Hierarchical Classification of Values

Öz

Values are of utmost importance for the creation, development and sustainability of a life worthy of human dignity. However, because even superficial views of values are regarded as values themselves, they have become relative and become degenerated; therefore, they have lost the properties – potentials and powers – essential to human dignity. This means that values have turned into subjective options and ideals that are no longer binding to personal, social and international relations. Restoring values’ righteous potential for the establishment of a humanistic life is possible only by enriching our personal perceptions and judgement with social and even universal values and revealing the hierarchical relations among them. All values are integral parts of a qualitative hierarchy of interrelated values. The primary concern of this study is to fill a niche in the literature by revealing this hierarchical interrelation and building a model to enable analysis of these values in terms of their instrumental or terminal functions, characteristics and scopes. For the purpose of the study, a new theoretical discussion on the hierarchical structure of values is introduced in consideration of their patterns and interrelations through a conceptual analysis of the values. This research is an analytical study based on a comprehensive literature review

Anahtar Kelimeler

• Values, value education, hierarchy of values, classification of values