ABSTRACT
Friendship has always been morally appreciated, though it is particularistic and partial. This chapter suggests that we can take friendship seriously, in the sense that we are sometimes permitted to prefer friendship over general principles and rules of impartial morality. Friendships depend upon the unique individualities of people and their contingent biographies and shared experiences. Duties of friendship are dependent on the friend’s needs and on our ability to help, and not on when and how much the friend has helped us in the past, then there is no reason for preferring to help the caring person over the egoist or the total stranger. From the utilitarian point of view, friendship, which is based on partiality, promotes happiness and the general good, and particularly self respect and self worth, which are primary values for rational beings. The conflict between friendship and moral obligations is not due to conceptual contradiction, but due to contingent circumstances.
