Abstract
Physiotherapists in South Africa are often confronted with ethicalissues, which arise from the multi-cultural nature of the society. This paper discusses the ethical theory of cultural relativism in an attempt to highlight the complexities of making moral judgements across cultural, ethnic and religious boundaries.
Highlights
Physiotherapy students and graduates in South Africa are faced with challenges to ethical* practice on a daily basis
Should physiotherapists guard against imposing their own cultural and religious norms on their expectations of patient/client behaviour? Are all cultural viewpoints valid? Is it the duty of the therapist to warn against unsafe cultural practices or is this unethical? These are not easy questions to answer, as South Africa emerges from the apartheid era in which a euro-centric cultural, religious and social viewpoint was regarded by the authorities as being the basis of moral behaviour
An ethical theory of relevance to this debate is that of cultural relativism
Summary
Physiotherapy students and graduates in South Africa are faced with challenges to ethical* practice on a daily basis. Relativism is a theory that arises from the observation that people within different cultural contexts appear to regard different actions as being morally acceptable and desirable behaviour. The theory of cultural relativism states that there are no absolute, morally acceptable or unacceptable actions but that all actions can only be judged from the social context within which they take place.
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