ABSTRACT
This chapter proposes an alternative moral theories and positions as representing a collection of available guides to bioethical reasoning. To do this, it reconsiders the role that is usually assigned to moral theory in bioethics. The chapter explores three different ways of understanding the role of moral theories in bioethics. In general, feminist bioethicists have been especially dissatisfied with the centrality of traditional moral theories in bioethics. Many feminist bioethicists have learned from their colleagues in feminist epistemology that knowledge claims, in ethics as in science, are inevitably situated in particular social and historical locations. The metaphor of lenses provides a more accurate and a more productive understanding of the role of theories in bioethics in a global context than do either foundations or frameworks. It has the added virtue of clarifying the vital role that feminist ethics should play in all bioethics deliberations, be they local or global.
