Clinical ethics support, including ethics consultation, has become established in the field of medical practice throughout the world. This practice has been regarded as useful, most notably in the UK and the USA, in solving ethical problems encountered by both medical practitioners and those who receive medical treatment. In Japan, however, few services are available to respond to everyday clinical ethical issues, although a variety of difficult ethical problems arise daily in the medical field: termination of life support, euthanasia and (...) questions about patient autonomy. In light of these conditions, a group of 17 volunteer educators and researchers from the area of biomedical ethics, including the authors, have formed the Clinical Ethics Support and Education Project, and began providing Japan’s first small team clinical ethics consultation service in October, 2006. Members include scholars of biomedical ethics, scholars of philosophy and ethics, legal professionals and legal scholars, nurses and doctors, consisting of five women and 12 men. Consultation teams, made up of a small number of members, were organised each time a request for consultation was received. Over approximately 15 months (October 2006–December 2007), the programme received 22 consultation requests from medical practitioners and medical institutions, and three from the families of patients. In this paper, we will discuss the status of our consultation service and examples of consultation cases we have handled. In addition, we will examine the process of evaluating small team clinical ethics consultation services, as well as the strengths and weakness of such programmes. (shrink)

Ever since its first publication in 1992, The End of History and the Last Man has provoked controversy and debate. Francis Fukuyama's prescient analysis of religious fundamentalism, politics, scientific progress, ethical codes, and war is as essential for a world fighting fundamentalist terrorists as it was for the end of the Cold War. Now updated with a new afterword, The End of History and the Last Man is a modern classic.

Francis Fukuyama is one of the most significant political theorists of the past thirty years. Bursting into public awareness in 1989 with his provocative thesis about "the end of history," Fukuyama has made fascinating contributions to a wide range of subjects - the importance of trust in societies, the potential dangers of biotechnology, the development of political authority and the modern state, and most recently, the role of identity in politics. This book records a series of conversations with (...) Fukuyama in which he discusses his background and its role in shaping his thinking, the context and genesis of his major works, and his thoughts in light of the dramatic developments of the past decade, especially the rise of populism around the world. The result is a fascinating picture of a major intellectual. The book both provides an overview of Fukuyama's thought and reveals new insights into his best-known work. This book also allows readers to trace the themes which have animated Fukuyama's entire intellectual career. (shrink)

Francis Fukuyama's controversial new book, Our Posthuman Future: Consequences of the Biotechnology Revolution, has elicited varied reactions, but like it or not, it seems likely to be influential. Here are three opinions. —Ed.

BackgroundNo laws or official guidelines govern voluntary assisted dying (VAD) in Japan. A legislative bill on the termination of life-sustaining measures has yet to be sent to deliberations for legislation, due to strong opposition that has prevented it from being submitted to the Diet. However, Japan has recently witnessed several cases involving VAD.Main textAgainst this backdrop, we argue that Japan should begin discussion on VAD legislation, referring to the Voluntary Assisted Dying Act 2017 (VADA2017), which was established in 2017 in (...) Victoria, Australia. VADA2017 puts in place a wide range of stringent safeguards and is considered worldwide to be the safest and most conservative policy on a physician offering assisted dying based on the patient’s premeditated request. We consider what opposing opinions from society would arise in response to the VADA2017. Among these will include arguments against VAD itself, those against the validation of this act, and opinions that oppose even the initiation of the dialogue on VAD.ConclusionsWe conclude that to protect the right to life among those placed in vulnerable positions and, at the same time, to respect decision-making of those who wish for immediate death due to unbearable suffering, the dialogue must immediately begin with that on introducing a policy more conservative than that of the VADA2017, which solidly considers arguments against VAD. (shrink)

No laws or official guidelines govern medical assistance for dying in Japan. However, over the past several years, cases of assisted suicide or voluntary euthanasia, rarely disclosed until recently, have occurred in close succession. Inspired by these events, ethical, legal, and social debates on a patient’s right to die have arisen in Japan, as it has in many other countries. Several surveys of Japanese people’s attitudes towards voluntary assisted dying suggest that a certain number of Japanese prefer active euthanasia. Against (...) this background, it is important to discuss voluntary assisted dying cases in Japan and the Japanese views on them and to consider their implications. We review three recent Japanese voluntary assisted dying cases and discuss the various objections to voluntary assisted dying that have been published in response to these in various media outlets. Our counterarguments include the double suffering of people who are unable to give up their desire to die, individuality of death, variability of culture, problem of being an annoyance to (burden on) others, a slippery slope argument supporting voluntary assisted dying, and unfair claims about responsibility and excessive burden on people who are unable to give up their desire to die. We also point out the psychocultural and social problems in Japanese society that these objections reflect, and argue that voluntary assisted dying can be ethically acceptable under certain conditions. We conclude that Japanese society must change in order to enable those who sincerely wish to die to do so in a better way. (shrink)

Moral leadership matters. As world politics enters a new and dangerous era, judgment, constancy, moral purpose, and a willingness to overcome partisan politicking are essential for America's leaders. Tempered Strength finds the alternative standard of leadership that Americans are seeking in the classical philosophy of prudence. Ethan Fishman's new work brings together leading American political scientists—including Ronald Beiner, Kenneth L. Deutsch, and George Anastaplo—to discuss the evolution of a standard of prudential leadership both reasonable in nature and practical in scope. (...) Section One studies the meaning of prudence and its evolution in the history of political science from Aristotelian phronesis to Xenophon, Thomas Aquinas, Edmund Burke, and Michael Oakeshott. Section Two demonstrates how the theory of prudential leadership can be applied to practical political issues. (shrink)

Patient families sometimes ask health professionals, ‘What would you do if this were your family member?’ The purpose of this paper is to examine appropriate responses to this Question. Health professionals may say, ‘It all depends on the patient's wishes’, or ‘I don't know what is best, because my family is different from yours in many ways’. Some may believe that the most favourable course of action is the same regardless of who the patient is and explain this to the (...) patient's family, while others may refuse to answer the Question saying it is personal, or argue that such a Question should neither be asked nor answered because it is unreasonable and unprofessional to do so. We believe that, in principle, health professionals should give an honest answer as to what they would do if the patient was their family member, recognising and empathising with the fact that the patient's family is in a difficult and vulnerable position, and that their circumstances forced them to ask such a Question. Moreover, personal and emotional views of health professionals regarding treatment options may help the patient's family make important decisions. An honest answer will help strengthen the trusting relationship between health professionals and the patient's family and support their decision-making. (shrink)

: The technologies at the intersection of assisted reproduction and genetics call for a new regulatory approach, say Franco Furger and Francis Fukuyama, authors of the recent report Beyond Bioethics. In the essay below they map out their recommendation. In the following essays, James Fossett argues that regulation is likelier—and would be better—at the state level, Leonard Fleck calls for more robust public involvement, and John Robertson recommends sticking with the status quo. Turning from procedural to substantive issues, Josephine (...) Johnston takes up Furger and Fukuyama’s suggestion that children have a right to a traditional genetic parentage. (shrink)

In general, only one diffusion model would be applied to whole field-of-view voxels in the intravoxel incoherent motion-magnetic resonance imaging study. However, the choice of the applied diffusion model can significantly influence the estimated diffusion parameters. The quality of the diffusion analysis can influence the reliability of the perfusion analysis. This study proposed an optimal model mapping method to improve the reliability of the perfusion parameter estimation in the IVIM study. Six healthy volunteers. Volunteers were examined using a 3.0 Tesla (...) scanner. IVIM-MRI of the brain was applied at 17 b-values ranging from 0 to 2,500 s/mm2. The Gaussian model, the Kurtosis model, and the Gamma model were found to be optimal for the CSF, white matter, and gray matter, respectively. In the mean perfusion fraction analysis, the GM/WM ratios were 1.16, 1.80, 1.94, and 1.54 ; in the mean pseudo diffusion coefficient analysis, the GM/WM ratios were 1.18, 1.19, 1.56, and 1.24. With the optimal model mapping method, the estimated fp and D* were reliable compared with the conventional methods. In addition, the optimal model maps, the associated products of this method, may provide additional information for clinical diagnosis. (shrink)

Bu çalışma ilkin, ütopyacı düşünceye karşı istikrarlı bir muhalefet yürüten liberal düşüncenin sağ kanadındaki Karl Popper ve Francis Fukuyama gibi kanonik isimlerin yaklaşımlarının, zamanın sosyo-ekonomik gelişmelerinin katkısıyla genel siyaset düşüncesinin ana akımına bürünmesi sürecini ve ütopyaya ilişkin fikirlerini değerlendirecektir. Bir kez müesses nizam haline geldiği vakit menşeindeki ütopyacı niteliklerin hilafına değişimin ancak tedricen olması gerektiğini ve aksini savunan siyasal tavır alışların da yersiz radikalizmle malul siyaset dışı yönelimler olduğunu iddia eden ana akım liberal çizginin savunucuları olarak Popper ve (...) class='Hi'>Fukuyama, bu çizgilerini radikal bir antikomünizmle taçlandırmışlardır. Aynı çizgide bu kez liberal düşüncenin sol cenahındaki sol-sosyalist fikri inkişaf döneminin ürünü çaplı toplumsal değişim taleplerini, radikal diye tabir ederek neredeyse affedilmez birer kusur gibi kabul eden kimi sol liberal feminist yaklaşımlar ile yenilginin sözde faturasını bu radikalizme keserek siyasal faaliyetini melankolik bir yazıklanmanın ötesine geçiremeyen birtakım liberal sol tavırların bu süreçteki rolü tartışılacaktır. Sonuç itibarıyla bu çalışma, çoğunlukla itham biçiminde zikredilen ütopyacılık tabirini, bu menfi kullanımın nesnesi olmaktan kurtarmak için alternatif ve daha iyi bir yaşama dair yolların çeşitlenmesinin önemli bir başlangıç noktası olarak bir paye gibi kabullenip sahiplenen Ernst Bloch’un umut mefhumu üzerinden yepyeni bir ontolojik ve epistemolojik inşaya tabi tutarak, ütopyacılığın bir tür iade-i itibarına odaklanacaktır. (shrink)

The Huntington thesis of the clash of cultures and American foreign policy analysis are both aspects of the legacy of Carl Schmitt's distinction between friend and foe. This article explores Schmitt's political theology as the theoretical basis of modern politics in terms of the concepts of state sovereignty and the idea of a permanent emergency. Within this Schmittian framework, the analysis of Islam as presented by writers such as Huntington, Fukuyama and Barber is critically analysed. Their analysis of fundamentalism (...) and political Islam fails to grasp the complexity and diversity of modern Islam. The article concludes by examining a number of social and economic processes that make the political division between friend and foe untenable. (shrink)

헤겔의 윤리학 내지 사회 · 정치철학에서 아주 많이 거론되고 있는 핵심문제들 가운데 하나가 바로 인정(認定) 내지 승인(承認)의 문제다. 그리고 많은 연구자들은 이 문제를 논의할 때 헤겔의 『정신현상학』(Phänomenologie des Geistes, 1807)을 그 중심 텍스트로 삼고 있다. 물론, 사회 속에서 발생하는 인간 상호간의 인정(승인)문제는 실로 중요한 문제가 아닐 수 없다. 사소한 다툼에서부터, 죽음을 초래하기까지 하는 전쟁에 이르기까지의 거의 모든 투쟁의 배경 내지 근저에는 바로 인간 상호간의 인정 내지 무시(無視)가 깔려있기 때문이다. 그러나 적어도 헤겔이 정신현상학에서 말하고 있는 생사를 건 인정투쟁은, 국가가 성립하기 이전의 (...) 자연상태에서 일어나는 현상이지, 결코 국가 속에서 발생하는 사건이 아니라는 점을 간과해서는 안 된다. 헤겔은 후자의 상태(조건)에서 발생하는 투쟁을 결코 ‘인정투쟁’이라고 부르지 않고 ‘결투’라고 불렀다. 이 점을 많은 사람들이 혼동하고 있다. 헤겔이 말하는 맥락을 떠난 의미의 ‘인정투쟁’이 국가 속에서 일어나고 있다고 말할 수 있지만, 그것은 결코 헤겔이 말하는 바가 아니다. 이 점을 입증하기 위해 필자는『정신현상학』이전의 헤겔의 저술들인 『인륜의 체계』(System der Sittlichkeit, 1802/03)와 『예나체계기획』(Jenenser Systementwürfe, 1803/04; 1805/06)에 나타난 인정 및 인정투쟁의 문제를 함께 검토한다. 이 글에서는 후쿠야마의 경우를 예로 들어, 원 저자가 사용한 용어의 본래 의미를 벗어나 자의적(恣意的)으로 용어를 사용하는 오류를 지적하고자 한다. 아울러, 인정투쟁의 결과로 발생하는 주인과 노예와 관련된 그의 이해의 문제점, 플라톤의 혼 3분설에 대한 그의 해석과 관련된 인간본성에 대한 이해의 오류, 특히 ‘패기’[thymos]에 대한 이해의 문제점 등을 지적함으로써 그의 주장이 철학의 고전적인 텍스트들에 대한 깊이 있는 독서 및 정확한 이해를 결여하고 있음을 드러낸다. 이 글의 성격상, ‘역사의 종말’에 대한 그의 이해가 지니고 있는 문제점들에 관해서는 글의 주제와 관련해서만 언급된다. (shrink)

This paper explores the relationship between Fukuyama’s account of history and Derrida’s theory of hauntology. Initially, I use Derrida’s idea of hauntology tocritique Fukuyama’s account of an end of history. I argue that Derrida’s idea of a hauntology is a valuable theoretical tool for theorising about politics, sinceDerrida shows that the death of a particular social/political system (e.g. Communism) does not entail the death/devaluing of the thinker(s) who inspired that system, since critics of the contemporary social and political (...) order may have something valuable to offer contemporary political thought. However, I do notendorse the view that history cannot reach an end point just because there are specters waiting to return. Instead, I argue that it is possible to bridge theapparent dualistic binary between Derrida’s hauntology and Fukuyama’s end of history, since the specter is something which must be recognised and realised atthe end of history. (shrink)

This philosophical discussion of history is divided into three parts: the first analyzes Fukuyama's view of history; the second analyzes Marx's view of history; and the third looks at the approach of modernity to the discussion of history.

In this paper, I consider what it might mean to approach boredom as a problem of post-history, rather than of modernity as such. Post-history, or ‘end of history’, in this sense, is linked with the impossibility or unlikelihood of political-systemic change, and thus with the disappearance of the contingency or temporal flux that had been understood as the context or prerequisite of political action and political freedom. I will, argue, firstly, that both Rousseau and Fukuyama depict societies that are (...) ‘post-historical’, in this sense, and which are marked by ‘boredom’ of this specifically post-historical kind. Secondly, I will argue that both thinkers link post-historical boredom with the disappearance or diminution of the ‘drive for recognition’ that both understood as both an agent and effect of ‘history’. Thirdly, I will argue that while Fukuyama understands post-historical boredom as an ‘irritant’ that threatens to restart history without quite succeeding in doing so, Rousseau understands it as an essentially stabilising (and happy) condition that maintains post-historical man in an equilibrium modelled on the order of nature itself. And fourthly, I consider certain ways in which this ‘post-historical’ boredom might coexist and overlap with the ‘promise of intensity’ experienced in post-Fordist neoliberal society. (shrink)

In this paper, I consider what it might mean to approach boredom as a problem of post-history, rather than of modernity as such. Post-history, or ‘end of history’, in this sense, is linked with the impossibility or unlikelihood of political-systemic change, and thus with the disappearance of the contingency or temporal flux that had been understood as the context or prerequisite of political action and political freedom. I will, argue, firstly, that both Rousseau and Fukuyama depict societies that are (...) ‘post-historical’, in this sense, and which are marked by ‘boredom’ of this specifically post-historical kind. Secondly, I will argue that both thinkers link post-historical boredom with the disappearance or diminution of the ‘drive for recognition’ that both understood as both an agent and effect of ‘history’. Thirdly, I will argue that while Fukuyama understands post-historical boredom as an ‘irritant’ that threatens to restart history without quite succeeding in doing so, Rousseau understands it as an essentially stabilising (and happy) condition that maintains post-historical man in an equilibrium modelled on the order of nature itself. And fourthly, I consider certain ways in which this ‘post-historical’ boredom might coexist and overlap with the ‘promise of intensity’ experienced in post-Fordist neoliberal society. (shrink)

This past February 22–24, the University of Virginia held a specially arranged conference on the subject of “Fukuyama and the End of History.” Invitations were extended to philosophers, historians, political scientists, sociologists, economists, and literary critics, with the host university contributing a number a speakers. Each person attending the conference received a copy of Francis Fukuyama’s well known article, “The End of History?” from The National Interest, 16 : 3–18, and Fukuyama himself was expected to attend. At (...) the last minute the organizers learned of the existence of Philip Grier’s “The End of History, and the Return of History,” which would within the next few weeks appear in The Owl, 21, 2 : 131–144. Upon receiving it, and the permission of the Editor of The Owl, the organizers decided to provide an advance copy of this article to everyone attending, along with the Fukuyama piece, so that the controversy over the latter’s possible mis-appropriation of Hegel would be a theme for discussion from the outset. (shrink)

This past February 22–24, the University of Virginia held a specially arranged conference on the subject of “Fukuyama and the End of History.” Invitations were extended to philosophers, historians, political scientists, sociologists, economists, and literary critics, with the host university contributing a number a speakers. Each person attending the conference received a copy of Francis Fukuyama’s well known article, “The End of History?” from The National Interest, 16 : 3–18, and Fukuyama himself was expected to attend. At (...) the last minute the organizers learned of the existence of Philip Grier’s “The End of History, and the Return of History,” which would within the next few weeks appear in The Owl, 21, 2 : 131–144. Upon receiving it, and the permission of the Editor of The Owl, the organizers decided to provide an advance copy of this article to everyone attending, along with the Fukuyama piece, so that the controversy over the latter’s possible mis-appropriation of Hegel would be a theme for discussion from the outset. (shrink)

If nothing else, Francis Fukuyama seems to have identified one of the more effective conversational gambits of recent memory. The apparently earnest declaration that history has ended seems to have an irresistible power to call forth commentary from all quarters. More than six years have passed since the publication of Fukuyama’s original article, and four years since the publication of his book on the same theme, The End of History and the Last Man, and the commentary still continues.

The aim of the article is to verify a thesis Fukuyama once advanced: the forthcoming end of history is related to the replacing of human need for appreciation by equality and mutual appreciation last men achieve in liberal democracies. I also analyze the conception of human nature which Fukuyama takes for granted and treats as the base for defining the essence of the last man. Another question I consider concerns the role of Platon’s thymos and can be stated (...) as follows: is it justified to draw such far reaching conclusions from the notion as Fukuyama does in The Las Man? To answer the question I confront Fukuyama’s reflections concerning thymos with Hobbes’ and Rousseau’s understanding of the notion, and the idea of the end of history with the idea of generation proposed by Jose Ortega y Gasset. (shrink)

Nietzsche is a silent interlocutor in Francis Fukuyama’s polemic The End of History and the Last Man (1992). But Fukuyama, I argue, ignores the rationale behind Nietzsche’s critique of the liberal worldview and misinterprets his call for the revaluation of all values. By exploring the relations between the end of history, the last man and the need for revaluation, this chapter aims to reconstruct the relevant aspects of Nietzsche’s critique of liberalism, which challenges the political vision of The (...) End of History. I contend that Nietzsche’s exposure of the conceptual and value inversions as central yet perilous sources of legitimacy in modern ‘industrial civilization’ continues to resonate today and deserves critical attention. (shrink)

In a sense, all technology is biotechnology: machines interacting with human organisms. Technology is designed to overcome the frailties and limitations of human beings in a state of nature -- to make us faster, stronger, longer-lived, smarter, happier. And all technology raises questions about its real contribution to human welfare: are our lives really better for the existence of the automobile, television, nuclear power? These questions are ethical and political, as well as medical; and they even reach to the philosophical (...) and spiritual. On the whole, we seem pretty well adapted to our technology, at least on the face of it -- but there have always been doubts about whether the human soul thrives best in the oppressively technological world we have created for ourselves. (I am continually struck by how much time I have to spend fixing the machines that supposedly improve my life.). (shrink)

Fukuyama's argument that we have recently reached ?The End of History?; is defended against writers who fail to appreciate the Hegelian meaning of Fukuyama's ?Endism,?; but is criticized for using simplistic dichotomies that evade the economic and ideological convergence of East and West. Against Fukuyama, the economic critique of socialism, revisionist scholarship on early Soviet economic history, and the history of the libertarian ideas of Rousseau, Kant, Hegel and Marx are deployed to show that history ?ended?; years (...) ago: the creeds of the First and Second Worlds sprang from common assumptions; and even before Eastern European reform movements, both sides of the Iron Curtain had moved to economies that are neither capitalist nor socialist. (shrink)

The purpose of this article is to reinforce the alert that the German philosopher Hans Jonas makes in his work Principle responsibility for the imminent possibility of a tragic end of history for humanity if the unpredictable effects arising from the form of action of the liberal political-economic system and the inconsequential advance of the technology that follows are considered. In this intention, we chose as a strategy, to weaken and oppose the Hegelian idea, opposed to Jonah's view, that there (...) would be no cause for alarm because history, in its development, is guided by an immanent and well-intentioned reason that inevitably leads humanity towards the realm of freedom and the absolute spirit. More recently, the American philosopher, economist and political scientist Francis Fukuyama, seeking support in Hegelian thought decreed that history had come to an end with the culmination of the sociocultural evolution of humanity. In this context, we initially seek to present an interpretative analysis of the ideas of Hegel and Fukuyama, and then to make a critique a of this way of thinking, in the light of Hans Jonas' arguments. Finally, it is concluded, through the Jonasian lens, that the story, in addition to not having reached its end, as Fukuyama stated, may also have a quite different ending from that imagined by Hegel. Therefore, one should not disregard the occurrence of the hypothesis of an essential death followed by a physical death of the human race, well before the Hegelian project of freedom has a chance to take place. In doubt, it is better for man to be wary of the existence and of the intention and of the capacity of an imminent reason and to retake in time the reins of his own destiny, through the adoption of a new ethical principle: that of responsibility. (shrink)

In this book, Fukuyama seeks to provide affirmative answers to two fundamental questions: Has the ideal of liberal democracy effectively triumphed throughout the world so that we can now speak of the end of humankind's ideological development and thus the end of history? If so, is this a good thing?

Francis Fukuyama, who teaches at Stanford, has written, in Identity, a highly accessible, compellingly written work. He argues that the “demand for recognition of one’s identity is a master concept...

In the past thirty years, the United States has undergone a profound transformation in its social structure: Crime has increased, trust has declined, families have broken down, and individualism has triumphed over community. Has the Great Disruption of recent decades rent the fabric of American society irreparably? In this brilliant and sweeping work of social, economic, and moral analysis, Francis Fukuyama shows that even as the old order has broken apart, a new social order is already taking its place. (...) The Great Disruption forges a new model for understanding the Great Reconstruction that is under way. (shrink)

This is a partly provocative essay edited as a humanitarian study in philosophy of science and social philosophy. The starting point is Isaac Asimov’s famous sci-fi novella “Profession” (1957) to be “back” extrapolated to today’s relation between Thomas Kuhn’s “normal science” and “scientific revolutions” (1962). The latter should be accomplished by Asimov’s main personage George Platen’s ilk (called “feeble minded” in the novella) versus the “burned minded” professionals able only to “normal science”. Francis Fukuyama’s “end of history” in post-Hegelian (...) manner is now interpreted to an analogically supposed “end of scientific history” without “scientific revolutions” any more. The relevant dystopia of the prolonged or even “eternal” period of normal science is justified to the contemporary institution of science due to mechanisms such as “peer-review”, “impact-factor rating”, the projects’ competition for funding, etc. Positive feedbacks forcing all scientists needing careers to be more and more orthodox are demonstrated therefore establishing for that dystopia to be the real state of contemporary science. Two counterfactual case studies based correspondingly on Feyerabend’s “Against method” (1975) if Galilei should make his discoveries today and Sokal’s hoax (1996) if he suggested a scientific masterpiece to be really rejected by journals are discussed. Still one case study considering the abundance of Kelvin’s “clouds” on the horizon of today’s physics (dark matter, dark energy, entanglement, quantum gravitation, phenomena refuting the Big Bang, etc.) serves to verify the aforementioned conjecture that science has already entered that dystopia of eternal normal science. The conception of “ontomathematics” implying “creation ex nihilo” being scandalous for the dominating paradigm is sketched as an eventual revolutionary way out. An imaginary and utopic “happy end” reinterpreting the analogical “happy end” of Asimov’s “Profession” finishes the essay “instead of conclusion” relying on the Internet and AI in an increasingly “fluid” and anti-hierarchical society. (shrink)

This volume gathers together for the first time are all the key texts in a crucial debate in modern philosophy, centered on Leibniz's famous 1695 essay, the "New System of the Nature of Substances and their Communication," in which he introduced his strikingly original theory of metaphysics. His "system" became increasingly famous and drew him into discussion and development of these ideas, both in public and in private, with a variety of thinkers, most notably the great French philosopher Pierre Bayle. (...) Woolhouse's and Francks's new English edition gives the only full representation of this debate, and will therefore be essential reading for anyone who wishes to gain a proper understanding of Leibniz's philosophy and its intelletual context. All the texts are newly translated and extensively annotated; many appear in English for the first time. (shrink)

The argument contained in The End of History and the Last Man consists of an empirical part and a normative part: critics have confused the two and their proper relationship. The assertion that we have reached the "end of history" is not a statement about the empirical condition of the world, but a normative argument concerning the justice or adequacy of liberal democratic political institutions. The normative judgment is critically dependent on empirical evidence concerning, for example, the workability of capitalist (...) and socialist economic systems, but ultimately rests on supra-empirical grounds. The empirical part concerns whether there is something like the Hegelian-Marxist concept of History as a coherent, directional evolution of human societies taken as a whole. The answer to this is yes, and lies in the phenomenon of economic modernization based on the directional unfolding of modern natural science. The latter has unified mankind to an unprecedented degree, and gives us a basis for believing that there will be a gradual spread of democratic capitalist institutions over time. This empirical conclusion, however, does no more than give us hope that there is a progressive character to world history, and does not prove the normative case. The normative grounding of modern liberal democracy has indeed been put in jeopardy by the philosophical "crisis of modernity" inaugurated by Nietzsche and Heidegger. Contemporary postmodernist critiques of the possibility of such a grounding have not, however, adequately come to terms with the destructive consequences of their views for liberal democratic societies. This aporia, discussed most seriously in the Strauss-Kojève debate, is the central intellectual issue of our age. (shrink)

This chapter offers a proceduralist argument against capital punishment. More specifically, it contends that the possibility of irrevocable mistakes precludes the just administration of the death penalty. At stake is a principle of political morality: legal institutions must strive to remedy their mistakes and to compensate those who suffer from wrongful sanctions. The incompatibility of remedy and execution is the crux of the irrevocability argument: because the wrongly executed cannot enjoy the morally required compensation, execution is impermissible. Along with defending (...) his key premises, Yost explains the complicated role that sentencing uncertainty plays in the argument. He concludes by noting some of the flaws in substantive consequentialist and retributivist justifications of capital punishment. (shrink)

Hello, my name is Francis Fukuyama and I am delighted to be able to participate in this symposium at EAFIT, on The End of History? I am a Senior fellow at Stanford University and in the summer of 1989, I published an article in the journal The National Interest titled The End of History? 30 years have passed since the publication of this article and this was a good opportunity to reflect on what has happened to the state of (...) global democracy and global politics in those three decades. (shrink)