The sociological literature on race operates under the progressive ideological assumption that systemic racism is the predominant cause of racial disparities. This assumption has become “paradigmatic,” shaping the selection of research questions and the interpretation of research results. Consequently, the literature offers a rather narrow “Overton window” concerning what we, as sociologists, know about: (1) the causes of racial disparities, (2) the accuracy and motivation behind the public’s views on race-related issues, and (3) race-related policy preferences. A paradigm shift is (...) needed to improve our understanding of racial disparities and devise more effective ways to address them. To achieve this end, sociologists should broaden their perspectives beyond attributing all racial disparities to systemic racism and consider additional hypotheses. From a policy perspective, to reduce racial disparities we should reconsider addressing social class and related factors early in life. (shrink)

Contrary to many contemporary readings of Plato and Aristotle, Hans-Georg Gadamer sees harmony in their thought. A challenge to this reading is that Aristotle criticizes Plato’s forms and the good. Aware of these criticisms, Gadamer understands these two thinkers as having significant commonalities and pursuing related goals. Gadamer’s interpretation is less a historical approach than an attempt to explain and justify aspects of his own philosophical views, in particular those regarding the relation between metaphysics and practical thought. We critically examine (...) Gadamer’s interpretation and consider tensions between its more radical conclusions and a more conventional Platonism. (shrink)

Iceland differs from the other Nordic countries in very significant ways, and broader comparative perspectives may be useful. Contrasts and parallels with other ‘new societies’ – overseas offshoots of European civilization – should be explored further. In the Icelandic case, the foundations of the ‘new society’ were laid during the High Middle Ages. The medieval heritage is crucial to Icelandic national identity, but it is not a sufficient explanation of later nation-forming processes. The nationalist turn in the early 19th (...) century began as a response to changes at the centre of the Danish composite monarchy but led to demands for separate statehood. In the course of the process that culminated in separation from Denmark, Icelandic intellectuals in Copenhagen and political leaders of the peasantry in Iceland represented different versions of nationalism. But the shared political culture that crystallized during this period continued to shape the course of events after independence. (shrink)

The author analyzes the successful strategy of overcoming financial breakdown in the case study of Iceland. The aim of the article is to verify a hypothesis that the Icelandic model could become a panacea for future crises? A document analysis method is applied to present essential indicators such as GDP and trade balance. With the use of a source analysis method, the collapse of the financial sector is determined as the main cause of the slump. The systematization of crisis (...) events is introduced and deepened by the social and political situation. Changes in the state’s condition after the crash are provided and future forecasts about economic development are discussed. As a summing up, the author disapproves of the hypothesis that the Icelandic model of overcoming the financial breakdown as a panacea for future crises, pointing out that it is only applicable for specific cases and cannot be seen as a magical remedy for every kind of crisis. (shrink)

In the fall of 2008, the three largest banks in Iceland collapsed, with severe and lasting consequences for the Icelandic economy. This article discusses the 'Icelandic banking crisis' in relation to the notion of corporate social responsibility (CSR). It explores some conceptual arguments for the position that the Icelandic banking crisis illustrates the broad problem of the indeterminacy of the scope and content of the duties that CSR is supposed to address. In particular, it is suggested that the way (...) the banks in question conceived of CSR, i.e. largely in terms of strategic philanthropy, was gravely inadequate. It concludes by proposing that the case of the Icelandic banking crisis gives us a reason to rethink CSR. (shrink)

Recent bioethics discussion and research in Iceland has been greatly affected by the fact that one of the world’s largest genetics research companies is based there and has been in the forefront of creating a population database resource for its research projects. Consequently, a large part of this article is centered around the bioethical discussion engendered by these projects, but other recent bioethical developments related to issues at the beginning and the end of life will also be discussed.

Glaciers in Iceland are disappearing, and this article investigates how such glacier change might be transmitted into Icelandic culture, specifically, in art oriented around Icelandic glaciers. Utilizing cultural climatology as an approach, this article analyzes changes in spatial properties of glaciers as represented in older and newer artworks. Three central spatial characteristics of glaciers emerge and provide insights into how glacier loss can be represented and understood: 1) the compression of traditional distance; 2) the use of multiple perspectives; and (...) 3) the structural representation of the glacier body. Analysis suggests a re-positioning of glaciers in the cultural imaginary and the fluctuating nature of how individuals and societies understand themselves and their place within the glaciated landscapes. (shrink)

The authors of this article contend that traditional corruption, which was largely blamed for the current situation in the Icelandic economy, was perhaps not the most fundamental reason for the ensuing crisis. The weak business culture and a symbiosis of business and politics have actually allowed for the bulk of self-erving and unethical decisions made by the Icelandic business and political elite. In order to illustrate this point, 10 expert interviews have been conducted within the period of 6 months in (...) 2009 to support in-depth research carried out by the authors. The article also discloses questionable business practices that have recently come to the attention of the public both in Iceland and abroad and that ultimately facilitated the downfall of the Icelandic economy. While traditional corruption has probably played its role in this downfall, the measures currently employed to determine its level did not account for various peculiarities of Icelandic society. The article thus argues that there was a high level of corruption in Iceland, but it was outside of the traditional definition. This other corruption has ultimately prevented the government from acting appropriately upon the questionable business practices mentioned above. The article also offers some general recommendations which should be useful to both policy makers and business leaders wishing to engage in business activities in a transparent, ethical manner and learn from the tragic Icelandic experience. Among these recommendations are the necessity to recognize the limitations of current definitions of corruption, as well as a word of caution to commercial enterprises to pay a close attention not only to commonly accepted indices and mainstream reports but also to a country's history, culture, and political environment, prior to making any sort of investment decisions in that country. (shrink)

What every medievalist knows about medieval Iceland is that it had no king, at least not until 1262 when it passed under the control of the Norwegian crown. In the rapidly growing discussion of early Iceland in the last forty years there has, however, been relatively little comment on what it may have meant for Iceland to have no king, specifically what it may have meant for the unique flowering of Icelandic letters beginning in the late twelfth (...) century and persisting in full vigor into the early fourteenth century. In what follows I will argue that the absence of a king and the increasingly palpable presence of the Norwegian king were significant factors in the shaping of Icelandic literature, not least of all that peculiar triumph of medieval narrative, the Icelandic saga. (shrink)

Machine generated contents note: W. G. COLLINGWOOD Letters from Iceland: introduced by Janet Gnosspelius -- GUIDO VANHEESWIJCK R. G. Collingwood, T. S. Elliot and the Romantic Tradition -- MARNIE HUGHES- History, Education and the Conversation of Mankind -- WARRINGTON --K. B. McINTYRE Collingwood, Oakeshott and the Social Contract -- LIONEL RUBINOFF The Relation Between Philosophy and History in the Thought of R G. Collingwood -- COLLINGWOOD CORNER -- BENEDETTO CROCE In Commemoration of an English Friend, a Companion in Thought (...) and Faith, R. G. Collingwood (translated -- by Lionel Rubinoff and Alan Franklin) -- BENEDETTO CROCE Review of R. G. Collingwood, Speculum Mentis (translated by Lionel Rubinoff and Alan Franklin) -- R. G. COLLINGWOOD Aesthethic and the Mind, introduced by -- James Connelly -- GRACE SIMPSON Collingwood's Philosophy of History: Observations of an Archaeologist -- REVIEWS -- Cameron Wybrow (ed.), Creation, Nature, and Political Order in the Philosophy of Michael Foster, reviewed by -- James Connelly. (shrink)

This paper argues how boards of directors of three Icelandic oil companies were kept in the dark while the companies were collaborating in illegal competitive behaviour. The paper offers a unique view into a situation where information or lack thereof has played a key part in corporate governance, exploring the relationship between management and the board of directors and how information filtering can go wrong to the extent that vital information does not reach the board. The paper is based on (...) a case study of the illegal collaboration of the oil companies. It furthermore surveys the literature on information flow and information asymmetry for explanations of what happened in the case of the Icelandic oil companies. (shrink)

Although thoughts of an approaching apocalypse may have occurred to Christians in western Europe as the end of the first Christian millennium neared, the inhabitants of Iceland—a country far removed from the Continent and almost halfway to the New World—wrestled with an entirely different problem: whether or not to become Christians. The way in which Icelanders deliberated the issue and made their momentous decision in the year 1000 deserves a commemoration of its own along with celebrations of the second (...) millennium of the Christian era. (shrink)

This article focuses on critical realist analysis of concrete processes of structure formation and realization of structural propensity. It aims to explain the reasons for the rise and fall of the neoliberal regime in Iceland that led to the extreme expansion of the Icelandic financial system and its crisis. The article argues that the neoliberal regime was actively constructed by economic and political actors within the framework of the particular structural characteristics of Iceland. It claims that rigid structural (...) conditions due to the very small size of the economy and severe problem of oligopoly undermined the neoliberal utopia of perfect market competition. In order to develop this argument, the paper observes how power elites actively affect public opinion and establish their hegemonic position in the political system. (shrink)

This article explores managers’ views on various ways in which business schools can contribute to providing solid ethics education to their students, who will ultimately become the next generation of business leaders. One thousand top level managers of Icelandic firms were approached and asked a number of questions aimed at establishing their view on the relationship between ethics education and the role of business schools in forming and developing business ethics education. Icelandic businesses were badly hurt by the 2008 crisis, (...) and therefore Iceland provides an interesting foundation for an empirical study of this sort as the aftermath of the crisis has encouraged managers to consciously reflect on the way their business was and should be conducted. Based on the results of the survey, a few main themes have developed. First, it appears that according to practicing managers, business schools should not be held responsible for employees’ unethical behavior. Nevertheless, managers believe that business schools should assist future employees in understanding ethics by including business ethics in teaching curricula. Second, managers believe that the workplace is not where ethics are learned, while also insisting that former students should already have strong ethical standards when entering the workplace. Third, managers call for business schools not only to contribute more to influencing students’ ethical standards, but also to reshape the knowledge and capabilities of practicing managers through re-training and continuous education. Based on the results of the study, the article also offers some recommendations on how to begin reformulating the approach to business ethics education in Iceland, and perhaps elsewhere. (shrink)

This paper addresses the application of the ethical concept of trust and the legal and political concept of public trust to population genomics projects in Iceland, Estonia, and Tonga. Focusing on trust and public trust, the paper explores analogies between the genomics projects and the treatment of other common-pool resources, making use of the notion of trust as an ethical demand, derived from the works of Emmanuel Levinas and Knud Eljer Lgstrup. The paper discusses the degree to which the (...) ethical demands for trust and public trust have been established and maintained in the three national population genomics projects. (shrink)

Neo-Aristotelian forms of character education often draw on literary sources as materials, although rarely poetry. This article offers retrospective reflections on a poetry-based character-education intervention, conducted in an Icelandic secondary-school setting. Having run into practical difficulties during the implementation phase, the challenges of implementation were reflected upon through consultation with ten subject experts who shared their views about the enablers and barriers encountered when running such an intervention. The interviews yielded a rich data set, which often took interviewees beyond the (...) boundaries of a poetry-based curricular context to focus on more general conditions for effective, character-inspiring school-work. Through thematic analysis, four themes were identified: freedom, time, creativity, and wonderment. Of these four, creativity had been identified in advance as an interview theme, meaning that the researchers expected to find it. The remaining three provide an insight into how, according to the interviewees, the ideal Icelandic school system should be designed. The theme of freedom addresses both negative and positive aspects of the current state of affairs, while the theme of time mostly reflects negative aspects of the Icelandic curriculum. The theme of wonderment has solely positive connotations in the minds of interviewees, and is the core of this analysis because it seems to hold the key to the question: what factors would enable an effective intervention of the sort under scrutiny here? This theme is analysed in detail, and some specific and general educational implications are elicited. (shrink)

ABSTRACT A major moral problem in relation to the deCODE genetics database project in Iceland is that the heavy emphasis placed on technical security of healthcare information has precluded discussion about the issue of consent for participation in the database. On the other hand, critics who have emphasised the issue of consent have most often demanded that informed consent for participation in research be obtained. While I think that individual consent is of major significance, I argue that this demand (...) for informed consent is neither suitable nor desirable in this case. I distinguish between three aspects of the database and show that different types of consent are appropriate for each. In particular, I describe the idea of a written authorisation based on general information about the database as an alternative to informed consent and presumed consent in database research. (shrink)

In this paper, we explore the 2008 financial crisis in Iceland through the lens of Donaldson’s concept of normalization of questionable behavior. We study the report published by the Special Investigation Commission, an investigation initiated by the Icelandic Parliament near the end of 2008. The report provides a detailed and systematic account of the processes leading up to the crisis. Our aim is to determine the extent to which the behaviors of professionals in the Icelandic financial sector can be (...) explained as a gradual fading of moral concerns to the point that they perceived the sale of high-risk products to unassuming customers for their own short-term benefit to be morally unproblematic. In doing so, we consider both character and circumstance explanations of moral misbehavior. We expand on Donaldson’s initial description of normalization of questionable behavior by applying the concept of moral neutralization, which is defined by criminologists Sykes and Matza as the process of convincing oneself that an option that initially conflicted with one’s own moral beliefs is actually morally acceptable. We find indications that individuals in the Icelandic financial sector did engage in moral neutralization in their attempts to frame their own actions in an acceptable light. In our study, we identify one way of neutralizing away moral dissonance not captured in the original theoretical framework. Icelandic bankers justified their behavior by claiming that they did not break any relevant rules or regulations when they engaged in what were later labeled questionable activities. Our name for this kind of justification is claim of having breached no rule. (shrink)

ABSTRACT A major moral problem in relation to the deCODE genetics database project in Iceland is that the heavy emphasis placed on technical security of healthcare information has precluded discussion about the issue of consent for participation in the database. On the other hand, critics who have emphasised the issue of consent have most often demanded that informed consent for participation in research be obtained. While I think that individual consent is of major significance, I argue that this demand (...) for informed consent is neither suitable nor desirable in this case. I distinguish between three aspects of the database and show that different types of consent are appropriate for each. In particular, I describe the idea of a written authorisation based on general information about the database as an alternative to informed consent and presumed consent in database research. (shrink)

Using the two cases of the Icelandic Health Sector Database and Russian initiatives in biobanking, the article criticizes the view of narratives and imaginaries as a sufficient and unproblematic means of shaping public understanding of genetics and justifying population-wide projects. Narrative representations of national biobanking engage particular imaginaries that are not bound by the universal normative framework of human rights, promote affective thinking, distract the public from recognizing and discussing tangible ethical and socioeconomic issues, and harm trust in science and (...) technology. In the Icelandic case, the presentation of the project in association with national imaginaries concealed its market identity and could lead to the commodification of biodata. In the Russian case, framing in terms of "genetic sovereignty" and "civilizational code" offers pretexts for state securitization. Adherence to normative framework of human rights and public discussion of genetics in an argumentative and factual mode can counter these trends. (shrink)

Iceland has not been known as a contributor to the history of science. This small nation in the North-Atlantic has only in recent decades made its mark on international science. But the Icelandic naturalist Thorvaldur Thoroddsen (1855-1921) is an exception to this generalisation, for he was well known at the turn of the 20th century in Europe and America for his research on the geography and geology of Iceland. Though Thoroddsen's contribution to these sciences is of great interest (...) there is another very interesting side to his career. This is his transformation from "mechanist" to "vitalist," which is the main focus of this paper. Thoroddsen, who began his career as a follower of Darwinism and Haeckelian monism, started to express his worries about materialism in society in 1902 culminating in a full-fledged denial of materialism in politics and science in 1910. Thoroddsen's transformation is in its nature a very complex process, but overall it can be traced to his view that materialism was destroying the Danish and Icelandic societies. In the years before 1902 Thoroddsen was a monistic atheist, relatively liberal in his politics, a firm believer in the power of the natural sciences, and considered the laws of physics the key to human progress. His views were strikingly similar to the ones Haeckel expounded in "The Riddle of the Universe" (1899), whose reception in Germany is explored in this paper in order to contextualise Thoroddsen's transformation. Between 1902 and 1910, however, Thoroddsen rejected this worldview in favour of conservative politics and ontological dualism, becoming a staunch believer in a higher, godly, authority. The theories of Darwin and Haeckel were now obsolete and needed to be replaced by the idea of purpose, direction and the final goal of life (Teleology). In order to understand Thoroddsen's transformation, I focus on the interaction of scientific knowledge, politics and other cultural issues in his writings. This is done by looking at Thoroddsen's views on biology, on the natural sciences in general, and on politics as published in Icelandic articles, manuscripts and letters in the period 1872 to 1910. I show that the transformation was due to influences from the German holistic movement, Thoroddsen's engagement with the Royal elite in Denmark and its political concerns, new developments in physics, and from personal traumas and professional disappointments. I also show that Thoroddsen's transformation seems to be a good example of the social shaping of scientific knowledge. (shrink)

The work of William Morris (1834-1896) was hugely influenced by the medieval sagas and poetry of Iceland; in particular, they inspired his long poems "The Lovers of Gudrun" and Sigurd the Volsung. Between 1868 and 1876, Morris not only translated several major sagas into English for the first time with his collaborator the Icelander Eiríkur Magnússon (1833-1913) but he also travelled on horseback twice across the Icelandic interior, journeys which led him through the best known of the saga sites. (...) By looking closely at his translations of the sagas and the texts on which he based them, the journals of his travels in Iceland, and his saga-inspired long poems and lyric poetry, this book shows how Morris conceived a unique ideal of heroism through engaging with Icelandic literature. It shows the sagas and poetry of Iceland as crucial in shaping his view of the best life a man could live and spurring him on in the subsequent passions on which much of his legacy rests. (shrink)

In October 2008, one of the largest bank crashes in history struck Iceland, a country of three hundred and thirty five thousand inhab-itants. The aim of the article is to examine two cultural responses to the crash and the crisis that followed. More precisely, the aim is to analyse how the creation of the haunted house in I Remember You, a crash-horror story by crime writer Yrsa Sigurðardóttir, as well as the spectral half-built houses portrayed by visual artist Guðjón (...) Ketilsson refer quite directly, yet spectrally, to the period. The spec-tral themes of the two works give the opportunity to discuss the moment following the crash as a moment of haunting—but who is haunted and by whom? (shrink)

Arguments in favour of strengthening the rights of victim–survivors in the criminal justice process have largely been made within the framework of a human rights perspective and with a view to meeting their procedural needs and minimising their experiences of secondary victimisation. In this article, however, I ask whether the prevalent legal arrangement, whereby victim–survivors are assigned the legal status of witnesses in criminal cases, with limited if any rights, is a just arrangement. In order to answer this question, the (...) article draws on interviews with 35 victim–survivors of sexual violence in Iceland. The interviews are presented against the backdrop of Nordic legal thinking and are interpreted in the context of Nancy Fraser’s democratic theory of justice. On the basis of the findings, I argue that assigning complainants the role of witnesses constitutes a case of misframing that results in misrecognition throughout the criminal justice process. (shrink)

Our research discusses how four main ethical challenges to veganism manifest in the context of Iceland. Veganism is becoming an increasingly popular lifestyle in many parts of the world, especially in OECD countries. Studies on the motivation for choosing a vegan lifestyle (which includes, but is not restricted to, following a vegan diet) include ethical considerations, dietary choices, personal health, taste, religious and political beliefs, or environmental concerns. Ethics plays a particularly important role, and as such, veganism has become (...) a central object of interest in recent conversations on animal rights and welfare among ethicists. Our analysis reviews four ethical challenges (i.e., the challenge of universality, demandingness, causal impotence, and the least environmental harm principle) in the literature that problematize the norms and rationale underpinning veganism and vegan discourse and discusses how each applies within the context of Icelandic society and geography. We conjecture that the particular economic, demographic, and geographic characteristics of Iceland indicate that being vegan in Iceland does not free oneself of having global social and environmental impacts on account of chosen dietary options. All diets constitute global systems that account for dependencies and opportunities, vulnerabilities, and strengths, which may challenge the assumption that veganism is a more socially and environmentally sustainable dietary option within this particular regional context. (shrink)

Ideally, good sports literature illuminates the subtle moral contours of sports reality. We ask in this paper how modern Icelandic literature describes sport-related ethical issues and attitudes. Our findings indicate that, in stark contrast to the rampant egocentrism, individual vice and misconduct blighting Icelandic sports reality, modern Icelandic prose literature typically either ignores this reality or refers to sports as if they were in full harmony with idealised ancient virtues and morals. Our conclusion is that this discrepancy admits of four (...) possible interpretations: that (1) theories about the individualism and egocentricity of modernity do not apply in Iceland and in Icelandic sports; (2) the writers are seriously self-deceived; (3) the writers write their books for the deliberate purpose of deceiving the public; (4) the writers write their books for the deliberate purpose of preaching. Our answer is that, while there may be reason to foreground (4), the explanation lies in a combination of those four factors. (shrink)

Limited attention has been paid to the potential of tort law to address the harm of sexual violence. Based on interviews with 35 victim-survivors of sexual violence in Iceland, this study asks: How do victim-survivors understand monetary compensation? How can tort law meet victim-survivors’ justice interests? The findings suggest that in addition to the financial risk involved, most participants had ambivalent views towards pursuing and receiving monetary compensation. Many thought that, given their often extensive pecuniary and non-pecuniary losses, it (...) was only fair to receive compensation; but at the same time, they did not want to accept ‘dirty money’ they considered that pursuing monetary compensation could undermine their credibility, and monetary compensation only partially aligned with their ideas about justice. The findings are interpreted in the context of tort law theory, taboo trade-offs and survivor-centred justice. It is suggested that state intervention is needed to better meet victim-survivors’ justice interests. (shrink)

The Nordic countries have been major contributors to peacekeeping, often seen as particularly well suited due to their lack of ties to colonialism and supposedly peaceful nature. The article critically addresses this idea in relation to how gender equality has been conceptualized in peacekeeping taking as an example Icelandic peacekeeping. Iceland’s recent engagement in peacekeeping has strongly emphasized gender issues but has lacked an engagement with issues of power and domination and thus reflects a particular idea of ‘Nordic exceptionalism’. (...) The authors emphasize in their discussion the need to maintain critical feminist perspectives that take diverse relations of power into account. (shrink)

This paper challenges the received wisdom on the diachronic development of expletives in Germanic and contributes to the increasing crosslinguistic evidence that expletives can be related to discourse-pragmatic properties, even at an early stage in their development. I examine the status of expletive það in Early Icelandic saga narratives (1250–1450) in time-clefts (‘It was one time that…’) via corpus data from MIcePaHC (Ingason 2020). The MIcePaHC data indicates that time-clefts have special status in Early Icelandic as the only context where (...) það is already obligatory. Moreover, það is robustly attested not just in the prefinite position but also postfinitely, thus contributing to the growing evidence against the standard view that Germanic expletives are initially motivated by the verb-second requirement. Considering broader discourse-pragmatic factors which have generally been neglected in this context, I link the early establishment of það in time-clefts to the specific discourse functions of the construction (backgrounding, known-fact effect), and connect this with the Icelandic sagas’ special status as orally-derived narratives. (shrink)

This article examines shifts in the image of Iceland created for international tourism. It argues that at the beginning of the 21st century the more traditional spotlight on the country’s natural attractions was altered, giving an additional, new focus on the nation’s beautiful, and apparently sexually promiscuous, women. Such a development deserves further comment for a variety of reasons. First, an examination of the importance of women to Iceland’s national marketing, especially their depiction visually, underlines the need to (...) reconsider the substantial role of gender and imagery representation in tourism studies, two themes that have been underexamined by scholars working in the discipline. Second, as a Nordic nation with a reputation for gender equality, this focus on women as sexual objects readily available for male tourist consumption raises a serious contradiction. Last but not least, the use of sexually alluring female images by a developed nation has intriguing implications for postcolonial scholars interested in representations of ‘the Other’. While shying away from implying that ideologies of ‘race’ are not important to discussions of international sex tourism, this article suggests that gender should be considered an equally important contributing factor in such analyses. (shrink)

The remote and inhospitable landscape of Iceland made it a perfect breeding-ground for heroes. The first Norsemen to colonize it in 860 found that the fight for survival demanded high courage and tough self reliance; it also nurtured a stern sense of duty and an uncompromising view of destiny. The Icelandic sagas relate the adventurous lives of individuals and families between 930 and 1030, which began as oral tales but were skilfully documented in the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries, and (...) are now regarded as written literature. (shrink)

_This paper will explore two strands of Vilhjálmur Árnason’s extensive body of work: his analysis of dialogue ethics within medical ethics and his analysis of ethics in the Icelandic sagas. The central thesis is that combining these two strands, bioethics and literary analysis, can provide valuable insights to further the discussion of ethics among citizens in multicultural communities. _ _Vilhjálmur’s 1 analysis of the Icelandic sagas shows that the sagas have a specific value foundation, specific virtues as well as narrative (...) in how to present the ethical aspects. In the field of bioethics, he has developed the study of dialogue ethics in several aspects, such as between patient and professional, in interdisciplinary research, and in public deliberation. By integrating insights from historic literary studies with contemporary bioethical research we gain an interesting platform for a discussion on Western assumptions of what constitutes a good dialogue. One of the core aspects in dialogue ethics is how to develop the procedure for a fair, open-minded, and oppression-free discussion in ethical issues. Vilhjálmur’s contributions are summarized here, but could they also be extended beyond the Icelandic and Western horizon?_ _I will compare his ethical framework to a recent parallel discussion on the claims of indigenous peoples for a fair dialogue. That is, a dialogue that must be inclusive with a carefulness about deciding the foundation of inherent values and the procedure of how to perform the dialogue. Finally, I draw conclusions on what dialogue ethics will gain from this explorative work._ _Keywords: _dialogue ethics, one health approaches, Indigenous peoples, bioethics, interdisciplinarity, ethics in the Icelandic sagas, medical ethics, literary analysis, multicultural communities. (shrink)

This article focuses on desires, fears and identities as entangled in the past. Emphasizing gendered aspects of mobility, the author takes as examples debates relating to Icelandic Muslims and discussions in regard to Iceland’s increased international involvements in global peacekeeping. She sees them sharing entanglements with the nationalistic ideologies of Europeans as carrier of justice and equality, as well as a collective forgetting of past histories that foreground and position people in relation to migrations and encounters in the present. (...) In these cases, gender is tightly interwoven with the tapestry of meaning, foregrounding, explaining and informing the relationships involved. (shrink)