Voluntary and beneficial exploitation in bioethics: private and public reasons

EDUARDO RIVERA LÓPEZ

Liverpool

Simposio; 4th IME Summer (Research) Conference; 2017

Institute of Medical Ethics

A problem that transversely crosses several areas of bioethics is the problem of exploitative transactions, that is, transactions in which one party (the strong one, "S") abuses or exploits, the other (the weak, vulnerable, one "W"). The most problematic case, from the theoretical point of view, is the case that Allan Wertheimer calls "beneficial exploitation". In beneficial exploitation, W?s consent for the transaction is an effective and rational consent. Moreover, W does not suffer any harm by the transaction; on the contrary, the transaction benefits W. My aim in this paper is twofold. From the perspective of individual ethics, I offer a model to conceive the nature of the wrongfulness of S?s action. From the perspective of legal ethics (about what should be legally permitted or forbidden), I suggest some reasons to believe that the prohibition of beneficial, exploitative, contracts is problematic and can only be justified in very exceptional cases