Depuis Droit, mythe et raison (1980) écrit avec Jacques Lenoble jusqu’aux récents À quoi sert le droit? Usages, fonctions et finalités (2016) ou Le droit, objet de passions (2018), François Ost ne cesse de questionner les rapports de nos sociétés au droit et la place de celui-ci dans nos sociétés contemporaines. Avec Le droit malgré tout, il s’agit de rendre hommage à l’œuvre et à la carrière d’une figure centrale de la théorie du droit contemporaine et aussi au fondateur, avec (...) le regretté Michel van de Kerchove, de ce que l’on appelle parfois « l’école de Saint-Louis ». Abordant les deux pôles de la dialectique à laquelle François Ost est si attaché - la critique et la reconstruction -, l’ouvrage propose un regard interdisciplinaire sur le droit, à travers les principaux thèmes qui ont nourri la pensée de l’auteur. Du statut épistémologique de la science du droit à un questionnement sur les fondements et l’avenir du droit et de la justice, des liens qu’entretiennent le droit et la littérature jusqu’à l’environnement saisi par le droit en passant par les « communs », les approches de ses collègues et amis sont toutes réflexives et critiques. En ce qu’elles sont soucieuses de soumettre le droit au regard des sciences sociales et, inversement, les normativités extra-juridiques au regard du droit, elles sont fidèles à la démarche de François Ost. Ce Liber Amicorum propose aussi un retour réflexif sur son œuvre par l’auteur lui-même, dans un entretien avec Manuel Atienza. Contributeurs : Yves CARTUYVELS, Robert JACOB, Mark VAN HOECKE, Jacques COMMAILLE, Isabelle HACHEZ, Laurent VAN EYNDE, Jacques LENOBLE, Benoit FRYDMAN, Alain PAPAUX, Guillaume DE STEXHE, Diane BERNARD, Antoine GARAPON, Jacques CHEVALLIER, Alain SUPIOT, Paul MARTENS, Jérémie VAN MEERBEECK, Sébastien VAN DROOGHENBROECK, Nicolas BERNARD et Françoise TULKENS, Pierre LEGRAND, Annette RUELLE, Isabelle OST, Jeanne GAAKEER, Massimo VOGLIOTTI, Denis SALAS, Pauline BÉGASSE DE DHAEM et Marie-Sophie DE CLIPPELE, Xavier DELGRANGE, Delphine MISONNE, Benoît JADOT, Alain STROWEL, Hugues DUMONT, Jean-Guy BELLEY, Antoine BAILLEU. (shrink)

Michel van de Kerchove : une figure de référence de la pensée pénale Tout au long de sa carrière académique et scientifique, Michel van de KERCHOVE a apporté à la pensé pénale des contributions majeures, essentielles et parfois radicales, n’hésitant pas à en bousculer les standards quand il dénonce le pouvoir mystificateur du langage ou interroge l’effectivité des normes juridiques. À travers ses innombrables travaux, il n’a cessé de rappeler l’importance d’une approche critique et interdisciplinaire du droit. Tel est dès (...) lors l’esprit et le fi l conducteur des deux journées organisées en l’honneur de celui qui fut, notamment, une cheville ouvrière de la revue Déviance et Société. La peine est un thème sur lequel Michel van de KERCHOVE a écrit les plus belles pages, mobilisant tour à tour les ressources du droit pénal et de la sociologie juridique, de la théorie générale et de la philosophie du droit. L’ambition de cet ouvrage est d’être une référence sur cette question. C’était l’occasion pour les auteurs de se mettre au travail sous le regard vigilant de Michel van de KERCHOVE, ce qui est peut-être le plus bel hommage qui pouvait lui être rendu. Le sens, la fonction et les justifications de la peine Dans un premier temps, il s’est agi d’interroger le sens, la fonction et les justifications de la peine à travers la littérature, la philosophie et la politique. La peine et les peines sont, ensuite, examinées au regard de l’exigence des droits fondamentaux garantis aujourd’hui dans les instruments universels et régionaux de protection des droits de l’homme. Les auteurs se dirigent alors vers les scènes européenne et internationale où se situent déjà aujourd’hui, et certainement encore plus à l’avenir, le centre de gravité du droit pénal. Les évolutions de la peine et de son exécution Dans un second temps, les auteurs abordent les évolutions de la peine et de son exécution pour interroger l’inflation pénale, la victimisation et le contexte sécuritaire qui caractérisent le droit pénal contemporain. Enfin, en abordant certains contentieux et dispositifs périphériques à la peine, ils S’interrogent le sens et les contours que prend aujourd’hui, et peut-être demain, le droit pénal. (shrink)

Presents essays describing the author's impressions of art and architectural works.

A collection of essays in French or English on the reception of Cartesian philosphy.

MĂDĂLINA DIACONU, Tasten, Riechen, Schmecken. Eine Ästhetik der anästhesierten Sinne, 2005 ; SILVIA STOLLER, VERONICA VASTERLING,LINDA FISHER, Feministische Phänomenologie und Hermeneutik, 2005 ; KARL SCHUHMANN, Karl Schuhmann: Selected Papers on Phenomenology. Edited by CEES LEIJENHORST and PIET STEENBAKKERS, 2004 ; HIROSHI GOTO, Der Begriff der Person in der PhänomenologieHusserls. Ein Interpretationsversuch der Husserlschen Phänomenologie als Ethik im Hinblick auf den Begriff der Habitualität, 2004 ; GÜNTER FIGAL, Lebensverstricktheit und Abstandsnahme. „Verhalten zu sich“ im Anschluss an Heidegger, Kierkegaard und Hegel, 2001 (...) ; JACQUES DERRIDA, Le toucher, Jean-Luc Nancy, 2000. (shrink)

Niccolò Machiavelli is the most prominent and notorious theorist of violence in the history of European political thought - prominent, because he is the first to candidly discuss the role of violence in politics; and notorious, because he treats violence as virtue rather than as vice. In this original interpretation, Yves Winter reconstructs Machiavelli's theory of violence and shows how it challenges moral and metaphysical ideas. Winter attributes two central theses to Machiavelli: first, violence is not a generic technology (...) of government but a strategy that tends to correlate with inequality and class conflict; and second, violence is best understood not in terms of conventional notions of law enforcement, coercion, or the proverbial 'last resort', but as performance. Most political violence is effective not because it physically compels another agent who is thus coerced; rather, it produces political effects by appealing to an audience. As such, this book shows how in Machiavelli's world, violence is designed to be perceived, experienced, remembered, and narrated. (shrink)

Yves R. Simon (1903-1961) was one of this century’s greatest students of the virtue of practical wisdom. Simon’s interest in this virtue ranged from ultimate theoretical and foundational concerns, such as the relationship between practical knowledge and science, to the most concrete and immediate questions regarding the role of practical wisdom in personal and social decision-making. These concerns occupied Simon from his earliest published writing to the final notes and correspondence he was working on at the moment of his (...) untimely death. Throughout his life, practical wisdom and its related philosophical ramifications emerge time and again at critical junctures, throwing into bold relief some of the deeper dimensions of questions as diverse as the nature of democracy, the concept of law, and the theory of work. Practical knowledge constitutes a unifying motif of Simon’s entire encyclopedic effort. This volume reconstructs what would have been Simon’s final sustained writing on practical knowledge. It includes reworking of some previously published material, especially the landmark 1961 essay, "Introduction to the Study of Practical Wisdom," possibly the best treatment of the concept of "command" in recent philosophical writing. But it also reproduces, in a form closely corresponding to Simon’s intention, material drawn from notes and schemata, concerning issues such as the relationship between moral science and wisdom, the nature of practical judgment, and the relationship between practical knowledge and Christian moral philosophy. Also included are previously unpublished letters to Jacques Maritain on the controversy surrounding the theoretical-practical and practico-practical syllogisms, as well as Maritain’s responses. The volume concludes with applications of Simon’s general theory to a critique of the concept of a social science and to the notion of Christian humanism. This volume will appeal to moral philosophers interested in a range of normative issues, as well as social scientists and readers concerned with the philosophical foundations of modern culture. Virtue moralist, in particular, will find in Simon one of the profoundest commentators on this tradition in normative ethics. (shrink)

This article attempts to bring more clearly into light Yves Congar's contribution to Lumen gentium. During the preparatory period of the council, Congar contributed some vota which influenced the De ecclesia schema of 1962, but more important were his theological publications which helped form the ecclesiological vision of many bishops. During Vatican II, his informal contribution through unofficial meetings and lectures gradually was replaced by a direct role in drafting and revising texts. His influence can be seen principally in (...) the first two chapters of Lumen gentium, rendering it more biblical and patristic and placing into relief 1) the priority of grace over structure, 2) the historicity of the Church, giving better expression to its humanity and catholicity, and 3) its essentially missionary nature. (shrink)

In his Florentine Histories, Machiavelli offers an ambivalent portrayal of the revolt of the textile workers in late fourteenth-century Florence, known as the tumult of the Ciompi. On the face of it, Machiavelli's depiction of the insurgent workers is not exactly flattering. Yet this picture is undermined by a firebrand speech, which Machiavelli invents and attributes to an unnamed leader of the plebeian revolt. I interpret this speech as a radical and egalitarian vector of thought opened up by Machiavelli's text. (...) The revolutionary address reveals an untimely and not entirely self-conscious political radicalism, a plebeian politics that repudiates the logic of oligarchic privilege and is simultaneously not available for subsumption under the mantle of civic republicanism. (shrink)

INTRODUCTION Beyond Dissociations Reassembling the mind-brain after all? Yves Rossetti Antti Revonsuo "Comme des banes de poissons de meme espece, ...

The popularity of the stakeholder model has been achieved thanks to its powerful visual scheme and its very simplicity. Stakeholder management has become an important tool to transfer ethics to management practice and strategy. Nevertheless, legitimate criticism continues to insist on clarification and emphasises on the perfectible nature of the model. Here, rather than building on the discussion from a philosophical or theoretical point of view, a different and innovative approach has been chosen: the analysis will return to the origin (...) of stakeholder theory and will keep the graphical framework firmly in perspective. It will confront the stakeholder model’s graphical representation to the discussion on stakeholder definition, stakeholder identification and categorisation, to re-centre the debate to the strategic origin of the stakeholder model. The ambiguity and the vagueness of the stakeholder concept are discussed from managerial and legal approaches. The impacts of two major shortcomings of the popular stakeholder framework are examined: the boundaries and the level of the firm’s environment, and the ambivalent position of pressure groups and regulators. Working pragmatically, with a focus on the managerial and organisational perspective, an attempt is made to clarify the categorisations and classifications by introducing new terminology with a distinction between stakeholders, stakewatchers and stakekeepers. The analysis will finally lead to a proposed upgraded and refined version of the stakeholder model, with incremental ameliorations close to Freeman’s original model and a return of focus to its essence, the managerial implications in a strategic approach. (shrink)

This research explores the relationship between work context and professional ethics. Specifically, we analyze through an online survey of professional accountants the degree to which changing work conditions have altered individual accountants ’ commitment to the core professional value of auditor independence. We argue that certain changes in the condition of work have made some categories of accountants more susceptible to the logic of commercialism rather than the logic of professionalism. We find general support for this argument. We observe that (...) accountants working outside of public accounting have a higher commitment to independence than do accountants working in the context of public accounting firms. We further observe that accountants in large international accounting firms report lower commitment to auditor independence than do others in public accounting. And we observe that older accountants report stronger commitment to auditor independence. One finding, however, contradicts our general thesis. We find that commitment to one’s client does not necessarily result in a loss of commitment to the core professional value of independence. We conclude that changes in the context of work have contributed to the demise of ethics among professional accountants and suggest that further research be done to elaborate the relationship between client commitment and independence commitment. (shrink)

The concept of general equilibrium, one of the central components of economic theory, explains the behavior of supply, demand, and prices by showing that supply and demand exist in balance through pricing mechanisms. The mathematical tools and properties for this theory have developed over time to accommodate and incorporate developments in economic theory, from multiple markets and economic agents to theories of production.Yves Balasko offers an extensive, up-to-date look at the standard theory of general equilibrium, to which he has (...) been a major contributor. This book explains how the equilibrium manifold approach can be usefully applied to the general equilibrium model, from basic consumer theory and exchange economies to models with private ownership of production. Balasko examines properties of the standard general equilibrium model that are beyond traditional existence and optimality. He applies the theory of smooth manifolds and mappings to the multiplicity of equilibrium solutions and related discontinuities of market prices. The economic concepts and differential topology methods presented in this book are accessible, clear, and relevant, and no prior knowledge of economic theory is necessary.General Equilibrium Theory of Value offers a comprehensive foundation for the most current models of economic theory and is ideally suited for graduate economics students, advanced undergraduates in mathematics, and researchers in the field. (shrink)

In The Equilibrium Manifold, noted economic scholar and major contributor to the theory of general equilibrium Yves Balasko argues that, contrary to what many textbooks want readers to believe, the study of the general equilibrium model did not end with the existence and welfare theorems of the 1950s. These developments, which characterize the modern phase of the theory of general equilibrium, led to what Balasko calls the postmodern phase, marked by the reintroduction of differentiability assumptions and the application of (...) the methods of differential topology to the study of the equilibrium equation. Balasko's rigorous study demonstrates the central role played by the equilibrium manifold in understanding the properties of the Arrow-Debreu model and its extensions. Balasko argues that the tools of differential topology articulated around the concept of equilibrium manifold offer powerful methods for studying economically important issues, from existence and uniqueness to business cycles and economic fluctuations. After an examination of the theory of general equilibrium's evolution in the hundred years between Walras and Arrow-Debreu, Balasko discusses the properties of the equilibrium manifold and the natural projection. He highlights the important role of the set of no-trade equilibria, the structure of which is applied to the global structure of the equilibrium manifold. He also develops a geometric approach to the study of the equilibrium manifold. Applications include stability issues of adjustment dynamics for out-of-equilibrium prices, the introduction of price-dependent preferences, and aspects of time and uncertainty in extensions of the general equilibrium model that account for various forms of market frictions and imperfections. Special effort has been made at reducing the mathematical technicalities without compromising rigor. The Equilibrium Manifold makes clear the ways in which the postmodern" developments of the Arrow-Debreu model improve our understanding of modern market economies. (shrink)

L'humanisme n'est pas le propre des esprits passéistes. Faute de savoir prédire quels humains nous serons suite au déferlement technologique et scientifique en cours, l'humanisme vise à réinscrire l'homme dans son histoire. Longue quête en faveur de la nécessaire rénovation de la pensée humaniste pour s'adapter au nouveau monde en train de se structurer sous nos yeux, tout en s'opposant à la « chosification » en cours de l'humain. En réponse à ce travail d'analyse et de compréhension d'un quotidien en (...) rapide évolution, le Professeur Escande recommande dans sa préface : « à ceux qui se sentiraient une âme d'humanistes en voie de recomposition que de travailler ce qu'Yves Bannel leur a concocté de profond et précis pour remettre leurs réflexions dans le sillon du monde neuf ». Après "Les Nouvelles voies de l'Ethique"(2013) qui décode le monde contemporain à travers le prisme de l'éthique, puis "La crise Identitaire (2014) qui suit les méandres du ressenti identitaire et "La construction du sens" (2015), recherche personnelle et responsable du sens des choses, ce nouvel essai pose une question de pleine actualité : « L'Humanisme reste-t-il un concept d'actualité? » question à laquelle il essaye de répondre avec lucidité et sans excessive illusion. (shrink)

The popularity of surgical modifications of race-typical features among Asian women has generated debates on the ethical implications of the practice. Focusing on blepharoplasty as a representative racial surgery, this article frames the ethical discussion by viewing Asian cosmetic surgery as an example of medicalization, which can be interpreted in two forms: treatment versus enhancement. In the treatment form, medicalization occurs by considering cosmetic surgery as remedy for pathologized Asian features; the pathologization usually occurs in reference to western features as (...) the norm. In the enhancement form, medicalization occurs by using medical means to improve physical features to achieve a certain type of beauty or physical appearance. Each type of medicalization raises slightly different ethical concerns. The problem with treatment medicalization lies in the pathologization of Asian features, which is oppressive as it continues to reinforce racial norms of appearance and negative stereotypes. Enhancement medicalization is ethically problematic because cosmetic surgery tends to conflate beauty and health as medical goals of surgery, overemphasizing the value of appearance that can further displace women’s control over their own bodies. I conclude that in both forms of medicalization, cosmetic surgery seems to narrowly frame a complex psychosocial issue involving physical appearance as a matter that can be simply solved through surgical means. (shrink)

Les violations des droits de la personne sont de plus en plus fréquentes et de plus en plus graves dans les sociétés occidentales. C’est la conséquence de « l’entreprisation » de notre monde. Devenue l’organisation domi­nante dans nos sociétés, l’entreprise constitue dans son principe même une menace pour la dignité de la personne, dans la mesure où elle est fondée sur l’ins­trumentalisation des êtres humains. Quiconque veut protéger l’homme de l’ex­ploi­tation et de l’aliénation ne peut donc que souhaiter l’abolition de (...) l’entreprise. Mais, dans ce cas, il faut supprimer les conditions qui la rendent possible. Or, paradoxalement, certains droits fondamentaux font partie de ces conditions. D’où la nécessité de les repenser. (shrink)

Stakeholder theory advocates that firms bear responsibility for the implications of their actions. However, while a firm affects or can affect stakeholders, stakeholders can also affect the corporation. Previous stakeholder theorising has neglected the reciprocal nature of responsibility. The question can be asked whether—in a spirit of reciprocity, loyalty and fairness—stakeholders should treat the corporation in a fair and responsible way. This study based on different definitions of stakeholders argues that various stakeholder attributes differ for different categories of stakeholders. This (...) analysis presumes that the attribute of stakeholder reciprocity can probably be restricted to real stakeholders, labelled stakeowners: genuine stakeholders with a legitimate stake, the loyal partners who strive for mutual benefits. Stakeowners own and deserve a stake in the firm. Stakeholder reciprocity could be an innovative criterion in the corporate governance debate as to who should be accorded representation on the board. Corporate social responsibility should imply corporate stakeholder responsibility. (shrink)

Yves R. Simon explores moral virtue in this piece through identifying three moral positions common in modernity that attempt to substitute the traditional concept of virtue, as well as discussing the distinction between nature and use of sources of good or evil. He also discusses the distinctions between habits and opinions, as well as the virtue and science. He gives clear examples that make this book enjoyable for readers of all levels to understand moral virtue.

Recent academic articles point to an increased vagueness and overlap in concepts related to business ethics and corporate responsibility. Further, the perception of these notions can differ in the smallbusiness world from the original academic definitions. This article focuses on the cognition of small-business owner-managers. Given the impact of small-business owner-managers on their ventures, corporate responsibility and ethical issues can take a different route in SMEs. The small-business owner-manager is able to shape the corporate culture and to enact values other (...) than profit. Adopting a cognitive perspective, we have identified how the small-business owner-manager makes sense of notions linked to corporate social responsibility (CSR) and business ethics. The concept of sensemaking has recently been applied to CSR (Basu and Pallazzo, 2008; Cramer et al., 2006). Applying a cognitive perspective to small-business owners may help in explaining specific phenomena found within smallbusiness ownership. For this research, the Repertory Grid Technique (RGT) is used, a method that has not previously been widely applied in the business and society field. Our findings to an extent invalidate the confusion in terminology found in the academic literature. Smallbusiness owner-managers, pragmatically and rather clearly, differentiate among the various concepts related to corporate responsibility and business ethics but, at the same time, they recognise the interrelationships and interdependencies of these concepts. These findings contribute to a better understanding of how small-business owners think and integrate corporate responsibility and ethical issues into their decisionmaking. (shrink)

Despite the recent increase in interest in corporate social responsibility and the propagation of corporate governance in both business and academic literature, from observations of actual practice, the author has seen at all company levels, in everyday operations, instances of non-ethical behaviour vis-à-vis the whole gamut of stakeholders. This state of affairs is linked with: pressure from stakeholders, short-term tactics, hegemony of financial considerations, ‘juridisation’ of business, the tyranny of communications and the media and the difficulties in translating strategy into (...) practical implementation. The paper scrutinises the motivation and the psychology of entrepreneurs and business people, and their behaviour is compared to other professional groups and confronted with the decline in ethics in society as described by some important observers. The conclusion drawn is that the recent positive evolutions do not provide sufficient ethical guidelines for the day-to-day activities of middle managers and entrepreneurs in the present competitive environment. Managers will always be confronted by difficult choices with ethical dilemmas. There will always be a tension between theory and pragmatism, but progress can be made with the effective implementation of the ethical discourse in companies. To achieve this, ethical management should not be confined to the large strategic issues but also applied to the small practical matters of everyday business life. Ethics in business and entrepreneurship requires more than corporate governance and corporate social responsibility (CSR). (shrink)

For Yves R. Simon, philosophy has an affinity to science, not in the sense that philosophy is a mere metascience, a commentary on the sciences, but rather because it shares the same aim as science: the search for explanation. The philosophy Simon espouses is philosophical realism which, following Jacques Maritain, he prefers to call critical realism. Against the prejudice that only some version of philosophical idealism, be it critical or absolute, is capable of understanding positive science. Simon, in Foresight (...) and Knowledge, develops a philosophy of science form a realistic perspective. Philosophy of science or the critique of science, as it was known in France, is according to Simon, metahphysics in the exercise of its critical function. Simon selects as the central focus of the treatise the problem of determinism, causality, and chance. Simon shows that the concept “determinism” must be understood in different conceptual systems, such as a philosophy of nature and physics; in the latter, determinism is conceived as a possibility of certain and exact prediction. (shrink)

Jean-Yves Le Naour et Catherine Valenti proposent un ouvrage ambitieux par son propos : faire une histoire de l'avortement depuis le milieu du XIXe jusqu'à la fin du XXe siècle. Entreprise ambitieuse mais nécessaire, une telle synthèse étant inédite en France. L'idée force du livre tient donc dans sa longue durée : un siècle et demi durant lequel la question de l'avortement fut au centre de débats tant politiques, que juridiques, économiques et sociaux. Le problème est pris à bras (...) le c... (shrink)

This article defends four claims. The first is that in the last few decades, two waves of democratic innovation based on random selection must be differentiated by their partly different concrete devices, embodying different social dynamics and pointing toward different kinds of democracy. The second claim is that the rationale of the first wave, based on randomly selected minipublics, largely differs from the dynamic of political sortition in Athens, as it points toward deliberative democracy rather than radical democracy. Conversely, empowered (...) sortition processes that have emerged during the second wave capture better the spirit of radical Athenian democratic traditions. The third claim is normative: these empowered sortition processes are more promising for a real democratization of democracy. The last claim is that any proposal of a legislature by lot must rely on this lesson when trying to defend a normatively convincing and politically realistic perspective. (shrink)

Rapprocher Bachelard des artistes de son époque relève d’une évidence, il est le philosophe de l’art de son temps. Le rapprocher de cette icône de la contemporanéité qu’est Yves Klein semble aller de soi, cela d’autant plus que Klein fait référence explicite à Bachelard et en fait la clé théorique de son exposition le Vide. Mais, sur un autre versant, Bachelard fait la sourde oreille aux sollicitations de Klein. Or s’il y a bien une incompréhension de deux personnes il (...) n’y en a pas moins un faisceau de corrélations esthétiques qui conduisent à considérer que l’art de Klein entre bien dans les catégories dégagées par Bachelard. En quoi une rencontre a bien eu lieu. (shrink)

This article discusses plant-closing decisions by multinational enterprises applying a stakeholder theory approach. In particular, we focus on the emergence of “intra-stakeholder alliances,” that is, alliances among the various stakeholder groups of a specific corporation. We analyze the emergence of stakeholder alliances in reaction to MNEs' decisions to terminate production locally and discuss their influence on the outcomes of such decisions. Our research is inspired by two exceptional case studies of two multinational breweries that announced their decisions to close niche (...) breweries in small towns in Italy and Belgium. In both cases, the initial decision was ultimately reversed through the actions of intra-stakeholder alliances. We combine insights from stakeholder theory and the social movement literature to analyze the action and influence of intra-stakeholder alliances in seven cases of plant-closing decisions. We conclude by formulating four general propositions that can provide guidance to MNE management in plant-closing decisions. Our findings extend managerial stakeholder theory, show how this approach can improve strategic management analysis, emphasize the importance of the relationships among stakeholders in the value-creation process, and shed light on the collective action and influence of intra-stakeholder alliances. (shrink)

Yve Lomax is a remarkable artist and writer, who has established a practice of writing that is unique within contemporary Fine Art. Her work has helped to establish a new discipline of Art Writing, which provides a particular space for a critical and analytical approach to writing within contemporary art. Passionate Being, as Anne Tallentire observes, "is both a culmination of and a departure from previous work," including her two earlier books for Tauris. Written through both the first and second (...) person singular, Passionate Being takes its author and its reader on a journey that has them thinking of their experience of and belonging to language. At its beginning, it brings to its author the question "What can you say?" The responses that ensue turn our attention toward presupposition and about how "singularity" can be said. The book also brings into play the work of other theorists, notably Giorgio Agamben. It asks us to view both language and the world taking-place without presupposition, revealing both the political implications, and those for living, that this vision holds. It is a work to be read twice with pleasure, and then again. (shrink)

First published in 1962, this classic study examines the relationship between authority and justice, life, truth, and order. Simon, himself a passionate proponent of liberty, defends authority as an essential concomitant of liberty.

In this article Schrijvers elaborates on the work of Jean-Yves Lacoste. In Expérience et Absolu , this French phenomenologist and theologian coins the ‘liturgic experience’. Such an experience is conceived of as a correction to the Heideggerian picture of finitude. While for Heidegger Dasein is a being towards the future and, most importantly, towards his own death, Lacoste wants to warrant the present as an area of meaning and sense. One such example is the liturgic experience, in which the (...) faithful undergo the nearness of God in the present. However, this experience must sharply be distinguished from the ‘religious experience’ as it is known in the works of Otto and Schleiermacher. The liturgic experience is the confrontation with the Christian God who does not appear objectively. Therefore the liturgic experience is a nonexperience. It is a brutal conversion of the believer to the image of Christ, who on the Cross had no experience of God whatsoever. Liturgy connotates a violent rupture with the world, and the experiences therein. In later works, Schrijvers contends, Lacoste corrects this Barthian scheme of liturgy: attention is now paid to the work of art as well as to the experience of resting as examples of an analogous rupture with Heideggers ‘being-in-the-world’. These experiences give back the Christian ‘being there’ its human character and recognizability: faith can be elucidated from the ruptures brought forth by the work of art and with the experience of resting in mind. The reflections on art are accompanied by an ontology of affectivity. ‘Older’ than the Heideggerian ‘world’ or ‘earth’ is our free and affective response to reality. This affective response is so rich that ‘being’ cannot and may not be reduced to Heidegger’s options: in between world and earth one encounters an open and indeterminate space that points to the irreducibility of being to its Heideggerian features. The experience of the work of art and liturgy, and their respective joyful present, can thus be given ontological weight. To conclude, Schrijvers examines I. Verhacks critical review of Lacostes book. The author tries to show that the Barthian scheme of liturgy is not solely due to the lack of a philosophical elucidation of the liturgic ‘being there’, as Verhack argues, but also, and foremost, to the lack of relation between God and world. This will be the occasion to conceive of the religious person as protesting against the Absolute. Is not the non-experience of liturgy the consequence of an ontotheological conception of the desire of God, and is it possible to understand theologically the protest against and refusal of one’s own non-experience as an unredeemedness? (shrink)

The success of the stakeholder theory in management literature as well as in current business practices is largely due to the inherent simplicity of the stakeholder model––and to the clarity of Freeman’s powerful synthesised visual conceptualisation. However, over the years, critics have attacked the vagueness and ambiguity of stakeholder theory. In this article, rather than building on the discussion from a theoretical point of view, a radically different and innovative approach is chosen: the graphical framework is used as the central (...) perspective. The major shortcomings of the popular stakeholder framework are systematically confronted with the graphical scheme to illustrate their visual impact. The graphical illustrations of the imperfections help explain the sometimes-oversimplified generalisation inherent to every graphical model. They also make some interrelationships easier to understand. The analysis demonstrates that, with the tacit but implicit acceptance of simplification of the discussed explanatory elements, Freeman’s framework remains a rather good approximation of reality. Only a few minor changes to the stakeholder model are consequently proposed. (shrink)

This essay offers a commentary of Jean-Yves Lacoste’s most recent book Théses sur le vrai. It does so through a close reading of the book’s main arguments and through relating this most recent work to Lacoste’s earlier thinking. Lacoste here offers a new introduction to his body of work by elaborating on the phenomenological experience of truth. Truth, Lacoste argues, is first and foremost experienced in experiences of newness and in experiences offered through poetry. These experiences show and manifest (...) the truth as “unexpected.” Such a surprise, for Lacoste, can be read as a secular translation of what theology calls the “good news.” The book concludes with new insights in Lacoste’s thinking of the relation between philosophy and theology. (shrink)

This article reviews experimental evidence for a specific sensorimotor function which can be dissociated from higher level representations of space. It attempts to delineate this function on the basis of results obtained by psychophysical experiments performed with brain damaged and healthy subjects. Eye and hand movement control exhibit automatic features, such that they are incompatible with conscious control. In addition, they rely on a reference frame different from the one used by conscious perception. Neuropsychological cases provide a strong support for (...) this specific motor representation of space, which can be spared in patients with lesions of primary sensory systems who have lost conscious perception of visual, tactile or proprioceptive stimuli. Observation of these patients also showed that their motor behavior can be ''attracted'' by a goal only under specific conditions, that is, when the response is immediate and when no cognitive representation of this goal is elaborated at the same time. Beyond the issue of the dissociation between an implicit motor representation and more cognitive processing of spatial information, the issue of the interaction between these two systems is thus a matter of interest. It is suggested that the conscious, cognitive representation of a stimulus can contaminate or override the short-lived motor representation, but no reciprocal influence seem to occur. The interaction observed in patients can also be investigated in normals. The literature provides examples of interaction between sensorimotor and cognitive framing of space, which confirm that immediate action is not mediated by the same system as delayed action, and that elaborating a categorial representation of the action goal prevents the expression of the short-lived sensorimotor representation. It is concluded that action can be controlled by a sensory system which is specialized for on-line processing of relevant goal characteristics. The temporal constraints of this system are such that it can affect the action before a full sensory analysis of this goal has been completed. The performance obtained on the basis of this spatial sensory processing suggests that short-lived motor representations may rather be considered as real ''presentation'' of the action world, which share its metric properties. (shrink)

This is a book that is stimulating, provocative, as well as very enjoyable reading.--Modern Age.