Wearing Many Hats Well: Ethical Guidance on Occupying Professional Roles

Abstract

Professionals’ responsibilities allow and restrict behavior in ways not expected for persons outside of their role; how and when do roles morally justify professionals’ special duties? I argue that prominent consequentialist and nonconsequentialist theories’ shared “middle-level” principles provide sufficient common ground to ethically define and evaluate professional role responsibilities. Ultimately, I develop the concept of moral role responsibility in order to respond ethically to cases of conflicts in which professionals occupy multiple roles.