As it emerged in the late twentieth century, Empire promised a new era of global cooperation and stability through a seamless integration of late capitalism and neoliberal technocracy. Premised as an end to history itself, all that was left to accomplish was to tinker at the margins, stimulate corporate enterprise, embrace financialization and technological innovation, and encourage liberal rights and inclusion. As we enter the third decade of the twenty-first century, the narrative fictions sustaining Empire have broadly collapsed at the (...) level of symbolic identification and belief. Empire has entered into a period of global emergency and mutation. Engaging with Michael Hardt and Antonio Negri’s work, this paper considers what might emerge when we read education into the circuitry of Empire’s decay. First, we locate Empire within foundational tensions in modernity, using Kantian philosophy and colonialism as examples, to foreground the idea of education as immanent to historical processes of creativity, resistance, and innovation. Second, we highlight dead-end responses, from space colonization to neo-fascism, as representations of how modes of education circulate to stabilize and contain Empire’s crises, specifically in relation to capitalism, nationalism, and identity. Lastly, the paper develops a political ontology of education after Empire. (shrink)

Policing is a highly pragmatic occupation. It is designed to achieve the important social ends of peacekeeping and public safety, and is empowered to do so using means that are ordinarily seen as problematic; that is, the use of force, deception, and invasions of privacy, along with considerable discretion. It is often suggested that the ends of policing justify the use of otherwise problematic means, but do they? This book explores this question from a philosophical perspective. (...) The relationship between ends and means has a long and contested history both in moral/practical reasoning and public policy. Looking at this history through the lens of policing, criminal justice philosopher John Kleinig explores the dialectic of ends and means and offers a new, sharpened perspective on police ethics. After tracing the various ways in which ends and means may be construed, the book surveys a series of increasingly concrete issues, focusing especially on those that arise in policing contexts. The competing moral demands made by ends and means culminate in considerations of noble cause corruption, dirty hands theory, lesser degradations, and finally, those means deemed impermissible by the majority in Western culture, such as torture. nstrued, the book surveys a series of increasingly concrete issues, focusing especially on those that arise in policing contexts. The competing moral demands made by ends and means culminate in considerations of noble cause corruption, dirty hands theory, lesser degradations, and finally, those means deemed impermissible by the majority in Western culture, such as torture. (shrink)

With her new book, The Conceptual Foundations of Transitional Justice, Colleen Murphy has advanced novel, comprehensive and sophisticated philosophical accounts of both what severely conflict-ridden societies should be aiming for and how they should pursue it. Ultimately grounded on a prizing of rational agency, Murphy maintains that these societies, roughly, ought to strive for a stable and legitimate democratic polity committed to not repeating gross historical injustice and do so in ways that do right by victims. In this article, I (...) argue, contra Murphy, that achieving democratic rights to political participation should not be considered an essential aim of transitional justice, and that, in contrast, doing right by victims should be considered an essential aim of it, not merely an appropriate means to achieving other aims. In addition, I highlight an issue downplayed in Murphy’s book, namely, the need to make trade-offs amongst the aims of transitional justice, which becomes particularly pressing upon accepting that doing right by victims is one of them. (shrink)

Volume 20, Issue 5, June 2020, Page 64-66.

In 1943, Allied forces in recently liberated Naples were confronted with an outbreak of louse-borne typhus. The established Anglo-American narrative of that epidemic is a triumphant story of effective action that controlled the disease with unprecedented speed and success, aided by the pioneering use of the pesticide DDT. Rather than retell that tale, this article discusses why the outbreak and its ending are largely absent from Italian accounts of wartime Naples. Drawing on Italian sources and contemporary Allied ones, it argues (...) that this absence speaks powerfully to the realities of life for Neapolitans at the time. These realities included the likelihood that the epidemic left most people unscathed, and the presence of additional challenges that made survival in the city perilous. Illustrating how tangled events (and even non-events) can be fashioned into simplistic but meaningful frameworks according to the perspective and priorities of the observer, the article also demonstrates how methods (in this case, delousing with insecticide) that were later proclaimed as crucial in ending an epidemic can be viewed very differently by populations required to comply with them, especially when the disease's dangers seem remote. (shrink)

Cover -- Half Title -- Title Page -- Copyright Page -- Table of Contents -- INTRODUCTION TO THE TRANSACTION EDITION -- I GOALS, ROADS AND CONTEMPORARY STARTING POINT -- II THE NATURE OF EXPLANATION -- III EFFICACY AND LIMITATIONS OF LARGE-SCALE SOCIAL REFORM -- IV SOCIAL REFORM AND VIOLENCE -- V THE PLANNED SOCIETY -- VI NATURE OF THE MODERN STATE -- VII CENTRALIZATION AND DECENTRALIZATION -- VIII DECENTRALIZATION AND SELF-GOVERNMENT -- IX WAR -- X INDIVIDUAL WORK FOR REFORM -- (...) XI INEQUALITY -- XII EDUCATION -- XIII RELIGIOUS PRACTICES -- XIV BELIEFS -- XV ETHICS -- INDEX. (shrink)

Reprint of an article first appearing in the Journal of Global Ethics (2018).

This article is a longitudinal analysis of the relation between gendered labour divisions and new data processing technologies at the Dutch Central Bureau of Statistics. Following social-constructivist and evolutionary economic approaches, the authors hold that the relation between technology and work organization is a two-way process. This means that technology does not only affect the relations between men and women at work, but that these relations also influence technological choices. The proportional numbers of men and women on the labour (...) market and changing conceptions of which work is deemed appropriate for women have been important factors in the strongly varying extent to which women participated in office work. They have also been important factors in determining the course of technological development. Shortages of women on the labour market have even determined search heuristics for new technological solutions in specific directions. (shrink)

In modern times a gap has appeared between the arts of history and literature, and the sciences of historicism and criticism. Many modern critics, historians, and teachers of literature and history (and even many so‐called authors of literature) have welcomed, or at least complied with, the “scientification” of their arts, resulting in widespread illiteracy with regard to literature and history. The solution to this problem lies in a (re‐)investigation of how the art of literature teaches us the truth. I maintain (...) that the lifeblood of literature is the set of common joys and griefs, the common blessings and sufferings, of mankind. Without a communication of these passions as passions with the result of a transformation or shaping of the soul – without a mimesis, as the Greeks would say –across the boundaries of tribe, race, gender and era, there is no literature; and no literacy. Using a scene from Solzhenitsyn's First Circle, I argue that these passions are part of the truth (or falsity) of any story involving human beings. So literature and history would both be restored if the writers, readers, and teachers of each developed a deeper concern for the whole truth. (shrink)

Why should we be means-end rational? Why care whether someone’s mental states exhibit certain formal patterns, like the ones formalized in causal decision theory? This paper establishes a dominance argument for these constraints in a finite setting. If you violate the norms of causal decision theory, then your desires will be aptness dominated. That is, there will be some alternative set of desires that you could have had, which would be more apt (closer to the actual values fixed by (...) your sensibility/ what you intrinsically care about) no matter which world is actual. If we care about having apt desires, then, we should never let ourselves violate these norms of means-end rationality. This argument shares a form with now-standard accuracy arguments for probabilism, opening up a new terrain for that discussion. I show that the foundational assumptions about the shape of accuracy and of aptness required to run the arguments for means-end rationality and for probabilism run closely parallel. I show the argument is robust under different theories of subjective actual value, including nonclassical treatments of indeterminacy in actual value; I show the argument may (but need not!) be generalized to objective theories of value. The upshot is that aptness-domination arguments for decision theories should be added to the philosophical playbook. (shrink)

This paper aims at understanding Sustainable Development Goals as normative ends to be achieved by normative means in the context of global ethics. It distinguishes the descriptive and the normative senses of sustainability and development and puts forward a case for exploring the role of human moral obligations as the normative means to attain the goals of sustainable development. It argues that it is only when basic human moral obligations and role-related obligations are fulfilled that human well-being (...) and that of the non-human elements of the eco-system can be achieved. Furthermore, it also explains how such a concept can be inclusive, diverse and integrative. (shrink)

This book is a full-scale account of the morally important ideas of treating persons merely as means and treating them as ends. Audi clarifies these independently of Kant, but with implications for understanding him, and presents a theory of conduct that enhances their usefulness both in ethical theory and in practical ethics.

Leading British, American and European philosophers contribute to this collection of essays, first published in 1976, in political philosophy. They are essays which have to do in different ways with better societies than the ones we have, and with ways of getting them. They exemplify what can fairly be called real political philosophy. Its past makers have been Plato, Hobbes, Locke, Rousseau, Hegel, Mill and Marx, and it consists in advocacy of certain social ends and of certain means, (...) rather than uncommitted inquiry or comment. The advocacy is of a kind, of course, which depends on analysis and argument. The book will be of interest not only to those who are primarily concerned with philosophy, but students of politics as well. (shrink)

Leading British, American and European philosophers contribute to this collection of essays, first published in 1976, in political philosophy. They are essays which have to do in different ways with better societies than the ones we have, and with ways of getting them. They exemplify what can fairly be called real political philosophy. Its past makers have been Plato, Hobbes, Locke, Rousseau, Hegel, Mill and Marx, and it consists in advocacy of certain social ends and of certain means, (...) rather than uncommitted inquiry or comment. The advocacy is of a kind, of course, which depends on analysis and argument. The book will be of interest not only to those who are primarily concerned with philosophy, but students of politics as well. (shrink)

According to the principles derived from his theory of discourse ethics, Habermas's model of deliberative democracy is justified only if the public is capable of making political decisions that advance the common good. Recent public‐opinion research demonstrates that the public's overwhelming ignorance of politics precludes it from having such capabilities, even if radical measures were taken to thoroughly educate the public about politics or to increase the salience of politics in their lives.

This essay investigates consequentialist reasoning in law. It begins with a brief exposition of the structure of consequentialist reasoning. It then turns to the role of consequentialist reasoning in two aspects of legal decision-making. Legal officials must reason both about ends and about the choice of means to achieve those ends. Legal instrumentalism, however, takes many forms, and different forms identify different officials to engage in the task of reasoning consequentially to choose means. The essay then (...) considers the difficulties posed by the fact that legal decision-makers choose policies or institutions that structure the outcomes they hope to achieve. Finally, the essay considers the role that consequentialist reasoning may play in choosing ends. (shrink)

In recent years the phenomenological approach to bioethics has been rejuvenated and reformulated by, among others, the Swedish philosopher Fredrik Svenaeus. Building on the now-relatively mainstream phenomenological approach to health and illness, Svenaeus has sought to bring phenomenological insights to bear on the bioethical enterprise, with a view to critiquing and refining the “philosophical anthropology” presupposed by the latter. This article offers a critical but sympathetic analysis of Svenaeus’ efforts, focusing on both his conception of the ends of phenomenological (...) bioethics and the predominantly Heideggerian means he employs. Doing so reveals certain problems with both. I argue that the main aim of phenomenological bioethics as set out by Svenaeus needs to be reformulated, and that there are important oversights in his approach to reaching this end. I conclude by arguing that to overcome the latter problem we should draw instead on the works of Max Scheler and Hans Jonas. (shrink)

Aristotle's distinction between the practical life and the contemplative life has been of central importance in fixing the sort of justification that is required for engineering activity. As practical it must be justified by its products, while intellect's activity claims intrinsic worth. Most philosophers of technology accept this model of justification. However, engineering is not essentially practical in the relevant sense. To claim that it is overlooks a distinction between "structuring ends" and "products" which when made allows engineering to (...) lay claim to the same sort of value as intellectual activity. The final conclusion is that both have intrinsic worth but that does not free either from the obligation to look to their consequences. (shrink)

This essay offers a start on sorting out the relationships of argumentation and persuasion by identifying two systematic ways in which definitions of argumentation differ, namely, their descriptions of the ends and of the means involved in argumentative discourse. Against that backdrop, the traditional “conviction-persuasion” distinction is reassessed. The essay argues that the traditional distinction correctly recognizes the difference between the end of influencing attitudes and that of influencing behavior—but that it misanalyzes the means of achieving the (...) latter (by focusing on emotional arousal) and that it mistakenly contrasts “rational” and “emotional” means of influence. The larger conclusion is that understanding the relationships of the phenomena of argumentation and persuasion will require close attention to characterizations of communicative ends and means. (shrink)

Whatever the world thinks, he who hath not much meditated upon God, the human mind, and the summum bonum, may possibly make a thriving earthworm, ...

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This is a constructive critique of Habermas’s account of rationality, which is central to his political theory and has sparked theoretical and empirical research across academia. Habermas and many critical theorists caricature means-ends rationality, e.g. by wrongly depicting it as egocentric. This weakens Habermas’s attempt to distinguish means-ends rationality from his hugely important and influential idea of communicative rationality. I suggest that sincerity and autonomy, rather than non-egocentrism, are the key distinguishing features of communicative rationality. This (...) shows that communicative rationality actually overlaps with means-ends rationality. Indeed, means-ends rationality is needed by critical theorists, as I exemplify by showing its use in deliberative democracy. Moreover, means-ends rationality will be present in discourse ethics, as I show with the example of moral discourse about gay marriage. My article thus challenges decades of what Habermas and critical theorists have written on means-ends and communicative rationality, but I stay broadly true to – and hopefully improve – Habermas’s account of rationality. (shrink)

Book review of 'Means, Ends, and Persons: The Meaning and Psychological Dimensions of Kant's Humanity Formula, by Robert Audi, OUP'.

Opponents of voluntary euthanasia and physician-assisted suicide often maintain that the procedures ought not to be accepted because ending an innocent human life would both be morally wrong in itself and have unfortunate consequences. A gravely suffering patient can grant that ending his life would involve such harm but still insist that he would have reason to continue living only if there were something to him in his abstaining from ending his life. Though relatively rarely, the notion of meaning of (...) life has figured in recent medical ethical debate on voluntary euthanasia and physician-assisted suicide. And in current philosophical discussion on meaning of life outside the medical ethical debate on voluntary euthanasia and physician-assisted suicide several authors have argued that being moral and having a meaningful existence are connected to each other. In this article, I assess whether his intentionally refraining from causing the harm related to voluntary euthanasia and physician-assisted suicide would involve something to such a patient in the sense that it would promote the meaningfulness of his life. (shrink)

This article discusses the perpetual debate on the Florentine, Niccolo Machiavelli's ethical values and leadership ideas and the consequent creation of the mythical reputation and negative epithet 'Machiavellian'. This article proposes recommendations on how Machiavelli's thought and his study can best be applied to bring genuine clarity and value to organisations in these interesting and turbulent times providing a hopefully viable compass for a changing landscape.

ABSTRACT I suggest in this essay that the responses to the coronavirus pandemic by the North Atlantic elite ought to be accounted in part to the circulation of nihilism as a structure of feeling under late capitalism. I then pose the question, how ought we think of meaning and meaning making under the shadow of ongoing extinction?