Exploring the Theory of Morality: Objective and Subjective Views

What makes an action right or wrong? For thousands of years, thinkers have wrestled with this question, and they have arrived at strikingly different answers. Some argue that certain qualities, such as honesty and compassion, are good everywhere and at all times. Others insist that the right choice depends entirely on the situation, the people involved, and the consequences that follow. This tension between fixed moral truths and flexible moral judgment sits at the heart of the theory of morality. Understanding both sides helps us think more clearly about the choices we make every day, from small personal decisions to large questions about justice and society.

The objective theory of good 🔗

The objective view of morality holds that some things are good in themselves, regardless of who is judging or what the circumstances are. According to this position, often called moral universalism or moral objectivism, a moral rule applies to everyone in a similar situation, no matter their culture, religion, or personal preference. If honesty is good, it is good for all people, in all places, at all times. This is not a matter of opinion but of moral fact.

This tradition runs deep in philosophy. Aristotle gave a central place to virtues such as courage, justice, prudence, and temperance, treating them as fixed habits that lead to a good life. In this framework, a virtue like honesty is not valuable because it produces a pleasant outcome in a particular case. It is valuable in its own right. The objective theory therefore treats moral principles much like mathematical truths: they exist independently of human wishes, and our task is to discover and follow them rather than invent them.

Why fixed virtues feel reliable 🔗

One reason the objective view has endured is that it offers clarity and stability. When a principle such as “do not lie” or “do not harm the innocent” holds without exception, people know where they stand. A doctor, a judge, or an ordinary citizen can rely on shared standards rather than negotiating right and wrong from scratch in every encounter. This is also why many legal and human rights systems are built on the idea that certain protections are universal. The Universal Declaration of Human Rights rests on the claim that human dignity and basic freedoms belong to every person everywhere, not merely to those whose societies happen to grant them.

The limits of a fixed code 🔗

The objective view also faces a serious challenge. Real life produces situations where two firm rules collide. Telling the truth is good, but what if a lie would save an innocent person from a violent attacker? Keeping a promise is good, but what if keeping it would cause great harm? A rigid moral code can struggle to handle these conflicts, because it offers little guidance on which principle should yield when two of them clash. Critics argue that treating moral rules as absolute can turn ethics into a checklist, where people follow the letter of a rule while ignoring the suffering in front of them.

Subjective and situational ethics 🔗

The alternative tradition responds to exactly this problem. Instead of applying a fixed rule to every case, it argues that moral choices should adapt to circumstances. The best known version of this approach is situation ethics, developed by the American theologian Joseph Fletcher in the 1960s. Fletcher rejected both rigid moral absolutism, which insists on unbreakable universal rules, and complete moral relativism, which claims there are no real moral principles at all. He proposed a middle path.

For Fletcher, the only thing that is good in itself is love, understood as genuine concern for the wellbeing of others. Every other rule becomes a servant of that goal. An action is right if it produces the most loving and caring outcome in a given situation, even if it means setting aside a conventional rule. This is why situational ethics weighs the particular context of an act rather than judging it only against a fixed standard. The people involved, the likely consequences, and the motives behind the action all matter.

The core principles of situational thinking 🔗

Situation ethics is usually described through a few guiding ideas. Relativism means approaching each situation flexibly and avoiding words like “never” and “always,” because the right response can change with circumstances. Pragmatism means a moral choice should actually work in practice and produce a good result, not merely satisfy a rule on paper. Personalism places people at the centre, asking “who will be helped?” rather than “what does the rule demand?” Together these principles treat laws and norms as tools that serve human needs, not as commands that humans exist to obey.

It is important to see that Fletcher did not abandon morality. He famously described his view as relativising the absolute rather than absolutising the relative. In other words, an absolute rule such as “do not kill” becomes relative to the goal of compassion, but not every choice can be justified. Only choices that genuinely serve the wellbeing of people pass the test. This keeps situational ethics distinct from a view in which anything goes.

The risks of flexibility 🔗

Critics of the situational approach worry that it gives individuals too much room to rationalise their own preferences. If each person decides what counts as the most caring outcome, morality can drift toward a position where every person becomes their own judge and shared standards collapse. There is also the practical difficulty that we rarely know all the consequences of our actions in advance. A choice that seems compassionate in the moment may cause harm later. These concerns explain why many thinkers do not want to give up objective principles entirely, even as they accept that context matters.

Freedom and autonomy in moral choices 🔗

Between the firmness of objective rules and the flexibility of situational judgment lies a third crucial idea: moral freedom. A choice has moral worth only when it is freely made. If someone behaves well merely because they fear punishment or follow orders without thought, we hesitate to call it genuine virtue. True morality seems to require that a person understands a principle, accepts it, and acts on it by their own reasoning.

The philosopher Immanuel Kant placed this idea of autonomy at the centre of his moral theory. For Kant, to be autonomous is to give the moral law to oneself through reason, rather than having it imposed from outside. He argued that a binding moral principle is not only consistent with freedom of the will but actually requires it. This is a striking combination. Kant defended universal moral laws, yet he insisted that we are, in a real sense, the authors of those laws when we recognise them through our own rational thought.

Self-rule, not doing whatever one wants 🔗

Kant’s notion of freedom is easy to misunderstand. It does not mean the liberty to do whatever one feels like at any moment. His idea of freedom differs from simply acting on desire. For Kant, a person who is driven only by impulse is not truly free, because their desires are controlling them. Real freedom lies in acting from reason, in choosing principles that one could rationally want everyone to follow. In this view, autonomy and responsibility are two sides of the same coin. To be free is to be accountable for the principles one lives by.

Personal responsibility within a shared society 🔗

This balance matters because no person makes moral choices in isolation. Our decisions affect families, communities, and the wider society. The challenge is to respect individual freedom while recognising that this freedom carries social responsibility. A mature moral outlook allows a person to make their own choices, but it also asks them to consider how those choices shape the lives of others. Freedom without responsibility slides into selfishness, while rules imposed without freedom produce mere obedience rather than genuine ethics.

Where the two views meet: lessons from Gandhi 🔗

The thought of Mahatma Gandhi offers a powerful example of how these ideas can come together. Gandhi held truth and non-violence as the two cardinal principles of his life. Yet his understanding of truth carried two layers. There was the relative truth of honesty in word and deed, and the absolute truth that he equated with ultimate reality. This shows a man committed to a universal moral ideal while remaining humble about how fully any individual can grasp it.

That humility had real consequences. Gandhi believed that no individual possesses absolute truth, which is why he was always willing to learn and to admit error. At the same time, he treated non-violence, or ahimsa, as a firm principle that could not be set aside for convenience. His method of satyagraha, or truth-force, combined an objective commitment to non-violence with a deeply personal, freely chosen discipline. When violence broke out during a major campaign, he called the whole movement off, even at great political cost, because the principle mattered more than the immediate gain. Gandhi’s life suggests that a person can hold firm moral values while still respecting freedom, context, and the dignity of opponents.

Bringing the theories together 🔗

The objective theory reminds us that some values are worth defending everywhere, that fairness, honesty, and compassion are not mere matters of taste. The situational view reminds us that wisdom lies in applying those values thoughtfully, with attention to real people and real consequences. The idea of autonomy reminds us that morality only becomes our own when we choose it freely and accept responsibility for it. Rather than picking one theory and discarding the rest, many thoughtful people draw on all three. They hold certain principles as genuinely important, apply them with care to each situation, and take ownership of their choices as free and responsible individuals.

This blended approach reflects how ethical life actually works. We rely on stable commitments to keep us steady, on practical judgment to handle complexity, and on personal freedom to make our moral life genuinely ours rather than something handed down or enforced.

What do you think? When a firm principle you believe in clashes with what seems like the most compassionate choice in a particular situation, which one should guide your action, and how would you decide? Can a person be genuinely moral if they follow good rules only out of habit or fear rather than free, reasoned choice?

References

1. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moral_universalism
2. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_ethics
3. https://www.un.org/en/about-us/universal-declaration-of-human-rights
4. https://www.britannica.com/topic/situation-ethics
5. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Situational_ethics
6. https://iep.utm.edu/kantview/
7. https://corporatefinanceinstitute.com/resources/esg/kantian-ethics/
8. https://www.ijrar.org/papers/IJRAR19D3832.pdf
9. https://www.nimbusias.com/gandhian-thought-truth-and-non-violence-satyagraha-end-and-means-religion-and-politics/