ETHICS AND SOCIAL WELFARE

VOLUME 2

NUMBER 1

(APRIL 2008)

Existentialist Ethics: From Nietzsche to Sartre and Beyond

Neil Thompson
Ethics are, of course, a fundamental part of professional practice. There are different philosophical schools of thought relating to ethics and, although there are often degrees of overlap, they are characterized more by difference than harmony. Among these philosophical schools, one school that has received relatively little attention in the professional literature (and a waning level of interest in the philosophical literature) is that of existentialism. This article outlines some of the main points of ethical theory in the works of Friedrich Nietzsche, one of the founders of existentialist thought, and Jean-Paul Sartre, the best known of the existentialist thinkers, as well as other contributors to existentialist thought. Possible developments in existentialist ethical theory since the time of Sartre are also sketched out, and these are linked to contemporary social work concerns. Keywords Ethics; Existentialism; Nietzsche, Friedrich (1844/1900); Perspectivism; Sartre, Jean-Paul (1905/1980)

Introduction
In the psychoanalytically oriented 1960s there was a strong emphasis on ethics in social work. This was parallel to the world of medicine and reflected in large part the medical model of social work that was predominant at that time. In situations where professional power is being exercised, ethical safeguards are needed to make sure it is used responsibly within professionally defined parameters, and so it is entirely appropriate that ethics should feature as part of social work education. However, in the United Kingdom, as a result of the advent of radical social work with its emphasis on politics rather than ethics, professionalism became de-emphasized. We entered a
Neil Thompson divides his time between his roles as an independent trainer and consultant with Avenue Consulting Ltd (www.avenueconsulting.co.uk) and part-time Professor of Social Work and Well-being at Liverpool Hope University. He has over thirty years experience in social work as a practitioner, manager, educator, consultant and author. He is committed to developing forms of social work that do justice to the complexities of both theory and practice. Correspondence to: Neil Thompson, Avenue Consulting Ltd, PO Box 2060, Wrexham LL13 0ZG, UK. E-mail: neil@avenueconsulting.co.uk ISSN 1749-6535 print/1749-6543 online/08/010010-14 2008 Taylor & Francis DOI: 10.1080/17496530801948705

EXISTENTIALIST ETHICS

11

period of anti-professionalism (Lymbery 2004; Thompson 2005) based on a political commitment to promoting radical social change. It is only relatively recently that professionalism has been able to reassert itself*/a new form of empowering professionalism that avoids the political naivety of traditional forms based on unquestioned relations of dominance (Duyvendak et al. 2006; Thompson 2007). Referring to the work of Jones (2000), McDonald (2006, p. 150) comments on the nature of the new professionalism: Social work must become an engaged profession, participating as politically significant actors in the social institutions shaping the contemporary environment. It cannot (and must not) sit outside the arenas of power. She goes on to characterize the new professionalism as that which acknowledges professional expertise while promoting active collaboration with other groups of service providers and with service users (McDonald 2006, p. 151). The new professionalism is therefore premised on partnership and empowerment rather than elitism and prescription. With the resurgence of interest in professionalism, there now comes a renewed emphasis on ethics. It is therefore important to ensure that this is a politically informed ethics and not a return to the naivety of traditional ethics largely disconnected from the wider political sphere (Clifton & Burke 2005). Existentialism has followed a broadly similar path. The earlier versions of existentialist thought were predominantly individualistic in their focus and took very little account of wider social issues (Sartre 1948, 1958). Early existentialist thought addressed ethical issues in a number of ways. However, Sartre promised a volume of work on ethics, but largely abandoned this project in favor of a political analysis. What resulted was a significant body of work on social and political theory (Sartre 1963, 1976), with only fragments of an ethical theory published posthumously under the title of Notebooks for an Ethics (Sartre 1992). However, as we shall see, there are clear strands of ethical theory that can be drawn out of Sartres work, although these remain in need of further detailed analysis and development if they are to be of value to social work. This article is in four main parts. The first focuses on early existentialist thought, with particular emphasis on the work of the German philosopher, Friedrich Nietzsche. Nietzsche is often portrayed as an immoralist (i.e., someone who eschews morality), but this does not do justice to the quality and breadth of ethical thinking to be found in his work. The second part relates to later existentialist thought, with a particular, but not exclusive, emphasis on the work of the French existentialist, Jean-Paul Sartre. While Sartres work clearly owes much to Nietzsches thinking, it also goes far beyond the basic platform that his predecessor established. The third part explores, albeit briefly, existentialist ethics beyond Nietzsche and Sartre. The final part is one in which I bring aspects of existentialist ethical theory up to date in the context of professional social work. These four parts combine to paint a picture of an ethical approach that has the potential to offer a great deal of understanding if it can be developed further.

12

THOMPSON

Ethical Thought in the Work of Nietzsche

Friedrich Nietzsche (1844/1900) is probably one of the most influential thinkers in the world of social theory. He was a significant influence on the development of Freuds work and therefore, indirectly at least, later psychoanalysts. Poststructuralism and postmodernism also show signs of being heavily influenced by strands of his thought (Bertens 1995). The absurdist work of writers such as Camus (2006a, 2006b) and, of course, existentialism itself owe much to the Nietzschean legacy (Guignon 1993). In addition, Nietzsches work has influenced a number of people in the literary world*/for example, George Bernard Shaw. A further significant influence is on the political world in the shape of laying the foundation for fascism. However, although Hitlers politics did owe much to the work of Nietzsche, this was based on a (wilful) misreading of Nietzsches work, exacerbated by misrepresentation of his ideas by his sister who was involved in the posthumous publication of his work (Cate 2003). Elizabeth Forster-Nietzsche had strong antisemitic beliefs which were not shared by her brother, but she allowed her beliefs to color the publication and propagation of his ideas after his death. This provided a foundation from which others could build a politics of hate notionally associated with Nietzsches thinking, but in reality fundamentally at odds with his philosophy. The basis of Nietzsches ethics is the rejection of metaphysics. He was committed to what he described as perspectivism. By this he meant that everything is seen from a particular perspective or point of view and that there is no absolute underlying reality; no metaphysical dimension that guarantees a Truth. As Kee (1999, p. 45) puts it: For Nietzsche there is no truth lying there to be discovered: truth has to be created. The world, according to Nietzsche, is: variously interpretable, it has no one meaning behind it, but countless meanings*/this is Perspectivism and bangs the door in the face of anyone who claims any sure knowledge (Nietzsche, Collected Works, Vol XIX, p. 13, cited in Heller 1988, p. 66; emphasis in original). This approach anticipates not only existentialism, but also many other sociological and philosophical perspectives that emphasize the significance of hermeneutics*/that is, the important role of interpretation and meaning. It is also a helpful basis for partnership working, laying the foundations for a multiperspectival approach. In arguing that there was no absolute truth, he was therefore proposing that there can be no absolute values. In his day, this was quite a radical departure in philosophical thought and was given a mixed reception. What added to this mixed reception of Nietzsches ideas was his announcement of the death of God (Nietzsche 1974). Whereas another early existentialist thinker, Sren Kierkegaard, had argued that it is the task of each individual to find his or her way in life without looking for divine instruction, he nonetheless was a firm believer in God (albeit critical of institutionalized religion*/what he referred to as Christendom; see Kierkegaard 1996). Nietzsche, by contrast, took this a step further by arguing that it is the responsibility of each individual to find a way

EXISTENTIALIST ETHICS

13

forward because of the non-existence of God. Humanity, he argued, cannot rely on predefined moral standards associated with a particular set of religious tenets. Such an approach raises a challenge to the idea that the moral basis of social work can be governed by a predefined code of ethics. We shall return to this point below. The death of God meant that what we have to establish is what Nietzsche referred to as self-overcoming. This is a concept closely linked to the idea of self-knowledge, but going beyond that in terms of freeing ourselves from misconceptions that we will have encountered in life and society. Cate (2003) provides helpful commentary on this when he explains that:
It is misleading to speak of a theoretical freedom of the will if the individual who is supposedly exercising that freedom is in reality obeying all sorts of hidden forces, impulses and motivations*/of an intellectual as much as genetic character. The existential environment in which an individual finds himself [sic] is made of internal as well as external forces, which he must oppose and combat if he is ever to achieve more than an illusory freedom of choice. The idea, here exposed for the first time in embryonic form, was later to develop into the Nietzschean concept of Selbstuberwindung (self-overcoming): the constant battle every human being must wage against ones hidden, inherited, unconsciously prejudiced self in order to become that rarest of products*/a truly free-spirited individual. (Cate 2003, pp. 31/2)

For Nietzsche, then, morality is not a matter of unquestioning adherence to a predefined code of ethics or a prescriptive set of practices. Morality, in Nietzschean terms, is a matter of becoming a free spirit (Freigeist, in German). There is a parallel here with reflective practice which emphasizes that practice needs to be creative and linked to the specifics of the situation rather than based on simply following rules or procedures (Fook & Gardner 2007; White et al. 2006)*/it needs to involve what Schon (1983) referred to as a reflective conversation with the situation. Nietzsches approach anticipated later existentialist themes of radical freedom and authenticity (Sartre 1958). For Nietzsche, the idea of being a free spirit was an essential feature of his thought and thus of his ethics. In the absence of a God-given morality, it is our responsibility to develop our own values and live according to them. This led him to develop his ideas about what he referred to as beyond good and evil (Nietzsche 1966). He was using these terms in an essentialist sense*/that is, he was urging us to go beyond fixed notions of what is good and what is bad, and helping us to realize that it is not a simple matter of attaching a positive or negative label to actions or, indeed, thoughts. The reality is far more complex than this. Nietzsche therefore looked down on any attempts to come up with a simple prescriptive morality. Beyond good and evil can therefore be understood to mean beyond simplistic, essentialized notions of absolute good and evil. For Nietzsche, ethics was more a matter of noble versus ignoble rather than good versus bad*/but this was not a nobility of birth, but rather a nobility of mind, characterized by free-spiritedness (Cate 2003, p. 362).

14

THOMPSON

This idea of nobility was also closely associated with Nietzsches distinction between master morality and slave morality (Nietzsche 1967). The latter, he argued, is based on suspicion and mistrust; the humility of the lower orders in society. It is fundamentally a negative morality. By contrast, he saw master morality as being noble, positive and self-affirming:
For the fundamental difference between a truly noble morality and its opposite is that it is a positive, confident, self-created, self-affirming system of values emanating from a feeling of abundant strength, whereas a slave morality is a form of negative reaction against a reigning system of values, an expression of a deep-seated ressentiment [Nietzsche invariably used the French word, derived from his study of the French Revolution] harboured by jealous human beings consumed by the repressed hatred and desire for revenge of the impotent. (Cate 2003, pp. 501/2)

It has to be recognized that Nietzsches approach is pre-sociological*/that is, he shows no understanding of how a slave morality is part of an ideology inculcated by systems of power and advantage. However, despite this, the distinction is an insightful one. It paints a picture of the majority of people governed by a prescriptive morality of the herd, accepted uncritically (slave morality) that can breed jealousy and cynicism (ressentiment), while a minority of people have the self-confidence to establish their own values and live in a spirit of selfovercoming. Despite Nietzsches terminology of master and slave, the concept does not fit neatly with a class analysis, as members of the ruling class will not necessarily be noble free spirits. Although there are undoubtedly elements of elitism in Nietzsches thought, it is important not to oversimplify his position here and see it simply as a matter of different moralities for different classes. His understanding of the issues is far more nuanced than this and is concerned with how individuals can rise above the unquestioning mores of the herd. This has implications for social work insofar as attempts to promote empowerment can be seen to involve supporting individuals in breaking out of established patterns of behavior that are self-defeating in some way*/for example, in helping young offenders to find self-esteem in ways that do not involve bowing to peer pressure to commit offences. In similar vein, a closely related notion in relation to morality introduced by Nietzsche, and one that has been widely misunderstood, is that of man and superman (or man and overman*/the German original, ubermensch, can be translated as superior being). Nietzsche described humanity as a rope between animal and superman (Cate 2003, p. 404). This refers to his view that, while people are able to rise above their animal basis and achieve more than animals can, we have considerable untapped potential*/that we are capable of rising above the pettiness and narrowness that hold us back. A superman, then, for Nietzsche, was somebody who showed the potential to move away from forms of practice that are based on prescriptions identified and reinforced by others, towards a self-guided, more confident approach to the challenges of human existence.

EXISTENTIALIST ETHICS

15

These challenges Nietzsche saw as having a potential for developing great strengths. He firmly believed in the importance of the ability to find joy in tragedy, strength through adversity. As Kaufmann (2000, p. 11) puts it: From tragedy Nietzsche learns that one can affirm life as sublime, beautiful, and joyous in spite of all suffering and cruelty. This is closely linked to three important concepts that have significant relevance for social work practice*/ namely, resilience (Gilligan 2001), post-traumatic growth (Calhoun & Tedeschi 1999, 2001) and the related phenomenon of transformational grief (Schneider, 1994, 2000). It is worth considering each of these in turn:
.

Resilience. This refers to the ability of individuals to bounce back from adverse events, growing stronger and learning from the experience. It is seen as an important concept in working with children who have been abused, deprived and/or traumatized (Cairns 2002). Being resilient is not simply a matter of being robust (i.e., able to withstand high levels of pressure), but rather of being able to draw out the positives of an otherwise painful and negative situation. Nietzsches idea is that what does not kill us makes us stronger (this common adage originates from his work), or at least has the potential to make us stronger. The implication here is that social work can help people maximize the positive potential of the painful situations they encounter, rather than simply try to get over them*/an approach that is clearly consistent with crisis intervention as a social work practice modality. This means that a simplistic approach to practice that neglects such key concepts as crisis and resilience can be seen as unethical because it has the effect of stifling human potential and limiting what people can achieve in circumstances of adversity. Post-traumatic growth. This refers to the recognition that experiences of trauma, while acutely painful and potentially very harmful, can also bring about positive changes in a persons life*/for example, in terms of greater intimacy and closeness and/or spiritual awareness that can lead to a more fulfilling life. A great deal of the work with children traumatized by abuse referred to above involves helping them not only to heal the metaphorical wound, but also to grow and develop as fully as possible*/for example, through the use of life story work to help them develop more empowering narratives (Rose & Philpot 2005). This is very much in line with Nietzsches conception of suffering and its positive potential. Transformational grief. This refers to the potential for experiences of loss and grief to lead to personal growth. It can also lead to greater strengths through the development of social connections and a fuller sense of meaning and understanding. As Schneider (2000, p. 7) comments: Honoring the fullness of your loss permits you to realize that you cant make it on your own, and you discover the delicate, essential threads of meaning and love, what I have called gossamer threads, that still weave themselves through your life. Given the relative neglect of grief issues in social work (Thompson &

16

THOMPSON Thompson 2008a), this concept is an important one to keep in mind. Mishandling our dealings with someone who is grieving by blocking opportunities for growth can be equated with kicking them while they are down */something that clearly has ethical implications.

Nietzsches ideas can be seen to be relevant to social work not only in these specific ways, but also more broadly in terms of how hardships and difficulties, while not welcome in themselves, can form the basis of positive developments. As an illustration of this, it is worth noting that many people have decided to pursue a career in the helping professions as a result of the lessons they have learned from dealing with adversity in their own lives (e.g., the highly committed residential worker who was brought up in care). The writings of Nietzsche can be seen to be extremely insightful and instructive (although some of his ideas are not so appealing*/for example, his views on women which are largely, but not exclusively, of a chauvinistic nature; Kaufmann 2000). Nietzsche clearly laid the foundations for later developments in existentialist thought, and it is to these that we now turn.

Ethics in the Work of Jean-Paul Sartre

Sartre (1905/1980) became the best known of the existentialists and arguably the most influential. For Sartre, the basis of ethics was a recognition of radical freedom*/the idea that, although we are surrounded by social and other constraints, each of us nonetheless remains a free agent in the sense that we not only can choose, we have to choose. We are responsible for ourselves insofar as we have no fixed personality or nature to fall back on as an explanation or justification for our actions. Sartre therefore rejected essentialism and determinism and, while he recognized the important influences of the social context, he was wise enough to recognize that social pressures did not remove the need to choose*/that is, did not alter the basis of radical freedom as the foundation of human existence. A recurring theme in Sartres work is the notion of bad faith: the idea that many people do not live up to the challenge of radical freedom. They deny this freedom in a number of ways*/for example, by relying on the notion of fatalism, social determinism and/or biological determinism. Bad faith is basically a lie to oneself. It is the denial that we are responsible for our actions and therefore ultimately responsible for ourselves. Indeed, if we had no notion of freedom, there could be no notion of sin or transgression and therefore no conception of ethics. If we were to accept a deterministic theory of human behavior, there would be no scope for the study of ethics. There is a need, then, to recognise that clients are not simply passive recipients of services, but active agents who play a central role in determining the course of their lives. The ability to make choices and the range of choices available are therefore key factors to take into consideration (Thompson 2000, p. 119).

EXISTENTIALIST ETHICS

17

The Sartrean conception of moral behavior is therefore premised on the notion of authentic behaviour*/that is, behavior which steers clear of a reliance on bad faith. To be authentic means to recognize radical freedom and live accordingly, without attempting to rely on the self-deceptions of bad faith. The existentialist use of the term authentic should not be confused with the everyday sense of the term, which has distinctly essentialist connotations*/for example, in the notion of a persons authentic self being their true, underlying essence. The existentialist conception of selfhood is markedly different from this, based on the idea that the self is a process of becoming and not a relatively fixed personality (the idea of becoming also features very strongly in Nietzsches work; see Kee 1999). Nor should we regard the emphasis on freedom and choice as a failure to recognize the significance of social constraints (Bowring 2000). A further key aspect of Sartres ethics is the use of the Kantian notion that ethical behavior is behavior that we would wish to become the rule for all behavior*/that is, if I would not wish lying to be an acceptable rule of social interaction, then ethically I should not lie (Kant 1964). This is an approach that has some strength as it enables us to establish a criterion by which to form an opinion as to whether a particular action or belief is ethically acceptable or not. However, it could also be argued that it is too simplistic and does not take account of the immense variability and complexity of moral matters. I would therefore conclude that it is a useful moral precept, but it should not be seen as a definitive statement of ethics, as that would be far too simplistic an approach to this intricate area of thought and social practice (for a discussion of the debates around these issues, see Hugman 2005, Chapter 2). Sartres later works focused on wider social and political issues, and this involved making use of a wide range of concepts drawn from sociology and social theory. Two of these are particularly important. The first is that of alienation. Sartre drew on Marxist understandings of alienation and was keen to emphasize that social arrangements within a capitalist society have the effect of alienating a large proportion of its citizens. As alienation can be construed as a harmful process, this can be seen as unethical, albeit unethical at the level of social organization, rather than that of individuals. It is a good example of how Sartre linked ethics to politics and argued that the two should not be separated. To understand what is morally acceptable is not a matter simply of understanding individuals, but rather of also taking account of wider social and political matters. This clearly has strong resonances with social work, where the development of antidiscriminatory practice has shown the inadequacy of an atomistic approach*/that is, one that focuses on individuals without reference to wider sociopolitical factors (Mullaly 2002; Thompson 2003a). A further important concept is that of seriality. This refers to how people can find themselves isolated (part of a series rather than part of a fused group, a series being a collection of unconnected individuals*/a bus queue, for example), separated from one another and, to a certain extent, from wider society. This is another example of how the social order can have detrimental and

18

THOMPSON

therefore, in Sartres eyes, unethical consequences for its citizenry. The study of ethics in Sartrean existentialism therefore goes beyond individual rules of behavior and incorporates elements of the moral acceptability or otherwise of social and political arrangements. It provides a more sociological analysis and thereby helps to address some of the weaknesses in Nietzsches approach, but without losing any of its strengths. In this regard, existentialism provides a basis for challenging oppression. Indeed, tackling oppression was a major feature of Sartres work, particularly in his later writings (e.g., Sartre 1965). Although I am not arguing that the development of social work values is premised on existentialist thought, there is indeed a parallel here insofar as social work values in the United Kingdom and elsewhere have moved from a narrow individualistic conception associated with a psychoanalytically influenced practice base in the 1960s and 1970s towards emancipatory values premised on antidiscriminatory practice from the 1980s onwards (Banks 2006; Thompson 2005).

Beyond Nietzsche and Sartre

The point was made earlier that Nietzsches work was also a strong influence on postmodernist and postructuralist thought. To a large extent, such developments (what McDonald (2006) refers to as contemporary theory) have occupied much of the theoretical space previously the concern of existentialism, although without acknowledging the legacy it has gained from this philosophical tradition in drawing on a number of existentialist concepts (Howells 1992a). A key feature of postmodernist thinking is the critique of metanarratives: the argument that theoretical explanations should be small scale and specific and not part of a grand theory (Lyotard 1984). However, there is a double irony here. First, postmodernism itself as a school of thought can be seen as a metanarrative, and so the critique is self-defeating (Sibeon 2004). This misguided emphasis on a critique of metanarratives has therefore led, to a certain extent, to a theoretical impasse. Consequently, it is important to revisit existentialist thought, in part to rehabilitate this canon and draw on its benefits and insights. One particular aspect of this that is worth emphasizing is the work of Simone de Beauvoir (1972) in terms of gender equality. Nietzsche was to a large extent misogynistic in his views (no doubt in large part influenced by the work of Schopenhauer who was well known for his antipathy towards women and was a significant influence on Nietzsche in his younger years). Sartres work, by contrast, contains no such direct sexism, and does not directly address issues of sexual equality. Writers such as Le Doeuff (1991) go so far as to argue that this neglect of gender is an example of sexism in itself. However, Simone de Beauvoir was a close companion of Sartres, personally and intellectually, and her own work on gender has established itself as a significant contribution to the development of feminist thinking. Her ideas have helped to broaden out Sartres emphasis on oppression in relation to class and race. In particular, de Beauvoirs

EXISTENTIALIST ETHICS

19

concept of alterity (or otherness) has proven very useful and is widely used in feminist scholarship. This refers to the way in which masculine perspectives are accepted as the norm and issues relating to womens perspectives are seen as secondary or other. An example of this is the use of exclusive forms of language (he or man to refer to people in general, including women; Cameron 1998; Thompson 2003b). In some respects, this parallels the development of antidiscriminatory practice in social work. The early emphasis of radical social work was on class-based inequality and oppression (Bailey & Brake 1975; Corrigan & Leonard 1978). This was later broadened out to incorporate issues of gender equality and race equality (see Thompson 2006). The work of Fanon in existentialism has made a significant contribution to our understanding of racism (Fanon 1963; Gordon 1997), building on the work Sartre undertook in relation to antisemitism (Sartre 1965). Fanons work has strongly influenced the development of postcolonial theory and has helped to establish the importance of challenging imperialist narratives that are both premised on, and supportive of, white supremacist ideas (Sekyi-Otu 1996). However, what is yet to emerge is any detailed treatment of issues relating to other areas of discrimination based on an existentialist perspective*/for example, age, disability, sexual identity, religion and language (although de Beauvoir (1977) begins this process in relation to age discrimination).

The Implications of Existentialist Ethics for Social Work Practice

A full and detailed analysis of the implications of existentialist ethics for professional practice would require a book-length treatment. My aim here is therefore the more modest one of raising awareness of some key issues that merit further exploration and development. I thus present a small number of issues to consider in terms of how existentialist ethics have implications for social work practice. These are presented by way of illustration and are not intended as a comprehensive overview. For further discussion of the links between existentialism and social work, see Thompson (1992, 2000). Perhaps the most important point to note from the discussions above is that ethics needs to be fluid and not absolutist. This is not a form of relativism in the sense of anything goes, but rather what Sartre referred to as relationism*/that is, the notion that everything is undertaken from a particular standpoint (compare this with Nietzsches notion of perspectivism). In other words, what we must seek is an ethics of uncertainty, not the false, arrogant and misleading certainty of essentialist moral prescription, but rather a free-spirited, authentic approach to recognizing the values underpinning our work and acting in accordance with them. An ethics of uncertainty would involve an approach that is fluid and tailored to the circumstances in question, rather than one based on a number of fixed precepts. Here existentialism coincides with critically reflective practice, with its emphasis on engaging critically with practice situations and

20

THOMPSON

creatively drawing on knowledge in ways that are consistent with values and ethical principles*/but which do not expect our professional knowledge and value base to provide predefined answers (Thompson & Thompson 2008b). The second important implication is that ethics needs to address macro-level as well as micro-level issues. Ethics needs to be seen as part of social theory, not as separate from it. Ethics and politics should therefore be seen as two sides of the same coin, rather than separate domains. As Hugman (2005, p. 30) comments: [E]thics is both individual and social. It is not possible to separate these aspects; indeed, it is more helpful to think of ethics in terms of the interaction between individual morality and social norms. Once we enter the social domain, we are also, of course, entering the political domain, for where there are people, there are power relations (Lukes 2005; Thompson 2007). A third implication is that we should aim for an ethics of empowerment. If Nietzsches notion of self-overcoming is to be given credence, and if Sartres emphasis on freedom and authenticity is to be valued for the insights these concepts bring, then the notion of empowerment needs to be at the forefront of our ethical thinking. Social work is not a matter of doing things to people or looking after people in a patronizing way (Nietzsche was quite harsh in his criticism of the notion of compassionate people who try to help without understanding the nature of human suffering and the ability to develop positively from such suffering; see the discussion above of resilience, post-traumatic growth and transformational grief).

Conclusion
Existentialist thinking on ethics is wide ranging and complex. An article such as this cannot possibly do justice to all the issues involved and makes no attempt to do so. More realistically, what I have attempted to do here is to present some of the key issues as a stimulus to further thought, debate, analysis and study. Existentialism is an underrated source of theoretical and practical insights (Van Deurzen & Arnold-Baker 2005), and it is to be hoped that the discussions here will have helped to give readers some insight into how existentialist concepts have the potential to be used effectively to develop our understanding. Based on Sartres later works, with their sociopolitical emphasis, it is a clear implication of existentialist ethics is that self-overcoming and authenticity need to be understood in the context of cultural and structural factors (Rubinstein 2001; Thompson 2003a). Ethics needs to be seen as linked to politics and not as an alternative to it: political liberty must be premised on ontological freedom*/that is, changes at a broader level cannot occur if we deny the significance of human agency at a personal and collective level (Thompson 1992). It should be clear that, from an existentialist perspective, ethics needs to be conceptualized as a set of broad guidelines that need to be tailored to the actual circumstances of the practice encounter (in line with the precepts of reflective practice) and not on prescriptions divorced from the specifics of the situation

EXISTENTIALIST ETHICS

21

(here existentialism is consistent with Foucaults approach to ethics; see Rabinow 2000). Ethics can then be part of a project of authenticity and selfovercoming and thus of empowerment. An overgeneralized ethics of essentialist prescription, by contrast, can be seen to be demeaning, disempowering and therefore ultimately oppressive.

References
Bailey, R. & Brake, M. (eds) (1975) Radical Social Work, Edward Arnold, London. Banks, S. (2006) Ethics and Values in Social Work, 3rd edn, Palgrave Macmillan, Basingstoke. Beauvoir, S. de (1972) The Second Sex, Penguin, Harmondsworth. Beauvoir, S de (1977) Old Age, Penguin, Harmondsworth. Bertens, H. (1995) The Idea of the Postmodern: A History, Routledge, London. Bowring, F. (2000) Andre Gorz and the Sartrean Legacy: Arguments for a Person-centred Social Theory, Macmillan, Basingstoke. Cairns, K. (2002) Attachment, Trauma and Resilience: Therapeutic Caring for Children, BAAF, London. Calhoun, L. G. & Tedeschi, R. G. (1999) Facilitating Posttraumatic Growth: A Clinicians Guide, Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, Mahwah, NJ. Calhoun, L. G. & Tedeschi, R. G. (2001) Posttraumatic growth: The positive lessons of loss, in Meaning Reconstruction and the Experience of Loss, ed. R. A. Neimeyer, American Psychological Association, Washington, DC, pp. 173/90. Cameron, D. (ed.) (1998) The Feminist Critique of Language: A Critique, Routledge, London. Camus, A. (2006a) The Myth of Sisyphus, Penguin, Harmondsworth. Camus, A. (2006b) The Rebel, Penguin, Harmondsworth. Cate, C. (2003) Friedrich Nietzsche: A Biography, Pimlico, London. Clifton, D. & Burke, B. (2005) Developing anti-oppressive ethics in the new curriculum, Social Work Education, Vol. 24, no. 6, pp. 677/92. Corrigan, P. & Leonard, P. (1978) Social Work Practice under Capitalism: A Marxist Approach, Macmillan, Basingstoke. Duyvendak, J. W., Knijn, T. & Kremer, M. (eds) (2006) Policy, People and the New Professional: De-professionalisation and Reprofessionalisation in Care and Welfare, Amsterdam University Press, Amsterdam. Fanon, F. (1963) The Wretched of the Earth, Grove, New York. Fook, J. & Gardner, F. (2007) Practising Critical Reection: A Resource Handbook, Open University Press, Maidenhead. Gilligan, R. (2001) Promoting Resilience: A Resource Guide on Working with Children in the Care System, BAAF, London. Gordon, L. R. (1997) Existence in Black: An Anthology of Black Existential Philosophy, Routledge, London. Guignon, C. (ed.) (1993) The Cambridge Companion to Heidegger, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge. Heller, E. (1988) The Importance of Nietzsche: Ten Essays, University of Chicago Press, Chicago, IL. Howells, C. (1992a) Conclusion: Sartre and the deconstruction of the subject, in The Cambridge Companion to Sartre, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, pp. 318/52. Hugman, R. (2005) New Approaches in Ethics for the Caring Professions, Palgrave Macmillan, Basingstoke.

22

THOMPSON

Jones, A. (2000) Social work: An enterprising profession in a competitive environment, in Contemporary Perspectives on Social Work and the Human Services Challenges and Changes, eds I. OConnor, P. Smyth & J. Warburton, Longman, Melbourne, pp. 150/63. Kant, I. (1964) Groundwork of the Metaphysics of Morals, Harper & Row, New York. Kaufmann, W. (ed.) (2000) Basic Writings of Nietzsche, Modern Library, New York. Kee, A. (1999) Nietzsche against the Crucied, SCM Press, London. Kierkegaard, S. (1996) Papers and Journals: A Selection, Penguin, Harmondsworth. Le Doeuff, M. (1991) Hipparchias Choice: An Essay Concerning Women, Philosophy, etc, Blackwell, Oxford. Luke, S. (2005) Power: A radical view, 2nd edn, Palgrave Macmillan, Basingstoke. Lymbery, M. (2004) Responding to crisis: The changing nature of welfare organisations, in Social Work Ideals and Practice Realities, eds M. Lymbery & S. Butler, Palgrave Macmillan, Basingstoke, pp. 34/56. Lyotard, J.-F. (1984) The Postmodern Condition: A Report on Knowledge, University of Minnesota Press, Minneapolis, MN. McDonald, C. (2006) Challenging Social Work: The Context of Practice, Palgrave Macmillan, Basingstoke. Mullaly, B. (2002) Challenging Oppression: A Critical Social Work Approach, Oxford University Press, Oxford. Nietzsche, F. (1966) Beyond Good and Evil, Random House, New York. Nietzsche, F. (1967) The Genealogy of Morals, Random House, New York. Nietzsche, F. (1974) The Gay Science, Vintage, New York. Rabinow, P. (2000) Michel Foucault Ethics: Essential Works of Foucault, 1954/1984, Penguin Books, London. Rose, R. & Philpot, T. (2005) The Childs Own Story: Life Story Work with Traumatized Children, Jessica Kingsley, London. Rubinstein, D. (2001) Culture, Structure and Agency: Towards a Multidimensional Society, Sage, London. Sartre, J.-P. (1948) Existentialism is a Humanism, Methuen, London. Sartre, J.-P. (1958) Being and Nothingness: An Essay in Phenomenological Ontology, Verso, London. Sartre, J.-P. (1963) Search for a Method, Vintage Books, New York. Sartre, J.-P. (1965) Anti-Semite and Jew, Schocken Books, New York. Sartre, J.-P. (1976) Critique of Dialectical Reason, Verso, London. Sartre, J.-P. (1992) Notebooks for an Ethics, University of Chicago Press, Chicago, IL. Schneider, J. M. (1994) Finding My Way: Healing and Transformation through Loss and Grief, Seasons Press, Colfax, WI. Schneider, J. M. (2000) The Overdiagnosis of Depression: Recognizing Grief and its Transformative Potential, Seasons Press, Traverse City, MI. Schon, D. F. (1983) The Reective Practitioner, Basic Books, New York. Sekyi-Otu, A. (1996) Fanons Dialectic of Experience, Harvard University Press, Cambridge, MA. Sibeon, R. (2004) Rethinking Social Theory, Sage, London. Thompson, N. (1992) Existentialism and Social Work, Avebury, Aldershot. Thompson, N. (2000) Existentialist practice, in Social Work Theory and Method, eds P. Stepney & D. Ford, Russell House, Lyme Regis, pp. 116/124. Thompson, N. (2003a) Promoting Equality: Tackling Discrimination and Oppression, Palgrave Macmillan, Basingstoke. Thompson, N. (2003b) Communication and Language, Palgrave Macmillan, Basingstoke. Thompson, N. (2005) Understanding Social Work, 2nd edn, Palgrave Macmillan, Basingstoke. Thompson, N. (2006) Anti-discriminatory Practice, 4th edn, Palgrave Macmillan, Basingstoke.

EXISTENTIALIST ETHICS

23

Thompson, N. (2007) Power and Empowerment, Russell House, Lyme Regis. Thompson, N. & Thompson, S. (2008a) The Social Work Companion, Palgrave Macmillan, Basingstoke. Thompson, S. & Thompson, N. (2008b) The Critically Reective Practitioner, Palgrave Macmillan, Basingstoke. Van Deurzen, E. & Arnold-Baker, C. (eds) (2005) Existential Perspectives on Human Issues: A Handbook for Therapeutic Practice, Palgrave Macmillan, Basingstoke. White, S., Fook, J. & Gardner, F. (eds) (2006) Critical Reection in Health and Social Care, Open University Press, Maidenhead.