More than perhaps anybody else in the world, the Swedish social scientist Björn Wittrock has contributed - both on the intellectual and institutional level - to making a truly global science possible. This book is devoted to an appreciation of his contributions.

More than perhaps anybody else in the world, the Swedish social scientist Björn Wittrock has contributed - both on the intellectual and institutional level - to making a truly global science possible. This book is devoted to an appreciation of his contributions.

This paper considers the complex relation between migrants’ interest in their host country and their consequent civic or social engagement in the framework of processes of transition following the rupture of international migration (cf. Zittoun 2006). In phases of transition, migrants live processes of identity definition, sense-making of the situation and learning new knowledge and social, cognitive and practical skills. I argue that learning may be considered a precondition for a migrant’s interest and engagement with the host country culture (...) and institutions. In this connection, I use Eade’s (2007) notion of migration strategy to describe migrant profiles based on learning. My case is supported by a qualitative analysis of two paradigmatic case studies. (shrink)

In this paper I analyze interpersonal and institutional recognition and discuss the relation of different types of recognition to various principles of social justice (egalitarianism, meritarianism, legitimate favouritism, principles of need and free exchange). Further, I try to characterize contours of good autonomous life, and ask what kind of preconditions it has. I will distinguish between five kinds of preconditions: psychological, material, cultural, intersubjective and institutional. After examining what the role of recognition is among such preconditions, and how (...) they figure in the work of Axel Honneth, Nancy Fraser and Charles Taylor, I suggest a somewhat complex and hopefully rich picture of interpersonal and institutional recognition as a precondition of autonomous good life. (shrink)

Endeavours of politicians, representatives of law enforcement institutions and courts to create simplified, accelerated and less human and time resources requiring legal procedures in criminal cases prompted the authors of this article to assess the possibilities to develop the written form of procedure in Lithuania. The goal of the authors of this article is to assess the origin and goals of the written form of procedure, as well as to define the main rules and points for discussions on the possibilities (...) to develop the written form of procedure in the Lithuanian criminal procedural law. The conclusion is drawn in this article to the effect that written form of procedure is seen as a condition for simplifying and accelerating the legal process, and choosing this form of procedure is not considered as denying or restraining the expectations of participants of criminal procedure towards a fair trial. The analysis provides the basis for the authors to make a conclusion on the appropriate limits of applying written or oral procedures for hearing criminal cases: Oral procedure must be guaranteed in cases where questions of criminal liability and personal guilt are solved at the first instance court hearings; Oral procedure usually has to be guaranteed in cases where during the procedure at the first instance court hearing the questions of criminal liability and personal guilt are solved, although oral procedure may be limited and the procedure may be conducted in written form if new evidence are not investigated and there is no doubt for deciding whether oral procedure is better for understanding the case; Oral procedure need not be guaranteed only in cases where questions of application of the law are solved and if oral procedure was guaranteed during the procedure at the court of first instance; Written procedure may guarantee the right to a fair trial, where the participants of the procedure are allowed to provide various explanations and written documents or a person is allowed to ask for an oral court hearing. (shrink)

Markets allow for the processing of decentralized information through the price mechanism. But in addition, many markets rely on other mechanisms in markets, or non-market institutions, that provide and manage other forms of knowledge. Within national economies, these institutions form an ‘epistemic infrastructure’ for markets. In global markets, in contrast, this epistemic infrastructure is very patchy, undermining the preconditions for morally responsible agency. New technologies might help to improve the epistemic infrastructure of global markets, but they require conceptualizing knowledge not (...) only as a tradable good, but also as a precondition of morally responsible agency. (shrink)

Political philosophy was once dominated by discussion of the virtues of character and their importance to the good life and the good society. Contemporary political philosophers, however, following the towering influence of John Rawls, have primarily focused on a single virtue of institutions: justice, while largely avoiding controversial claims about the good life. As a result, political philosophy lacks a unified account of the virtues of institutions and the virtues of character. More importantly, we lack an understanding of the connection (...) between the just society and the good life. This book begins to mend this broken seam, which, on reflection, lies at the heart of our deepest political problems. The book’s central argument is that the virtues of character require institutions, while good institutions enable persons to live together virtuously. Political institutions are a necessary precondition for the moral agency exhibited by the virtues. But good institutions enable virtue to grow, while helping to constrain the excesses of vice. On this view, justice emerges primarily as a virtue of character, not institutions. The just person balances conformity to existing institutional norms with practically wise reforms. Ultimately, this book concludes that the just society and the good life are linked through the common good of virtuous activity within the shared institutions of a political community. (shrink)

The paper analyses the problem of workload quotas for district court judges in relation to the standard statutory work time duration. The problem is set against the general tendency of increase in the number of cases brought before courts each year. District courts as the courts of first instance are faced with an ever growing flow of cases. With regard to civil cases, the numbers are increasing especially in the field of the law of obligations (disputes in relation to sale, (...) loan, credit, consumer credit, lease contracts, as well as contracts for the provision of services, etc.). As far as criminal cases are concerned, the numbers are increasing especially in the fields of robbery, theft, in particular car theft, disturbance of public order and other crimes. In these circumstances, it is extremely important to conduct the analysis of the activity of courts in order to obtain a picture of the current situation with regard to the workload of courts and judges. District courts deserve special attention. Uneven distribution of workload among courts and judges is often the reason for the increase of the number of cases where a final decision (judgement) is reached later than 6 months after the start of proceedings. This was pointed out in the Overview of Activities of the Lithuanian Courts and their Self-Governance Institutions (2009–2010), as well as in the report of the National Courts Administration (2010). Those documents underline the importance to analyse the workload of district court judges for the purposes of optimising work organisation, setting the number of judges, distribution of resources, evaluation of judges’ activity, etc. The said analysis is crucial in order to avoid exceeding working time quotas and excessive workload of judges. At present, the workload of district court judges is calculated in accordance with the regulation adopted by the Courts Council in 2004 (as amended in 2005) and it reflects the number of standard cases (civil, criminal cases and cases of administrative offences) as well as other types of procedural documents dealt with by a judge within a period of one month. However, there are no quotas set for judge’s workload with regard to the duration of the statutory work time. The quotas for separate procedural stages (preparation for hearings, hearings, adoption of decision (judgement), other procedural actions that a judge performs while administering justice) are inexistent. The calculation does not take into account whether those standard cases are heard by a single judge or by a panel of judges, the complexity of a particular case is neither reflected. Establishing quotas for district court judges and other court clerks (judge assistants, secretaries, etc.) should consist of legal, organisational-procedural and technical-economical activity. The Ministry of Justice of the Republic of Lithuania, the National Courts Administration, the Courts Council as well as chairmen and experienced judges of district courts should play an active part in the process of establishing quotas. A special role should be assumed by the General Assembly of Judges. (shrink)

This paper outlines the main trends in higher education in the Baltic States and in particular in Estonia and Latvia, on the basis of the European Union concept of competitiveness and knowledge-based society development. Using the World Bank system of knowledge-based indicators, the position of the Baltic States is discussed and compared with international competitiveness ratings. We illustrate higher education systems in Estonia and Latvia by providing information on present institutional structures and by analyzing the key issues that contributed (...) to their adaptation to a market economy in the 1990s until they became members of the EU. The study suggests that the educational systems in Estonia and Latvia are rather similar and that they have been restructured in accordance with western educational requirements and quality standards. They have greatly benefited from international efforts to professionalize the faculty in these institutions. At the same time, the educational system is not yet fully adjusted to the dynamic needs of the labor market. In order to meet the needs of competitive development, the education systems of the Baltic States, as small open countries and new EU members, should focus on increasing the functional flexibility of the labor force. (shrink)

In a series of papers in Economica between 1941 and 1944 Hayek’s criticisms of socialist planning were directed at a set of assumptions about the social world and social science that he took to partly underpin the socialist project. Hayek’s epistemic arguments against planning and in defence of the market are deployed against the claims of ‘scientism’, ‘objectivism’ and ‘physicalism’ in the social sciences. These assumptions illustrate a pervasive version of the rationalist errors underlying socialist planning. They foster a form (...) of social engineering which promises to achieve an optimal technical outcome through planning in which monetary calculation in the market place is replaced by in natura calculation in kind. One of the main objects of criticism was Neurath in whom, for Hayek, all these errors are gathered in one person. Neurath responded to those criticisms in a series of notes and letters to Hayek in 1945 which he hoped would form the basis for a public exchange between them . Neurath’s response focused on what he took to be shared epistemological assumptions and their common commitment to a pluralist alternative to totalitarianism. The response was in some ways an attempt to answer a question he formulated in his generous review of Hayek’s Road to Serfdom: ‘What would Professor Hayek answer if the tables were turned on him?’ . Elsewhere I have looked in more detail at the epistemic arguments in this debate . In this paper while I touch upon these arguments, I focus on the discussion of pluralism and its social and economic preconditions. I will argue that while there are internal problems with Neurath’s arguments, his defence of non-market institutional orders in the modern world raises significant problems with Hayek’s position. (shrink)

The interrelation between the development of political institutions and the processes of scientific-technical revolution is twofold. On the one hand, there must exist the political preconditions of the rapid change in science and technology. On the other hand, the processes of rapid scientific and technical change produce important consequences in the politica life.From the point of view of the economic structure of the country, Poland has reached the threshold of scientific-technical revolution ; it now depends on the political conditions whether (...) the country wilt be able to achieve the stage of high technological development in reasonably short time.Three changes in the functioning of political institutions are directly related to the processes of scientific-technical revolution : they are changes in the system of management on all levels of authority, changes in the circulation of informations and development of autonomic structures of decision-making. Indirectly, however, other changes in the system of political institutions influence the processes of scientific and technological change. Two variants of future developments of the political institutions are discussed in this context : that of a rationalized centralism and the one of democratic self-management. The author expresses the opinion thatboth these variants would constitute conditions for rapid scientific and technological transformations but he favours the strategy of combining the strong elements of both and eliminating their weaknesses.In the second part of the paper, the author discusses the consequences of scientific-technological revolution for the political institutions. Five major factors could be hypothetically identified : 1° changes in classstructure and social stratification, particularly in the direction of increased role of the professional stratum and the increase of educational level of the working class ; 2° further political integration of the nation; 3° changesin the culture of work, increase of social discipline, and higher assessment of collective and individual efficacy of the Poles ; 4° achievement of the higher standard of living and on the basis of it leveling of economicinequalities; 5° increase of the amount of leisure time. All these changes wilt result in the formation of better and more harmonious society, which in its turn wilt make it both possible and necessary to considerablyincrease the scope of democratic self-management in all spheres of sociopolitical life. Potential restraints to this process may result from the inertia of old politica! institutions and/or from technocratic tendenciesamong some segments of the aparatus. Neither, however, is likely to become strong enough to stop the processes of democratic self-management.The main changes in the direction of greater self-management will include: 1° development of various forms of direct democracy on local levels ; 2° development of organizations which represent interests of varioussegments of the society; 3° bettering of the representative institutions ; 4° further differentiation between administrative and political authorities and further democratization of thelatter; 5° deepening of the leading role of the Communist party combined with development of its internal democracy. (shrink)

Cornelius Castoriadis understood history as a self-creating order. In turn, he elaborated history in two directions: as the political project of autonomy, and as the ontological modality of the social-historical. On his account, history as self-creation was only possible through the interplay of social (or political) imaginaries and social doing. Although social imaginaries are readily situated within the non-subjective field, non-subjective modes of doing have been less explored. Yet non-subjective contexts are integral to both the “doing” and “imaginary” dimensions of (...) the human condition, and form the preconditions for concrete varieties of social and political action and politics (as la politique), more generally. The present paper begins to clear a path to reflect on social doing in its non-subjective aspects; as such, it is preparatory rather than programmatic. After briefly reviewing the field of “social imaginaries”, it reflects on Castoriadis’s elaboration of “praxis” and “teukhein”. It then considers Johann Arnason’s culturological reconfiguration of Castoriadis’s approach, and Jan Patočka’s asubjective phenomenology of the movement of human existence as different ways of engaging with the problematic of doing, instituting society and political imaginaries. Despite a gradual subordination of “doing” to “signification” in Castoriadis’s philosophical elaborations, “social doing” as a non-subjective modality does not disappear altogether from his thought – especially and explicitly in respect to the phenomenon of instituting society as a political project – and remains a point of recurring intrusion into his more explicit theoretical concerns. (shrink)

The brutal wars in Iraq, Syria and now Ukraine have caused a massive influx of refugees to Europe. Turkey alone has received more than 4.8 million refugees. An important precondition for their economic and social incorporation is trust: refugees need to trust the citizens as well as the state and the justice system to find their place in the host country. Yet refugees’ propensity to trust may be affected by cultural differences between their home and host countries, their personal (...) conflict exposure and the experiences they had on the run. This study investigates how individual differences in exposure to armed conflict and institutional breakdown shape two types of trust among refugees: Generalized social trust and trust in the institutions of the settlement country. We survey a large and diverse sample of refugees from Syria and Iraq living in Turkish communities and deploy well-established measures of conflict exposure, posttraumatic stress, and posttraumatic growth. We find that higher degrees of conflict exposure are positively related to social trust, and to trust in courts and the police. These positive findings are largely driven by refugees who had very personal and emotionally powerful experiences. The psychological mechanism of posttraumatic growth cannot explain these findings, however, suggesting positive experiences of cooperation in the midst of war and displacement are potentially a better explanation for this finding than positive psychological changes resulting from trauma. At the same time, conflict exposure is negatively related to trust in political institutions. Posttraumatic stress may be the mechanism behind this result. We discuss the implications of these findings for the integration of war refugees—a topic that is tragically of great relevance today. (shrink)

One of the important determinants of development during the transition to adulthood is the undertaking of social roles characteristic of adults, also in the area of finishing formal education, which usually coincides with beginning fulltime employment. In the study discussed in this paper, it has been hypothesized that continuing full-time education above the age of 26, a phenomenon rarely observed in Poland, can be considered as an unpunctual event that may be connected with difficulties in the process of identity formation. (...) Relationships between identity dimensions and identity statuses, and age and educational context were analyzed. 693 individuals aged 19-35 took part in the study. The participants attended three types of educational institutions: full-time university studies, part-time university studies, and full-time post-secondary school. Among the students of full-time university studies predictable dependencies, also in respect of highlevels of indicators of identity crisis and a high frequency of diffused identity occurrence, were observed. Such dependencies were not found in the group of full-time post-secondary school students. (shrink)

The republican tradition has long been ambivalent about markets and commercial society more generally: from the contrasting positions of Rousseau and Smith in the eighteenth century to recent neorepublican debates about capitalism, republicans have staked out diverse positions on fundamental issues of political economy. Rather than offering a systematic historical survey of these discussions, this chapter will instead focus on the leading neo-republican theory—that of Philip Pettit—and consider its implications for market society. As I will argue, Pettit’s theory is even (...) friendlier to markets than most have believed: far from condemning commercial society, his theory recognizes that competitive markets and their institutional preconditions are an alternative means to limit arbitrary power across the domestic, economic, and even political spheres. While most republican theorists have focused on political means to limit such power—including both constitutional means (e.g., separation of powers, judicial review, the rule of law, federalism) and participatory ones (democratic elections and oversight)—I will examine here an economic model of republicanism that can complement, substitute for, and at times displace the standard political model. Whether we look at spousal markets, labor markets, or residential markets within federal systems, state policies that heighten competition among their participants and resource exit from abusive relationships within them can advance freedom as non-domination as effectively or even more effectively than social-democratic approaches that have recently gained enthusiasts among republicans. These conclusions suggest that democracy, be it social or political, is just one means among others for restraining arbitrary power and is consequently less central to (certain versions of) republicanism than we may have expected. So long as they counteract domination, economic inroads into notionally democratic territory are no more worrisome than constitutional ones. (shrink)

In this contribution the prototypical argumentative patterns are discussed in which pragmatic argumentation is used in the context of legal justification in hard cases. First, the function and implementation of pragmatic argumentation in prototypical argumentative patterns in legal justification are addressed. The dialectical function of the different parts of the complex argumentation are explained by characterizing them as argumentative moves that are put forward in reaction to certain forms of critique. Then, on the basis of an exemplary case, the famous (...) Holy Trinity case, the way in which the U.S. Supreme Court uses pragmatic argumentation in this case is discussed by showing how the court instantiates general prototypical argumentative patterns in light of the institutional preconditions of the justification in the context of the specific case. (shrink)

This article presents a defense of Kant’s idea of a league of states. Kant’s proposal that rightful or just international relations can be achieved within the framework of such a league is often criticized for being at odds with his overall theory. In view of the analogy he draws between an interpersonal and an international state of nature, it is often argued that he should have opted for the idea of a state of states. Agreeing with this standard criticism that (...) a league of states cannot establish the institutional framework for international justice, others also suggest an alternative stage model interpretation. According to this interpretation, Kant’s true ideal is in fact a state of states, whereas the league is merely introduced as a temporary and second best solution. In contrast to both the standard criticism and the stage model interpretation, I argue that fundamental normative concerns count in favour of a league rather than a state of states. I also argue that Kant’s defense of such a league is consistent with his position on the institutional preconditions for just interaction in the domestic case because of crucial relevant differences between the state of nature among individuals and the external relations between states. (shrink)

Medical argumentation in non-Western societies has attracted little attention. In line with the pragma-dialectical approach to the study of argumentation, this article identifies a prototypical argumentative pattern in Chinese medical consultations. In addition to institutional preconditions, whose relevance to the argumentative pattern has been well cited, a factor that may be equally important has remained unnoticed: the preference for certain drugs, treatments or therapeutic measurements on the basis of folk interpretations of medical phenomena in individual ethnic groups. These preferences (...) may be seen as cultural preferences in the medical domain. In this paper, a prototypical argumentative pattern of Chinese medical consultations is provided. Two levels of the pattern are distinguished and discussed: a basic argumentative pattern as presented in the pragmatic-dialectical approach and its extensions due to cultural preferences as well as institutional constraints. Illustrated by an exemplary analysis on the basis of empirical data collected from Chinese consulting rooms, the impact of cultural preferences on physicians’ strategic maneuvering in argumentation is identified and recognized. It is argued that the existence and impact of cultural preferences require attention in medical argumentation. (shrink)

This paper serves as an introduction to the special issue on argumentative patterns in discourse, more in particular on argumentative patterns with pragmatic argumentation as a main argument that are prototypical of argumentative discourse in certain communicative activity types in the political, the legal, the medical, and the academic domain. It situates the studies of argumentative patterns reported in these papers in the pragma-dialectical research program. In order to be able to do so, it is first explained in which consecutive (...) stages the pragma-dialectical theorizing has developed, what the study of argumentative patterns involves, and why the identification of argumentative patterns represents a vital stage in the development of pragma-dialectics. The description of the theoretical innovations that are introduced and the exposition of their relationship with the standard and extended pragma-dialectical theory create a conceptual and terminological framework for understanding the background and the rationale of the current research projects. (shrink)

_The power and materiality of form. On studying the forms of knowledge in catechisms and ship’s logs._ The article argues that in the emerging field of the history of knowledge, with its focus on the production, circulation and exchange of knowledge, explorations of _ forms _ will represent a valuable addition. Form is related to genre. Yet, while the identification of genres is largely based on linguistic, literary or rhetorical criteria, form is also about structures and materiality as well as (...) about practical and institutional preconditions. Form often attracts less attention than contents, although the form makes this content recognizable _ as _ knowledge. Our argument builds on the exploration of two different early modern knowledge forms, the catechism and the ship's log respectively. Both demonstrate how form is decisive in defining contents as authoritative knowledge. They also illustrate how form is a prerequisite to enable knowledge to circulate and be part of cultural exchange, and thus to be socially efficient. The forms serve to codify existing knowledge, but also to the production and circulation of new insights. When forms like the log and the catechism are examined historically, however, they can also be seen to live their own lives in a tension between stability and change. The forms themselves become objects of negotiations, change and innovation. (shrink)

Addressing the slippery slope argument (SSA) in legal contexts from the perspective of pragma-dialectics, this paper elaborates the conditions under which an SSA-scheme instance is used reasonably (rather than fallaciously). We review SSA-instances in past legal decisions and analyze the basic legal SSA-scheme. By illustrating the institutional preconditions influencing the reasoning by which an SSA moves forward, we identify three sub-schemes (causal SSA, analogical SSA, and Sorites SSA). For each sub-scheme we propose critical questions, as well as four rules (...) that clarify when the SSA scheme is used reasonably. The institutional preconditions make the analogical SSA expectable in common law contexts; the Sorites SSA is expectable in civil law contexts; whereas the causal SSA is common to both contexts. This result should inform future work on the identification of typical argumentative patterns for the SSA in legal contexts. (shrink)

For persons serving life-without-parole (LWOP) sentences in California, a commutation usually offers them the sole glimpse of hope for release from prison. While governors were reluctant to consider any sentence reductions from 1975 to 2016, commutations—including those for LWOP—have become a more frequent occurrence since. Yet, little is still known about how governors have justified reducing a sentence that initially offered no prospect of release from prison. Given the apparent change in practice, themes emerging from the content of 177 gubernatorial (...) commutation summaries granted to persons serving LWOP sentences between 2017 and 2021 are analyzed in this paper. Through open coding, rehabilitative indicators (programming and institutional conduct) emerged as necessary preconditions for a commutation, while retributive factors (a reassessment of the nature of the crime and the prerogative to adjust excessive prison sentences or to correct sentencing errors) complemented sentence reductions. The findings expose the ethical issues that arise from an LWOP sentence and the subsequent commutation. More specifically, they shed light on the commitment offenses underlying commuted LWOP sentences and raise questions regarding the penal objectives that are supposed to be accomplished with permanent imprisonment. (shrink)

The idea of moral certainties is venerable, highly contentious, and nevertheless alive. What I call “hinge ethics” (in analogy to hinge epistemology) combines three currents – meta-ethical concerns about the scope and limits of moral knowledge and objectivity, the idea of limits of doubt as articulated in On Certainty, and sympathies for Wittgensteinian ideas about ethics. This essay critically assesses hinge ethics, focusing on Nigel Pleasants’ work. My main objection is not that Wittgensteinian ideas about certainty cannot be transferred from (...) the domain of physical phenomena to the moral domain. Nor shall I nail my colours to the mast of moral relativism. Instead my main tack will be as follows: Several of the views hinge ethicists detect in or derive from On Certainty are intriguing and ingenious, yet either unwarranted and/or not echt Wittgensteinian. Purported moral certainties like the wrongness of killing are neither ineffable, nor non-propositional, nor quasi-transcendental preconditions of moral thought and action. In so far as morality has scaffolding foundations, it is not certainties but capacities. At least some of these capacities are cognitive, a matter of social cognition. (shrink)

This book is a major contribution to the current theory of liberalism by an eminent political theorist. It challenges the views of such theorists as Rawls, Dworkin, and Ackerman who believe that the essence of liberalism is that it should remain neutral concerning different ways of life and individual conceptions of what is good or valuable. Professor Galston argues that the modern liberal state is committed to a distinctive conception of the human good, and to that end has developed characteristic (...) institutions and practices - representative governments, diverse societies, market economies, and zones of private action - in the pursuit of specific public purposes that give unity to the liberal state. These purposes guide liberal public policy, shape liberal justice, require the practice of liberal virtues, and rest on a liberal public culture. Consequently the diversity characteristic of liberal societies is limited by their institutional, personal, and cultural preconditions. (shrink)

It is a commonplace within philosophy that the ontology of institutions can be captured in terms of constitutive rules. What exactly such rules are, however, is not well understood. They are usually contrasted to regulative rules: constitutive rules (such as the rules of chess) make institutional actions possible, whereas regulative rules (such as the rules of etiquette) pertain to actions that can be performed independently of such rules. Some, however, maintain that the distinction between regulative and constitutive rules is (...) merely a linguistic one. In this paper I present the status account of constitutive rules in order to address this criticism. According to the status account constitutive rules pertain to institutional statuses and statuses are to be understood in terms of status rules. Status rules concern the enabling and constraining roles of institutions, and constitutive rules specify the preconditions that have to be met in order for them to play these roles. Even though I end up endorsing the claim that the distinction mentioned is a linguistic one, I go on to argue that there is an underlying reality that constitutive rules serve to make apparent. (shrink)

Ownership, as a basic value of a legal state is the subject to special protection guaranteed by a basic law. However, in certain situations acting for the benefit of public interest is, according to a legislator, takes priority over private ownership. Thus, in cases when public interest is at stake limitation of ownership title to property can be permitted by regulations. Expropriation of private property for the sake of public good is the solution used for many years in Poland and (...) in other countries. Basic preconditions for expropriation are described in art. 21 section 2 of The Constitution of the Republic of Poland. Private ownership in art. 21 of Polish Constitution was defined in a very general context without defining the subject. Thus, all the ownership is the subject to state protection without specifying the principles of this protection, which are regulated by ordinary acts. Guaranteeing right to private ownership does not mean the right is inviolable. Constitution allows for property expropriation for the benefit of public purposes after a just compensation. However, it must be emphasized that regulations relating to the rules of property expropriation as a special form of depriving ownership right by means of authoritarian state act, which is the exception from general civil and legal principles of transferring ownership title, must be applied literally, excluding admissibility of extensive interpretation. Provisions of the constitution are defined in the regulations of the Real Estate Management Act from 21st August 1997. (shrink)

Need-claims are ubiquitous within moral and political theory. However, need-based theories are often criticized for being too narrow in scope and too focused on the material preconditions for leading a decent life for grounding a substantial theory of social justice. The aim of this paper is threefold. Firstly, it will investigate the nature and scope of needs by analysing existing conceptualizations of the idea of needs. In so doing, we will get a better understanding of needs, which will help us (...) to carve out the importance and singularity of basic need claims. Secondly, on the basis of the analysis of needs, it will argue for the concept of a fundamental interest in free social agency, which is much better suited than the idea of basic needs actually to ground a theory of social justice, as it highlights the social and institutional conditions for free agency. Thirdly, using the distinction between basic needs and fundamental interests, it will clarify their respective role in and importance for grounding moral principles. Overall, the paper offers a friendly critique of need-based theories, while arguing for a shift of focus to the idea of fundamental interests. (shrink)

A short, provocative book about why "useless" science often leads to humanity's greatest technological breakthroughs A forty-year tightening of funding for scientific research has meant that resources are increasingly directed toward applied or practical outcomes, with the intent of creating products of immediate value. In such a scenario, it makes sense to focus on the most identifiable and urgent problems, right? Actually, it doesn't. In his classic essay "The Usefulness of Useless Knowledge," Abraham Flexner, the founding director of the Institute (...) for Advanced Study in Princeton and the man who helped bring Albert Einstein to the United States, describes a great paradox of scientific research. The search for answers to deep questions, motivated solely by curiosity and without concern for applications, often leads not only to the greatest scientific discoveries but also to the most revolutionary technological breakthroughs. In short, no quantum mechanics, no computer chips. This brief book includes Flexner's timeless 1939 essay alongside a new companion essay by Robbert Dijkgraaf, the Institute's current director, in which he shows that Flexner's defense of the value of "the unobstructed pursuit of useless knowledge" may be even more relevant today than it was in the early twentieth century. Dijkgraaf describes how basic research has led to major transformations in the past century and explains why it is an essential precondition of innovation and the first step in social and cultural change. He makes the case that society can achieve deeper understanding and practical progress today and tomorrow only by truly valuing and substantially funding the curiosity-driven "pursuit of useless knowledge" in both the sciences and the humanities. (shrink)

The Philosophy of Right presents us with a vision of bureaucratic paternalism that is designed to check the excesses of free markets set in motion by the triumph of natural-law thinking, which abstracted the principles of private property and subjective freedom from the institutions that had tamed them and situated them in a stable context. Against these excesses Hegel pits the agricultural estate, which has not succumbed to natural-law thinking; and a “universal estate” of bureaucrats who are educated in Hegel’s (...) philosophy itself, freeing them of the natural-law conflation of human needs with arbitrary and endlessly expanding preferences. Taught by Hegel to look after the needs of the organic whole that is society rather than the gratification of their own preferences, the task of the bureaucrats of the universal estate is to curb the tendency of free markets to produce the social preconditions for an alienated “rabble” to bring down the system. (shrink)

PLEASE NOTE: This is the corrected 2nd eBook edition, 2021. ●●●●● _Critique of Impure Reason_ has now also been published in a printed edition. To reduce the otherwise high price of this scholarly, technical book of nearly 900 pages and make it more widely available beyond university libraries to individual readers, the non-profit publisher and the author have agreed to issue the printed edition at cost. ●●●●● The printed edition was released on September 1, 2021 and is now available through (...) all booksellers, including Barnes & Noble, Amazon, and brick-and-mortar bookstores under ISBN 978-0-578-88646-6. ●●●●● In light of the length of this book, readers who would like to have a more detailed description of the book's objectives and method may find it helpful to read the detailed and clearly written Wikipedia entry about this work: From the Wikipedia search page, use the search phrase "Critique of Impure Reason". At least at the time of this writing (11/29/2021), the Wikipedia entry is well-researched and accurate. ●●●●● In addition, a "Primer on Bartlett's CRITIQUE OF IMPURE REASON" has been made available by the author. It is available under its title through PhilPapers and other philosophy online archives. ●●●●● COMMENDATIONS OF THIS WORK, from the back cover of the published edition: ●●●●● “I admire its range of philosophical vision.” – Nicholas Rescher, Distinguished University Professor of Philosophy, University of Pittsburgh, author of more than 100 books. ●●●●● “Bartlett’s _Critique of Impure Reason_ is an impressive, bold, and ambitious work. Careful scholarship is balanced by original analyses that lead the reader to recognize the limits of meaning, knowledge, and conceptual possibility. The work addresses a host of traditional philosophical problems, among them the nature of space, time, causality, consciousness, the self, other minds, ontology, free will and determinism, and others. The book culminates in a fascinating and profound new understanding of relativity physics and quantum theory.” – Gerhard Preyer, Professor of Philosophy, Goethe-University, Frankfurt am Main, Germany, author of many books including _Concepts of Meaning_, _Beyond Semantics and Pragmatics_, _Intention and Practical Thought_, and _Contextualism in Philosophy_. ●●●●● “[This work’s] goal is of a unique and difficult species: Dr. Bartlett seeks to develop a formal logical calculus on the basis of transcendental philosophical arguments; in fact, he hopes that this calculus will be the formal expression of the transcendental foundation of knowledge.... I consider Dr. Bartlett’s work soundly conceived and executed with great skill.” – C. F. von Weizsäcker, philosopher and physicist, former Director, Max-Planck-Institute, Starnberg, Germany. ●●●●● “Bartlett has written an American “Prolegomena to All Future Metaphysics.” He aims rigorously to eliminate meaningless assertions, reach bedrock, and place philosophy on a firm foundation that will enable it, like science and mathematics, to produce lasting results that generations to come can build on. This is a great book, the fruit of a lifetime of research and reflection, and it deserves serious attention.” — Martin X. Moleski, former Professor, Canisius College, Buffalo, NY, studies of scientific method, the presuppositions of thought, and the self-referential nature of epistemology. ●●●●● “Bartlett has written a book on what might be called the underpinnings of philosophy. It has fascinating depth and breadth, and is all the more striking due to its unifying perspective based on the concepts of reference and self-reference.” – Don Perlis, Professor of Computer Science, University of Maryland, author of numerous publications on self-adjusting autonomous systems and philosophical issues concerning self-reference, mind, and consciousness. ●●●●● ●●●●● The _Critique of Impure Reason: Horizons of Possibility and Meaning_ comprises a major and important contribution to philosophy. Thanks to the generosity of its publisher, this massive 885-page volume has been published as a free open access eBook (3.75MB) as well as an open access printed edition. It inaugurates a revolutionary paradigm shift in philosophical thought by providing compelling and long-sought-for solutions to a wide range of philosophical problems. In the process, the work fundamentally transforms the way in which the concepts of reference, meaning, and possibility are understood. The book includes a Foreword by the celebrated German philosopher and physicist Carl Friedrich von Weizsäcker. ●●●●● In Kant’s _Critique of Pure Reason_ we find an analysis of the preconditions of experience and of knowledge. In contrast, but yet in parallel, the new _Critique_ focuses upon the ways—unfortunately very widespread and often unselfconsciously habitual—in which many of the concepts that we employ _conflict_ with the very preconditions of meaning and of knowledge. ●●●●● This is a book about the boundaries of frameworks and about the unrecognized conceptual confusions in which we become entangled when we attempt to transgress beyond the limits of the possible and meaningful. We tend either not to recognize or not to accept that we all-too-often attempt to trespass beyond the boundaries of the frameworks that make knowledge possible and the world meaningful. ●●●●● The _Critique of Impure Reason_ proposes a bold, ground-breaking, and startling thesis: that a great many of the major philosophical problems of the past can be solved through the recognition of a viciously deceptive form of thinking to which philosophers as well as non-philosophers commonly fall victim. For the first time, the book advances and justifies the criticism that a substantial number of the questions that have occupied philosophers fall into the category of “impure reason,” violating the very conditions of their possible meaningfulness. ●●●●● The purpose of the study is twofold: first, to enable us to recognize the boundaries of what is referentially forbidden—the limits beyond which reference becomes meaningless—and second, to avoid falling victims to a certain broad class of conceptual confusions that lie at the heart of many major philosophical problems. As a consequence, the boundaries of _possible meaning_ are determined. ●●●●● Bartlett, the author or editor of more than 20 books, is responsible for identifying this widespread and delusion-inducing variety of error, _metalogical projection_. It is a previously unrecognized and insidious form of erroneous thinking that undermines its own possibility of meaning. It comes about as a result of the pervasive human compulsion to seek to transcend the limits of possible reference and meaning. ●●●●● Based on original research and rigorous analysis combined with extensive scholarship, the _Critique of Impure Reason_ develops a self-validating method that makes it possible to recognize, correct, and eliminate this major and pervasive form of fallacious thinking. In so doing, the book provides at last provable and constructive solutions to a wide range of major philosophical problems. ●●●●● CONTENTS AT A GLANCE ▪▪▪▪▪ Preface ▪▪▪▪▪ Foreword by Carl Friedrich von Weizsäcker ▪▪▪▪▪ Acknowledgments ▪▪▪▪▪ Avant-propos: A philosopher’s rallying call ▪▪▪▪▪ Introduction ▪▪▪▪▪ A note to the reader ▪▪▪▪▪ A note on conventions ▪▪▪▪▪ ▪▪▪▪▪ ▪▪▪▪▪ PART I ▪▪▪▪▪ ▪▪▪▪▪ WHY PHILOSOPHY HAS MADE NO PROGRESS AND HOW IT CAN ▪▪▪▪▪ 1 Philosophical-psychological prelude ▪▪▪▪▪ 2 Putting belief in its place: Its psychology and a needed polemic ▪▪▪▪▪ 3 Turning away from the linguistic turn: From theory of reference to metalogic of reference ▪▪▪▪▪ 4 The stepladder to maximum theoretical generality ▪▪▪▪▪ ▪▪▪▪▪ ▪▪▪▪▪ PART II ▪▪▪▪▪ THE METALOGIC OF REFERENCE ▪▪▪▪▪ A New Approach to Deductive, Transcendental Philosophy ▪▪▪▪▪ 5 Reference, identity, and identification ▪▪▪▪▪ 6 Self-referential argument and the metalogic of reference ▪▪▪▪▪ 7 Possibility theory ▪▪▪▪▪ 8 Presupposition logic, reference, and identification ▪▪▪▪▪ 9 Transcendental argumentation and the metalogic of reference ▪▪▪▪▪ 10 Framework relativity ▪▪▪▪▪ 11 The metalogic of meaning ▪▪▪▪▪ 12 The problem of putative meaning and the logic of meaninglessness ▪▪▪▪▪ 13 Projection ▪▪▪▪▪ 14 Horizons ▪▪▪▪▪ 15 De-projection ▪▪▪▪▪ 16 Self-validation ▪▪▪▪▪ 17 Rationality: Rules of admissibility ▪▪▪▪▪ ▪▪▪▪▪ ▪▪▪▪▪ PART III ▪▪▪▪▪ PHILOSOPHICAL APPLICATIONS OF THE METALOGIC OF REFERENCE ▪▪▪▪▪ Major Problems and Questions of Philosophy and the Philosophy of Science ▪▪▪▪▪ 18 Ontology and the metalogic of reference ▪▪▪▪▪ 19 Discovery or invention in general problem-solving, mathematics, and physics ▪▪▪▪▪ 20 The conceptually unreachable: “The far side” ▪▪▪▪▪ 21 The projections of the external world, things-in-themselves, other minds, realism, and idealism ▪▪▪▪▪ 22 The projections of time, space, and space-time ▪▪▪▪▪ 23 The projections of causality, determinism, and free will ▪▪▪▪▪ 24 Projections of the self and of solipsism ▪▪▪▪▪ 25 Non-relational, agentless reference and referential fields ▪▪▪▪▪ 26 Relativity physics as seen through the lens of the metalogic of reference ▪▪▪▪▪ 27 Quantum theory as seen through the lens of the metalogic of reference ▪▪▪▪▪ 28 Epistemological lessons learned from and applicable to relativity physics and quantum theory ▪▪▪▪▪ ▪▪▪▪▪ PART IV ▪▪▪▪▪ HORIZONS ▪▪▪▪▪ 29 Beyond belief ▪▪▪▪▪ 30 _Critique of Impure Reason_: Its results in retrospect ▪▪▪▪▪ ▪▪▪▪▪ SUPPLEMENT ▪▪▪▪▪ The Formal Structure of the Metalogic of Reference ▪▪▪▪▪ APPENDIX I ▪▪▪▪▪ The Concept of Horizon in the Work of Other Philosophers ▪▪▪▪▪ APPENDIX II ▪▪▪▪▪ Epistemological Intelligence ▪▪▪▪▪ References ▪▪▪▪▪ Index ▪▪▪▪▪ About the author. 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Purpose. To analyse the philosophical and psychological contexts of social expectations of personality, to form general scientific provisions, to reveal the properties, patterns of formation, development and functioning of social expectations as a process, result of reflection and construction of social reality. Theoretical basis of the study is based on the phenomenology of E. Husserl, the social constructivism philosophy of L. S. Vygotskiy, P. Berger, T. Luckmann, K. J. Gergen, ideas of constructive alternativeism of G. Kelly, psychology of social expectations (...) of a personality as the unity of the mental process, mental state and properties of expectations. Originality. Social expectations of personality are considered as philosophical and psychological dimensions of the study, presented by analysing expectations in social constructivism, externalizing, building a model of the expected future. The authors clarified some theoretical and methodological aspects of the study of patterns of social expectations in the reflection and construction of social reality. The role of social institutions in the formation of expectations is outlined. The poly-aspect of the investigated problems is shown. It is substantiated that formation, realization of social expectations in organization of interaction of personality and social environment is possible in the presence of subject, object and content of activity. Conclusions. Social expectations influence social behaviour and determine the behaviour of an individual, small contact group, community, or large mass of people. Social expectations are able to set specific requirements, norms, sanctions, ideals that participants of the process must follow or must not violate. The philosophical dimension of the study integrates the ontological, epistemological, axiological preconditions for the formation and realization of the social ideal, represented by the study of the expected future in the forms of utopia, eschatology and thanatology. Psychological dimension of the study has a sufficiently developed content orientation from the psychological content parameters of social expectations to the role of expectations in social institutions and various spheres of human life. Systematic, actionable, self-regulatory, and subjective approaches have constituted a verified system of interpreting the social expectations of personality as a process, a result of the reflection and construction of social reality. The topic of social expectations of personality is far from being completed, in our opinion it is promising to create a deeper philosophical concept of social expectations of the personality. The specific topics are of particular relevance in the context of socio-political uncertainty, domination of the mass consciousness, loss of national and cultural identity. (shrink)

This chapter argues that the choice of trust conceptualisations in the context of consumer Internet of Things (IoT) can have a significant impact on the understanding and implementations of a user’s private data protection. Narrow instrumental interpretations of trust as a mere precondition for technology acceptance may obscure important moral issues such as malleability of user’s privacy decisions, and power imbalances between suppliers and consumers of technology. A shift of focus in policy proposals from trust to the trustworthiness of (...) technology can be the first step on the way to addressing these moral concerns. It is argued that complexity of IoT systems, comprised of technological artefacts and institutional data-collecting entities, warrants the moral value of distrust as a prima facie assumption for technological design and regulatory measures. Such a conceptual perspective highlights importance of technological measures that can minimise reliance on trust in consumer IoTs and regulatory measures aimed to improve transparency of IoT architectures. (shrink)

Funding is an important mechanism for exercising influence over ever more parts of academic systems. In order to do so, funding agencies attempt to export their functional and normative prerequisites for financing to new fields. One essential requirement for fundees is then to construct research processes in the form of a project beforehand, one that is limited in time, scope and content. This article demonstrates how the public funding of doctoral programs expands this model of project research from experienced academics (...) to the socialization process for the new academic generation. This process of “projectification” underlies funding-driven institutional changes in doctoral training. A multi-level comparative study of German policies, funding mechanisms and organizational frameworks for doctoral training demonstrates the emergence of a specific model of predefined PhD projects. The investigation of doctoral training practices reveals that socio-epistemic preconditions regulate whether research fields adopted or rejected this demanding model. This result contradicts widespread claims about a radical change in doctoral training and suggests focusing on the actual practices of field-specific doctoral research. (shrink)

Convulsed by a civilizational crisis, the great thinkers of the Renaissance set out to reconceive the nature of society. Everywhere they saw problems. Corrupt and reckless tyrants sowing discord and ruling through fear; elites who prized wealth and status over the common good; military leaders waging endless wars. Their solution was at once simple and radical. "Men, not walls, make a city," as Thucydides so memorably said. They would rebuild their city, and their civilization, by transforming the moral character of (...) its citizens. Soulcraft, they believed, was a precondition of successful statecraft. A dazzlingly ambitious reappraisal of Renaissance political thought by one of our generation's foremost intellectual historians, Virtue Politics challenges the traditional narrative that looks to the Renaissance as the seedbed of modern republicanism and sees Machiavelli as its exemplary thinker. James Hankins reveals that what most concerned the humanists was not reforming laws or institutions so much as shaping citizens. If character mattered more than constitutions, it would have to be nurtured through a new program of education they called the studia humanitatis: the humanities. We owe liberal arts education and much else besides to the bold experiment of these passionate and principled thinkers. The questions they asked-Should a good man serve a corrupt regime? What virtues are necessary in a leader? What is the source of political legitimacy? Is wealth concentration detrimental to social cohesion? Should citizens be expected to fight for their country?-would have a profound impact on later debates about good government and seem as vital today as they did then. (shrink)

The question raised in this paper is whether legal rights to vote are also moral rights to vote. The challenge to the justification of a moral right to vote is that it is not clear that the vote is instrumental to the preservation of some critical interest of the voter. Because a single vote has ‘no impact’ on electoral outcomes, the right to vote is unlikely to serve the interests of the individual. The account developed in this paper holds that (...) moral voting rights can be justified once we acknowledge that voting by a sub-set of citizens is among the necessary preconditions for democratic institutions making a significant difference to their collective interests. The justification of a moral right to vote does not, then, apply to each individual citizen but only to a sub-set of them. In order to justify inclusive moral voting rights, the further consideration must be added that individuals have critical interests in public recognition of equal status. An inclusive moral right to vote accordingly depends on both collective interest in the outcomes of democratic institutions and on individual interest in equal recognition. (shrink)

Photo ID 72893750 © Rawpixelimages|Dreamstime.com ABSTRACT Solidarity is a concept increasingly employed in bioethics whose application merits further clarity and explanation. Given how vital cooperation and community-level care are to mitigating communicable disease transmission, we use lessons from the COVID-19 pandemic to reveal how solidarity is a useful descriptive and analytical tool for public health scholars, practitioners, and policymakers. Drawing upon an influential framework of solidarity that highlights how solidarity arises from the ground up, we reveal how structural forces can (...) impact the cultivation of solidarity from the top down, particularly through ensuring robust access to important social determinants of health. Public health institutions can support solidarity movements among individuals and communities by adopting a lens of social justice when considering public health priorities and, in turn, promote health equity. INTRODUCTION Over the past two decades, scholars have invoked the concept of solidarity when assessing a wide range of topics in bioethics, from CRISPR-Cas9 technology to organ donation to structural racism.[1] However, the growing literature on solidarity has not fully examined the roles and responsibilities of institutions and governments in fostering solidarity, especially regarding public health measures that implicate entire populations. We argue that it remains unclear how public health institutions should engage with solidarity and how their engagement will affect public health and its ethics. We first take Prainsack and Buyx’ three-tiered framework as an analytical starting point.[2] We then explore how public health institutions can foster solidarity by carefully considering factors that may bolster it on an interpersonal, community, and national scale. We conclude that public health institutions should adopt a lens of social justice to promote solidarity at the interpersonal and community levels, thereby promoting equity in future public health efforts. BACKGROUND Calls for solidarity in bioethics raise longstanding normative questions about the nature and limits of our duties to one another and how to weigh autonomy over considerations of justice.[3] Though the term is diversely applied, Prainsack and Buyx propose a potentially unifying definition in the 2011 Nuffield Council report, “Solidarity: Reflections On An Emerging Concept in Bioethics.” The report defines solidarity as an activity involving “shared practices reflecting a collective commitment to carry financial, social, emotional, and or other ‘costs’ to assist others.” Their conceptualization also includes important features that distinguish solidarity from other values like empathy or altruism: solidarity emphasizes action rather than mere internal feeling and recognition of connection as motivation.[4] Bioethicists have since applied this conceptualization when analyzing issues in public and global health, given that population-level efforts need cooperation from individuals and communities. Prainsack and Buyx further note that solidarity is relevant in bioethics discourses about justice and equity, in support of providing aid to low- and middle-income countries, and as a value exemplified by European welfare states.[5] Other bioethicists have argued that promoting solidarity can contribute to community engagement, partnership with Tribal communities, and global health equity.[6] Most recently, scholars have applied solidarity as a lens to assess the COVID-19 pandemic, highlighting the pitfalls of national mitigation efforts and global disparities in disease outcomes.[7] I. Solidarity at Three Levels It seems impossible to foster solidarity in public health if we cannot identify it in general contexts. Prainsack and Buyx articulate three levels of solidarity: interpersonal solidarity, group solidarity, and legal or contractual codifications of solidarity.[8] They argue that each level inherently informs the one ‘above’ it in a unilateral direction. In other words, solidarity is fundamentally a bottom-up phenomenon. Solidarity among individuals influences group norms, which then have the potential to shape policy and institutional practice.[9] Within the Prainsack and Buyx framework, it would seem nonsensical to posit how solidarity might be expressed vertically or from the “top down.” It appears intuitively odd to imagine how a government entity might ‘be’ in solidarity with a person or group if solidarity requires some cognition about their condition per Prainsack and Buyx’ definition. Some have argued that solidarity does not seem like something that one can impose, as instances of it arise from agents recognizing and acting upon some bond rather than in response to a command. Indeed, people may be rightfully hesitant to engage in solidarity if the official messaging is overly paternalistic or coercive.[10] However, some authors have countered that governments can express solidarity through enacting structural and policy changes, though it is ambiguous how these actions are distinct from a justice-driven approach.[11] If a bottom-up approach is thus the most practical means of achieving policy that reflects solidarity, then it does not add much to public health. Institutions would be ineffective without the population’s initiation of the corresponding social norms. However, we find this conclusion overly pessimistic. Fostering a culture of solidarity to improve public health has potential merit. Prainsack and Buyx’ framework overlooks how public health actors can influence solidarity between individuals and across communities. To clarify, we agree with the view that solidarity is a bottom-up phenomenon. Solidarity may not be able to originate in a top-down fashion, but we suggest that public health institutions can take a more active role in providing the public with accurate information, promoting social justice, and intervening in the social determinants of health. II. The COVID-19 Pandemic as a Case Study Lessons learned from the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic support our argument. The pandemic deepened socioeconomic disparities in the US and hindered access to vital resources such as food, housing, and healthcare.[12] Prainsack recently noted: “[n]ext to the immediate health effects of the virus, poverty and grave inequalities have been the root causes of human suffering during the pandemic.”[13] Prior to the pandemic, many rural and low-income populations lacked reliable access to the internet and devices like laptops or smartphones. This continued lack of access restricts the flow of information and prevents people from accessing telemedicine services.[14] Preexisting social, political, and health inequities worsened health outcomes among many marginalized racial and ethnic groups. It is well-documented that communities of color, including Black, American Indian or Alaska Native, and Latinx populations, had greater COVID-related mortality and morbidity due to the effects of structural racism.[15] Although federal US agencies such as the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention enacted laws that provided safety nets (e.g., the Federal Eviction Moratorium), the majority of such programs have ended, leaving many with little assistance and the threat of further hardship.[16] These disparities are relevant because Prainsack, Buyx, and others note that solidarity arises from agents recognizing and acting on some perceived attainable collective goal(s). Income inequality and disparate access to food, education, and health care may lead people to consider public health goals unattainable. This could limit the desire to work toward those goals collectively.[17] The existing literature on collective action theory supports this intuition. It emphasizes that structural conditions, such as an absence of perceived hope for social change among a group, can lead to low ‘group efficacy’ and little willingness to cooperate, both within and across socioeconomic strata.[18] The pandemic spurred countless messages from public health agencies. The messaging did not recognize or attend to the different material realities and circumstances of the US population. How can people feel comfortable getting vaccinated if they deeply distrust the government, including public health institutions? How can people remain motivated to wear masks and distance themselves if they cannot afford basic necessities and work jobs without adequate pay and leave policies? We ask these questions to illustrate how socioeconomic disparities can marginalize people if they feel ignored, apathetic, or resentful of those better off or those in power whom they perceive to “not be doing enough.” This marginalization precludes the formation of solidarity. There are instances when a population has disparate access to resources and social capital, but solidarity may still emerge from a shared goal or vision for the future. For example, a heterogeneous population living in the same town may come together to protest an environmental injustice that impacts their water supply with the common goal of securing access to safe drinking water. However, many populations in the US failed to recognize shared goals of this kind during the COVID-19 pandemic. A significant minority of the US population was reluctant to acknowledge the severity of COVID-19 infection and thus refused to participate in efforts to mitigate its spread. Even between groups who shared the goal of slowing COVID-19 transmission, the methods were widely debated. Approximately 20 percent of the adult population eligible for vaccination remains unvaccinated.[19] Governmental bodies responsible for disseminating information, coordinating the allocation of resources, and establishing guidelines have a large role in mediating these disagreements and intervening in socioeconomic conditions that impact people's ability and willingness to engage in solidarity. III. Solidarity, Social Justice, and the Role of Public Health Institutions Adopting a lens of social justice provides further insights into how public health actors impact solidarity. Powers and Faden argue that the “foundational moral justification for the social institution of public health is social justice.”[20] Their theory of social justice has two aims. First, it ensures that everyone has a sufficient amount of the six core elements of well-being and that public health institutions are responsible for “adopting policies and creating environments” where all can flourish.[21] Second, public health institutions should distribute resources meant to promote well-being and focus on the “needs of those who are the most disadvantaged.”[22] Public health institutions should enact policies that address injustice. In doing so, public health institutions can seed the opportunity to build solidarity from the bottom up. Equipping individuals and communities with resources will foster cooperation and adherence to policies that require solidarity, such as masking and vaccination. This is consistent with arguments illustrating how institutions such as Tribal governments promote the conditions needed for their group, and especially its most vulnerable members, to flourish.[23] Addressing social determinants of health with a social justice lens will create the circumstances under which more individuals and groups can find common causes and foster solidarity. In the long run, such efforts may result in the establishment of values and practices from the bottom up. There are societal and public health preconditions required before institutions can expect their audience to act in solidarity with one another. Through their great influence over information and resources, public institutions do have the power to impact what values are most widespread. Furthermore, public health may foster trust and hope, which are important psychosocial factors that influence collective action,[24] if policies increase access to resources that promote well-being. Messaging efficacy also depends on the context of public trust, education, and whether the institutions meet one’s basic needs. Disparate messaging across different public institutions may confuse or disillusion individuals. To apply our theory of solidarity to the decision to vaccinate, a policy would be to foster conditions that facilitate access to vaccines and information about vaccine efficacy instead of imposing a top-down mandate without first eliciting public trust. IV. Counterargument Some argue that discordant public health messaging, ineffective government, and inadequate social programs can also bring people together under pressure and foster solidarity. One may argue that the most powerful motivators towards solidarity are strife and disparity, as evidenced throughout history. During the pandemic alone, political struggle and personal hardship inspired solidarity in the US, from individual neighbors helping each other to mutual aid groups forming across communities. We thus do not claim that solidarity is possible only when our government programs and public health institutions are most effective. We instead point out that solidarity can be further hindered when people feel alienated, hopeless, and pitted against each other. CONCLUSION Many competing conceptualizations of solidarity persist in the bioethics literature, and Prainsack and Buyx offer one compelling framework that public health ethicists continue to draw upon.[25] However, their framework fails to acknowledge how public health institutions impact interpersonal and group solidarity. Public health institutions can foster solidarity through actions other than mere messaging, invoking catchphrases like “we are all in this together.” Efforts to address socioeconomic preconditions and alleviate health disparities can cultivate group solidarity. As we saw during the pandemic, cooperation and solidarity go hand-in-hand with disease mitigation efforts; solidarity has clear intrinsic value.[26] As this relationship becomes more apparent, we will continue to see attempts from public health institutions to foster or invoke solidarity. Therefore, public health institutions would be remiss to ignore their role in addressing the social determinants of health. Adopting a social justice lens when planning public health interventions will clarify and strengthen their role in facilitating solidarity. Ultimately, if health disparities continue to persist or widen, it is very hard to imagine how group solidarity can ever be achieved. The widescale adoption of many public health measures needed to promote health and well-being would be conducive to solidarity. - Disclaimer: The opinions expressed are the authors’ and do not represent the views of the NIH, DHHS, or the U.S. government. Funding Disclosure: This work was supported in part by the Intramural Program of the National Institutes of Health Clinical Center. - [1] John J Mulvihill et al., “Ethical Issues of CRISPR Technology and Gene Editing through the Lens of Solidarity,” British Medical Bulletin 122 (2017): 17–29, https://doi.org/10.1093/bmb/ldx002; Ben Saunders, “Altruism or Solidarity? The Motives for Organ Donation and Two Proposals,” Bioethics 26, no. 7 (September 2012): 376–81, https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1467-8519.2012.01989.x; -Vanessa Y Hiratsuka, “SPECIAL REPORT: A Critical Moment in Bioethics: Reckoning with Anti-Black Racism through Intergenerational Dialogue A Call for Solidarity in Bioethics: Confronting Anti-Black Racism Together,” 2022, https://doi.org/10.1002/hast.1380. [2] Prainsack and Buyx, Solidarity: Reflections on an Emerging Concept in Bioethics London: Nuffield Council on Bioethics, 2011; Prainsack and Buyx, “Solidarity in Contemporary Bioethics--towards a New Approach.” Bioethics 26, no. 7 (September 2012): 343–50. https://doi.org/10.1111/J.1467-8519.2012.01987.X. [3] Bob Simpson, “A ‘We’ Problem for Bioethics and the Social Sciences: A Response to Barbara Prainsack,” Science, Technology, & Human Values 43, no. 1 (January 12, 2018): 45–55, https://doi.org/10.1177/0162243917735899. [4] Barbara Prainsack and Alena Buyx, Solidarity: Reflections on an Emerging Concept in Bioethics (London: Nuffield Council on Bioethics, 2011). [5] Barbara Prainsack and Alena Buyx, “Solidarity in Contemporary Bioethics--towards a New Approach,” Bioethics 26, no. 7 (September 2012): 343–50, https://doi.org/10.1111/J.1467-8519.2012.01987.X. [6] Bridget Pratt, Phaik Yeong Cheah, and Vicki Marsh, “Solidarity and Community Engagement in Global Health Research,” The American Journal of Bioethics : AJOB 20, no. 5 (May 3, 2020): 43–56, https://doi.org/10.1080/15265161.2020.1745930; Sara Chandros Hull, F. Leah Nez (Diné), and Juliana M. Blome, “Solidarity as an Aspirational Basis for Partnership with Tribal Communities,” The American Journal of Bioethics 21, no. 10 (October 3, 2021): 14–17, https://doi.org/10.1080/15265161.2021.1965258; Mbih J. Tosam et al., “Global Health Inequalities and the Need for Solidarity: A View from the Global South,” Developing World Bioethics 18, no. 3 (September 1, 2018): 241–49, https://doi.org/10.1111/DEWB.12182. [7] Peter West-Oram, “Solidarity Is for Other People: Identifying Derelictions of Solidarity in Responses to COVID-19,” Journal of Medical Ethics 47, no. 2 (February 1, 2021): 65–68, https://doi.org/10.1136/MEDETHICS-2020-106522; Barbara Prainsack, “Solidarity in Times of Pandemics,” Democratic Theory 7, no. 2 (December 1, 2020): 124–33, https://doi.org/10.3167/DT.2020.070215; F. Marijn Stok et al., “Social Inequality and Solidarity in Times of COVID-19,” International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health 18, no. 12 (June 2, 2021), https://doi.org/10.3390/IJERPH18126339; Ming Jui Yeh, “Solidarity in Pandemics, Mandatory Vaccination, and Public Health Ethics,” American Journal of Public Health 112, no. 2 (February 1, 2022): 255–61, https://doi.org/10.2105/AJPH.2021.306578; Barbara Prainsack, “Beyond Vaccination Mandates: Solidarity and Freedom During COVID-19.,” Am J Public Health 112, no. 2 (February 1, 2022): 232–33, https://doi.org/10.2105/AJPH.2021.306619. [8] Prainsack and Buyx, Solidarity: Reflections on an Emerging Concept in Bioethics London: Nuffield Council on Bioethics, 2011; Prainsack and Buyx, “Solidarity in Contemporary Bioethics--towards a New Approach.” Bioethics 26, no. 7 (September 2012): 343–50. https://doi.org/10.1111/J.1467-8519.2012.01987.X. [9] Prainsack and Buyx, Solidarity: Reflections on an Emerging Concept in Bioethics London: Nuffield Council on Bioethics, 2011; Prainsack and Buyx, “Solidarity in Contemporary Bioethics--towards a New Approach.” Bioethics 26, no. 7 (September 2012): 343–50. https://doi.org/10.1111/J.1467-8519.2012.01987.X. [10] Yeh, “Solidarity in Pandemics, Mandatory Vaccination, and Public Health Ethics”; Prainsack, “Beyond Vaccination Mandates: Solidarity and Freedom During COVID-19.” [11] Ho, Anita, and Iulia Dascalu. "Relational solidarity and COVID-19: an ethical approach to disrupt the global health disparity pathway." Global Bioethics 32, no. 1 (2021): 34-50; West-Oram, Peter. "Solidarity is for other people: identifying derelictions of solidarity in responses to COVID-19." Journal of Medical Ethics 47, no. 2 (2021): 65-68. [12] Monica Webb Hooper, Anna María Nápoles, and Eliseo J. Pérez-Stable, “COVID-19 and Racial/Ethnic Disparities,” JAMA 323, no. 24 (June 23, 2020): 2466, https://doi.org/10.1001/jama.2020.8598. [13] Prainsack, Barbara. “Beyond Vaccination Mandates: Solidarity and Freedom During COVID-19.” Am J Public Health 112, no. 2 (February 1, 2022): 232–33. https://doi.org/10.2105/AJPH.2021.306619. [14] Camille A Clare, “Telehealth and the Digital Divide as a Social Determinant of Health during the COVID-19 Pandemic,” Network Modeling Analysis in Health Informatics and Bioinformatics 10 (2021): 26, https://doi.org/10.1007/s13721-021-00300-y. [15] Patrick Nana-Sinkam et al., “Health Disparities and Equity in the Era of COVID-19,” Journal of Clinical and Translational Science 5, no. 1 (March 16, 2021): e99, https://doi.org/10.1017/cts.2021.23. [16] Kathryn M Leifheit et al., “Expiring Eviction Moratoriums and COVID-19 Incidence and Mortality,” American Journal of Epidemiology 190, no. 12 (December 1, 2021): 2503–10, https://doi.org/10.1093/aje/kwab196. [17] Barbara Prainsack, “Solidarity in Times of Pandemics,” Democratic Theory 7, no. 2 (December 1, 2020): 124–33, https://doi.org/10.3167/DT.2020.070215 [18] Maximilian Agostini and Martijn van Zomeren, “Toward a Comprehensive and Potentially Cross-Cultural Model of Why People Engage in Collective Action: A Quantitative Research Synthesis of Four Motivations and Structural Constraints.,” Psychological Bulletin 147, no. 7 (July 2021): 667–700, https://doi.org/10.1037/bul0000256. [19] Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (HHS/CDC), “COVID Data Tracker,” 2023, https://covid.cdc.gov/covid-data-tracker. [20] Powers, Madison, and Ruth Faden. Social Justice: The Moral Foundation of Public Health and Health Policy. 1st editio. New York: Oxford Press, 2006, p. 9 and Chapter 4 [21] Powers and Faden, Social Justice: The Moral Foundation of Public Health and Health Policy; Madison Powers and Ruth Faden, Structural Injustice: Power, Advantage, and Human Rights (New York: Oxford University Press, 2019). [22] Powers, Madison, and Ruth Faden. Social Justice: The Moral Foundation of Public Health and Health Policy. 1st editio. New York: Oxford Press, 2006, p. 10 [23] Bobby Saunkeah et al., “Extending Research Protections to Tribal Communities,” The American Journal of Bioethics 21, no. 10 (October 3, 2021): 5–12, https://doi.org/10.1080/15265161.2020.1865477. [24] Agostini and van Zomeren, “Toward a Comprehensive and Potentially Cross-Cultural Model of Why People Engage in Collective Action: A Quantitative Research Synthesis of Four Motivations and Structural Constraints.” [25] Prainsack and Buyx, Solidarity: Reflections on an Emerging Concept in Bioethics. [26] Ruth Chadwick, “COVID‐19 and the Possibility of Solidarity,” Bioethics 34, no. 7 (September 8, 2020): 637–637, https://doi.org/10.1111/bioe.12813. (shrink)

Prior research on corporate misconduct pays extensive attention to single misconduct behaviors. However, little research has addressed recidivism – the repeated behaviors of corporate misconduct. Based on institutional theory and using the context of emerging economies where recidivism plays a considerable role, we propose the path dependency of corporate recidivism and suggest that three influential factors exist: internal preconditioning, inter-organizational imitation, and the prevailing external evaluation. Our event history analysis of 1,036 listed companies in China over the period 2001–2008 (...) statistically confirms our hypotheses. We conclude the paper by outlining the implications for both theory and practice. (shrink)

The relationship between participatory democracy (the rule of and by a socially diverse citizenry) and constitutional liberalism (a regime predicated on the protection of individual liberties and the rule of law) is a famously troubled one. The purpose of this essay is to suggest that, at least under certain historical conditions, participatory democracy will indeed support the establishment of constitutional liberalism. That is to say, the development of institutions, behavioral habits, and social values centered on the active participation of free (...) and equal citizens in democratic politics can lead to the extension of legally enforced immunities from coercion to citizens and noncitizens alike. Such immunities, here called “quasi-rights,” are at least preconditions for the personal autonomy and liberty in respect to choice-making that are enshrined as the “rights of the moderns.” This essay, which centers on one ancient society, does not seek to develop a formal model proving that democracy will necessarily promote liberal constitutionalism. However, by explaining why a premodern democratic citizenry of free, adult, native males—who sought to defend their own interests and were unaffected by Enlightenment or post-Enlightenment ideals of inherent human worth—chose to extend certain formal protections to slaves, women, and children, it may point toward the development of a model for deriving liberalism from democratic participation. Development of such a model could have considerable bearing on current policy debates. (shrink)

The well-known Kantian passage on misology in the Foundations of the Metaphysics of Morals starts making fuller sense when located within the framework of Kant writings on philosophy of history where he contrasts civilization with moralization as two different phases in the growth of humankind. In this context, the growth of commerce and manufactures plays a distinctive role, namely that of means of fostering civilization, while pursuing a deceptive goal, namely happiness. Deception plays a basic role in the growth of (...) mankind, in so far as it allows for a hidden twofold teleology in human action. Men, while following the dictates of self-love, are systematically mistaken about the results they actually contribute in bringing about. Commerce brings different peoples into mutual relationship and thus paves the way to a cosmopolitan society. The growth of the arts and sciences provides preconditions for the growth of learned institutions, a free press, and a public opinion that are the basis on which reason may start being used in its critical capacities. This, that is Enlightenment, is a preliminary step to moralization, that is the jump of individuals from a state of minority to a state where they are masters of themselves. The twofold teleology of human action makes room for a system of "pragmatic" ends, and of laws connected to the former, that may be studied rationally in themselves and yet are connected to the higher ends established by reason in its "practical" capacities. (shrink)

Those researching HIV prevention measures for people who inject drugs face a dilemma. Regions where baseline HIV prevalence and onward transmission via injecting is sufficiently high to power HIV prevention trials are also those where repressive laws, policies and practices raise concerns about the ethics of research subject protection. Dawson et al, outlining criteria to address ethical challenges in HIV prevention research among PWID, recommend that all trial participants be offered sterile injecting equipment and urge additional strategies to limit research (...) and background risks.1 In light of ethical questions opened by recent clinical trials involving PWID, including several the authors cite favourably, these cautions are timely. Dawson et al urge weighing of costs and benefits of PWID participation in research trials as an essential part of the ethical calculus. Overdose is a particular risk in any trial that uses abstinence from opioids as a precondition for participation or as an outcome of interest, and a risk that institutional review boards and researchers frequently ignore. Given the increased likelihood of fatal overdose for those who return to injection following a period of abstinence, provision to all trial participants of naloxone—the overdose antidote …. (shrink)

This paper concerns the character of argumentation in inner dialogue, i.e. dialogue that an individual keeps to herself in her own mind. The problem of inner dialogue research is the methodological difficulty connected with its externalization. In the text, the activity of crisis diary-writing is suggested as a way of naturally externalizing inner decision-making. By adopting a pragma-dialectic approach to argumentation, the text attempts to characterize crisis diary-writing as an argumentative activity type. The argumentative characterization of crisis diary-writing involves identifying (...) the institutional point and implemented genre as well as distinguishing the empirical counterparts of the four stages of critical discussion. For illustration, the paper draws its examples from Anne Frank’s Diary. As a result of the characterization achieved in the paper, it is concluded that crisis diary-writing is a conventionalized deliberative activity type preconditioned by implicit norms governing the conduct of argumentation. (shrink)

Since 1985, the US Animal Welfare Act and Public Health Service policy have required that researchers using nonhuman primates in biomedical and behavioral research develop a plan “for a physical environment adequate to promote the psychological well-being of primates.” In pursuing this charge, housing attributes such as social companionship, opportunities to express species-typical behavior, suitable space for expanded locomotor activity, and nonstressful relationships with laboratory personnel are dimensions that have dominated the discussion. Regulators were careful not to direct a specific (...) set of prescriptions (i.e., engineering standards) for the attainment of these goals, but to leave the design of the programs substantially up to “professional judgment” at the local level. Recently, however, the Institute of Medicine, in its path-finding 2011 report on the necessity of chimpanzee use in research, bypassed this flexible and contingent concept, and instead, required as a central precondition that chimpanzees be housed in “ethologically appropriate” environments. In so doing, obligations of ethical treatment of one great ape species were elevated above the needs of some research. The evolution and significance of this change are discussed. (shrink)

Many of us have experienced a peculiar feeling of freedom, of the world being open before us. This is the feeling that is captured by phrases like “the freedom of the open road” and “free spirits,” and, to quote Phillip Larkin, “free bloody birds” going “down the long slide / To happiness, endlessly.” This feeling is associated with the ideas that my life could go in many different directions and that there is a vast range of things that I could (...) become. It arises in concert with a wide range of human experiences, including experiences of artistic creation, play, fun, and resistance to authority. This freedom of openness and spontaneity, which I call spontaneous freedom, is central to our ordinary talk about freedom. Yet it is a phenomenon largely ignored in discussions of freedom in contemporary moral philosophy. This is because moral philosophers are primarily concerned to identify the sort of freedom that is a prerequisite for moral responsibility, and so focus on deliberate, voluntary action rooted in rational choice. When moral philosophers do discuss spontaneous freedom, it is often to disparage it as, in the words of Harry Frankfurt, the freedom of “the wanton” whose liberty is merely that of “anarchic impulsive behavior.” My dissertation develops a theory of spontaneous freedom and of the role it does and should play in our lives, including our moral and political lives. I argue that, to do full justice to the human aspiration for freedom, moral and political theory must recognize the value of spontaneity. Through a study of characters from stories and films by Virginia Woolf, Saki, Akira Kurosawa, and Aman Sethi, I develop a phenomenological account of the nature of spontaneous freedom. I argue that we experience spontaneous freedom when we experience our actions as arising out of ourselves but not fixed in advance either by the decisions of other agents or by our own preexisting commitments or plans. I further argue that spontaneous freedom is valuable because it allows for the distinctive pleasure of feeling that one’s life is unforetold and that one is among the sources of novelty in the world, a feeling that is central to artistic creativity. It also affords solace from the anxiety associated with the inevitability of death. As with many experiences, like falling in love or seeing an alpine lake, experiences of spontaneous freedom are most valuable when they are veridical. But even the subjective experience of spontaneous freedom, I suggest, activates our awareness of and openness to possibility. Achieving this awareness, at least on occasion, is valuable because it provides us with a sense of our own psychological potential and sharpens a skill that contributes to practical deliberation. My claim that spontaneous freedom is valuable conflicts with a popular account of the self. According to that account—endorsed by a number of moral philosophers but most famously associated with Christine Korsgaard—the ideal self is one that is well-ordered, actively constituted through rational deliberation. Such integrity theories of the self are attractive because they provide an account of agency according to which ideal moral agents invariably endorse their own actions and beliefs. Integrity theories view freedom as involving rational, deliberative control of one’s actions. But I argue that integrity theories forbid well-constituted moral agents to seek out experiences of spontaneous freedom: such agents must act in a manner that they antecedently and reflectively endorse, while spontaneous freedom requires acting in a manner not antecedently fixed by one’s own decisions. Insofar as spontaneous freedom is a kind of freedom that we do and should value, my account exerts pressure on this standard view of agency and the self. My account of spontaneous freedom also has important political implications. One version of liberal theory holds that the only sort of political freedom worth having is the freedom of each individual to effectively exercise choice compatibly with every other individual doing likewise. On this picture, I have all of the freedom that I could want if I am able to choose autonomously and act in accordance with my choices. But I argue that a community that secures this liberal variety of freedom does not yet provide its members with all the freedom for which people rightly yearn. When public and private institutions arrange our circumstances in ways that make the courses of our lives predictable, our own choices about how to act may be largely settled by the plans and decisions of other agents. This in turn makes it difficult for us to regard our futures as open in the way that is characteristic of experiences of spontaneous freedom. States should promote spontaneous freedom by providing the material and social preconditions for us to feel that our lives could head in radically different and unanticipated directions. (shrink)

The relationship between participatory democracy (the rule of and by a socially diverse citizenry) and constitutional liberalism (a regime predicated on the protection of individual liberties and the rule of law) is a famously troubled one. The purpose of this essay is to suggest that, at least under certain historical conditions, participatory democracy will indeed support the establishment of constitutional liberalism. That is to say, the development of institutions, behavioral habits, and social values centered on the active participation of free (...) and equal citizens in democratic politics can lead to the extension of legally enforced immunities from coercion to citizens and noncitizens alike. Such immunities, here called “quasi-rights,” are at least preconditions for the personal autonomy and liberty in respect to choice-making that are enshrined as the “rights of the moderns.” This essay, which centers on one ancient society, does not seek to develop a formal model proving that democracy will necessarily promote liberal constitutionalism. However, by explaining why a premodern democratic citizenry of free, adult, native males—who sought to defend their own interests and were unaffected by Enlightenment or post-Enlightenment ideals of inherent human worth—chose to extend certain formal protections to slaves, women, and children, it may point toward the development of a model for deriving liberalism from democratic participation. Development of such a model could have considerable bearing on current policy debates. (shrink)

The history of the welfare state is not only or even primarily a story of men and measures but also one of concepts and social ideals. Over the last hundred and twenty years or so, the body of policies, rules, and practices which we collectively term the welfare state has become the most prominent feature of politics and state activity in every developed country. This reflects not only institutional and procedural pressures on the political process during this period, but (...) also the gradual permeation of all parties and arguments by a particular conception of welfare which has determined and limited the range and terms of debate. Both theoretical debate and concrete measures reflect pervasive assumptions and generalized arguments about the nature and content of collective and individual welfare, their preconditions, and their consequences. (shrink)

The article contains an explanation of the topic to be dealt with by the author within the work on the project "Regional and European Aspects of Integration Processes in Serbia: Civilization Preconditions, Reality and Prospects for the Future" of the Institute for Philosophy and Social Theory. A concern for the problem of Bildung reoccurs in social sciences. The author claims that we should elicit a dominated normative meaning from many senses of the concept of Bildung, in order to explain his (...) vitality and the possibility of his interdisciplinary application in more appropriate way. Clanak sadrzi obrazlozenje teme kojom ce se autor baviti u okviru rada na projektu "Regionalni i evropski aspekti integrativnih procesa u Srbiji civilizacijske pretpostavke, stvarnost i izgledi za buducnost" Instituta za filozofiju i drustvenu teoriju. U drustvenim naukama reaktualizovano je interesovanje za problem Bildunga. Autor tvrdi da bi iz viseznacnosti tog pojma trebalo izvuci njegovo dominantno normativno znacenje, kako bi se na adekvatniji nacin objasnila njegova vitalnost i mogucnost njegove interdisciplinarne primene. (shrink)