Because it is often argued that surrogacy should not be treated as contractual, the question arises in which terms this practice might then be couched. In this article, I argue that a phenomenology of surrogacy centering on the notion of trust provides a description that is illuminating from the moral point of view. My thesis is that surrogacy establishes a complex and extended reproductive unit––the “surrogacy triad” consisting of the surrogate mother, the child, and the intending parents––whose constituents are bound (...) together by mutual trustful commitments. Even though a trust-based approach does not provide an ultimate answer to whether surrogacy should be sanctioned or prohibited, it allows for at least some practical suggestions. In particular, I will argue that, under certain conditions, surrogacy is tenable within familial or other significant relationships, and I will stress the necessity of acknowledging the new relationships and moral commitments that result from this practice. (shrink)

Background: When midwives are not treated with respect and their professional competencies are not recognised, their professional dignity is violated. Objective: This study explored and described how the professional dignity of midwives in the selected hospital can be enhanced based on their experiences. Research design: A descriptive phenomenological research design was used with in-depth interviews conducted with 15 purposely selected midwives. Ethical considerations: The Faculty of Health Sciences Research Ethics Committee of the University of Pretoria approved the study. The research (...) was conducted in an academic tertiary hospital with voluntary participants. Findings: To dignify midwives it is essential to enhance the following: ‘to acknowledge the capabilities of midwives’, ‘to appreciate interventions of midwives’, ‘to perceive midwives as equal health team members’, ‘to invest in midwives’, ‘to enhance collegiality’, ‘to be cared for by management’ and ‘to create conducive environments’. Conclusion: The professional dignity of midwives is determined by their own perspectives of the contribution that they make to the optimal care of patients, the respect that they get from others and the support that hospital management gives them. With support and care, midwives’ professional dignity is enhanced. Midwives will strive to render excellent services as well as increasing their commitment. (shrink)

This paper presents a review of studies that were aimed at determining which brain regions are recruited during visual self-recognition, with a particular focus on self-face recognition. A complex bilateral network, involving frontal, parietal and occipital areas, appears to be associated with self-face recognition, with a particularly high implication of the right hemisphere. Results indicate that it remains difficult to determine which specific cognitive operation is reflected by each recruited brain area, in part due to the variability of used control (...) stimuli and experimental tasks. A synthesis of the interpretations provided by previous studies is presented. The relevance of using self-recognition as an indicator of self-awareness is discussed. We argue that a major aim of future research in the field should be to identify more clearly the cognitive operations induced by the perception of the self-face, and search for dissociations between neural correlates and cognitive components. (shrink)

Labor unions are key stakeholders in the field of corporate social responsibility but researchers have paid surprisingly little attention to their CSR strategies. This article extends stakeholder theory by treating unions as having stakeholders that influence their CSR strategies. Drawing on qualitative data from a longitudinal study on selected unions in France between 2006 and 2013, this paper analyzes the underlying reasons for the differences in their approaches. It finds connections between the unions’ CSR strategy, and the perception of and (...) cooperation with stakeholders. (shrink)

In France, some institutions seem to call for the engineer’s sense of social responsibility. However, this call is scarcely heard. Still, engineering students have been given the opportunity to gain a general education through courses in literature, law, economics, since the nineteenth century. But, such courses have long been offered only in the top ranked engineering schools. In this paper, we intend to show that the wish to increase engineering students’ social responsibility is an old concern. We also aim at (...) highlighting some macro social factors which shaped the answer to the call for social responsibility in the French engineering “Grandes Ecoles”. In the first part, we provide an overview of the scarce attention given to the engineering curriculum in the scholarly literature in France. In the second part, we analyse one century of discourses about the definition of the “complete engineer” and the consequent role of non technical education. In the third part, we focus on the characteristics of the corpus which has been institutionalized. Our main finding is that despite the many changes which occurred in engineering education during one century, the “other formation” remains grounded on a non academic “way of knowing”, and aims at increasing the reputation of the schools, more than enhancing engineering students’ social awareness. (shrink)

This paper provides a summary of the symposium on the institutional and social construction of Responsible Investment (RI), held at the 22nd IABS conference. In the context of the symposium, we propose to move beyond the dominant focus on the financial impact of RI to consider the potential of emergent institutional and sociological perspectives to explain the practices and concepts related to RI. In doing so, our aim is to explore in greater detail the current changes in the RI infrastructure (...) and the impact of these changes on wider issues of corporate sustainability and social responsibility. (shrink)

Fruit de la collaboration de 95 chercheurs et chercheuses de renommée nationale et internationale, cet ouvrage se compose d’une vingtaine d’articles longs et d’une centaine de notices plus courtes, illustrés par 1 200 images (peintures, dessins, gravures, sculptures, affiches, cartes postales, photographies, presse, objets du quotidien, etc.). Ce format « beau-livre»s’impose au regard par une finition soignée. Volumineux, il est structuré en quatre parties couvrant tous les empires coloniau...

ZusammenfassungIn der ethischen Debatte um die Forschung mit Biobanken wird selten zwischen verschiedenen Biomaterialien differenziert. Vor diesem Hintergrund widmet sich die vorliegende qualitative Interviewstudie erstmals den praktischen Herausforderungen, die sich bei der Sammlung von postmortal gewonnenem menschlichem Gehirngewebe zu Forschungszwecken aus Sicht von in diese Praxis involvierten Experten in Deutschland stellen. Im Zentrum der ethischen Analyse stehen Herausforderungen der Spenderrekrutierung, der Kommunikation über eine Gehirnspende sowie der informierten Zustimmung. Unsere Ergebnisse relativieren zum einen die Annahme eines sogenannten Spendermangels, insofern insbesondere (...) Kliniker eine Gatekeeper-Rolle bei der Spendergewinnung innehaben. Deren Einstellungen sollten daher als ein die Praxis unmittelbar beeinflussender Faktor stärker berücksichtigt werden; zudem sollten im Wissen um bestehende moralische Vorbehalte Ansätze zur Verbesserung der professionellen Kommunikation entwickelt werden. Bezüglich der Regelung der Einwilligung in postmortale Forschungsspenden wurde in unserem Sample das Bemühen deutlich, den ethischen Vorrang der Organspende nicht zu gefährden und die Postmortalspende vor Assoziationen mit der Organspende zu bewahren. Zur Sicherung des Vertrauens in die Forschung sowie der Autonomie von Spendern befürworteten die Experten nicht nur die Anwendung einer Zustimmungsregelung, sondern auch ein den Familienangehörigen explizit eingeräumtes Recht, einer Gehirnspende selbst dann zu widersprechen, wenn der Verstorbene seine Zustimmung erteilt hat. Die Erfahrung zeigt, dass eine offene Kommunikation über das Erfordernis eines familiären Konsenses zu einer hohen Akzeptanz des Spenderwillens in der Praxis führt. Daher könnte ein solcher, auf den Dialog von Spender und Angehörigen zu Lebzeiten bauender Ansatz auch instruktiv für die Realisierung von Spenden im Kontext der Organspende sein. (shrink)

Human reproduction in the age of reprogenetics raises fundamental ethical and political questions. Critics of so-called liberal eugenics like Jürgen Habermas have sparked an ethical debate on whether selective genetic manipulation might undermine the natural basis of the moral self-conception and autonomy of future generations. Contrary to this perception, the authors of this article argue for a dialectic understanding of the moral challenges arising from human natality: Freedom and dependency, sociality and human embodiment, autonomy and relatedness likewise determine our human (...) existence as moral beings. As an answer to these challenges, the authors develop a dialectic understanding of parenthood in the age of reprogenetics, thereby transcending present debates of modern reproductive medicine. (shrink)

Les sœurs Papin, auteures d’un fait divers tragique qui a sidéré la France en 1933, ont inspiré, voire fasciné, hommes de lettres, cinéastes, psychanalystes. Christine et Léa Papin seraient dépositaires des traumatismes familiaux inter et transgénérationnels non transformés et clivés. Séparées dans la petite enfance, placées par leur mère comme domestiques chez la famille Lancelin, elles reproduiraient entre elles le lien d’interdépendance symbiotique instaurée auparavant avec elle. Le retour du vécu traumatique clivé et l’ébranlement de la symbiose consécutif à la (...) rupture d’avec celle-ci seraient à l’origine du passage à l’acte criminel sauvage perpétré par les sœurs sur leurs patronnes. (shrink)

Roman B. J. Kwasniewski, a son of Polish immigrants, used his camera to document life in this neighborhood shortly after the turn of the twentieth century. The photographs in this book are representative of the Polish American experience in Milwaukee prior to World War II. Kwasniewski's photographs document this critical time when the children and grandchildren of Milwaukee's Polish immigrants established themselves fully as American citizens. The photographs in this collection depict what life was like in Kwasniewski's Lincoln Avenue/Mitchell Street (...) neighborhood. Many images such as family portraits and wedding pictures are from the time when Kwasniewski operated Park Studio between 1913 and 1947. Kwasniewski also took his camera out into the community to capture scenes of life on the streets, local businesses, homes, classrooms, and cultural, social, and recreational activities. With an introduction by well-known Milwaukee historian John Gurda, this book provides a visual picture of the growth of Milwaukee's second largest ethnic group and the distinctive community that developed on Milwaukee's South Side. (shrink)

The pervasiveness of domestic employment in the South African context gives rise to the question as to why women not only enter into, but remain in, such an undervalued work situation, and whether they are ultimately able to exit this sector. Contextualising the sectoral engagement of domestic workers as a transitional work-life cycle characterised by impoverishment, limited alternatives, acceptance of the work context, and future directedness, with individual transition through these phases determined by a unique set of circumstances, female domestic (...) workers’ lived experience of their work-life cycle was explored within the framework of an interpretivist research design. Non-probability respondent-driven self-sampling was employed to select 20 participants, most of whom were representative of families with a long history of sectoral involvement, particularly along the female line. Dense, non-numerical data was generated through in-depth interviewing. Inductive data explication was conducted with the aid of MAXQDA. The findings confirmed the existence of an institutionalised culture of engagement within the sector perpetuated from one generation to the next. Hardship and an urgent need for survival leave many with little option but to enter and remain within the sector. Despite negative societal perceptions of the sector, those within it take pride in their work and view their engagement as an enabling tool to better their future prospects and those of their families. Attempts to exit the sector are unsuccessful due, in part, to a limited formal education and skills repertoire. Domestic workers are thus entrapped within a never-ending cycle of sectoral engagement, with the possibility of exiting the sector remaining merely a dream for many. (shrink)

Bioethicists tend to focus on the individual as the relevant moral subject. Yet, in highly complex and socially differentiated healthcare systems a number of social groups, each committed to a common cause, are involved in medical decisions and sometimes even try to influence bioethical discourses according to their own agenda. We argue that the significance of these collective actors is unjustifiably neglected in bioethics. The growing influence of collective actors in the fields of biopolitics and bioethics leads us to pursue (...) the question as to how collective moral claims can be characterized and justified. We pay particular attention to elaborating the circumstances under which collective actors can claim ‘collective agency.’ Specifically, we develop four normative-practical criteria for collective agency in order to determine the conditions that must be given to reasonably speak of ‘collective autonomy’. For this purpose, we analyze patient organizations and families, which represent two quite different kinds of groups and can both be conceived as collective actors of high relevance for bioethical practice. Finally, we discuss some practical implications and explain why the existence of a shared practice of trust is of immediate normative relevance in this respect. (shrink)

L’ouvrage est constitué par les actes du séminaire du Centre de Recherches sur la Pensée Antique (Centre « Léon Robin », alors dirigé par Gilbert Romeyer Dherbey), consacré de 1998 à 2000 aux stoïciens. Doté d’indices ainsi que d’une bibliographie très complète, il regroupe des communications de très grande qualité, en majorité inédites, et se place parmi les recueils dont la consultation se révèle urgente pour qui veut avoir une idée à la fois complète et précise de la pensée du (...) Portique. Le... (shrink)

The panel aims to further a conversation between being advanced by a forthcoming volume, Engineering, Social Science, and the Humanities: Has Their Conversation Come of Age? (Eds. Christensen, Buch, Conlon, Didier, Mitcham, Murphy).

Moral principles are universally valid, valid for all human beings in so far as they are mature, responsible and of a sound mind – this idea is an essential part of our understanding of morality. Moral principles do not allow for any exceptions. Therefore, we expect from every person we take for mature and responsible to do her or his moral duty. This does not mean that we are naive about the moral goodness of human beings. We just cannot give (...) up this expectation without considering a person as immature and irresponsible, as not being provided with a sound mind so that we cannot blame her or him for any moral failure. Any analysis of moral motivation therefore has to explain both that all responsible persons can and must have a disposition to moral agency and that for all of them this disposition is somehow privileged so that, in a case of confl icting dispositions of volition and action, it is the moral dispositions that finally determine the aim or purpose of the action. On this background, the theories of moral motivation provided by David Hume, Immanuel Kant, and Adam Smith are compared. Whereas Hume seems to give up the whole idea of universal validity of moral principles and moral obligation, both Kant and Smith try to explain how dispositions to moral agency can be as omnipresent and motivationally strong as they should be – given the implication of our moral expectations. However, both theories meet with essential difficulties because they cannot exclude the influence of contingent factors on the moral motivation of a responsible person. (shrink)

I will demonstrate how religious change repeatedly confronts the sociology of religion with new problems of interpretation and explanation. In the first part (I), I will take a closer look at these problems at a macro sociological level. In doing so, I will provide a brief historical outline and link this to the respective problems of interpretation and explanation. This historical development allows us to discuss the various explanatory models. In the second part (II), I will take a different perspective (...) and switch to the micro sociological level. I will show how responding to the question of meaning is still possible in secular societies, where the answers handed down by religious traditions are no longer accepted as a matter of course. In this part, I will take up the problems of explanation previously outlined and trace in particular the transformation of church-based religion into subjective forms of religiosity. My paper focuses on the following questions: How are social developments and religious change interwoven? How do theories in the sociology of religion explain religious change? What does social modernization and functional differentiation mean for the individual? What effects does modernity have on religion and in particular on the religiosity of individuals? (shrink)

This article attempts to clarify and critically to discuss some variants of the sociological Interpretation of regularities in social action. The widely held view that the concept of norm yields the decisive approach to a specifically sociological understanding of behavioural regularities is placed in opposition to Weber’s reflections on the basic concepts of sociology. Weber from the start reserves room for an utility - and interestoriented component of explanation, apart from the concept of norm and in principle not less important. (...) In this connection the article also works out and criticises Parsons' attempt to ‘integrate’ Weber's sociology into a normativistic conception of the discipline. As o consequence of this criticism the author stresses the value of using the concept of norm - and also tho of rule - in o more differentiated fashion. In particular we should distinguish clearly between on the one hand norms, or rules with obligatory components, and on the other utility- or means -ends-oriented rules, followed in the process of furthering one’s own interests. If we neglect this distinction and, like Parsons, subsume o conflation of these concepts under the notion of norm, we run the risk of perceiving any moderately polished and strategically prudent pursuit of an agent’s own interests as a case of norm-governed action. (shrink)