The landscape of social theory has changed significantly over the three decades since the publication of Anthony Giddens and Jonathan Turner’s seminal Social Theory Today. Sociologists in the twenty-first century desperately need a new agenda centered around central questions of social theory. In Social Theory Now, Claudio E. Benzecry, Monika Krause, and Isaac Ariail Reed set a new course for sociologists, bringing together contributions from the most distinctive sociological traditions in an ambitious survey of where social theory is (...) today and where it might be going. The book provides a strategic window onto social theory based on current research, examining trends in classical traditions and the cutting edge of more recent approaches. From distinctive theoretical positions, contributors address questions about how social order is accomplished; the role of materiality, practice, and meaning; as well as the conditions for the knowledge of the social world. The theoretical traditions presented include cultural sociology, microsociologies, world-system theory and post-colonial theory, gender and feminism, actor network and network theory, systems theory, field theory, rational choice, poststructuralism, pragmatism, and the sociology of conventions. Each chapter introduces a tradition and presents an agenda for further theoretical development. Social Theory Now is an essential tool for sociologists. It will be central to the discussion and teaching of contemporary social theory for years to come. (shrink)

To build an argument--and particularly an argument presented as a monologue--a writer must assemble and marshal a battery of supports for a claim. Some of those supports will be arranged in convergent structures, some as linked; some will be expressed, some will be left implicit; sometimes a support will need further support of its own--and sometimes, not. This paper explores the factors which lead a writer to make particular choices, the interactions between those factors, and the constraints on a w (...) riter's freedom in exercising her power, drawing on recent findings in computational modelling of the generation process. (shrink)

Are there key respects in which character and character defects are voluntary? Can agents with serious vices be rational agents? Jonathan Jacobs answers in the affirmative. Moral character is shaped through voluntary habits, including the ways we habituate ourselves, Jacobs believes. Just as individuals can voluntarily lead unhappy lives without making unhappiness an end, so can they degrade their ethical characters through voluntary action that does not have establishment of vice as its end. Choosing Character presents an account of (...) ethical disability, expanding the domain of responsibility and explicating the role of character in ethical cognition. Jacobs contends that agents become ethically disabled voluntarily when their habits impair their ability to properly appreciate ethical considerations. Such agents are rational, responsible individuals who are yet incapable of virtuous action. The view develops and modifies Aristotelian claims concerning the fixity of character. Jacobs' interpretation is developed in contrast to the overlooked work of Maimonides, who also used Aristotelian resources but argued for the possibility of character change. The notion of ethical disability has profound ramifications for ethics and for current debates about blame and punishment. (shrink)

The principle of exchange seems to be limited in its application, and it cannot serve as a link between utilitarianism and the idea of a market for interpersonal relations. Our preferences concern the inner states of other people as well as their overt behavior. The neglect of this aspect of our preferences is a result of the coupling of utilitarianism with behaviorism. The problem is thus behaviorism, not consequentialism. It might be argued that commensurability is wrong because it sanctions impure (...) practices - aside from any principle of exchange. In reply, it may be argued that the principle of purity is an intuitive one, which must be justified at a higher level. At the intuitive level, the purity principle competes with the view that practices are in some cases too pure already, and that blind purity cannot be maintained without educational deception. The apparent difficulty of making tradeoffs among different kinds of consequences is a problem in practice, not a problem in principle. The difficulty may indeed justify certain prescriptive rules, but a blanket prohibition against impure practices would seem to require considerable defense. (shrink)

A major intellectual history of the American Revolution and its influence on later revolutions in Europe and the Americas The Expanding Blaze is a sweeping history of how the American Revolution inspired revolutions throughout Europe and the Atlantic world in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. Jonathan Israel, one of the world’s leading historians of the Enlightenment, shows how the radical ideas of American founders such as Paine, Jefferson, Franklin, Madison, and Monroe set the pattern for democratic revolutions, movements, and (...) constitutions in France, Britain, Ireland, the Netherlands, Belgium, Poland, Greece, Canada, Haiti, Brazil, and Spanish America. The Expanding Blaze reminds us that the American Revolution was an astonishingly radical event—and that it didn’t end with the transformation and independence of America. Rather, the Revolution continued to reverberate in Europe and the Americas for the next three-quarters of a century. This comprehensive history of the Revolution’s international influence traces how American efforts to implement Radical Enlightenment ideas—including the destruction of the old regime and the promotion of democratic republicanism, self-government, and liberty—helped drive revolutions abroad, as foreign leaders explicitly followed the American example and espoused American democratic values. The first major new intellectual history of the age of democratic revolution in decades, The Expanding Blaze returns the American Revolution to its global context. (shrink)

Introduction : ethical economics? -- The sovereign consumer -- Two myths about economic growth -- The politics of pay -- Happiness -- Pricing life and nature -- New worlds of money : public services and beyond -- Conclusion.

With the rise of globalization, the debate around free trade versus fair trade and liberalism versus protectionism has become increasingly complicated. At times, the regulations of the World Trade Organization seem to pit developed markets against emerging markets as governments attempt to expand international trade while at the same time protecting local industry. To this end, antidumping measures have been extensively developed as a way to block foreign low-cost goods from entering domestic markets. In response, some exporters have begun to (...) circumvent these antidumping measures using strategies such as transhipment, assembly operations, and slightly modified products. While previous studies have addressed the ethical aspects of antidumping measures, this study will focus on the ethics of circumvention strategies with a special focus on the theories on legal compliance and, specifically, civil disobedience and conscientious evasion. (shrink)

This book defines Christian epistemological orthodoxy against such heterodox systems as Kantian phenomenology, Barthian Neoorthodoxy, Ayerian Logical Positivism, and Whiteheadian Process Thought and their respective trajectories.

This paper argues that contemporary child and youth experiences of globalization call for retheorizing global justice around a new concept of empowered inclusion. The first part of the paper examines three case studies in globalization – child labour movements, child and youth migration, and young people’s organization around climate change – and shows how, in each case, young people, through their struggles against injustice, are simultaneously disempowered and empowered by their deep global interdependency. The second part proposes new theoretical advances (...) in global justice that better respond to child and youth experiences through a childist concept of the empowered inclusion of both children and other marginalized groups. And the third part advances some preliminary suggestions about how a more child-responsive conception of global power and justice might be operationalized in practice across global policies, institutions, and culture. (shrink)

'It is going to change the way in which we understand many modern debates about economics, politics, and society' Ha Joon Chang, author of 23 Things They Don't Tell You About Capitalism Over the past fifty years, the way we value what is 'good' and 'right' has changed dramatically. Behaviour that to our grandparents' generation might have seemed stupid, harmful or simply wicked now seems rational, natural, woven into the very logic of things. And, asserts Jonathan Aldred in this (...) revelatory new book, it's economics that's to blame.Licence to be Bad tells the story of how a group of economics theorists changed our world, and how a handful of key ideas, from free-riding to Nudge, seeped into our decision-making and, indeed, almost all aspects of our lives. Aldred reveals the extraordinary hold of economics on our morals and values. Economics has corrupted us. But if this hidden transformation is so recent, it can be reversed. Licence to be Bad shows us where to begin. (shrink)

This essay considers the prospects of modeling spacetime as a phenomenon that emerges in the low-energy limit of a quantum liquid. It evaluates three examples of spacetime analogues in condensed matter systems that have appeared in the recent physics literature, indicating the extent to which they are viable, and considers what they suggest about the nature of spacetime.

Changes in immigration policy and legislation have the power to shape and alter the gendering of migration in significant ways, and can have a dramatic effect on the lives and relationships of the men, women and families involved. In this paper, we examine the provisions of the new Immigration Act introduced in South Africa in 2002. The Act, which replaces the outdated Aliens Control Act of 1991, gives considerable cause for concern on gender grounds. Foremost, the Act entrenches a system (...) of male-dominated regional labour migration that has its origins in the 19th-century discovery of gold and diamonds. The male bias in the work permit and other employment-based categories along with the limits to family reunification for those entering for work are likely in effect to discriminate against women to a greater extent than men. While similar gender concerns are common to most immigration policy regimes around the world, the particular circumstances of the South African case, where both skilled and unskilled migration streams are heavily male-dominated, makes them especially acute here. This paper contextualizes migration regimes in South Africa and examines in detail the likely implications of the new Immigration Act. (shrink)

Resumen El presente artículo realiza un análisis de los apoyos otorgados por los cárteles de narcotráfico en México, desde la lectura del aparato crítico de Slavoj Žižek, quien sienta las bases para la interpretación de la ayuda humanitaria como un acto violento. Por lo que, el siguiente texto abarca desde la filosofía Žižekianay el psicoanálisis lacaniano, el fenómeno de la violencia ejercida por la figura del comunista liberal, en un comparativo con el crimen organizado mexicano, intentando desentrañar la estructura básica (...) de la dinámica social que impera en la ayuda humanitaria. Así mismo se define la violencia en general y algunas de sus manifestaciones en la sociedad; estableciendo los elementos esenciales de una ideología, distinguiéndola como una herramienta adecuada para el análisis social, esperado así, resolver cómo se constituye en realidad. Palabras clave: Violencia, sistémica, ayuda humanitaria, goce, realidad.This article presents the analysis of the aid provided by drug trafficking cartels in Mexico. It arises from a critical reading of Slavoj Žižek’s work regarding violence and ideology which lays the foundation for the interpretation of humanitarian aid as a violent act. Hence, the coverage of the article from Žižekian philosophy and Lacanian psychoanalysis, the phenomenon of violence exerted by the figure of the liberal communist, in comparison to Mexican organized crime, trying to unravel the basic structure of social dynamics which prevail in humanitarian aid. Likewise, violence in general and some of its manifestations in society are defined; establishing the essential elements of an ideology, distinguishing it as a suitable tool for social analysis, thus expected, solving how it is actually constituted. Key words: Violence, systemic, humanitarian aid, enjoyment, reality. (shrink)

The spider papers.--Natural philosophy.--The mind.--Short scientific and philosophical papers.

In this paper, I argue that deportations often serve as “theaters of inequality” that reinforce the unjust, widely held perception that Latina/os and Latin Americans do not belong in the United States and can therefore be treated as inferiors. My analysis focuses on the United States but is intended to be applicable to other states and contexts. Working within a relational egalitarian framework, I argue that in those cases where deportations constitute theaters of inequality, they are unjust and prima facie (...) impermissible. (shrink)

This response agrees with Stanovich's emphasis on the need for decentering, and, in response to Beyth-Marom, attempts to clarify the normative-prescriptive-descriptive distinction and point in the direction of prescriptive models. It takes issue with Cabanac and with Lindsay & Gorayska.

A key working hypothesis in neuroscience is ‘materialistic reductionism’, i.e., the assumption whereby all physiological, behavioral or cognitive phenomena is produced by localized neurochemical brain activation (but not vice versa). However, analysis of sub-threshold Weber’s psychophysical stimulation indicates its computational irreducibility to the direct interaction between psychophysical stimulation and any neuron/s. This is because the materialistic-reductionistic working hypothesis assumes that the determination of the existence or non-existence of any psychophysical stimulation [s] may only be determined through its direct interaction [di1] (...) with a given neuron/s [N] that together forms the ‘neural registry’ computational level [NR/di1]. But, this implies that in cases of (initial) sub-threshold (sensory-specific) psychophysical stimulation which is increased above the sensory-specific threshold but below Weber’s psychophysical ‘dv’—the psychophysical computational processing [PCP] produces an apparently ‘computationally indeterminate’ output. This is because materialistic reductionism asserts the contingency of PCP upon the existence of a direct interaction between ‘s’ and ‘N’ within the NR/di1 level, but in the special case of Weber’s sub-threshold psychophysical stimulation the same PCP/di1 also asserts the non-existence of ‘s’ (as demanded by Weber’s psychophysical law). However, given robust empirical evidence indicating the capability of PCP to determine whether (or not) ‘s’ exists, we must conclude that PCP may not be carried out from within NR’s direct interaction between a particular psychophysical stimulation and any set of neuron/s in the brain. Hence, the Duality Principle asserts the conceptual irreducibility of sub-threshold psychophysical stimulation to any direct NR/di1: s-N interaction, thereby challenging the current materialistic-reductionistic assumption. (shrink)

The roots of the formation of a post-Mongol political theology that situated Muslim emperors and sultans at the center of an Islamic cosmos are found in the Ilkhanid court in late thirteenth- and early fourteenth-century Iran. This article investigates the case of the short-lived rebellion of the Mongol governor of Rūm and Mahdi-claimant Temürtash. It demonstrates how the discourse of religious reform was recruited to translate and support the claims of non-Chinggisid commanders to the transfer of God’s favor, thus opposing (...) the Chinggisids’ heaven-derived exceptionalism. Exploring affinities with the Timurid appropriation of the mujaddid tradition a century later, the article argues that Temürtash’s rebellion signaled the early stages of the dispersion of a new political language that freed Muslim kingship from the restrictive genealogical and juridical Sunni models of authority. (shrink)