A Historical Perspective of Casuistry and its Application to Contemporary Biomedical Ethics
Casuistry, from the Latin casus meaning "a case," is a method used in moral theology that attempts to apply a set of general principles in specific cases of human conduct. It relies upon knowledge of the law and moral theology in so-called " real world" situations for the purposes of informing conscience and guiding conduct.' In practice this means considering morally perplexing cases "in the light of certain ethical norms or rules," where "a definite view of the nature of the moral life is confronted with a well-described real or fictional situation."2 Casuists are skeptical of rules, rights, and theories divorced from history, precedent, and circumstance. Appropriate moral judgments occur, casuists say, through an intimate understanding of particular situations and the historical record of similar cases.3 The casuist looks for cases that are obvious examples of a principle a case in which there is sure to be a high degree of agreement among most, if not all, observers. The casuist then moves from these clear cases to more dubious ones, ordering them by paradigm and analogy under some principle. Casuistry does not eschew principles, nor is it incompatible with them. Its nemesis may, in fact, be the absolutization of principles. Casuist theory typically holds that these principles of moral belief and knowledge evolve incrementally through reflection on specific, and subsequently, related cases. To support thi s thesis , casuists sometimes