The Rise and Decline of Universal Values

From a historical perspective, the concept of values appears to be a relatively recent invention, born out of the gradual decline of the great traditional ethical systems. In a world deprived of a common human purpose, all that remains are subjective preferences, lacking any shared rational criterion: this is precisely what we now refer to as values.

Yet, insofar as moral judgment essentially depends on sensibility, emotions, and personal convictions, values cannot resolve the moral crisis of modernity. They may even intensify it by replacing genuine ethical reflection with individual preferences.

In light of these considerations, it is necessary to examine the thought of several philosophers, beginning with Friedrich Nietzsche, whose analyses remain remarkably relevant today. For Nietzsche, values are never expressions of moral truth. They are always the result of power relations, passions, and interests. In On the Genealogy of Morality (1887), he states that “there are no moral facts, only moral interpretations.” Through this formulation, he radically challenges the very possibility of attributing universal validity to values. According to him, dominant morality emerges from what he calls “slave morality,” born of weakness, resentment, and the desire to transform a position of inferiority into one of moral superiority.

When Nietzsche calls for a “transvaluation of all values,” he does not seek to replace the old moral system with a new one. Rather, his aim is to expose the fictitious, constructed, and fundamentally political nature of every hierarchy of values. From this perspective, the mere use of the word values appears as a symptom of a nihilistic evolution: values continue to exist as empty shells, even though the metaphysical foundation that once granted them authority has disappeared.

The sociologist Max Weber (1864–1920) extends Nietzsche’s reflection while developing an equally radical critique of the notion of values. In his famous........

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