Thursday, February 23, 2006
On Professional Self-Regulation
So the execution of convicted rapist/murderer Michael Morales in California has been delayed because the prison responsible for conducting the execution was unable to comply with a court order requiring an anaesthesiologist to be present. The reason? Apparently, doctors feel that assisting in an execution would be a violation of the Hippocratic Oath, which, among other things, require its swearers to "prescribe regimens for the good of [their] patients according to [their] ability and [their] judgment and never do harm to anyone".
Now, it should come as a surprise to nobody that I view this as good news. The death penalty is barbaric, and ineffective in any case (there is little evidence that it serves any real purpose as a deterrant, it does no more to protect society than life imprisonment does, and it obviously does nothing to rehabilitate offenders; I do not accept the existence of any other role for the criminal justice system). However, an element of this bothers me: specifically, the ability of professional associations to effectively circumvent judgments of the state.
Because a majority of my readership seems to fall on approximately the same side of the political spectrum as I do, let me turn the tables for a moment: it would certainly appear that the above clause prohibits euthanasia as well. A different clause of the Oath quite explicitly prohibits abortion. This means that, we the various medical professional associations to actually enforce the Hippocratic Oath on their members, abortion would be effectively outlawed. . . notwithstanding what the state might have to say. It would also render the debate over euthanasia moot since, even if the state were to decide (as it should) that doctor-assisted suicide is okay, any doctor who participated in one would cease in very short order to be a doctor.
This is the disconnect that can result when an entity other than the state regulates professions - something that the broader society views as acceptable can continue to be blocked by an elite professional association.
I believe that doctors should be permitted to decide for themselves whether their morals permit their participation in abortions or euthanasia - just as, so long as it remains legal, a doctor who supports capital punishment should be permitted to participate in it without fear of losing his/her license.
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So the execution of convicted rapist/murderer Michael Morales in California has been delayed because the prison responsible for conducting the execution was unable to comply with a court order requiring an anaesthesiologist to be present. The reason? Apparently, doctors feel that assisting in an execution would be a violation of the Hippocratic Oath, which, among other things, require its swearers to "prescribe regimens for the good of [their] patients according to [their] ability and [their] judgment and never do harm to anyone".
Now, it should come as a surprise to nobody that I view this as good news. The death penalty is barbaric, and ineffective in any case (there is little evidence that it serves any real purpose as a deterrant, it does no more to protect society than life imprisonment does, and it obviously does nothing to rehabilitate offenders; I do not accept the existence of any other role for the criminal justice system). However, an element of this bothers me: specifically, the ability of professional associations to effectively circumvent judgments of the state.
Because a majority of my readership seems to fall on approximately the same side of the political spectrum as I do, let me turn the tables for a moment: it would certainly appear that the above clause prohibits euthanasia as well. A different clause of the Oath quite explicitly prohibits abortion. This means that, we the various medical professional associations to actually enforce the Hippocratic Oath on their members, abortion would be effectively outlawed. . . notwithstanding what the state might have to say. It would also render the debate over euthanasia moot since, even if the state were to decide (as it should) that doctor-assisted suicide is okay, any doctor who participated in one would cease in very short order to be a doctor.
This is the disconnect that can result when an entity other than the state regulates professions - something that the broader society views as acceptable can continue to be blocked by an elite professional association.
I believe that doctors should be permitted to decide for themselves whether their morals permit their participation in abortions or euthanasia - just as, so long as it remains legal, a doctor who supports capital punishment should be permitted to participate in it without fear of losing his/her license.
