Lawrence Kohlberg Research Articles

Julgamento moral sobre pena de morte e redução da maioridade penal

O objetivo principal deste trabalho foi investigar o julgamento moral de estudantes do ensino médio e de licenciaturas sobre pena de morte e redução da maioridade penal. Para tanto, utilizou-se como suporte teórico e empírico a tipologia do desenvolvimento moral de Lawrence Kohlberg. Participaram deste estudo 200 estudantes que responderam, além de uma lista que solicitava informações de alguns dos seus dados biodemográficos, a questões relacionadas à pena de morte e à redução da maioridade penal. De um modo geral, os participantes opinaram favoravelmente pela pena de morte e pela redução da maioridade penal, e, em defesa de suas opiniões, utilizaram, sobretudo, argumentos típicos dos estágios hierarquicamente inferiores da tipologia kohlberguiana, havendo, contudo, algumas diferenças entre as respostas em função do grau de escolaridade. Esses resultados foram discutidos com base na teoria kohlberguiana e em estudos empíricos que tratam dos temas pena de morte e redução da maioridade penal.

Moral reasoning in the early years: Age and gender patterns amongst young children in South Africa

Drawing on the work of Carol Gilligan (1982) and Lawrence Kohlberg (1969) the study sought to examine children.s moral reasoning about situations involving conflicts and how they would resolve them. It also explored whether children.s choice of moral orientation varied across individual factors such as age and gender. The study was conducted at a primary school in a working class suburb in THE province of KwaZulu-Natal. The participants in the study were a group of 72 grade one and two students. They were randomly selected stratified by age (6, 7 and 8 year olds) and gender. The children were required to respond to three scenarios depicting real life moral dilemmas. A key finding was that children.s responses across gender and age reflected more of a care than a justice orientation. Across age ranges boys. responses reflected more of a care orientation than a justice orientation which is contrary to Kohlberg.s view. Girls. responses reflected a greater care orientation than a justice orientation, as found in studies by Gilligan.

Unite the Pair so Long Disjoined: Justice and Empathy in Moral Development Theory

The paper provides an analysis of moral development theory developed by Jean Piaget and Lawrence Kohlberg. The paper explores the primary critiques of Kohlberg's moral development theory, including justice (the right) as the primary motivation for morality. The paper examines the research of Martin Hoffman's view of empathy (the good) as the primary motivation for morality. John Gibbs takes Hoffman's research a step further by advocating that the primary motivation for morality is co-primary (the right and the good). A Wesleyan view of moral psychology is developed by following Charles Wesley's famous stanza, “Unite the pair so long Disjoined: Knowledge and vital piety.” This statement is a framework to discuss how empathy and justice become the primary motivation for moral development. The paper argues for a Wesleyan view of morality that includes the transformation of the human emotions and affections by the “means of grace” as a basis for moral development. The paper concludes by exploring how congregations can be a means of grace in shaping and forming moral persons.

From Lawrence Kohlberg’s Approach to Moral Education by F. Clark Power, Ann Higgins, and Lawrence Kohlberg, with Judy Codding (1989)

Previous articleNext article No AccessFrom the ArchivesFrom Lawrence Kohlberg’s Approach to Moral Education by F. Clark Power, Ann Higgins, and Lawrence Kohlberg, with Judy Codding (1989)*PDFPDF PLUSFull Text Add to favoritesDownload CitationTrack CitationsPermissionsReprints Share onFacebookTwitterLinkedInRedditEmail SectionsMoreDetailsFiguresReferencesCited by Schools Volume 8, Number 1Spring 2011 Published in association with the Francis W. Parker School, Chicago Article DOIhttps://doi.org/10.1086/659438 Views: 393Total views on this site Citations: 1Citations are reported from Crossref PDF download Crossref reports the following articles citing this article:Benjamin V. Madison The Emperor Has No Clothes, But Does Anyone Really Care? How Law Schools are Failing to Develop Students' Professional Identities and Practical Judgment, SSRN Electronic Journal (Jan 2014).https://doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.2414015

The Deep Roots of the Fairness Committee in Kohlberg’s Moral Development Theory

AbstractEarlier essays in this symposium describe Restorative Justice processes in schools, referred to in our school as a Fairness Committee. Implementing these collaborative, restorative processes does not come without challenges. This essay will explore some of the historical and theoretical roots of the Fairness Committee in Lawrence Kohlberg’s work on moral development, share some critiques of Kohlberg’s work, and briefly describe Kohlberg’s initial efforts to implement his theories on moral development in schools. Finally, this essay concludes with some reflections on the challenges that come with implementing a Fairness Committee in a public school setting and some tips for beginning a Restorative Justice/Fairness Committee in your school community.

Framing the Oxymoron: A New Paradigm for Intelligence Ethics

Despite some arguments to the contrary, I argue that because ethics benefit, rather than harm, the intelligence profession they should be considered an inherent part of intelligence studies. The literature largely presents intelligence ethics as a two-sided debate between teleologists and deontologists. I propose that ethical justifications should instead be considered along a progressive spectrum drawn from the work of moral psychologist Lawrence Kohlberg. Such a spectrum has numerous applications for gauging the moral arguments of individual practitioners of intelligence. I illustrate this using the dilemma of targeted political assassination – first in a hypothetical context, and finally using examples from the investigations of the 1975 Church Committee.

The African ethic of Ubuntu/Botho: implications for research on morality

In this article we provide a theoretical reconstruction of sub‐Saharan ethics that we argue is a strong competitor to typical Western approaches to morality. According to our African moral theory, actions are right roughly insofar as they are a matter of living harmoniously with others or honouring communal relationships. After spelling out this ethic, we apply it to several issues in both normative and empirical research into morality. With regard to normative research, we compare and contrast this African moral theory with utilitarianism and Kantianism in the context of several practical issues. With regard to empirical research, we compare and contrast our sub‐Saharan ethic with several of Lawrence Kohlberg’s views on the nature of morality. Our aim is to highlight respects in which the African approach provides a unitary foundation for a variety of normative and empirical conclusions that are serious alternatives to dominant Western views.

Sentimentalist moral education

Care ethics, and moral sentimentalism more generally, have not developed a picture of moral education that is comparable in scope or depth to the rationalist/Kantian/Rawlsian account of moral education that has been offered by Lawrence Kohlberg. But it is possible to do so if one borrows from the work of Martin Hoffman and makes systematic use of Hume’s earlier sentimentalist ideas. Kohlberg and Rawls offer accounts of moral learning that leave moral motivation largely unexplained or mysterious, but an emphasis on the psychology of empathy can help us to better understand both the content of our morality and the ways in which children and adults can become and be morally motivated. Parents can in a number of ways evoke and strengthen children’s empathic moral tendencies, and such processes can also occur and need to occur in schools and later on in life. In addition, a sentimentalist understanding of the meaning of moral terms can show how moral rules, principles, and injunctions can strongly reinforce the sorts of empathic/moral tendencies that are at least initially based in other elements of human psychology.

DOES ETHICAL THEORY HAVE A PLACE IN POST‐KOHLBERGIAN MORAL PSYCHOLOGY?

Philosophers tend to assume that theoretical frameworks in psychology suffer from conceptual confusion and that any influence that philosophy might have on psychology should be positive. Going against this grain, Dan Lapsley and Darcia Narváez attribute the Kohlbergian paradigm's current state of marginalization within psychology to Lawrence Kohlberg's use of ethical theory in his model of cognitive moral development. Post‐Kohlbergian conceptions of moral psychology, they advance, should be wary of theoretical constructs derived from folk morality, refuse philosophical starting points, and seek integration with literatures in psychology, not philosophy. In this essay, Bruce Maxwell considers and rejects Lapsley and Narváez's diagnosis. The Kohlbergian paradigm's restricted conception of the moral domain is the result of a selective reading of one tendency in ethical theorizing (Kantianism). The idea that moral psychology may find shelter from normative criticism by avoiding ethics‐derived models overlooks the deeper continuity between “ethical theory” and “psychological theory.” The confusion and barrenness of psychology is not to be explained by calling it a “young science”; its state is not comparable with that of physics, for instance, in its beginnings. (Rather with that of certain branches of mathematics. Set theory.) For in psychology there are experimental methods and conceptual confusion. (As in the other case conceptual confusion and methods of proof.)The existence of the experimental method makes us think we have the means of solving the problems which trouble us; though problem and method pass one another by.1

From self interest to public interest: Promoting higher levels of business ethics

While there has been widescale acknowledgement of the importance of business ethics, it is evident that many businesses still conduct themselves unethically. This paper adapts Lawrence Kohlberg’s study on moral development to provide insight into the different levels of impact that self interest and public interest may have on promoting higher levels of business ethics. By drawing on Kohlberg’s stages of moral development, an attempt is made to show the importance of public interest in promoting higher levels of business ethics. Attention is devoted to the capacity of businesses driven by public interest over self interest in curbing unethical conduct. While some may argue that businesses are notably motivated by self interest, there is also evidence that businesses also act for moral purposes primarily out of concern for the public. It is suggested that at stage 2 of the preconventional level of cognitive moral development which can be associated with self interest, business ethics is promoted at a lower level. However, at stage 4 of the conventional level which can be associated with public interest, business ethics is promoted at a higher level.

The Potential Value of the Adoption of an Aristotelian-Centred Communitarian Vocabulary: Facilitating a Character Turn

This article sought to encourage the adoption of novel ethical approaches at the interstice between political and international relations (IR) theory, and character-based approaches in particular. It was argued that though the Fourth Debate has encouraged debate about the ethics of IR theory, surprisingly, character-based approaches have not been discussed, with communitarian and cosmopolitan performative ethics maintaining a conceptual hegemony. The concept of Jus in Bello was nominated for deconstruction since it has traditionally been understood cosmopolitan or communitarian manner based on performative ethic. An Aristotelian vocabulary was adopted in order to deconstruct the concept of Jus in Bello, with Jonathan Haidt's moral psychology, Lawrence Kohlberg's moral development psychology, Immanuel Kant's ethics, and social contract theory all being used to supplement the nominated Aristotelian reading of Jus in Bello. It was concluded that an Aristotelian reading of Jus in Bello is a viable alternative to and hence an Aristotelian vocabulary could be adopted when attempting to understand certain concepts and phenomena at the interstice between political and IR theory.

Juízo e ação moral: desafios teóricos em psicologia

O presente artigo apresenta e discute a polêmica, no campo da psicologia moral, sobre as relações entre juízo e ação. Teorias de tradição racionalista e estruturalista, como as de Piaget e Kohlberg, afirmam uma relação de continuidade entre juízo e ação moral e, ao mesmo tempo, lançam pontos de discussão sobre a complexidade envolvida no tema. Por outro lado, novas frentes de trabalho sugerem a integração de outros elementos (a cultura, a afetividade e o self), além das estruturas que podem compor um referencial com o qual se evidenciem as relações entre os aspectos envolvidos nas condutas morais. Por fim, apesar das críticas acenarem com caminhos promissores na pesquisa sobre o juízo e a ação moral, ainda existem limites na construção de referenciais teóricos e metodológicos que articulem diferentes perspectivas de análise psicológica da moralidade.

Taking development seriously: critique of the 2008 JME Special Issue on moral functioning

This essay comments on articles comprising a Journal of Moral Education Special Issue (September, 2008, 37[3]). The issue was intended to honour the 50th anniversary of Lawrence Kohlberg’s doctoral dissertation and his subsequent impact on the field of moral development and education. The articles were characterised by the Issue editor (Don Collins Reed) as providing a ‘look forward’ from Kohlberg’s work toward a more comprehensive or integrated model of moral functioning. Prominent were culturally pluralist and biologically‐based themes, such as cultural learning; expert skill; culturally shaped and neurobiologically‐based predispositions or intuitions; and moral self‐relevance or centrality. Inadequately represented, however, was Kohlberg’s (and Piaget’s) key concept of development as the construction of a deeper or more adequate understanding not reducible to particular socialisation practices or cultural contexts. Also neglected were related cognitive‐developmental themes, along with supportive evidence. Robert Coles’ account of a sudden rescue is used as a heuristic to depict Piaget’s/Kohlberg’s approach to the development of moral functioning. We conclude that, insofar as the Special Issue does not take development seriously, it moves us not forward but, instead, back to the problems of moral relativism and moral paralysis that Kohlberg sought to redress from the start of his work more than 50 years ago.

Assessing the “Tone at the Top”: The Moral Reasoning of CEOs in the Automobile Industry

Relying on an expanded view of leadership and the moral reasoning framework developed by Lawrence Kohlberg (1981), this study explores the moral reasoning of the chief executive officers at the 11 largest automobile manufacturers in the world. Using the CEOs’ letter to their stakeholders found in the organizations’ annual social responsibility reports, the CEOs’ moral reasoning is compared to other managers’ moral reasoning, and the moral reasoning exhibited within the CEO group is analyzed for differences due to regional location. Contrary to conventional understanding based on prior research, the CEOs in our sample did not exhibit moral reasoning at a higher level than a cross section of managers but there were differences within the sample of CEOs when looking at nationality. Implications of these results for CEOs, managers, academics, and others are explored.

Complex Identities

In 1974, Herbert Marcuse claimed that Women's Liberation Movement was the most important and potentially most radical political movement that we have1 because of its double task: on one hand, full social, economic, and cultural equality; on other hand, something even more ambitious and important: re-shaping of society according to a different reality principle than one operating in capitalist world, based on historically labeled female characteristics revolutionary potential of which was beginning in those years to become visible. From that second-wave feminism came a critical thrust, which is still today very profitable-although in recent years a third-wave feminism has appeared, as clearly emerges from work of such authors as Wendy McElroy2 or Nadine Strossen3-bringing a whole range of new disciplines and new approaches to light, articulated around specific gender-related issues. Nonetheless, it is not easy to find a common ground shared by all these new perspectives, making it particularly clear that, today, we should not talk about feminism, rather about different feminisms. In what follows, I will focus on one of these feminist perspectives, social-political tradition reference point of which can be traced back to theoretical constellation of Hegel-Marx-Critical Theory. I will first take into consideration debate between feminist theorists and Jurgen Habermas about his model of communicative rationality, particularly referring to main objections raised through a gender point of view. Second, I will analyze Seyla Benhabib's position, since in her work both perspectives are combined in order to achieve an adequate social theory with strong critical potential. Gender Issues: Criticizing Habermas The most common position towards Habermas within feminist social-political theory is to some extent ambivalent. On one hand, some aspects of Habermas's perspective are seen as still connected to an essentially patriarchal4 and male-oriented underlying point of view; on other hand, main features of communicative rationality are taken to be best approach to rule out these limiting premises. It seems as though many feminist theorists try to use Habermas contra Habermas, i.e., to develop main features of his theory in a way that will leave out all those aspects which could have discriminatory consequences from a gender point of view.5 This is what could be called, using Lisa McLaughlin's words, the feminist project of revising Habermasian public sphere.6 Although not shared by every kind of feminist approach, it is possible to identify basically four main critical objections that have been raised against Habermas's perspective.7 The first critical direction is related to Habermas's position within KohlbergGilligan debate. As is well known, Lawrence Kohlberg proposes a theory of different stages of moral reasoning which puts at highest level of development ability to formulate a moral judgment solely on purely formal, universalistic grounds, excluding from proper moral domain every argument connected with particular contexts. The authentic moral judgment has an universalizable nature, depending only on formal features, it is free from beliefs and values existing in a given society. Carol Gilligan emphasizes gender-discrimination character of Kohlberg's approach: in her view, reference standards he chooses give more relevance to typical male moral reasoning models, based on such concepts as and right, in comparison to other female models, more dependent on ideas of care and responsibility. The female moral point of view is oriented, in Gilligan's view, toward a greater consideration of context, situatedness of individual caught in a web of different relations which call for a particular and specific consideration. Therefore, Gilligan proposes to balance male ethics of justice and its universalistic tendencies with a female ethics of care, more sensible to concrete context situations. …

The Just Community approach to moral education: system change or individual change?

This article focuses on the development of, and new theorising about, a strong democracy education intervention, the Just Community approach. Three questions frame the discussion: (1) Does democracy education change children and adolescents or do students in these programs change their schools, or is there a dynamic interaction over time? (2) How can democracy be ‘learned’? How can the concept of democracy be most thoroughly learned and how can democratic problem‐solving skills best be acquired? (3) How can we optimise the chances that the knowledge and skills learned will motivate future active citizenship? The article begins with a brief history of the Just Community approach, a description of the original developmental model created by Lawrence Kohlberg and collaborators and some variation in more recent European Just Community programs. In a discussion of controversial and difficult issues democracy education may face, the second question takes centre stage and several structural aspects are offered that should be included in such efforts to maximise their effectiveness. In the remainder of the article new perspectives coming from Europe are introduced. Some additional pathways to the Just Community approach and their justifications, which have not played a significant role in the theory and practice of the ‘traditional’ model but can add to its strengths, are identified. Finally, the idea of ‘trusting in advance’ is introduced as critical for well‐functioning educational democracies.

Shiloh in Fiction

On the banks of the Tennessee River, on the 6th and 7th of April 1862, roughly 3,500 men from Union and Confederate armies died in battle, on a field that took the name Shiloh from a log church near the settlement of Pittsburg Landing. It was the bloodiest encounter of the Civil War so far. Gone was the romantic innocence of Rebs and Yanks who had marched off to war in 1861, says historian James McPherson (413). Chronicler James McDonough calls the battle colorful, dramatic, blundering, and confused in his book Shiloh, subtitled In Hell before Night (v). For the untried armies, Shiloh was a profoundly disorienting experience, and Americans have been trying to get their bearings ever since. Historical narration, says theorist Jorn Rusen, the general of orienting practical life in time by mobilizing the memory of experience, by developing a concept of continuity and by stabilizing identity (12). But this fundamental practical function (18) of telling stories about the past, Rusen warns, is not always well appreciated by professional academic historians. To the extent that academic historians concern themselves mainly with methodological and intradisciplinary issues, they cede their primary of orientation in history to popular historians-or, just as often, to popular novelists. Rusen's typology of historical narration can be illustrated vividly with examples from fictional narratives of the April 1862 battle of Shiloh. Such an illustration can promote an understanding of what historical novelists do when they set out to write fictions that make a claim to the historian's orienting function. Shiloh is a landmark that writers and readers use to orient themselves to the American Civil War and its continued salience in American temporal experience. In History: Narration-Interpretation - Orientation, Rusen distinguishes four types of historical narration. Traditional narrative, the first, repeats origin stories in order to affirm the permanence of a culture's dispensations. Exemplary narrative, the second, draws on the past to guide future conduct; we learn wise courses and eschew foolish or vicious ones by looking to past events. Critical narrative, the third, identifies problems in traditional or exemplary accounts, revising them to draw contrarian conclusions and to deny given patterns of identity (12). Genetical narrative, the fourth, seeks to understand how the process of forming memories of the past has shaped those memories. In genetical narratives, the past is always a site of negotiation; history is no longer an eternal verity, an object lesson, or even a locus for revision, but a process of formation and reformation. For Rusen, these four types of narration are grounded in anthropological universals and serve the necessary social functions of affirmation, regularity, negation, transformation, respectively (12). Broadly speaking, each of the four types of historical narration gives way to the next in both cultural phylogeny and individual ontogeny. Cultures develop myths, then teaching stories, then critical consciousness, and then critical self-consciousness about the history-making process. Thus, a child first learns traditions, then their application as lessons, then to critically evaluate those traditions and lessons, and then to analyze how those traditions, lessons, and critiques emerge in a dynamic process. Rusen speculates that the individual's acquisition of these narrative types in the process of development may be parallel to the acquisition of cognitive abilities or moral abilities, as formulated by Jean Piaget and Lawrence Kohlberg (Rusen 17-18). The interplay of phylogeny and ontogeny means that each of the four types of narration is continuously in practice. Because of the need to teach children or socialize assimilants, cultures never outgrow traditional or exemplary narratives. There were past eras where only traditional narrative was practiced, or only traditional plus exemplary narrative. …

Adolescent Psychological Development: A Review

1. Eric Hazen, MD* 2. Steven Schlozman, MD† 3. Eugene Beresin, MD‡ 1. *Instructor in Psychiatry, Harvard Medical School, Boston, Mass 2. †Assistant Professor of Psychiatry, Harvard Medical School, Boston, Mass 3. ‡Professor of Psychiatry, Harvard Medical School, Boston, Mass After reading this article, readers should be able to: 1. Discuss the processes of physical, emotional, social, cognitive, and moral development in adolescence. 2. Know the contributions of major developmental theorists, including Erik Erikson, Jean Piaget, and Lawrence Kohlberg, to the understanding of adolescent development. 3. Describe the relationship between adolescent behavior and recent findings from studies of brain development. 4. Identify the primary tasks of adolescent development. Adolescent patients present a unique set of challenges to pediatricians. A polite, compliant child can appear to transform into a surly, rebellious teen before a doctor's eyes. Adolescence can be a tumultuous time, even when it is unfolding in a healthy manner. For this reason, and because there is so much individual variation in adolescent development, it can be particularly challenging to determine what is “normal” in adolescent development. Although previously believed to be uniformly a time of turmoil, this view has not been substantiated by large-scale studies. (1) Most teenagers progress through this period of life with few obvious behavioral problems. However, a sound and trusting doctor-patient relationship is required to appreciate the inner struggles many adolescents endure. A working understanding of the developmental tasks of adolescence and the processes through which they are achieved provides the best tool for a pediatrician in evaluating an adolescent's development. Any discussion of adolescent development should include a definition of adolescence itself. Determining the exact onset and conclusion of adolescent development can be difficult, with complex biologic, psychological, and social paradigms all playing roles. Cultural factors also must be considered in determining the developmental norms of adolescence. Normal development from one cultural perspective may appear aberrant when viewed through the lens of another culture, and in an increasingly multicultural society, such considerations are especially important. For example, an Asian youth who begins to question his parents’ values may …

Harry Potter's Provocative Moral World: Is There a Place for Good and Evil in Moral Education?

ALTHOUGH I count myself among many educators who relish Harry Potter series, I sometimes wonder if we should not think more about controversial implications of moral world J. K. Rowling created. While we applaud way series motivates kids to read, perhaps we should also contemplate how its moral outlook differs from moral reality of most public schools in critical ways. In this respect, public educators should be challenged by Rowling's provocative moral world, but they should also think about how to borrow something from it that would embolden moral education they provide. PUBLIC SCHOOLS WITHOUT GOOD AND EVIL? In a challenging critique of moral education in public schools, James Davison Hunter argues that unspoken imperative of all moral education is to teach only those virtues, principles, and other moral teachings about which there is essentially no disagreement in American society. (1) Hunter claims that almost every major form of moral education in public schools falls prey to this quest for inclusiveness. psychological approaches championed by Lawrence Kohlberg, recent forms of character education, and communitarian alternatives recommended by Amitai Etzioni are all subject to Hunter's critique. The effort to affirm an inclusive morality, Hunter argues, reduces morality to thinnest of platitudes, severed from social, historical, and cultural encumbrances that make it concrete and ultimately compelling. (2) Words such as and become obsolete in light of this strategy, and instead moral education establishment replaces them with words like prosocial. By inventing a new vocabulary, Hunter maintains, the moral education establishment literally creates a new way of seeing reality. Altogether, we end up epistemologically and linguistically with a moral cosmology that is beyond good and (emphasis in original). (3) If Hunter accurately represents moral cosmology presented in theories, curricula, and actual lessons of moral education--and I believe in many respects he does--public educators should be concerned about this subtle form of epistemological and linguistic bias. After all, public schools should show fairness to diverse visions of good life and not merely replace them with neutered and safe substitutes. In addition, sterile and safe substitutes, as Hunter points out, may be ineffective and contribute to narcissism among young people and adults. Hunter would no doubt find studies confirming growing narcissism among college students unsurprising. (4) I would also suggest that part of reason these forms of moral education may be ineffective is that a moral education without good and evil becomes boring. HARRY POTTER'S EXCITING MORAL WORLD It is fascinating to compare moral world presented to public school students with exciting moral world presented in Harry Potter books. Clearly, one attraction of Potter series is that it enlists students on side of good in a cosmic battle against evil. Within Potter story, this struggle between good and evil gives meaning and excitement to everything that happens at school. In Sorcerer's Stone, Hermione saves Ron, Harry, and herself from a nasty encounter with a plant called devil's snare through her knowledge of spells. As Ron quips after encounter, Lucky you pay attention in Herbology, Hermione. (5) What Harry learns in Quidditch pays dividends in his efforts to defeat Voldemort. Thus Rowling provides a clear connection between learning and school activities and a larger moral struggle, something that American public school students may not always perceive. In wizarding world, what one learns and experiences at school can actually help in battle between good and evil. battle between good and evil not only provides a larger reason for learning, but it also allows us to make sense of Harry's moral choices. …

Development of moral motivation from childhood to early adulthood1

Luhmann, a prominent exponent of social systems theory, maintains that in modern, functionally differentiated societies morality is neither possible nor necessary. Against this claim it is argued that democracies want citizens with moral motivation. In contrast to Kohlberg, moral motivation is conceptualised as independent of stage of moral development, i.e. of the complexity of sociocognitive reasoning capacity. It is defined as willingness to do what one knows to be right even if that entails personal costs. This definition agrees with children's understanding. Moral motivation is assessed using emotion attributions. As empirically demonstrated, emotions indicate value commitments and action dispositions and this allows a motivational interpretation of the ‘happy victimiser phenomenon’, i.e. younger children's tendency to expect wrongdoers to feel good. Drawing on a longitudinal study, the development of moral motivation from childhood to early adulthood is described. There is a steady increase in sample means, yet individual trajectories vary widely. Possible determinants as well as some educational implications are briefly discussed. 1. This is the text of the 19th Lawrence Kohlberg Memorial Lecture presented at the 32nd annual conference of the Association for Moral Education, University of Fribourg, Switzerland, 6 July 2006.