This article seeks to explore the relationship between populism, 21st-century socialism, and the emergence of what has been referred to as an ‘ estado delincuente’ (criminal state), in the case of Venezuela. That is, a state structure permeated with transnational organized crime mafias in the executive and the judiciary, in the financial system, the prosecutor’s office, the police, the armed forces, the prison system, state-owned companies, governorships, and city councils, among other state institutions. First, I review conceptual aspects (...) of populism to understand how this served as the basis for creating the postulates of 21st-century socialism, which promoted the institutional destruction of Venezuelan democracy and created the conditions for the unbridled dissemination of state corruption. Second, emblematic cases of white-collar and blood crimes, nepotism and other corrupt activities are discussed to provide an idea of the magnitude of the issues that permeate the state apparatus. To conclude, I provide a critical summary of the consequences of this way of doing politics in contemporary Venezuela. (shrink)

_Realism for the 21st Century_ is a collection of thirty essays from John Deely—a major figure in contemporary semiotics and an authority on scholastic realism and the works of Charles Sanders Peirce. The volume tracks Deely’s development as a pragmatic realist, featuring his early essays on our relation to the world after Darwinism; crucial articles on logic, semiotics, and objectivity; overviews of philosophy after modernity; and a new essay on “purely objective reality.”.

Since its beginnings Bioethical analyses and debates have been mostly aimed at discussing the permissibility of new practices such as New Reproductive Technologies (NRTs). NRTs are no longer “new”: they are part of human ordinary life and contribute to human flourishing, allowing people to build families that could have not been built otherwise. Bioethics should take this fact into account and modify its agenda accordingly. NRTs should be regarded not as a matter of “Frontiers Bioethics” but rather of “Everyday Bioethics” (...) even when genetic interventions aimed at “choosing” the identities of future people are at stake. A 21st Century Reproductive Bioethics should be focused on how to improve the right of every human being to access NRTs and not on a general discussion about their permissibility. (shrink)

This book offers a unique and insightful analysis of Western and Middle Eastern concepts of dignity and illustrates them with examples of everyday life. Dignity in the 21st Century - Middle East and West is unique and insightful for a range of reasons. First, the book is co-authored by scholars from two different cultures (Middle East and West). As a result, the interpretations of dignity covered are broader than those in most Western publications. Second, the ambition of the (...) book is to use examples from everyday life and fiction to debate a range of dignity interpretations supplemented by philosophical and theological theories. Thus, the book is designed to be accessible to a general readership, which is further facilitated because it is published with full open access. Third, the book does not defend one superior theory of dignity, but instead presents six Western approaches and one based on the Koran and then asks whether a common essence can be detected. -/- The answer to the question whether a common essence can be detected between the Koranic interpretation of dignity and the main Western theories (virtue, Kant) is YES. The essence can be seen in dignity as a sense of self-worth, which persons have a duty to develop and respect in themselves and a duty to protect in others. The book ends with two recommendations. First, given the 7 concepts of dignity introduced in the book, meaningful dialogue can only be achieved if conversation partners clarify which variation they are using. Second, future collaborations between philosophers and psychologists might be helpful in moving theoretical knowledge on dignity as a sense of self-worth into practical action. The “scourges” of a sense of self-worth and dignity are identified by psychologists as violence, humiliation, disregard and embarrassment. To know more about how these can be avoided from psychologists, is helpful when protecting a sense of self-worth in others. (shrink)

1. At its core, education is characterized by a preoccupation with the future. Despite the notable lack of agreement concerning the aims of education (e.g., social mobility, personal development, w...

Human beings have encountered several innovations in all areas of life and have needed to adapt to them because of the changing and transforming world in the 21st century. The new lifestyle of the 21st century has forced people to acquire more than basic life skills, and the education of the 21st century person has emerged as a critical issue. For this purpose, various educational policies have been developed around the world in order to (...) train people who will be able to keep up with the demands and problems of this age. Institutions have revised the curricula to ensure that 21st century people have sufficient knowledge and skills in media, health, communication, technology, finance, etc. Higher education institutions, in particular, are expected to produce graduates who have acquired 21st century skills and are prepared for professional and social life. The same expectation arises in higher religious education, and the students in higher religious education need to graduate with the 21st century skills both for their personal and professional development and for the generations they will raise in later life. This study aims to identify the level of 21st century skills of students in higher religious education. The research reveals the competence of students in the faculty of theology in the dimensions of knowledge, skills, character and meta-learning. Mixed methods research uses sequential explanatory design. Firstly, quantitative data are collected and the general findings were detailed with qualitative data. The quantitative dimension of the study analyses the level of the 21st century skills of students at a descriptive level. The survey method is preferred in this analysis. The qualittaive data are collected through the interview method, using a semi-structured interview form developed by the researchers. The population of the study consists of the students of the Faculty of Theology and Islamic Sciences in Turkey. The sample population of the study consists of undergraduate students at the Faculty of Theology of Necmettin Erbakan University between the 2022-2023 academic years. Sequential and simultaneous mixed method sampling is used in sample selection. Quantitative data are obtained from 216 students who were randomly sampled from the population. Qualitative data are obtained from a total of 10 students (4 male and 6 female students) graduating from different high schools, representing different age groups and education types by maximum diversity sampling. As a result of the research, it is revealed that students of higher religious education are at a good level in terms of knowledge, character and meta-learning dimensions, and at a very good level in terms of 21st century skills dimension. Participants are moderately competent in the health sub-dimension, and are not moderately or poorly competent in any other dimension and sub-dimensions. It is revealed that students who graduated from Imam Hatip High School have higher finance management skills than the others, there is a differentiation in favour of males in the entrepreneurship sub-dimension, and female students are more successful than male students in terms of adaptation skills to the social system. Therefore, qualitative data are obtained from the participants regarding the differentiation in the sub-dimensions of personal finance, health, social cohesion and entrepreneurship, and the quantitative findings of this differentiation were explained through qualitative data. As a result of the interviews conducted to clarify the reasons for the differentiation in the sub-dimensions, family, upbringing environment, society, individual interest and indifference, past experiences and some theological assumptions are the reasons for these differentiations. It is thought that the research will contribute to the steps towards meeting the expectations of higher religious education in Turkey in terms of product and process. As a result, it is recommended that higher religious education programmes should be arranged in line with the goal of developing the 21st century skills, lecturers should include activities that will develop these skills in all courses, and the content of the programmes at all levels should be arranged in a way to gain these skills. (shrink)

A framework is given for the discussion of blogs as a form of online business protests against objectionable labor practices. Blogs are described and analyzed regarding responsibility and effectiveness. Future research on the morality and effectiveness of blogs and other types of online business protests is detailed.

The article surveys few of the most important philosophical contributions by Christians in the 21st century. Those surveyed include Francis Schaeffer, Alvin Plantinga, Norman Geisler, and Ravi Zacharias.

A framework is given for the discussion of blogs as a form of online business protests against objectionable labor practices. Blogs are described and analyzed regarding responsibility and effectiveness. Future research on the morality and effectiveness of blogs and other types of online business protests is detailed.

Doing philosophy for/with children and exposing students to multiple perspectives, exemplified within the Austrian Centre of Philosophy with Children’s implementation project of the Philosophical Enquiry Advancing Cosmopolitan Engagement (PEACE) curriculum in schooling, may offer a valuable written, taught, and tested curriculum for democratic citizenry. This paper provides an analysis that seeks to present, describe, critique, and make recommendations on the PEACE curriculum. The paper asks the question: In what ways does the Philosophical Enquiry Advancing Cosmopolitan Engagement as a 21st (...) century curriculum address education for democratic citizenry? In this evaluation the ways in which issues of culture and identity, human rights and democracy are perceived and addressed, along with issues of critical thinking and reasoning in verbal and non-verbal language are attended. Concepts of collaboration, cooperation, teacher support and development are also critiqued. This critique is based on a ten-day Austrian Center of Philosophy with Children conference and training course on the PEACE curriculum, and consists of open-ended interviews, personal observations, and published reports on pre- and post-test results of the PEACE curriculum. Exploring the integration of the Austrian Center of Philosophy with Children PEACE curriculum and the Philosophy for/with Children methodology, this paper utilizes Hansen’s (1995) five principles for guiding curriculum development practice as a framework for analysis. It is hoped that findings and recommendations from this study may stir further exploration and contribute to the work of Philosophy for/with Children in democratic education for 21st century citizenry worldwide. (shrink)

This study examined the performance and future predictions for the Middle East produced by 18 global climate models participating in the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change Fourth Assessment Report. Under the Special Report on Emission Scenarios A2 emissions scenario the models predict an overall temperature increase of ~1.4 K by mid-century, increasing to almost 4 K by late-century for the Middle East. In terms of precipitation the southernmost portion of the domain experiences a small increase in precipitation due (...) to the Northward movement of the Inter-Tropical Convergence Zone. The largest change however is a decrease in precipitation that occurs in an area covering the Eastern Mediterranean, Turkey, Syria, Northern Iraq, Northeastern Iran and the Caucasus caused by a decrease in storm track activity over the Eastern Mediterranean. Other changes likely to impact the region include a decrease of over 170,000 km 2 in viable rainfed agriculture land by late-century, increases in the length of the dry season that reduces the length of time that the rangelands can be grazed, and changes in the timing of the maximum precipitation in Northern Iran that will impact the growing season, forcing changes in cropping strategy or even crop types. (shrink)

The organizing theme for this special volume raises a momentous question: What are the implications of 21st century science for nursing care? The two terms the question relates – 21st century science and nursing care – are each of central importance for nursing and in philosophical enquiry about nursing as a practice, profession, or institution. These key terms are also highly charged and open to interpretation, as is the relationship of implication between them. Different interpretations or (...) assumptions will steer the search for an answer in quite different directions.Putting the expectation of an answer in abeyance, this paper probes the question precisely in its openness to interpretation and contestation. In elaborating different ways in which the main terms of the question can be taken, and analysing how different interpretations of or assumptions about them lead to different responses, the paper delineates crucial issues and divisions in nursing and commentary about nursing today. (shrink)

The 21st century has been revolutionary for the field of clinical genomics, with major advancements and breakthroughs over the years. It is now considered an instrumental tool in clinical and preventive medicine and has been used on a day-to-day basis to complement current clinical practice. However, with advancements in genomics comes greater bioethical concerns, which becomes increasingly complex with more cutting-edge technology. Some of the major ethical concerns include obtaining informed consent, possibility for genetic enhancements and eugenics, genomic (...) equity and potential discrimination and cloning. It is imperative that we appreciate the benefits of genomic medicine in complementing traditional practices, identify and address the ethical concerns with relation to the practice of genomic medicine, and to ensure a common goal of improving human lives. With these in mind, the practice of genomics can have maximum impact in the collective health of the population, with greater benefit to all. (shrink)

This work provides a critical look at business practice in the early 21st century and suggests changes that are both practical and normatively superior. Several chapters present a reflection on business ethics from a societal or macro-organizational point of view. It makes a case for the economic and moral superiority of the sustainability capitalism of the European Union over the finance-based model of the United States. Most major themes in business ethics are covered and some new ones are (...) introduced, including the topic of the right way to teach business ethics. The general approach adopted in this volume is Kantian. Alternative approaches are critically evaluated. (shrink)

Regarding the state of contemporary metaphysics, as it has been said, “There’s something in the air.” My goal in this essay is to offer some brief reflections on the state of contemporary metaphysics, otherwise called contemporary “ speculative ” philosophy – the “something in the air” – that has resurfaced within the early part of the 21st century. In order to clarify the nature of the new metaphysics in question I proceed by isolating geographically and topically two main (...) tendencies of thought which appear to constitute it: namely continental realism and continental materialism. I argue that clarifying the nature of these tendencies better characterizes what metaphysics means today. With respect to the possible ambiguity of “continental realism” or “continental materialism ” in the 21st century, a consideration of “ speculative realism” seems necessary if only to position my analysis upon a specific conceptual map. From there I offer thoughts as to how contemporary continental realism and materialism may be said to be defined first and foremost by its engagement with a concept identified as “correlationism,” a central feature of the new metaphysics ’ rejection of the sort of philosophy that has come before it. (shrink)

How relevant is Foucault's social thought to the world we inhabit today? This collection comprises several essays considering the contemporary relevance of the work of Michel Foucault. While Foucault is best remembered for his historical inquiries into the origins of disciplinary society in a period extending from the 16th to the 19th centuries, it seems that today, under the conditions of global modernity, the relevance of his ideas are called into question. With the increasing ubiquity of markets, the break up (...) of centralized states and the dissolution of national boundaries, together with new scientific and political discourses on biological life, the world of today seems far removed from the bounded, disciplinary societies Foucault described in his most famous books. Yet in recent years, it has become apparent that Foucault's thoughts on modern society have not been exhausted, and, indeed, that much remains to be explored. Within this volume, novel interpretations and thematic developments of key Foucauldian concepts are presented in the works of 24 authors. Prominent among them are new forms of neoliberal economic conduct framed by distinct governmentalities; new critical concepts of biological life reflected in Foucault's analysis of biopower, and new theoretical treatments of the effects of subjectivation. Moreover, included among these theoretical departures are empirical studies of contemporary formations of religion and spiritual practice, consumerism, race and racism, the discourse of genetics and the life sciences, surveillance and incarceration, and new social movements. Drawn from a conference held at the University of Massachusetts, Boston bearing the same title, A Foucault for the 21st Century: Governnentality, Biopolitics and Discipline in the New Millennium both expands our understanding of Foucault's central theoretical legacy, and applies his ideas to a range of contemporary empirical phenomena. (shrink)

After the French Revolution, when “Left” and “Right” came to designate the two main political orientations in Europe, “modernity” became the dominant metaphysical horizon within which almost all political questions have been formulated. As Panajotis Kondylis has shown in Konservatismus and other works, earlier “pre-modern” conservative visions lingered on, buried mostly in fading institutions, but their time was up. In the 20th century, the major political ideologies—Bolshevism, fascism, Nazism, liberalism, etc.—have all been alternative modernist proposals for social reconstruction, concerned (...) primarily with how to modernize society in what these ideologies postulate as the most efficient, just and rational way. Most…. (shrink)

We are much better equipped to let the facts reveal themselves to us instead of blinding ourselves to them or stubbornly trying to force them into preconceived molds. We no longer embarrass ourselves in front of our students, for example, by insisting that “Some Xs are Y” means the same as “Some X is Y”, and lamely adding “for purposes of logic” whenever there is pushback. Logic teaching in this century can exploit the new spirit of objectivity, humility, clarity, (...) observationalism, contextualism, and pluralism. Besides the new spirit there have been quiet developments in logic and its history and philosophy that could radically improve logic teaching. This lecture expands points which apply equally well in first, second, and third courses, i.e. in “critical thinking”, “deductive logic”, and “symbolic logic”. (shrink)

Covering both practical and theoretical aspects of strategic management, this three-volume work brings the complex topic down to earth and enables readers to gain competitive business advantages in their marketplace. This clear, insightful, and interesting work covers all aspects of strategic management, including chapters that discuss SWOT (Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities, and Threats) analysis, the Resource-Based View, transaction cost economics, and real options theory. Unlike other books, this three-volume work examines strategic management from different perspectives, effectively interweaving seemingly disparate subdisciplines, such (...) as entrepreneurship and international business, with specialized foci, such as creativity, innovation, and trust. Incorporating information from contributors as varied as a proprietor of a worldwide motorcycle business to one of the most published scholars in the field of international strategic management, the practical and theoretical perspectives presented in Strategic Management in the 21st Century will benefit business strategists, professors of strategic management, and graduate students in the field. (shrink)

This edited volume presents an interdisciplinary and international revaluation of Friedrich Engels as much more than “junior partner” to Karl Marx or “second fiddle” in the Marxist orchestra. The nineteen critical essays in this collection are the work of scholars from Germany, USA, UK, Italy, China, India, Mexico and the Philippines. Together they present and evaluate archival material and scholarly commentary that covers epistemology, political economy, political theory, gender studies, cultural studies, political geography, philosophy of social science and sociological studies (...) of class-conflict. Students, activists and specialists will find fresh consideration of familiar works, such as The Condition of the Working Class in England, The Origin of the Family, Private Property and the State, and The Dialectics of Nature. They will also be able to explore Engels’s less familiar pamphleteering, literary criticism and political commentary through detailed contextualization and careful analysis. Friedrich Engels for the 21st Century: Perspectives and Problems is unique in putting different intellectual and political receptions of Engels’s work into productive conversation, particularly from non-Anglophone scholars, translated here into English. Readers will appreciate why Engels has been so widely celebrated some two hundred years after his birth. (shrink)

(1993). A curriculum for the 21st century? Towards a new basis for overcoming academic/vocational divisions 1 . British Journal of Educational Studies: Vol. 41, No. 3, pp. 203-222.

This article contends that the evolution toward interdisciplinary collaboration that we are witnessing in the sciences must also occur in the humanities to ensure their very survival. That is, humanists must be open to working with scientists and social scientists interested in similar research questions and vice versa. Digital humanities is a positive first step. Complexity science should be the next step. Even though much of the ground-breaking work in complexity science has been done in the natural sciences and mathematics, (...) it can, if critically adapted, provide the needed metaphor for a broad integration of disciplines, humanistic and otherwise. Given its almost a-disciplinary nature, a complexity approach to the research problems in the humanities necessarily breaks down silos. Moreover, it can restore and reframe the seamless intellectual fabric sought by researchers before the atomization of the various disciplines in the nineteenthcentury academy. (shrink)

In this paper I argue that the continued relevance of Descartes' philosophy for present-day concerns can be demonstrated by bringing to bear on his Meditations state-of-the-art developments in Informal logic and Argumentation theory, specifically Leo Groarke’s approach to multimodal arguments. I show that the meditative exercises that Descartes viewed as preconditions of establishing the metaphysical tenets of his system can be recast in present-day form using technological tools and media that we are familiar with. We will see that, due to (...) the different historical and cultural contexts, the 21st century Cartesian meditating process can be: 1) technology-enhanced (a customizable, multimodal process using images and nonverbal sounds alongside verbal claims) and 2) interdisciplinary (sensitive to and informed by the history of philosophy, of ideas and of art). Reformulated and practised in this way, Descartes’ meditative exercises can serve as tools for honing much-needed critical thinking skills and dispositions, as well as for promoting autonomous decision-making. After providing examples of this contemporary Cartesian meditation, I suggest that Groarke’s multimodal approach can be extended to reconstructing the arguments of other philosophers thus supplying a way of doing history of philosophy that is both novel and has personal benefits for its practitioners. (shrink)

This volume is a 'stand alone' follow up and companion to the forthcoming volume Metatheory for the 21st-Century: Critical Realism and Integral Theory in Dialogue. Whereas Vol. I is primarily theoretical in its focus, this volume (Vol. II) will build on many of the theoretical foundations laid in Vol. I while applying them more concretely and practically to addressing the complex planetary crises of a new era that many scholars now refer to as 'the Anthropocene.' We live in (...) a time when humanity's powers have become so powerful and ubiquitous that our impact on nature has literally reached tectonic proportions. Welcome to the Anthropocene (Crutzen, 2002): a new epoch marked by the profound and far-reaching causal power of human, social life in shaping the trajectory of Earth system processes, including the climate system. The state of the world is thus profoundly influenced by the shortcomings of our dominant philosophies and metatheories and the collective self-understanding(s) they have produced. A key aim of this volume is thus to develop metatheoretical applications that serve emancipatory praxis toward a flourishing world. This volume will be of interest to upper-undergraduate and post-graduate students of philosophy, sociology and critical realism. (shrink)

Examining a variety of bio-objects in contexts beyond the laboratory, Bio-Objects: Life in the 21st Century explores new ways of thinking about how novel bio-objects enter contemporary life, analysing the manner in which the boundaries between human and animal, organic and non-organic, and being 'alive' and the suspension of living, are questioned, destabilised and in some cases re-established.

Located in Kleinbasel close to the Rhine, the Kaskadenkondensator is a place of mediation and experimental, research-and process-based art production with a focus on performance and performative expression. The gallery, founded in 1994, and located on the third floor of the former Sudhaus Warteck Brewery (hence cascade condenser), seeks to develop interactions between artists, theorists and audiences. Eight, maybe, nine or ten 40 litre bags of potting compost lie strewn about the floor of a high-ceilinged white washed hall. Dumped, split (...) open, the soil mixed with iridescent specks of green, blue and red glitter. On the walls hang large black and white photographic images—negative and positive prints barely clean, hardly sharp, scavenged from the world and presented half processed. On a third wall, hangs a framed golden and charcoal surface. Finally, a huge stain of black dye runs down a wall that descends into a sunken quarter of the Kaskadenkondensator gallery space. The results of a collaboration between Oliver Minder and Walter Derungs reflect on themes addressed in the recent Aesthetics in the 21st Century conference held by the department of English, University of Basel. In particular, the joint show questions how an aesthetic experience may be other than a human-world interaction, hinting at the withdrawal and veiling that objects perform, while demanding that different works engage with each other and play out this game under the non-supervisory eyes of a human audience. Things here are becoming—sometimes it’s a movement towards a more complete ontic whole in a projection of finality, other times it’s a dispersal, an atrophy to rather disarrayed entities. Yet, in the moment and place in which the objects are, we take them as here and now. Let’s get to the material of the stuff that Minder and Derungs have assembled. Oliver Minder employs organic materials—potting earth, cuttlefish ink secretion, rice, and insects; yet his works hardly seem natural in the sense of a harmonic relation between material and the form they are constrained into, the objects they are compelled to occupy. For the substrates on, through, or within which these natural materials are mediated are harshly inorganic substances—Plexiglas, safety glass, acrylic resin, boat varnish, spray paint. Minder, thus, generates a conflict within the materiality of his work between two polar opposites—from the human perspective—in the contiguity of materials engaging with each other in a thrown together formation that nonetheless appears to keep the materials and the objects they make in happy accidental relation to each other. Let me expand a little: on the one hand, the things Minder makes query our belief in substance as belonging in a particular domain, an environment suited to precisely that stuff. We are focused on thinking categorically where things belong, both in terms of natural place and natural relations they might extend to each other. Hence, we are driven to think of environment and order. On the other hand, while extracting things from their conventional place and arranging them within awkward constellations that we as observers feel isn’t quite right, Minder manages to persuade the viewer that the materials are nonetheless “doing alright.” So, simultaneous to our awareness of the appropriateness of the world according to our global notions of accord and uniformity, we are forced to accept the local discrepancies of disassociation, inappropriateness and misplacement. The tension between these two vectors generates a vacillation that intensifies Minder’s work. In the Kaskadenkondensator works, then, it is vital to first consider the material of Minder’s works: potting compost—what is it doing here in the first place?—seems to enjoy being “polluted” by sparkly glitter. Glitter has a long history, used in cosmetics by the Egyptians, and in cave paintings, too, earlier made of beetle shells and mica, nowadays glitter is made of plastic cut to minute sizes down to 50 microns. So what’s the point here? Well shiny bits of dust-like material are actually generated from ultra-thin plastic sheets and are normally cut into shapes that fit contiguously on a two-dimensional surface: squares, triangles, hexagons etc. What then appears to be totally random, chaotic decoration, is actually an array of extremely regular identifiable objects. 1 Of course scale has a role to play here. The minuteness of the dimensions means the regularity is beyond our recognition—all we see are the twinkling surfaces of the multi-coloured grains of plastic. In contrast, potting compost, which appears to be unary in its dull unresponsive lumpen disposition, is in fact an amalgam of a variety of organic and inorganic materials: peat, bark, mushroom compost, and sand and perlite, and should perhaps be more proactively exciting to the viewer because of this complexity. Yes; we can (if we care to) identify different textures, different sizes in the mixture of the medium, but I claim that we tend to treat this organic/inorganic assemblage as just a simple substance. Further and crucially important to our consideration here is that the medium is partially contained, but also partially spilling from the split plastic bags in which it is sold in garden centres. That the compost spills out gives it a movement suggesting life; that the bags are cast here and there in a random fashion by Oliver Minder, lying like discarded carcasses, hacked torsos, dismembered bodies, suggests a horrific murder scene, a Tatort. 2 The glitter flourishes in the medium, lies happy and decorative; that is simply what it does, how it is—always already broken, made-for-scattering, designed to be incomplete; the taken-to-be-natural compost, in contrast, cannot rest content but is forced to speak to us metaphorically in its abject overflowing of violence and rupture. While Oliver Minder’s elements in the installation direct our attention to material, Walter Derungs’ works raise questions around seeing and making in photography. There is a simultaneous flicker between the materials and their use in the production of a sense making representation, on the one hand, and on the other the very notion of what is worthy of picturing, framing, representing on the other. Derungs' images are of non-places. Ranging from archaic decaying monster buildings, buildings that have gone far beyond the ravages of a time that we can safely associate with the genteel preservation of a Bernd and Hill Belcher post-industrial decline, to the background “noise” of an urban world that is falling apart, and to which we most of the time seem to pay little attention, and habitually just pass by. In this respect, their non-ness differs somewhat from the conventional association of the term with Marc Augé 3 , where emphasis is on the specifics (if we do care to examine them for their non-placedness) of the spatial or place containment in which movement between multimodal coordinates occurs in supermodern late capitalist post-urban spaces. In other words, we might be in an Augéian non-place and (not) experience—be impervious to—that environment, or we might in Derungs’ manner look out from such a position at the “scenery” around us. I claim scenery, as this is what Derungs seems to do with his partial photography—construct a very purposefully articulated, symmetric, flat world of image. Mostly depopulated, his images construct a space in which the direction of time is uncertain: are these partial structures falling apart, or perhaps terminated in a never-to-be-completed state, or are they a few steps from final completion? Temporal and spatial dimensions figure large in Derungs’ image-making: his world, and perhaps this is in fact the only way for it to be registered photographically, is already image before it is photographed. A key combination of images in this show is a matrix of six black and white negative prints measuring 300 x 215 cm that form the image of a semi-derelict (or is it yet incomplete) church, and adjacent on a perpendicular wall, a single black and white positive print 150 x 250 cm of two bricked-up windows of a late-Victorian industrial building. What are we led to believe that we see here? In the negative print, the conditions of perception 4 are sufficiently reproduced for us to recognise the structure of the building, to distinguish ground and form, to relate some partial elements of narrative, and to recognize symbols such as the alter cross and figure of Christ, a looming crane, a traffic cone, and banks of tiered seating. We piece the image together both from the individual forms which we recognize despite the tonal reversal, and we piece the six prints together as a whole, the matrix of lines between them emphasizing our purview onto the world. While we recognise the forms at work in the image and might possibly relate the negative reversals to other figurations such as Vera Lutter’s camera obscura exposures, we cannot but avoid seeing the partialness of the image in the sponge marks of the developer that was spread by hand across the prints. 5 Derungs’ thus intervenes with our usual conception of photography as the mimetic realist vehicle sine qua non , by exposing the viewer to tonal reversal and incomplete or over developed areas of the print. We thus confront both the idiom of such image making and its raw (chemical) materiality at once in the simultaneity of the recognition of what the image pictures and the recognition that it is in the act of picturing. The church image, taken from the series “BW Negativs 2011,” thus orients us towards how we see things in the world via photographs. The single image of the bricked-up wall presents us with a completely different visuality that relates to a faciality 6 which we cannot easily escape from. We look, or rather try to look with no success, through the face of the windows, through the classic Albertian screen 7 which has already been given to us in the church matrix beside. Yet although we should be able to make more of these concealed windows because they are a positive print, because they are complete, because they approach us on a more realistic scale, reproduced at life size, we cannot. The objects pictured here withdraw from us; furthermore, they merely mock our blindness at not seeing how we look. Blocked up with quite a hint of paned glass behind, one window is blanked out with a white blind, the other simply blankly dark. The apertures look like eyes with teeth in them, or a Dogon mask, or even Man Ray’s Noire et Blanche (1926) if we want to get really perverse. The height of elegant modernist chauvinist beauty thrown against the vacuity of post-industrial decline. Derungs thus catapults us consciously into a world enfolded with and through images, but in such a way that the images themselves become objects that stand resistant to us, impervious to our gaze, indifferent. We—and indeed they—do not attempt to reach out to a real that is beyond, rather the images play in a world that is just theirs, and we can only enter that world if we too submit to their regime: tonal reversal, segmented, partial, inadequate, still, wrenched out of time. In contemplation, in the flood of the image “falling” off the wall, we too become image-object. Perhaps enough has now been said about the works, yet enough can never really be said, we know the image will always exceed the word—let’s accelerate the critique: Derungs’ work continues in a second space partially partitioned from this first room. Opposing three more “BW Negativs” which figure yet more quotidian aspects of the world is Minder’s gold spray paint and cuttlefish secretion mix: things that just shouldn’t work together do in the dialogue between stuff that Derungs and Minder have constructed. Minder makes things; Derungs makes images; together they make objects which inhabit their own world which we can approach and sensually engage with and come to grips with only on those objects’ own terms. This is best summarised by a final work made by Oliver Minder which on a third wall faces these two semi-partitioned spaces. A deep black stain about 100 X 200 cm with streak marks running down a further 2 metres hovers positioned to observe the whole work, and also to be part of this installation, too. This liminal flat suzerain lies in/out of the whole work. The stain of cuttlefish secretion resonates with Derungs’ sponge strokes on the church image; it mirrors the iris of an all-seeing eye; it combines material in situ with the situation itself. Where Minder’s other works have material and medium or substrate upon which the material is exercised, this single black hole is image which sucks everything up into itself. It draws the viewer, who must otherwise look away attentively at the floor work, and imagine horror, or smile at the ironic play of glitter. Look away at the image constructions that suggest how it is we too look to our world. See the play of thing and image in a third area. Or, finally return to the base of the pyramid that triangulates, to realise the stuff-image that unlocks it all for us. Black on white, organic on inorganic, material to substrate, that which in the falling out of one on the other, in its running down the wall simply gives form to both content and expression in one direction, and content and expression to form in another. NOTES In fact, glitter is used as associative forensic evidence: the 20,000 or so varieties are all uniquely identifiable. Joel Sternfeld, Tatorte: Bilder gegen das Vergessen (München: Schirmer/Mosel, 1996). Marc Augé, Non­places: Introduction to an Anthropology of Supermodernity trans. John Howe (London: Verso, 2006). An echo of the uneven paint strokes of light­sensitive chemicals in the paper preparations made by Henry Talbot some 170 years ago in the first sun drawings that also often pictured architectural forms. It was Talbot’s surprising discovery that where a weaker chemical solution was more thinly spread, greater light sensitivity was actualized, yet this virtual image had then to be chemically developed in a second step. Thus, Derungs unevenly finished spongings suggestively trace back to this originary technology (although his sweeps are the stains of uneven development and not those of the initial preparation of light–sensitive material). Umberto Eco, “Critique of the Image” in “Articulations of Cinematic Code” Cinematics 1, 1970. Gilles Deleuze and Felix Guattari, A Thousand Plateaus: Capitalism and Schizophrenia trans. Brian Massumi (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 2007). Geoffrey Batchen, Burning With Desire: the Conception of Photography (Cambridge, Mass: MIT Press, 1999). (shrink)

Past debates surrounding wilderness have not led to constructive dialogue but instead have created a rift between dueling sides. Far from academic, this debate has important ethical, policy, and pr...

This volume brings together about 50 scientists and researchers from the four corners of the world to redefine and anticipate tomorrow's values, and reflect on ...

The contemporary debate on 21st century populism centres on a term that can be flled with multiple meanings. It provides the social sciences with a “meta-concept” that offers coherence to disciplinary discourses. In the 21st century, globalization and cosmopolitanism are often viewed as an irresistible force by intellectuals, with advocacy of cosmopolitanism becoming commonplace. For the most part, the academic community has only belatedly and reluctantly decided to address the electoral success of political parties that reject (...) the political consensus of the post-1989 “New World Order”. In sharp contrast to the intellectuals’ stance, the empirical evidence suggests that it is localism that has been on the rise in recent decades. Glocalization is connected to the formation of varied collective responses and representations, thereby giving rise to the mutually defined pair of cosmopolitanism and localism. The cosmopolitanism–localism binary relationship is a result of glocalization. However, the majority of social-scientifc perspectives do not give proper consideration to the notion of “local”. The notions of localization and de-globalization as part of post-Great Recession trends are discussed. The extent to which these can rectify shortcomings in current theorizing is explored. (shrink)

Here's an exercise: take a piece of paper. Grab a pen, pencil, crayon - any drawing utensil within reach. Now, draw a typical family. The shape of family has changed in the 21st century. While the nuclear family still exists, many more types of kinship surround us. Kin is an investigation into what influences us to have children and the new ways that have made parenthood possible. It delves into the experiences of couples without children, single parents by (...) choice and rainbow families, and investigates the impacts of adoption, sperm donation, IVF and surrogacy, and the potential for a future of designer babies. Assisted reproductive technology has developed quickly, and the ways in which we think and speak about its implications - both legally and ethically - need to catch up. Written by journalist Marina Kamenev, Kin: Family in the 21st century is an incisive and powerful look at how families are created today, and how they might be created in the future. 'A careful and compassionate exploration of the creativity, pain and power involved in the eternally imperfect art of family making.' - Gina Rushton, author of The Most Important Job in the World 'A forensically researched book that's impossible to put down, Kamenev deftly demonstrates how society's understanding of family has changed through the generations and what it might mean now. You'll be thinking about the issues she explores for years to come.' - Isabelle Oderberg, author of Hard to Bear: Investigating the science and silence of miscarriage 'Kin is a veritable tome on family - from its evolution to the unique ways we build it - that makes clear Western society's concepts of family, reproduction and kinship need updating. Kamenev's thoughtful and often witty voice combined with meticulously researched stories makes Kin a fascinating read.' - Roz Bellamy, author of Mood: A memoir of love, identity and mental health and editor-in-chief of Archer magazine 'Well researched and animated by a multitude of voices, Kin is a complex and moving account of how our capacity to create new forms of family has not always been accompanied by sufficient reflection. Kin is an important addition to our understanding of how modern kinship relations are understood, generated, and regulated.' - Fiona Kelly, Dean of La Trobe University law school and an expert in family and health law. (shrink)

This book offers a new radical reading of Hayek in the 21st century.

Neuroscience has dramatically increased understanding of how mental states and processes are realized by the brain, thus opening doors for treating the multitude of ways in which minds become dysfunctional. This book explores questions such as when is it permissible to alter a person's memories, influence personality traits or read minds? What can neuroscience tell us about free will, self-control, self-deception and the foundations of morality? The view of neuroethics offered here argues that many of our new powers to read (...) ,alter and control minds are not entirely unparalleled with older ones. They have, however, expanded to include almost all our social, political and ethical decisions. Written primarily for graduate students, this book will appeal to anyone with an interest in the more philosophical and ethical aspects of the neurosciences. (shrink)

Counseling Ethics for the 21st Century prepares students to address ethical issues arising in contemporary counseling practice. Drawing on their own clinical and practical experiences, authors Elliot D. Cohen and Gale Spieler Cohen present detailed, realistic, and engaging clinical case studies along with a comprehensive five-step model that can be used to manage the complex ethical problems raised throughout the book. Each chapter focuses on particular virtues in the context of examining a particular counseling issue, including online counseling, (...) digital record keeping, and social media. Students will be empowered to define problems, identify relevant facts, conduct ethical analyses, and make the best decisions for their clients. (shrink)

The theory of servant leadership with its key concepts of servanthood and leadership has emerged during the last few decades. A person who has a heart for people and serves them whilst leading them practices servant leadership. Servant leaders are not motivated by attaining higher positions but by serving people. Leaders call people to follow a set vision. In the church, that vision ought to be a God vision, premised on the Word of God. Leaders in the church should lead (...) people according to the guidance of the Bible and inspiration from God. He is the one who calls people, gives them an assignment and will require an account from them. The church has been in the spotlight in recent times because of the conduct of their leaders, who are the pastors assigned with the task of leading believers. Understanding the principles of servant leadership can contribute to spiritual formation of theological students in contextualisation of 21st century theological training. The article begins with a reflection on the findings of an empirical study, followed by a short view on the servant leadership of Moses, David, Paul and Jesus Christ. Thereafter, the article focuses on servant leadership characteristics and competencies or skills according to contemporary scholars, and the article concludes with a proposed model for servant leadership as part of spiritual formation of theological students.Contribution: Although the article is context specific to the Faculty of Theology, Mahikeng campus, the principles of servant leadership can contribute to the spiritual formation of all theological students and is especially relevant to the discourse of contextualised 21st century theological training. (shrink)

Plato has received his share of bad press in this century. A number of significant schools of thought, like existentialism and phenomenology, have openly expressed impatience with Platonic ‘essentialism.’ He has even been blamed for fascism. Perhaps the problem goes back to Nietzsche’s call, at the turn of the century, to be true to the earth, our common mother. His message was aimed at otherworldly, pious Christians who, with a spiritualism worthy of the Platonists, regarded contemplative thought as (...) the way to truth. Like a doubleedged sword Nietzsche’s call was also directed against metaphysics, dogmatism and intellectualism, the fruits of which he confronted in the weighty tomes for which German scholars then were justifiably renowned. It is not surprising that in the Soviet empire, built on Marxist-Leninist atheism, Nietzsche’s words fell on receptive ears. Not only were philosophers who dared openly to identify themselves as ‘Platonist’ or ‘idealist’ banned, exiled or executed. The teaching of classical antiquity, too, was almost entirely removed from the curriculum; the ancients could be considered only from a highly restricted point of view, via Democritus, Lucretius, or Aristotle. (shrink)

Globalization, international policymanipulations such as the US farm bill, andnational policy responses have received a greatdeal of media coverage in recent times. Theseinternational and national events are having amajor impact on agricultural production inAustralia. There is some suggestion that theyare, in fact, responsible for a downturn in thefortunes of agriculture. Yet, it is more likelythat these issues are acting to continue andexacerbate a trend towards reduced viabilityfor farm families evident in economic andsocial trends since at least the 1950s.Nevertheless, globalization and (...) Australia's policy responses have left farm families morevulnerable in the global world. What then do weknow about their impact at farm gate level?Just who is doing the farming in Australia inthe 21st century and how are these peopleresponding to major world politics? This paperwill focus on the social aspects ofagricultural production in Australia notingsocial trends and drawing attention to thechanging social relations of agriculture. Thedominance of farm families, the role ofcorporate agriculture, ethnic diversity, theimportance of women, and the practice of farmtransfers will be canvassed in this paper. (shrink)

This chapter surveys the respective influences of Personalism and of analytic philosophy on twentieth-century thought about persons. It shows that personalism promoted a concept of personhood that is supportive of human dignity and conducive to positive moral and social engagement, as exemplified in Personalism’s best-known representative, Martin Luther King, Jr. By contrast, the analytic tradition has exhibited a persistent tendency to undermine personhood as King and the Personalists understood it, while failing to supply a metaphysically and morally adequate alternative. (...) This unfortunate legacy is worth reversing if possible. With this in mind, I suggest that contemporary analytic philosophy has something important to learn from personalism concerning what counts as an adequate metaphysical basis for human dignity and the moral life. (shrink)