Cultural Safety as an Ethic of Care

Abstract

New writings broadening the construct of cultural safety, a construct initiated in Aotearoa New Zealand, are beginning to appear in the literature. Therefore, it is considered timely to integrate these writings and advance the construct into a new theoretical model. The new model reconfigures the constructs of cultural safety and cultural competence as an ethic of care informed by a postmodern perspective. Central to the new model are three interwoven, co-occurring components: an ethic of care, which unfolds within a praxiological process shaped by the context. Context is expanded through identifying the three concepts of relationality, generic competence, and collectivity, which are integral to each client–nurse encounter. The competence associated with cultural safety as an ethic of care is always in the process of development. Clients and nurses engage in a dialogue to establish the level of cultural safety achieved at given points in a care trajectory.