Hettie, Nomvula and social ethics

" It's like this. Everything to be decided about your life is discussed at a 'family Conference'. You and the whole family get together and we all make plans together. Sometimes, other important people in your life , like in your community can be there also.. Also if there is a problem,say  you get yourself into some trouble, then that is what will happen.

Two 14 year old girls were in this conversation - a standard procedure of orientation to set out our program method. There was Hettie, a White Afrikaans speaking adolescent and Nomvula, a Black African teen.

"It's OK" said Nomvula.

" I would rather DIE !" Said Hettie.

"Why ? If there's a problem then your mother needs to know and the family can all help to sort it out together with you."

"We don't do it like that in our family", said Hettie. "If there is a problem we keep it to US". If I get into trouble I don't even want my mother to know. OK, if she has to know  , she'll kill me. But nobody else. What is a secret is a secret in our family.... we always sort it out ourselves. I won't come to any - what did you say? Family thing,.... family conference".

It was this conversation that got us all thinking again. Could it be that this child care procedure, a scheduled routine in our process, was not as ideal as we had thought it to be? What fitted Nomvule was terrifying for Hettie.

Benezet Bujo in his book The Ethical Dimensions of Community (Paulines 1990) says:
                  " The cultural problem is of paramount importance to every human being. If a person's culture is not taken seriously, one cannot respect human dignity, since the individual's identity cannot be realised  outside of this field. Hence ignoring a people's culture may well be the first violation of human rights. In social ethics one should count as new forms of property not only the ' possession of knowledge technique and know how'  but also the culture as root of the whole" (p 142 )

He also talks of the "multiplicity of human rights"(p 156)

If we listen to Bujo, then the cultural roots of Nomvula and of Hettie is their property, to be respected and protected even to the extent of us having to create diverse organisational methodologies for them in our programs.

Especially in Africa, says Bujo, because in Africa it will be a violation of rights to ignore the dead. Their struggle for the social well-being of their offspring must not be in vain (p155)


Somehow, it seems, Hettie's cultural right to privacy and individualisation in problem solving needs to be accomodated in our procedures, and then equally does Nomvula's cultural right to somehow involve community and if it is culturally important to the family,to include her ancestors in family problem solving.

We do speak of diversity and we do uphold rights we say.

Are we socially ethical

I wonder?




.