Endeavours to map out a piece of the intellectual history of this century which once almost faded from memory. In 1941 William Temple, then Archbishop of York, called for a Christian social philosophy and in so doing voiced a concern that had been gathering momentum all through the 30s, sharpened by the challenge of authoritarian regimes, left and right, and had formed the focus of the Oxford Conference of Church, Community and State in 1937.

The political concern of the Church towards an authentic political development of man and society has always been expressed by the Church. One of the means of doing this is the teaching Magisterium of the Roman Pontiffs begun with the Encyclical Rerum novarurn of Leo XIII. John Paul II had called for reforms of political institutions in the world in his Sollicitudo rei socialis. The political situation in Africa is one of great concern, characterised by dictatorial (...) military regimes. Even the democratically elected Governments turned out to be corrupt and are be-devilled with bad governance. This work focuses on the pronouncements indicated in the Pastoral Communiques of the Bishops under the aegis of SECAM in imitation of the Roman Pontiffs to advance the Social Teaching of the Church in the era of globalisation. In agreement with the tradition of the Roman Pontiffs and the Social Teaching of the Church, the thesis draws attention to ways of ameliorating the deteriorating political situation in Africa. The Bishops condemned corrupt regimes and offered solutions for a better political future for Africa. This book finally indicates much of the way forward for Africa. (shrink)

Applied Christian Ethics addresses selected themes in Christian social ethics. Part one shows the roots of contributors in the realist school; part two focuses on different levels of the significance of economics for social justice; and part three deals with both existential experience and government policy in war and peace issues.

Within moral and political philosophy and the social sciences, recent conceptual developments in the concept of recognition cannot be dissociated from an opposition to those theories inspired by what is commonly called rational action theory or the economic model of action. The paradigm of recognition represents the heart of those theories that are both alternative and complementary to the theory of individual action. Nonetheless, this conceptual development calls out for an alliance between political philosophy and the (...) class='Hi'>social sciences. We argue that the paradigm of recognition can only be developed to its full potential if it is interpreted in the wake of what Marcel Mauss and the Revue du MAUSS, has called the paradigm of the gift. The gift only takes on its full sense when understood as a means, performer, and symbol of public and/or private recognition. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Reviewed by:Bonhoeffer and King: Their Legacies and Import for Christian Social ThoughtCharles W. ChristianBonhoeffer and King: Their Legacies and Import for Christian Social Thought Edited by Willis Jenkins and Jennifer M. McBride Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 2010. 304 pp. $25.00Countless books have been written about Dietrich Bonhoeffer and Martin Luther King Jr., assessing their individual leadership in the areas of social justice and theology in (...) the twentieth century. Relatively few works have brought these two individuals together in comparative analysis. This book, edited by Willis [End Page 216] Jenkins (assistant professor of social ethics at Yale Divinity School) and Jennifer M. McBride (visiting lecturer at Candler Divinity School), seeks to do that; it brings together a wide array of scholars in the fields of ethics, theology, pastoral ministry, political theory, African American studies, and feminist theology.As McBride points out in her introduction, the “significant differences in their historic, sociopolitical contexts” can present challenges in comparing the work of these two men and in seeking to contemporize them (8). However, the thought and life of both martyrs “demand[s] action”; in other words, the “thought” of both Bonhoeffer and King remains incomplete without “courageous, constructive, redemptive social engagement” (3). It is in this spirit that the book unfolds.The book is divided into four parts. The first four chapters compose part 1 (titled “Critical Distance”), which takes a broader look at the legacies, key concepts, and limitations or critiques of the thought of Bonhoeffer and King. For example, the second chapter by Stephen R. Haynes (“King and Bonhoeffer as Protestant Saints”) reminds us of the perils of the larger-than-life legacies of both these individuals. When noteworthy persons become personalities or cultural heroes, key aspects of their legacies can be minimized or overlooked. This is particularly important in contemporary American settings where politicians and commentators tend to reduce the legacies of both Bonhoeffer and King to fit their own political agendas.Part 2 pays specific attention to the influence of Bonhoeffer and King on matters related to social justice, such as poverty, racism, and violence. Among the notable contributions in this section is the chapter by Craig J. Slane that deals with the “unexpected turn toward violence” (112) for Bonhoeffer during his involvement in the plot to assassinate Hitler during World War II. Part 3 looks at the ways in which the lives and teaching (and especially preaching, in King’s life in particular) of Bonhoeffer and King are instruments of social redemption. In addition to noting the influence of Niebuhr’s emphasis on social sin and social redemption on King’s preaching and leadership, it points out that both Bonhoeffer and King were deeply influenced by the economic and social upheavals of their time; their preaching, teaching, and writing sought to address, in concrete ways, the racial, economic, and political realities of their contexts. In part 4, “Peacemaking,” four authors highlight the contributions King and Bonhoeffer have made to peacemaking and the influence these contributions continue to have. They discuss both men’s commitment to nonviolence and pacifism and the particular challenges this commitment created for them (especially for Bonhoeffer, given his participation in a plot to overthrow Hitler).The essays in this book do not present these two martyrs as unblemished. The book contains rich discussions that honestly assess their personal struggles [End Page 217] of conscience as well as their contextual struggles with such issues as the role of women. Furthermore, the reader will find a solid introduction to the lives and thought of both men while at the same time sitting in on a diverse conversation about how their influential interpretations of the Christian faith can continue to be fleshed out. May this kind of conversation (and action) continue!Charles W. ChristianMount Vernon Nazarene UniversityCopyright © 2012 The Society of Christian Ethics... (shrink)

The central question of this conference is whether the media can contribute to high quality social dialogue. The prospects for resolving that question positively in the “sound and fury” depend on recovering the idea of truth. At present the news media are lurching along from one crisis to another with an empty centre. We need to articulate a believable concept of truth as communication's master principle. As the norm of healing is to medicine, justice to politics, critical thinking to (...) education, craftsmanship to engineering, and stewardship to business, so truth-telling is the news profession's occupational norm. Truth-telling is the ethical framework that fundamentally reorders the media's professional culture and enables them to enrich social dialogue rather than undermine it.Historically the mainstream press has defined itself in terms of an objectivist worldview. Centred on human rationality and armed with the scientific method, the facts in news have been said to mirror reality. The aim has been true and incontrovertible accounts of a domain separate from human consciousness. In Bertrand Russell's formula, “truth consists in some form of correspondence between belief and fact” . In the received view, truth is defined in elementary epistemological terms as accurate representation. News corresponds to context-free neutral algorithms, and ethics is equated with impartiality.The attacks on this misguided view of human knowledge had already originated in Giambattista Vico's fantasia and Wilhelm Dilthey's verstehen in the counter-Enlightenment of the 18th century. They have continued with hermeneutics, critical theory in the Frankfurt School, American pragmatism, Wittgenstein's linguistic philosophy, Gramsci, and in their own way, Lyotard's denial of master narratives and Derrida's sliding signifiers; until the anti-foundationalism of our own day indicates a crisis in correspondence views of truth. Institutional structures remain Enlightenment-driven, but in principle the tide has turned currently toward restricting objectivism to the territory of mathematics, physics, and the natural sciences. In reporting, objectivity has become increasingly controversial as the working press' professional standard, though it will remain entrenched in our ordinary practices of news production and dissemination until an alternative mission for the press is convincingly formulated.The demise of correspondence views of truth has created a predicament for the notion of truth altogether. However, instead of appealing to coherence versions or abandoning the concept, truth needs to be relocated in the moral sphere. Truth is a problem of axiology rather than epistemology. With the dominant scheme no longer tenable, truth should become the province of ethicists who can reconstruct it as the news media's contribution to social dialogue.When truth is articulated in terms of a moral framework, we can mold its richly textured meaning around the Hebrew emeth , the Greek aletheia . In Serbo-Croatian the true is justified as with plumbline in carpentry. In the powerful wheel imagery of the Buddhist tradition, truth is the immovable axle. The Truth and Reconciliation Commission in South Africa presumes that sufferings from apartheid can be healed through truthful testimony. In Ghandhi's “satyagrapha,” the power of truth through the human spirit eventually wins over force . Dietrich Bonhoeffer's Ethics contends correctly that a truthful account lays hold of the context, motives, and presuppositions involved .Telling the truth depends on the quality of discernment so that penultimates do not gain ultimacy. Truth means, in other words, to strike gold, to get at “the core, the essence, the nub, the heart of the matter” . For Henry David Thoreau – though addressing a different issue – when we are truthful, we attempt to “drive life into a corner and¼if it proves to be mean, why then to get the genuine meanness out of it and publish its meanness to the world; or if it were sublime, to know it by personal experience and be able to give a true account of the encounter” . For the former secretary general of the United Nations, Dag Hammarskjold, “the most dangerous of all moral dilemmas is when we are obliged to conceal truth in order to help the truth be victorious” . In the Talmud, the liar's punishment is that no one believes him.Augustine , professor of rhetoric at Milan and later Bishop of Hippo, illustrates a non-correspondence view of truth. His rhetorical theory is a major contribution to the philosophy of communication, contradicting the highly secular and linear view of the ancient Greeks. As with Aristotle, rhetoric entails reasoned judgement for Augustine; however, he “break[s] away from Graeco-Roman rhetoric, moving instead toward ¼rhetoric as aletheiac act” . Rhetoric for him is not knowledge-producing or opinion-producing but truth-producing . The Epistolae Doctrina Christiana scourges the value-neutral, technical language of “word merchants” without wisdom.Truth is not fundamentally a prescriptive statement. The aletheiac act in Augustine “tends to be more relational than propositional, a dialogically interpersonal, sacramentally charitable act rather than a statement¼taking into account and being motivated by [the cardinal virtues] faith, hope, and charity” . The truth for him does not merely make things clear, but motivates us to belief and action. In truthful communication for Augustine, “it is not enough to seek to move men's minds, merely for the sake of power; instead, the power to move is to be used to lead men to truth”. (shrink)

A daring marriage of philosophical theory and practical politics, this collection is the first of Gianni Vattimo's many books to combine his intellectual pursuits with his public and political life. Vattimo is a paradoxical figure, at once a believing Christian and a vociferous critic of the Catholic Church, an outspoken liberal but not a former communist, and a recognized authority on Nietzsche and Heidegger as well as a prominent public intellectual and member of the European parliament. Building on (...) his unique position as a philosopher and politician, Vattimo takes on some of the most pressing questions of our time: Is it still possible, long after Nietzsche proclaimed the death of God, to talk of moral imperatives, individual rights, or political freedom? Are these values still relevant in today's world? Tackling these crucial issues, Gianni Vattimo argues that nihilism is not the absence of meaning but a recognition of a plurality of meanings; it is not the end of civilization but the beginning of new social paradigms. Commonly associated with the pessimistic belief that all of existence is meaningless, nihilism, as a philosophical principle, is far less sensational--it is the ethical doctrine that there are no moral absolutes or infallible natural laws, that "truth" is inescapably subjective. Because the conditions for equality and liberty are not "naturally" given, society must actively create these ideals or it will inevitably fall prey to irrationality, prejudice, and oppression. Vattimo contends that the infighting, timidity, and confusion that have overtaken contemporary liberal thought and politics are the products a prolonged and indulgent mourning over the loss of the transcendental father figure--any institution or power structure that defines truth, knowledge, and reality. Until humanity overcomes its need for external authority--whether it be organized religion, the nation-state, or free-market capitalism--emancipation will remain unattainable. Collecting fourteen of Vattimo's most influential essays on ethics, politics, and law, _Nihilism and Emancipation_ is a provocative reevaluation of meaning, values, and the idea of freedom in Western culture. (shrink)

This is the first book to focus on the ethic that Dietrich Bonhoeffer constructed during the 1930s—an ethic he crafted while playing a key role in Christian resistance to Nazism and an ethic still inspiring politically active Christians. The ethic of discipleship, this study argues, represents a reworking of the Christian faith so that it becomes actively opposed to totalitarianism. This book therefore adds a significant dimension to the published record concerning the German theologian and pastor executed in (...) 1945 for conspiring to assassinate Hitler and overthrow the Third Reich. Since an ethic reflects more than a cognitive assent and has emotional and experiential dimensions, the author's approach is socio-psychological, drawing on the large documentary record of Bonhoeffer's family relations. Reductionism, however, is rejected in this book, which gives social psychology parity but not superiority—in understanding Bonhoeffer's religious quest and political dialogue. (shrink)

I thought it useful, in responding to the paper written by J.A. Selling, to look at the relation between fundamental and applied ethics and between faith, ethics and science. Not so much because I do not share his opinion — I agree with the content of his paper — nor to limit the reflection to the general ethical foundation, but because the meaning and range of the term ‘Christian ethics’, as it relates to applied ethics, (...) is anything but evident. This is particularly true for ethical judgments within those social sectors where religion no longer plays a commonly accepted role as a public source of legitimation. Does not the communis opinio hold that religious traditions have nothing to contribute to ethics, and certainly to applied ethics, that cannot be known and confirmed from human reason? Therefore, within a pluralistic society, reference to religious arguments in ethical reflection seems more hindersome than helpful when we seek a pragmatic consensus on rational, nonconfessional grounds, and strive towards a common value judgment on matters where religions are not competent.I believe that there are many positive arguments to support this communis opinio. I expect they will be used in our further discussion. When I continue to plead for a countercultural link between the Christian worldview and applied ethics, I do so to clarify the meaning of our position as a Centre. I believe that we must avoid understanding our position only as a sociological or political arrangement. We would do better to wonder whether there is any inherent link between Christianity and applied ethics, and if so, where this link lies. If there is no link, our function is reduced to a sociopolitical arrangement, which I personally would find regrettable. (shrink)

This book discusses Alasdair MacIntyre’s engagement with Marxism from the early 1950s to the present. It begins with his early writings on Marxism and Christianity, moving through his period in the New Left and the Socialist Labour League and International Socialism in the late 1950s and 1960s. It then discusses MacIntyre’s break with Marxism by developing the brief but telling five-point critique he gives of Marxism in his 1981 volume After Virtue. Marxism, Ethics and Politics highlights MacIntyre’s continuing admiration (...) for much in Marx’s thought, noting that his contemporary project is developed in response to what he now sees as the inadequacies of Marxism, particularly Marxist politics. It concludes by examining the place of Marxism in the contemporary MacIntyrean debate and by pointing out the contested nature of the claims about Marxism that MacIntyre makes. (shrink)

Christine Firer Hinze examines how socio-political power has been modeled in recent social theory and Christian ethics, and considers its theological and sociological underpinnings. The interaction of two models of power, "power over" and "power to" is traced in the works of selected religious and social theorists of the past century. Hinze advances a constructive argument in favor of a theory that systematically integrates power's superordinating and collaborative features, and does so in a manner that (...) coheres with the ethicist's underlying theological and sociological commitments. Appealing to a variety of warrants, she offers a comprehensive approach to power that takes "power to" as its descriptive and normative starting point and relegates "power over" to a limited and strictly instrumental role in socio-political practice. (shrink)

Today there is a fruitful dispute between secularists and those who argue the compatibility between Christianity, with its religious precepts and intrinsic system of ethical values, and the liberal democracy. The second group is however hopelessly wrong, as much as the first. This endeavor is epistemologically wrong and the argument is pretty simple. The institutions of divine right, such as the Church or family, shall be subject to the single principle or hierarchy of being, that goes beyond the narrow human (...) consciousness and action. From this perspective, these institutions may be called undemocratic or they do not respect the ideology of inalienable human rights, as formulated at the present time. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:American Journal of Philology 126.1 (2005) 138-142 [Access article in PDF] Kathy L. Gaca. The Making of Fornication: Eros, Ethics, and Political Reformin Greek Philosophy and Early Christianity. Hellenistic Culture and Society 40. Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press, 2003. xviii + 359 pp. Cloth, $60. As the current attention to same-sex marriage attests, religious communities and politicians today are concerned with sexual activity and (...) rules, viewing [End Page 138] them as correlated with particular kinds of social orders and values. Since second-wave feminism and Foucault, classicists and historians of early Christians have given considerable attention to how ancients themselves were concerned with sexual activity and its bearing on social, political, and religious life. Kathy Gaca's study contributes fresh insights about the saliency of religious ideology to understanding the different kinds of "sexual blueprints" produced by Greek philosophers, biblical authors and their interpreters, and early Christians. The Making of Fornication takes as its starting point a challenge to Foucault's argument for fundamental continuity in sexual morality between Greek and early Christian thought. Gaca argues instead that historically successful forms of Christianity are more discontinuous than continuous with Greek philosophy.Porneia exemplifies the break Gaca charts: "the Greek biblical sense of 'fornication' should not be confused with in the non-biblical Greek sense.... as 'fornication' requires biblical monotheism to be intelligible as a sexual rule, insofar as sexual intercourse and procreation are fornicating, and forbidden, by virtue of not being dedicated to the Lord alone. In the non-biblical Greek sense, however, means 'prostitution' and has nothing to do with worshipping God alone" (20). Sexual activity in non-biblical Greek understandings was nonetheless closely linked to piety, and philosophers crafted their moral sexual visions in accordance with their understandings of how sexual desires, practices, and reproduction relate to the gods and cosmic order. Gaca argues that the combination of Greek biblical ideas and non-biblical Greek associations of sex with the gods led to Christian "practices of intense sexual asceticism among converted Greeks and other gentiles.... Since alien gods such as Aphrodite remained so potent a presence in human sexuality, it seemed critical to put an end to exercising her sexual energy rather than to defy God" (304). She sees this ascetic trend differently expressed in the first-century writings of Philo of Alexandria and Paul of Tarsus and the second-century writings of the Christians Tatian and Clement of Alexandria.This three-part work unfolds as a study of different views about sexual activity, even as it builds a larger argument about "the motivating philosophical and religious principles behind Christian sexual asceticism" (9). In each part's chapters, Gaca charts the range of visions for how sexual activity does and should correlate with social order held by Greek philosophers (Part 1: Platonic, Stoic, and Pythagorean), biblical texts and their interpreters (Part 2: Septuagint, Paul of Tarsus, and Philo of Alexandria), and three second-century Christians (Part 3: Tatian, Clement of Alexandria, and Epiphanes).For Gaca, Tatian and Clement of Alexandria craft their respective Christian ideals in monogamous heteroerotic, reproductive terms adapted from biblical traditions as well as some aspects of Platonic and Pythagorean thought (notably an emphasis on the regulation of sexual desire and procreative ideal for sex, respectively); their two versions of sexual norms (Tatian rejecting all sexual activity, Clement conceding only non-libidinous procreative marital sex) should be understood as a response to the religious associations of sex and sexual desire [End Page 139] among gentiles, especially Greeks (303-304). Epiphanes represents a historically unsuccessful alternative trajectory for early Christian sexual norms, in its basic presuppositions (of egalitarianism as a norm for community which extends to a rejection of marriage), in its relationship to Greek philosophy (in continuity with many early Stoic ideals about egalitarian communalism), and in its interpretation of Paul (using Gal. 3:28 as an interpretive key over 1 Cor. 6:18).In Part 1 Gaca aims to correct for a lack of attention to early Stoic material among classicists and ancient historians... (shrink)

My paper concerns a rather extraordinary generation which arose in France in the 1930s, reacting against Action française which had long infected French Catholic political and social thought. Action française was a line of thought — and a political movement — inspired by Charles Maurras, himself an agnostic, basing his political thinking on a form of naturalism and positivism which clearly divorced politics from religion and ethics. Pope Pius XI forbade the participation of Catholics in (...) that movement in 1926, which was quite a blow and provoked quite an uproar since the majority of Catholic intellectuals were from Action française.The great Thomists of the time in particular and the bishops were reluctant in following the Pope's condemnation. Already the following year however, Jacques Maritain, who had sided with Action française for a long time, rallied to Rome. He contributed to a famous book Rome has spoken . Many followed him. He subsequently changed his basic views, fought for an integration of politics with morality as well as for a certain integration of politics and the Christian message, under the name Humanisme intégral, the title of one of his books. Jacques Maritain was born in 1882, died in 1975. The decisive years of his work are clearly the '30s and early '40s. (shrink)

This collection of essays and thoughts covers such areas as basic Christian thought, which includes traditional family morality and a great concern for alleviating poverty and promoting social justice, political thought comparing the need for a system which includes both socialist and capitalist elements, and the need for values in our society, which has come to emphasize money, power, and greed as philosophical goals and values, though they are not. The book also has thoughts concerning literature, a (...) consideration of what constitutes true progress, the denial in our society of any absolute moral truth, and the substitution of moral relativism as a mistaken ethical system. --publisher description. (shrink)

Are religion and public life really separate spheres of human activity? Should they be? In this book, Robin W. Lovin criticizes contemporary political and theological views that separate religion from public life as though these areas were systematically opposed and makes the case for a more integrated understanding of modern society. Such an understanding can be underpinned by 'Christian realism', which encourages responsible engagement with social and political problems from a distinctive perspective. Drawing on the work (...) of Rawls, Galston, Niebuhr, and Bonhoeffer, Lovin argues that the responsibilities of everyday life are a form of politics. Political commitment is no longer confined to the sphere of law and government, and a global ethics arises from the decisions of individuals. This book will foster a better understanding of contemporary political thought among theologians and will introduce readers primarily interested in political thought to relevant developments in recent theology. (shrink)

The Political Crisis and Christian Ethics addresses themes in political philosophy in the context of a crisis in democracy after the denial of the 2020 election by the Republican candidate for president. The refusal to accept the results of the election divided the electorate and drove the president's followers to fail in their attempted coup attempt in January of 2020. Democracy is defended in Reinhold Niebuhr's writing on politics and in Barack Obama's use of the theologian's (...) thought. It is developed further in the political theory of Paul Tillich. The themes of just peacemaking are reviewed in Paul Tillich's critique of John Foster Dulles' work and in the author's critique of just peacemaking in the work of Glen Stassen. Domestically the issues of race, inequality, ecology, and healthcare are addressed from the perspective of prophetic realism. The book concludes in terms of Alfred North Whitehead's philosophy of education and religion and a vision of the good president. In summary, The Political Crisis and Christian Ethics is a volume of American, Christian political theory in a period of overcoming the trauma of 2016 with Christian ethics and political philosophy. (shrink)

‘Researcher identity’ affects global health research in profound and complex ways. Anthropologists in particular have led the way in portraying the multiple, and sometimes tension-generating, identities that researchers ascribe to themselves, or have ascribed to them, in their places of research. However, the central importance of researcher identity in the ethical conduct of global health research has yet to be fully appreciated. The capacity of researchers to respond effectively to the ethical tensions surrounding their identities is hampered by lack of (...) conceptual clarity, as to the nature and scope of the issues involved. This paper strives to provide some clarification of these ethical tensions by considering researcher identity from the perspective of (1) Guillemin and Heggen's (2009) key distinction between procedural ethics and ethics in practice, and (2) our own distinction between perceptions of identity that are either symmetrical or asymmetrical, with the potential to shift research relationships toward greater or lesser ethical harmony. Discussion of these concepts is supported with ethnographic examples from relevant literature and from our own (United States (US) Government-funded) research in South Africa. A preliminary set of recommendations is provided in an effort to equip researchers with a greater sense of organization and control over the ethics of researcher identity. The paper concludes that the complex construction of researcher identity needs to be central among the ethical concerns of global health researchers, and that the conceptual tools discussed in the paper are a useful starting point for better organizing and acting on these ethical concerns. (shrink)

The Sermon on the Mount is not abstract idealism. It connects to our political contest not least because it insists on the big questions of purpose and ends and how society should be ordered. Rooted in the Old Testament focus on the fair distribution of wealth (ensuring the poor get priority) — cf. Proverbs 2, 8, 9, 14, 15, 29 — the Sermon is a programme for social citizenship and local community development.

The classic programme of conceptual engineering (Cappelen, Herman. 2018. Fixing Language: An Essay on Conceptual Engineering. Oxford: Oxford University Press; Eklund, Matti. 2021. “Conceptual Engineering.” In The Routledge Handbook of Social and Political Philosophy of Language, edited by Justin Khoo, and Rachel Sterken, 15–30. London: Routledge) envisages a two-stage ameliorating process. First, we assess ‘F’ and determine what the term should express. Second, we bring it about that ‘F’ expresses what it should express. The second stage gives rise (...) to a practical challenge: the implementation challenge. Engineering advocates need to explain by what means they can implement specific conceptual changes in the natural language shared by a community – a feat Herman Cappelen (2018. Fixing Language: An Essay on Conceptual Engineering. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2020; “Conceptual Engineering: The Master Argument.” In Conceptual Engineering and Conceptual Ethics, edited by Alexis Burgess, Herman Cappelen, and David Plunkett, 132–151. Oxford: Oxford University Press) argues to be beyond our understanding and control both on an externalist and on an internalist meta-semantics. I devise a new answer to the implementation challenge. Enlisting the influential theory of social norms by Cristina Bicchieri, I argue that engineering social norms in Bicchieri’s technical sense amounts to an effective, specific, and feasible means to implement specific conceptual change, at least on internalist premises. I also argue that Bicchieri’s social norms are an essential addition to the more familiar conventions and moral norms when it comes to conceptual engineering. (shrink)

This volume offers clear and forceful contemporary translations of the most important of Seneca's 'Moral Essays': On Anger, On Mercy, On the Private Life and the first four books of On Favours. They give an attractive, full picture of the social and moral outlook of an ancient Stoic thinker intimately involved in the governance of the Roman empire in the mid first century of the Christian era. A general introduction describes Seneca's life and career and explains the fundamental (...) ideas underlying the Stoic moral, social and political philosophy that informs the essays. Individual introductions, footnotes and biographical notes place the essays in their historical and philosophical contexts, and further assistance to students is provided by section headings in the translations which organize the principal transitions in the argument and the more unfamiliar aspects of Seneca's writing. (shrink)

This book explores the relation between agape (or Christian charity) and social justice. Timothy Jackson defines agape as the central virtue in Christian ethical thought and action and applies his insights to three concrete issues: political violence, forgiveness, and abortion. Taking his primary cue from the New Testament while drawing extensively from contemporary theology and philosophy, Jackson identifies three features of Christian charity: unconditional commitment to the good of others, equal regard for others' well-being, and (...) passionate service open to self-sacrifice for the sake of others. Charity, prescribed by Jesus for his disciples and named by Saint Paul as the "greatest" theological virtue, is contrasted with various accounts of justice. Jackson argues that agape is not trumped by justice or other goods. Rather, agape precedes justice: without the work of love, society would not produce persons capable of merit, demerit, and contract, the elements of most modern conceptions of justice. Jackson then considers the implications of his ideas for several questions: the nature of God, the relation between Christian love and political violence, the place of forgiveness, and the morality of abortion. Arguing that agapic love is to be construed as a gift of grace as well as a divine commandment, Jackson concludes that love is the "eternal life" that makes temporal existence possible and thus the "first" Christian virtue. Though foremost a contribution to Christian ethics, Jackson's arguments and the issues he takes up will find a broader readership. (shrink)

This essay questions the place of other-than-human animals in Levinas’s thought. After detailing how animals and animality figure in Levinas’s work, it is claimed that his ethical exclusion of animals is due to a conception of animals as wholly accountable for in terms of species-being, wholly within “naturalhistory.” It is then suggested that Levinas’s position is ill-founded, and at odds with his claims about the importance of suffering and the vulnerable body in the encounter with the other. The essay concludes (...) by arguing that speaking of other-than-human animal “faces” is not necessarily an unduly anthropocentricextension of thinking-of-the-other. (shrink)

Contemporary ‘realists’ attack the Kantian influence on political philosophy. A main charge is that Kantians fail to understand the specificity of politics and neglect to develop a ‘distinctively political thought’ that differs from moral philosophy. Instead, the critics say, Kantians are guilty of an ‘ethics-first approach to politics,’ in which political theory is a mere application of moral principles. But what does this ethics-first approach have to do with Kant himself? Very little. This article shows (...) how Kant’s approach to political theory at a fundamental level includes political institutions, power, and coercion as well as disagreement, security, and coordination problems. In contrast to realists, Kant has a fundamental principle, which can explain why and guide how we ought to approach the political question, namely the norm of equal freedom. Yet, Kant’s theory does not take the form of a moralistic ought addressed to the isolated individual, but concerns a problem that we share as interdependent beings and that requires common institutions. The fruitfulness of the Kantian approach, then, is that it can take the political question seriously without being uncritical of actual politics and power, and that it can be normative without being moralistic. (shrink)

A daring marriage of philosophical theory and practical politics, this collection is the first of Gianni Vattimo's many books to combine his intellectual pursuits with his public and political life. Vattimo is a paradoxical figure, at once a believing Christian and a vociferous critic of the Catholic Church, an outspoken liberal but not a former communist, and a recognized authority on Nietzsche and Heidegger as well as a prominent public intellectual and member of the European parliament. Building on (...) his unique position as a philosopher and politician, Vattimo takes on some of the most pressing questions of our time: Is it still possible, long after Nietzsche proclaimed the death of God, to talk of moral imperatives, individual rights, or political freedom? Are these values still relevant in today's world? Tackling these crucial issues, Gianni Vattimo argues that nihilism is not the absence of meaning but a recognition of a plurality of meanings; it is not the end of civilization but the beginning of new social paradigms. Commonly associated with the pessimistic belief that all of existence is meaningless, nihilism, as a philosophical principle, is far less sensational -- it is the ethical doctrine that there are no moral absolutes or infallible natural laws, that "truth" is inescapably subjective. Because the conditions for equality and liberty are not "naturally" given, society must actively create these ideals or it will inevitably fall prey to irrationality, prejudice, and oppression. Vattimo contends that the infighting, timidity, and confusion that have overtaken contemporary liberal thought and politics are the products a prolonged and indulgent mourning over the loss of the transcendental father figure -- any institution or power structure that defines truth, knowledge, and reality. Until humanity overcomes its need for external authority -- whether it be organized religion, the nation-state, or free-market capitalism -- emancipation will remain unattainable. Collecting fourteen of Vattimo's most influential essays on ethics, politics, and law, _Nihilism and Emancipation_ is a provocative reevaluation of meaning, values, and the idea of freedom in Western culture. (shrink)

The phrase ‘critique of power’ refers to that analytical program within social philosophy that concerns the discord between the individual and the social orders. From the perspective of many critical theorists, Hannah Arendt’s conception of power, however, is considered unsuitable for such a critical enterprise. In contrast to this assumption, the article argues for reading Hannah Arendt’s concept of power in the light of a critical theory of the political. The critical potential of her thoughts is embedded (...) in her concept of power, which provides an as yet disregarded but highly relevant approach for the analysis of contemporary political orders. Despite the great number of writings concerned with Arendt’s concept of power, this critical potential has not yet been unfolded. This is primarily due to a constricted reading of her concept of power where it is seen as per se normatively positive and non-repressive. In order to overcome this misleading interpretation, the article reconstructs Arendt’s concept of power and argues that her political thinking should be literally read as a critique of power. To illustrate this critical potential, the article unfolds 5 dimensions of Arendt’s analysis of power: the political-parcipitative; the socio-economic; the political-institutional; the ideological-critical; and the ethical. (shrink)

Despite his significance in early modern Germany, where he was well-known as a political and moral philosopher, jurist, lay-theologian, social and educational reformer, Christian Thomasius (1655-1728) is little known in the world of Anglophone scholarship. 1 Unlike those of his mentor, Samuel Pufendorf, none of Thomasius's works was translated into English, when, at the end of the seventeenth century, English thinkers were searching for a final settlement to the religious question. None has been translated since. Moreover, while (...) Thomasius has been subject to increasing scholarly attention in Germany since the 1970s, where he has been treated largely as a representative of the "early Enlightenment," there is very little secondary literature on him in English. 2 Things are however beginning to change in this regard, with recent research already giving rise to important new Anglophone books and essays. 3 Knud Haakonssen's article on [End Page 595] Thomasius for the new Routledge Encyclopedia of Philosophy might well be a straw in the wind. (shrink)

Corporations significantly influence the public and political spheres. In light of this corporate power in society, academics have criticized the lack of legitimization (i.e., the legitimacy gap) and highlighted a potential divergence between corporate resource allocation and the needs and preferences of the public (i.e., the social issues gap). To address these problems, democratizing organizations has been proposed as a potential solution. In line with this, the authors argue that an increase in corporate power outside the economic realm (...) should be counterbalanced by more democratic corporate governance (i.e., an internalization of democracy). While important groundwork exists, academic attention to these topics remains limited. The authors provide an overview of the literature linking corporate power and the claim for democratizing organizations, advocate for legitimization, identify research gaps, and develop a research agenda to inspire and guide future research efforts. The paper's findings suggest the importance of conceptual and empirical research on the micro-, meso-, and macro-levels and the cross-level effects, which is needed to advance this incipient research area. Future research must (1) clearly define corporate power and discuss how democratizing organizations can contribute to more legitimate organizational decisions, (2) unveil novel approaches for more democratic corporate governance, and (3) understand the organizational- and individual-level factors necessary for the successful realization of democratic organizations. (shrink)

Today's social and political climate often pits conservative or traditional Christianity against "progressive" Christianity. But what is progressive Christianity? What is a progressive Christian? What is a progressive church? Christianity in Blue answers these questions by drawing from biblical scholarship, Christian history, theology, popular culture, philosophy, and cultural anthropology. Kaden shows how socially liberal values and progressive attitudes can be the fruits of taking seriously both the Bible and Christian tradition. But rather than treating these (...) sources as static authorities and the final word on every subject, Kaden argues that they are places to start one's exploration of how to be a Christian in the world. Being a progressive Christian is an ethical exhortation to "uplift human personality," as Martin Luther King Jr. once said. This exhortation structures how progressive Christians receive, interpret, and apply the Bible and Christian tradition to daily life. A robust tradition provides an anchor to avoid the illiberal trends in contemporary society, and a commitment to uplifting human personality provides a check against dehumanizing uses of Scripture and tradition. Christianity in Blue will help both progressive and conservative Christians better understand the importance of the Bible, theology, history, and philosophy for building a loving church for everyone. (shrink)

Several discourses about theology, church, and politics are occurring among Christian theologians in the United States. One influential strand centers on the communitarian theology of Stanley Hauerwas, who calls on Christians to witness faithfully against liberalism in general and war in particular. Jeffrey Stout, in his widely discussed "Democracy and Tradition" (2004), responds that religious people ought precisely to endorse those democratic and liberal American traditions that join religious and secular counterparts to battle injustice. Hauerwas, Stout, and many of (...) their interlocutors envision liberal U.S. culture as the context of Christian social ethics. The ensuing debate rarely incorporates Catholic scholars, feminist scholars, scholars of color, or international and liberationist voices. Their inclusion could enhance an understanding of the role of the church in society, and support a common morality in the face of global pluralism. More importantly, it could broaden the scope of discourse on religion and politics to envision global Christian social ethics. (shrink)

The Global Financial Crisis is acknowledged to be the most severe economic downturn since the 1930s, and one that is unique in its underlying causes, its scope, and its wider social, political and economic implications. This volume explores some of the ethical issues that it has raised.

A truly Christian bioethics challenges the nature, substance, and application of secular morality, dividing Christians from non-Christians, accenting central moral differences, and providing content-full forthrightly Christian guidance for action. Consequently, Christian bioethics must be framed within the metaphysical and theological commitments of Traditional Christianity so as to provide proper orientation toward God. In contrast, secular bioethicists routinely present themselves as providing a universal bioethics acceptable to all reasonable and rational persons. Yet, such secular bioethicists habitually insert their (...) own biases and prejudices into their moral conclusions, ethical consultations, and political aspirations, without any real justification. As this article explores, the ideologically driven anti-Christian commitments, including commitments to human rights and social justice, embodied within contemporary bioethics routinely illustrate the increasing gap between the traditionally Christian and the devoutly secular, further deepening the culture wars. (shrink)

Several discourses about theology, church, and politics are occurring among Christian theologians in the United States. One influential strand centers on the communitarian theology of Stanley Hauerwas, who calls on Christians to witness faithfully against liberalism in general and war in particular. Jeffrey Stout, in his widely discussed Democracy and Tradition (2004), responds that religious people ought precisely to endorse those democratic and liberal American traditions that join religious and secular counterparts to battle injustice. Hauerwas, Stout, and many of (...) their interlocutors envision liberal U.S. culture as the context of Christian social ethics. The ensuing debate rarely incorporates Catholic scholars, feminist scholars, scholars of color, or international and liberationist voices. Their inclusion could enhance an understanding of the role of the church in society, and support a common morality in the face of global pluralism. More importantly, it could broaden the scope of discourse on religion and politics to envision global Christian social ethics. (shrink)

In his landmark monograph, "The Politics of Jesus", John Howard Yoder challenged mainstream Christian social ethics by arguing that the New Testament account of Jesus's founding of a messianic community entails a normative politics, not only for early Christianity but for the contemporary church. This challenge is further elaborated in several important posthumous publications, especially "Preface to Theology", in which Yoder examines the development of early Christology with attention to its political and ethical implications, and "The (...) Jewish-Christian Schism Revisited", Yoder's proposal for a renewed Jewish-Christian dialogue around the moral meaning of messianism. This article interprets these writings with reference to a range of critical scholarship on and about Yoder, Yoder and Augustine, and Jewish and Christian messianism, paying particular attention to questions of political ethics. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Reviewed by:A Report from the Front Lines: Conversations on Public Theology. A Festschrift in Honor of Robert Benne, and: Explorations in Christian Theology and Ethics: Essays in Conversation with Paul L. LehmannJeffrey P. GreenmanA Report from the Front Lines: Conversations on Public Theology. A Festschrift in Honor of Robert Benne Edited by Michael Shahan Grand Rapids, Mich.: Eerdmans, 2009. 184 pp. $30.00.Explorations in Christian Theology and (...) Ethics: Essays in Conversation with Paul L. Lehmann Edited by Philip G. Ziegler and Michelle J. Bartel Farnham, Surrey, UK: Ashgate, 2009. 206 pp. $99.95.The volumes reviewed here each recognize an important thinker in Christian social ethics in America: Robert Benne, emeritus professor of religion at Roanoke College, a Lutheran social ethicist; and Paul L. Lehmann (1906–94), a Presbyterian who was an influential teacher associated with Princeton Theological Seminary, Harvard University Divinity School, and Union Theological Seminary in New York.The first volume honors Benne’s seventieth birthday. His major writings include The Ethic of Democratic Capitalism: A Moral Reassessment (1981), Ordinary Saints: An Introduction to the Christian Life (1988), The Paradoxical Vision: A Public Theology for the Twenty-First Century (1995), Quality with Soul: How Six Premier Colleges and Universities Keep Faith with Their Religious Traditions (2001), and most recently, Good and Bad Ways to Think about Religion and Politics (2010). Since Benne is known for his traditionalist moral views, some unmistakably conservative voices, including a number of prominent Lutherans and neoconservative political thinkers, are represented in this book. The broad theme is public theology, working from Benne’s definition of public theology as “the engagement of a living religious tradition with its public environment—the economic, political, and cultural spheres of our common life.”The book has three parts. The first section, “The Imperative of a Public Theology,” includes essays by editor Michael Shahan, Carl Braaten, Jean Bethke Elshtain, and Richard John Neuhaus. Shahan’s essay provides a helpful exposition of Benne’s intellectual trajectory. Braaten offers a defense of the historic, bodily resurrection of Jesus as the “crux of Christianity’s case.” Elshtain takes [End Page 206] up C. S. Lewis’s concerns in his Abolition of Man (1944) as she diagnoses the “cultural disorder” reflected in current debates about euthanasia and abortion. Neuhaus’s wistful essay looks back over his efforts in the public square, stating that he and Benne have shared a common concern: “A renewal of Christian confidence in providing a morally informed philosophy for a more just and virtuous society in the tradition of liberal democracy” (47). Taken together, these four chapters sketch the assumed intellectual and cultural landscape that sets the context for the volume as a whole.The second section, “The Lutheran Necessity in Public Theology,” begins with a largely autobiographical essay by James Nuechterlein about his journey in Lutheranism and the value of its theological distinctives, especially the famous simul. Next is Gilbert Meilaender’s account (exploring an insight from Kierkegaard) of the place for a Lutheran “corrective” within the wider normative tradition, then Mark Noll’s chapter that underscores the value of robust Lutheran social thinking against the backdrop of the more revivalist and pietist tendencies of Protestant evangelicalism.The final section, “Contested Issues in Public Theology,” includes chapters by Paul Hinlicky, Ronald Thiemann, Gerald McDermott, Donald Schmeltekopf and Michael Beaty, and Joseph Swanson. The chapters by Hinlicky on Luther’s relation to liberal political theory, and by Thiemann on the idea of the public theologian’s prophetic role as “connected critic,” are the most densely argued material in the book. These two essays will probably be of the most interest for scholars in theological ethics. The chapter by McDermott deals with Lutheran church-related colleges. A coauthored essay by Schmeltekopf and Beaty champions the vocation of Christian university education. Swanson situates Benne’s economic writings within neo-conservative thought.The book takes up some of Benne’s favorite themes and interest areas, but only rarely do the authors engage Benne’s own thought. Virtually nowhere do they prod Benne to become clearer, to strengthen his arguments, or to modify his conclusions. I would have preferred a deeper engagement with Benne’s ideas; in several... (shrink)

Collaborative consumption activities like saving food and buying used clothes are an important and rapidly growing part of sustainable consumer behavior. Many political and commercial campaigns promote collaborative consumption practices by highlighting subsets of normative motives, such as sustainable, social, and ecological effects. Whether or not consumers can comprehend these claims and incorporate them into their decision-making process is, however, unclear. This article introduces a new experimental study design to ethical consumer research—an adapted version of the Defining Issues (...) Test—that enables to assess consumers’ ability to cognitively and intuitively understand moral arguments in collaborative consumption contexts. The experiment was conducted with N = 435 collaborative consumers from Germany. The findings indicate that in different collaborative consumption contexts, consumers consider different moral arguments as important. Furthermore, the findings also indicate that consumers can incorporate the provider’s point of view in their moral judgment. (shrink)

“De-extinction” projects propose to re-create or “resurrect” extinct species. Perhaps the most common justification offered for these projects is that humans have an obligation to make restitution to species we have eradicated. There are three versions of this argument for de-extinction—one individualistic, one concerned with species, and one that emphasizes ecological restoration—and all three fail to provide a compelling case for species revival. A general critique of de-extinction can be sketched that highlights how it can both facilitate inattentiveness to biological (...) and ecological boundaries and foster a managerial mentality toward the natural world. (shrink)

There is growing interest in contact tracing apps for pandemic management. It is crucial to consider ethical requirements before, while, and after implementing such apps. In this paper, we illustrate the complexity and multiplicity of the ethical considerations by presenting an ethical framework for a responsible design and implementation of CT apps. Using this framework as a starting point, we briefly highlight the interconnection of social and political contexts, available measures of pandemic management, and a multi-layer assessment of (...) CT apps. We will discuss some trade-offs that arise from this perspective. We then suggest that public trust is of major importance for population uptake of contact tracing apps. Hasty, ill-prepared or badly communicated implementations of CT apps will likely undermine public trust, and as such, risk impeding general effectiveness. (shrink)

Adrian-Paul Iliescu, Etică socială și politică [Social and Political Ethics], (București: Ed. Ars Docendi, 2007), 325 p.

This study argues for the historical existence of Jesus of Nazareth as a radical Jewish pacifist who angered both the orthodox religious establishment and those who advocated violent insurrection against the Romans. The author asserts that Jesus' views were based on belief in a non-retributive, omnibenevolent God, challenging not only the Mosaic Law but assumptions about eternal punishment and the divine sanction of the state and its retributive institutions of war and punishment. The volume also interprets Paul as being the (...) first Christian revisionist. As a result, orthodox Christianity, through the influence of Paul (and thus Augustine, Aquinas, Luther, and Calvin), has mistakenly promoted the "just war" and "divinely ordained state" doctrines in the name of a thinker whose conclusions were in the opposite direction. (shrink)