ABSTRACT
This chapter considers two quite different approaches to moral reasoning: examining a framework of fundamental rights; and exploring the idea of ethics as being about virtue—being the right kind of person—rather than it being primarily about specific decision-making. According to a rights-based theory, the essence of morality is a set of moral rights that persons have. For the rights-based theorist moral evaluation centers on whether certain actions conform to the rules of interaction prescribed by the rights of the individuals involved. An important strength of these rights-based ethical theories is that they provide for the moral rights of the individual apart from the whims of society. Such rights do not depend upon the promotion of society's happiness since using pleasure as the main criterion could create an unstable societal foundation. Virtues are admirable traits of character that dispose one to behave in a certain manner.
