The world worth making: Implementing care aesthetics to boost well-being

Abstract

In treating care as a moral imperative, the ethics of care aims for normativity, yet its normativity is thrown into jeopardy by the fact that standards of care vary dramatically among care-givers. To counter the limitations of care ethics, I propose care aesthetics, whose success reflects measurable metrics. Rooted in ameliorative practices, care aesthetics stresses the well-being of the cared-for, whereby flourishing entails both capacity and access. Thus, care aesthetics and care ethics are distinct, since the former treats the well-being of the cared-for as proof of the “sign that our caring has been received”. To demonstrate the measurable features of well-being, I offer two concrete examples: one proposed by landscape architect Joan Iversson Nassauer and another focused on curatorial practice (curare is Latin for care). To explain why philosophers have overlooked the role of well-being in signalling the success of care, I describe how concepts such as balance, harmony, order and unity, which were originally characterised as material, became immaterial aesthetic concepts by the 20th Century. I then circle back to connect well-being to epistemology and ethics, before discussing how the goal to enhance the well-being of cared-fors and care-givers alike stands to enrich quotidian experiences.