The essence of most ethical theories lies within the teachings of philosophers on the obligations of people and institutions. For example, John Rawls’s theory of justice implies fairness in relation to people. Rawls assumes that people’s beliefs and values predetermine society’s structure, and ideally, in a democratic society, everybody should be treated equally regardless of social status, gender, or other factors (John Rawls). Nevertheless, discrimination and unfair treatment still thrive in the community and remain a multifaceted issue. For example, discrimination may still be found in organizations, their ways of operations, and policies. Among the most severe inequities involves gender discrimination against women and is implemented inside human resource (HR) processes. This is due to the fact that human resource practices, such as guidelines, judgments, and decisions, have an impact on the recruiting, training, salary, and promotions of women.
The statistical data can indicate the unfair treatment of women. For example, in the U.S., nearly four in ten working women, which is 42 %, report that they have suffered workplace discrimination due to their gender. A recent study of the Pew Research Center survey from 2020 results describes a wide range of personal encounters, from earning less than male colleagues for performing the same tasks to being overlooked in significant projects (Parker and Funk). To further investigate the issue of unfair treatment of individuals and correlate them to John Rawls’s theory of justice, a case study by Gauci et al. (2021) will be reviewed. This case study highlighted the most common types of workplace gender inequality encountered by female nurses and the practices that lead to gender-focused workplace discrimination.
According to the study, nursing is among the most gendered fields, and the worldwide situation seems to be identical. Women make up 88-95% of the nursing field in the United Kingdom, countries of North America, and Hong Kong (Gauci et al.). This field was traditionally seen as a low-status career for women in need of work. Nurses were seen as the doctor’s servants, and their employment was seen as a continuation of the care they had already provided as spouses and parents. As a result, gender inequality has been established as a critical factor in the working life of female nurse practitioners.
The given research focused on interviews with female participants and literature reviews. In this research, the sample size equaled 32 and was calculated using a quota sampling approach (Gauci et al.). Adopting a quota technique guaranteed that the groups chosen for interviews represented various experiences, including degrees, part-time and full-time work, job settings, nursing regions, and complex family conditions.
As a result, the findings of this study show that women in nursing face workplace gender bias. After accounting for variations in demographics, occupational characteristics, and degrees of authority, male nursing practitioners received $12,859 more than female nursing practitioners (Gauci et al.). Moreover, women who choose a nursing profession and try to balance parenthood and part-time employment with career breaks for parenting face additional challenges. The researchers stated that it is a fundamental right of women to work in surroundings protected from discrimination, where all staff members can thrive and develop professionally. Furthermore, women have the right to demand that the organizations for which they work implement gender-related processes and regulations effectively.
As for the ethical theory, Rawls presents his theory of justice as fairness in society. According to the philosopher, justice establishes the highest standard, the ethically ideal organization of societal structures (John Rawls). Rawls defined justice as fairness based on particular formulations of the notions that people are free and equal and that the whole nation should be fair (John Rawls). Rawls also contends that justice as fairness is preferable to utilitarianism, the dominant school in contemporary political thinking.
In Rawls’ inclusive liberalism, individuals connect as equals inside a social structure defined by fairness and cooperation rather than within today’s unfair status hierarchies. Significant political and economic disparities are frequently coupled with social background disparities, which encourage lower social status to be perceived as inferior both by themselves and other parties (John Rawls). This may elicit broad views of humility and obedience on the one hand and a desire to dominate and conceit on the other. These consequences of economic and social inequities can be significant problems, and the mindsets they foster can be terrible character flaws (John Rawls). An established position conferred by birth, gender, or ethnicity is particularly objectionable.
Moreover, justice as fairness seeks to explain a fair structure of a liberal community’s fundamental political and social establishments: the political system, the judicial framework, the economy, the family, the workplace, and others. Rawls refers to the order of these entities as a society’s basic structure. A basic system is a place of fairness since these organizations disseminate the primary benefits and harms of social relationships (John Rawls). This includes the questions of who will obtain social acceptance, fundamental rights, or opportunities to obtain what type of work, how earnings will be distributed, and so on.
As a result, the proponent of the theory of justice would view the case mentioned above study as a limitation of fundamental rights and an abuse of individuals’ fair treatment. As can be seen from the thoughts of John Rawls, the philosophers stress the necessity to avoid bias of gender, social status, and other factors (John Rawls). Therefore, the proponent would not condone the treatment of female nursing practitioners and unfairly distribute salaries. Moreover, the unfair status hierarchies might lead the philosopher to disagree with a preconceived belief that women should only be seen as mothers and wives. Lastly, Rawls believed it is unfair to determine who receives a specific type of work (John Rawls). Therefore, the behavior of those who view nurses as doctors’ servants is inappropriate and not just.
As for the blind spots, this research focused primarily on women’s experiences and gender inequality; a fuller understanding may have been developed if the material on male employees and prejudice was also investigated. A second weakness is that the research was done in a specific context and nation, and it should be noted that each country has specific legislation in place addressing workplace gender inequality.
Hence, the ethical theory in consideration was John Rawls’ theory of justice which involved the prescriptions for an adequate societal structure. According to Rawls, society should not consider social status, gender, age, or other factors when treating different individuals. In this respect, the analyzed case study that observed gender discrimination among nursing practitioners serves as an example. As per Rawls’ views, workplace conditions should be devoid of determining types of tasks depending on social factors and bias. Thus, unfairly distributed salaries, work tasks, and challenges of not being viewed as a professional should be abolished as per the theory of justice.
Works Cited
Gauci, Patricia, et al. “Women’s Experiences of Workplace Gender Discrimination in Nursing: An Integrative Review.” Collegian, vol. 29, no. 2, 2021.
“John Rawls.” Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, 2021. Web.
Parker, Kim, and Cary Funk. “Gender Discrimination Comes in Many Forms for Today’s Working Women.” Pew Research Center, 2020.