In many countries grappling with the politics of equal recognition, the experiences, beliefs and reasons for action of people who identify as non-binary are starting to be seen as valid and intelligible.1 And, despite some gender clinics still responding cautiously to requests for non-standard medical interventions, their treatment needs are now recognised in major clinical guidelines. This is the current social context in which Notini and colleagues outline the case of ‘Phoenix’, an 18-year-old birth-assigned woman, who has requested the indefinite (...) continuation of puberty suppression, a treatment that was initiated when the client was 11 years old to mitigate their intense distress at the onset of puberty. Drawing on a conception of health as overall well-being, the authors conclude that OPS is ‘consistent with the proper goals of medicine’, and that there are ‘equity-based reasons’ for offering OPS to adults as a group. They concede that the physical risks are greater for OPS than for hormonal interventions generally provided to people with a binary gender identity. They also acknowledge the need for ‘a fine-grained ethical evaluation of Phoenix’s particular situation’ to assess whether the potential benefits of OPS outweigh the potential harms for this individual. Here I respectfully raise three points to amplify the authors’ discussion. First, there seem to be significant ethical issues of a general, not a particular, kind arising from the type of individual evaluation they call for. Following initial screening for significant mental distress and other major vulnerabilities, the key undertaking …. (shrink)

This paper is an exploration of the state of ‘clinical unease’ experienced by clinicians in contexts where professional judgement—grounded in clinical knowledge, critical reflection and a sound grasp of the law—indicates that there is more than one ethically defensible way to proceed. The question posed is whether the courts can be viewed as an appropriate vehicle to settle clinical unease by providing a ruling that clarifies the legal and ethical issues arising in the case, even in situations where there is (...) no dispute between the patient (or her proxies) and the healthcare team. The concept of ‘clinical unease’ is framed with reference to the broader experience of clinical decision-making, and distinguished from other widely discussed phenomena in the healthcare literature like moral distress and conscientious objection. A number of reported cases are briefly examined where the courts were invited to rule in circumstances of apparent ‘unease’. The respective responsibilities of clinicians and courts are discussed: in particular, their capability and readiness to respond to matters of ethical concern. Four imagined clinical scenarios are outlined where a clinical team might welcome a court adjudication, under current rules. Consideration is given to the likelihood of such cases being heard, and to whether there may be better remedies than the courts. There are final reflections on what clinicians may actually wish for in seeking court involvement, and on whether a willingness to engage with the experience of clinical unease may lead to greater sensitivity towards the value perspectives of others. (shrink)

These 13 essays by noted American and German scholars provide a focused discussion of many of the issues raised by the integration of philosophical and psychological theories of moral development. The essays pivot around two key contributions, by Lawrence Kohlberg and his associates and by JA1⁄4rgen Habermas. Kohlberg's major work was a description of the stages of development of moral understanding in children. This book contains the final formulation of his view of the end point of moral development (Stage 6). (...) Habermas's insightful response to that formulation, which seeks to fit Kohlberg's perceptions into the framework of a communicative ethics, is an important extension of his own moral theory. In three parts, the essays map out the relationship between philosophy and psychology in the study of the moral domain, explore the way the moral point of view is understood within Kohlberg's cognitive-developmental model, and discuss the place of moral development in terms of various models of personality and decision making. The contributors are Augusto Blasi, Dwight R. Boyd, Rainer Dobert, Wolfgang Edelstein, JA1⁄4rgen Habermas, Helen Haste, Monika Keller, Lawrence Kohlberg, Charles Levine, Mordecai Nisan, Gil G. Noam, Gertrud Nunner-Winkler, Bill Puka, Ernst Tugendhat, and Thomas E. Wren. Thomas E. Wren is Professor of Philosophy at Loyola University of Chicago. The Moral Domain is included in the series Studies in Contemporary German Social Thought, edited by Thomas McCarthy. (shrink)

The current empirical research and normative arguments on physician-assisted dying in the Netherlands seem insufficient to provide ethical guidance to general practitioners in the practice of PAD, due to a gap between the evidence and arguments on the one hand and the uncertainties and complexities as found in everyday practice on the other. This paper addresses the problems of current ethical arguments and empirical research and how both seem to be profoundly influenced by the Dutch legislative framework on PAD and (...) a certain view on ethics. Furthermore, the paper elaborates on how other approaches to empirical research in bioethics, such as found in the broad field of narrative research, could supplement the empirical and ethical evaluation of PAD in the Netherlands. This paper also addresses the challenging question of how empirical data—in this case narratives—relate to normativity. The paper is written in the form of a personal narrative of the author, a young Dutch general practitioner and researcher in bioethics. This style is intentionally chosen, to illustrate how work context and professional background influence the observations one makes and the questions one may ask about the topic of PAD. In addition, by using this style, this paper not only gives a different perspective on a much-contested bioethical issue, but also on the challenges faced when a physician–bioethicist has to navigate different disciplinary fields and epistemological paradigms, especially since the ‘empirical turn’ in bioethics. (shrink)

Stimulant drugs, transcranial magnetic stimulation, brain-computer interfaces, and even genetic modifications are all discussed as forms of potential cognitive enhancement. Cognitive enhancement can be conceived as a benefit-seeking strategy used by healthy individuals to enhance cognitive abilities such as learning, memory, attention, or vigilance. This phenomenon is hotly debated in the public, professional, and scientific literature. Many of the statements favoring cognitive enhancement (e.g., related to greater productivity and autonomy) or opposing it (e.g., related to health-risks and social expectations) rely (...) on claims about human welfare and human flourishing. But with real-world evidence from the social and psychological sciences often missing to support (or invalidate) these claims, the debate about cognitive enhancement is stalled. In this paper, we describe a set of crucial debated questions about psychological and social aspects of cognitive enhancement (e.g., intrinsic motivation, well-being) and explain why they are of fundamental importance to address in the cognitive enhancement debate and in future research. We propose studies targeting social and psychological outcomes associated with cognitive enhancers (e.g., stigmatization, burnout, mental well-being, work motivation). We also voice a call for scientific evidence, inclusive of but not limited to biological health outcomes, to thoroughly assess the impact of enhancement. This evidence is needed to engage in empirically informed policymaking, as well as to promote the mental and physical health of users and non-users of enhancement. (shrink)

Bernadette M Tobin; Development in Virtues, Journal of Philosophy of Education, Volume 20, Issue 2, 30 May 2006, Pages 201–214, https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1467-9.

What is it to be mentally healthy? In the ongoing movement to promote mental health, to reduce stigma, and to establish parity between mental and physical health, there is a clear enthusiasm about this concept and a recognition of its value in human life. However, it is often unclear what mental health means in all these efforts and whether there is a single concept underlying them. Sometimes, the initiatives for the sake of mental health are aimed just at reducing mental (...) illness, thus implicitly identifying mental health with the absence of diagnosable psychiatric disease. More ambitiously, there are high-profile proposals to adopt a positive definition, identifying mental health with psychic or even overall well-being. We argue against both: a definition of mental health as mere absence of mental illness is too thin, too undemanding, and too closely linked to psychiatric value judgments, while the definition in terms of well-being is too demanding and potentially oppressive. As a compromise, we sketch out a middle position. On this view, mental health is a primary good, that is, the psychological preconditions of pursuing any conception of the good life, including well-being, without being identical to well-being. (shrink)

La notion de médiation culturelle s'est institutionnalisée dans le monde culturel et dans le monde universitaire. Son analyse concerne la situation de médiation et le système de médiations comme répertoire d'actions, ce qui engage deux dimensions: la dimension historique et la dimension politique. Il est donc nécessaire, tant dans la recherche que dans les formations, de maintenir une distance critique envers certaines conceptions mythiques de la notion.The concept of cultural mediation has become an institutionalized part of the worlds of both (...) culture and the university. Analysis of the concept covers the context of mediation and the general system of mediations, understood as a repertoire of actions. This brings into play two dimensions, historical and political. It is therefore necessary to maintain a critical distance from certain mythologizing versions of this notion, as much in research as in education and training. (shrink)

Approaches to business ethics can be roughly divided into two streams: ‹codes of behavior’ and ‹forms of subjectification’, with code-oriented approaches clearly dominating the field. Through an elaboration of poststructuralist approaches to moral philosophy, this paper questions the emphasis on codes of behaviour and, thus, the conceptions of the moral and responsible subject that are inherent in rule-based approaches. As a consequence of this critique, the concept of a practice-based ‹ethics of responsiveness’ in which ethics is never final but rather (...) always ‹to come’, is investigated. In such an approach the ethical self is understood as being continuously constituted within power/knowledge relations. Following this line, we ask how one can become a responsible subject while also acknowledging certain limits of full responsibility. We thereby explore responsibility as a considered but unconditional openness in response to the other. (shrink)

Summary With regard to the dynamics of human experience and behavior, Gestalt theoretical psychotherapy (GTP) relies mainly on Kurt Lewin’s dynamic field theory of personality. GTP is carried out by including a re-interpretation of Lewin’s theory in some aspects of psychotherapeutic practice in relation to critical realism. Human experience and behavior are understood to be functions of the person and the environment (including the other individuals therein) in a psychic field (life space), which encompasses both of these mutually dependent factors. (...) The anthropological model of this approach is, therefore, not mono-personal but, a priori, structural and relational in nature. It does not one-sidedly focus on the “inner components” of a person, but on the interrelation of the individual and a given environment, which affects experience and behavior. After a brief introduction of these basic concepts, this lecture will focus especially on Lewin’s concept of tension-systems, which may be considered as the Gestalt theoretical counterpart of Freud’s drive theory. Further, we define the basic assumptions which underlie GTP and explain how the person moves through her/his life experience in terms of Gestalt psychology. (shrink)

Bernadette M Tobin; An Aristotelian Theory of Moral Development, Journal of Philosophy of Education, Volume 23, Issue 2, 30 May 2006, Pages 195–211, https://doi.

Zusammenfassung In diesem Aufsatz wird erstens der Frage nach den gesellschaftlichen Umgangsweisen von europäischen Gesellschaften der Neuzeit mit religiös gerahmter, weiblicher Nahrungsabstinenz nachgegangen. Zweitens werden Überlegungen dahingehend angestellt, welche Bedingungen und Faktoren für die Persistenz dieser relativ marginalisierten Praxis im untersuchten Zeitraum ausgemacht werden können. Dabei wird in der Argumentation für einen wissensgeschichtlichen Ansatz plädiert. Mit diesem Instrumentarium können u. a. auch hybride Erklärungsweisen der historischen Akteure rekonstruiert werden, die nicht einfach den Kategorien „natürlich“ bzw. „übernatürlich“ zugeordnet werden können. Der (...) Gegenstand der Fallstudie sind nahrungsabstinente Katholikinnen Westeuropas im Zeitraum von 1780 bis 1980. Nahrungsabstinenz hat dabei auf der objektsprachlichen Ebene sowohl die Bedeutung von Nicht-essen können oder wollen bis hin zur völligen Abwesenheit des Bedürfnisses nach „irdischer“ Nahrung. (shrink)

Happiness is currently the topic of a wide range of empirical research, and is increasingly becoming the focus of public policy. The interest in happiness largely stems from its connection with well-being. We care about well-being – how well our lives are going for us. If we are happy it seems that, to some extent, we must be doing well. This suggests that we may be able to successfully measure well-being through measuring happiness. The problem is that both happiness and (...) well-being are elusive and their measurement is far from uncontroversial. What exactly does information about happiness tell us about well-being? Is there more to well-being than happiness? If so, to what extent is happiness connected to well-being? These are controversial questions, but answers to them must be given if we are to make progress in the measurement of well-being. I argue that we should view happiness as an indicator of changes in well-being. I call this the Indicator View. According to this view, someone can be doing badly yet be happy insofar as their well-being is improving (and vice versa). More precisely, the Indicator View is the view that happiness is a defeasible indicator of local changes in well-being. Thus, we can successfully measure an important aspect of well-being through measuring happiness. I argue in favour of this view on the basis of an understanding of well-being that is widely acceptable. The Indicator View, therefore, has the potential to unite divided opinion over what happiness research can tell us about well-being. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:ABORTION AS A SACRAMENT: MIMETIC DESIRE AND SACRIFICE IN SEXUAL POLITICS Bernadette Waterman Ward SUNY-Oswego "If men got pregnant, abortion would be a sacrament." That familiar taunt is mostly aimed at Roman Catholics to humiliate them for their purportedly religious and anti-rational opposition to abortion. It is conventional to sniffthat the "religious assumptions" on which disapproval of abortion is "typically based" are "highly questionable" (Chambers 1). But the (...) cultural theories of René Girard suggest that it is because men don't get pregnant that abortion already is a sacrament. The key elements of sacrificial religion, as Girard defines it, are the presence of intolerable tension that must lead to social disruption; the choice of a victim who cannot strike back to absorb the community's violence; and the concealment ofthe function ofthe sacrifice, which employs actual violence for the purpose of stabilizing institutional violence. Abortion in America is upheld not as medical or even political policy, but as, in fact, a religious sacrifice. Girard's definition ofreligion requires neither a moral code nor a divinity nor a metaphysical grounding. The cult of Dionysus, to name only one example, evidently endorsed nothing we would recognize as a general code of morality; Buddhism, a far more august example, does not focus on a divinity; animism proposes no universal metaphysics. As to sacraments, Bernadette Waterman Ward19 Thomas Aquinas, following St. Augustine, did not scruple to call nonChristian sacrifices sacraments oftheir religions, "Whether true or false."' Scapegoating defines religious sacrifice. It protects the sacrificing community and promotes its unity—so long as all believe that the scapegoat must suffer. Often the victim is called an enemy to some established order; sacrifice is always conservative, even if it upholds an inherently unstable system. Because powerlessness, not real disruptive power, is the criterion for becoming a scapegoat, sacrifice requires a strong shared illusion. Classical religions provide unopposable gods to choose the tragically necessary victims, allowing strong ambivalence to surround the sacrifice itself. Ifthis is not present, the death or banishment takes on a different character—more political than religious, though Girard notes a fundamental unity between those two methods ofcontrolling mimetic violence. Mimetic violence originates in illusion surrounding a rivalry. Often there is an object involved, such as territory or wealth or political rank, but the object, which seems important, is actually irrelevant. The rivalry can continue, seeking new objects, whatever concrete acquisitions either party makes or loses. General, aimless rivalry dominates a social world of fragile, undefined selves in which anyone can be a model for imitation, and therefore anyone can be a threat to one's sense ofself. What an imitator actually seeks is to have whatever is desirable; most desirable ofall, perhaps, is the ability to know what is desirable, a mysterious quality that is constantly attributed to others; Girard calls this quality "being." From the nursery we are each other's disciples, wanting each other's toys not because of their inherent virtue so much as because someone else has seen some virtue in them. As human desire has no real single object, it has no closure; envy and revenge threaten others in a widening net of destruction. In the classic scenario, the model whose "being" has become matter for imitation finds himself in competition for the object, and attacks the rival, who returns in kind. A disciple who can rally aspire to the model's status can become a dangerous, even a deadly rival; in imagination, and sometimes in reality, they turn each other intp monsters. Yet as the desire has no single object, neither has the rage: the violence can be easily transferred to another object than one's rival. Sometimes those who are uneasy about their status in relation to one another can cement a powerful unity by focusing blame on some common target: a scapegoat. The Orwellian scenario is in fact the normal scenario: individuals caught in the maelstrom of social instability 'Summa Theologiae, 3a.61.1 31. 20Abortion as a Sacrament seek to avoid victimization by diverting the violence into blame and destruction directed, first of all, against someone else—and, if possible, against someone who cannot strike back: a sacrifice. Not all sacrificial religious... (shrink)

Bernadette M Tobin; Richard Peters's Theory of Moral Development, Journal of Philosophy of Education, Volume 23, Issue 1, 30 May 2006, Pages 15–27, https://doi.

Moral distress is a phenomenon of increasing concern in nursing practice, education and research. Previous research has suggested that moral distress is associated with perceptions of ethical climate, which has implications for nursing practice and patient outcomes. In this study, a randomly selected sample of registered nurses was surveyed using Corley’s Moral Distress Scale and Olson’s Hospital Ethical Climate Survey (HECS). The registered nurses reported moderate levels of moral distress intensity. Moral distress intensity and frequency were found to be inversely (...) correlated with perceptions of ethical climate. Each of the HECS factors (peers, patients, managers, hospitals and physicians) was found to be significantly correlated with moral distress. Based on these findings, we highlight insights for practice and future research that are needed to enhance the development of strategies aimed at improving the ethical climate of nurses’ workplaces for the benefit of both nurses and patients. (shrink)

All articles in May 2019’s special issue of Bioethics offer profound insights into the issue of “being a burden to others” in relation to wishes to die, which are highly relevant for ethical debates about end‐of‐life care and physician‐assisted dying. In this reply, we wish to stress the importance of acknowledging and analyzing the sociopolitical context of the phenomenon “being a burden” in relation to wishes to die and we will show how this analysis could benefit from a care ethical (...) approach. As discussions in care ethics have made clear, caring practices are both social and political practices. An empirical and ethical analysis of “being a burden” therefore needs to take institutional and societal norms and structures into account, in addition to first‐person experiences and concepts such as caring needs, relational autonomy, and interdependency. Besides the relevance of the sociopolitical context for the phenomenon “being a burden” as such, the sociopolitical context also seems relevant for the investigation of the phenomenon, which we will illustrate by reflecting on “being a burden” in relation to the practice of physician‐assisted dying in the Netherlands. (shrink)

This article draws from cultural studies, political theory, international relations, art history and museum studies in order to consider `China Design Now' — the blockbuster exhibition, recently held at the V&A. It argues that, despite the inclusion of a number of interesting exhibits, the attempt to frame contemporary Chinese design independently of political contextualization has led to an exhibition which is largely unsatisfying. The approach taken by the V&A is further shown to have produced several ironic outcomes. First, by attempting (...) to avoid `contentious' political issues, the museum has, in fact, forced the `political' to the fore. Second, by taking such an approach, the V&A demonstrates that it has failed to understand the essentially political nature of the design problem. Third, it has produced an exhibition which appears to advocate a (highly political) neoliberal agenda — one which insists on an inexorable drive towards greater global economic integration. Finally, it has failed to mention its own embeddedness within larger strategies of `cultural diplomacy' and the significance of such strategies for international relations and for cultural production. As well as drawing on a range of relevant literature, the article makes direct reference to exhibition wall texts, exhibit labels and quotations from the catalogue in order to support its argument. (shrink)

Property in Human Tissue It seems that a recurring theme in our Recent Developments is the issue of property rights in tissue . This has most commonly been associated with access to reproductive material and begins from the presumption of no property in tissue. A recent decision for the Superior Court of Justice, Ontario, whilst unsuccessful on largely procedural grounds, warrants a brief note because it adds to the general discourse on property in tissue and adopts a different approach. Piljak (...) Estate v Abraham 2014 ONSC 2893 addressed the question of whether or not the family of a deceased person could access liver tissue for genetic testing. The property question arose because the family applied for access to the tissue under Rule 32.01 and in order for the tissue to fall within the ambit of the Rule it must be defined as real or personal property.Background .. (shrink)

This is followed by a section about action in general: it establishes the standpoint of the agent and makes an inventory of several species of action.

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Evaluation, Standards, Normalization: Historico-philosophical Formations and the Conditions of Possibility for Checklist Thought Bernadette Baker University of Wisconsin-Madison In education today a new vocabulary has emerged that is far more than just words. In the context of educational policy the setting of goals or objectives is now being subsumed under terms such as statewidestandards, child development is now being adjectivized by descriptors such as learning disability or emotionally (...) disturbed, and the evaluation ofclassroom-based performance is now being collated in aportfolio. These are more than just buzz words-at one level they are new ways of governing children and teachers, of organizing action, and of perceiving the world. What, for instance, does it tell us about ourselves when first-grade students Mikey, Enrique, Waldo, orDonal are introduced to visitors to the school by labels such as LD, ED, ADD, ADHD, and so forth, rather thanby their name? What does it tell us about ourselves when we say a curriculum or program of study is in line with the standards established somewhere else? And what story do we think is being narratedin the documentation of a child's performance in portfolio form across a semester or year? In consideringwhyterms suchasstandards, child development, or even evaluation have such contemporary currency I am necessarily drawn into a study of the timespaces in which they did not have such currency at all. This paper maps four moves into a moment that I think of as a rather long present-day-a present that is not simply this morning, yesterday, or the daybefore, but one that links the subjectivities ofthose now living in educational workto those made available about one hundred years ago. The four moves that I analyze here can be thought of as conditions of possibility for the operation of contemporary educational mies of reasoning, especially those that have formed around the resurgent popularity of"checklist thought" in reform efforts. The four moves collectively historicize how notions of standards, child development, and evaluation can pop up as commonsensical tropes through which to gather and degather action in the educational field. The first ofthese moves is that which flows from the operation ofan ideal to the operation of a norm. The second move is that which flows between the advent of statistics and the advent of eugenics. The third move is that which flows between the appearance ofnovels and fiction and the novel ficticityoffacts. And the fourth move is that which flows from the fictions of child development narratives to the stories that standards tell us. Collectively, these historico-philosophical moves will enable reconsideration of what we think evaluation, standards, and norms for child development actually narrate, lending food for thought to the specificityoftheir uptake in music education. From Ideal to Norm One way inwhichto examinethe shift from a seventeenth-century concept of the ideal to the nineteenth-century concept of the norm is by telling a story that was told in the early twentieth century. At this time when the educational field was formalizing, there was great care taken to record discussions held at conferences. When conferenceproceedings werepublished, theywere usually structured so that the presenter's paper©Philosophy ofMusic Education ReviewlO, no. 1 (Fall, 2002): 92-101. Bernadette Baker 93 was followed by a transcript of the conversation held after it. Like today, in the discussion time, audience members asked questions or made comments. Unlike today, the names of such participating audience members were typed into the proceedings and their specific questions or comments were written up as part ofreporting on the paper presented. In a discussion held at a conference in 1 905 on the topic of methods for training children labeledas feebleminded, apresenterhadspokenof the positive uses of a vegetable garden in the disciplining of feebleminded girls. The audience members relayed their own versions of experimenting with gardening and gathering, some complaining oftoo little space and others indicating the effects of having too many fields from which to gather. Dr. Dunlap was one such participant, indicatingimplicitlytheeffectsofhavingtoo many choices. In the spirit ofthe hunter/gatherer dichotomy, thegirlslabeledas feeblemindedatthe institutionwhereDr. Dunlap worked weresentout to pick com. The following story emerged. Dr. Dunlap: Our girls go out under an attendant and gather vegetables... (shrink)

„On 23rd February 2022, when the editors had worked out topical issues of dispute relating to politics, ethics, technology and religion for a Hans Jonas Centre conference on responsibility for the future and discourse ethics, it was suddenly foreseeable that Russia would invade the core area of Ukraine the next night. We immediately informed our Ukrainian colleagues that we would allow them asylum, if desired, and invite them to the conference in Bad Kissingen as keynote speakers. In no time at (...) all, the new programme for the confer-ence was ready: After commemorating Hans Jonas' honorary doctorate in Berlin under the motto ‘Fatalism would be a mortal sin’ exactly 30 years ago, we now focus on ‘Discourse despite war’. After that, we discuss digitalisation as well as theology, philosophy and commitment". With contributions by Prof. Dr. Claus Altmayer; Harald Asel, M.A.; Dorothee Bär, MdB; Dr. Thomas Bausch; Prof. Dr. Dietrich Böhler; Prof. Dr. Michael Bongardt; Wolfgang Freese; Bernadette Herrmann, M.A.; Sebastian Höpfl; Bischof em. Prof. Dr. Dr. h.c. mult. Wolfgang Huber; Dr. Grigori Katsakoulis; Pfarrer Wolfgang Klein; Wolfgang Korb; Dr. Lena Kornyeyeva; Prof. Dr. Dr. h.c. Klaus Leisinger; Prof. Dr. Dr. h.c. Hans Lenk; Prof. Dr. Ulf Liedke; Prof. Dr. Alfons Matheis; Dr. Olaf Meyer; Dr. Jürgen Naeher-Zeiffer; Stephanie von Dallwitz; Dr. Marianne Rabe; Dr. Manuela Rottmann, MdB; PD Dr. Dr. Thomas Rusche; Prof. Dr. Johann Michael Schmidt; Dr. Eva-Maria Schwickert; Maritta Strasser, M.A.; OB Dr. Dirk Vogel and Prof. Dr. Anatoliy Yermolenko. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:diacritics 30.2 (2000) 25-42 [Access article in PDF] What is Political Feeling? Bernadette Meyler Anthony Cascardi. Consequences of Enlightenment. Cambridge: Cambridge UP,1999. As disaffection with poststructuralism increases, but new paradigms have not yet emerged, theorists have begun to reconsider the ties that current thought maintains with the tradition it critiques, in particular, its affiliations with the Enlightenment. Focus has inevitably fallen on the writings of Immanuel Kant, which (...) in the act of codifying Enlightenment rationality simultaneously initiated its dissolution. Disputes tend to arise, however, over the precise nature and cause of the hairline fracture that prevents Kant's Critiques from attaining the unity to which they aspire. Even greater controversy centers on the advisability of possible responses: should we set the bones, break open the gap, or provide an entirely new limb? In Consequences of Enlightenment, Anthony Cascardi undertakes a detailed discussion of how various theoretical schools interpret the fissure, and the problems posed by their accounts. Not simply remaining content with this critique of critiques, Cascardi presents his own stance, advising that we embrace Kant's recourse to "feeling" in the Critique of Judgment as an inevitable entailment of the Kantian system. Whereas Horkheimer and Adorno's Dialectic of Enlightenment argues that the opposition between Kantian reason and Nietzschean irrationalism represents the undoing of the Enlightenment, Cascardi responds that Kant's own writings encompass the duality. As an essential moment of what he terms the Enlightenment's "aesthetic critique," the resistance that feeling poses to "the unity of experience"--or to the unity of the Critique of Pure Reason and the Critique of Practical Reason--should be embraced. Cascardi further maintains that this "should" entails political consequences, although his text does not itself fully elaborate a vision of what these might be.The fact that such a rich suggestion remains relatively undeveloped is perhaps inevitable in a book of such comprehensive scope. Consequences of Enlightenment is a text that seems to call the reader to the task of continuing the multiple projects that Cascardi has initiated. I will attempt to articulate what those endeavors might be, and to propose points in his work upon which future inquiry could be focused. Because Cascardi's goals are two-pronged--to examine twentieth-century thinkers' Kantian inheritance and to engage directly with the "aesthetic critique" of Kant--it is sometimes difficult to ascertain whether Consequences of Enlightenment attributes certain positions to Kant or to his interpreters. Although this difference might not seem significant given Cascardi's claims about the persistence of Kantian aporias in the work of his inheritors, returning to Kant may allow us to ask how we should proceed in developing the political potentials of aesthetic critique. Two principal questions arise in this regard. The first inquires whether and how one can think aesthetics with politics; in other words, [End Page 25] what is political feeling? The second question provides a more limited point of entry into the same problem by focusing on the Critique of Judgment itself; what politics are entailed respectively by the beautiful and the sublime?Cascardi discusses the Kantian sublime only twice in detail during the course of Consequences of Enlightenment, once in chapter 4, "Communication and Transformation: Aesthetics and Politics in Habermas and Arendt," and for the second time, and most provocatively, in chapter 7, "Feeling and/as Force." In treating Hannah Arendt, who, in her 1970 Lectures on Kant's Political Philosophy, attempted to derive a Kantian account of the political from the Critique of Judgment, Cascardi explains that she tried to complete the Enlightenment by erroneously "turning from the indeterminacy of the aesthetic in Kant to a politics that designates democratic community as its field or object-domain"; he then asserts that, "Specifically, the politics that Arendt would claim to derive from Kant's aesthetics is a democratic politics of the beautiful..." [156]. Subsequently elaborating on the reasons that Arendt overemphasized the beautiful, seemingly at the expense of the sublime, Cascardi writes, "Arendt's tendency to privilege the beautiful over the sublime must be seen as part of her larger effort to construct a rational politics. For this effort, she takes... (shrink)

Stakeholder theory provides a framework for investigating the relationship between corporate social performance (CSP) and corporate financial performance. This relationship is investigated by examining how change in CSP is related to change in financial accounting measures. The findings provide some support for a tenet in stakeholder theory which asserts that the dominant stakeholder group, shareholders, financially benefit when management meets the demands of multiple stakeholders. Specifically, change in CSP was positively associated with growth in sales for the current and subsequent (...) year. This indicates that there are short-term benefits from improving CSP. Return on sales was significantly positively related to change in CSP for the third financial period, indicating that long-term financial benefits may exist when CSP is improved. (shrink)

Abstract Responding to recent calls from within critical MOS and organizational ethics studies to explore questions of difference and inclusion ‘beyond unity and fixity’, this paper seeks to enrich the debate on difference and its negotiation in organizations, thereby foregrounding difference as the contested and ever-changing outcome of power-invested configurations of practice. The paper presents an ethnographic study conducted in a psychosocial day-care centre that positions itself as a ‘space of multiplicity’ wherein ‘it is normal to be different’. Highlighting the (...) context-specific challenges and struggles encompassing mental ill-health as a category of difference deviating from the norm, our paper contributes to a critical-affirmative understanding of difference. We foster an approach that values normative orientations such as ‘egalitarian difference’ and ‘difference as multiplicity’ yet avoids idealising portrayals of an ethics of difference that challenges normalcy and unconditionally favours otherness and calls for ‘radically other kinds of difference’. (shrink)

Danišová, Nikola, 2021. Marginálie k figúre šibala v arcinaratívoch (Tematologicko-kultúrne súvislosti). Nitra: Univerzita Konštantína Filozofa v Nitre. ISBN 978-80-558-1807-8.

One of the core goals of Digital Health Technologies (DHT) is to transform healthcare services and delivery by shifting primary care from hospitals into the community. However, achieving this goal will rely on the collection, use and storage of large datasets. Some of these datasets will be linked to multiple sources, and may include highly sensitive health information that needs to be transferred across institutional and jurisdictional boundaries. The growth of DHT has outpaced the establishment of clear legal pathways to (...) facilitate the collection, use and transfer of potentially sensitive health data. Our study aimed to address this gap with an ethical code to guide researchers developing DHT with international collaborative partners in Singapore. We generated this code using a modified Policy Delphi process designed to engage stakeholders in the deliberation of health data ethics and governance. This paper reports the outcomes of this process along with the key components of the code and identifies areas for future research. (shrink)

L’itinéraire de Jeanne Kœhler-Lumière l’a conduite de la philanthropie à la collaboration avec les pouvoirs publics pour la réalisation d’une politique sociale à Lyon après la Première Guerre mondiale. Fille et sœur d’industriels, elle participe aux œuvres mises en place pour le personnel de l’usine familiale, puis élargit son action en faveur de l’enfance à l’échelle de la ville. Cependant, l’ancrage de la famille Lumière dans le camp de la République laïque isole Jeanne Kœhler-Lumière des milieux traditionnels de la philanthropie (...) conservatrice et catholique. La guerre constitue un tournant durant lequel elle s’engage dans les services de santé, travaillant avec des sommités du monde médical lyonnais. Son expérience et sa notabilité lui valent dans les années 1920 d’être sollicitée par la municipalité radicale en quête de compétences pour impulser une politique sociale. Dame d’œuvres puis ambassadrice du social, Jeanne Kœhler-Lumière illustre une forme originale de participation des femmes à la vie politique. (shrink)

According to evolutionary theory, emotions are psychological mechanisms that have evolved to enhance fitness in specific situations by motivating appropriate (adaptive) behavior. Taking this perspective, a previous study examined the relationship between mood and preference for natural environments. It reported that participants’ anxiety level was associated with a preference for landscapes offering what Appleton called "refuge," while participants’ anger and cheerfulness were both associated with a preference for landscapes offering what Appleton called "prospect." We attempted to replicate these results and (...) to improve on the study by experimentally manipulating mood. Using a between-subjects design, 80 participants were instructed to self-induce one of four moods: anger, sadness, anxiety, or joy. After the mood induction, they viewed fourteen landscape photographs and recorded the seven most preferred. It was hypothesized that subjects experiencing anger or joy would prefer landscapes rich in "prospect" features, whereas participants experiencing sadness or anxiety would prefer landscapes rich in "refuge" features. In contrast to the previous study, the predictions were not supported: artificially induced moods may not provide ecological validity as a test of the "mood as motivator" model; alternatively, the first study may have reported an alpha error. To see whether the model has practical value, we recommend a study of landscape preference using participants with clinically significant levels of mood dysphoria. (shrink)

Farmers perceive and appraise climate change, related risks and opportunities as well as adaptation measures differently. Such differences are not well understood and rarely considered in extension services, outreach activities and agricultural policies. We aim to develop empirically based farmer types, who differ in their socio-cognitive and emotional processes towards droughts, their expected drought impacts, their appraisal of drought adaptation measures, and their previous and intended implementation of such measures. The Model of Private Pro-Active Adaptation to Climate Change provides the (...) theoretical foundation for a three-phase procedure of semi-structured interviews, a standardized survey and a qualitative workshop. The principal component analysis reveals eight socio-cognitive and emotional processes of relevance for forming the famer types of drought adaptation: perceived opportunities resulting from droughts, perceived effectiveness of drought adaptation measures, negative affect towards droughts, perceived work effort and perceived social approval of drought adaptation measures, fatalism, trust in public measures, and perceived self-efficacy. Cluster analyses of these processes yield four types of Austrian farmers. The social implementers perceive themselves as capable, and drought adaptation measures as effective, socially approved, and effortless. The unaffected profiteers have hardly been affected by droughts and perceive beneficial impacts due to a decline in precipitation. The trusting fearfuls have already experienced severe drought impacts and express intense negative affect towards droughts. The passive fatalists focus on avoidance and do neither trust in important others nor in public measures. The identified farmer types of drought adaptation may support the design of climate and agricultural policy instruments and of tailor-made education and communication programs, for instance to increase self-efficacy and reduce fatalism. (shrink)