Thinking critically about the occurrence of widespread participation in poor nursing care

AimA discussion of how Arendt's work can be productively re-contextualized to provide a critical analysis of the occurrence of widespread participation in poor nursing care and what the implications of this are for the providers of nursing education.BackgroundWhile the recent participation of nurses in healthcare failings, such as that detailed in the Francis report, has been universally condemned, there has been an absence of critical analyses in the literature that attempt to understand the occurrence of such widespread participation in poor nursing care. This is a significant omission in so far as such analyses will form an integral part of the strategy to limit the occurrence of such widespread participation of nurses in future healthcare failings.DesignDiscussion paper.Data sourcesArendt's Eichmann in Jerusalem: A Report on the Banality of Evil and Thinking and Moral Considerations: A Lecture. In addition, a literature search was conducted and articles published in English relating to the terms care, compassion, ethics, judgement and thinking between 2004–2014 were included.Implications for nursingIt is anticipated that this discussion will stimulate further critical debate about the role of Arendt's work for an understanding of the occurrence of poor nursing care, and encouraging additional detailed analyses of the widespread participation of nurses in healthcare failings more generally.ConclusionThis article provides a challenging analysis of the widespread participation of nurses in poor care and discusses the opportunities confronting the providers of nursing education in limiting future healthcare failings.