Moral reasoning and cultural–religious meaning-making in inclusive education: a philosophical interpretation of inclusive teaching in Muslim Turkic school contexts

Inclusive education is often framed as a policy objective or a set of pedagogical strategies for accommodating learner diversity. This article reframes inclusion as a culturally situated moral practice enacted through teachers’ everyday ethical judgement. Rather than presenting empirical findings, it develops a philosophical – interpretive account of how moral reasoning about disability, responsibility and care takes shape in Muslim Turkic school settings, with primary attention to post-Soviet Kazakhstan. Drawing on Islamic ethical vocabularies – raḥma, iḥsān, adab, taklīf, and ibtilā’ – and on the institutional legacy of Soviet defectology and the article argues that inclusion is shaped by three interacting features: Islamic frameworks of obligation and care, a persistent institutional inheritance, and kinship-based responsibility beyond the parent – school dyad. Together, these dimensions present inclusion as an ongoing ethical process rather than a purely technical or policy-driven task, contributing to philosophical debates on the moral foundations of inclusive education.