Fletcher's Four Working Principles
Fletcher identified four operational principles guiding situation ethics: pragmatism (consequences matter ethically), relativism (no absolute principles), positivism (reason cannot prove ethical truths; faith grounds ethics), and personalism (persons matter absolutely; rules serve persons, not vice versa).
Real World
Médecins Sans Frontières workers who treat enemy combatants equally, regardless of ideology, embody Fletcher's personalism — the concrete needs of the person in front of you override abstract rules about allegiance.
Exam Focus
Distinguish personalism ('persons, not principles, matter') from relativism ('no absolute rules') — conflating them is a frequent examiner-noted error.
How well did you know this?