What's the difference between cultural relativism and moral relativism?

No one I've asked seems to have a clear answer to this question. Would anyone care to try?

That's a hard question, but I'll start by commenting that - to an extent, anyway - many cultures allow for some moral relativism within the culture. Moreover, I wonder whether all cultures have significantly different moral codes?

Cultural relativism is the belief that all ethical truth is relative to a specific culture.See Here: http://www.philosophyofreligion.info/culturalrelativism.html
Moral relativism is the belief that moral standards are not absolute. This can be a cultural belief or an individual belief. It can change constantly, depending on a situation.

Fjohn's definitions seem pretty similiar to things I've heard before, and I tend to agree. On the other hand, I recently heard a Doctor of anthropology speak about cultural relativism for about an hour without once mentioning morals or ethics.

To expand on my previous question, there's a bit of a chicken and egg conundrum here: which came first? Is cultural relativism a form of moral relativism or is moral relativism a form of cultural relativism?

Historically it seems moral relativism developed first. Franz Boas, who coined the term "cultural relativism", was German, and was known to have been influenced by German Romanticism. I'm beginning to suspect that moral relativism is a Romantic notion, since German Romanticism is basically just the application of notions the Romanticists attributed to individuals to nations.

I'm going to be showing my ignorance here, especially since I can't even get my tongue around the word 'relativism'.

I've read the article that fjohn referred to, but for me I really wish it had been written in plain English. Not simple English, just something where it could be clearly understood.

Following on from that, could someone give me an actual example of the two and then I might be able to absorb the question. I think if that could be provided then there would be more input to the thread that would help clarify things.

Basically what the article says is this: since each culture has a different set of values, each culture has to be viewed according to its own values. Or, as various BB posters are fond of saying: "you can't say that one culture is better than another culture, because you can't judge one culture by another culture's values".

For example, the Western World values equality between the sexes. Therefore, in the Western World, discriminating against women in the workplace is wrong . In many parts of the Third World, on the other hand, men are considered inherently superior to women, and therefore, in accordance with the values of these societies, men are afforded far more rights. Hence, in certain societies, discriminating against women in the workplace is right .


The example of women’s rights is the one given most often, for some reason. It isn't just work inequity, dress codes, and inheritance laws, either. I've seen relativists excuse gang rape and murder in the name of family honour, using arguments that are perfectly reasonable within the framework of moral and/or cultural relativism (I'm still not entirely sure which is which). However, in certain circles, if you say that a brother shouldn't be allowed to murder his sister just because she dishonoured the family name by allowing herself to be raped (since in these societies women are deemed "impure" and it is therefore assumed that if a woman was raped then she must have done something to "invite" it) you run the risk of being accused of cultural insensitivity, or even the dreaded CULTURAL IMPERIALISM ! (TM).

The problem becomes even deeper when we try to apply relativistic principles to slavery and genocide. Can we really say that slavery is unequivocally wrong when Sudanese Muslims believe with all their hearts that enslavement of Sudanese non-Muslims is right ? Can we really say that genocide is always wrong when Nazi ideology and values held that genocide of certain nations was right ?

Common sense tells us that the answer to both of those questions is "yes, we can say that slavery and genocide are wrong ". However, if we look at these questions from a Relativistic POV, and are not hypocritical, we have to conclude that under certain circumstances slavery and genocide are right .

That's the problem in a nutshell. Cultural relativism is a nice theory, and it gives us a pretty good tool with which to understand other cultures, but it's useless in practice, since it doesn't work in a common sense situation (personally I'm in favour of the notion that holds that just because you understand a culture doesn't mean you can't condemn certain aspects of it).

Another problem is that of separating cultural relativism from moral relativism. I'm almost certain that originally cultural relativism had very little to do with morality, but over time they seem to have become entwined, and now it's very hard to tell them apart. I think that one way to solve this problem might be to figure out how they each came about, and what they meant originally. Cultural relativism is easy: Franz Boas coined the term early in the twentieth century while working with Native Americans, and from what I understand he was influenced by German Romantic notions of each nation having a unique creative spirit, or something like that. Moral relativism is more difficult to trace.

What you are saying SNM is correct when judging cultures in their own environments. The problems begin when the cultures are brought together and have to work together.
The UK has very strict equality rules when it comes to employment (made more stringent today when religious beleifs have been added) and given that it's illegal to discriminate when employing someone there will be the inevitable culture clash where "FOR EXAMPLE" a woman from a culture that beleives women to be inferior will be the Manager or Boss of a male from the same culture in the buisness place - in this case the ethnic culture has to be ignored and the culture of the society in which you live takes precedence.

The difference between cultural and moral relativism is easy to describe. Cultural relativism is pretty much what we've been talking about so far on this thread. Moral relativism is what happens when people within a given culture come to believe that it is acceptable for different people to have different moral standards within a given culture. An example of this could be shoplifting. One person may believe that it is OK to shoplift, as prices are adjusted to account for shoplifting losses ahead of time, and therefore shoplifted items are already paid for, in a sense. Another may believe that stealing is wrong no matter what. Another good example is the Catholic church and its policies on priesthood. In other careers, it is illegal to forbid women to hold any position. The Church allows prohibition of women priests, and the moral relativist argument supports this stance.

Both moral and cultural relativism are used to defend immoral practices the world over, and supposed enlightened and educated people defend these immoral and unethical acts on the basis of such relativism.