On the basis of ethnographic and historical material this article makes a comparative analysis of the relationship between public events, ceremonies and academic rituals, institutional identity, and processes of transition and power at two universities, one in Mexico and the other in South Africa. The public events examined here play a major role in imagining and bringing about political shifts within universities as well as between universities and external actors. It shows how decisive local histories and constituencies are in mediating (...) and transfiguring identity projects initiated from above. (shrink)

On the basis of ethnographic and historical material this article makes a comparative analysis of the relationship between public events, ceremonies and academic rituals, institutional identity, and processes of transition and power at two universities, one in Mexico and the other in South Africa. The public events examined here play a major role in imagining and bringing about political shifts within universities as well as between universities and external actors. It shows how decisive local histories and constituencies are in mediating (...) and transfiguring identity projects initiated from above. (shrink)

The paper presents a renewed Habermasian view on transnational multi-stakeholder initiatives and assesses the institutional characteristics of the Equator Principles Association from a deliberative democracy perspective. Habermas’ work has been widely adopted in the academic literature on the political responsibilities of corporations, and also in assessing the democratic qualities of MSIs. Commentators, however, have noted that Habermas’ approach relies very much on ‘nation-state democracy’ and may not be applicable to democracy in MSIs—in which nation-states are virtually absent. We argue that (...) Habermas’ detailed conceptualization of the institutionalization of deliberative democracy can be applied to transnational MSIs if these initiatives can be said to have their own ‘dèmoi’ that can be represented in associational decision-making. Therefore, we develop a definition of the dèmos of an MSI based on the notion of collective agency. Subsequently, we explain how Habermas’ approach to democracy can be applied to MSIs and show that it has more to offer than hitherto has been uncovered. Our illustrative analysis of the EPA confirms the criticisms regarding this MSI which have recently been articulated by researchers and practitioners, but also yields new findings and possible avenues for the further development of the EPA: That is, although our assessment suggests that the EPA in its current state is still far from being a democratic MSI, the possibility of a sensible analysis of its democratic character indicates that transnational MSIs can, in principle, help to fill governance gaps in a democratic way. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Communicating Conversion:Penitential Turn Transmission in the Early Franciscan FraternityKrijn PanstersIntroductionThe literature on religious conversion shows that there is no comprehensive inventory of individual conversion stories that may provide the basic materials for a genealogy of Christian conversion, or of a further examination of its tradition.1 The scholarly interpretations that we have almost exclusively concern conversion narratives about anonymous masses, such as the Saxons under Charlemagne, or the conversions of (...) a limited number of famous people.2 These include the "usual suspects" such as St. Paul, whose conversion led him to become a follower of Jesus,3 St. Augustine, who also converted to Christianity,4 John Wesley, whose conversion led him to begin his own ministry,5 and Thomas Merton, who converted to Catholicism and became a priest.6 To this exclusive crowd of icons of Christian conversion certainly belongs St. Francis of Assisi (†1226), [End Page 171] whose exemplary conversion experience centers on penance (recognition of himself as a sinner, conversion of the heart, rejection of worldly life, imitation of Christ) and whose case is special and exceptional in that the event of the commencement of his penitential life remains the essence of the core of his spiritual preaching and teaching.In this article, I will therefore deal with Francis's penitential turn transmission—his communication of a spiritual propositum based on conversion from sin to virtue—and thus with his main spiritual message.7 I will start with a short description of how Francis turned his conversion experience, an episode that has been studied extensively as an important part of his biography, into the cornerstone of his spiritual transmission, viz., his promotion of a new religious program. I will continue with a contextualization of Francis's communication of conversion from a broader historical-theological perspective. I will then analyze the deeper dimensions of his call to conversion, viz., his instruction of "doing penance" in terms of turning from sin to virtue. I will conclude with a reflection on the continuation of his spiritual transmission within the Franciscan order and, furthermore, on the comparison with other "conversional communications" in the Christian tradition.Francis's Communication of ConversionFrancis described his conversion to a life of "doing penance" as the outcome of an encounter with outcasts, after which "what had seemed bitter to me was turned into sweetness of soul and body" and he "delayed a little and left the world."8 In this confession, he conceptualized his religious [End Page 172] turnabout as the start of the penitential life and, with this, as an invitation to his readers to also change the orientation and direction of their lives and to switch from worldliness to otherworldliness—to the realization, from now on, not of worldly but of heavenly goods. It is very likely that Francis had already heard the call to conversion and penitential life in the encounter with certain Gospel texts.9 As is evident from his conversional account, however, he truly "first recognized himself as a sinner"10 in an encounter with lepers. It was this spiritual event, causing a moral shift from selfishness to social concern,11 that brought about a radical reorientation toward a life of faith, a remarkable religious renewal, and a rapid replacement of sin with salvation. It was also this existential experience, this self-perceived transition "from damnation to redemption," that came to represent the essence of the evangelical program that Francis developed in the following years. In the words of André Vauchez:The text of the Gospel to which Francis and his companions never ceased referring in their preaching included this dimension: "Do penance! The kingdom of heaven is at hand!" (or "is coming," according to the other version of Matthew 4:17 then in circulation). But the conversion to which they were inviting [End Page 173] their listeners was not presented as a simple preparation or preliminary step that was necessary to pass through in order to attain perfection. It already included entry into this "kingdom of heaven," which it was helping to create here and now (hinc et nunc). Far from any millenarian speculation or complex divisions of the history of salvation which certain ecclesiastical authors... (shrink)

The year 2019 marked 900 years ago since Francis of Assisi’s visit to Egypt to visit Sultan Al-Kamil and speak to him about Christ. All around the world, people celebrated this important event as a groundbreaking Christian-Muslim encounter, often seen as the first example or one of the earliest forms of interreligious dialogue.1 Nothing is known about what the saint and the sultan talked about, and we are not sure about the true motives of Francis on this mission and about (...) the sultan’s true reasons for receiving Francis. Francis probably intended to do what he describes in chapter 16 of his own rule as good behavior in those who go among the Saracenes: “As for the brothers who go, they can live spiritually among... (shrink)

The Franciscan Movement in the Netherlands is an association of people who are moved by the evangelical ideal of Francis and Clare of Assisi. Its members are lay and religious people who aim to live a spiritual life characterized by solidarity and simplicity. In this article, I will describe the lively spirituality of the "Franciscaanse Beweging", a movement that started as a "Franciscan Cooperation" seeking to deepen Franciscan spirituality within religious communities in the 1950s but that changed its course and (...) expanded rapidly after the Second Vatican Council.63In 1987, Gerard Pieter Freeman, staff member of the Franciscan Cooperation, explained in an article on Franciscan spirituality and... (shrink)

This book assembles leading legal, political, and moral philosophers to examine the legacy of the work of Ronald Dworkin. They provide the most comprehensive critical treatment of Dworkin's accomplishments focusing on his work in all branches of philosophy, including his theory of value, political philosophy, philosophy of international law, and legal philosophy. The book's organizing principle and theme reflect Dworkin's self-conception as a builder of a unified theory of value, and the broad outlines of his system can be found throughout (...) the book. The first section addresses the most abstract and general aspect of Dworkin's work--the unity of value thesis. The second section explores Dworkin's contributions to political philosophy, and discusses a number of political concepts including authority, civil disobedience, the legitimacy of states and the international legal system, distributive justice, collective responsibility, and Dworkin's master value of dignity and the associated values of equal concern and respect. The third section addresses various aspects of Dworkin's general theory of law. The fourth and final section comprises accounts of the structure and defining values of discrete areas of law. (shrink)

So cial re search is no lon ger fo cused on the “ob ject” of re al ity, but on and from an af fec tive space relationality in which the “ob jects” form part of the sig nif i cance and sym bol iza tion re la - tions of the sub jects that act inter-sub jec tively. In view of this co-existencial t..

Recent years have witnessed major developments in philosophical inquiry concerning the nature of law and, with the growth of transnational legal institutions, in the phenomenon of law itself. This volume gathers leading writers in the field to take stock of current debates on the nature of law and the aims and methods of legal philosophy.

Illative combinatory logic consists of the theory of combinators or lambda calculus extended by extra constants (and corresponding axioms and rules) intended to capture inference. The paper considers 4 systems of illative combinatory logic that are sound for first-order propositional and predicate calculus. The interpretation from ordinary logic into the illative systems can be done in two ways: following the propositions-as-types paradigm, in which derivations become combinators, or in a more direct way, in which derivations are not translated. Both translations (...) are closely related in a canonical way. In a preceding paper, Barendregt, Bunder and Dekkers, 1993, we proved completeness of the two direct translations. In the present paper we prove completeness of the two indirect translations by showing that the corresponding illative systems are conservative over the two systems for the direct translations. In another version, DBB (1997), we shall give a more direct completeness proof. These papers fulfill the program of Church and Curry to base logic on a consistent system of $\lambda$ -terms or combinators. Hitherto this program had failed because systems of ICL were either too weak (to provide a sound interpretation) or too strong (sometimes even inconsistent). (shrink)

Illative combinatory logic consists of the theory of combinators or lambda calculus extended by extra constants (and corresponding axioms and rules) intended to capture inference. In a preceding paper, [2], we considered 4 systems of illative combinatory logic that are sound for first order intuitionistic propositional and predicate logic. The interpretation from ordinary logic into the illative systems can be done in two ways: following the propositions-as-types paradigm, in which derivations become combinators, or in a more direct way, in which (...) derivations are not translated. Both translations are closely related in a canonical way. In the cited paper we proved completeness of the two direct translations. In the present paper we prove that also the two indirect translations are complete. These proofs are direct whereas in another version, [3], we proved completeness by showing that the two corresponding illative systems are conservative over the two systems for the direct translations. Moreover we shall prove that one of the systems is also complete for predicate calculus with higher type functions. (shrink)

Illative combinatory logic consists of the theory of combinators or lambda calculus extended by extra constants intended to capture inference. In a preceding paper, [2], we considered 4 systems of illative combinatory logic that are sound for first order intuitionistic propositional and predicate logic. The interpretation from ordinary logic into the illative systems can be done in two ways: following the propositions-as-types paradigm, in which derivations become combinators, or in a more direct way, in which derivations are not translated. Both (...) translations are closely related in a canonical way. In the cited paper we proved completeness of the two direct translations. In the present paper we prove that also the two indirect translations are complete. These proofs are direct whereas in another version, [3], we proved completeness by showing that the two corresponding illative systems are conservative over the two systems for the direct translations. Moreover we shall prove that one of the systems is also complete for predicate calculus with higher type functions. (shrink)

The Flemish Movement was born out of the democratic and especially, the national enthusiasm of the Belgian revolution of 1830. lts purpose was the recovery of the people language in public life. Till the defeat of France in the France-German war of 1870-1871 she wanted to protect Belgium from annexation by France. The revolution of 1848 in Europe and the threat of Belgium by «the dictator» Napoleon III, reinforced its democratic character and connected it with the movement for enlargement of (...) the voting-right, for decentralization and anti-militarism. Therefore she was supported also from the Walloon patriots and democrats, especially out of the catholic party.From 1847 onwards its morale and politics which were close to the church opinion, were openly tempted by a group for whom the Flemish Movement had to have a liberal character. In that group, most of them rejected the enlargement of votingright because it would be in the interest of the catholics, and they condamned the cooperation of some liberals with the Flemish minded catholics. The introduction of the universal suffrage in 1893 led to a reinforced Flamingant agitation.She was backed upon the christian-democrat peasant- and labour movement, but did get little response in the socialist party. The interest for political action in the Flemish Movement stayed weak. (shrink)

Definition of the problem: Stem cell transplantations from umbilical cord blood, especially if from autologous origin, are often treated with distrust. Not only are the therapeutic effects controversial, but the question of ownership is also hard to answer from an ethical point of view. Furthermore, the extraction of umbilical cord blood is already related to information about the factual and potential health condition of the child and its parents. Arguments and conclusion: The three problems will be discussed separately. Despite certain (...) uncertainties, there are no weighty ethical arguments against the extraction of umbilical cord blood for autologous purposes. The owner of the umbilical cord blood should be the mother. The question of information is not at all typical for this problem area and does not carry more weight here than in other relevant medical situations. (shrink)

Zusammenfassung. Stammzellen-Transplantationen aus Nabelschnurblut, vor allem solchen aus autologer Quelle, wird oft mit Misstrauen begegnet. Die therapeutischen Effekte sind umstritten, aber auch die Eigentumsfrage lässt sich aus ethischer Sicht nicht leicht beantworten. Darüber hinaus ist bereits die Gewinnung von Nabelschnurblut mit Informationen über den faktischen und potentiellen Gesundheitszustand des Kindes und seiner Eltern verbunden. Die drei Problemgebiete werden einzeln gewichtet. Trotz bestehender Unsicherheiten stehen der Gewinnung von Nabelschnurblut zu autologen Zwecken keine gravierenden ethischen Argumente entgegen. Eigentümer des Nabelschnurblutes sollte die (...) Mutter sein. Die Informationsfrage ist keineswegs typisch für diesen Problembereich und wiegt hier nicht schwerer als in anderen relevanten medizinischen Situationen. (shrink)

This paper is an exploration of the concept equal value as it applies to pay equity. Following a brief discussion of several standard objections to pay equity legislation, the paper considers a number of different criteria which are employed in determining equal value or worth. Two in particular are isolated for extended discussion: the desert and the contribution criteria. The paper concludes with a major concern about the phrase equal value to the employer. This concern becomes pressing once the desert (...) and contribution criteria are distinguished. (shrink)

Artikelen over intersubjectiviteit in ethiek, spiritualiteit en filosofie.

This paper explores the ambiguous notion of bodily integrity, focusing on male and female circumcision. In the empirical part of the study we describe and analyse the various meanings that are given to the notion of bodily integrity by people in their daily lives. In the philosophical part we distinguish (1) between a person-oriented and a body-oriented approach and (2) between four levels of interpretation, i.e. bodily integrity conceived of as a biological wholeness, an experiential wholeness, an intact wholeness, and (...) as an inviolable wholeness. We argue that bodily integrity is a prima facie principle in its own right, closely connected with, but still fundamentally different from, the principle of personal autonomy, that is, autonomy over the body. (shrink)

This history of human origin studies covers a wide range of disciplines. This important new study analyses a number of key episodes from palaeolithic archaeology, palaeoanthropology, primatology and evolutionary theory in terms of various ideas on how one should go about such reconstructions and what, if any, the uses of such historiographical exercises can be for current research in these disciplines. Their carefully argued point is that studying the history of palaeoanthropological thinking about the past can enhance the quality of (...) current research on human origins. The main issues in the present volume are the uses of disciplinary history in terms of present-day research concerns, the relative weight of cultural and other 'external' contexts, and continuity and change in theoretical perspectives. The book's overall approach is an epistemological one. It does not, in other words, primarily address anthropological data as such, but our ways of handling such data in terms of our most fundamental, but usually quite implicit theoretical presuppositions. (shrink)

Erst kommt das Leben, dann der Tod, denken viele. Doch schon das Verweilen vor einem Grab eröffnet einen Dialog, der das Band zwischen dem Vergangenen und Gegenwärtigen spürbar werden lässt: Das Band der Kommunikation zwischen den Toten und den Lebenden scheint unzerreißbar. Der Tod? der eigene und der der anderen - ist eine Kategorie des Lebens, die jeden von uns zur Auseinandersetzung zwingt.0Das Buch von Jean-Pierre Wils ist seit langer Zeit der erste, großangelegte Versuch einer Lehre vom Tod, einer Thanatologie, (...) die ein umfassendes Panorama entfaltet: Todesarten, Todesangst, Todeszeitpunkt werden zum Thema ebenso wie die Frage nach der Unsterblichkeit, dem angemessenen Trösten und den Riten der Bestattung. Angesichts des Todes kommt die Philosophie an ihre Grenze? darum holt der Autor der Philosophie eine?Weggefährtin auf der Erkundungsfahrt zum Tod? an die Seite, nämlich die Literatur. So wird das Buch zu einem einmaligen Grenzgang zwischen Philosophie und Literatur, zwischen Reflexion und Narration und beglaubigt den Satz von Saint-Exupéry:?Es wird aussehen, als wäre ich tot, und das wird nicht wahr sein.? (shrink)

Over the last few decades there has been a revival of interest in virtue ethics, with the emphasis on the virtuous caregiver. This paper deals with the ‘virtuous patient’, specifically the patient with End Stage Renal Disease (ESRD). We believe that a virtue approach provides insights not available to current methods of studying coping styles and coping strategies. Data are derived from seven semi-structured in-depth interviews. The transcripts of the interviews were subjected to an Interpretative Phenomenological Analysis (IPA). The focus (...) of the analysis was on ‘living well with chronic illness’. It appears that the moral challenges faced by patients with an ESRD are manifold. When they are invited to tell the story of their illness, they do not explicitly speak of virtues, but they often refer to moral qualities, and to attitudes that can be regarded as virtuous. We identify several such concepts in the narratives of patients with ESRD. We conclude that the Aristotelian model of virtue ethics is particularly descriptively (and possibly also normatively) relevant to the explanation of the life narratives and the moral challenges of patients with an ESRD. (shrink)