Morality In The 21st Century

In this series, Rabbi Lord Jonathan Sacks explores what morality means in the 21st Century.

Traditionally, morality has been what lifts us above the pursuit of self-interest and self-esteem. It’s about the things we do not just because they’re beneficial for us personally, but because they’re good for everyone. It’s about doing things because we ought to: about duty, obligation, doing the right and honourable thing. At a national level it’s about the values, virtues and ideals that bind us together as a society. It’s about collective responsibility for the common good.

But these ideas have been radically out of fashion for some time. Rabbi Lord Jonathan Sacks argues that this is dangerous for our future, as a world without morality may be good for the successful and the strong, but it can be very bad for everyone else. He asks whether we can rediscover a common moral purpose.

He speaks to some of the world’s leading thinkers about morality, together with voices from the next generation: groups of sixth form students from a range of backgrounds and schools based in the North and South. They are the generation that will have to face some of these big moral issues and deal with them. How will their views about morality play a part in finding the solutions?

In the first episode, Outsourcing Responsibility, Rabbi Sacks argues that a world in which we each pursue our own interests and leave everything else to the state and the market can be incredibly liberating, but outsourcing moral responsibility can also leave us feeling vulnerable and alone, without meaning and direction in our lives.

With contributions from psychology professor Jordan Peterson, economist, author and broadcaster Noreena Hertz, Harvard professor Michael Sandel and sixth form students from The Manchester Grammar School and Manchester High School for Girls.

• Producer: Christine Morgan for BBC Radio 4

Publicity contact: IP