The capability approach is gaining momentum as a theory of corporate responsibility and business ethics at a time when the UN Guiding Principles have become a most important framework. A novel approach is now emerging that seeks to understand and specify human rights obligations of businesses within the framework provided by the capability approach. This article partially examines the triad corporate responsibility–human rights–capability approach by exploring the relationship between human rights and capabilities. Thus, it offers conceptual and practical implications for (...) a human rights perspective on corporate responsibility. The bulk of our thesis focuses on studying Nussbaum’s and Sen’s claim that human rights are entitlements to capabilities by means of a discussion of the notion of human dignity. In particular, we show the capability approach’s ability to dissipate theoretical and practical challenges posed by the notion of dignity. This article does not offer a detailed explanation of the implications of our investigation for human rights responsibilities of business. However, an outline of its potential contribution toward unfolding those obligations, conceptually and practically, is provided. (shrink)

Introduction: Motor evoked potentials (MEPs) to transcranial magnetic stimulation are known to be susceptible to several sources of variability. However, conflicting evidences on individual characteristics in relatively small sample sizes have been reported. We investigated the effect of age, height, and sex on MEPs of the motor cortex and spinal roots in a large cohort. Methods: A total of 587 subjects clinically and neuroradiologically intact were included. MEPs were recorded during mild tonic contraction through a circular coil applied over the (...) “hot spot” of the first dorsal interosseous and tibialis anterior muscles, bilaterally. Central motor conduction time (CMCT) was estimated as the difference between MEP cortical latency and the peripheral motor conduction time by cervical or lumbar magnetic stimulation. Peak-to-peak MEP amplitude to cortical stimulation and right-to-left difference of each parameter were also measured. Results: After Bonferroni correction, general linear (multiple) regression analysis showed that both MEP cortical latency and peripheral motor conduction time at four limbs positively correlated with age and height. At lower limbs, an independent effect of sex on the same measures was also observed (with females showing smaller values than males). CMCT correlated with both age (negatively) and height (positively) when analyzed by a single regression; however, with a multiple regression analysis this significance disappeared, due to the correction for the multicollinearity within the dataset. Conclusions: Physical individual features need to be considered for a more accurate and meaningful MEPs interpretation. Both in clinical practice and in research setting, patients and controls should be matched for age, height, and sex. (shrink)

The author of this paper discusses the theme of the "simulated body", that is the sense of "being there” in a body that is not one's own, or that does not exist in the way one perceives it. He addresses this issue by comparing Immersive Virtual Reality technology, the phenomenological approach, and Gerald Edelman's theory of Neural Darwinism. Virtual Reality has been used to throw light on some phenomena that cannot be studied experimentally in real life, and the results of (...) its simulations enrich the phenomenological discourse on the lived body. Virtual “Reality” seems to replicate—at least in part—the simulation mechanisms of our mind, thus favoring developments in the field of philosophy of mind. (shrink)

In this book, the author proposes an understanding of corporate responsibility that can be captured in the answer to the following question: What are the implications for companies, as main drivers of economic activity (Part III), of the idea that the purpose of the economy is to create wealth (Part I) within the normative-ethical framework of human rights (Part II)? Enderle crafts a solid, well-thought and comprehensive account of corporate responsibility as a means to create wealth, understood in an expansive (...) manner. His notion of wealth encompasses social capital, natural, economic and human wealth, both at the public and private levels. To substantiate those dimensions, Enderle draws on the capability approach. Enderle proposes human rights – and, more specifically, the United Nations Guiding Principles for Business and Human Rights – as normative framework to guide corporate responsibility in its wealth creating endeavor. Enderle’s work is innovative in many respects. But, eventually, the book does not put forward a viable solution to major challenges affecting today’s world. By staying within the framework of voluntariness in an economic system driven by the profit motive and shareholder capitalism, his proposal falls short of the task. (shrink)

For more than three decades, Integrative Social Contracts Theory (ISCT) has been lauded as a business ethics theory particularly well suited to the international arena, especially because of its alleged ability to reconcile respect for cultural idiosyncrasies and normative teeth. However, this theory has also faced various objections, many of which its authors have responded to with varying degrees of satisfaction. As a contribution to this debate, this article provides a unifying rationale for many of those objections by exploring their (...) rooting in the Separation thesis. It submits that this fact negatively impacts the theory with three major challenges, namely: significant limitations to correctly frame moral issues and situations; poor identification of hypernorms; and insufficient theoretical grounding of hypernorms. This critique highlights the need for the entanglement of the normative and the empirical in business ethics theorizing. (shrink)

Blumenberg´s “metaphorology” is offered as a hermeneutical alternative to the Heideggerian existential hermeneutic. This implies that philosophical anthropology —as we find it in Gehlen, Plessner and others— achieves onthological standing, and is developed as a history of great metaphors, which supports the history of ideas.

ENGLISH Blumenbergs Metaphorology is offered as an hermeneutical alternative to heideggerian existential hermeneutic. It implies that philosophical anthropology –as we find her in Gehlen, Plessner and others– achieves onthological standing, and it’s developed as a history of great metaphers, that seems to support the history of ideas.

This paper intends to explore an aspect of Blumenberg’s metaphorology as memory of mankind and the ethical commitment derived from it. It is seen as the culmination of the fight that the human being maintains against the senselessness of reality. It manifests itself and it is perceived by a human being as theimmensurability of world time and life time (i.e. that the human being is born and dies), that impedes the human being from having all of the world i.e. the (...) satisfaction of its infinite desires. In the fight against finity technology and money play a vital role. They have in common the power to enable an expansion of human capacities over the boundaries of factual existence: through technology and money the human being can do more or, do the same in less time. That is: tobring closer life time and world time. But in this process the instrumental character of technology and money causes homogenisation in the societies where they thrive. That’s one of the characteristics of globalization. This homogenisation is to be understood as the forgetting of other essential possibilities of the human creation of meaning. Thus, what technological and monetary processes construct on one side, come to be destroyed on the other side. Blumenberg’s metaphorology is the adequate response: it is understood both as the self-consciousness of the process of reason in its making sense of the universe, and as an “ideal store” of everything the human being has come to make in this process. (shrink)

We present an OWL 2 ontology, called SaintGall, representing the Saint Gall plan, one of the most ancient documents arrived intact to us. The Saint Gall plan describes the ideal model of a Benedictine monastic complex that inspired the design of many European monasteries. The structural, functional, and architectural specification of an ideal Benedectine monastery is modeled by the SaintGall ontology, which allows one to analyse and model the Monastery architectural type. This work started with the purpose of relating Catania’s (...) San Nicolò l’Arena Benedectine Monastery with the abstract notion of Benedectine monastery, in the ambit of an ontological model based on the renovation works carried out by the architect Giancarlo De Carlo and developed by the same authors. The SaintGall ontology opens a research path aiming at comparing different monastic architectures that can be useful in any intervention of refurbishment or design for a monastery. (shrink)

BackgroundSonographic mesenteric pattern in celiac disease (CD) suggests a hyperdynamic circulation. Despite the well-known CD-related neurological involvement, no study has systematically explored the cerebral hemodynamics to transcranial Doppler sonography.Materials and methodsMontreal Cognitive Assessment (MoCA) and 17-item Hamilton Depression Rating Scale (HDRS) were assessed in 15 newly diagnosed subjects with CD and 15 age-, sex-, and education-matched healthy controls. Cerebral blood flow (CBF) velocities and indices of resistivity (RI) and pulsatility (PI) from the middle cerebral artery (MCA), bilaterally, and the basilar (...) artery (BA) were recorded. We also assessed cerebral vasomotor reactivity (CVR) through the breath-holding test (BHT).ResultsWorse scores of MoCA and HDRS were found in patients compared to controls. Although patients showed higher values of CBF velocity from MCA bilaterally compared to controls, both at rest and after BHT, no comparison reached a statistical significance, whereas after BHT both RI and PI from BA were significantly higher in patients. A significant negative correlation between both indices from BA and MoCA score were also noted.ConclusionThese treatment-naïve CD patients may show some subtle CVR changes in posterior circulation, thus possibly expanding the spectrum of pathomechanisms underlying neuroceliac disease and in particular gluten ataxia. Subclinical identification of cerebrovascular pathology in CD may help adequate prevention and early management of neurological involvement. (shrink)

This article identifies an integrated teaching strategy that was originally developed for engineers, the so-called ‘micro-insertion’ approach, as a practical and effective means to teach ethics at business schools. It is argued that instructors can incorporate not only generic or thematic learning objectives for students into this method (i.e., the intended content of what is being taught: in our case, an underlying ethical base for doing business), but also do so via a strategically integrated approach regarding the appropriate mix and (...) timing of these micro-insertions. With this in mind, we propose a qualitative and example-based approach that endeavors to provide a versatile way for business teachers to incorporate ethics into their general business classes. We also present a conceptual and theoretical framework that underpins this method, and we further provide a set of specific examples and a practical table that show how business instructors might integrate ethics-oriented micro-insertions into their teaching. (shrink)

En tant qu’acteur important dans la gouvernance rurale, les organisations économiques collectives jouent un rôle primordial dans le processus d’urbanisation rurale et constituent un point de vue important pour comprendre l’évolution des relations entre zones urbaines et zones rurales en Chine. En même temps, ces organisations constituent le noyau de la communauté locale, qui représente les individus sur la base d’une même appartenance ethnique, par proximité locale ou par proximité de valeurs communes, voire par proximité économique. Ainsi, les individus partagent (...) une forme de cohésion solidaire, fondée affectivement. Toutefois, au fur et à mesure du développement économique et social, le système, la notion et la nature de l’économique s’évoluent et les valeurs des individus changent, tandis que ces organisations s’adaptent mal au changement économique et social, ce qui provoque la controverse de la société chinoise rurale au cours de la modernisation de la Chine. S’appuyant sur une recherche de terrain et l’analyse des données du village de Liede à Guangzhou, cet article porte sur le processus d’intégration urbaine-rurale du village urbain et explore l’intégration du village urbain dans la ville à travers l’organisation économique collective de Liede, notamment Liede Economic Development Co., Ltd. Dans ce processus, il existe des contradictions entre le rôle du village et le rôle des organisations économiques collectives. Les organisations collectives ont des fonctions économiques, mais elles assument toujours aussi des coûts importants concernant des fonctions publiques telles que la sécurité sociale. On verra que la réforme de la « séparation politique et économique » après la période de l’économie planifiée des années 1980 n’a pas eu d’effet au niveau local. L’évolution du rôle des organisations économiques reflète la mutation de l’économie chinoise, c’est-à-dire, le passage de l’économie communiste à l’économie de marché. Toutefois, l’engagement solidaire existe toujours dans l’économie collective et celle-ci essaie de limiter la cupidité et soutenir l’intérêt commun au lieu de le marginaliser, ce qui constitue un caractère spécifique de l’économie collective en Chine. Classification JEL : A23, B25, H32. (shrink)

What would the constitution of a free nation look like? In trying to answer that question we immediately think in terms of a Bill of Rights, restrictions on governmental power, and so forth. And any constitution worth having would certainly include those things. But if a constitution is to be more than a wish list, it must also specify the political structure necessary to ensure that these freedoms are not eroded or ignored. Consider the old Soviet Constitution, which guaranteed all (...) sorts of fine sounding freedoms for its citizens -- but which in practice proved only an empty promise, since its interpretation and enforcement lay in the hands of an unfettered monolithic centralized state. (shrink)

L’aphorisme sur lequel s’ouvre la préface du livre : « Tant vaut la femme, tant vaut la famille et la société » retrace parfaitement le rôle que la société du XIXe siècle entend accorder aux femmes. Se comporter en ménagères chevronnées, en femmes de foyer expertes en sciences domestiques, en maîtresses de maison économes, en un mot en « fées du logis » est la première des tâches qui leur incombent. C’est cet éloge de la ménagère œuvrant au bien-être de (...) son foyer et de la nation toute entière... (shrink)

Dans les années 1930, la société cantonaise porte son attention moins sur les consommatrices d’opium que sur les yanhua (“ fleurs de la fumée ”), jeunes et jolies femmes d’extraction modeste employées dans les fumeries afin de préparer les pipes pour les clients. Les yanhua cristallisent des craintes liées au maintien de l’ordre et de la hiérarchie établis. Les séductions conjuguées de la drogue et de l’attrait physique de ces femmes apparaissent susceptibles de favoriser une mobilité sociale de mauvais aloi, (...) qu’elle soit descendante (ruine du fumeur aisé causée par une consommation inconsidérée d’opium), ou ascendante (lorsqu’une yanhua parvient à séduire etépouser un riche client). (shrink)

During the eighteenth century, cabinetmakers in Canton (Guangzhou) produced a large quantity of hardwood furniture for European consumers. This essay examines the knowledge culture of these cabinetmakers, focusing on epistemic negotiations and adaptations in the process of making export furniture. While export furniture was made in European styles, cabinetmakers did not parrot European techniques of carpentry but creatively mobilized their own craft knowledge. Juxtaposing material evidence from extant pieces and the carpentry manual The Classic of Lu Ban, the essay argues (...) that the knowledge of joinery formed the basis of a practice of artisanal translation that was material and syntactic. Offering modular rubrics for spatial handling, joinery allowed cabinetmakers to restructure and reinvent furniture with a European appearance. Tracing the interaction between an indigenous knowledge system and global trade commodities, the essay underlines the social and epistemic realignments of locally rooted craft in the achievement of innovation. (shrink)

The craft companies that transform cocoa into value-added products in the Ambato-Ecuador canton generate a large number of losses and waste, causing low production performance, which is not solved by the chocolatiers as they don’t have a clear knowledge of the amount exactly what is lost and how it affects in the productive growth. Therefore, it seeks to quantify the losses and waste generated in the transformation of cocoa into semi-finished products. The work was carried out through the information collected (...) in the craft companies, where was determined the losses and waste of each of the processes that are carried out for the production of semi-finished products will be prolonged. Obtaining in this way key information on waste management within companies and the exact amount and percentages of losses and waste during the production of cocoa paste and its derivates. (shrink)

Las edificaciones con valor patrimonial son un testimonio excepcional del progreso de una comunidad y representan ejemplos innegables de la transferencia de conocimientos a lo largo de las generaciones. Es inevitable caminar por centro consolidado de Pasaje y no reconocer el legado cultural de muchas edificaciones. Sin embargo, también resulta fácil observar las alteraciones erróneas que sea han realizado a estas edificaciones con el objetivo de responder a las “nuevas exigencias” de la actualidad. La conservación de los bienes patrimoniales resulta (...) necesaria para la preservación de la integridad e identidad de la ciudad. La presente investigación posibilita entender el nivel de susceptibilidad que presentan las edificaciones consideradas como bienes patrimoniales, debido a que estás viviendas poseen un valor cultural. El objetivo de la investigación es el de identificar la susceptibilidad sísmica a las que están expuestas, para esto se utilizaron métodos de matrices de evaluación sísmica para medir el nivel de susceptibilidad en las edificaciones patrimoniales. (shrink)

We consider fragments of the relational logic RL(1) obtained by posing various constraints on the relational terms involving the operator of composition of relations. These fragments allow to express several non classical logics including modal and description logics. We show how relational dual tableaux can be employed to provide decision procedures for each of them.

This article propose some ret1ections about the existential significance of the eriugenian concept of original sin. This, together with the divine grace, permits John Scot to understand the historical and worldly configuration of the existence and the possibility of realization in it and from it of the natural human condition of imago Dei.

Summary In this essay we seek to clarify the meaning and theoretical implications of the statement by Merleau-Ponty contained in his 1953 course, Le Monde Sensible et le Monde de l’Expression, according to which movement is ‘revealing of being’. This analysis takes up and comments on chapter 7 of Koffka’s Principles of Gestalt Psychology (dedicated to the issue of movement) and related experiments in particular. We will show that Merleau-Ponty’s idea of ontology of movement emerges from his examination of several (...) exemplary cases. This method of analysis brings to light an idea of similar phenomenology compatible with an experimental phenomenology. (shrink)