The Pluralistic Theory of Organ Allocation Cover Image

Pluralistyczna Teoria Alokacji Narządów
The Pluralistic Theory of Organ Allocation

Author(s): Piotr Grzegorz Nowak
Subject(s): Philosophy, Philosophical Traditions, Special Branches of Philosophy
Published by: Wydawnictwo Uniwersytetu Jagiellońskiego
Keywords: transplantation ethics; organ allocation; utilitarianism;egalitarianism; prioritarianism; sufficientarianism; Derek Parfit; Larry Temkin; Roger Crisp;

Summary/Abstract: Biomedical sciences cannot answer the question who should be saved from death if not everyone can be. This is an ethical issue. However, we face exactly this question when deliberating on the criteria for organ allocation. The main aim of this article is to formulate a pluralistic theory of just distribution of organs, which incorporates the tenets of utilitarianism, egalitarianism and sufficientarianism. Each constituent theory adopts a different value as a criterion for organ allocation. For utilitarianism it is a health benefit for the patient, for egalitarianism it is the ratio of deserts and health-related wellbeing, for suficientarianism what is important is that the candidate for a transplant be situated below the sufficientarian threshold. The article presents a proposal to reconcile these three competing theories.

  • Issue Year: 2017
  • Issue No: 51
  • Page Range: 65-89
  • Page Count: 25
  • Language: Polish