For Ivan Illich, a twentieth-century critical thinker driven by deep faith, sin is a denial of the dignity of another who calls out to me, and a betrayal my own vocation to respond, which were revealed by the Incarnation and the Gospel. Illich thus holds that the criminalization of sin, that is to say, its transformation into a violation of Church law through the imposition of compulsory confession in the thirteenth century, is a perversion of what has been opened by (...) the Gospel. This article explains Illich’s conception and explores its strength, not as historiography of the past, but as carrying a unique resonance with the present. (shrink)

Adolescents are said to be, figuratively speaking, thin-skinned. But their thin-skinnedness is also real: both ambivalent and ambiguous, the border between self and other is, for many young people, a source of constant turmoil. The recourse to bodily self-harm is a means of dealing with this turmoil and the feelings of powerlessness it generates. Drawing on extensive semi-structured interviews conducted over the course of the last twenty years, this article explores the experiences of adolescents who engage in self-cutting. A deliberate (...) and controlled use of pain, this ‘symbolic homeopathy’ – that is, harming oneself to feel less pain – acts as a defence against externally imposed suffering. Far from being destructive, self-harm practices can paradoxically be understood as survival techniques. Part of a long-term, ongoing project investigating adolescent risk-taking, this article seeks to better understand the experiences of teens who injure themselves through skin-cutting. (shrink)

We develop a model of ideals-based accountability which we have witnessed at work in several long-thriving family businesses. The owners and managers of these firms eschew individualism and materiality in the pursuit of ethical ideals such as supporting democracy and bettering the human condition. Although accountability is to these ideals, not for outcomes such as profitability or even reputation, IBA has resulted in outstanding reputations for some firms. We characterize IBA according to its missions, leadership, culture, and stakeholder relationships. We (...) also contrast it with traditional forms of accountability and differentiate IBA from related stakeholder, stewardship, and CSR perspectives. Finally, we examine its manifestations within five long-lived family enterprises, in the process generating propositions to advance the concept. (shrink)

Although the effectiveness of some tobacco programs and policies has been clearly demonstrated in reducing the overall population smoking prevalence, the health benefits are not equally distributed across all socio-economic classes; a situation that clearly runs against the equalitarian ethos of most modern states. In this article, we evaluate the benefits of using Sen’s Capability Approach as a theory of social justice to guide public health program and policy development in a way that would prevent the further increase of inequalities (...) in health outcomes. Starting from four consensual goals of tobacco control practice (i.e. that individuals live a smoke-free life, that smokers quit smoking, that non-smokers are protected from exposure to second-hand smoke and that smoking cessation support is accessible) we found that besides the standard interventions (e.g. education on the harms of smoking, policies to reduce exposure to SHS) an iniquity-proof tobacco control program needs also to address the lack of options of underprivileged people in affordable smoke-free settings and in leisure activities. We conclude that an ethical tobacco prevention program needs to address the broader social determinants of health such as the socio-economic policies that put a strain on people’s capacity to shun or quit smoking. (shrink)

This article proposes a new reading of transformative learning theory (TAT), proceeding from an examination of three concepts: the function of habit in the processes of constructing experience, the notion of trial and its potential, and the biographical dimensions of Transformative Learning Theory. This approach leads us to question the theories of experience that tacitly underlie the learning models proposed by Mezirow. The discussion thus opened is part of the controversy and dialogue between the currents of pragmatism, critical hermeneutics and (...) biographical research. (shrink)

A union ultrafilter is an ultrafilter over the finite subsets of ω that has a base of sets of the form ${\text{FU}}\left$, where X is an infinite pairwise disjoint family and ${\text{FU}} = \left\{ {\bigcup {F|F} \in [X]^{ < \omega } \setminus \{ \emptyset \} } \right\}$. The existence of these ultrafilters is not provable from the $ZFC$ axioms, but is known to follow from the assumption that ${\text{cov}}\left = \mathfrak{c}$. In this article we obtain various models of $ZFC$ that (...) satisfy the existence of union ultrafilters while at the same time ${\text{cov}}\left = \mathfrak{c}$. (shrink)

Andre Breton discusses the meaning, aims, and political position of the Surrealist movement.

"La méditation du Principe est le principe même de la philosophie." Cette sentence par laquelle débute le présent ouvrage ne décline pas seulement le projet d'un livre, elle traduit l'ambition d'une oeuvre. Son auteur, Stanislas Breton, disparu le 2 avril 2005, métaphysicien original et génial, parvenu alors au faîte d'une recherche initiée dans les universités romaines, poursuivie dans les Instituts catholiques de Lyon de Paris et relancée à l'Ecole normale supérieure d'Ulm, en déroulait alors la thèse dans une étonnante (...) fulgurance. Trente ans exactement après sa première publication, celle-ci se trouve à nouveau, plus actuelle que jamais, présentée au public. Les quatre parties qui la structurent sont consacrées au concept antique de "Principe" à "l'Ineffable" auquel il se trouve nécessairement confronté, à ses usages en philosophie et en théologie, et à la critique à laquelle le soumet la pensée contemporaine. Elles déchiffrent, chemin faisant, ce qui décide, sous des modes bien différents, de l'"organisation du pensable" à l'intérieur des philosophies et des théologies. Ainsi réédité, cet ouvrage se livre à l'inspiration de nouvelles générations soucieuses d'honorer et d'exploiter, dans la ligne du N Fonds Breton une oeuvre d'exception. (shrink)

In this work the authors present a general theory of bureaucracy and use it to explain behaviour in large organizations and to explain what determines efficiency in both governments and business corporations. The theory uses the methods of standard neoclassical economic theory. It relies on two central principles: that members of an organization trade with one another and that they compete with one another. Authority, which is the basis for conventional theories of bureaucracy, is given a role, despite reliance on (...) the idea of trade between bureaucracies. It is argued, however, that bureaucracies cannot operate efficiently on the basis of authority alone. Exchange between bureaucrats is hampered because promises are not enforceable. So trust and loyalty between members of bureaucratic networks play an important part. The authors find that vertical networks promote efficiency while horizontal ones impede it. (shrink)

Dans un contexte de crise existentielle chez les jeunes générations, si les autres modes de symbolisation ont échoué, échapper à la mort, réussir l'épreuve, administrent la preuve ultime qu'une garantie règne sur son existence. Ces épreuves sont des rites intimes, privés, autoréférentiels, insus, détachés de toute croyance, et tournant le dos à une société qui cherche à les prévenir. Parfois elles provoquent un sentiment de renaissance personnelle, elles se muent en formes d'auto-initiation.In an existential crisis among the younger generations, if (...) other modes of symbolization have failed to escape death, pass the test, administering the ultimate proof that security prevails on its existence. These tests are rites intimate, private, self-referential insus, detached from any belief, and turning his back to a society that seeks to prevent. Sometimes they cause a sense of personal rebirth, they are transformed into forms of self-initiation. (shrink)

Competitive Governments, explores in a systematic way the hypothesis that governments are internally competitive, that they are competitive in their relations with each other and in their relations with other institutions in society which, like them, supply consuming households with goods and services. Breton contends that competition not only serves to bring the political system to an equilibrium, but it also leads to a revelation of the households' true demand functions for publicly provided goods and services and to the (...) molding of a link between the quantities and the qualities demanded and supplied and the tax prices paid for these goods and services. In the real world where information is costly, the links may not be first-best, but they will be efficient if competition is vigorous. (shrink)

Many amateur sportsmen in the West, have today started undertaking long and intensive ordeals where their personal capacity to withstand increasing suffering is the prime objective. Running, jogging, the triathlon and trekking are the sorts of ordeal where people without any particular ability are not pitting themselves against others but are committed to testing their own capacity to withstand increasing pain. Constantly called upon to prove themselves in a society where reference points are both countless and contradictory and where values (...) are in crisis, people are now seeking a one-to-one relationship by redical means, testing their strength of character, their courage and their personal resources. Going right on to the end of a self-imposed ordeal gives a legitimacy to life and provides a symbolic plank that supports them. Performance itself is of secondary significance; it has a value only to the individual. There is no struggle against a third party, only a method for reinforcing personal will-power and over-coming suffering by going right to the limit of a personally imposed demand. The physical limit has come to replace the moral limit that present-day society is failing to provide. Overcoming suffering tempers the individual, providing a renewed significance and value to his life. (shrink)

The purpose of this book is to formulate and discuss positive (as distinguished from normative) rational choice models of the advantages and costs of transparency in various areas of public sector activity and to assess what is in effect the social level of obfuscation in politics that results from rational behaviour.

Representations of the body depend on a social framework, a vision of the world and a definition of the person. The body is a symbolic construction and not a reality in its own right. A priori, its characterization seems to be self-evident, but ultimately nothing is less comprehensible. Far from being unanimously accepted by human societies, making the body stand out as a reality in some way distinct from man seems an uneasy effort, contradictory between one time and place and (...) another. Many societies do not retain it as part of their vision of the world. They do not detach man from his body in the dualist fashion so common to Western man. We might recall here the incident recounted by Maurice Leenhardt, who asked an elderly Kanak what the West had contributed to Melanesia. The answer surprised him. “What you brought us is the body”. With the intrusion of cultural and social values and forms from the Western world that tend to individualism, there came an awareness of the body as a barrier and a boundary distinguishing each person from every other person. In the societies to which we refer, the components of a person include the flesh without setting this off separately. The body itself is an abstraction. On the phenomenological level, only a person whose body gives him a face and establishes his presence in the world can exist. Man is indiscernible from the flesh that models him. (shrink)

Bijural services as factors of production -- Commentary A on Breton and Salmon -- Commentary B on Breton and Salmon -- The challenge of incomplete law and how different legal systems respond -- Commentary C on Pistor and Xu -- Commentary D on Pistor and Xu -- Coevolution as an influence in the development of legal systems -- Commentary E on Breton and Des Ormeaux -- Commentary F on Breton and Des Ormeaux -- The demand for (...) bijurally trained Canadian lawyers -- Commentary G on Davis and Trebilcock -- Commentary H on Davis and Trebilcock. (shrink)

Animal and plant species exhibit an astonishing diversity of sexual systems, including environmental and genetic determinants of sex, with the latter including genetic material in the mitochondrial genome. In several hermaphroditic plants for example, sex is determined by an interaction between mitochondrial cytoplasmic male sterility (CMS) genes and nuclear restorer genes. Specifically, CMS involves aberrant mitochondrial genes that prevent pollen development and specific nuclear genes that restore it, leading to a mixture of female (male‐sterile) and hermaphroditic individuals in the population (...) (gynodioecy). Such a mitochondrial‐nuclear sex determination system is thought to be rare outside plants. Here, we present one possible case of CMS in animals. We hypothesize that the only exception to the strict maternal mtDNA inheritance in animals, the doubly uniparental inheritance (DUI) system in bivalves, might have originated as a mitochondrial‐nuclear sex‐determination system. We document and explore similarities that exist between DUI and CMS, and we propose various ways to test our hypothesis. (shrink)

Cet essai est un retour aussi réfléchi que possible sur l'ensemble de mes écrits de philosophie. S'étalant sur une durée approximative de cinquante-cinq ans, ils sont à la fois nombreux et, du fait de leur nombre, menacés par la dispersion. Je suis bien conscient de l'objection possible ainsi que de la demande, toujours plus réitérée depuis 1990, d'une quasi-synthèse, de la part de lecteurs qui, à diverses reprises, m'ont fait part de leur sympathie et de leur encouragement. Je me suis (...) promis de les satisfaire par un bref écrit qui serait, à ma façon, et sans égaler le modèle qui de loin m'inspire, une quasi-monadologie. J'ai le sentiment, dans ce retour sur mon passé, de devoir beaucoup à ceux qui, au cours de mon cheminement, m'ont aidé dans ce long travail de pensée. Ma première interrogation serait donc celle-ci : " Qu'as-tu que tu n'aies reçu? STANISLAS BRETON. (shrink)

In the first English language translation of this classic late 20th-century text within French Catholic thought, Poetics of the Sensible brings together insights from Neoplatonism and phenomenology with a distinctive and innovative approach. Taking a stance within the generative conception of human language represented by continental thinkers such as Humboldt and Herder and powerfully articulated today by Charles Taylor, Stanislas Breton expands the sense of the "poetic"-the constructive meaning-bearing capacity that is a core characteristic of humanity-to include the body (...) and its senses phenomenologically intertwined with the world. Defying Heidegger's prohibition on the question of God alongside contemporary thinkers such as Jean-Luc Marion, Jean-Louis Chrétien and Emmanuel Falque, he boldly writes of God, of the angel, of the icon, and of prayer in a refusal to bracket his religious faith. Against a Neoplatonic backdrop, Breton promotes the dense material dimensions of embodied signification as paradoxically harbouring meaning that is greater than that of conceptual abstraction alone. Illuminating Breton's poetic and allusive discourse, Poetics of the Sensible showcases his unique voice in French philosophy, phenomenology and the philosophy of religion and is essential reading for scholars and students alike. (shrink)

In 1866, six Inuits were taken to the United States for the purpose of serving as specimens to American scientists at the Natural History Museum. Shortly after their arrival in New York, four of them had died. One of the survivors returned to the Arctic, while the sixth, Minik, now alone, fought to make possible the return of the remains of his dead companions to their village. Since the latter were being exhibited, as was then often the case (and happens (...) even today in many museums), in order to offer visitors examples of the Inuk people, Minik protested in vain. In 1909 he returned to Greenland when the scientists denied that the remains of his friends still existed. Several years later, still pursuing the issue, he went back to the United States to take up the fight against the bureaucracy for the repatriation of the bodies. He died in the United States in 1918. It was only in 1993 that he won out and that the remains of the four were returned to the Arctic homeland. (shrink)

Stanislas Breton's _A Radical Philosophy of Saint Paul_, which focuses on the political implications of the apostle's writings, was an instrumental text in Continental philosophy's contemporary "turn to religion." Reading Paul's work against modern thought and history, Breton helped launch a reassessment of Marxism, introduce secular interpretations of biblical and theological traditions, develop "radical negativity" as a critical category, and rework modern political ideas through a theoretical lens. Newly translated and critically situated, this edition takes a fresh approach (...) to Breton's classic work, reacquainting readers with the remarkable ways in which an ancient apostle can reset our understanding of the political. Breton begins with Paul's biography and the texts of his conversion, which challenge common conceptions of identity. He broaches the question of allegory and divine predestination, introduces the idea of subjectivity as an effect of power, and confronts Paul's critique of Law, which leads to an exploration of the logics and limits of agency and power. Breton develops these and other insights in relation to Paul's subversive reflections on the crucified messiah, which challenge meaning and reason and upend our current world order. Neither a coherent theologian nor a stable humanist, Breton's Paul becomes a fascinating figure of excess and madness, experiencing a kind of being that transcends philosophy, secularity, and religion. (shrink)

Comment s'inscrit dans l'univers des causalités cette causalité singulière que signifiait jadis l'étrange expression " cause de soi "? (causa sui)? Le projet humain n'est autre que cette énigmatique causalité dont l'icône est, parmi nous, l'enfant nouveau-né. La tradition philosophique, plus soucieuse de la mort, a fait constamment abstraction de la naissance. Il convenait donc de partir de la naissance comme première étape d'une causalité de soi par soi. Sur cette paradoxale causalité se posent aujourd'hui les questions les plus décisives (...) : Quel est le monde de temporalité qui lui convient? Quel rapport entretient-elle avec le monde sous le double aspect d'immanence et de rupture? Comment s'insère-t-elle dans le politique en sa forme démocratique? Et tout d'abord quel jugement porter sur les événements majeurs de notre temps qui ont motivé la critique de cette démocratie? (shrink)

Studies linking religion to CSR have produced conflicting findings due to a failure to draw distinctions among religious influences and different CSR practices, and to theorize their connection. Drawing on social identity theory and the theory of planned behavior, we first argue that religion will influence CSR when ethical values from a CEO’s religious social identification resonate with an aspect of CSR. Second, CEO attitudes congruent with those values and forms of CSR—interpersonal empathy and proactiveness—will strengthen that relationship. Third, the (...) relationship between religious social identification and CSR will be strengthened by a CEO’s ability to enact CSR policies, a function of personal and firm market power. Our research on 270 CEOs from 242 publicly traded US firms from 2007 to 2020 supports these relationships. (shrink)

The face embodies for the individual the sense of identity, that is to say, precisely the place where someone recognizes himself and where others recognize him. From the outset the face is meaning, translating in a living and enigmatic form the absoluteness yet minuteness of individual difference. Any alteration to the face puts at stake the sense of identity. Disfigurement destroys the sense of identity of an individual who can no longer recognize himself or be recognized by others. Disfigurement places (...) a mask on the face. The goal of a facial transplant consists of restoring an individual’s place in the world and reviving his taste for life, returning to him his ‘human shape’. Facial transplants raise essential anthropological questions such as ‘Who am I?’ and ‘To whom belongs this face that henceforth is mine?’. (shrink)

Mill n’a pas pensé la sécularisation comme un simple affaiblissement des religions traditionnelles, mais s’est préoccupé de leur remplacement comme fondement de la stabilité sociale. La Religion de l’Humanité doit réorienter sur le progrès humain les aspirations religieuses. Liée à la neutralisation de la portée morale des religions théistes et surnaturelles sur le plan métaphysique, en cohérence avec l’engagement pour une éducation nationale séculière, la dimension religieuse de l’utilitarisme éloigne aussi Mill de Bentham. La comparaison avec la version comtienne de (...) la religion de l’humanité permet d’aborder quelques difficultés soulevées par ce projet. (shrink)

Risk is most often associated with danger and perceived as a harmful aspect of life, as an insidious and unwelcome threat that should be avoided. Risk-taking, however, is sometimes a singular passion, a source of pleasure that becomes a way of life. When freely pursued as a valorised activity, it can be a path to self-fulfilment, an opportunity to confront new situations, and a means for redefining one’s self, testing personal abilities, increasing self-esteem or gaining recognition. Deliberate risk-taking is a (...) form of character building. It accommodates life’s intensities. It is extremely popular in high-risk physical activities and sports and postmodern forms of adventure. (shrink)