Analysts of political culture within the "civil religion" tradition have generally assumed that discourse in civil society is structured by a single set of enduring codes based on liberal traditions that actors draw upon to resolve crises. Based on two case studies of national crises and debate in Brazil during its transition to democracy, I challenge this assumption by demonstrating that not only do actors draw upon two distinct but interrelated codes, they actively seek to impose one or another as (...) dominant. In Brazil this is manifest in actors who defend elements from the code of liberty and its valuation of the freestanding citizen, and those who defend the corporate code and its valuation of the collectivity over the individual. In an earlier debate on crime the corporate code was dominant, but in a later debate surrounding presidential improprieties, the liberal code became dominant. This analysis makes two contributions to the literature: it highlights the importance of nonindividualist cultural codes, such as the corporate code, in animating discourse in the public sphere in democratizing societies, raising attention to the importance of the symbolic contestation between actors seeking to establish one or another code during political transitions. Second, it offers a subtle commentary on the literature on democratization: changes in collective representations in the public sphere may not proceed apace of institutional changes and may be contingent on the kinds of crisis events and actors willing to contest previously dominant codes. (shrink)

In this essay we explore Rancière’s ‘politics of equals’ as an alternative conception of the political. Central to this conception is a division between instances of political contestation that address fundamental questions of equality (‘the politics of equals’) and those that are part of the management of the division of resources and positions in society (‘the police’). This distinction provides a new way of thinking about theoretical and empirical questions over logics of political action.

Despite recent interest in political ethnography, most of the reflection has been on the ethnographic aspect of the enterprise with much less emphasis on the question implicit in the first word of the couplet: What is actually political about political ethnography and how much should ethnographers pre-define it? The question is complicated because a central component of the definition of what is political is actually the struggle to define its jurisdiction and how it gets distinguished from what it is not. (...) In this article we aim to show how ethnography can actually lead us out of this conundrum in which the political is paradoxically both predefined and, at the same time, the open question that leads the process of inquiry. We do so by advancing a formal and relational approach that provides us with procedural tools to define the nature and specificity of the political bond not ex ante, but rather during the process of research itself. In the first part of the article we historicize the development of political ethnography as a distinct avenue for inquiry and show what have been the challenges to its normalization. This is followed by the article’s main section, which focuses on the four ways in which what is political has been conceptualized in contemporary socio-ethnographical literature. In the conclusion of the article, we advance a lowest common denominator definition proposal, with examples from other scholars as well as from our own research to illustrate how this approach would work. (shrink)

Adorno’s negative dialectics wants to free the thought from the dictates of the system, taking position against the illusion to grasp the essence of reality by logic. Against that false idea of totality, Adorno devises a philosophy of fragment, a logic of disgregation that presupposes a different concept of totality: a fragmented, scattered and conflicting wholeness. The anti systematic thinking of Adorno is configured, however, as a systematic rejection of any systematic formulation: philosophy can at most claiming a pretension to (...) truth by the practice of interpretation. A dialectic configuration of fragments of totality is at stake here: so, the arrangement of such fragments can both produce an image of reality endowed with meaning and also unfold through heterogeneous combinations that are not definitive, but always renewable from time to time. In Adorno’s reflection are so expressed two different instances which are complementary at the same time: on the one hand it represents the critical and negative element against the system and its hybris, on the other hand it expresses the need of the thought to go beyond and overcome that fragmentation, showing how the need of unity of the system is a need of the thought in itself. (shrink)

The essay aims to discuss a global skepticism about epistemic justification called Agrippa's Trilemma. Based on its exposition, the article will deal with the infinitist alternative of justification, traditional foundationalism and the hypothesis of the infallibility of introspection. It concludes that introspection beliefs are not verifiable propositional attitudes, representing an advantage to the infinitist theory. Keywords: Skepticism; Infinitism; Agrippa’s Trilemma; Epistemic Justification.

In the 1950s, long before his ascent to international renown, Michel Foucault published a scant few works. His early writings on psychology, psychopathology, and anthropology have been dismissed as immature. However, recently discovered manuscripts from the mid-1950s, when Foucault was a lecturer at the University of Lille, testify to the significance of the work that the philosopher produced in the years leading up to the “archaeological” project he launched with History of Madness. Elisabetta Basso offers a groundbreaking and in-depth (...) analysis of Foucault’s Lille manuscripts that sheds new light on the origins of his philosophical project. She considers the epistemological style and methodology of these writings as well as their philosophical context and the scholarly networks in which Foucault was active, foregrounding his relationship to existential psychiatry. Young Foucault blurs the boundaries between biography and theory, exploring the transformations—and, at times, contradictions—that characterize the intellectual trajectory of a philosopher who, as Foucault himself put it, “turned to psychology, and from psychology to history.” Retracing the first steps of the philosopher’s intellectual journey, Basso shows how Foucault’s early writings provide key insights into his archaeological work of the 1960s. Assembling a vast array of archival sources—including manuscripts, reading notes, notes for lectures and conferences, and correspondence—this book develops a new and deeper understanding of Foucault’s body of work. (shrink)

This paper distinguishes between two arguments based on measurement robustness and defends the epistemic value of robustness for the assessment of measurement reliability. I argue that the appeal to measurement robustness in the assessment of measurement is based on a different inferential pattern and is not exposed to the same objections as the no-coincidence argument which is commonly associated with the use of robustness to corroborate individual results. This investigation sheds light on the precise meaning of reliability that emerges from (...) measurement assessment practice. In addition, by arguing that the measurement assessment robustness argument has similar characteristics across the physical, social and behavioural sciences, I defend the idea that there is continuity in the notion of measurement reliability across sciences. (shrink)

Participatory Budgeting has by now been widely discussed, often celebrated, and is now instituted in at least 1,500 cities worldwide. Some of its central features—its structure of open meetings, its yearly cycle, and its combination of deliberation and representation—are by now well known. In this article, however, we critically reflect on its global travel and argue for more careful consideration of some of its less well-known features, namely the coupling of the budgeting meetings with the exercise of power. We disaggregate (...) PB into its communicative and empowerment dimensions and argue that its empowerment dimensions have usually not been part of its global expansion—and this is cause for concern from the point of view of emancipation. We thus discuss the specific institutional reforms associated with empowerment in the original version as well as its analytic dimensions. We also address some of the specific dangers of a communication-only version of PB as well as some suggestions for reintroducing empowerment. (shrink)

In this paper I focus on the emergence of the concept of the “historical a priori” at the origin of Foucault’s archeology. I emphasize the methodological function of this concept within Foucault’s archaeology, and I maintain that despite the different thesis it entails as compared to its philosophical sources, it pertains to one of the main issues of phenomenology, that is, the problematization of the relation between reality as it appears in its historicity, and transcendentality. I start from the interest (...) of the young Foucault in existential psychiatry, and I focus on the French philosophical context in which Foucault’s Introduction to Ludwig Binswanger’s “Dream and Existence” (1954) was conceived. My aim is to show that the first “phenomenological” phase of Foucault’s work is coherent, from a methodological point of view, with the development of archaeology intended as “historical epistemology.” I conclude by arguing that Foucault’s archaeology is methodologically linked to Canguilhem’s epistemology, in that the latter presents itself as an important attempt at linking together historicity and transcendentality. (shrink)

This paper is based on the archives of Michel Foucault collected (since 2013) at the manuscripts department of the Bibliothèque nationale de France, Paris. Our investigation focuses in particular on the documents of the 1950s, in order to study the role of the reflection on anthropology and phenomenology at the beginning of Foucault’s philosophical path. This archival material allows us to discover the tremendous work that is at the basis of the relatively few works that Foucault published in the 1950s. (...) The access to the 1950s documents enables us at last to investigate the reasons for the seemingly sharp break that divides these works from the works published by Foucault in the 1960s and the 1970s, in which emerges the archaeological refusal of phenomenology and anthropology, as well as the strong criticism against any form of psychopathological discourse. (shrink)

The article advances a new way of thinking about classifications in general and the classification of mental disorders in particular. By applying insights from measurement practice to the context of classification, I defend a notion of epistemic accuracy that allows one to evaluate and improve classifications by comparing different classifying methods to each other. Progress in classification arises from the mutual development of classification systems and classifying methods. Based on this notion of accuracy, the article illustrates with an example how (...) psychiatric classifications can be improved via circumscribed comparisons of different perspectives on mental disorders, without relying on complete models of their complex aetiology. When applying this strategy, the traditional opposition between symptom-based and causal approaches is of little consequence for making progress in the epistemic accuracy of psychiatric classification. (shrink)

This paper focuses on one of the original moments of the development of the “phenomenological” current of psychiatry, namely, the psychopathological research of Ludwig Binswanger. By means of the clinical and conceptual problem of schizophrenia as it was conceived and developed at the beginning of the twentieth century, I will try to outline and analyze Binswanger’s perspective from a both historical and epistemological point of view. Binswanger’s own way means of approaching and conceiving schizophrenia within the scientific, medical, and psychiatric (...) context of that time will lead us to grasp the epistemological stakes at the origins of his project of reforming psychiatry by means of phenomenology. I will finally attempt to upgrade and update Binswanger’s project in light of the current reappraisal of phenomenology within the ongoing debate on psychopathology engaged by studies in the field of science and philosophy of mind. (shrink)

Les articles réunis dans ce dossier proviennent pour l’essentiel de la journée d’étude organisée par Elisabetta Basso et Laurent Dartigues le 6 juin 2017 à l’ENS de Lyon, avec le soutien de l’Institut d’études avancées (Collegium) de Lyon, de l’UMR Triangle et de l’ENS de Lyon. Seul fait exception le texte d’Ugo Balzaretti, que nous avons eu plaisir à accueillir dans ce dossier. Cette journée d’étude s’inscrivait dans le contexte du projet de recherche intitulé « Rethinking anthropology in li...

Gilles Deleuze's assertion that 'Sartre knew how to invent the New' suggests a vital aspect of the French philosopher, one that departs from the image that has often been presented of him. Criticism of the Soviet Union post 1956, together with the increasing prominence of anti-colonial struggles and a series of experiences that would find their condensation in 1968, pushed Sartre to a continuous rearticulation of his political ideas, on the basis of an intense confrontation with Marx. In Basso's (...) lucid study, here newly translated into English, the expression 'singular universal' seeks to capture the revolutionary potential of individual and collective subjects, illuminating the close but also unstable relationship between history and politics. (shrink)

The paper reviews the philosophical literature on the epistemology of modelling in contemporary economics. In particular, it focuses on open questions concerning the epistemic role of models, the validity of inferences from the models to the world, and the legitimacy of their use for purposes of explanation, prediction and intervention.

Journal Name: Semiotica Issue: Ahead of print.

En su sitio de Facebook, llamado “Fantasmas del Cordobazo”, Sebastián Cánepa, actualiza, por medio de la superposición de imágenes pasadas y presentes, la insurrección popular en las calles cordobesas. Aflora un tiempo superpuesto, condensado que se vuelve nítido con el contraste entre el color y las formas de las fotos actuales y el blanco y negro del año 69.

En el presente trabajo, se analizan factores asociados con las migraciones internas de Argentina. Se presenta una discusión teórica de las distintas perspectivas migratorias distinguiendo entre enfoques de carácter individual-económico y aquellos estructurales-sociales. Utilizando la matriz de migraciones para las 24 jurisdicciones, obtenida con Redatam correspondiente a datos censales de 2010, se calcularon indicadores de migraciones (tasas de migración neta y bruta e índice de eficacia migratoria, entre otros). También se desarrolló un script para realizar novedosos diagramas circulares que resumen (...) visualmente los flujos migratorios constituyendo un vistoso y útil instrumento para tener un panorama más completo y rápido que la tradicional matriz. Se identificaron los principales flujos migratorios entre provincias. Las tasas netas de migración fueron positivas en la Patagonia y negativas en el norte argentino y notablemente en Ciudad Autónoma de Buenos Aires (CABA). En la región pampeana, los flujos son elevados y las tasas migratorias son bajas. Posteriormente se efectuó un análisis más detallado utilizando la Encuesta Anual de Hogares Urbanos del mismo año, la cual posee datos a nivel individual y variables adicionales para realizar un análisis más profundo. Se identificaron factores de atracción y expulsión; entre las principales conclusiones, el ingreso es un factor importante de atracción de migrantes, como indica la teoría neoclásica, pero también se consideraron factores sociodemográficos como educación. En general, las migraciones están asociadas con ingresos más altos, aunque con tasas de desocupación mayores, lo cual puede deberse a dificultades para conseguir empleo en el nuevo destino. (shrink)

O comportamento de apego se expressa em adultos quando estes se encontram em situações que envolvam medo, mudança ou conflito, como em casos de perda. O objetivo do presente estudo foi investigar os comportamentos de apego adulto frente à perda repentina de um ente querido. Participaram cinco adulto..

In this dissertation we explore projective Fraïssé theory and its applications, as well as limitations, to the study of compact metrizable spaces. The goal of projective Fraïssé theory is to approximate spaces via classes of finite structures and glean topological or dynamical properties of a space by relating them to combinatorial features of the associated class of structures. Using the framework of compact metrixable structures, we establish general results which expand and help contextualize previous works in the field. Many proofs (...) in the domain of projective Fraïssé theory are carried out in a context dependent fashion and have thus far eluded clean generalizations. A reason is to be found in the lack of a clear understanding of which spaces are amenable to be studied via projective Fraïssé limits. We give both positive and negative results in this direction. We isolate a combinatorial condition which entails a correspondence between finite structures and regular quasi-partitions of compact metrizable spaces. This correspondence greatly aids the combinatorial-toplogical translation. We apply this machinery to study a class of one-dimensional compact metrizable spaces, which we call smooth fences. To this end, we isolate a class of finite structures—finite partial orders whose Hasse diagram is a forest—whose projective Fraïssé limit approximates a distinctive smooth fence with remarkable properties. We call it the Fraïssé fence and characterize it topologically by carefully exploiting the bridge between the combinatorial and topological worlds. We explore homogeneity and universality features of the Fraïssé fence and the properties of its spaces and endpoints, and provide some results on the dynamics of its group of homeomorphisms. The dissertation is partially based on [1, 2]. (shrink)

Dance has traditionally been viewed from a Eurocentric perspective as a mode of self-expression that involves the human body moving through space, performed for the purposes of art, and viewed by an audience. In this Hypothesis and Theory article, we synthesize findings from anthropology, sociology, psychology, dance pedagogy, and neuroscience to propose The Synchronicity Hypothesis of Dance, which states that humans dance to enhance both intra- and inter-brain synchrony. We outline a neurocentric definition of dance, which suggests that dance involves (...) neurobehavioral processes in seven distinct areas including sensory, motor, cognitive, social, emotional, rhythmic, and creative. We explore The Synchronicity Hypothesis of Dance through several avenues. First, we examine evolutionary theories of dance, which suggest that dance drives interpersonal coordination. Second, we examine fundamental movement patterns, which emerge throughout development and are omnipresent across cultures of the world. Third, we examine how each of the seven neurobehaviors increases intra- and inter-brain synchrony. Fourth, we examine the neuroimaging literature on dance to identify the brain regions most involved in and affected by dance. The findings presented here support our hypothesis that we engage in dance for the purpose of intrinsic reward, which as a result of dance-induced increases in neural synchrony, leads to enhanced interpersonal coordination. This hypothesis suggests that dance may be helpful to repattern oscillatory activity, leading to clinical improvements in autism spectrum disorder and other disorders with oscillatory activity impairments. Finally, we offer suggestions for future directions and discuss the idea that our consciousness can be redefined not just as an individual process but as a shared experience that we can positively influence by dancing together. (shrink)

Dans la formulation de la question du concours de l’Académie de Berlin de 1763, le texte français utilise le mot « évidence » là où le texte allemand mentionne des deutliche Beweisen. Que manifeste cette différence ? Quelles en sont les conséquences ? Les termes « évidence », Deutlichkeit, « certitude » apparaissent de manières très différentes dans les réponses. La multiplication terminologique et conceptuelle correspond à une profonde ambiguïté épistémologique. Au sein des réponses rédigées en allemand, la notion de (...) Deutlichkeit n’est pas centrale, tandis que l’est celle de Gewißheit. Les réponses rédigées en français font, quant à elles, toutes référence à l’« évidence », mais ce terme apparaît peu défini et trop ample. Ainsi, c’est l’esprit plutôt que la lettre de la question qui a été en jeu. La plupart des réponses se rejoignent cependant sur une analyse de la « nécessité de croire » à l’œuvre à la fois dans l’évidence, la certitude et la Deutlichkeit et sur la force coercitive de la démonstration. (shrink)

In the French version of the question set by the Berlin Academy in 1763, the word évidence is used whereas the German document mentions deutliche Beweisen. What is this difference the sign of? What are its consequences? The terms évidence, Deutlichkeit, certitude occur in very different ways in the answers provided. The various terminological and conceptual meanings reflect a deep epistemological ambiguity. Among German-language answers, the notion of Deutlichkeit is not central unlike that of Gewißheit. French-language answers all refer to (...) évidence but this term is little defined and too broad. As a result, it was the spirit rather than the letter of the question that prevailed. However, most answers converge on the “need to believe” found both in évidence, certitude, Deutlichkeit and the constraining force of demonstration. (shrink)