Non-Consensual Treatment is (Nearly Always) Morally Impermissible

Abstract

The goal of my comments regarding the case study of Eve Hyde — presented in the introduction of this symposium — is not first and foremost to resolve the conflict between individual autonomy and medical paternalism regarding non-consensual psychiatric treatment. Instead, the goal is to step back far enough from what is generally accepted as the morally appropriate basis for non-consensual psychiatric treatment, including involuntary hospitalization and medication, and to ask very basic questions about when patients may permissibly be treated without their consent. My goal, in short, is Socratic — to explore aspects of what we take for granted in order better to determine whether we ought to take them for granted. Commentators routinely urge that it is morally permissible forcibly to treat psychiatric patients, such as Eve Hyde, in order to preserve the patient’s best interests and restore the patient’s autonomy. Such arguments typically specify duties of beneficence toward others, while appreciating personal autonomy as a positive value to be weighed against other factors.