Kohlberg's Moral Development Theory

Great Debates
1

If you aren’t familiar with this it goes something like this. When people are born they have no morals. Their cognitive development mirrors their moral development. There are 3 levels of moral development and 6 stages, 2 stages per level. It looks like this.

Level 1 - Pre-Conventional

Stage 1 - Punishment Obedience Orientation
Stage 2 - Personal Reward Orientation

Level 2 - Conventional

Stage 3 - Good Boy/Nice Girl Orientation
Stage 4 - Law and Order Orientation

Level 3 - Postconventional

Stage 5 - Social Contract Orientation
Stage 6 - Universal Ethical Principal

This is a simple outline. For more detailed info search the internet for Kohlberg…

Everyone starts at stage one and most develop through the stages to stage 3/4. Kohlberg says a very small percentage of people ever make it to Level 3 - Postconventional.

Is this a valid theory? In my mind it has some problems especially with the stages 5/6. Most all of stage 6 thinkers have had serious problems with some segment of society and have paid severly for it. Abraham Lincon, Martin Luther King JR., Ghandi, etc. I personally think that someone of high moral/cognitive development would be more careful with their own lives by not causing quite so much controversy. But maybe I’m stuck in stage two and too worried about my life. =)

2

“Stage 5 - Social Contract Orientation”

Anyone who questions any of Society’s more unsavory aspects has reached this stage. I personally think most people have.
“Stage 6 - Universal Ethical Principal”
I think that this should be in part somewhere lower in the 3 stages. Most people have some sort of moral sense that is imprinted upon them just by living in society and assocaiting with organizations such as the church.

Wouldn’t someone who has developed “High Morals” disregard their own coporal bodies and do what is best for the greater whole?
Of course only those who also have High cognitive abilities would see past the social contract that we are all bound to.

What makes you say Abe was a stage 6er? He didn’t emacipate the slaves out of morals. Rather he did it to give the Union side a “moral” cause for the purpose of raising and extending Morale. He was just as willing to NOT free the slaves if it would have kept the Union in union! He was simply a politician that acomplished a great deed.