Title: Of Siblings and Citizens
Many of us, through no fault of our own, have siblings. Our relationships with them are complex, rewarding, frustrating, sad, joyful, and goofy; sometimes filled with love and closeness, sometimes inexplicably, even disquietingly distant. These are often among our most profound and confounding relationships. And yet, almost nothing has been written about the ethics of sibling relationships. This talk begins by focusing on the question: siblings, what do we owe them? The talk then takes up a perhaps surprising question: can an account of sibling ethics and obligations serve as a useful framework for thinking about our ethical obligations in another kind of non-voluntary relationship, that of co-citizens? I argue—perhaps surprisingly—that it can. The talk then provides a new way to understand our ethical obligations to our co-citizens, both in terms of their ground and their content.