The chapter offers six different metaphors of communication ethics praxis: democratic communication ethics, universal-humanitarian communication ethics, codes/procedures/standards in communication ethics, contextual communication ethics, narrative communication ethics, and dialogic communication ethics. All six forms of communication ethics provide viable and useful practices, but the one that stood out most to me was the first listed - democratic communication ethics.
Within the initial description, democratic communication ethics is defined as a process of public communication wherein there exists a discussion of ideas, customs, and rights. As with all communication ethics, democratic communication ethics arises from a central "good", this particular one being the protection and promotion of the good of collaborative decision-making. According to the chapter, the democratic approach is potentially the most popular and most widely-known method of communication ethics ever since its ancient Greek birth. It is the go-to method of communication ethics. During WWII, there developed an automatic or innate connection between the terms of democracy and ethics. Everyone assumed that by saying one you were both saying and meaning the other, as well. Communication also got grouped with these terms to create an understood universal concept of being democratic equating to being ethical.
My question arises here: With there being a minimum of six viable approaches to communication ethics, how did the democratic approach come out as the most popular and often default approach? Yes, there are historical factors that played into its rise to domination, but in a field that revolves around the idea of multiplicity, how is it possible that one form seems to rise above all others as the default? Are the other forms given a fair play or are they acknowledged but dismissed?
As I read I found myself asking the same thing. When I tried to justify it for myself I figured maybe the democratic approach is the most popular approach because it is, I think, the most collaborative of the six. The others seem to draw on more situational contexts, whereas the democratic approach seems very welcoming in the sense of how it can be applied in everyday life.
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