This thesis studies the conflicting normative claims of partiality and impartiality in nursing care. The principal focus and aim of the study is to establish an argument for permissible partiality in nursing care. Partiality here is understood as giving preference to one patient's nursing-care needs over those of other patients based on relational proximity to the actual patient. The study assumes that prioritisations in health care give rise to moral dilemmas in clinical nursing care. One such

more »

... dilemma is how to reconcile qualified concerns for the particular patient with equally important concerns for the maximisation of health-related welfare for all with relevant nursing-care needs. The trend in clinical nursing care is that qualified attention to the nursing-care needs of the individual patient increasingly is constrained because nurses' ability to accomplish the mandate of the nursing profession is progressively becoming compromised by the demands of cost-efficient health care. This situation amplifies a significant normative imbalance between concerns for relational and individual care and concerns for distributive justice. It also highlights the growing importance of debates about reasonable and legitimate forms of partiality in nursing care. The discussion in this thesis is based on different positions and theories in moral philosophy, and the challenge is how discussions of partiality and impartiality in moral philosophy can have relevance to the professional context of clinical nursing care as well as in nursing ethics in general. This challenge is met through an exploration of how to conceptualise professional roles and ethical responsibility in nursing. It is argued that the role of a nurse should be comprehended as a professional role distinct from other contractual role occupations, thereby influencing the way role morality is understood. Nursing involves role-relative ethical concerns and obligations that combine impartial and the partial views. Nurses are committed to individualised nursing care as one of the most important responsibilities of their profession. Nursing care takes place in nursing projects, in relational proximity to the individual patient. Any aspect of nursing care requires various degrees of time and attention in order to be adequate and tailored to the individual. Therefore, it is argued that nurses, in some situations, are permitted to be partial in order to uphold their professional commitment. Though partiality sometimes might trump impartial concerns of distributive justice, it is also constrained by both principled and context-sensitive assessments of patients' needs, as well as of the role-relative deontological restriction of minimising harm.