Should answers to fundamental questions of political philosophy be ‘convincing’ and ‘meaningful’ to real people with vested interests? Normative behaviourists argue that they should, and this can be achieved by avoiding the use of intuitions in our normative theorizing and instead relying on long-term empirical evidence of human behaviour. In this paper, I argue that to obtain the full benefits of behaviourism, it needs to be accompanied by some form of mentalism. Normative behaviourism sacrifices critical distance from the status quo (...) to provide answers that are convincing and meaningful. However, there is no clear benefit obtained from this sacrifice. Furthermore, because of behaviourism’s institutional focus in its current form, it does not have much to say about how to achieve its goals. Behaviourists can solve both problems by incorporating a mentalist account of political agency, one that determines what values and ideals political agents should fight for and helps political agents develop strategies to achieve their goals. (shrink)

With its specific focus on Asia, this anthology constitutes an excursion into the realm of transversality, or the state of 'postethnicity,' which, the book argues, has come to characterize the global culture of our times. Hwa Yol Jung brings together prominent contemporary thinkers—including Thich Nhat Hanh, Edward Said, and Judith Butler—to address this fundamental and important aspect of comparative political theory. The book is divided into three parts. Part One demythologizes Eurocentrism, deconstructing the privilege of modern Europe as the world's (...) cultural, scientific, religious, and moral capital. Part Two traces the rise of Asian thought and the process of East-West cultural hybridization, while Part Three introduces the concept of the 'global citizen.' Jung's anthology reveals a postmodern multiculturalism whose new philosophical matrix transgresses the existing cultural and intellectual typology to offer new understanding of today's pluralistic world. (shrink)

This book responds to the need to help Christians in Asia find a biblical response to pressures in the marketplace. It takes seriously both Scripture and the context Asian Christians function in. It contains a theological framework for grappling with real-time problems, responses from theologians, and actual case studies from the marketplace.

This paper introduces Song Siyeol, known as Master Song (Songja 宋子), who had a great influence on Korean philosophy and politics in late Joseon (18-19th century). Among his Great Compendium, there are substantial body of writings and comments related to women. As his views directly and indirectly contributed to shaping orthodox Korean Neo- Confucian views regarding women, his writings are an invaluable resource for understanding women and gender in the late Joseon period. This paper presents his views on women, focusing (...) on issues related to rituals. By highlighting and analyzing the issues discussed regarding the role of women in four traditional family rituals, I delineate ways in which Song Siyeol positioned women in his ritualist metaphysics and use this analysis to examine his philosophical approach, which reflects his views on, and understanding of, women, gender, and associated philosophical concepts, while making meaningful and practical discoveries that can be embraced and implemented by women and people today. (shrink)

Prolegomena to a Carnal Hermeneutics introduces body politics from both Eastern and Western perspectives. Hwa Yol Jung explores Giambattista Vico's anti-Cartesiansim and covers the carnal landscapes of Martin Heidegger, Mikhail Bakhtin, Hannah Arendt, Emmanuel Levinas, Luce Irigaray, Marshall McLuhan, and transversal geophilosophy.

This essay attempts to contextualize the importance of Wang Yangming’s 王陽明 philosophy in terms of world philosophy in the manner of Goethe’s innovative plan for “world literature” (Weltliteratur). China has the long history of philosophizing rather than non-philosophy contrary to the glaring and inexcusable misunderstanding of Hegel the Eurocentric universalist or monist. In today’s globalizing world of multicultural pluralism, ethnocentric universalism has become outdated and outmoded. Transversality, which is at once intercultural, interspecific, interdisciplinary, and intersensorial, is a far more befitting (...) response than universality. In this context, what is focused and emphasized in Wang’s world philosophy is mainly fourfold. First, there is the unity or circularity of knowledge and action, that is, knowledge is the beginning of action, and action is the consummation of knowledge. Second, sincerity is the moral soul of Sinism as it is the enabling act of making perform all other virtues, including ren 仁. Third, in Sinism, including Wang’s philosophy, there is no Cartesian dualism in that the mind and the body are inseparable soulmates. Fourth, if ethics is prima philosophia, then geophilosophy is ultima philosophia to sustain and perpetuate all life-forms on earth (geo). (shrink)

Too often Confucian women’s voices and experiences are neglected as insignificant. This paper provides a wide and diverse set of examples of traditional Chinese and Korean women who knew and practiced Confucian ritual. Though representing only a small percentage of traditional women, these examples provide clear evidence and compelling arguments that support the following three conclusions. First, that the Confucian tradition did not deny women’s ability to know and perform rituals; second, that Confucian women read, learned, evaluated, decided, and contributed (...) to re/create the conception and practice of ritual; and third, that this led at least some women and the men around them to recognize and admire not only their moral agency but also their ability to become sages. (shrink)

This article contributes to normative debates about residential segregation and its relationship to inequality. It defends a position often disregarded in literature: that there is merit to advancing residential integration through some scenarios where advantaged individuals move to disadvantaged areas. It develops this case in dialogue with three other views. In relation to advocates of addressing the inequalities of residential segregation through redistribution, it defends integration as a means of tackling social and political factors that sustain injustice. It challenges those (...) who defend relocating disadvantaged individuals to advantaged areas by highlighting the burdens and demand for cultural assimilation this imposes on the disadvantaged. It considers the worry that advantaged individuals relocating to disadvantaged areas harbours the problematic features of gentrification. It responds that these concerns, while important in some cases, do not arise in all scenarios of this kind. (shrink)

Comparative Political Theory and Cross-Cultural Philosophy explores new forms of philosophizing in the age of globalization by challenging the conventional border between the East and the West, as well as the traditional boundaries among different academic disciplines. This rich investigation demonstrates the importance of cross-cultural thinking in our reading of philosophical texts and explores how cross-cultural thinking transforms our understanding of the traditional philosophical paradigm.

This essay offers an analysis of the writing and practices of Song Siyŏl as a way to explore the philosophical concepts and philosophizing process of Confucian ritual in relation to women. As a symbolic and influential figure in Korean philosophy and politics, his views contributed to shaping the orthodox interpretation of the theory and practice of Neo-Confucian ritual regarding women. By demonstrating and analyzing what kinds of issues were discussed in terms of women in four family rituals, I delineate the (...) ways in which Song Siyŏl positioned women in his ritualist metaphysics and to examine his philosophizing process. (shrink)

Almost everywhere throughout the Majority World, that is Africa, Asia, Latin America, and Middle East and North Africa, Christianity used to be called the ‘white-man's religion’. But that is the case no more—the church has exploded all over the MW. In this paper I would like to look at this shift in Christianity worldwide, and what implications it has for the global church, and especially for us in Asia. My purpose here is not to highlight the weaknesses of the Western (...) church and to glorify the growth of the churches in the MW. Rather my hope is that this will help us have a clearer understanding of the challenges before us so that we can labor more fruitfully for the advance of the gospel in the Asian context. In the process I will also raise questions which hopefully will help point the way forward. (shrink)

This article investigates the views of Song Siyeol 宋時烈 (1607–1689), a Confucian scholar-official in Joseon Korea, on marriage ritual, with a special focus on the issue of women’s remarriage. Song opposed the legal ban on women’s remarriage that was enforced in his age, despite the danger this invited of being accused of promoting licentious deeds as well as generating suspicion about his loyalty as a subject. He clearly understood women’s remarriage as an ethical and not a legal issue. The ethical (...) principle of his conception of spousal loyalty, or ui 義, however, reveals its gendered aspect through his discussion with a fellow Confucian scholar. Moreover, his private behavior exemplifies the gendered aspects of his view on spousal fidelity. In addition, the unequal application of ui was supported by beliefs about the asymmetrical relation between Heaven and Earth, that were widely held and deployed by Confucians of Joseon Korea. (shrink)

This essay introduces two Korean women Confucian philosophers: Im Yun- jidang and Gang Jeongildang who lived in the latter period of the Joseon dynasty. Im Yunjidang was the first Confucian woman to explicitly claim women possessed an equal capacity to become sages as men. Gang Jeong- ildang made it clear that she was inspired by and sought to develop the thought of Im and added her own unique insights and new perspectives. Though they and their writings differ in many ways, (...) these two women philosophers created a lineage of female sages, marking a turning point in the history of Confucian philosophy. This paper aims to provide the his- torical background that shaped their thought and to introduce some of their writings in the hope of inspiring readers to study further the lives and philosophies of these two remarkable women and to take up and extend the insights they have left behind. (shrink)

This article puts forward the thesis that in the age of multiculturalism, global communication is rooted in cross-cultural understanding as shown in McLuhan's late communication theory. The American philosopher Ernest Fenollosa went to Japan during the Meiji Restoration when it started in earnest full-scale Westernization. He became fascinated with the poetics of sinography manifested in etymosinology. Etymosinology reveals the depth of the Sinic cultural soul, which is this-worldly, practical, concrete and specific. Sinism (i.e. Confucianism, Daoism and Chan/Zen Buddhism) is a (...) species of relational ontology which is predicated upon the conception of reality as social process. This social process is always already embodied. With the aid of Merleau-Ponty's phenomenology of embodiment, I critically explore and examine the connection between embodiment and `new media' theory. (shrink)

Ten essays (previously published in such journals as The Review of Politics and Human Studies ) contemplate the contributions of phenomenology to the philosophy of political science, and offer a critique of the two other major paradigms in political thought: behavioralism and essentialism. Annotatio.

How would representatives of World Christianity respond to the key issue which Dana Robert has posed? Allow me to speak as one such representative, and whose view is probably shared by a substantial majority from the Global South.

Phenomenology, Transversality, and World Philosophy explores the concept of world philosophy (Weltphilosophie) to take into account the reality of today’s multicultural and globalizing world, as well as the constructive roles played by phenomenology and transversality.

This paper analyzes two philosophers’ views on chastity as a virtue, comparing Song Siyeol, a Korean neo-Confucian philosopher of the east, and David Hume, a Scottish philosopher. Despite the importance in and impact on women’s lives, chastity has been understated in religio-philosophical fields. The two philosophers’ understandings and arguments differ in significant ways and yet share important common aspects. Analyzing the views of Song and Hume helps us better understand and approach the issue of women’s chastity, not only as a (...) historical phenomenon but also in the contemporary world, more fully and deeply. The analysis will provide an alternative way to re-appropriate the concept of chastity as a virtue. (shrink)