Moral evolution as development: an unfinished task

Development has to be essentially in moral terms, not just material and technological. Mahatma Gandhi defined civilisation in moral terms. His disciple economist, Kumarappa, believed in a long-term tendency of humans towards reduced violence. This may be doubted in the present context of nuclear brinkmanship and environmental crisis. It only indicates that our moral evolution is an unfinished task. However, there are indications of long-term moral progress, like significantly reduced world poverty, improvement in gender justice, and reduced child labour, mainly due to moral pressures on the governments. There is evidence of a long-term broad-basing process succeeding, due to measures like abolition of slavery and untouchability and adult suffrage. However, even before the battle against inequality is won, we have a new challenge of artificial intelligence with a potential for massive unemployment and concentration of power. Moral evolution does not occur automatically; we have to strive for it consciously and continuously, overcoming many challenges. In doing this, we face questions like whether ethics is universal or relative, bias-free, and how to deal with ethical dilemmas. The article stresses not only the need to enhance moral sensitivity among all, but also of developing professional ethical expertise.