechtswidrig, wenn es die durch das Recht gezogenen Grenzen überschreitet und an die Stelle von rechtlichen Kriterien, eigene, genuin ethische Kriterien setzt.“ (Fateh-Moghadam und Atzeni, 2009, p. 128)

Ethics committees usually consists of people of different professions as well as laypersons, which each argue through the logic of whatever system they are part of. Modern society, which according to Nassehi can be describes as a "Gesellschaft der Gegenwarten" has no central ponit of reference, which could be used to evaluate and decide, what way of looking at a situation is right. Instead, there different perspectives all co-exist as valid points of reference at the same time. Through explaining their viewpoint to acteurs of other systems (or contexts of logics), they are translating their professional knowledge into ethical arguments, which then can be understood by other actors aswell.

The "ethical" aspecto of ethics committees or other bioethical procedures therefore isn't to be found in their Sachdimension, but in their Zeit- und Sozialdimension. The opportunity to have a process in which different perspectives meet and can discuss about their specific judgements on a situation is what constitutes the "ethical" character of an ethics committee, as "the process allows for a pluralistic consensus-building" (p. 129).

„Über die kommunikative Bezugnahme auf Ethik gelingt es, differente fachliche Perspektiven so aufeinander zu beziehen, dass die Herstellung konsensualer Entscheidungen möglich wird. Das Ethik-Label nimmt bei der Herstellung einer so verstandenen praktischen Konkordanz, die nicht mit tatsächlich konvergierenden Perspektiven zu verwechseln ist, eine Art Übersetzerfunktion ein, die Anschlussfähigkeiten auch dort erzeugt, wo zunächst inkommensurable Logiken aufeinander treffen.“ (Fateh-Moghadam und Atzeni, 2009, p. 143)

What is interesting to me is the question whether this construction of ethics can also be found in political discourses or parliamentary debates on assisted dying laws.

Looking at the way bioethical questions are oftentimes handled through committees, who, through their procedural consensus-making, can influence legally binding decisions and which act preemptively rather than reactively, i wonder why this isn't applied to assisted dying aswell? Maybe it is because there are just way more cases or because it ususally is a decision that only refers to one single persons life, but doesn't endanger society as a whole?