Introduction to Casuistry and Its Use in Clinical Ethics

Abstract

Casuistry is one of the most widespread methods of moral reasoning in contemporary bioethics. It is often found in opposition to the dominant theory of principlism. While theoretically, ethical principlism has been elaborated quite often in the Czech bioethical and medical-ethical literature, the theoretical definition of the casuistic method does not appear. This article, therefore briefly presents the theoretical foundations of the so-called casuist method. The historical context of the casuistry method, its advantages, and disadvantages are presented. In particular, it was compared with so-called deductivist approaches and principlism, which appear in contemporary bioethics as basic competing approaches.