La democracia en el texto es vista desde una perspectiva integral u onmicomprensiva que complementa la parte instrumental (procedimiento electoral) con la sustancial (goce efectivo de derechos humanos) basado en la concienciación de una real dignidad humana que permita que la persona realice su proyecto de vida, disfrute de sus derechos y funcione efectivamente en la sociedad dentro del Estado democrático constitucional: la interrelación e interdependencia entre democracia, dignidad humana y Estado constitucional de derecho resulta para el autor un norte (...) el cual hay que seguir a cada instante. El libro muestra la importancia de la dogmática actual de la Corte Constitucional colombiana sobre derechos fundamentales, lo cual es un aporte latinoamericano a la estructuración de un constitucionalismo que contribuya con soluciones a favor de la libertad y la justicia en función de la persona humana en un escenario de tensiones evidentes entre la globalización y nacionalismos populistas y patrioteros. En el sentido expresado en el punto anterior la obra del profesor Caldera corrobora la relevancia que dicha dogmática le atribuye a la funcionalidad de los DerechosFundamentales con el logro del contenido normativo de la dignidad humana. Así, para Caldera Ynfante y desde su especial interpretación de la democracia cumple con los requisitos dogmáticos entronizados por la Corte Constitucional para ser considerado como un derecho fundamental generador de todos los efectos instrumentales y sustanciales que le son señalados. El texto nos lleva a establecer conceptualmente con un propósito práctico que la democracia integral, es decir, entendida como derecho fundamental es posible asumirla desde la perspectiva de la denominada teoría de la integralidad de los DDHH a partir de la Declaración y Plan de Acción de Viena sobreDDHH de 1993, instrumento del derecho internacional que resulta apical a partir del cual considera como fundamentales todos los Derechos Humanos. En consecuencia para el autor la democracia integral, como derecho fundamental, es posible asumirla desde la perspectiva del Enfoque Basado enDDHH y así puede ser defendida ante cualquier sistema de protección, ora universal o regional. Por otra parte es necesario para el lector reflexionar en torno al sentido de una democracia integral que para el autor es asumida como una meta garantía de losDDHH; es decir, como el derecho fundamental de los derechos fundamentales. (shrink)

Para quienes tengan interés en la filosofía moral y política contemporánea la obra de John Rawls es sin discusión una parada necesaria. De hecho, la tesis de Robert Nozick según la cual resulta imposible hacer filosofía moral y política sin considerar el marco ofrecido por Rawls, aunque parezca extrema, resulta bastante acertada. En gran medida el impacto de la obra de Rawls radica en su interés por ofrecer una teoría sustantiva de la justicia, teoría que hundiendo sus raíces en la (...) tradición de la filosofía sea capaz de orientarnos al momento de abordar las discusiones contemporáneas sobre justicia social. -/- En los trabajos que componen este libro el lector podrá encontrar una discusión actualizada sobre aquellos elementos que definen la base moral y política que Rawls presentó como fundamento de su teoría de la justicia. Al mismo tiempo, estos ensayos intentan construir un puente entre la justicia como equidad y otras tradiciones de la filosofía moral y política contemporánea. Para lograr este último fin, varios de los trabajos que aquí se presentan consideran las ideas de reconocimiento y autorrespeto como claves de interpretación de la obra de Rawls. (shrink)

World Crisis and Underdevelopment examines the impact of poverty and other global crises in generating forms of structural coercion that cause agential and societal underdevelopment. It draws from discourse ethics and recognition theory in criticizing injustices and pathologies associated with underdevelopment. Its scope is comprehensive, encompassing discussions about development science, philosophical anthropology, global migration, global capitalism and economic markets, human rights, international legal institutions, democratic politics and legitimation, world religions and secularization, and moral philosophy in its many varieties.

The social science literature on identity politics around questions of race and ethnicity is profuse, prolix and contentious. Indigenous identity politics have seen a parallel growth and are equally complex. While there are analogies and overlaps, indigenous identities and social movements are neither conceptually nor empirically a sub-set of ethnic identities. The central issue of indigenous groups is the place of first peoples in relation to the nation-state system. This takes different forms in old world states of Asia and Africa (...) to those of new world settler states of the Americas and Australasia. While the major issues of the indigenous peoples have expanded beyond their national boundaries, their modes of participation in the national political arenas vary. They share a gradual nationalization of indigenous movements, including stronger links with socio-political forces of the respective countries in the region, a heightened consciousness of global processes and the broadening and enrichment of their socio-cultural and economic objectives. This paper looks at trans-national dimensions of indigenous social movements and identity politics in relation to nation-state policy regimes and examines the varying routes taken by indigenous peoples to achieve their goals. (shrink)

This paper studies the relation between modern democracy and Chinese cultural patterns. It introducing the concept of 'Multiple Others' to explain how the classical concept of harmony can help integrating cultural and social differences within a social body, thus allowing social cohesion to integrate diversity. The main classical concepts of ren, li, and yi are analyzed in both Confucianism and Daoism, and compared to the concepts of recognition and dialogue developed by modern political theorists like Ch. Taylor and J. Habermas.

This article combines the neo-Hegelian theory of recognition with an analysis of social pathologies to show how the populist formulations of political goals in struggles for recognition are – despite their potential positive motivating force – socially pathological. The concept of recognition, combined with the idea of social pathologies, can thus be used to introduce normative considerations into the populism analysis. In this article it is argued that, although populism is useful in the sense that it aims to ameliorate real (...) experienced lack of recognition through fostering political movements, it is also harmful. The simplified populist representations of collective identities are often guilty of essentializing and reifying identities. Furthermore, populist identities are also harmful for the populists themselves as the simplified view is applied also to oneself. This article claims that these dynamics can be understood as an obstruction of discursive identity-formation. From the perspective developed, populism leads to the lack of genuine mutual recognition between those who struggle to get their identities affirmed. (shrink)

The purpose of this article is a critical reflection on the field of educational administration and its varied and often conflicting epistemologies. It is argued that the field of educational administration is a community of diverse epistemologies. Although epistemological heterogeneity has been persistently vilified by both theorists and pragmatists with their own discursive agendas, it is this precise environment of critical dialogue and diversity that is conducive to new frontiers in the field. A phenomenology of recognition is thus presented as (...) a showcase for the possibility of approaching and expanding the field topically rather than treatise-like generalizations at the macro level, which are mostly dated discussions on philosophy of science. The principal value of the article is showing alternative pathways—not limited to the discussions about theory of recognition—to new frontiers in educational administration by demonstrating the possibility of thematic theory developments in the field and defending the diversity of existing epistemologies in the field as an asset rather than a liability for further development in the field. (shrink)

This paper examines recent forms of post-identity thought within contemporary gender theory, specifically the works of Rosi Braidotti, Elizabeth Grosz and Bobby Noble. Despite the many insights that these theories offer, I argue that they suffer from what Lois McNay has labelled ‘social weightlessness’ insofar as their models of subjectivity and agency are disconnected from the everyday realities of social subjects. I identify two ways in which this social weightlessness is manifested in radical gender theories that endorse a post-identity politics: (...) they overlook the social and political importance to many individuals of establishing stable, coherent identities; they are unable to offer a satisfactory account of agency. I suggest that these issues arise, at least in part, from the anti-recognition stance adopted by such radical gender theorists. I argue that by incorporating a properly nuanced model of recognition back into their theories they can imbue their accounts with a properly grounded model of the subject that is responsive to the inequalities and oppressions that infuse the particular concrete contexts in which we experience and live out our identities. (shrink)

Most readers of Habermas would not classify him as an existential thinker. The view of Habermas as a philosopher in German Idealist and Critical traditions from Kant to Hegel and Marx to the Frankfurt School prevails among Continental as much as among analytic philosophers. And the mainstream Anglo-American reception of his work and politics is shaped by the approaches of formal analysis rather than those of existential and social phenomenology or even current American pragmatism. One may argue that both these (...) readings eclipse richer existential dimensions of a thinker who challenges the notorious methodological and political splits among analytic, Continental and pragmatist orientations. I argue that Habermas’ critical relation to Heidegger’s a historical history of Being and his misguided political career cannot explain a competing narrative of his own affirmative appropriation of existential-ethical dimensions of thought and activism. Second, if one sets in the foreground this competing narrative, there emerges a weak thesis, whether or not a plausible complementarity between the communications critical social theory and concrete existential categories can be established. Third, one may inquire further into a stronger thesis whether or not this link must be developed in order to render Habermas’ own theory of a communicatively competent self sufficiently concrete and critical. (shrink)

In order to facilitate cooperation to solve problems within a nation-state, a new approach which conceptualizes citizenship in terms of shared fate has been promoted to potentially ameliorate the tensions identified between civic liberty and solidarity. Proponents of an emphasis on shared fate frame it not in terms of a particular shared national identity, but in terms of participation in the shared project of the nation-state. The approach of singular shared fate rightly emphasizes the urgency of finding a common ground (...) for people to cultivate obligations to others and achieve sincere cooperation in a society. Unfortunately, in some cases it leaves room for some people to undermine the common ground and its good intention, however, as the promotion of a view of singular shared fate risks producing a hegemonic singular nation building project and predesigning an agreement before a truly inclusive and just dialogue among relevant stakeholders proceeds. To make the good intentions of the notion of shared fate realizable, a modification is explored, in recasting the concept of singular “shared fate” to plural “shared fates”. Given the situation that people in societies have the plural shared fates de facto, the view of plural shared fates recognizes that people will reject any singular substantial nation building project that has a predesigned direction. In current, divided societies, acknowledging multiple fates at the beginning, rather than predesigning a singular fate, can better provide a platform for all stakeholders to discuss their obligations to others toward sincere cooperation through equal co-construction of what is shared and what is not shared. To enhance civic education in a multicultural society, we suggest that complementing the concept of singular “shared fate” with a recognition of the value of plural “shared fates” can provide a context for all people to work together towards a more inclusive and just future. (shrink)

In the context of the fairly recent Truth and Reconciliation Commissions (TRC), I examine phenomenologically the nature of truth as the essential condition for overcoming social and political conflicts, and as an instrument for enforcing so-called “transitional justice” periods and promoting reconciliation. I also briefly approach the limits of this truth’s possibility of being recognized, if its evaluative and practical dimensions and its appeal to an “intelligence of emotions” do not prevail over its merely theoretical claims. Though not expounding Schutz’s (...) and Husserl’s contributions, and meditating on phenomena they did not deal with, I carry out this reflection inspired by their work and methodological approach. The case study used as an intuitive illustration is the recent Peruvian Truth and Reconciliation Commission. (shrink)

Thanks to Axel Honneth, recognition theory has become a prominent fixture of critical social theory. In recent years, he has deployed his recognition theory in diagnosing pathologies and injustices that afflict institutional practices. Some of these institutional practices revolve around specifically juridical institutions, such as human rights and democratic citizenship, that directly impact the lives of the most desperate migrants. Hence it is worthwhile asking what recognition theory can add to a critical theory of migration. In this paper, I argue (...) that, although its contribution to a critical theory of migration is limited, it nonetheless carves out a unique body of ethical insights related to diagnosing the interpretative and epistemic pathologies and injustices associated with the legal processing of migrants’ claims for asylum. Going beyond discourse ethics, which mainly highlights procedural violations of legislative and judicial deliberation, it trains our gaze on the institutional biases that lead migrants to be misrecognized or under-recognized as credible witnesses to their own refugee status. (shrink)

Identity and democracy and, more particularly, national identity and deliberative democracy account for a controversial relationship. However, from a classical deliberative democratic point of view, the controversy over who is the ‘we’ that needs to stand together in contemporary complex societies settled with the constitution of modern states. In this sense, the main contribution of this paper is twofold. On the one hand, I rebut the analytical appropriateness and conceptual coherence of Habermas’ discursive approach to democracy for the case of (...) plurinational societies in contemporary constitutional democracies. A discussion of a test case – Catalonia – demonstrates that this inadequacy renders incoherent the deliberative model regarding one of its most fundamental premises: the equal weight of the principles of law and the principle of democracy. On the other hand, I sustain that the challenge is not about identity but democracy, and more particularly, about the role deliberative democracy is called to play when controversy challenges whether the people of a state do conform to a single people or not. More concretely, I explore the opportunities offered by the systemic turn to sustain a more realistic approach to deliberative democracy regarding its capacity to steer society towards integration in the context of the system of public deliberation. (shrink)

This paper sees Charles Taylor's moral discourse as a version of liberal communitarianism, an attempt to reconcile liberalism and communitarianism, by examining his three transcendental arguments: the liberal transcendence from the parochial to the universal; the communi tarian transcendence from the instinctual to the ontological; and the theistic transcendence from the good to God. While this liberal communi tarianism absorbs some great insights from both liberalism and communi tarianism and overcomes some of their respective weaknesses, it fails to avoid their (...) common dichotomy of the good and the right because Taylor's fundamentally communitarian commitment leads him to believe that there must be a universal ontological (religious or metaphysical) idea of the good as the foundation for any needed universal social and political idea of the right. (shrink)

Global-scale solar geoengineering raises critical ethical questions, including questions of distributive, procedural, and intergenerational justice. Although geoengineering is sometimes framed as a response to injustice, insofar as it might benefit those most vulnerable to climate-related harms, geoengineering also has the potential to exacerbate climate injustice, especially if control of research, governance, and potential plans for deployment remains concentrated in the hands of a few. The scope and scale of solar geoengineering, the diverse concerns it raises, and the lack of consensus (...) surrounding it pose particular challenges for justice. I argue that addressing these challenges requires an inclusive, dialogical approach that takes seriously diverse perspectives, particularly the perspectives of those who are most affected by climate change and those who have had the least voice in decisions surrounding it. The concept of recognition––as developed in the work of Nancy Fraser, David Schlosberg, and others––offers a normative ground for this approach and can help guide the development of institutions and practices directed toward geoengineering justice. (shrink)

This is an introduction to a special issue on recognition and democracy. We outline the constitutive and enabling relations between democracy and recognition. We distinguish between pre-political and political forms of identity and recognition, between horizontal and vertical forms of recognition, and between democratic and other ways or arranging the vertical and horizontal aspects of political life. We also distinguish between the roles of a subject and a co-author of law. The intruduction also includes an overview of the individual articles (...) in this special issue. The issue tries to fill some theoretical gaps in theories of democracy and recognition, with a special emphasis on feminist politics. (shrink)

This paper draws from two central intuitions that characterize modern western societies. The first is the normative claim that our identities should be recognized in an authentic way. The second intuition is that our common matters are best organized through democratic decision-making and democratic institutions. It is argued here that while deliberative democracy is a promising candidate for just organization of recognition relationships, it cannot fulfil its promise if recognition is understood either as recognition of ‘authentic’ collective identities or as (...) recognition of too atomistic or individualized subjects. If deliberative democracy is to be understood as successfully providing authentic recognition of individual identities, it requires a specific understanding of how individuals’ recognition needs and desires are collectively and institutionally constituted. Furthermore, it is argued that even if deliberative democracy can provide the necessary circumstances for individual self-realization, it comes with homogenizing tendencies and cannot fully avoid the problems of multiculturalism. (shrink)

Based on a critical reading of Jürgen Habermas’s journalistic writings on the European Union, the article argues that Europe’s current crisis is also a crisis of its narratives, and hence a crisis of meaning. The German philosopher has revised his political vision of a united Europe but has done so without abandoning his neo-Kantian ‘soft revolutionism’. The EU of the future is not only envisaged as an alternative to the allegedly defunct European nation-state, but also as the antithesis to US-style (...) federalism and to what is called ‘post-democratic executive federalism’. What is more, Habermas no longer fully trusts in the power of the better argument, as championed in his critical social theory. Instead, his hope of normative progress towards a socially and politically more integrated Europe is founded on a belief in the power of the crisis itself – aided by a convincing pro-European narrative – to drive us in the same direction as that indicated by reason. The conclusion contrasts Habermas’s utopian Europeanism, which has failed to find favour with the wider European public, with a less utopian alternative inspired by the highly specific, non-universal situation of the Old Continent. (shrink)

Most theories of nationalism presume a causal link between 'culture' and 'identity' in the analysis of nationalism. This article argues for a more contingent linkage while drawing conclusions for the 'globalization of cultures-national identity' nexus in different theoretical domains. It goes on to review core assumptions about transnational identity formation, arguing that a distinctive phenomenon is a tendency to approach identities as strategic resources. This has significant impact on, for example, perceptions of boundaries and images of belonging. Finally, the article (...) addresses central figurations between identity, globalization and European integration, in the context of the European Union viewed as an instrument for proactively handling transnational problems, and it proposes some salient differences between this 'Euronationalism' and nationalism in more traditional formats. (shrink)

For generations, critical social theorists have turned to the framing of ‘pathology’ to provide a theoretical infrastructure for their critique. Such an approach famously undergirds much of the Frankfurt School’s canonical work. Axel Honneth, current chair of the Institute of Social Research, continues this tradition. While Frankfurt School approaches have largely tied pathology diagnosis to a critique of historically mediated reason, a plurality of alternate conceptions exist. With the ascendancy of an intersubjective approach to critical social theory, the pathologies of (...) the social have increasingly been comprehended as ‘pathologies of recognition’. Advocates of such a framing point to the ease of establishing an immanent basis to their critique, and of the empirical evidence supporting the need for recognition. Yet, today’s academy is increasingly spilt between those who embrace a ‘pathologies of recognition’ framework, and those who consider the development a ‘domestication’ of the Critical Theoretical tradition. This special issue brings together contributors from both sides of this divide. While the optimal framing of social pathology remains contested, the contributors to this collection are committed to furthering forms of social critique which transcend the limited liberal framings of injustice and illegitimacy. (shrink)

While the framework of social pathology remains a crucial tool for critical social theorists, there is confusion and debate surrounding the precise nature of the heuristic. The core argument of this article is that while the diagnosis of social pathology harbours radical potential as a critical device, recent developments have led to the ascendancy of a restrictive, recognition-cognitive understanding. I argue that this has displaced alternate, more radical framings. To illustrate the changing face of the heuristic, this article opens by (...) articulating the merits and demerits of five predominant conceptions of social pathology. The second section elucidates the turn to increasingly view social pathology in a manner compatible with just one of these five framings. By drawing on, and extending, the existing critical literature, I seek to demonstrate the relative limitations of such an understanding. Throughout this analysis, I argue for the continued relevance of social pathology diagnosis, the need for sustained critical scholarship, and the dangers of embracing too readily the turn to an exclusively recognition-cognitive understanding of social pathology. (shrink)

Since the 1990s, there has been an extended debate among feminists and left-wing thinkers concerned with notions of justice and equality about the relationship between ‘redistribution’ and ‘recognition’ in contemporary politics. In this article, I examine the ways in which the issues of redistribution of resources and recognition are articulated in plays by contemporary Black and Asian women playwrights such as Rukhsana Ahmad, Tanika Gupta, Winsome Pinnock, and Zindika. I shall suggest that their theatre work, and experience of working in (...) the theatre, produce a dynamic and interdependent model of the relation between redistribution and recognition that ultimately suggests the need for recognition as the continuing primary concern of Black and Asian communities in Britain. This is evident in the plays’ contents, the theatrical forms employed by Black and Asian women playwrights (often naturalistic and issue-based), and the funding and theatre policies with which they engage. These, as I shall argue, produce tensions between the collective identities which they hail, for instance, through the appellation ‘Black playwright’, and the individual identities the playwrights seek to assert, requiring negotiations between the empowering as well as constraining demands of collective identities and the post-‘cultural diversity’ aspirations of long-term theatre politics. (shrink)

Liberal theories of justice have often been unable to include the recognition of minority rights or of multiculturalism because of their emphasis on individuals. In contrast, recent theories of cultural recognition and minority rights have underestimated the tensions between group and individual rights. It is precisely the incorporation of past wrongs and their impact on present politics that can advance the liberal theory of justice for cultural minorities and their members.

The article presents a new typology of forms of misrecognition. Through a critique of Axel Honneth's Hegelian-Republican treatment of the issue of recognition, I elaborate an alternative typology of misrecognition forms inspired by Reinhart Koselleck's notion of asymmetric counterconcepts. After deriving three basic forms of misrecognition from historical examples of counterconceptual pairs, I examine some properties of their linguistic articulation as well as the horizons of expectations associated with their usage. The text concludes with an exposition of the comparative advantages (...) of this typology, particularly in regard to identifying the misrecognition of the ones who live outside the republic's national borders. (shrink)

Democracy is in serious difficulties. Three features of the crisis stand out. First is the dominant culture of disillusionment in democracy, which transpires as the mistrust in constitutionalist institutions and values. Second, political authority, both at domestic and international levels, is largely substituted by the rule of non-transparent and unpredictable social powers. Third, democratic states are deprived of much of their capacity to govern, but they retain a non-negligible capacity to coerce.The article is structured as follows. Section I introduces Karl (...) Polanyi’s concept of embeddedness and juxtaposes it to the theoretical defense of market disembeddedness advanced by the classical political economy. It then points to the challenge that the complexity of the contemporary society poses to the idea of embeddedness and identifies the need for further analytical clarification of the idea. Section II tries to explain why the idea of embeddedness is intuitively suspect. One reason is found in the domi... (shrink)

Extending recent appropriations of Charles S. Peirce's work in political theory, we argue that the same epistemic norms that justify democracy offer a plausible basis for justifying multiculturalist policies aimed at protecting at-risk cultural groups. Because this epistemic argument is compatible with a full range of reasonable comprehensive doctrines, it fully accommodates the fact of reasonable pluralism, thereby skirting the Rawlsian objection to which the multiculturalisms of Charles Taylor and Will Kymlicka fall prey.

The Kurdish-led autonomous entity called Autonomous Administration of North and East Syria - also known as Rojava - considers women?s liberation an imperative condition for shaping a democratic society. The practice of autonomy in NES shares strong resemblances with Non- Territorial Autonomy models; however, it introduces a novelty in the role of women as active agents in building a plurinational democracy. This paper examines the intellectual and political origins of the political role ascribed to women in autonomous administrations and how (...) the practice of autonomy in Rojava has advanced women?s rights by shedding light on both institutional implementation of women?s rights, as well as the creation of -territorial spaces of women?s emancipation within the autonomous model. The argument made is that the conceptual framework of the Rojava model goes beyond the Kurdish question and can be considered an attempt to resolve a democratic deficit of liberal democratic nation-states through bringing together solutions that address the intertwined subordination of minorities and women. nema. (shrink)

O debate entre Habermas e Rawls representa uma contribuição fundamental para a compreensão das questões sobre reconhecimento, multiculturalismo e pós-secularismo, introduzindo diferentes concepções filosóficas que podem contribuir sobre a temática acerca do uso público da razão, a fim de elucidar as diferentes percepções teóricas capazes de atender aos desafios propostos pelas sociedades pluralistas. Carlos Santiago Nino, por sua vez, estabeleceu uma estratégia teórica denominada “construtivismo epistemológico”, delineada a partir do debate Habermas-Rawls. Por conseguinte, pretendemos articular os fundamentos filosóficos atinentes à (...) concepção de razão pública delineada por Rawls e Habermas e ao construtivismo epistemológico de Carlos Santiago Nino com a análise da legitimidade democrática do STF na resolução de uma questão moral controvertida que é objeto de um desacordo moral razoável: o aborto de fetos anencéfalos.The Habermas - Rawls debate represents a fundamental contribution to understanding the issues about recognition, multiculturalism and post-secularism by introducing different philosophical views that can contribute about the issue of the public use of reason in order to elucidate the different theoretical insights that can meet the challenges of pluralistic societies. Carlos Santiago Nino, in turn, established a strategy called “epistemological constructivism” outlined from Rawls-Habermas debate. Therefore, we intend to articulate the philosophical foundations relating to the Rawls’s and Habermas’s conceptions of public reason and Carlos Santiago Nino’s epistemological constructivism with the analysis of democratic legitimacy of the Supreme Court to resolve a moral issue that is of a reasonable moral disagreement : the abortion of anencephalic fetuses. (shrink)

While Appiah and Soyinka criticize racial essentializing in Sartre and the Negritude poets, Sartre in Black Orpheus interprets the Negritudinists as employing a phenomenological, anamnestic retrieval of subjective experience. This retrieval uncovers two ethical attitudes: a less exploitative approach toward nature, and a conversion of slavery’s suffering into a stimulus for universal liberation. These attitudes spring from peasant cultural traditions and ethical responses to others’ race-based cruelty, rather than emanating from mystified ‘blackness’. Alfred Schutz’s because-motive analysis, a process of narrative (...) self-constitution, renders plausible these linkages the Negritudinists draw between themselves and peasant or slave ancestors. Such narratives, customarily constructed in common sense by European- and African-Americans, regularly involve mythic elements, serve laudable ethical purposes and require continual theoretical critique by anthropology, genetics and ethics. Theory, though, plays only a critical, corrective role for subjective, anamnestic recoveries of racial and ethnic identity, and it can never replace them. (shrink)

A decade has passed since the breaking out of the ‘Arabic Spring’ revolutionary phenomena all over the Arab World’s societies. Many challenging and radically intriguing developments and ramifications have eventuated out of that era and led the Arab World’s context into unchartered territories of existence and self-understanding. This essay pauses at one of the particular challenges that faces this Sitz im Leben, namely the question of identity-formation and self-perception processes. It argues that the Arab states do manifest in their political (...) and statehood situations a political situation of democracy that is run by ‘non-democrats’. The essay then suggests that this democracy of non-democrats is the outcome of the prevalence of an identity-formation and self-perception rationales that are rooted in crudely religious Weltanschauung that, far from maintaining distinction and particularity individually and communally, turns alterity into a self-otherizing dogma expressive of contrariety and stark divisive and discriminative relatedness to the other. The essay, finally, suggests that liberating the identity-formation process from the dogmatic attempt at turning religion into ‘identity’ per se is the first required step towards a more cross-pollinating and symbiotic relationality between the different persons and groups who live in that context. (shrink)

Community engagement is increasingly defended as an ethical requirement for biomedical research. Some forms of community engagement involve asking the consent of community leaders prior to seeking informed consent from community members. Although community consent does not replace individual consent, it could problematically restrict the autonomy of community members by precluding them from research when community leaders withhold their permission. Community consent is therefore at odds with one of the central principles of bioethics: respecting autonomy. This raises the question as (...) to how community consent can be justified or even required. This paper aims to provide an answer to this question by arguing, based on the work of Taylor and Kymlicka, that community practices are important for the identity and autonomy of community members. When these practices are incompatible with a solitary focus on individual informed consent, they need to be protected by making these decision‐making practices (including asking permission to community authorities) part of the consent process. Since these decision‐making practices are important for the autonomy of community members, community consent with the goal of protecting these practices is not necessarily in conflict with autonomy. (shrink)

An encyclopedia entry providing an overview of the philosophical issues entailed in the theory and practice of "identity politics." Open access and online. Regularly updated.

Can a man be a feminist? If so, what would it mean? I want to participate in a dialogue between women and men on how to accommodate women’s moral concerns. I propose that the fundamental values of justice embodied in the South African constitutional democracy require men to be feminist. These values provide the best safeguard of the important interests and values of both women and men. Men who accept these values can support the main concerns of feminism. The implications (...) of the argument in this article range from public issues to the most private aspects of marriage. (shrink)

Awareness of, and respect for differences of gender, race, religion, language, and culture have liberated many oppressed groups from the hegemony of white, Western males. However, respect for previously denigrated collective identities should not be allowed to confine individuals to identities constructed around one main component used for political mobilisation, or to identities that depend on a priority of properties that are not optional, like race, gender, and language. In this article I want to sketch an approach for accommodating different (...) kinds of identity within a multicultural constitutional democracy. From a vantage point provided by a definition and explanation of personal identity, I want to show how people define, construct and change their personal identities to make themselves into unique individuals. Next I show how democratic political institutions and the personal identities of individuals reciprocally influence one another. In the final section I sketch ways in which diverse personal identities ought to be accommodated in multicultural constitutional democracies. The conclusion is that a society which gives its members the liberty, space, and opportunity to freely construct their own identities might avoid the formation of closed groups committed exclusively to their own sectional interests. (shrink)

Collective intentionality is one of the most fundamental notions in social ontology. However, it is often thought to refer to a capacity which does not presuppose the existence of any other social facts. This chapter critically examines this view from the perspective of one specific theory of collective intentionality, the theory of Margaret Gilbert. On the basis of Gilbert’s arguments, the chapter claims that collective intentionality is a highly contingent achievement of complex social practices and, thus, not a basic social (...) phenomenon. The argument proceeds in three steps. First, Gilbert’s thesis that certain kinds of collective intentionality presuppose joint normative commitments is introduced. Second, it is argued that, on this view, individual commitments can only constitute the relevant kinds of collective intentional states if there are socially shared “principles of membership” that connect the force of individual commitments to a shared content. Third, it is shown that strong collective intentionality depends on the practical acceptance of shared norms and on the establishment of authority relations through mutual recognition. (shrink)

This thesis explores the meaning and educational implications of respect in liberal multicultural democracies. Significantly, I examine respect from a philosophical perspective as a civic virtue, and hence as a central aim of civic education.

I wish to carry out a philosophical inquiry into the present day intercultural public spheres. The thesis I endeavour to support is that the achievement of inclusive public spheres largely depends on one’s willingness and capacity to foster the “appreciation of diversities” by first, enhancing policies and forms of cooperation between the citizens’ emotional and motivational resources, and then enhancing their cognitive competences. More specifically, my proposal is to understand such an effort from the viewpoint of post-Weberian responsibility, that is (...) of an ethics and politics that overcome the traditional divisions between theory and practice, cognition and emotion, “Verantwortung” and “Gesinnung” , and therefore succeed in enhancing the citizens’ awareness and attitudes as – in Habermas’ words – “democratic co-legislators”. The case study of Matthew Lipman’s “Philosophy for Children/Community” succeeds precisely in highlighting these results. (shrink)

Este artículo investiga la posible justificación de derechos culturales dentro del marco teórico del enfoque en las capacidades. El enfoque no se opone en principio a esta justificación, pero establece restricciones significantes, y correspondientemente, no es compatible con las demandas multicultur..