EthicsEthics or moral philosophy is a branch of philosophy that "involves systematizing, defending, and recommending concepts of right and wrong behavior". The field of ethics, along with aesthetics, concerns matters of value; these fields comprise the branch of philosophy called axiology. Ethics seeks to resolve questions of human morality by defining concepts such as good and evil, right and wrong, virtue and vice, justice and crime. As a field of intellectual inquiry, moral philosophy is related to the fields of moral psychology, descriptive ethics, and value theory.
Individual and group rightsGroup rights, also known as collective rights, are rights held by a group as a whole rather than individually by its members; in contrast, individual rights are rights held by individual people; even if they are group-differentiated, which most rights are, they remain individual rights if the right-holders are the individuals themselves. Historically, group rights have been used both to infringe upon and to facilitate individual rights, and the concept remains controversial.
IndividualAn individual is that which exists as a distinct entity. Individuality (or self-hood) is the state or quality of living as an individual; particularly (in the case of humans) of as a person unique from other people and possessing one's own needs or goals, rights and responsibilities. The concept of an individual features in diverse fields, including biology, law, and philosophy. Every individual contributes significantly to the growth of a civilization.
RightsRights are legal, social, or ethical principles of freedom or entitlement; that is, rights are the fundamental normative rules about what is allowed of people or owed to people according to some legal system, social convention, or ethical theory. Rights are of essential importance in such disciplines as law and ethics, especially theories of justice and deontology. The history of social conflicts has often involved attempts to define and redefine rights.
Outline of ethicsEthics or moral philosophy is a branch of philosophy that involves systematizing, defending, and recommending concepts of right and wrong conduct. The field of ethics, along with aesthetics, concern matters of value, and thus comprise the branch of philosophy called axiology. The following outline is provided as an overview of and topical guide to ethics.
Minority rightsMinority rights are the normal individual rights as applied to members of racial, ethnic, class, religious, linguistic or gender and sexual minorities, and also the collective rights accorded to any minority group. Civil-rights movements often seek to ensure that individual rights are not denied on the basis of membership in a minority group. Such civil-rights advocates include the global women's-rights and global LGBT-rights movements, and various racial-minority rights movements around the world (such as the Civil Rights Movement in the United States).
Civil and political rightsCivil and political rights are a class of rights that protect individuals' freedom from infringement by governments, social organizations, and private individuals. They ensure one's entitlement to participate in the civil and political life of society and the state. Civil rights include the ensuring of peoples' physical and mental integrity, life, and safety; protection from discrimination on grounds such as sex, race, sexual orientation, national origin, color, age, political affiliation, ethnicity, social class, religion, and disability; and individual rights such as privacy and the freedom of thought, speech, religion, press, assembly, and movement.
Virtue ethicsVirtue ethics (also aretaic ethics, from Greek ἀρετή [aretḗ]) is an approach to ethics that treats virtue as central. Virtue ethics is usually contrasted with two other major approaches in ethics, consequentialism and deontology, which make the goodness of outcomes of an action (consequentialism) and the concept of moral duty (deontology) central. While virtue ethics does not necessarily deny the importance to ethics of goodness of states of affairs or of moral duties, it emphasizes virtue, and sometimes other concepts, like eudaimonia, to an extent that other ethics theories do not.
Business ethicsBusiness ethics (also known as corporate ethics) is a form of applied ethics or professional ethics, that examines ethical principles and moral or ethical problems that can arise in a business environment. It applies to all aspects of business conduct and is relevant to the conduct of individuals and entire organizations. These ethics originate from individuals, organizational statements or the legal system. These norms, values, ethical, and unethical practices are the principles that guide a business.