CHAPTER 2
HUMAN VULNERABILITY
In the nursing literature there is a tendency for various groups of clients (or potential
clients) to be described as ‘vulnerable’. Thus we read of ‘the vulnerable child’, ‘the
vulnerable family’, ‘the vulnerable adult’, and ‘the vulnerable older person’, and more
generally we are told of various ‘vulnerable groups’ in society for whom, as nurses, we
are required to be extra vigilant, extra careful or extra observant. If we do not, then
these vulnerable individuals or vulnerable groups will suffer or come to some harm
from which they have limited resources to protect themselves. Generally speaking to
use the word ‘vulnerable’ in this way is to attach to it a semi-technical meaning in order
to denote that individuals thus described are in some way more vulnerable than ordinary
people, or more-than-ordinarily vulnerable. However this extended use of the word
vulnerability is rarely acknowledged, and even less often explained, as being used in a
technical or semi-technical sense. Rather it is assumed that it is known what is meant
when one or other person or group is labeled as vulnerable. We do tend to recognise
that the ‘vulnerable adult’ is an adult who is more likely to come to harm than someone
for whom the label would be inappropriate. Those described as vulnerable are perceived
to be vulnerable because they appear to be particularly susceptible to harm as a result of
either a higher than normal exposure to risk or a reduced, sometimes absent, capacity to
protect themselves. For such persons this increased risk of harm is compounded by their
reliance upon others, including institutional others, to protect them in ways that are,
generally speaking, unnecessary for ordinary individuals.
But this is already to identify a difficulty in using vulnerable as an adjective in this
semi-technical sense because ordinary people are also vulnerable. Indeed, vulnerability
is part of the human condition and to say that some patients are vulnerable fails to
distinguish between ordinary and extraordinary vulnerability. The idea of a non-
Vulnerable person or patient is unsustainable. We are all vulnerable and our individual
vulnerabilities are related to our own particular circumstances at any point in time. Or to
put this another way, we may share certain common features of vulnerability but we all
differ in some of our specific individual vulnerabilities because of the particular
situations in which we find ourselves at any given time or place. The extent of our
vulnerability is not constant for we may be less or more vulnerable on any given
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