Global Ethics Day 2026: Re-Centering Ethics

In an era of increasing global inequality, devastating climate turbulence, and rapid technological change that lowers the threshold for deadly conflict, how can we ensure that ethics play a central role in our discussions of future policy solutions? For the 13th annual Global Ethics Day, taking place October 21, 2026, the editors of Ethics & International Affairs invited brief essays for an online roundtable on this year’s theme of "Re-Centering Ethics." The collection below pushes us to think about this theme from the individual level all the way up up to the supranational, tackling subjects such as military AI, ethics education, refugees, and human rights. In different ways, each essay encourages us to reflect on the value of time spent engaging in person-to-person interactions, whether through discussions in the classroom, activism, or simply pausing for a moment of reflection and feedback before making a decision.