This chapter presents a constructivist reading of Dewey's work by establishing a line of development between Dewey's 1896 essay on the reflex arc and the social constructivism explicit in his later works. It demonstrates the relevance of classical Pragmatism to current issues in the philosophy of education, highlighting key theoretical and conceptual components of the cultural construction of meanings, truth claims, and identities. It also looks into Dewey's short essay “Knowledge and Speech Reaction” to identify the connection between (...) speech acts, the constitution of stimuli by responses, and the construction of knowledge objects by the operations of inquiry. (shrink)

Dewey on the reflex arc concept--an important theme in William James.

This article deals with the concepts, processes, and antagonisms that are associated with the notion of postsecularity. In light of this article’s expanded interpretation of José Casanova on the secular and secularization, as well as thoughts on James A. Beckford’s take on public religions, five rubrics on the postsecular derived from critical theory and an understanding of ‘reflexive secularization’ are presented. This term focuses on secularization processes and how these practices unleash complementary as well as antagonistic tendencies, a confrontation of (...) normativities and specific social-empirical challenges. From this basis it is argued that social-empirical analysis should focus on non-naturalistic relations between individuals occupying structurally equivalent positions in narrative networks. A plurality of normativities are seriously considered as ideas circulating through social relations where the critical competence of the participants of such communication processes are provoked to subvert anything – including any normative positionality – as taken for granted. Moves towards the decolonization of the secular/postsecular dyad are emphasized, with ramifications for thinking about the urban, which point to the universal and authentic foundations of the human condition that are brought into play. (shrink)

John Dewey and Ludwig Wittgenstein offer devastating critiques of the dominant model of human action that each inherited in their own time. Dewey, very early in his philosophical career, ostensibly put the stimulus–response mechanical understanding of action to rest with his “reflex-arc” concept article. Wittgenstein famously redescribed action as moves within language games that interconnect to constitute an interpretively open-ended form of life. In each case, these fundamental insights serve as heuristics, guiding our intellectual activity with regard to (...) understanding our practices, and as reminders in approaching problems. Several scholars have interpreted Dewey and Wittgenstein as allies in a grand project of... (shrink)

This article addresses the need for adaptive ethical analysis within machine learning that accounts for emerging problems concerning social bias and generative adversarial networks. I use John Dewey’s criticisms of the reflex arc concept in psychology as a basis for understanding how these problems stem from human-gan interaction. By combining Dewey’s criticisms with Donna Haraway’s idea of cyborgs, Luciano Floridi’s concept of distributed morality, and Shaowen Bardzell’s recommendations for a feminist approach to human-computer interaction, I suggest (...) a dynamic perspective from which to begin analyzing and solving issues of injustice evident in this particular domain of machine learning. (shrink)

In the preface to this work, Thayer explains that his purpose is to present "the classic writings of pragmatism" defined as "the original and formative expressions of this philosophy articulated by its most eminent spokesmen." The selections are from Peirce, James, and Dewey as well as brief readings from Mead and C. I. Lewis. Each selection is accompanied by a brief introduction. In addition to these selectional introductions, there is also a two-part general introduction. The first part is a short (...) historical piece by Thayer situating pragmatism in the context of western thought. The second part is a 1931 article by Dewey outlining the development of pragmatism in Peirce and James. These informative introductions should be of value to the philosophical novice who finds himself in many anthologies afloat on the sea of primary sources without the aid of the historical context necessary to fix his position. The individual selections have been carefully chosen and well coordinated. Insofar as they cluster about the central theme of the epistemological nature of pragmatism, they avoid the pitfall of attempting to elucidate the entire philosophy of many thinkers in one volume. The Peirce section includes in addition to the usual articles, "The Fixation of Belief" and "How to Make Our Ideas Clear," selections from Peirce's later writings including the 1905 article, "What Pragmatism Is" in which he differentiates his pragmatism from that of James. The section on James incorporates important sections from The Principles of Psychology together with the famous essay "The Will to Believe" and two lectures on the pragmatic concept of meaning and truth from Pragmatism. The Dewey selection provides a judicious collection of his writings from the 1896 article on the "Reflex Arc Concept" advocating the integration of organism and action to the general analysis of intelligent action in his 1938 book, Logic: The Theory of Inquiry. Also included is a chapter from The Quest for Certainty describing the application of pragmatic method to the realm of moral value. The contents of this volume are rounded out with a piece by Mead on social consciousness and the social self and an article by C. I. Lewis on the pragmatic conception of the a priori. Thayer has produced an excellent anthology of pragmatic philosophy well suited to any course in classical American philosophy emphasizing an epistemological approach.--W. J. L. (shrink)

This essay aims at providing a brief analysis of John Dewey’s 1896 essay The reflex arc concept in psychology by identifying in it “proto-aesthetic” elements that will be thematized in an explicitly aesthetic sense only, almost forty years later, in Art as experience. This latter can be indeed considered both as a hapax and an apex of a path in which Dewey progressively focuses on matters that can be deemed properly aesthetic and of which The reflex arc (...) concept in psychology can be seen as one of the first steps. Our analysis will attempt at showing this connection by spanning the reflex arc idea, amended by Dewey in this essay, and that of “an” experience as a proper aesthetic experience through the fundamental concept of coordination. (shrink)

This article offers an approach that combines, on the one hand, the philosophical notion of reflexivity, which is related to the ideas of self-reference and paradox, and, on the other hand, the sociological discussion of epistemic reflexivity as a problem of coherence, which was mainly initiated by certain branches of ethnomethodology and social constructionism. This combinatory approach argues for reflexivity as an epistemic criterion of ontological coherence, which suggests that social ontologies should account for the possibility of self-reflective (...) subjectivity – for otherwise they result in a paradoxical conclusion according to which a social scientist reflects on her or his ontological commitments even though these commitments deny her or him the capacity for self-reflection. This analysis presupposes that all human sciences are categorically premised on social ontologies; and it argues for an analytical distinction between self-reflection, which refers to the agential capacity for reflecting on one’s own commitments, and the epistemic criterion of reflexivity hereby proposed. These two analytically distinct though interdependent socio-theoretical concepts are frequently conflated in the literature; thus, this article also aims at a ‘clearing of the ground’ that can be of categorical use to the human sciences. (shrink)

The critical realist and Bourdieusian conceptions of action fundamentally disagree on a number of fronts: the synthetic versus dualistic relationship between structure and agency; the social nature of the self/body; the link between morphogenesis and reflexivity. Despite these differences, this article argues that re-reading Bourdieu’s theories with attention to some of the core tenets of critical realism (emergence, the stratification of reality, and conjunctural causality) can provide insights into how the habitus is capable of reflexivity and social change. (...) In particular, this article reworks Bourdieu’s theory of habitus by suggesting that social selves are always situated at the intersection of multiple and competing social locations (or field positions) and that the habitus itself is always layered. Reflexivity arises from horizontal disjunctures (between field positions) and vertical disjunctures (across temporal sedimentation). (shrink)

In her book, The Human Condition, Hannah Arendt states: “we are all the same, that is, human, in such a way that nobody is ever the same as anybody else”. In this statement, we are the same and yet nobody is ever the same as anybody else. This may sound contradictory yet what it means is that there is a common base which makes us all the same, and precisely because of this base, we are able to make comparisons and (...) hence differentiate one from the other because we are all different. When analyzing two concepts, an equal status in at least one normatively relevant respect is needed. Where there is one, there is the other precisely because of the other and vice versa. The fact that it is only at least one respect that is needed implies the existence of other aspects that act as common distinguishing factors. Therefore, distinction implies equality. The paper will explore how according to Arendt, equality, a political concept, has been perverted into a social concept. In her view, previously, differing circumstances and conditions served as “protection” and actually had a protective role. An explanation will thus be given as to how a lack of these differences in the modern period has resulted in a challenge and how this challenge has created unexpected problems for the human condition. This implies reflexivity between political theory and the human agent, and will be presented from Arendt’s perspective. (shrink)

In 1987, George Soros introduced his concepts of reflexivity and fallibility and has further developed and applied these concepts over subsequent decades. This paper attempts to build on Soros's framework, provide his concepts with a more precise definition, and put them in the context of recent thinking on complex adaptive systems. The paper proposes that systems can be classified along a ‘spectrum of complexity’ and that under specific conditions not only social systems but also natural and artificial systems can (...) be considered ‘complex reflexive.’ The epistemological challenges associated with scientifically understanding a phenomenon stem not from whether its domain is social, natural, or artificial, but where it falls along this spectrum. Reflexive systems present particular challenges; however, evolutionary model-dependent realism provides a bridge between Soros and Popper and a potential path forward for economics. (shrink)

Reflexivity is a well-established theoretical and methodological concept in the human sciences, and yet it is used in a confusing variety of ways. The meaning of `reflexivity' and the virtues ascribed to the concept are relative to particular theoretical and methodological commitments. This article examines several versions of the concept, and critically focuses on treatments of reflexivity as a mark of distinction or source of methodological advantage. Although reflexivity often is associated with radical epistemologies, social scientists (...) with more conventional leanings often speak of reflexivity as a methodological tool, substantive property of social systems, or source of individual enlightenment. Radical and conventional social scientists alike tend to stress the importance of being reflexive, as opposed to being unreflexive, but they do not share a coherent conception of what `being reflexive' means or entails. As an alternative to reflexive self-privileging, I recommend an ethnomethodological conception of reflexivity as an ordinary, unremarkable and unavoidable feature of action. The ethnomethodological conception does not support a particular theoretical or methodological standpoint by contrasting it to an `unreflexive' counterpart. It has little value as a critical weapon or source of epistemological advantage, which, in the present context, can have advantages of its own for promoting peace and epistemic democracy. (shrink)

Un des effets de la radicalisation de la modernité tient à la montée de l’incertitude qui déstabilise les institutions les plus solides de notre culture, dont notamment la science, et à la généralisation de la sémantique du risque qui affecte les processus de prise de décision. Parmi les centres de recherche en sciences sociales spécialisés sur les risques en Europe, deux grands établissements ont retenu plus particulièrement notre attention en raison de leur polarité. Nous établirons des comparaisons entre deux projets (...) menés par Wolfgang Van den Daele, Wissenschaftszentrum , Berlin, et Robin Grove-White et Brian Wynne, Centre for the Study of Environmental Change , Lancaster. L’expérience menée par le WZB autour de l’évaluation des risques associés à la diffusion des organismes génétiquement modifiés dans l’agriculture et l’alimentation a conduit l’équipe à défendre une procédure strictement technique favorable à la normalisation des biotechnologies. Pour les chercheurs du CSEC, au contraire, l’élargissement des évaluations des innovations technologiques à des considérations éthiques, économiques, politiques et sociales s’impose. Le différend atteste de l’immersion des sciences et de leurs controverses dans des visions du monde et des Weltanschauungen : il compromet l’éventualité d’une entente entre les protagonistes du conflit.One of the consequences of advanced modernity is the intensification of uncertainty, which destabilizes the main institutions of our world. The production of knowledge and the legitimacy of decisions are mainly affected by this transformation, as the semantics of risk shows. We spent several stays at different research institutions in France, Germany and the United Kingdom to study the variations in the social sciences framing of risk issues. We will focus our attention on two teams of researchers, because of the exemplariness of their positions structuring the field. We follow a comparison between two projects led by Wolfgang Van den Daele at the Wissenschaftszentrum Berlin , and Robin Grove-White and Brian Wynne at the Centre for the Study of Environmental Change in Lancaster . Their conclusions based on an experiment to evaluate the risks associated with the introduction of GMOs in agriculture and food, differ radically. The WZB argues for a strict delimitation and restriction of risk assessment, while the CSEC argues for the integration of ethical and sociopolitical considerations in the discussions about the diffusion of technical innovations in society. The strength of both arguments illustrates the articulation of science and its controversies with Weltanschauungen and sociophilosophical background, which contribute to the stabilization of each position and thus reduces the chances for a resolution of controversy. (shrink)

Many scholars continue to accord routine action a central role in social theory and defend the continuing relevance of Bourdieu's habitus. Simultaneously, most recognize the importance of reflexivity. In this article, I consider three versions of the effort to render these concepts compatible, which I term "empirical combination," "hybridization," and "ontological and theoretical reconciliation." None of the efforts is ultimately successful in analytical terms. Moreover, I argue on empirical grounds that the relevance of habitus began to decrease toward the (...) end of the 20th century, given major changes in the structures of the advanced capitalist democracies. In these circumstances, habitual forms prove incapable of providing guidelines for people's lives and, thus, make reflexivity imperative. I conclude by arguing that even the reproduction of natal background is a reflexive activity today and that the mode most favorable to producing it—what I call "communicative reflexivity"—is becoming harder to sustain. (shrink)

The tertiary industry development has increased researches on service relationship and professional skills needed in relational professions. Universities and education fields have also adapted their programs to ensure students acquire these new skills. However, knowledge on the topic is still incomplete. At the same time, professions are required to rationalize their outputs. To meet this requirement, the use of reflexive approaches has become common. Despite the increase of these approaches, few data are available on how they are conceived and used. (...) In order to identify the current perspectives, this article presents the results of a scientific literature analysis on reflexivity in four relational professions : social work, education, nursing and psychology. After presenting these perspectives, the results will be then discussed. (shrink)

This article relates to the CJEU’s understanding of the concept of the spouse in Case C-673/16 and its effect on the process of law application by Polish administrative courts. The authors considerations are based on the assumption that the CJEU’s interpretation of EU law in Coman and Others is of a dynamic-deliberative nature, based on functional rules, and that at the same it time takes into account a specific legal and socio-cultural context in which one of the fundamental freedoms (...) guaranteed by EU law is implemented. This judgment, as authors underline, confirms that a proper understanding of the current legal context of the concept of a spouse requires that the social and cultural context and the plurality of values arising from different lifestyles be taken into account in the application and interpretation of the law, all with a view to empowering the individual in his or her relationship with the State and raising the level of protection of human rights. Authors observe in the practice od Polish administrative courts that this CJEU’s judgment is important in the argumentative layer, but not decisive for the resolution of the case in specific situations where there is a need to address the effect of same-sex marriage in a case related to the implementation of the EU right to free movement. In this context authors consider whether the justification for rulings of administrative courts may be sought in John Gray’s concept of modus vivendi liberalism. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:The Social, the Outer and the ReflexiveSome More Dimensions of Subjectivity, Schizophrenia, and Its RecoveryThe author reports no conflicts of interest.First of all, I want to express my gratitude to the Association for the Advancement of Philosophy and Psychiatry, Philosophy, Psychiatry, & Psychology, and the Karl Jaspers Award Committee for their recognition of my paper "Institution or individuality? Some reflections on the lessons to be learned from personal (...) accounts of recovery from schizophrenia" (Wannberg, 2024). I am also very thankful for Dr. Paul B. Lieberman's (2024) and Pr. Elizabeth Pienkos' (2024) stimulating comments on the paper.In the original paper, I used the case of the first person accounts of recovery from schizophrenia as a paradigm to elucidate the components of subjectivity more generally, as well as their logical relations. My main point was that considering the "recovery claim" as potentially endowed with a meaning sufficiently close to the official definition of the "personal" sense of recovery at stake—that is, in brief, having "become oneself" despite recurring or residual symptoms—invites us to question current phenomenological, narrative and constructionist approaches of the self in psychopathology. By contrast to these, I stressed the need of a conception of the self more sensible to its social and interpersonal dimensions, which I attempted to sketch out notably by resorting to Wittgenstein's (1953/1997) idea of "grammar." I am very happy that both Lieberman and Pienkos see the appeal to the social as a welcome move with regard to prevailing approaches to schizophrenia and its recovery. But what does it really mean for the subjective or the individual to be socially and interpersonally constituted, and how are we to account for that? [End Page 75]At a first glance, appealing to the social seems to be in line with current trends in psychopathology, including, as Pienkos points out, in the phenomenological tradition. She elsewhere announces a "shift in emphasis" currently taking place within phenomenological psychopathology, characterized by an increasing interest in the situated and dated aspects of subjectivity (Pienkos et al., 2023). This is a valuable turn. However, I am quite dubious that the well-known distinction between an "experiential" and a "narrative" self to which Pienkos appeals is apt to do all the conceptual work required to attain a satisfactory conception of the self and its social dimensions. In my original paper, I took the "recovery account" to challenge both these notions. As concerns the experiential dimension, I held that this type of account questions the phenomenologist's assumption that subjectivity is ultimately grounded in lived (self-)experience. Provided that typical symptoms of schizophrenia (e.g., thought insertion) are expressions of a disorder situated at this most "fundamental" level of the self and provided that they are stemming, at least according to one of the most widespread phenomenological models, from a trait-like disposition present before the onset of psychosis (e.g., Henriksen et al., 2019), it is quite natural to think that these symptoms persist in some form in the context of recovery (e.g., as intrusive thoughts or as "thoughts spoken out loud"). This is indeed the case for several of the authors "in recovery" in the Schizophrenia Bulletin's archives (e.g., Greenblat, 2000), which provided the main source of my analysis. But if this is so, we cannot see their recovery claim as an expression of a "whole" self, so to speak. So we must either say that "personal" recovery from schizophrenia is an illusion or a contradiction, or else we must revise the foundational status of the experiential dimension (other possible options are left aside for the purposes of this brief comment). I argue for the revisionist option. For the equation between the subjective and the experiential does not only lead to an unwelcomed skepticism about the recovery account. There are also more straightforward philosophical reasons for refusing it. Wittgenstein (1980) made a first important step by inviting us to better take into account the variability of the psychological concepts. He notably made a crucial categorical distinction between "lived experiences" (like sensations and mental images) and "attitudes" (like beliefs and intentions) such that all concepts which, when used in the first person... (shrink)

This article develops the thesis that normative social orders are always fore-structured by horizons of possibilities. The thesis is spelled out against the background of a criticism of ethnomethodology for its hermeneutic deficiency in coping with radical reflexivity. The article contributes to the debates concerning the status of normativity problematic in the cultural disciplines. The concept of hermeneutic pre-normativity is introduced to connote the interpretative fore-structuring of normative inter-subjectivity. Radical reflexivity is reformulated in terms of hermeneutic phenomenology.

The main purpose of this paper is to explore Pierre Bourdieu’s conception of social science. To this end, the paper sheds light on the main epistemological presuppositions that undergird Bourdieu’s defence of reflexive sociology as a scientific endeavour. The predominant view in the literature is that, in most of his writings,Bourdieu has a tendency to embrace a positivist conception of social science. When examining Bourdieu’s conception of social science in more detail, however, it becomes clear that the (...) assumption that he remains trapped in a positivist paradigm does not do justice to the complexity of his multifaceted account of social science. In order to illustrate the complexity of Bourdieu’s conception of social science, the following analysis scrutinises ten epistemological tensions which can be found in Bourdieu’s writings on the nature of knowledge production. In view of these epistemological tensions, a more fine-grained picture emerges which demonstrates that Bourdieu invites,and indeed compels, us to reflect upon the complexity of the various tension-laden tasks posed by the pursuit of a critical social science. (shrink)

The theory of “reflexive modernisation” requires not only the development of a novel view of society, but also the description of an entire new, already existing social state. In the light of this as well as in this society, the status and meaning of freedom and justice are different from those in modern political theories and modern societies. In what way and due to which theoretical and political reasons are the concept of ‘freedom’ and ‘justice’ eliminated in the (...) theory of “reflexive modernisation”, two indispensable concepts for political theory, and what is it that takes their place – are the most important questions the authoress attempts to answer. (shrink)

In response to Strydom, Nicoll and Gregg's queries, I draw out some further implications of my analysis of theory classrooms. I aim to clarify the theoretical basis of my concepts of social order and fetishism. I end by considering the pedagogical implications of my analysis. It seems to me that the contradiction between critical values and the classroom's forms of authority remain irresolvable.

How can one distinguish the concept of second modernity from the concept of postmodernity? Postmodernists are interested in deconstruction without reconstruction, second modernity is about deconstruction and reconstruction. Social sciences need to construct new concepts to understand the world dynamics at the beginning of the 21st century.Modernity has not vanished, we are not post it. Radical social change has always been part of modernity. What is new is that modernity has begun to modernize its own foundations. (...) This is what it means to say modernity has become reflexive. It has become directed at itself. This causes huge new problems both in reality and in theory. There has been a pluralization of the boundaries within and between societies, between society and nature, between Us and Other, between life and death. This pluralization also changes the inherent nature of boundaries. They become not so much boundaries as a variety of attempts to draw of boundaries. Border conflicts become transformed into conflicts over the drawing of boundaries. Where postmodernism simply celebrates this multiplication of boundaries, the theory of second modernity starts with the problem this new reality poses for individual and collective decisions, and with the problem that the continued existence of such decisions poses for theory. Institutions that are capable of such conscious boundary drawing are enabled in a way that those of the first modernity were not. But this process also generates qualitatively new kinds of trouble and crises. To investigate those troubles is to unveil the emergence of the second modernity. (shrink)

George Soros makes an important analytical contribution to understanding the concept of reflexivity in social science by explaining reflexivity in terms of how his cognitive and manipulative causal functions are connected to one another by a pair of feedback loops (Soros, 2013). Fallibility, reflexivity and the human uncertainty principle. Here I put aside the issue of how the natural sciences and social sciences are related, an issue he discusses, and focus on how his thinking applies in economics. (...) I argue that standard economics assumes a ‘classical’ view of the world in which knowledge and action are independent, but that we live in a complex reflexive world in which knowledge and action are interdependent. I argue that Soros's view provides a reflexivity critique of the efficient market hypothesis seen as depending on untenable claims about the nature of random phenomena and the nature of economic agents. Regarding the former, I develop this critique in terms of Cauchy distributions; regarding the latter I develop it in terms of rational expectations and rational addiction reasoning. (shrink)

This paper gives prescriptions for introducing ethical concerns into the economic theory of the firm. Topics include social responsibility, corporate governance, profit maximization, competition barriers, collusion, the market system, and welfare economics. The need for such prescriptions is based on a content analysis of 21 managerial economics texts for their coverage of ethics. My analysis finds that substantive discussions of ethics are conspicuous by their absence. As ethical breaches can involve significant monetary damages to a firm - particularly through (...) adverse market reactions - moral-reasoning abilities can complement analytical skills. Consequently, my analysis demonstrates how ethics figure into the opportunity costs of managerial decision making, which is central to the economic definition of profit. (shrink)

The relationship between knowledge and values, experts and lay people, represents a major issue of the debate involving environment and technology. There is a growing awareness that the connection between value commitments and technical solutions, scientific expertise and lay competence, is much more entangled than once was believed. The article deals with this issue by analysing Robert Dahl's `minipopulus' and Silvio Funtowicz and Jerry Ravetz's `extended peer communities' arguments. They are subsequently inserted into the sociological debate which is, at present, (...) considerably influenced by the reflexive modernization framework. As a result, Ulrich Beck's and Anthony Giddens' theories appear as one of four ideal-typical approaches to the social construction of the issues that can be outlined, according to the priority assigned to knowledge versus power and nature versus society. The idea of an `extended peer review' of problems and solutions is remarkably close to the deliberative democracy concept. However, the high level of uncertainty characterizing major environmental and technological questions suggests that a `strong' version of deliberative democracy, such as the Discourse Ethics proposed by Habermas, is untenable in its search for a universal, rational consensus on the normative grounds of action. Thus it is necessary to develop a `weak' interpretation of the extended peer review, exploring the possibility of fair and stable agreements on bounded, practical solutions to bounded, practical problems. (shrink)

This article examines how experimental psychology experienced a revolution as cognitive science replaced behaviorism in the mid-20th century. This transition in the scientific account of human nature involved making normal what had once been normative: borrowing ideas of democratic thinking from political culture and conceptions of good thinking from philosophy of science to describe humans as active, creatively thinking beings, rather than as organisms that simply respond to environmental conditions. Reflexive social and intellectual practices were central to this process (...) as cognitive scientists used anti-positivist philosophy of science simultaneously to justify their own work as valid and also as a model of human thinking. In the process, the normative philosophy of science or ‘good academic thinking’ that cognitive scientists used to reshape the discipline of psychology and characterize themselves became, at the same time, the descriptive model of human nature. (shrink)

Reflexive pluralism is here put forward as the conception that is most reasonable for supporters of political liberalism to hold at a period when the reasons justifying acceptance of political and religious pluralism seem inadequate.

Most work on reflexivity has focused on individuals exercising their reflexivity through discourse. However, agents have three major aspects (intentionality, causal efficacy and embodiment) and they are fundamentally social. This article examines the possibility of collective reflexivity conducted not just by saying, but also by doing—that is, through their embodiment. By expanding the concept of ‘performatives’ to encompass not just speech acts but also acts that speak (i.e. embodied activities as socially meaningful) and applying the work of Charles (...) S. Peirce in order to develop an ontology of embodied reflexivity, it becomes possible to determine several criteria defining embodied collective reflexivity. Assessing possibilities such as legislative debate, political demonstrations, religious ritual and dramatic performance reveals that a certain set of practices does in fact meet those criteria and discloses additional aspects of what constitutes embodied collective reflexivity. (shrink)

This article theorizes a research process in a highly politicized environment in which we, as feminist researchers, found ourselves standing outside the feminist standpoint which dominated Irish public discourse, viz advocacy of a Swedish-style, neo-abolitionist, prostitution policy. We suggest that our increasing personal and intellectual discomfort as that policy position gained support contained valuable epistemic insight. We theorize this principally by drawing on Pillow’s concept of ‘reflexivities of discomfort’. This article offers an account of the messy dynamics of a (...) research process in which we, in time, recognized our own psychosocial worlds as sites of social critique. We contribute to debates about reflexivity by exploring the insights which this approach brought when applied to the dynamics of power politics between us as researchers and the wider policy field within which we were immersed. (shrink)

The pandemic caused by the COVID 19 Virus creates an unprecedented situation of global confinement altering the development of competition and sports training at all levels of participation and in all sports, including rhythmic gymnastics (RG). To avoid possible effects of physical, technical and psychological detraining, coaches looked for home training alternatives. The objectives of the study were to know how rhythmic gymnastics training developed during the lockdown period (the conditions, type of training, performance monitoring means, and determinants of gymnasts’ (...) participation) and to provide recommendations for a possible future lockdown. Three hundred and two RG coaches from twenty-six different countries throughout the five continents and four professional levels took part in the study: national team (28), international (26), national (172) and regional (75). The data collection tool was a questionnaire consisting of 39 closed questions structured in three dimensions: identification data of the coaches, training data during confinement and gymnast participation data. The independent variable was the gymnasts’ performance levels and the dependent variables organized in four categories: the technical media used to conduct and monitor the training sessions, the type of training done, the mechanisms for monitoring training performance and the aspects that determined participation. Most coaches kept their gymnasts training during confinement, although 76.5% confirm abandonment of any of their gymnasts. The main means used were real-time video conferencing, although at the lower practice levels the media stand out in deferred time. The contents of the training were mainly body technique, physical preparation and body difficulties. For performance monitoring, challenges, physical, and technical tests were predominant. The determinants for the development of training in the confinement vary depending on the level of the gymnasts, connectivity and electronic resources at the highest level, and the availability of spaces and social distancing at lower levels. For future lockdowns, it is necessary to review the content of the trainings, as well as the performance evaluation and the means necessary for it. (shrink)

This paper gives prescriptions for introducing ethical concerns into the economic theory of the firm. Topics include social responsibility, corporate governance, profit maximization, competition barriers, collusion, the market system, and welfare economics. The need for such prescriptions is based on a content analysis of 21 managerial economics texts for their coverage of ethics. My analysis finds that substantive discussions of ethics are conspicuous by their absence. As ethical breaches can involve significant monetary damages to a firm – particularly through (...) adverse market reactions – moral-reasoning abilities can complement analytical skills. Consequently, my analysis demonstrates how ethics figure into the opportunity costs of managerial decision making, which is central to the economic definition of profit. (shrink)

This paper addresses the problem of reflexivity in modern social inquiry in general and in sociology in particular. This problem is inherited from Weber''s very conception of sociology, is transformed by phenomenology and ethnomethodology, deepened by the linguistic turn of hermeneutics and Wittgenstein''s later philosophy, and has been the central concern of the work of Alan Blum and Peter McHugh. The issues and spectres raised by reflexivity are methodological arbitrariness, the need to take responsibility for one''s own talk (and (...) the cultural assumptions embedded in talk) and, finally, the deep fear of nihilism – the sense that with regard to inquiry (along with everything else in the world) nothing matters. As such, reflexivity raises the most fundamental issue that can be raised for modern social inquiry. Through an oriented interpretation of the work of Blum and McHugh and other contemporary social theorists (particularly Gadamer and Arendt), this paper works through what a dialectical engagement with these issues look like. (shrink)

This paper analyses Soros' theory of reflexivity by breaking it down into several component concepts that are individually well analysed in existing literature – including performativity, self-reinforcing feedback loops and uncertainty. By focusing on the cognitive myopia implied by analytical monocultures and on the indeterminacy implied by innovation, it helps establish boundaries of applicability for reflexivity models. It argues that Soros largely ignores a key element in the formation of self-reinforcing delusions or market bubbles – the role played in conditions (...) of uncertainty by homogeneous social narratives and shared mental models. This paper also examines how social learning, rhetoric, power, emotional contagion, the discourse of ‘best practice’, ‘and Keynes' beauty contest may lead to such shared narratives and analytical homogeneity in markets. It concludes that market instability results when there is insufficient cognitive diversity or heterogeneity of beliefs among actors to enable them to spot anomalies and novelties. (shrink)

What makes trust such a powerful concept? Is it merely that in trust the whole range of social forces that we know play together? Or is it that trust involves a peculiar element beyond those we can account for? While trust is an attractive and evocative concept that has gained increasing popularity across the social sciences, it remains elusive, its many facets and applications obscuring a clear overall vision of its essence. In this book, Guido Möllering (...) reviews a broad range of trust research and extracts three main perspectives adopted in the literature for understanding trust. Accordingly, trust is presented as a matter of reason, routine or reflexivity. While all these perspectives contribute something to our understanding of trust, Möllering shows that they imply, but cannot explain, ‘suspension’ – the leap of faith that is typical of trust. He therefore proposes a new direction in trust research that builds on existing perspectives but places the suspension of uncertainty and vulnerability at the heart of the concept of trust. Beyond a purely theoretical line of argument, the author discusses implications for empirical studies of trust and presents original case material that captures the experience of trust in terms of reason, routine, reflexivity and suspension. Möllering concludes by suggesting how the new approach can enhance the relevance of trust research and its contributions to broader research agendas concerning the constitution of positive expectations in the face of prevalent uncertainty and change at various levels in our economies and societies. The book is essential reading for anyone who wants to gain a thorough understanding of trust. It can serve as a general introduction for advanced students and scholars in the social sciences, especially in economics, sociology, psychology and management. For more experienced researchers, it is a challenging and provocative critique of the field and a new approach to understanding trust. (shrink)

Labor market deregulation has been at the core of the changes in the political economy during the last decades. The pervasive neoliberal wisdom has depoliticized the nature and effects of this process, a bias that has also affected the scholarship, which often overlooks its power dimension. This article aims to explore the role of power in the labor market to offer some theoretical insights for empirical research and public debate. Departing from the worker–employer “contested exchange” at the workplace, the article (...) pivots on the concept of “decommodification” to grasp the institutional arrangements that shape this relationship at the institutional level of power. Furthermore, the article addresses the symbolic dimension of power and how epistemic reflexivity enables us to examine whether social research ideologically depicts or conceals the role of power in the study of labor relations, as illustrated by two subjects in vogue: the insiders–outsiders divide and the activation policy. The article concludes with a discussion of the normative implications of the preceding argument about freedom as nondomination for workers. (shrink)

Margaret Archer plays a leading role in the sociological analysis of the relation between structure and agency, and particularly in the study of reflexivity. The main aim of this article is to discuss her approach, focusing on the main contributions and limitations of Archer’s theory of reflexivity. It is argued that even though her research is a pioneering one, proposing an operationalization of the concept of reflexivity in view of its empirical implementation, it also minimizes crucial social factors (...) and the dimensions necessary for a more complex and multi-dimensional study of the concept, such as social origins, family socialization, processes of internalization of exteriority, the role of other structure–agency mediation mechanisms and the persistence of social reproduction. (shrink)

The main aim of this article is to offer a sociological concept of crisis that, defined as the expected yet non-lineal outcome of the internal dynamics of modern societies, builds on the synergies between critical theory and systems theory. It contends that, notwithstanding important differences, both traditions concur in addressing crises as a form of self-reproduction of social systems as much as a form of engagement with the complexities and effects of such processes of reproduction. In order to (...) make our comparison exhaustive, this article explores critical and systems theories’ notions of crisis at three levels: (1) their conceptual delimitation of crises; (2) their methodological proposals to empirically observe crises; and (3) their normative attempts to contribute to their resolution. As crises remain a distinctive structural feature of the social world and a rich source of knowledge about it, reflexivity must be seen as a crucial form of engagement with the negative expressions of social life itself. (shrink)

This paper gives prescriptions for introducing ethical concerns into the economic theory of the firm. Topics include social responsibility, corporate governance, profit maximization, competition barriers, collusion, the market system, and welfare economics. The need for such prescriptions is based on a content analysis of 21 managerial economics texts for their coverage of ethics. My analysis finds that substantive discussions of ethics are conspicuous by their absence. As ethical breaches can involve significant monetary damages to a firm – particularly through (...) adverse market reactions – moral-reasoning abilities can complement analytical skills. Consequently, my analysis demonstrates how ethics figure into the opportunity costs of managerial decision making, which is central to the economic definition of profit. (shrink)

The systemic complexity of sustainable development imposes a major cognitive challenge to students’ learning. Faculty can explore new approaches in the classroom to teach the topic successfully, including the use of technology. We conducted an experiment to compare the effectiveness of a simulation vis-à-vis a case-based method to teach sustainable development. We found that both pedagogical methods are effective for teaching this concept, although our results support the idea that simulations are slightly more effective than case studies, particularly to (...) teach its multidimensional and inter-temporal nature. Therefore, our findings suggest the use of both simulations and case studies as pedagogical tools to convey the main ideas associated with sustainable development. (shrink)

A lower tendency to influence and be influenced by their social environment seems almost self-evident in autism. However, a closer look at differences and similarities between autistic and non-autistic individuals suggests that some basic mechanisms involved in social influence might be intact in autism, whereas atypical responses point to differences in more sophisticated recursive social strategies, such as reputation management.

To understand the distinctive characteristics of the institutions of law, one needs to understand the idea of law. Understanding the nature of law is not ultimately a matter of achieving a careful description of social practices but a matter of grasping the idea towards which those practices must be understood as oriented. The idea of law is the focal point that enables us to make coherent sense of the otherwise diverse features of practice, but it is not itself a (...) matter of observable practice. It resembles a notional point in space that enables us to grasp the relationship between various parts of a complex drawing, although in itself it forms no part of the drawing. But how is such an idea to be investigated? We expect a clear understanding of the idea of law to explain our settled understandings about what will and will not count as an instance of legal ordering. We expect it, in other words, to explain some at least of the minimum conditions for applicability of the idea. But, since the idea of law is invoked within the practices of law, we also expect a philosophical understanding of that idea to clarify its role in guiding and orienting practice, and not simply in describing practice. Although the practices of law are oriented towards the idea of law, that idea is not straightforwardly available to be read in the surface appearance of the practices. For such practices, while involving systematic appeal to the idea of law, operate for the most part on the basis of that unreflective conformity that assists the stable functioning of most human institutions. Can we begin by identifying a "minimum specification" of the concept of law, in the form of a set of conditions without which nothing could count as law at all? From such a minimum specification, can we proceed in some orderly and intellectually defensible way towards "later phases" of the concept, with their "qualitative changes as well as additions and complications"? The possibility is worth exploring, however unfashionable may be the philosophical viewpoint from which it springs. Fuller's famous story of Rex, and his failed attempts to enact law, identifies the minimum conditions that something must satisfy in order to count as an instance of law. Fuller's theory becomes interesting when he proceeds to demonstrate that the eight desiderata (identified as minimum conditions), when taken collectively, be regarded as a guiding ideal for legal thought: the ideal that we usually label "the rule of law". Fuller claimed that his eight requirements represent an "inner morality of law". Hart's critique of Fuller appeared to suggest that the moral value of compliance with the eight requirements is wholly contingent upon the law's content, and that the eight requirements are more akin to precepts of efficiency than to moral standards. This criticism has been widely endorsed as correct. In fact, the criticism is not correct. The eight requirements are not principles of efficacy, but (when taken together) represent a moral ideal for legal systems. Fuller never really succeeded in giving a clear explanation of the moral status of his eight requirements. I argue that Fuller's eight desiderata represent an intrinsically moral ideal that we may call "freedom as independence from the power of another". This is the aspect of freedom that distinguishes the slave from the free man. My theory seeks to establish the existence of a very tight and necessary connection between law and morality. Positivists will find it impossible to deny that governance by law involves some degree of compliance with Fuller's eight requirements, and that such compliance necessarily involves the realisation of some degree of freedom as independence. If they are tempted to deny that freedom as independence is a distinct aspect of freedom, they must also argue that connections between slavery and the lack of freedom are purely contingent. If they accept that the lack of freedom as independece is what makes a slave a slave, but they deny that freedom as indepenence is a moral value, they must say that there is nothing intrinsically morally wrong with slavery: the moral wrongness of slavery would then have to be seen as stemming from purely contingent features of the slave's position. The value of freedom as independence may be thin. But it is real, it is genuinely valuable, and it is tightly connected to the existence of law. (shrink)

The article focuses on the fact that the consequence of Bourdieu’s death is that we now have to respond specifically to the texts that he produced between 1958 and 2002, rather than to the impact of writing and political action in combination, which was his goal during his life. The article raises general questions about the status of social texts in relation to the practices of philosophy and social scientific enquiry to which Bourdieu must have returned in preparing (...) his final course of lectures, published in 2001 as Science de la science et réflexivité. It then offers three case studies of this relationship in action in Bourdieu’s early work, considering his textual and scientific practices. It discusses aspects of the contemporary philosophical debate about the referentiality of texts at the time of this early work and thus indicates that this was a question of continuous importance in Bourdieu’s work. The article next reflects on the significance of Bourdieu’s thinking in this respect for the ways in which we should now respond to his texts and deploy his concepts empirically. It takes three examples of different ways in which Bourdieu’s texts have become pretexts for further research practice. These are characterized as ‘academic exploitation’, ‘nominal appropriation’ and ‘informed divergence’. The conclusion is that Bourdieu’s work demands a reflexive response, which requires that respondents should analyse rigorously their own situations and the grounds for transferring received concepts, and that this entails detailed attention to both Bourdieu’s texts and the contexts of their production, rather than a superficial exploitation or appropriation of his ‘consecrated’ texts. (shrink)

The starting point of this study is the concept of the “world-opening instance” one of the most carefully created concepts in philosophical reflection, from the predominance of the being, via consciousness, to a singular mode of experience which finds its support in finiteness and dispossession . The main points of the article are the analysis of the fragile itinerary of subjectivity, the study of Da-seinas the limit of the substantialist ontology, and the experience of negativity as an appropriate form (...) for illuminating the manifestation of the self. The article highlights the contrast between this and the experience of the “you”, proposed by Gadamer and by Habermas theory of communicative action. (shrink)

This chapter focuses on changing moral values associated with the provision of public goods, which incorporates an additional moral condition based on donor self-interest. Assistance for less-developed countries to replace ozone-depleting chlorofluorocarbons with non-ozone-depleting hydrofluorocarbons helps the donor country to achieve a thicker stratospheric ozone layer, which protects its own citizens, along with others. The elimination of corrupt practices can provide LDCs with markets for primary exports and lead to better provision of public goods. Improved economic conditions in these countries (...) through different economic and humanitarian measures can improve the prospects of secondary public goods sectors. Aggregator technologies can also play a key role in public goods assistance, with greater implications for the donor and recipient countries. (shrink)

Proceeding from the debate opened by Beck, Giddens and Lash’s Reflexive Modernization, this paper seeks to clear the way for a more consistent and coherent concept of reflexivity in relation to the cultural-symbolic foundations of society. Seeing that Lash in his contribution to the debate inadvertently raises a key problem, i.e., the broad cognitive problem, the paper develops a critique of his hermeneutic culturalism. It focuses on the disparity between the position explicitly put forward in the debate with Beck (...) and Giddens and the cognitive one which more or less implicitly comes into play throughout his relevant essays. The disparity shows up already in his treatment of the problem of mediation, but it comes graphically to a head in his appropriation of Bourdieu. To lend the analysis some profile and depth, the argument is supported by elements of a socio-cognitive theory which has been gaining visibility in both social theory and the philosophy of social science. While the paper is critical of Lash, its overall aim is to strengthen his contribution to the debate. (shrink)

The article talks about the postmodern approach to studying the problem of reflexive competence of future specialists, requires a comprehensive analysis of the organization and content of the educational process in higher education institutions. The postmodern concept of professional reflection and personal reflexivity of students is highlighted, it determines the ratio of these formations as unique individual phenomena, their influence on the formation and manifestation of professional and professional competence at the creative-professional, cognitive and personal-motivational levels. The concept (...) of reflectivity of the future specialist is specified. The structure of professional reflection of students is specified. The value of pedagogical practice for the development of professional reflection in future professionals from the standpoint of the postmodern approach is emphasized. The model of formation and development of personal-professional reflectivity in future specialists at the competence, cognitive, personal-motivational, emotional and evaluative-behavioral levels is presented. (shrink)