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Books > Humanities > Philosophy > Topics in philosophy
Why "aporophobia"-rejection of the poor-is one of the most serious problems facing the world today, and how we can fight it In this revelatory book, acclaimed political philosopher Adela Cortina makes an unprecedented assertion: the biggest problem facing the world today is the rejection of poor people. Because we can't recognize something we can't name, she proposes the term "aporophobia" for the pervasive exclusion, stigmatization, and humiliation of the poor, which cuts across xenophobia, racism, antisemitism, and other prejudices. Passionate and powerful, Aporophobia examines where this nearly invisible daily attack on poor people comes from, why it is so harmful, and how we can fight it. Aporophobia traces this universal prejudice's neurological and social origins and its wide-ranging, pernicious consequences, from unnoticed hate crimes to aporophobia's threat to democracy. It sheds new light on today's rampant anti-immigrant feeling, which Cortina argues is better understood as aporophobia than xenophobia. We reject migrants not because of their origin, race, or ethnicity but because they seem to bring problems while offering nothing of value. And this is unforgivable in societies that enshrine economic exchange as the supreme value while forgetting that we can't create communities worth living in without dignity, generosity, and compassion for all. Yet there is hope, and Cortina explains how we can overcome the moral, social, and political disaster of aporophobia through education and democratic institutions, and how poverty itself can be eradicated if we choose. In a world of migrant crises and economic inequality, Aporophobia is essential for understanding and confronting one of the most serious problems of the twenty-first century.
Yale H. Ferguson and Richard W. Mansbach have made a significant contribution to our contemporary understanding of global politics. This collection contains some of their classic essays and many unpublished articles which have been edited into a coherent and stimulating collection. Subjects covered include: Theory and method in global politics; The role of values and the postmodern challenge; The complex roles of actors in global politics 9/11 and its aftermath; and, The changing nature of war US unilateralism, hegemony and empire. A World of Polities will be essential reading for all advanced students and scholars in international relations.
"The questions this book deals with deserve close investigation. The book offers a rare opportunity to think about the limitations of our standard logic and semantic analysis from an overall perspective." - Notre Dame Philosophical Reviews In this challenging and provocative book, Dale Jacquette argues that contemporary philosophy labours under a number of historically inherited delusions about the nature of logic and the philosophical significance of certain formal properties of specific types of logical constructions. Exposing some of the key misconceptions about formal symbolic logic and its relation to thought, language and the world, Jacquette clears the ground of some very well-entrenched philosophical doctrines about the nature of logic, including some of the most fundamental seldom-questioned parts of elementary propositional and predicate-quantificational logic. Having presented difficulties for conventional ways of thinking about truth functionality, the metaphysics of reference and predication, the role of a concept of truth in a theory of meaning, among others, Jacquette proceeds to reshape the network of ideas about traditional logic that philosophy has acquired along with modern logic itself. In so doing Jacquette is able to offer a new perspective on a number of existing problems in logic and philosophy of logic.
Foundations of Embodied Learning advances learning, instruction, and the design of educational technologies by rethinking the learner as an integrated system of mind, body, and environment. Body-based processes-direct physical, social, and environmental interactions-are constantly mediating intellectual performance, sensory stimulation, communication abilities, and other conditions of learning. This book's coherent, evidence-based framework articulates principles of grounded and embodied learning for design and its implications for curriculum, classroom instruction, and student formative and summative assessment for scholars and graduate students of educational psychology, instructional design and technology, cognitive science, the learning sciences, and beyond.
As the demand for organs continues to outstrip availability and waiting lists surge, the pressure to make morally questionable, unethical decisions becomes more likely and trust in transplant medicine starts to erode. Medical ethics expert and former health professional, Trevor Stammers, analyses the complex ethical web that constitutes the worldwide exchange of organs and tissues. Key philosophical questions concerning existence, consciousness, the nature of death and the right to life connect organ donation and transplantation to real-life case studies exploring difficulties with the 'dead donor rule' for deceased donation, organ donation euthanasia, xenotransplantation and the creation of organoids and 'organs-on-chips', alongside examples of human trafficking and systematic state murder to provide organs. Controversial cases from Japan, Germany, USA and Singapore are examined alongside the Spanish, Welsh, and Chilean experience of deceased donation opt-out schemes to highlight the variety of threats and challenges to public trust in transplant medicine. Charting these examples provides valuable material for debates and discussions in the philosophy of medicine and medical ethics more generally. Stammers suggests viable alternatives to current ethical failings by focusing on the moral arguments that define public trust, moving the debate on transplant ethics in vital new directions.
This volume explores agricultural commercialization from a gender equality and right to food perspective. Agricultural commercialization, involving not only the shift to selling crops and buying inputs but also the commodification of land and labour, has always been controversial. Strategies for commercialization have often reinforced and exacerbated inequalities, been blind to gender differences and given rise to violations of the human rights to food, land, work and social security. While there is a body of evidence to trace these developments globally, impacts vary considerably in local contexts. This book systematically considers these dynamics in two countries, Cambodia and Ghana. Profoundly different in terms of their history and location, they provide the basis for fruitful comparisons because they both transitioned to democracy in the early 1990s, made agricultural development a priority, and adopted orthodox policies of commercialization to develop the sector. Chapters illustrate how commercialization processes are gendered, highlighting distinctive gender, ethnic and class dynamics in rural Ghana and Cambodia and the different outcomes these generate. They also show the ways in which food cultures are changing and the often-problematic impact of these changes on the safety and quality of food. Specific policies and legal norms are examined, with chapters addressing the development and implementation of frameworks on the right to food and land administration. Overall, the volume brings into relief multiple dimensions shaping the outcomes of processes of commercialization, including gender orders, food cultures, policy translation, national and sub-national policies, corporate investments and programmes, and formal and informal legal norms. In doing so, it offers insight not only on our case countries, but also provides proposals to advance rights-based research on food security. This book will be of great interest to students and scholars of food security, agricultural development and economics, gender, human rights and sustainable development.
This volume brings together a collection of recent essays on the philosophy and theory of history. This is a field of lively interdisciplinary discussion and research, to which historians, philosophers and theorists of culture and literature have contributed. The author is a philosopher by training, and his inspiration comes primarily from the continental-phenomenological tradition. Thus the influence of Husserl, Heidegger, Merleau-Ponty and Ricoeur can be discerned here. This background opens up a unique perspective on the issues under discussion. Phenomenology differs from other philosophical approaches, like metaphysics and epistemology. Phenomenology asks, of anything that exists or may exist: how is it given, how does it enter our experience, what is our experience of it like? Very broadly we can say: phenomenology is about experience. At first glance, this approach may seem ill-suited to history. In our language, "history" usually means either 1) what happened, i.e. past events, or 2) our knowledge of what happened. We can't experience past events, and whatever knowledge we have of them must come from other sources-memory, testimony, physical traces. But the author maintains that we actually do experience historical events, and these essays explain how this is so. Sitting at the intersection of philosophy and history, and divided into three parts-Historicity, Narrative, and Time, Teleology and History, and Embodiment and Experience-this is the ideal volume for those interested in experience from a philosophical and historical perspective.
We see the modern State as the most rational form of governing yet devised, and one which properly recognises our inherent individual rights. However, as the histories of colonialism and imprisonment reveal, it is also an intruder into the lives of generally unwilling individuals, constraining rights. This book looks beneath the contradiction to see an entity willingly sustained by all individuals and for which we forgo our responsibility to and for ourselves. We place ourselves in the hands of those interests that promise to deal with our fears and desires the best. Probing the work of political thinkers from Hobbes to Rawls, the book discovers a State that is a real, mythological entity, spreading across social and geographic space and concerned first with satisfying our two passions. Understanding this mythology may allow reason to emerge from its service to fear and desire, so that the modern State could become truly modern. This book will be of interest to scholars in Sociology, Politics, Philosophy, and Law.
What is the relationship between scientific research and ethics? Some think that science should be free from ethical and political considerations. Biomedical Research and Beyond argues that ethical guidance is essential for all forms of inquiry, including biomedical and scientific research. By addressing some of the most controversial questions of biomedical research, such as embryonic research, animal research, and genetic enhancement research, the author argues for a rich moral framework for the ethics of inquiry, based on the ideal of human flourishing. He then looks at other areas of inquiry, such as journalistic ethics, and military investigation, to see how similar they are to the ethics of scientific research. Finally, he looks at the virtues that must play a role in any life that is devoted to research and inquiry as a vocational commitment.
We all engage in the process of reasoning, but we don't always pay attention to whether we are doing it well. This book offers the opportunity to practise reasoning in a clear-headed and critical way, with the aims of developing an awareness of the importance of reasoning well and of improving the reader's skill in analyzing and evaluating arguments. In this third edition, Anne Thomson has updated and revised the book to include fresh and topical examples which will guide students through the processes of critical reasoning in a clear and engaging way. In addition, two new chapters on evaluating the credibility of evidence and decision making and dilemmas will fully equip students to reason well. By the end of the book students should be able to:
Hannah Arendt's work offers a powerful critical engagement with the cultural and philosophical crises of mid-twentieth-century Europe. Her idea of the banality of evil, made famous after her report on the trial of the Nazi war criminal, Adolf Eichmann, remains controversial to this day. In the face of 9/11 and the 'war on terror', Arendt's work on the politics of freedom and the rights of man in a democratic state are especially relevant. Her impassioned plea for the creation of a public sphere through free, critical thinking and dialogue provides a significant resource for contemporary thought. Covering her key ideas from The Origins of Totalitarianism and The Human Condition as well as some of her less well-known texts, and focussing in detail on Arendt's idea of storytelling, this guide brings Arendt's work into the twenty-first century while helping students to understand its urgent relevance for the contemporary world.
William E. Connolly's writings have pushed the leading edge of political theory, first in North America and then in Europe as well, for more than two decades now. This book draws on his numerous influential books and articles to provide a coherent and comprehensive overview of his significant contribution to the field of political theory. The book focuses in particular on three key areas of his thinking:
The first philosophical introduction to extremism which will become the 'go to' book on the topic. A highly topical subject on which courses are emerging - this book will enable teachers to teach it. Quassim Cassam is a prestigious name and already well-known for his work on terrorism and conspiracy theories and is a regular commentator on BBC Radio. Includes lots of examples of many kinds of extremism, from the philosophical and psychological (Nietzsche and Jung) to the political (Suffragettes, ANC) to contemporary examples like Prevent, the UK Deadicalization program and examples from the US and Europe.
The politics of the internet has entered the social science mainstream. From debates about its impact on parties and election campaigns following momentous presidential contests in the United States, to concerns over international security, privacy and surveillance in the post-9/11, post-7/7 environment; from the rise of blogging as a threat to the traditional model of journalism, to controversies at the international level over how and if the internet should be governed by an entity such as the United Nations; from the new repertoires of collective action open to citizens, to the massive programs of public management reform taking place in the name of e-government, internet politics and policy are continually in the headlines. The Routledge Handbook of Internet Politics is a collection of over thirty chapters dealing with the most significant scholarly debates in this rapidly growing field of study. Organized in four broad sections: Institutions, Behavior, Identities, and Law and Policy, the Handbook summarizes and criticizes contemporary debates while pointing out new departures. A comprehensive set of resources, it provides linkages to established theories of media and politics, political communication, governance, deliberative democracy and social movements, all within an interdisciplinary context. The contributors form a strong international cast of established and junior scholars. This is the first publication of its kind in this field; a helpful companion to students and scholars of politics, international relations, communication studies and sociology.
This volume distinguishes between two main traditions in the philosophy of science - the aristotelian, with its stress on explanation in terms of purpose and intentionality, and the galilean, which takes causal explanation as primary. It then traces the complex history of these competing traditions as they are manifested in such movements as positivism, idealism, Marxism and contemporary linguistic analysis. Hempels's theory of scientific explanation, the claims of cybernetics the rise of an analytic philosophy of action and the revival of hermenuetics are all discussed. The volume also deals with causal explanation, intentionality and teleological explanation, and explanation in history and the social sciences. The author concludes that explanation of human actions cannot be reduced to simple causality, and discusses the implications of this conclusion for the disciplines of history and sociology.
Needs and Moral Necessity analyses ethics as a practice, explains why we have three moral theory-types, consequentialism, deontology and virtue ethics, and argues for a fourth needs-based theory.
This book charts and traces state-mandated or state-encouraged "patriotic" histories that have recently emerged in many places around the globe. Such "patriotic" histories can revolve around both affirmative interpretations of the past and celebration of national achievements. They can also entail explicitly denialist stances against acknowledging responsibility for past atrocities, even to the extent of celebrating perpetrators. Whereas in some cases "patriotic" history takes the shape of a coherent doctrine, in others they remain limited to loosely connected narratives. By combining nationalist and narcissist narratives, and by disregarding or distorting historical evidence, "patriotic" history promotes mythified, monumental, and moralistic interpretations of the past that posit partisan and authoritarian essentialisms and exceptionalisms. Whereas the global debates in interdisciplinary memory studies revolve around concepts like cosmopolitan, global, multidirectional, relational, transcultural, and transnational memory, to mention but a few, the actual socio-political uses of history remain strikingly nation-centred and one-dimensional. This volume collects fifteen caste studies of such "nationalizations of history" ranging from China to the Baltic states. They highlight three features of this phenomenon: the ruthlessness of methods applied by many state authorities to impose certain interpretations of the past, the increasing discrepancy between professional and political approaches to collective memory, and the new "post-truth" context. This book will be of interest to students and researchers of international politics, the radical right and global history. It was originally published as a special issue of the Journal of Genocide Research.
The first full, philosophical introduction to Descartes for many years – competitors are either out of date or considerably higher in level Descartes is the most important Western philosopher after Plato and studied by virtually all philosophy students at some point Explains and assesses Descartes’ most important ideas, arguments and texts, particularly his Meditations Concerning First Philosophy Ideal for anyone coming to Descartes for the first time Additional features include a chronology, a glossary and annotated further reading
This is the first book-length academic study of historical crime fiction that explores Nazi Germany and the Holocaust. This is the first book-length academic study of the intersection of crime fiction and Holocaust fiction. This book discusses changing and conflicting ideas of legal, moral and social justice as they appear and are explored in historical crime fiction about the Holocaust and its legacies. This book discusses the ways in which popular historical crime novels explore the forms, styles and techniques of the novel, as they test its capacity to represent the Holocaust.
• Links the cultural agency of imaginative discourse to its capacity to address, challenge, and evoke a deep sociality characteristic of humans; • Brings together two prominent currents informing contemporary literary theory—affective and neurocognitive-evolutionary literary studies and work calling for renewed attentiveness to ethical and aesthetic qualities in literary works; • Develops and illustrates his arguments through analyses of a wide range of literary works
In this classic work, Thomas Sowell analyzes the two competing visions that shape our debates about the nature of reason, justice, equality, and power: the constrained" vision, which sees human nature as unchanging and selfish, and the unconstrained" vision, in which human nature is malleable and perfectible. He describes how these two radically opposed views have manifested themselves in the political controversies of the past two centuries, including such contemporary issues as welfare reform, social justice, and crime. Updated to include sweeping political changes since its first publication in 1987, this revised edition of A Conflict of Visions offers a convincing case that ethical and policy disputes circle around the disparity between both outlooks.
The European Union is often attacked for its 'democratic deficit', namely its deficiencies in representation, transparency and accountability, as well as its lack of popular support. Can these shortcomings be counteracted by the development of a viable European public sphere? This book assesses the possible formation of a communicative space that might enable and engender the creation of a transnational or a supranational public. The contributors consider the EU's democratic credentials and how well it communicates, and they also evaluate the major institutions and their links to general publics. The European Union and the Public Sphere emphasizes a 'deliberative democratic' perspective on the public sphere, addressing some key questions: * What are the prospects for a European public sphere? * Should we think in terms of the EU having a single public sphere, or are overlapping public spheres a more viable option? * What do this book's findings on the question of the public sphere tell us about the EU as a political entity? Students and scholars of European democracy, political communication, and the politics of institutions will all be greatly interested by this book.
The year 1888 marked the last year of Friedrich Nietzsche's intellectual career and the culmination of his philosophical development. In that final productive year, he worked on six books, all of which are now, for the first time, presented in English in a single volume. Together these new translations provide a fundamental and complete introduction to Nietzsche's mature thought and to the virtuosity and versatility of his most fully developed style. The writings included here have a bold, sometimes radical tone that can be connected to Nietzsche's rising profile and growing confidence. In The Antichrist, we are offered an extended critique of Christianity and Christian morality alongside blunt diagnoses of contemporary Europe's cultural decadence. In Dionysus Dithyrambs we are presented with his only work composed exclusively of poetry, and in Twilight of the Idols we find a succinct summary of his mature philosophical views. At times the works are also openly personal, as in The Case of Wagner, which presents Nietzsche's attempt to settle accounts with his former close friend, German composer Richard Wagner, and in his provocative autobiography, Ecce Homo, which sees Nietzsche taking stock of his past and future while also reflecting on many of his earlier texts. Scrupulously edited, this critical volume also includes commentary by esteemed Nietzsche scholar Andreas Urs Sommer. Through this new collection, students and scholars are given an essential introduction to Nietzsche's late thought.
This book deals with the theoretical and empirical questions of federalism in the context of five case studies: Austria, Belgium, Canada, Germany and Switzerland. The central argument is that in the long run the political institutions of federalism adapt to achieve congruence with the underlying social structure. This change could be in the centralist direction reflecting ethno-linguistic homogeneity, or in decentralist terms corresponding to ethno-linguistic heterogeneity. In this context, the volume:
Explaining Federalism will be of interest to students and scholars of federalism, comparative government, comparative institutional analysis and comparative public policy.
This book explores the enduring appeal of child pornography and its ramifications for criminal justice systems around the world. It is based on an extensive review of academic literature and newspaper coverage, a trawl of websites frequented by those with a sexual interest in children, a survey of how police investigate these offences, examination of prosecutors' decisions, and interviews with judges. It provides a framework for understanding the contemporary nature of this problem, especially the harms it causes, its intimate relationship with new technologies and the challenges it poses to law enforcement authorities. The internet plays a pivotal role. Its sheer size, the anarchic way it grows, the lack of any boundaries to its expansion and its disregard for national borders make it a legal environment without parallel. An unwavering focus on the threat of sexual abuse has contributed to the emergence of a context where routine dealings with children are viewed through a 'paedophilic' lens. This can have the unfortunate consequence of distracting attention from more urgent concerns (such as poverty and neglect), which make children vulnerable to sexual exploitation. In this way an emphasis on the sexualisation of children could be said to aggravate the problem that it sets out to address. The book: provides a comprehensive analysis of child pornography issues in all of their complexity, including legal, psychological, criminal justice and social perspectives. presents significant volume of original empirical data gathered from police, prosecutors and judges. includes new qualitative and quantitative information set against a background of shifting international developments. The analysis is explicitly comparative. draws on a variety of sources including support groups for paedophiles, newspaper coverage of court cases involving child pornography, victim testimony and police operations. |
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