The great linguistic coup of 21 th century medical ethics

George H. Smith in his book "The System of Liberty" in the chapter entitled "Liberalism,Old and New" discusses how the concept of liberalism and its advocates were victims of a linguistic coup in the latter part  of the nineteenth century.

 The classic liberals thought of freedom as the absence of coercion.They championed the notion of a limited government whose function was to secure the rights of individuals.Enter a group of thinkers who proposed a " new liberalism" , one that would,in their view, correct this inadequate,limited definition of freedom.To the newcomers liberty without equality was freedom in name only  and true freedom involved equal opportunity and power to enjoy one's life. They wanted to replace the idea of "negative freedom" of the classical liberals with what would become  the focus  of  the welfare state.True freedom in their view was more than mere removal of compulsion or coercion.  The new liberals were paternalistic and believed  the state should do much more than secure the people from internal and external predators but rather protect them from the effects of their own uncoerced actions.The classic liberals defended their position in part by asserting that the new liberalism was old wine in new bottles, with the wine being advocacy for a paternalistic government.The new liberals continued to dispense rhetoric that supported liberty but they had redefined the word liberty.

The new liberals won the day and the old or classic liberals lost much influence  but re-appeared in the 20th century with a new label, libertarian. The new liberals were simply known as liberals and later referred to by some as progressives.

I argue analogously that the traditional ,classical medical ethics and its advocates ( physicians themselves) were victims of a similar linguistic coup. Throughout most of the 20th century and earlier the core of medical ethics was primacy of patient welfare and respect of the autonomy of the patient,the later gradually replacing an older paternalism of medicine.Physicians were considered to have a fiduciary duty to the patient.

At the end of the 20th century and the early years of the 21th century a new medical ethics emerged,one in which -while  its proponents claimed nothing had really changed-there was a radical sea-change in regard to the duties of the physician.This was accomplished by nothing more rhetorically solid based  or intellectually justified  than a simple gratuitous assertion.The notion of social justice was simply declared to be part of medical professionalism and medical ethics.The degree to which this bogus concept has been accepted and endlessly repeated in medical publication is a tragic shame.The victims of this linguistic coup are the physicians themselves but to a greater degree the patients are the real losers as they have lost their advocates at a time when they may need them the most.