What do the wealthiest in society owe to the poor? How shall we define justice? And how should we deal with the issues of equality and inequality within society?
All important questions with far-reaching implications for policymakers and citizens alike. But all too often, these questions are not being addressed to the frustration of the public, said Michael Sandel, a political philosopher at Harvard University.
"In most places, political parties and politicians are not addressing big questions and are not creating a framework for a meaningful public debate about the things that matter most," he told the Bangkok Post.
"Democratic societies should be addressing and debating these big questions ... Too often the debates are managerial and technocratic. In many cases, political argument is defined by shouting matches across deep partisan divisions."
Mr Sandel argues that greater debate is necessary to address the drift in recent decades from market economies to "market societies", where money is supreme and everything is for sale. The idea is a central question of his 2012 book, What Money Can't Buy: The Moral Limits of Markets, which tackles the role of money and markets in a good society.
"Should people be allowed to sell a kidney? Are there goods that money shouldn't be able to buy? Do we want to encourage people to regard their bodies as collections of spare parts?" he asks.
Such questions regarding the role of money and markets address our perception of justice, civic duty and the role of government and how it applies to education, health care or even military service.
"In Iraq and Afghanistan, there were more paid military contractors on the ground than US military troops," said Mr Sandel. "Now this isn't because we had a public debate on whether we wanted to outsource. But this is what has happened in the absence of a debate."
"I think there is a need for explicit debate about big questions, including questions of justice, equality and inequality. And whether there are certain moral and civic goods that may be diminished or devalued or corrupted if they are subjected to market valuation and exchange."
Mr Sandel, whose lectures on justice stand out among the most popular at Harvard University and have been viewed by millions online, said he is a strong proponent of using technology as an enabler to further education and communications.
The transformative power of the internet and social media offers huge opportunities to improve understanding across different societies and cultures.
"But the technology by itself will not produce an increase or deepen mutual understanding. It's not just a matter of hardware. It's not just a matter of technology," said Mr Sandel.
"True global understanding requires that people in different societies engage with one another through cultural exchanges, through educational exchanges, to try to work out terms of global cooperation. It doesn't happen by itself, even though we may all be connected through the internet."
Mr Sandel will speak today on values and ethics at the 2013 Bangkok Conference: Global Dialogue on Sustainable Development, a one-day conference co-hosted by the Caux Round Table, the Thai Chamber of Commerce and the Thailand Development Research Institute. www.sdglobaldialogue.com