Children, Paternalism and the Development of Autonomy

This paper addresses the issue of paternalism in child-rearing. Since the parent–child relationship seems to be the linguistic source of the concept, one may be tempted to assume that raising a child represents a particularly appropriate sphere for paternalism. The parent–child relationship is gener...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Ethical theory and moral practice
Main Author: Mullin, Amy (Author)
Format: Electronic Article
Language:English
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Published: Springer Science + Business Media B. V 2014
In: Ethical theory and moral practice
Year: 2014, Volume: 17, Issue: 3, Pages: 413-426
Further subjects:B Autonomy-oriented paternalism
B Paternalism
B Parent–child relationship
B Children
B Autonomy
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Summary:This paper addresses the issue of paternalism in child-rearing. Since the parent–child relationship seems to be the linguistic source of the concept, one may be tempted to assume that raising a child represents a particularly appropriate sphere for paternalism. The parent–child relationship is generally understood as a relationship that is supposed to promote the development and autonomy-formation of the child, so that the apparent source of the concept is a form of autonomy-oriented paternalism. Far from taking paternalism to be overtly unproblematic in such paradigmatic, pedagogical settings, this article analyzes how an effort should be made to understand a child’s capacities and which standards parents should be held to when deciding whether interference truly serves the child’s interests.
ISSN:1572-8447
Contains:Enthalten in: Ethical theory and moral practice
Persistent identifiers:DOI: 10.1007/s10677-013-9453-0