ABSTRACT
A related issue facing the new paradigms in bioethics is the problem of identifying the "we" that is the subject of moral consensus and devising ways of mediating conflicts between competing communities of inquiry and meaning. The critiques of "applied ethics" and principlism by the partisans of casuistry and narrative ethics have further expanded the importance and role of case studies. The renaissance of casuistry, or case-based reasoning, in practical ethics has stressed the pivotal role of cases while de-emphasizing the role of theory and routinized appeals to "the principles of bioethics." The critique of deductivism, endorsed by reformed principlists and casuists alike, assigns an important role to cases in the dialectic of reflective equilibrium. Although a precarious consensus has emerged on a surprising number of bioethical issues, one must be alert to the fact that a heightened sensitivity to social and cultural particularity will subvert consensus rather than foster it.
