(Joint project with Prof. Roy Gilbar)

Dr. Ram-Tiktin’s current research focuses on the legitimacy of public decision-making in contested bioethical domains. This project examines how liberal democracies can justify health policies under conditions of deep moral pluralism and explores the appropriate roles of experts, religious authorities, and ordinary citizens in policy formation.

Drawing on traditions of public reason, deliberative democracy, contractualism, and neutrality liberalism, the project seeks to develop a normative framework for health policymaking. Through case studies involving end-of-life care, surrogacy, and posthumous reproduction, it investigates how decision-making processes can achieve not only legal validity and professional credibility but also moral and democratic legitimacy.

The broader aim of the project is to contribute to our understanding of how democratic societies can address profound moral disagreements in healthcare while maintaining commitments to liberty, equality, human rights, and reciprocal justification among citizens who hold diverse worldviews.