This research paper attempts to get pragmatic way to deal with few questions like, 'Will Indian Economic thoughts be able to give directions to crises-ridden global economic system?', 'Can India show solutions to the World's Present Socio-economical crises?'' and What are the Alternatives available before mankind to avoid economic crises?' The concept of economic exploitation or “exploitation” which has been the focal point of solemn philosophical debate is one of the favorite nouns in the glossary of critics of the free (...) market economy. The strongest version of the claim that the free market necessarily involves exploitation is that of Karl Marx. The aim of this research paper is to bring to the notice of economist, policy makers, research scholars, professors and students of economics as well as of philosophy and layman, that what kind of solution, a Philosopher from India, like Prof. Surendra S. Barlingay has to offer to the discipline of economics at large. (shrink)

The concept of essence is thought by many political theorists to be a residue of the patriarchal onto-theological tradition of metaphysics that needs to be (or has been) overcome by more progressive aims. The purpose of this paper is to examine the concept of essentialism in light of the treatment of the concept of essence in Hegel’s Science of Logic, and within the context of recent issues in critical race theory and feminism. I will argue that the role of an (...) essence underlying appearance is a valuable one within a Hegelian framework, and that it is politically important to reassess it. There are reasons that we should want to uphold the distinction between essence and an inessential appearance. We should want to uphold the irreducibility of essence to the Hegelian self-determining concept, and I argue in this paper that there is a basis for doing so in Hegel’s own text. Despite the well established impossibility of claiming that there is a property or set of properties that all women share, to dissolve essence as an illusory side-effect of the show of appearance is both to misunderstand essence, and to relinquish a tool needed in the struggle for justice. Essence cannot be dismissed by claiming that it is an illusory side-effect of the show of appearance because essence and the inessential do not exhibit the characteristic of reciprocity. (shrink)

Free Trade Reimagined begins with a sustained criticism of the heart of the emerging world economy, the theory and practice of free trade. Roberto Mangabeira Unger does not, however, defend protectionism against free trade. Instead, he attacks and revises the terms on which the traditional debate between free traders and protectionists has been joined. Unger's intervention in this major contemporary debate serves as a point of departure for a proposal to rethink the basic ideas with which we explain economic activity. (...) He suggests, by example as well as by theory, a way of understanding contemporary economies that is both more realistic and more revealing of hidden possibilities for transformation than are the established forms of economics. One message of the book is that we need not choose between accepting and rejecting globalization; we can have a different globalization. Traditional free trade doctrine rests on shaky empirical and theoretical ground. Unger takes a new approach to show when international trade is likely to be useful or harmful to the socially inclusive economic growth that every nation wants. Another message is that the movement of people and ideas is more important than the movement of things and money, and that freedom to change the institutions defining a market economy is just as important as freedom to exchange goods on the basis of those institutions. Free Trade Reimagined ranges broadly within and outside economics. Presenting technical issues in plain language, it appeals to the general reader. It puts a disciplined imagination in the service of rebellion against the dictatorship of no alternatives that characterizes life and thought today. (shrink)

This paper examines why fundamental freedoms are so unevenly distributed across the earth. Climato-economic theorizing proposes that humans adapt needs, stresses, and choices of goals, means, and outcomes to the livability of their habitat. The evolutionary process at work is one of collectively meeting climatic demands of cold winters or hot summers by using monetary resources. Freedom is expected to be lowest in poor populations threatened by demanding thermal climates, intermediate in populations comforted by undemanding temperate climates irrespective of income (...) per head, and highest in rich populations challenged by demanding thermal climates. This core hypothesis is supported with new survey data across 85 countries and 15 Chinese provinces and with a reinterpretative review of results of prior studies comprising 174 countries and the 50 states in the United States. Empirical support covers freedom from want, freedom from fear, freedom of expression and participation, freedom from discrimination, and freedom to develop and realize one's human potential. Applying the theory to projections of temperature and income for 104 countries by 2112 forecasts that (a) poor populations in Asia, perhaps except Afghans and Pakistanis, will move up the international ladder of freedom, (b) poor populations in Africa will lose, rather than gain, relative levels of freedom unless climate protection and poverty reduction prevent this from happening, and (c) several rich populations will be challenged to defend current levels of freedom against worsening climato-economic livability. (shrink)

The pandemic nature of COVID-19 has caused major changes in health, economy, and society globally. Albeit to a lesser extent, contingent access to shops and places to socialize the imposition of social distancing and the use of indoor masks is measures still in force today, with repercussions on economic, social, and psychological levels. The fear of contagion, in fact, has led us to be increasingly suspicious and to isolate ourselves from the remainder of the community. This has had repercussions on (...) the perception of loneliness, with significant psychological consequences, such as the development of stress, anxiety, and, in extreme cases, depressive symptoms. Starting from these assumptions, this research was developed with the aim of deepening the perceptions that the participants have of their own mental health, loneliness, fear linked to contagion, and attitudes toward imposed social distancing. In particular, we wanted to analyze whether there is a relationship between perceived fear and the perceived level of mental health, loneliness, and attitude toward social distancing. Finally, we wanted to analyze whether there are differences related to gender, age, marital status, current working mode, and educational qualifications. The research, performed after the diffusion of the vaccination in Italy, lasted 14 days. The participants were 500 Italians who voluntarily joined the study and were recruited with random cascade sampling. The research followed a quantitative approach. The analyzed data, from participants residing throughout the national territory, allow us to return the picture of the perceptions that Italians have of the fear of contagion, of their level of mental health, of loneliness and of their attitude toward social distancing. In particular, the data show that fear of COVID-19 is an emotional state experienced by the entire population and that young people have suffered more from loneliness and have been less inclined to accept the imposed social distancing. The data that emerged should make policymakers reflect on the need to find functional strategies to combat COVID-19 or other health emergency crises whose effects do not affect the psychological wellbeing of the population. (shrink)

Disagreements about morally appropriate mitigation policies arise in part from implicit disagreements about the nature and moral significance of needs. One key question is what, if anything, distinguishes “needs” from “mere wants.” One approach, prominent in economics and implemented in existing integrated assessment models of climate change, rejects a hard distinction between needs and wants. An alternative approach, prominent in the philosophical literature on needs, identifies needs with the requirements for autonomous agency, which is the capacity to set and (...) pursue one’s own goals. A second key question is in what sense, if any, the satisfaction of needs should take precedence over the satisfaction of wants. Those who reject the distinction between wants and needs can say only that some desires should be weighted more heavily than others. Those who endorse the distinction can say that, given certain ethical assumptions, it is wrong to frustrate one person’s needs in order to satisfy others’ mere wants. Thus, rejecting the distinction between wants and needs tends to justify less aggressive mitigation policies, in which satisfying the so-called “wants” of present generations compensates for frustrating the so-called “needs” of future generations. Endorsing the distinction between wants and needs, along with certain ethical assumptions, tends to justify more aggressive mitigation policies. Both positions are intellectually defensible; understanding them helps illuminate disagreements over mitigation policy. (shrink)

Personalist Economics: Moral Convictions, Economic Realities, and Social Action examines the nature of the worker and consumer from a personalist perspective, comparing that body of knowledge to what is received from conventional economics. A running theme throughout this book is that personalist economics is attentive to both aspects of human material need - physical need and the need for work as such - in a way that does not disregard human wants. Accordingly, this book (...) is more concerned about the philosophical base and description of the economy's significant characteristics than social economic policy. Personalist Economics explores four dimensions of particularly acute human physical need: unemployment, poverty, homelessness, and death. In addressing these four aspects of need, the book delves into the second and third domains of social economics: description of the significant characteristics of the economy, and social economic policy. In the same way, Personalist Economics explores two types of economic cooperation - supra-firm alliances and inter-firm partnerships - as means for addressing certain aspects of human material need. This book concludes with a lengthy discussion of the challenges facing personalist economics in the years ahead. (shrink)

Principles of need are constantly referred to in health care priority setting. The common denominator for any principle of need is that it will ascribe some kind of special normative weight to people being worse off. However, this common ground does not answer the question how a plausible principle of need should relate to the aggregation of benefits across individuals. Principles of need are sometimes stated as being incompatible with aggregation and sometimes characterized as accepting aggregation (...) in much the same way as utilitarians do. In this paper we argue that if one wants to take principles of need seriously both of these positions have unreasonable implications. We then characterize and defend a principle of need consisting of sufficientarian elements as well as prioritarian which avoids these unreasonable implications. (shrink)

Mainstream economics was founded on many strong assumptions. Institutions and politics were treated as irrelevant, government as exogenous, social norms as epiphenomena. As an initial gambit this was fine. But as the horizons of economic inquiry have broadened, these assumptions have become hindrances rather than aids. If we want to understand why some economies succeed and some fail, why some governments are effective and others not, why some communities prosper while others stagnate, it is essential to view (...) class='Hi'>economics as embedded in politics and society. Prelude to Political Economy is a study of this embeddedness; it argues for an 'inclusive' approach to institutions and the state.Modern economics recognizes that individuals' pursuit of their own selfish ends can result in socially suboptimal outcomes -- the Prisoner's Dilemma being the stark example. It has been suggested that what we need in such an eventuality is 'third-party' intervention, which can take the form of imposing punishment on players. Kaushik Basu objects to this method of wishing third parties out of thin air. He argues that if a third party that could impose its will on others were available, then it should have been modeled as a player to start with.The adoption of such an inclusive approach has implications for our conception of the state and the law. It means that the law cannot be construed as a factor that changes the game that citizens play. It is instead simply a set of beliefs of citizens; and, as such, it is similar to social norms. What the law does for an economy, so can social norms. The book discusses how the nature of policy advice and our conception of state power are affected by this altered view of the state and the law.As corollaries, the book addresses a variety of important social and philosophical questions, such as whether the state should guarantee freedom of speech, whether determinism is compatible with free will, and whether the free market can lead to coercion. (shrink)

ABSTRACT This article argues that taking concepts of euthanasia out of their political and economic contexts leads to violations of the premises on which the Stoic ideal of euthanasia is based: ‘a quick, gentle and honourable death’.2 For instance, the transplantation of the narrowly defined concept of euthanasia developed under the Dutch welfare system into a developing country, such as the People’s Republic of China (PRC), seems inadequate. For it cannot deal with questions of anxiety about degrading forms of dying (...) and suffering without reference to its economic rationale, demanded by a scarcity (unequal distribution) of health care resources. The weakness of health care provisions for the terminally ill in Mainland China has become increasingly poignant since the collapse of collective health care institutions in the countryside since the reforms of the late‐1980s. As in most cases where health care facilities are wanting, it is difficult to apply the criteria of gentleness and dignity at reaching death. Its solution lies not in a faster relief from suffering by euthanasia, but in extending the quality of life through distributive justice within Chinese healthcare policy‐making. This paper begins with a brief description of the Dutch euthanasia law, after which it discusses Chinese conceptions of euthanasia in biomedical textbooks, the media and in surveys. It concludes by pointing out the need for a transnational framework in which both the specifics and generalities of euthanasia can be discussed. (shrink)

Despite 40-year-old evidence of childcare challenges limiting women’s participation in agriculture in the United States, it was not until a major societal crisis, COVID-19, that farm organizations and policy makers began to recognize that these challenges negatively impact the farm enterprise. Among farm persistence and farm transition scholars, farm households’ social and economic needs, including childcare, have also been underappreciated despite the constant exchange of time, money, and energy between the farm household and the enterprise. We use survey responses from (...) 729 U.S. farm families to understand how children and their childcare needs shape the farm enterprise and the extent to which childcare arrangements, farm individuals and households, and farm enterprise characteristics interact with these decisions. A high proportion of respondents made changes to adapt to the needs of children with the greatest impact on farm productivity, followed by impact on the structure of labor on- and off- the farm, and impact on the farm enterprise structure. These impacts likely have short- and long-term consequences on the trajectory of the farm enterprise and well-being of the household. Different decisions required a different calculus and the trade-offs that respondents considered were shaped by access to a support system, access to financial resources, and specific needs of the children. Last, the limited variations across the four decisions for a number of farm individual and household characteristics hint both at the universality of being a farm parent needing to constantly adapt amid high rates of childcare challenges and inadequate social safety nets. We conclude our article by discussing the implications of our findings along with future research avenues. (shrink)

The literature of economic theory, like that of philosophy, abounds in prefaces and prolegomena. Methodology and analysis of concepts take an important place in a science which has not found the sure path of development. But there is no sure path for methodology either. The selfconscious methodology of social science has been largely a borrowing from that of physical science, where procedures have developed to a stage of considerable maturity. But the analogy falls down where guidance is most needed, at (...) the points where social science is most likely to develop new concepts and new types of structure. Philosophers have not been lacking, indeed, to belittle the entire enterprise, and to deny the possibility of anything that could strictly be called social science. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Economy, Society, Tragedy: Moral Reflections in an Age of Crisis and Austerity LOUIS A. RUPRECHT JR. Precisely their tragedies prove that the Greeks were not pessimists... In this sense, I have the right to understand myself as the first tragic philosopher—that is to say, the most extreme antithesis and antipode of a pessimistic philosopher. —Nietzsche, Ecce Homo, “The Birth of Tragedy” Orgiastic religion leads most readily to song and (...) music; ritualistic religion inclines toward the pictorial arts; religions enjoining love favor the development of poetry and music. In all of this, the one important fact for us is the significance of the marked rejection of all distinctively aesthetic devices by those religions which are rational, in our special sense. —Max Weber, The Sociology of Religion tragedy and society The title of this review essay is taken from Max Weber’s posthumous magnum opus, Economy and Society,1 an ambitious and wide-ranging comparative sociological analysis of economic orders, social orders and the normative structures that both emerge from and lend meaning to the intersecting economic, political and religious spheres in which complex human arion 28.2 fall 2020 Kathryn A. Kozaitis, Indebted: An Ethnography of Despair and Resilience in Greece’s Second City (New York, NY: Oxford University Press, 2021), 248 pages. This book is the fifteenth in Oxford’s important series, “Issues of Globalization: Case Studies in Contemporary Anthropology,” edited by Carla Freeman and Li Zhang. 138 economy, society, tragedy societies take shape. To Weber’s grand and capacious sociological categories, economy and society, I have added a third literary and philosophical term: tragedy. Now, to be sure, Weber thought a great deal about tragedy,2 and was drawn to tragic themes in many of his most salient and influential sociological studies. One need think only of his account of the bureaucratic “routinization” of prophetic charisma in The Sociology of Religion,3 or his depiction of modern humanity’s self-imposed “iron cage” in the rousing final pages of The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism,4 a text to which I will return at the end of this essay.5 But tragedy entails far more than systemic collapse or self-inflicted disaster. In this essay, I want to explore some of the implications of combining close attention to the lived experience of concrete individuals to the highly theoretical, systems-level analysis inspired by such Weberian categories. Put another way, how may Cultural Anthropology, and more specifically Ethnography, deepen such a globally-oriented Sociology? Here, I intend to supplement Weber’s sociological dyad, economy and society, with a conception of tragedy drawn from the cognate social sciences of Comparative Religion and Cultural Anthropology; I will be using Attic Greek tragedy as a benchmark. More specifically, I wish to highlight some of the ways in which the first book-length ethnographic study of the Greek economic crisis may add vital nuance to Weber’s more theoretical, world-systems approach. That book is Kathryn Kozaitis’s Indebted: An Ethnography of Despair and Resilience in Greece’s Second City, an ethnographic study of the lived reality of Greeks experiencing the double -whammy of a sovereign debt crisis and externally imposed austerity regimes in the Greek city of Thessaloniki; the book is the fifteenth to appear inOxford’s “Issues of Globalization: Case Studies in Contemporary Anthropology” series, edited by Carla Freeman and Li Zhang. As Kozaitis demonstrates with sensitivity and eloquence, by zeroing in on the people, rather than the economic policies or the social and administrative structures, Louis A. Ruprecht Jr. 139 certain normative categories and ethical stances become more relevant, many of them implicated in ancient Greek tragedy, and drama more broadly. tragic crises appropriately to a work of cultural ethnography, Kozaitis links the personal to her profession; further still, she weaves her own personal story into the story of the people to whom she is attempting to give voice. This, she notes, constitutes “the auto-ethnography in this ethnography” (4–6). How, then, did this professor of Cultural Anthropology, based in the United States, find her way to Greece’s “second city”? The path was circuitous, and its destination unclear for quite some time. That Kozaitis’s personal... (shrink)

Fascinating and compelling in equal measure this volume presents a critical examination of the multilayered relationships between engineering and business. In so doing the study also stimulates ethical reflection on how these relationships either enhance or inhibit strategies to address vital issues of our time. In the context of geopolitical, economic, and environmental tendencies the authors explore the world that we should want to create and the role of the engineer and the business manager in this endeavor. Throughout this (...) volume the authors identify periods of alignment and periods of tension between engineering and business. They look at focal points of the engineering-business nexus related to the development of capitalism. The book explores past and present movements to reshape, reform, or reject this nexus. The volume is informed by questions of importance for industry as well as for higher education. These are: What kinds of conflict arise for engineers in their attempts to straddle both professional and organizational commitments? How should professionals be managed to avoid a clash of managerial and professional cultures? How do engineers create value in firms and corporations? What kinds of tension exist between higher education and industry? What challenges does the neoliberal entrepreneurial university pose for management, faculty, students, society, and industry? Should engineering graduates be ready for work, and can they possibly be? What kinds of business issues are reflected in engineering education curricula, and for what purpose? Is there a limit to the degree of business hybridization in engineering degree programs, and if so, what would be the criterion for its definition? Is there a place in engineering education curricula for reflective critique of assumptions related to business and economic thinking? One ideal of management and control comes to the fore as the Anthropocene - the world transformed into an engineered artefact which includes human existence. The volume raises the question as to how engineering and business together should be considered, given the fact that the current engineering-business nexus remains embedded within an economic model of continual growth. By addressing macro-level issues such as energy policy, sustainable development, globalization, and social justice this study will both help create awareness and stimulate development of self-knowledge among practitioners, educators, and students thereby ultimately addressing the need for better informed citizens to safeguard planet Earth as a human life supporting system. (shrink)

Philosophers, lawyers, and political scientists have for a long time attempted to solve issues related to human rights, crises, and catastrophes. This article aims at bringing these debates together, to show that human rights and crises are mutually interdependent. More precisely, I will illustrate that the instincts and emotions triggered by the materialization of certain crises and catastrophes might devalue the implementation of human rights law as it influences our conception of the grounding of human rights qua moral rights. For (...) this reason, a call for a “theory of want” as a justification for the grounding and the implementation of human rights in times of crisis is needed. (shrink)

For years, the number of opaque algorithmic decision-making systems (ADM systems) with a large impact on society has been increasing: e.g., systems that compute decisions about future recidivism of criminals, credit worthiness, or the many small decision computing systems within social networks that create rankings, provide recommendations, or filter content. Concerns that such a system makes biased decisions can be difficult to investigate: be it by people affected, NGOs, stakeholders, governmental testing and auditing authorities, or other external parties. Scientific testing (...) and auditing literature rarely focuses on the specific needs for such investigations and suffers from ambiguous terminologies. With this paper, we aim to support this investigation process by collecting, explaining, and categorizing methods of testing for bias, which are applicable to black-box systems, given that inputs and respective outputs can be observed. For this purpose, we provide a taxonomy that can be used to select suitable test methods adapted to the respective situation. This taxonomy takes multiple aspects into account, for example the effort to implement a given test method, its technical requirement (such as the need of ground truth) and social constraints of the investigation, e.g., the protection of business secrets. Furthermore, we analyze which test method can be used in the context of which black box audit concept. It turns out that various factors, such as the type of black box audit or the lack of an oracle, may limit the selection of applicable tests. With the help of this paper, people or organizations who want to test an ADM system for bias can identify which test methods and auditing concepts are applicable and what implications they entail. (shrink)

Law and Economics deals with the economic analysis of legal relations, legal provisions, laws and regulations and is a research field which has a long tradition in economics. It was lost after the expulsion of some of the leading economists from Germany during 1933 to 1938, but then revived in Chicago. Both the subject of Law of Economics and the need for a concise Encyclopedia is particularly relevant in Europe today. Currently in the European Union there (...) are several different legal cultures: the Anglo-Saxon legal framework, the German legal framework, which for example also includes Greece, and the Roman legal family—three jurisdictions which have to be covered with one and the same theory. In the EU, the task of the European Commission to interact with the various European jurisdictions means different legal cultures collaborating and some degree of harmonization is necessary. The result is an immediate need, if only for the science, to show how a given problem is solved in each legal tradition and jurisdiction. This Encyclopedia provides both a common language and precise definitions in the field, which will be useful in the future to avoid misunderstandings during harmonization of EU Law. (shrink)

From its very beginnings economic anthropology had to tackle a major obstacle: the very nature of its object of study. What in fact is meant by the use of the term ‘economics’ or its corresponding adjective? Does ‘economics’ refer to a specific relationship between ends and means, as some think, or is it defined, more prosaically, as the satisfaction of material needs? Is it a category of specific facts or a praxeology of goal-oriented action? Some interesting debates on (...) the matter, which have brought formalist, substantivist, and Marxist writers into conflict, have revealed marked ideological distortions, some reductionism, and finally epistemological positions that were difficult to reconcile. (shrink)

The study of social, ethical, and political issues from a naturalistic perspective has been pervasive in social sciences and the humanities in the last decades. This articulation of empirical research with philosophical and normative reflection is increasingly getting attention in academic circles and the public spheres, given the prevalence of urgent needs and challenges that society is facing on a global scale. The contemporary world is full of challenges or what some philosophers have called ‘existential risks’ to humanity. Nuclear wars, (...) natural and/or engineered pandemics, climate change, global totalitarianism, and emergent technologies, are some of the challenges mentioned by many authors devoted to the study of long-term potential risks for the survival of the human species. However, while there are many reasons to be a pessimist about the future of humanity, there is also a lot of ink wasted in showing that the world today is far better than we had in the past and also that there have been many instances of social and moral progress in the last centuries. Some authors have even claimed that “we have made more progress over the last 100 years than in the first 100,000”. According to ‘our world in data’, some of the most relevant advances of humanity in the last centuries have to do with the reduction of poverty and/or inequality, better health and security, the decline of violence and war, and the development of democracy and institutional mechanisms to guarantee individual freedom and rights. Yet, there is a more concrete concern that our world faces nowadays, and requires a particularly detailed analysis. In a few words, the advance in information and communication technologies, the huge volume of people migration because of prevalent instances of global inequality, and the reality of an interconnected world that just mirrors an extensive history of massive human intergroup relations open the question about the feasibility of social and moral progress in the contexts of diverse, multicultural, and unequal societies. This makes it crucial to reflect not only on whether human societies may keep advancing on a path of social progress, but how this can be achieved by addressing the challenges of inequality and potential intergroup conflict. This concern closely relates to the further consolidation of democratic values and the achievement of a more generalized consideration of the equal moral value of human individuals far from group, ethnic, or collective distinctions. This vision of progress follows the moral convictions that have been considered right and worthy to be pursued by most ethical theories explored by philosophers and social scientists so far. This work aims to contribute to the study of the mechanisms and feasibility of social and moral progress grounded on the precept of human equality and is guided by the idea that social and moral progress in a plural world requires the accomplishment of a more democratic and tolerant society. These forms of progress have already been defined by philosophers Allen Buchanan and Russel Powell as inclusivist forms of moral progress. According to these authors, inclusivist moral progress is featured by the transformation of moral judgments, motivations, and norms guided by the rejection of “group-based restrictions on moral standing and moral status” (2018). The work of Buchanan and Powell is fundamental for the argumentation developed in this work since they have pioneered a more complex debate in the field of evolutionary social sciences and philosophical anthropology. In brief, these authors have inquired how human nature, conceptualized by the advances in evolutionary thinking and the empirical sciences, is related to our moral convictions and the possibilities that we have to establish certain forms of social and moral progress. The work of Buchanan and Powell contributes to the debate on moral progress by incorporating empirically-informed concepts and arguments. With this objective in mind, they develop their discussion around a generalized tension between exclusivist and inclusivist forms of moral progress. This tension revolves around the question of whether and to what extent human moral concerns, motivations, and norms, are limited or bounded by social identities, group thinking, or collective values. This question is at the center of this work. In other words, I aim to answer whether and to what extent the nature of our social and moral cognition hinders or enables the development of inclusivist forms of morality and moral progress. As I mentioned so far, the distinction between exclusivist and inclusivist forms of morality has a practical implication and facilitates the reflection on the mechanisms and feasibility of concrete forms of progress based on the precept of human equality, which is the road to progress that we should follow according to most ethical theories. The distinction between exclusivist and inclusivist morality is not used here as a form of summarizing highly divergent descriptive approaches to morality, but as a way to address the practical implications of morality research, particularly around the question of the feasibility of social forms of progress based on the precept of equality and tolerance. My objective then has less to do with offering a conceptualization of human morality or with the proposition of a new ethical perspective. Instead, I aim to identify, from an empirically informed perspective, what enables the achievement of egalitarian forms of social progress, to subsequently offer a normative reflection about what we should do if we want to accomplish such inclusivist forms of progress. This task is of great relevance, having in mind that some theoretical proposals on the matter have claimed that human prosocial behavior and morality are constrained by exclusivist fixed tendencies as a product of our evolutionary history. According to these views, human morality is a group-centered cognitive and behavioral expression that has severe limits in its scope and extent, which hinders in the end the emergence of inclusivist forms of moral concerns and behaviors. These claims align with the philosophical intuition about the ‘dissociation of empathy’, or the fact that human individuals tend to express empathy and sympathy preferably for members of their group whereas their empathic and moral concern and recognition for outgroup individuals tend to be reduced or eliminated in real-life social interactions. Multiple theorists have expressed, however, that these assumptions are wrong for empirical and philosophical reasons, which results in a serious challenge to the conception of human morality as exclusivist by nature. Furthermore, simple intuition and practical experience constantly show us that human individuals can develop and endorse a broad spectrum of moral considerations and adopt an arguably inclusivist stance concerning the kind of persons or agents that deserve moral concern. Moreover, and adopting a historical perspective, the expansion of cultural and commercial exchanges, the consolidation of democracy, the development of welfare states, or the emergence of institutions based on the concept of universal human rights, have partially driven human progress based on the impartial concern for the well-being of persons. These historical instances of cultural evolution and institutional design have shown that it is feasible to promote behaviors and attitudes grounded in impersonal prosocial and inclusivist principles. This optimistic perspective, however, still begs the question of the exact relationship between social, cultural, and historical contexts, and the emergence of certain behavioral expressions of inclusivist morality. This is crucial since a great number of human individuals around the world still do not make part of these instances of social progress, and some authors have suggested that such instances of social and moral progress are particularly favored by the contexts of the WEIRD world, that is the world of Western, Educated, Industrialized, Rich, and Democratic societies. Some of these approaches consider moral inclusivity a ‘luxury good’ and follow the ‘dependency thesis’ according to which the expression of moral inclusivity depends on the presence of very concrete material conditions that trigger inclusivist and impersonal prosocial tendencies that human beings are not able to express in threatening contexts without physical security. This thesis is problematic for various reasons and has led to incomplete explanations about the enabling and causal factors of inclusivist moral progress, as well as unsatisfactory suggestions about what we should do to foster the accomplishment of more generalized instances of progress based on inclusivist concerns. In an attempt to contribute to this debate, the main objective of this thesis is to offer an alternative proposal about the nature of human morality and a more detailed reflection on what we should do if we want to further accomplish such instances of progress. More precisely, this work adopts a particular developmental and constructivist vision of human morality to answer the question of how feasible it is to reach generalized forms of social progress based on the precepts of moral inclusivity. Furthermore, it offers some ideas about what are the most adequate and favorable conditions to foster such progress both at the individual and the collective level. At this point, a preliminary clarification of some starting points is necessary. In the first place, and contrary to what other authors have proposed when debating moral progress from an empirically-based approach, my perspective adopts a radical developmental and constructivist perspective, following particularly the conceptual and empirical ideas of the social-domain theory in moral psychology. From this perspective, morality is a domain of normative and social knowledge that develops and emerges in human interactions. Moral concerns, judgments, and norms are not only the result of the expression of innate adaptive intuitions, nor the product of social conformity and a simple process of mirroring the normativity that communities have established to organize their social life. Human individuals, instead, construct moral concerns and judgments during their situated interactions. More specifically, the constructivist tradition claims that we need to research how moral concerns, judgments, and reasons emerge in social interactions and how human beings construct the content of their moral knowledge in the first place. Based on these ideas, morality is defined here as the result of a constructive process through which human individuals, by the means of constant interactions on a background of mutual respect and recognition, develop evaluative concerns about how we ought to treat others, and how to ‘care’ and ‘respect’ others’ well-being, needs, and vulnerabilities. This developmental-constructivist theory of human psychology contributes to an alternative understanding of the origins of moral variability and informs a very particular normative stance about the most desirable contexts needed for the urgent accomplishment of inclusivist forms of morality in contemporary societies. This is so given that the very same definition of morality adopted presupposes the feature of inclusivity. The main objective of this work is then to argue, based on a developmental perspective, what are the most favorable conditions to foster the development of moral inclusivity and what we should do to accomplish concrete instances of moral progress that truly help us to overcome our most urgent moral challenges. The whole thesis is organized as follows. In part I, I show how received visions about human social evolution have informed conceptions of morality as an adaptive function evolved to solve the challenges of cooperative life. Based on these assumptions, some theories argue that human morality is limited by the boundaries of group thinking, and always obeys the mandates of collective interests and the will of the majority. However, this conception has problematic implications from a normative and ethical perspective. The aim of Chapter 1 is to present this introductory debate in detail. In chapter 2, I consider a relevant amount of scientific evidence that helps to consolidate a more optimistic and inclusivist perspective about the starting conditions of human prosocial behavior. Later, I will summarize some ideas offered to explain the possible evolutionary mechanisms that led to the consolidation of these inclusivist capacities. However, I will also show how evolutionary theories that share the same adaptationist foundations but initially seem relevant to explain the feasibility of moral inclusivity, result incomplete when considering the complexity of moral behavior and its ethical implications. Part II is devoted to presenting a developmental alternative to the adaptationist versions around the starting conditions of morality. In this section, I first summarize the epistemological, conceptual, and empirical basis of a constructivist perspective already proposed by several authors in the last decades. This is the goal of chapter 3. More precisely, I adopt the conceptualization of morality established by the social-domain theory school and clarify its conception of the situated development of moral concerns, motivations, and norms. All these ideas are essential for my argumentation on the feasibility of inclusivist moral progress offered later. Chapter 4 provides a more detailed idea of constructivist thinking about moral development, by analyzing one particular dimension: the development of moral concerns for fairness and the sense of justice in distributive dilemmas. In Part III, I assume a constructivist perspective on morality to contribute to the philosophy of moral progress. In particular, I discuss the implications of such a perspective for the conceptualization of human moral nature and discuss what are the most favorable conditions for moral inclusivity to emerge. Answering that question is of enormous relevance since favoring the transition of human societies towards more inclusivist forms of moral concern and behavior supposes a more generalized accomplishment of our most urgent moral convictions. Previous developmental or culturally-sensible attempts to explore this issue are already on the market. As mentioned before, most authors have approached the topic by situating the cultural evolution and development of (inclusivist) moral progress in the WEIRD world. For instance, some of these authors claim that very concrete material conditions (mostly present in the Western World) have been necessary for triggering inclusivist and impersonal prosocial tendencies that human beings are not able to express in threatening contexts without physical security. Despite their interest in explaining inclusivist morality and the feasibility of inclusivist forms of progress following a naturalistic and culturally situated approach, these theories are problematic for two main reasons. In the first place, most of the authors that explain moral progress tend to focus exclusively on the consolidation of liberal values in the Western world and the underlying adoption of laws, social-epistemic practices, and public narratives about tolerance and inclusivity, as unequivocal signs of inclusivist morality. Nevertheless, there is an enormous distance between the institutional and public support of inclusivist moral values or the construction of public images of tolerance and inclusivity, and the real materialization of impersonal moralities in situated social interactions. Secondly, the variability of human moral behavior is far bigger than most of the theories in moral psychology and moral progress tend to assume. Accordingly, inclusivist and exclusivist forms of morality may develop simultaneously in similar or divergent geographical and socio-ecological environments, including those with harsh conditions such as competition for scarce resources, potential intergroup conflict, and risks of disease transmission. In addition, harsh environmental conditions are usually present in almost all societies around the globe, and the presence of socio-ecological conditions such as physical security and prosperity, predominant in highly resourced populations, do not prevent the existence of exclusivist moral tendencies. My model explores a different perspective on the relationships between cultural, institutional, and historical factors, and the situated development of human morality. This supposes a clear distinction from previous approaches to the matter since it offers a different view on what we should do to pursue further instances of inclusivist social progress. In the fifth chapter, I first analyze the proposals of some defenders of the ‘dependency’ theory. The attention is focused on the ‘Evolutionary Developmental Model’ proposed by Buchanan and Powell (2018). Based on a critique of this approach, I will argue that to explain the evolution and development of human morality in its multiple manifestations, it is essential to put focus on social interactions. This also involves a different perspective on human-environment relations that in line with a constructivist worldview makes an innovative contribution to the philosophy of moral behavior and moral progress. Later, in the sixth chapter, I will define my alternative relational view of inclusivist morality and I will offer my view on how to establish favorable conditions that make inclusivist morality possible. Complementing the constructivist approach, my conception is based on the essential role of equality and individuality and on how moral inclusivity is favored if moral concerns do not develop driven by the accomplishment of group-centered, binding, and communitarian concerns and values. In brief, my relational model suggests that the accomplishment of moral inclusivity not only depends on the overall achievement of certain levels of physical security or economic prosperity. Instead, its development is favored by transforming the interactional contexts in which moral concerns towards autonomy and individuality emerge. In arguing so, I will need to start with a critique of contemporary situated and embodied approaches in ethics. Then, I will show how societies guided by the accomplishment of group-centered values of power, dominance, and relational inequality tend to express exclusivist moral behaviors, while individualistic societies tend to be more inclusivist. Starting from this diagnosis, my final attempt is then to reflect on which are the best conditions for the moral valuation of individuality to emerge and what we should do to promote the accomplishment of moral inclusivity at the societal level. (shrink)

Ethical oaths for bankers, economists and managers are increasingly seen as successful instruments to ensure more responsible behaviour. In this article, we reflect on the nature of ethical oaths. Based on John Austin's speech act theory and the work of Emmanuel Levinas, we introduce a performative concept of ethical oaths that is characterised by (1) the existential self-performative of the one I want to be, which is (2) demanded by the public context. Because ethical oaths are (3) structurally threatened (...) by the possibility of infelicity or failure, we stress (4) the behavioural aspect of ethical oaths in economics and business. We conclude that a performative concept of ethical oaths can contribute to more ethical behaviour in economics and business, because the performative involves action and behaviour. At the same time, it becomes clear that a radical new perspective on the nature, function and limitation of oaths is needed. (shrink)

The development and utility of genetically modified crops for smallholders around the world is controversial. Critical questions include what traits and crops are to be developed; how they can be adapted to smallholders’ ecological, social and economic contexts; which dissemination channels should be used to reach smallholders; and which policy environments will enable the greatest benefits for smallholders and the rural poor. A key question is how the voices of smallholders who have experience with or desire to use GM technologies (...) enter the larger debate. Africa has the greatest number of smallholders and poor with the least exposure to GM crops. Because of the well-established use of GM crops in South Africa by commercial farmers, we formed a community of practice involving smallholders, extension, researchers, non-profits and agribusiness in KwaZulu-Natal to examine the conditions under which GM crops are used by smallholders, how smallholders interact with GM technologies and what insights smallholders and other stakeholders can provide regarding these questions. One of the advantages of the CoP approach is that it brings stakeholders together in a non-hierarchical way that encourages new ways of thinking and new partnerships. Such interaction around a specific project can enhance the voice of smallholders in a variety of ways. In our project, smallholder participants have increased their knowledge and can make better decisions about GM technologies, which had been barriers for them. Notably, they have also improved their knowledge of maize production practices, accessed new practice networks, and met new researchers and resource providers. They are now being integrated into these networks in a way that should improve their livelihoods and make the wants and needs of smallholders better known. Such knowledge and experience has improved their voice in agriculture and rural development discussions. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Bible and Yoga:Toward an Esoteric Reading of Biblical LiteratureSusanne ScholzThe ProblemWe live in a post-biblical world—a world that sentimentalizes the Bible, ignores it, or is indifferent about the sacred text of the Christian and Jewish religions. Our daily lives are not shaped by biblical rhetoric, imagery, or practice, but by our everyday efforts of making a living, staying healthy, and raising a family. By "we" I mean those of (...) us who are part of North America or Western Europe and belong to the culturally and politically dominant group of white, middle-class, educated people. We live in societies that are largely secularized, perhaps even "anti-religiously" oriented, increasingly digitalized, and economically organized by a capitalist system that eradicates equal and just distribution of wealth nationally and internationally. In our world the Bible plays, at best, a privatized, individualized, and societally marginalized role. Sometimes, especially in the United States, Christian fundamentalists organize politically to foster change, trying to reinstate the Bible's political centrality. The effort to place stone sculptures of the Ten Commandments in the Alabama state courthouse,1 or—related primarily to middle and high school education—the insistence on the validity of creationism are prominent examples for the Christian fundamentalist involvement in the secularizing developments of Western countries. Mostly, however, such reactionary struggles confront an indifferent majority that favors the Western scientific worldview over biblical primacy. And even among many American fundamentalists, the Bible is mainly a privatized source of religious piety.My comments come from and speak to the particularities of the Western secular context. I do not want to be understood as making general statements about locations different from the Western one since they face different priorities. For instance, in Asian countries biblical traditions have never enjoyed a majority position as they did in Europe or North America. Historical, cultural, and religious differences do not, however, imply that other locations have nothing to contribute to the understanding of the Bible in post-biblical societies—on the contrary. But here my comments focus on the situation of the Bible and biblical studies in the West. [End Page 133]The Situation: Biblical Studies TodayThe familiarity with biblical literature is dramatically lower among people younger than forty-five than among those older than forty-five. The so-called Generation X (those born after 1960) and the generation afterward (those born after 1984) know little of the Bible and have little use for it, except if they affiliate with a Christian or Jewish organization. This fact raises important questions: If the younger generations in post-biblical societies do not read the Bible, what is the future of this sacred text in the West? Will it simply turn into a relic of the past? And what does this trend indicate for the academic field of Bible research?Biblical scholarship—until the 1980s a largely Western endeavor—is still indifferent about these generational developments in our societies. To many biblical scholars, the fact that we are living in a post-biblical world is a nonissue and does not affect their daily work with biblical literature. Accordingly, many, if not most, publications in biblical studies continue operating within a nineteenth-century mindset that regards "the Church" as the powerful opposition to the historical and literary study of the Bible, although by now mainstream religion has little cultural, political, and religious authority and power. Furthermore, much of biblical scholarship is not read by laypeople, who remain mostly ignorant of the issues discussed in the field. And even when some scholars recognize independence from religious institutions, they seldom reflect on the limited relevance of their work to larger society.Perhaps oblivious of the changed circumstances or unable to relate to post-biblical discourse in Western societies, many researchers do what they know best: they apply historical and literary methods to biblical literature, as if nothing else is needed in our era. Accordingly, many Bible scholars hardly notice that they talk only with, and among, themselves. They seem undisturbed that their work rarely, if ever, has an impact on cultural, religious, or political discourse. In fact, many of them would not even agree that the Bible and biblical studies... (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:The Suffering of Sexism:Buddhist Perspectives and ExperiencesRita M. GrossHaving been assigned the topic of suffering and sexism for this conference and celebration of Paul Knitter’s career and work, I feel qualified to address that topic. I have suffered a lot because of the work I have done on sexism, including a very diminished career. After nearly fifty years of demonstrating the presence of sexism in religious studies and in (...) Buddhism, and taking a lot of flak and criticism for bringing to light many things that many people simply don’t want to know, I would be delighted if such discussions were no longer needed. That, however, is not the case. So bringing together these two s-words—suffering and sexism—is very potent. The only effect of sexism is suffering. Forming identities and organizing society on the basis of male dominance have no redeeming benefits that offset the suffering.However, it is critical that we understand what is the real issue as we begin these reflections on suffering and sexism. I have long contended that, rather than trying to reform gender roles or discern what an ideal set of gender roles might be, the fundamental problem is the very existence of gender roles—any set of gender roles whatsoever. Does the shape of our genitals really predetermine our hearts, minds, longings, and abilities? Does it have anything to do with one’s ability to think theologically or to excel at spiritual disciplines? Gender roles severely and arbitrarily constrain people. That is the real suffering of sexism, and that, rather than male dominance, is the true problem. Male dominance is only one of the more unfortunate results of the constraint of arbitrary and binding gender roles. Thus, the suffering of sexism needs to give way to freedom from the prison of gender roles.engaged buddhism (and christianity) and the suffering of sexismUnfortunately, the engaged Buddhist movement has been very slow to recognize that the suffering of sexism is something engaged Buddhists should care about, or even that is exists. Doubly unfortunately, many engaged Christians are no more likely to take up issues of gender justice very forcefully. It is not uncommon for books on [End Page 69] engaged Buddhism or Christianity to omit the topic altogether. If it is discussed at all, a single issue, such as bhikkshuni ordination in the Buddhist case, is often the only gender issue discussed, rather than the full topic of Buddhist androcentrism and patriarchy.It is very frustrating and disappointing when those who wax eloquent on economic and political justice are completely silent on sexism and gender justice. How can they possibly imagine there could be economic or political justice when women still lack political and economic equality because they lack both equal access to all culturally valued pursuits and to reproductive freedom? Yet many engaged Buddhists and Christians seem to see no contradiction at all between advocating for economic and political “justice” at that same time as they advocate against women’s religious equality and reproductive freedom. Even if they don’t advocate against things that are essential for women, they are often silent on those issues.It’s very easy to criticize the IMF, the World Bank, or US foreign policy, things that we Buddhists don’t and can’t control, things that even Christians can’t control. But we do control our own religious institutions, whether Buddhist or Christian. So why don’t engaged Buddhists and Christians even discuss Buddhist and Christian sexism and patriarchy? We could change those institutions in a heartbeat, if we chose to do so. Why don’t we? I challenge engaged Buddhists and Christians to become much more aware of the suffering of sexism and much more serious about ending it in Buddhist and in Christian institutions.received generalities regarding buddhism and genderIf one looks at the world’s various Buddhisms, especially in Asia, superficially less so in the Western world, it would be impossible to avoid the conclusion that Buddhism is seriously infected with the sexism of male dominance. All the leaders and most of the teachers are men. Male monastics are well supported, while female monastics barely survive. Lack... (shrink)

When we start with the wrong question, no matter how good an answer we get, it won’t give us the results we want. Rather than joining the throngs who are asking, When will this economic crisis be over? Jim Wallis says the right question to ask is How will this crisis change us? The worst thing we can do now, Wallis tells us, is to go back to normal. Normal is what got us into this situation. We need (...) a new normal, and this economic crisis is an invitation to discover what that means. Some of the principles Wallis unpacks for our new normal are . . . • Spending money we don’t have for things we don’t need is a bad foundation for an economy or a family. • It’s time to stop keeping up with the Joneses and start making sure the Joneses are okay. • The values of commercials and billboards are not the things we want to teach our children. • Care for the poor is not just a moral duty but is critical for the common good. • A healthy society is a balanced society in which markets, the government, and our communities all play a role. • The operating principle of God’s economy says that there is enough if we share it. • And much, much more . . . In the pages of this book, Wallis provides us with a moral compass for this new economy—one that will guide us on Wall Street, Main Street, and Your Street. Embracing a New Economy Getting back to "the way things were" is not an option. It is time we take our economic uncertainty and use it to find some moral clarity. Too often we have been ruled by the maxims that greed is good, it’s all about me, and I want it now. Those can be challenged only with some of our oldest and best values—enough is enough, we are in it together, and thinking not just for tomorrow but for future generations. Jim Wallis shows that the solution to our problems will be found only as individuals, families, friends, churches, mosques, synagogues, and entire communities wrestle with the question of values together. (shrink)

Like a message in a bottle, How Is Critical Economic Theory Possible? originally written in the late 1960s in Hungarian, has recently arrived on the shores of critical theory in the form of an English translation. As a critique of Marx’s economic determinism, the authors aim to set Marxist thinking on a more realistic path. This article looks first, at what the authors think are flawed premises in Marx’s work. Second, I sketch the contemporary economic context of a global digital (...) economy to point at issues a critical economic theory inevitably has to contend with today to prove its relevance. Finally, I argue that Maria Márkus’s ideas of a politicisation of needs and civil/decent society make a significant contribution to a potential answer to How Is Critical Economic Theory Possible? and also advance the idea of a mixed economy with the goal to sustain an economic order that allows a maximum of economic and political freedom while simultaneously reducing economic and political inequalities to a minimum. (shrink)

The moral heart of normative law and economics is efficiency, especially dynamic efficiency that takes incentive effects into account. In the economic theory, justificatory argument is inherently at the institutional- or rule-level, not an the individual- or case-level. InMarkets, Morals, and the Law Jules Coleman argues against the efficiency theory on normative grounds. Although he strongly asserts the need to view law institutionally, he frequently grounds his criticisms of law and economics in arguments from little more than (...) direct moral intuition about individual cases. He evidently holds that consent provides a better normative basis for law than does efficiency and he uses consent arguments to attack recommendations from scholars in law and economics. His own chief contribution, however, is to law and economics rather than to any alternative theory. (shrink)

This book is unique because it is the first single-author monograph which applies Bourdieu’s theory to management studies. It takes a theory-driven approach to develop models to describe service innovation. This will give the reader a full understanding of the variety of different theoretical concepts that Bourdieu created and used and how they can be applied to the study of management and innovation. Moreover, it is also the only book that links Bourdieu’s theory to his methodological approach, providing the reader (...) with a toolkit of methods to perform business ethnographies according to Bourdieu’s approach. The book acts as a primer for anyone wanting to learn how to model an organisational system from a Bourdieusian perspective. It contains all the information someone might need to begin to go out in the field and collect data. Consequently, the people that might want to read this publication include post-graduate students looking to learn business anthropology, as well as post-doctoral and other early career researchers. (shrink)

The phenomenon of weakness of will – not doing what we perceive as the best action – is not recognized by neoclassical economics due to the axiomatic assumptions of the revealed preference theory (RPT) that people do what is best for them. However, present bias shows that people have different preferences over time. As they cannot be compared by the utility measurements, economists need to normatively decide between selves (short- versus long-term preferences). A problem is that neoclassical economists (...) perceive RPT as value-free and incorporate present bias within the economic framework. The axiomatic assumption that people do what is best for them leads to theoretical and practical dilemmas. This work examines weakness of will to resolve some shortcomings of RPT. The concept of intention is used to provide multiple self conception with the framework to decide between selves, which had not been done before. The paper concludes that individuals should not always follow their revealed preferences (desires) but the intentions (reason) because the latter indicates what people really want. (shrink)

The agenda informing this compact book has the transparency of crystal. Against the widely repeated claim that the so‐called Information Age began with the invention of the transistor in 1947, a claim trumpeted both by the knowledgeable and the ignorant , Daniel Headrick seeks a more distant source for the information‐saturated environment in which we now live. He sensibly points out that human demand for information is as old as humanity itself, and consequently we should not look to name any (...) single moment as the “dawn” of the Information Age. Instead we should be attentive to historical periods during which the availability of information accelerates sharply. Often such moments are associated with particular technical innovations, such as the appearance of double‐entry bookkeeping, printing, the telegraph, and, yes, the computer. But Headrick wants to direct attention away from particular machines and technologies as accelerators of information and toward the eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries as a period during which a host of novel information systems were introduced.On this basis the book discusses a series of developments in information systems under five headings. The first, “Organizing Information,” describes how Linnaeus and Lavoisier and Guyton de Morveau created new languages to process and communicate scientific information. The creation of the metric system finds a niche in this chapter as well. Headrick's second heading, “Transforming Information,” discusses the attempt by governments to collect statistics about populations, culminating in the specification of a decennial census in the American Constitution and the repeated attempts by French revolutionary regimes to conduct a census during the 1790s. The third heading, “Displaying Information,” turns to innovations in mapmaking during the eighteenth century and the invention of graphical representation. Under the fourth heading, “Storing Information,” Headrick describes eighteenth‐century encyclopedias and dictionaries, an overview that thankfully ranges considerably more widely than Diderot's Encyclopédie. Finally, the heading “Communicating Information” discusses the development of postal systems in various European countries and North America, as well as the invention of telegraphy. Of particular interest here is the extensive network of visual telegraphs established in France during the 1790s and then elsewhere in Europe.This breadth of coverage is impressive and suggests the comprehensiveness and significance of Headrick's story, but it also betrays certain weaknesses. First, the treatment of topics is highly uneven. The discussion of encyclopedias and dictionaries, for example, is deep and well informed by the primary sources. The treatment of Linnaeus's taxonomy, Lavoisier's chemical nomenclature, and the metric system is far more superficial, as is the analysis of postal systems. Second, this same breadth causes one to wonder just what the phenomenon is that Headrick means to describe. Such concerns are certainly not diminished by the wholly unsatisfactory definition provided for the book's central concept, information. As the book defines it, information is “the patterns of energy and matter that humans understand” . That somewhat underdetermines the object, I should say.Disappointing too was the book's failure to engage very deeply with an explanation of why these changes occurred. Leaving aside the question of whether all of the changes described really constitute changes in information systems , and also the question of whether all of these eighteenth‐century novelties could not be traced farther back in time, as several surely could, we can still ask what brought such developments together. A book of such synthetic reach ought to be ideal for such ruminations. As one might expect, Headrick does attribute the rising demand for information to the attempt by enlightened absolutist governments and later revolutionary regimes to develop policies to stimulate economic growth, along with the needs of actors in an increasingly complex and robust economic system. But all too often the book simply asserts that because this was the Age of Reason, the innovations occurred because they were inherently more rational. Linnaeus's nomenclature appealed to the “orderly minds of mid‐eighteenth‐century rationalists” , while the physician William Farr's statistical compilation of disease data for the English General Register Office gave “a more scientific basis to the classification of diseases” , and so on. (shrink)

Economic migration, international mobility and refugee crises have brought about both risks and opportunities. Alongside the socio-economic and cultural potential to capitalize on they have generated challenges that need to be addressed. In such an increasingly globalized and diverse world, intercultural competences have become strategic resources underpinning the concept of democratic citizenship and social integration. The objectives of the present article are thus two-fold: firstly we want to explore the concept of cultural cognition and highlight the importance of (...) intercultural and diversity awareness, and, secondly, we intend to present and discuss the results of intercultural training sessions for uniformed services conducted within the “Open Lodz” project (Otwarta Łódź POWR.03.01.00-IP.08-00-3MU/18) (2019-2022) coordinated by the University of Lodz in collaboration with the Marek Edelman Dialogue Center in Łódź, the Municipal Police, the City of Lodz Office and the City Guard in Łódź. The project was aimed at enhancing foreigners’ quality of life and functioning in Poland. With this goal in view project activities, addressed at two groups of beneficiaries, namely foreign nationals and frontline workers (police, city guard officers, and municipal clerks) focused on improving communication skills (linguistic and cultural competences). (shrink)

One major objection to social rights is a failure of determining which precise social and economic claims should be granted rights status. The social rights debate has grappled with this ‘indeterminacy problem’ for quite some time, and a number of proposals have emerged aimed at fixing the content of these rights. In what follows I examine three distinct approaches to fleshing out the idea of a minimum threshold: social rights as the fulfilment of basic needs, social rights as the securing (...) of a minimally decent life and social rights as a requirement of citizenship. Each of these proposals progressively expands on what the minimum threshold of social rights requires and, conversely, what obligations they generate on part of the state. I will show that none of these approaches is entirely satisfactory and suggest that the social rights debate look elsewhere to determine its content. (shrink)

PURPOSE: There is an increasing demand for researchers to provide research results to participants. Our aim was to define an appropriate process for this, based on needs and attitudes of participants. METHODS: A multicenter survey in five sites in the United States and Canada was offered to parents of children with cancer and adolescents with cancer. Respondents indicated their preferred mode of communication of research results with respect to implications; timing, provider, and content of the results; reasons for and against (...) providing results; and barriers to providing results. RESULTS: Four hundred nine parents (including 19 of deceased children) and 86 adolescents responded. Most parents (n = 385; 94.2%) felt that they had a strong right to research results. For positive results, most wanted a letter or e-mail summary (n = 238; 58.2%) or a phone call followed by a letter (n = 100; 24.4%). If the results were negative, phone call (n = 136; 33.3%) or personal visits (n = 150; 36.7%) were preferred. Parents wanted the summary to include long-term sequelae and suggestions for participants (n = 341; 83.4%), effect on future treatments (n = 341; 83.4%), and subsequent research steps (n = 284; 69.5%). Understanding the researcher was a main concern about receiving results (n = 145; 35.5%). Parents felt that results provide information to support quality of life (n = 315; 77%) and raise public awareness of research (n = 282; 68.9%). Adolescents identified similar preferences. CONCLUSION: Parents of children with cancer and adolescents with cancer feel strongly that they have a right to be offered research results and have specific preferences of how and what information should be communicated. (shrink)

Efforts to recruit and retain farmers have traditionally supported the farm business through a focus on access to land, capital, and business skills. While these efforts are critical, a small body of work indicates that these may be insufficient because they rarely account for the social and economic needs of farm households and how the (in)ability to meet these needs interacts with the development and economic viability of the farm enterprise. Social and economic needs include, but are not limited to (...) access to health insurance and health care, childcare, adequate household and retirement income, affordable housing, and food security. This article introduces a symposium intended to shed light on these underappreciated needs and how they connect to the farm enterprise. We contend that a greater understanding of farm households’ lived realities meeting their social and economic needs could lead to a paradigm shift in how we understand and support farm families’ resilience. We set the stage for the eight articles in this symposium in two ways. First, we present the theoretical and empirical reasons why considering household-level needs is crucial when working towards supporting the agricultural sector. Second, we review the literature on farm households’ social and economic needs. We then thematically summarize the key insights from the eight articles. Despite variations in topics studied, research designs, and geographical contexts, we note a clear pattern in what the authors see as the implications of their findings. Namely, they reaffirm the need to challenge the traditional view that separates household needs from farm enterprise activities and outcomes. Their collective call for stronger social and agricultural programs and policies is noteworthy and may in part be connected to the structural underpinnings of the challenges meeting social and economic needs highlighted across the articles. (shrink)

First published in 1997, this volume delves into the most influential theories of economic justice, which ground themselves in utilitarian or related contractarian ideas about the self. These ideas take self-interest to be transparent and unproblematic. Favoured assumptions about the self also make scarcity the primary reality with which economic justice must deal. Much is lost in consideration of the justness of economic arrangements when we take the wants and interests of the self for granted in this way, and treat (...) scarcity as a premise. In this book the author places the discussion of economic justice on a sounder foundation as regards the nature and ends of the self. The book begins with a discussion of the self as a structure, and proceeds to consider aspects of self-interest, public ends, economic welfare, needs and wants, the limits of the market, economic democracy, global inequality, and justice as the end of development. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Speaking With and Away:What the Aporia of Ineffability Has to Say for Buddhist-Christian DialogueJoseph ThometzYears ago, I entered my graduate studies with the intent of undertaking a comparative study of the Christian apophatic tradition and Indian Mahāyāna Buddhism. Shortly after enrolling in a course on Indian Buddhist philosophy, I recall a question that in spite of its apparent simplicity has since troubled me. Having been informed of my interests, (...) the instructor approached me at a coffee break and asked, "What's the point of comparing?" Feeling caught off guard by the absurdity of his question, I fumbled for a reply. Surely, it's obvious (I thought). "To understand?" I jousted with noticeable unease. He nodded, and I was left wanting. Indeed, what initially appeared as an awkward icebreaker became one of the more pressing theoretical questions that has plagued my thinking as a scholar in the Buddhist and Christian traditions as well as in the philosophy of religions: Do I compare with the hope of canonizing those very concepts and categories that I claim ostensibly to call into question? Do I seek to secure some place of conceptual stability for my home tradition amidst the sacred rhetoric of "the other"? Have I adequately assessed those implicit notions that inform my method of inquiry?1 And to what ends are texts to be drawn into conversation? Inevitably, this raises the question, is the term "compare" even appropriate?Comparative study of religious traditions must learn from the spectre of its missiological past.2 This means keeping at the forefront of scholarship questions about how "the other" is depicted, and made accessible. In an effort to gain its legitimacy in the academy, pioneers of comparative religions wrestled with reconciling the aims of this burgeoning academic field with the mission of entrenched, confessional theology.3 Among so-called liberal theologians of the nineteenth century, such as Ernst Troeltsch, Christianity represented the pinnacle of human culture amidst a backdrop of less-evolved cultures.4 (No doubt, much of German theology during that century was directly—or indirectly—influenced by Hegel's progressive view of history.)The so-called liberal shift toward inclusivism, beginning in the nineteenth century and continuing to the present, warrants critical redress whenever doctrines and [End Page 119] categories deemed sacrosanct by the speaker's tradition of identification are mapped (even inadvertently) onto "the other."5 Karl Rahner's concept of the Anonymous Christian might serve to illustrate this point.6 His extension of the Christian concept of grace for the purpose of extending salvation outside the Church, for example, says little or nothing about the beliefs of the recipients who may not have requested such "charitable" extension. A more productive line of inquiry might seek to dissemble and expose the mechanisms (epistemological, psychological, historical, theological, and so forth) that underpin inclusive approaches as well as ascertain some insight into how such conceptual extensions accommodate the grantors, rather than recipients. Put another way, is the goal of comparative study to reinterpret one's own tradition or to redefine "the other"?7 Recent "experiments" in comparative theology advocate the need to proceed in a self-conscious manner, questioning even the appropriateness of the term "comparative."8Again, does one extend or elaborate on concepts in order to secure a place of safety for one's own tradition amidst the sacred rhetoric of "the other"? Is the exchange simply an attempt at negotiating tolerance economically, politically, or legally? Viewed pragmatically, is the underpinning value one of cultural or religious self-preservation?Tolerance evokes a connotation of "putting up with," and does not necessarily imply any respect or commitment toward comprehending the religious convictions of "the other." Rather, tolerance more suitably concurs with Thomas Hobbes's redaction on the Golden Rule: "Do not that to another, which thou wouldest not have done to thy selfe."9 Embracing the value of tolerance does not necessitate the view that one must appreciate the beliefs and practices of another tradition, nor does it require an openness of being transformed by "the other."Frequently undertaken for reasons of tolerance, dialogue centers on securing ways of achieving, if not mutual respect, a right to... (shrink)

A dazzling blend of business vision, history, social psychology, and economics, The Support Economy starts with a compelling premise: People have changed more than the corporations upon which their well-being depends. In the chasm that now separates the new individuals from the old organizations is the opportunity to forge a capitalism suited to our times and so unleash a vast new potential for wealth creation. In recent years, many books have offered fixes for this crisis, but they have dealt (...) only with its symptoms. The Support Economy is the first book to critically examine its cause: Managerial capitalism has outlived the society it was once designed to serve. It successfully achieved the efficient production of goods and services, but today's individuals want more. They want to take their lives into their own hands and are ready to pay for the support and advocacy necessary to fulfill that yearning. The next leap forward in wealth creation depends upon developing a new capitalism that speaks to the needs of people today. The Support Economy will be the next "must read" big think book. It speaks to every business and technology leader, as well as every reader interested in the future of the economy and society. (shrink)

I offer a novel conception of the nature of wanting. According to it, wanting is lacking something one needs. Lacking is not a normative notion but needing is, and that is how goodness figures in to wanting. What a thing needs derives from what it is to be a good thing of its kind. In people, wanting is connected to both knowledge and the will. A person can know that she wants something and can act on that knowledge. When she (...) does, she is acting in light of that want and her want is a reason why she acted. There is a close connection between wanting and our wills, not just because we can sometimes choose how to get what we need, but because our choices can determine what we want. We can't simply choose to want something, but in deciding how to live our lives, who to be, and what to pursue, we are free to settle what we want, at least within limits. These connections to knowledge and the will make human wanting rich and morally relevant, but they don't transform human wanting into something special. Wanting is everywhere just a matter of lacking something one needs. (shrink)

One of the distinctive features of the Austrian School of Economics has been its emphasis on the entrepreneur as central to the market process. One 20th century Austrian whose work is normally not thought of as making a major contribution to the Austrian theory of entrepreneurship is Ludwig Lachmann. However, a careful reading of his 1956 book Capital and its Structure can tease out a theory of the function of the entrepreneur that is distinctly different from that of Israel (...) Kirzner, yet still clearly situated in an Austrian conception of the market process. In this contribution, I want to emphasize two points that have been raised by previous work on Lachmann, but not explored in any detail. The first is that Lachmann’s conception of entrepreneurship is deeply bound up with the need to engage in monetary calculation thanks to the heterogeneity of capital and uncertainty of the future. For Lachmann, the key function of the entrepreneur is to “specify” the uses of capital goods. Such specification requires the use of money prices and what Mises called monetary calculation. The second contribution is to offer more detail on the way in which entrepreneurs both creatively specify and re-specify the uses of their capital goods in response to profit and loss signals. The constant shuffling and reshuffling of capital goods, of which coming up with new products or new twists to old ones are a part, is the essence of Lachmann’s implicit vision of entrepreneurship. For Lachmann, entrepreneurship is bound up with resource ownership and deployment through the creation and revision of plans in ways that are much more active than Kirzner’s conception of the entrepreneur. (shrink)

The current and prevailing paradigm of intensive agricultural production is a straightforward example of the mainstream way of doing business. Mainstream enterprises are based on a negativistic view of human nature that leads to counter-productive and unsustainable behaviours producing negative impact for society and the natural environment. If we want to change the course, then different players are needed, which can flourish thanks to their capacity to serve others and creating values for all the participants in the network in (...) which they are embedded. In the article, through the analysis of the Slow Food movement and the use of recent theoretical and empirical contributions in behavioural sciences and psychology, we support the collaborative enterprise model as an alternative to the still prevailing, mainstream business models. Evidence shows that caring and responsible efforts of economic agents are acknowledged and reciprocated even in highly competitive markets. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:The Spirit of Settler Colonialism and the City Streets:A Response to Mishuana GoemanErin C. Tarveri want thank dr. goeman for her excellent paper and for introducing us to these extraordinary artists. Their work is beautiful and important, and I am grateful for the opportunity to witness it and think about it and to consider in particular in its relation to its setting in Los Angeles.In what follows, I (...) want to consider that setting—a city, as Dr. Goeman notes, containing some of "the most expensive real estate properties in the United States," commercial areas officially defined by "colonial encompassing property logics," and marked by "noise and [the] reverberation of mass consumerism" ("Caring for Landscapes 57). My interest will be in putting Dr. Goeman's analysis of these works and the Indigenous artist-activists who create them in dialogue with Jane Addams's diagnosis of the problems of early twentieth-century American urban life in her book The Spirit of Youth and the City Streets. I will suggest that Dr. Goeman's paper illuminates the limitations of Addams's approach to responding to the alienation of modern urban life—which, while rightly critical of the harms of mass consumer culture and the reduction of city life to economic productivity in conditions of industrialization, does not grapple with its own implication in settler colonialism and dispossession, and therefore cannot care for the land or its inhabitants as these artists invite us to do. I will also invite her to reflect on whether Addams's suggestion that play and recreation are essential components of urban human flourishing is borne out in the work of these artists.Jane Addams, in 1909, discussed the problems of urban life in post-Industrial Revolution Chicago in similar terms to those Dr. Goeman uses to describe the contemporary landscape of Los Angeles. The contemporary city, Addams writes, in forgoing spaces for public play, art, creativity, and non-production, has "entered upon a most difficult and dangerous experiment … at the very moment when the city has become distinctly industrial, [End Page 71] and daily labor is continually more monotonous and subdivided" (4–5). In this context, young people are increasingly alienated and isolated, valued solely for the products of their labor, and desperate for social connection. The playfulness and creativity of youth cannot be entirely stifled, yet without clear public spaces or institutions for outlets, young people become easy targets for capitalists who promise pleasure and self-actualization through consumption—of liquor, of fashion, of music, and so on. Lamenting the impoverished state that the city of mass consumption leaves us in, Addams writes:The spontaneous joy, the clamor for pleasure, the desire of the young people to appear finer and better and altogether more lovely than they really are, the idealization not only of each other but of the whole earth which they regard but as a theater for their noble exploits, the unworldly ambitions, the romantic hopes, the make-believe world in which they live, if properly utilized, what might they not do to make our sordid cities more beautiful, more companionable? And yet at the present moment every city is full of young people who are utterly bewildered and uninstructed in regard to the basic experience which must inevitably come to them, and which has varied, remote and indirect expressions.(15–16)There is, for Addams, a basic human need for play, creativity, and connection—to a community and to the natural world itself—whose unsatisfaction in a city devoted entirely to industry is nothing short of dehumanizing. So basic are these needs that they cry out for fulfillment in the most unexpected moments. She quotes a young man who describes his experience thusly:I never had a chance to go into the country when I was a kid, but I remember one day when I had to deliver a package way out on the west side, that I saw a flock of sheep in Douglas Park. I had never thought that a sheep could be anywhere but in a picture, and when I saw those big white spots on the green grass beginning to move and to turn into sheep, I... (shrink)

If models can be true, where is their truth located? Giere (Explaining science, University of Chicago Press, Chicago, 1998) has suggested an account of theoretical models on which models themselves are not truth-valued. The paper suggests modifying Giere’s account without going all the way to purely pragmatic conceptions of truth—while giving pragmatics a prominent role in modeling and truth-acquisition. The strategy of the paper is to ask: if I want to relocate truth inside models, how do I get it, (...) what else do I need to accept and reject? In particular, what ideas about model and truth do I need? The case used as an illustration is the world’s first economic model, that of von Thünen (1826/1842) on agricultural land use in the highly idealized Isolated State. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Reviewed by:Doughnut Economics: Seven Ways to Think Like a 21st-Century Economist by Kate RaworthYoko NagaseKate Raworth, Doughnut Economics: Seven Ways to Think Like a 21st-Century Economist. London: Random House Business Books, 2017. 372 pp. £20. ISBN 9781847941374.Question: Is this a book about utopia? Answer: Yes, indeed; it is a book about a twenty-first-century utopia represented by the Doughnut.The author presents a vision of a pragmatic utopia, represented (...) by the inside of her Doughnut that is both distributive and regenerative. According to the author, a distributive economy is "one whose dynamics tend to disperse and circulate value as it is created, rather than concentrating it in ever-fewer hands." A regenerative economy is "one in which people become full participants in regenerating Earth's life-giving cycles so that we thrive within planetary boundaries" (156).The emphasis on the fair distribution of income, wealth, and means of production is an ideal pursued by famous utopians, from perfectly equal distribution of everything in Thomas More's Utopia to very libertarian position of "whatever he has justly made he has a right to keep" by H. G. Wells.1 The distributive Doughnut community aims to enable individuals to be, in Amartya Sen's words, "healthy, empowered and creative—so that they can choose to be and do things in life that they value" (43). This ideal of individuals' rights to choose their life and to realise their ends is the centerpiece of libertarians' ideal society.2 The Doughnut, however, leans heavily toward democratic socialism. Arguments for redistributive measures such as a universal basic income and taxes on land and wealth put forward by the author go beyond promoting equal opportunity and emphasize the necessity of economic means to make the best out of the opportunities (164, 180, 200). [End Page 528]The issue of sustainability at the global level is a concept that does not appear in the classical utopian literature, even though the idea of living happily in perpetuity is very much the tenet of many classical utopian societies. Given the extent of the geographical knowledge that existed by the time Wells explored his idea of a utopia, he was no longer able to set it in some not-yetdiscovered place on Earth like his predecessors did—hence the adaptation of "another planet."3 But this setup had nothing to do with the concept of the ecological limit of Earth. Pre-nineteenth-century utopians would be familiar with the contents of the Doughnut's foundation, the inner shell that consists of the social and economic factors such as food, health, education, and housing. However, the outer shell of the Doughnut is very twenty-first century, enclosing the nine planetary boundaries of the Doughnut as a life-support system, such as ozone layer depletion, ocean acidification, biodiversity loss, and climate change (44–48).The author points out that we need to get a grip on understanding how we belong in the world. Instead of relying on the power of words as George Orwell's Thought Police, the author takes full advantage of the power of the visual, by drawing the Doughnut as a map for a new economy and society.4 If studying economics is tantamount to "mastering the mother tongue of public policy" (287), Doughnut Economics is a critical introduction to and the foundation of economic, environmental, and social policymaking.Rather than utopias as purely thought exercise by Plato or More, Raworth, like David Hume, presents a model of a utopia that is meant to be achievable.5 The economics of the Doughnut does not depend on any unrealistic assumptions of human nature. The author proposes means to reaching inside the Doughnut without abolishing the market system or private property rights. But a strong emphasis is placed on additional redistributive policies and regulations that are deemed critical toward sustainability. This position is consistent with that of the former chancellor of Germany who reportedly said that she "wanted as much market economics as possible, but as much state intervention as necessary."6 In promoting the open-source circular economy movement, the author wonders if it may seem "unfeasibly utopian" (231). Yet given the pace... (shrink)

Questions of how we claim to know the things that we know and whose claims to knowledge are treated as authoritative are inescapable in reaching legal judgments. I want to illustrate this generalization by referring to a pair of hypothetical self-defense cases that, I argue, require fact finders to judge both how “accurately” each defendant understood the situation in which he found himself and how accurately policymakers can assess the consequences of alternative legal rules.The first case I will deal (...) with is one in which the defendant shoots and kills her sleeping husband. The husband had physically abused her over a long period. While the defendant will of course acknowledge that she was in no immediate danger at the moment she killed the man, her preliminary claim is that she needed to act self-defensively at that moment for fear that she subsequently would be incapable of defending herself against life-threatening attacks that she was convinced would inevitably be made.The second case is one in which a white defendant shoots and kills a black teenager who has confronted him on the subway, in a situation in which the teenager’s “threats” were ambiguous. The shooting victim had brandished no weapon and made no physical contact with the defendant, but he had “asked” the defendant for money and, in the defendant’s mind, displayed a generally threatening demeanor. I will presuppose that this defendant—unlike Bernhard Goetz, the defendant in the notorious New York subway vigilante case on which I partly base this hypothetical model—overtly acknowledges that the race of the victim played a substantial role in his assessment of the danger of the situation. Mark Kelman, professor of law at Stanford University, is the author of A Guide to Critical Legal Studies as well as a number of articles on law and economics, taxation, criminal law, and legal theory. (shrink)

Purpose This paper is concerned with the place of human rights in the process of technological development but specifically as this process is situated within the corporate-technological complex of modern digital communications and their derivatives. This paper aims to argue that expecting and institutionalizing the incorporation of human rights in the process of technological innovation and production, particularly in the context of global economic actors, constitutes a necessary act if we want to navigate the immediate future of artificial intelligence (...) and ubiquitous connectivity in ways that protect democracy and human dignity. Design/methodology/approach The discussion presents the case for defending human rights through a social control perspective, which assumes the conscious quest for impacting change and cartographing a path of actions and intentions. The authors approach the problem from James Ralph Beniger’s theory of the Control Revolution to explain the emergence of a new social order and to outline the main challenges brought particularly by media and information and communication technology corporations as global actors of power. Findings Ethics initiatives, considering human rights as an ethical framework for media and ICT businesses, can be based on social control perspectives to regard the more complex variables interacting in the formation of effective policy making. It is the right to participate in the construction of knowledge in society and, informed by this knowledge, help manage or control democratic issues, including influencing on the regulation of technology and other cultural formats of control. Knowing social control tools enable citizens to lead their destinies, plan their freedom and the change what they wish in the societies they live in. Originality/value Social control is often understood as a term taken for granted and many times faced as representing malignant and anti-democratic forms. Here, the authors try to build a theoretical ground where both sides – the benign and the malignant – can be taken in consideration to bring awareness to the need to discuss social control as a democratic endeavor, and consider human rights as part of this and not something apart and idealized. The practice of human rights is directly associated with social control forms and is from within these practices individuals must understand its role on social control and act. (shrink)

Alfred Müller-Armack was one of the very important policy-makers who initiated the West-German economic recovery after WWII. He devised the underlying economic program of the so-called “German Miracle”, which was not a miracle at all. It was the outcome of a rigorous rule transformation from the bankrupt central planning of the Nazi- regime to a market economic order based on the principles of classical liberalism combined with a social safety net for all who suffered from the terrible consequences of war (...) destruction. He called his program “Social Market Economy”, thereby expressing that the risky game of the market needs a social safety net to make his program acceptable for the majority of the German citizens.Müller-Armack was not only the Head of the Central Policy Unit at the Federal Economic Ministry under Ludwig Erhard for twelve years but also a well-known university teacher of economics. In the tradition of Max Weber he combined this subject with the theory of economic sociology, and especially, the sociology of religion. In this respect he was an early author in the field which nowadays is named “cultural economics”. His publications on the impact of religious beliefs of greek-orthodox societies on the economic performance of South-East European countries are still of great interest for the present debates about the economic consequences of Islam.Alfred Müller-Armack fut l’un des très importants politiciens qui initièrent l’économie de l’ Allemagne de l’Ouest après la 2ème Guerre Mondiale. Il conçut dans ses grandes lignes le programme économique du soi disant « Miracle Allemand ». Ce fut le résultat d’une règle rigoureuse de transformation à partir de la faillite de la planification centrale du régime Nazi vers un ordre marchand fondé sur les principes du libéralisme classique combiné à un filet de sécurité sociale pour tous ceux qui avaient souffert des conséquences terribles des destructions de la guerre. Il appela son programme « Economie sociale de marché », exprimant ainsi que le jeu risqué du marché nécessite un filet de sécurité sociale pour rendre son programme acceptable par la majorité des citoyens allemands. Müller-Armack n’était pas seulement le chef de l’unité politique centrale au ministère fédéral de l’économie sous la direction de Ludwig Erhard pendant 12 ans, mais également un professeur très réputé d’économie à l’université. Dans la tradition de Max Weber, il associe ses sujets avec la théorie économique de la sociologie et plus particulièrement, la sociologie de la religion. Dans cette mesure, il fut un pionnier dans le champ de ce que l’on appelle aujourd’hui « l’économie de la culture ». Ses publications sur l’impact des croyances religieuses des sociétés grecques orthodoxes sur la performance économique des pays du Sud-Est Européen restent d’un grand intérêt pour les débats actuels au sujet des conséquences économiques de l’Islam. (shrink)

Can the rise of populism be explained by the growing chasm between rich and poor? With regard to Germany, such a causal relationship must be rejected. Income distribution in Germany has been very stable since 2005, and people’s knowledge on actual inequality and economic development is limited: inequality and unemployment are massively overestimated. At the same time, a persistently isolationist and xenophobic group with diverse concerns and preferences has emerged within the middle classes of society that riggers support for populist (...) parties. This mood is based on welfare chauvinism against immigration rather than on a general criticism of distribution. Since the immigration of recent years will inevitably affect the relevant indicators concerning distribution, an open, cautious but less heated approach is needed in the debate on the future of the welfare state. In order to address and take the local concerns of citizens seriously, an increased exchange with public officials on the ground is needed. (shrink)

What is luxury? The concept has never received proper attention in social theory. It seemed as if luxury was a highly economic concept that did not need any further investigation. Primary and secondary needs are considered to form the basis of the luxury concept. Luxury has been viewed as useless and superfluous because it belongs to the realm of desires instead of elementary needs. This definition has often been used to stigmatize the use and demonstration of luxury. The needs-wants (...) dichotomy was severely criticized a few decades ago. Luxury touches more than the question of necessity in society. This article attempts to outline the formulation of a definition of luxury. We leave the classic concept of luxury in favor of a more socio-semiotic approach of the concept. The bounds between luxury and some specific product property will be cut through. There is no such thing as a luxury good comparable to categories like ‘cars,’ or ‘clothes.’ Luxury is defined as a specific kind of sign value, produced in specific narratives and used in processes of stratification. As a sign, it becomes apparent that luxury is a relative concept. Every social group can be said to have its own luxury. Every social group has in fact a different kind of luxury, which means that a Cartier is no luxury in some cases where a television is highly exclusive in other cases. (shrink)