This article reviews empirical and conceptual material from two distinct research traditions: on the science-technology relation and on industrial innovation. It aims both to shed new light on an old debate—the distinction between scientific and technological knowledge—and to refine our conceptualizations of the knowledge used by companies in the course of research and development leading to innovation. On the basis of three empirical studies, a composite categorization of different types of knowledge used in innovation is proposed, as part of a (...) broader framework encompassing two further taxonomic dimensions. It is hoped that this typology and framework might provide useful research tools in furthering our understanding of the knowledge transfers and transformations that occur in the course of innovation. It could also prove useful for organizations and groups facing difficult strategic choices about technology. (shrink)

This article seeks to open up a new avenue for feminist technology studies—gender-aware research on engineers and engineering practice—on the grounds that engineers are powerful symbols of the equation between masculinity and technology and occupy significant roles in shaping new technologies. Drawing on the disparate evidence available, the author explores four themes. The first asks why the equation between masculinity and technology is so durable when there are such huge mismatches between image and practice. The second examines this mismatch in (...) the detail of engineering knowledge and practice to reveal that fractured and contradictory constructions of masculinity frequently coexist. The third theme addresses the suggestion that women and men might bring different styles to engineering. Finally, the author explores subjective experiences of engineering to argue that engineers’ shared pleasures in and identification with technology both define what it means to be an engineer and provide appealing symbols of power that act to compensate for a perceived lack of power or competence in other arenas. (shrink)

The pleasures experienced by boys and men who work and play closely with technology have important implications for both gender and technology. This article presents empirical evidence on the topic from two studies: one of hobbyist “robot builders” who build machines for the U.K. television program Robot Wars, the other of professional software developers working in a large U.S. corporation. In spite of the obvious differences between these two groups, they experience strikingly similar pleasures—in creating technologies, in their skills and (...) knowledge, and in their intimacy and comfort with technology. The authors discuss available gender-based analyses of men’s pleasures in technology, drawing on the empirical material to both challenge and extend these analyses. The authors suggest, tentatively, that technology is a gender-authentic and gender-available avenue for those men who particularly crave certainty because technology appears more certain, easier to understand, and easier to master than other worlds they inhabit. (shrink)

The child directed speech of twelve English‐speaking motherswas analyzed in terms of utterance‐level constructions. First, the mothers' utterances were categorized in terms of general constructional categories such as Wh‐questions, copulas and transitives. Second, mothers' utterances within these categories were further specified in terms of the initial words that framed the utterance, item‐based phrases such as Are you …, I'll …, It's …, Let's …, What did … The findings were: (i) overall, only about 15% of all maternal utterances had SVO (...) form (most were questions, imperatives, copulas, and fragments); (ii) 51% of all maternal utterances began with one of 52 item‐based phrases, mostly consisting of two words or morphemes (45% began with one of just 17 words); and (iii) children used many of these same item‐based phrases, in some cases at a rate that correlated highly with their own mother's frequency of use. We suggest that analyses of adult–child linguistic interaction should take into account not just general constructional categories, but also the item‐based constructions that adults and children use and the frequency with which they use them. (shrink)

We invoke the ideal of tolerance in response to conflict, but what does it mean to answer conflict with a call for tolerance? Is tolerance a way of resolving conflicts or a means of sustaining them? Does it transform conflicts into productive tensions, or does it perpetuate underlying power relations? To what extent does tolerance hide its involvement with power and act as a form of depoliticization? Wendy Brown and Rainer Forst debate the uses and misuses of tolerance, an (...) exchange that highlights the fundamental differences in their critical practice despite a number of political similarities. Both scholars address the normative premises, limits, and political implications of various conceptions of tolerance. Brown offers a genealogical critique of contemporary discourses on tolerance in Western liberal societies, focusing on their inherent ties to colonialism and imperialism, and Forst reconstructs an intellectual history of tolerance that attempts to redeem its political virtue in democratic societies. Brown and Forst work from different perspectives and traditions, yet they each remain wary of the subjection and abnegation embodied in toleration discourses, among other issues. The result is a dialogue rich in critical and conceptual reflections on power, justice, discourse, rationality, and identity. (shrink)

In Sleeping with Extra-Terrestrials , Wendy Kaminer argues that we are a society intoxicated by the irrational: religion, spirituality, and popular therapies threaten to replace rational thought with supernaturalism and impassioned but unexamined personal testimony. Ranging from our fascination with angels, aliens, and near- death experiences to the rise of junk science, the recovery movement, and the digital culture, Kaminer points out the amusing and ominous effects of our deference to spiritual authorities and resistance to critical thinking. She questions (...) conventional wisdom about the association of religious belief with virtue, identifying the sectarianism of efforts to establish religion in the public square. With both wit and empathy, Kaminer takes on what many people hold sacred. Kaminer is an eloquent and incisive critic and rationalist living in a superstitious, evangelical age. In Sleeping with Extra-Terrestrials she challenges us to exercise skepticism, reason, and irreverence and to appreciate the pleasures of free inquiry. (shrink)

Trust is central to our social lives. We know by trusting what others tell us. We act on that basis, and on the basis of trust in their promises and implicit commitments. So trust underpins both epistemic and practical cooperation and is key to philosophical debates on the conditions of its possibility. It is difficult to overstate the significance of these issues. On the practical side, discussions of cooperation address what makes society possible—of how it is that life is not (...) a Hobbesian war of all against all. On the epistemic side, discussions of cooperation address what makes the pooling of knowledge possible—and so the edifice that is science. But trust is not merely central to our lives instrumentally; trusting relations are themselves of great value and, in trusting others, we realize distinctive forms of value. What are these forms of value, and how is trust central to our lives? These questions are explored and developed in this volume, which collects fifteen new essays on the philosophy of trust. They develop and extend existing philosophical discussion of trust and will provide a reference point for future work on trust. (shrink)

Whether in characterizing Catharine MacKinnon's theory of gender as itself pornographic or in identifying liberalism as unable to make good on its promises, Wendy Brown pursues a central question: how does a sense of woundedness become the basis for a sense of identity? Brown argues that efforts to outlaw hate speech and pornography powerfully legitimize the state: such apparently well-intentioned attempts harm victims further by portraying them as so helpless as to be in continuing need of governmental protection. "Whether (...) one is dealing with the state, the Mafia, parents, pimps, police, or husbands," writes Brown, "the heavy price of institutionalized protection is always a measure of dependence and agreement to abide by the protector's rules." True democracy, she insists, requires sharing power, not regulation by it; freedom, not protection.Refusing any facile identification with one political position or another, Brown applies her argument to a panoply of topics, from the basis of litigiousness in political life to the appearance on the academic Left of themes of revenge and a thwarted will to power. These and other provocations in contemporary political thought and political life provide an occasion for rethinking the value of several of the last two centuries' most compelling theoretical critiques of modern political life, including the positions of Nietzsche, Marx, Weber, and Foucault. (shrink)

As sources of knowledge, perception and testimony are both vulnerable to sceptical arguments. To both arguments a Moorean response is possible: both can be refuted by reference to particular things known by perception and testimony. However, lies and dreams are different possibilities and they are different in a way that undercuts the plausibility of a Moorean response to a scepticism of testimony. The condition placed on testimonial knowledge cannot be trivially satisfied in the way the Moorean would suggest. This has (...) substantial implications for any non-sceptical epistemological theory of testimony. (shrink)

Tolerance is generally regarded as an unqualified achievement of the modern West. Emerging in early modern Europe to defuse violent religious conflict and reduce persecution, tolerance today is hailed as a key to decreasing conflict across a wide range of other dividing lines-- cultural, racial, ethnic, and sexual. But, as political theorist Wendy Brown argues in Regulating Aversion, tolerance also has dark and troubling undercurrents. Dislike, disapproval, and regulation lurk at the heart of tolerance. To tolerate is not to (...) affirm but to conditionally allow what is unwanted or deviant. And, although presented as an alternative to violence, tolerance can play a part in justifying violence--dramatically so in the war in Iraq and the War on Terror. Wielded, especially since 9/11, as a way of distinguishing a civilized West from a barbaric Islam, tolerance is paradoxically underwriting Western imperialism. Brown's analysis of the history and contemporary life of tolerance reveals it in a startlingly unfamiliar guise. Heavy with norms and consolidating the dominance of the powerful, tolerance sustains the abjection of the tolerated and equates the intolerant with the barbaric. Examining the operation of tolerance in contexts as different as the War on Terror, campaigns for gay rights, and the Los Angeles Museum of Tolerance, Brown traces the operation of tolerance in contemporary struggles over identity, citizenship, and civilization. (shrink)

Neoliberalism and neoconservatism are two distinct political rationalities in the contemporary United States. They have few overlapping formal characteristics, and even appear contradictory in many respects. Yet they converge not only in the current presidential administration but also in their de-democratizing effects. Their respective devaluation of political liberty, equality, substantive citizenship, and the rule of law in favor of governance according to market criteria on the one side, and valorization of state power for putatively moral ends on the other, undermines (...) both the culture and institutions of constitutional democracy. Above all, the two rationalities work symbiotically to produce a subject relatively indifferent to veracity and accountability in government and to political freedom and equality among the citizenry. (shrink)

Critical Conversations in Philosophy of Education presents a series of conversations expressing many of the multiple voices that currently constitute the field of philosophy of education. Philosophy of education as a discipline has undergone several turns--the once marginal perspectives of the various feminisms, critical Marxism, and poststructuralist, postmodernist and cultural theory have gained ground alongside those of Anglo-analytic and pragmatic thought. Just as western philosophers in general are coming to terms with the "end of philosophy" pronouncement implicit in postmodernism, so (...) too are philosophers of education faced with similar challenges--challenges to long-held moral, political, aesthetic and epistemological commitments. The contributors take up these challenges through a dialogical structure, expressing differing positions without engaging in destructive critique. There is no intention to come to consensus; rather the point is to expand the number and kind of participating voices in the conversation and engage in a lively intellectual exchange that will insure the vitality of educational theorizing. (shrink)

The moral distress of psychologists working in psychiatric and mental health care settings was explored in an interdisciplinary, hermeneutic phenomenological study situated at the University of Alberta, Canada. Moral distress is the state experienced when moral choices and actions are thwarted by constraints. Psychologists described specific incidents in which they felt their integrity had been compromised by such factors as institutional and interinstitutional demands, team conflicts, and interdisciplinary disputes. They described dealing with the resulting moral distress by such means as (...) silence, taking a stance, acting secretively, sustaining themselves through work with clients, seeking support from colleagues, and exiting. Recognizing moral distress can lead to a significant shift in the way we perceive moral choices and understand the moral context of practice. (shrink)

ABSTRACT:In a world filled with poverty, environmental degradation, and moral injustice, social enterprises offer a ray of hope. These organizations seek to achieve social missions through business ventures. Yet social missions and business ventures are associated with divergent goals, values, norms, and identities. Attending to them simultaneously creates tensions, competing demands, and ethical dilemmas. Effectively understanding social enterprises therefore depends on insight into the nature and management of these tensions. While existing research recognizes tensions between social missions and business ventures, (...) we lack any systematic analysis. Our paper addresses this issue. We first categorize the types of tensions that arise between social missions and business ventures, emphasizing their prevalence and variety. We then explore how four different organizational theories offer insight into these tensions, and we develop an agenda for future research. We end by arguing that a focus on social-business tensions not only expands insight into social enterprises, but also provides an opportunity for research on social enterprises to inform traditional organizational theories. Taken together, our analysis of tensions in social enterprises integrates and seeks to energize research on this expanding phenomenon. (shrink)

ABSTRACT:In a world filled with poverty, environmental degradation, and moral injustice, social enterprises offer a ray of hope. These organizations seek to achieve social missions through business ventures. Yet social missions and business ventures are associated with divergent goals, values, norms, and identities. Attending to them simultaneously creates tensions, competing demands, and ethical dilemmas. Effectively understanding social enterprises therefore depends on insight into the nature and management of these tensions. While existing research recognizes tensions between social missions and business ventures, (...) we lack any systematic analysis. Our paper addresses this issue. We first categorize the types of tensions that arise between social missions and business ventures, emphasizing their prevalence and variety. We then explore how four different organizational theories offer insight into these tensions, and we develop an agenda for future research. We end by arguing that a focus on social-business tensions not only expands insight into social enterprises, but also provides an opportunity for research on social enterprises to inform traditional organizational theories. Taken together, our analysis of tensions in social enterprises integrates and seeks to energize research on this expanding phenomenon. (shrink)

Loi recently proposed a libertarian right to direct to consumer genetic testing — independent of autonomy or utility—reflecting Cohen’s work on self-ownership and Hohfeld’s model of jural relations. Cohen’s model of libertarianism dealt principally with self-ownership of the physical body. Although Loi adequately accounts for the physical properties of DNA, DNA is also an informational substrate, highly conserved within families. Information about the genome of relatives of the person undergoing testing may be extrapolated without requiring direct engagement with their personal (...) physical copy of the genome, triggering rights and interests of relatives that may differ from the rights and interests of others, that is, individual consumers, testing providers and regulators. Loi argued that regulatory interference with exercise of the right required justification, whereas prima facie exercise of the right did not. Justification of regulatory interference could include ‘conflict with other people’s rights’, ‘aggressive’ use of the genome and ‘harming others’. Harms potentially experienced by relatives as a result of the individual’s exercise of a right to test include breach of genetic privacy, violation of their right to determine when, and if, they undertake genetic testing and discrimination. Such harms may justify regulatory intervention, in the event they are recognised; motives driving ‘aggressive’ use of the genome may also be relevant. Each of the above criteria requires clarification, as potential redundancies and tensions exist between them, with different implications affecting different groups of rights holders. (shrink)

Once a term used primarily by moral philosophers, “moral distress” is increasingly used by health professionals to name experiences of frustration and failure in fulfilling moral obligations inherent to their fiduciary relationship with the public. Although such challenges have always been present, as has discord regarding the right thing to do in particular situations, there is a radical change in the degree and intensity of moral distress being expressed. Has the plight of professionals in healthcare practice changed? “Plight” encompasses not (...) only the act of pledging, but that of predicament and peril. The author claims that health professionals are increasingly put in peril by healthcare reform that undermines their efficacy and jeopardizes ethical engagement with those in their care. The re-engineering of healthcare to give precedence to corporate and commercial values and strategies of commodification, service rationing, streamlining, and measuring of “efficiency,” is literally demoralizing health professionals. Healthcare practice needs to be grounded in a capacity for compassion and empathy, as is evident in standards of practice and codes of ethics, and in the understanding of what it means to be a professional. Such grounding allows for humane response to the availability of unprecedented advances in biotechnological treatments, for genuine dialogue and the raising of difficult, necessary ethical questions, and for the mutual support of health professionals themselves. If healthcare environments are not understood as moral communities but rather as simulated marketplaces, then health professionals’ moral agency is diminished and their vulnerability to moral distress is exacerbated. Research in moral distress and relational ethics is used to support this claim. (shrink)

Wendy Brown's work commands widespread attention and respect, and there has been considerable interest as to how it would develop after "States of Injury." This book will not disappoint.

'Is politics gendered? Wendy Brown things so, and argues for this point with elegance, imagination and pungent phrases. Brown's book is challenging, provocative and...original; it does force us to question the degree to which gender controls our politics.'-THE REVIEW OF POLITICS.

The term compassion fatigue has come to be applied to a disengagement or lack of empathy on the part of care-giving professionals. Empathy and emotional investment have been seen as potentially costing the caregiver and putting them at risk. Compassion fatigue has been equated with burnout, secondary traumatic stress disorder, vicarious traumatization, secondary victimization or co-victimization, compassion stress, emotional contagion, and counter-transference. The results of a Canadian qualitative research project on nurses? experience of compassion fatigue are presented. Nurses, self-identified as (...) having compassion fatigue, described a change in their practice by which they began to shield and distance themselves from the suffering of patients and families. Time to help patients and families cope with suffering seemed unavailable, and many felt they were running on empty and, ultimately, impotent as nurses. Feelings of irritability, anger, and negativity arose, though participants described denying or ignoring these emotions as a way to try to survive their work day. Difficulties with work carried over into the nurses? personal lives, affecting their relationships with family and friends. Such experiences invariably called into question the participants? identity, causing them to reflect on the kind of nurse they were. The participants? compassion fatigue created a sense of hopelessness regarding positive change, although some nurses described strategies that seemed to help alleviate their compassion fatigue. (shrink)

Unable to answer the call of our patients: mental health nurses’ experience of moral distress When health practitioners’ moral choices and actions are thwarted by constraints, they may respond with feelings of moral distress. In a Canadian hermeneutic phenomenological study, physicians, nurses, psychologists and non‐professional aides were asked to identify care situations that they found morally distressing, and to elaborate on how moral concerns regarding the care of patients were raised and resolved. In this paper, we describe the experience of (...) moral distress related by nurses working in mental healthcare settings who believed that lack of resources (such as time and staff) leads to dispiritedness, lack of respect, and absence of recognition (for both patients and staff) which severely diminished their ability to provide quality care. The metaphors of flashlight and hammer are used to elaborate nurses’ possible responses to intolerable situations. (shrink)

Across the Euro-Atlantic world, political leaders have been mobilizing their bases with nativism, racism, xenophobia, and paeans to “traditional values,” in brazen bids for electoral support. How are we to understand this move to the mainstream of political policies and platforms that lurked only on the far fringes through most of the postwar era? Does it herald a new wave of authoritarianism? Is liberal democracy itself in crisis? In this volume, three distinguished scholars draw on critical theory to address our (...) current predicament. Wendy Brown, Peter E. Gordon, and Max Pensky share a conviction that critical theory retains the power to illuminate the forces producing the current political constellation as well as possible paths away from it. Brown explains how “freedom” has become a rallying cry for manifestly un-emancipatory movements; Gordon dismantles the idea that fascism is rooted in the susceptible psychology of individual citizens and reflects instead on the broader cultural and historical circumstances that lend it force; and Pensky brings together the unlikely pair of Tocqueville and Adorno to explore how democracies can buckle under internal pressure. These incisive essays do not seek to smooth over the irrationality of the contemporary world, and they do not offer the false comforts of an easy return to liberal democratic values. Rather, the three authors draw on their deep engagements with nineteenth–and twentieth–century thought to investigate the historical and political contradictions that have brought about this moment, offering fiery and urgent responses to the demands of the day. (shrink)

_John Stuart Mill_ investigates the central elements of the 19th century philosopher’s most profound and influential works, from _On Liberty_ to _Utilitarianism_ and _The Subjection of Women_. Through close analysis of his primary works, it reveals the very heart of the thinker’s ideas, and examines them in the context of utilitarianism, liberalism and the British empiricism prevalent in Mill’s day. • Presents an analysis of the full range of Mill’s primary writings, getting to the core of the philosopher’s ideas. • (...) Examines the central elements of Mill’s writings in easily accessible prose • Places Mill’s work and thought within the larger cultural and social context of 19th century Britain • Illustrates the continued relevance of Mill’s philosophy to today’s reader. (shrink)

In the present study we analyse a sample of Irish Child Directed Speech in terms of item-based constructions and the communicative intents which they express. The study is based on the speech of an Irish native speaker engaged in daily activities with her son (aged 1;9). The findings of the analyses indicate the high degree of lexical specificity attested in the sample; in total 35 item-based frames account for just under 70% of analysed utterances. In most cases there was a (...) one-to-one relationship between item-based frame and communicative intent. However, of particular interest was the clustering of structurally related frames around specific functions. We propose that this relationship highlights the role of communicative intent in the organisation of structural linguistic knowledge. (shrink)

Surveying a wide range of cultural controversies, from the Mapplethorpe affair to Salman Rushdie's death sentence, from canon-revision in the academy to the scandals that have surrounded Anthony Blunt, Martin Heidegger, and Paul de Man, Wendy Steiner shows that the fear and outrage they inspired are the result of dangerous misunderstanding about the relationship between art and life. "Stimulating. . . . A splendid rebuttal of those on the left and right who think that the pleasures induced by art (...) are trivial or dangerous. . . . One of the most powerful defenses of the potentiality of art."--Andrew Delbanco, New York Times Book Review "A concise and . . . readable account of recent contretemps that have galvanized the debate over the role and purposes of art. . . . [Steiner] writes passionately about what she believes in."--Michiko Kakutani, New York Times "This is one of the few works of cultural criticism that is actually intelligible to the nonspecialist reader. . . . Steiner's perspective is fresh and her perceptions invariably shrewd, far-ranging, and reasonable. A welcome association of sense and sensibility."-- Kirkus Reviews, starred review "Steiner has succeeded so well in [the] task she has undertaken. The Scandal of Pleasure is itself characterized by many of the qualities Steiner demans of art, among them, complexity, tolerance and the pleasures of unfettered thought."--Eleanor Heartly, Art in America "Steiner . . . provides the best and clearest short presentation of each of [the] debates."--Alexander Nehamas, Boston Book Review "Steiner has done a fine job as a historian/reporter and as a writer of sophisticated, very clear, cultural criticism. Her reportage alone would be enough to make this a distinguished book."--Mark Edmundson, Lingua Franca. (shrink)

We appreciate the opportunity to present some further thoughts on the libertarian right to test initially proposed by Loi, and hope these additional comments will further inform debate about this critical emerging technology. Loi’s important argument is that individuals possess a prima facie libertarian right to test their genomes and that regulatory intervention restricting genetic testing must be justified by those proposing regulation. Our position is that the onus of justifying regulation is reversed. The risk to others whose genomic information (...) is shared with the individual is potentially significant enough to warrant prima facie regulatory intervention, including protection against misuse of genetic information derived from those tests, not just against the individual tested but also against those who for reasons of common familial ancestry are also susceptible to misuse. Testing an individual’s genome does not merely reveal information about that individual; it reveals, or renders reasonably inferable, information about the genomes of close relatives due to the commonality of genomic DNA within families. Such commonality is not merely ‘incidentally identical’: it is instead inevitable given the shared nature of genomic DNA sequences within families. ‘Incidental identity’ may appropriately describe the statistical possibility of two unrelated individuals in the human …. (shrink)

Partnerships with Families and Communities: Building Dynamic Relationships is a comprehensive and accessible resource that provides pre-service teachers with the tools required to build effective, sustainable and proactive partnerships in both early childhood and primary educational settings. This text introduces models of home-school-community partnerships in educational contexts and presents a comprehensive partnerships approach for best practice in applying and leading effective relationships with key stakeholders. It explores essential underpinning policies, legislation and research theories that position strong, positive and proactive partnerships (...) as a systemic solution to children's learning development. Key topics covered include diversity in partnership work, reflective practice and tools for evaluating working partnerships. Each chapter includes focused pedagogy, key terms and definitions, scenarios and review questions, which enable readers to deeply engage with new concepts. 'Proactive Partners' boxes explore real-world scenarios and encourage readers to link theory with practice. (shrink)

Informal political representation—the phenomenon of speaking or acting on behalf of others although one has not been elected or selected to do so by means of a systematized election or selection procedure—plays a crucial role in advancing the interests of groups. Sometimes, those who emerge as informal political representatives (IPRs) do so willingly (voluntary representatives). But, often, people end up being IPRs, either in their private lives or in more public political forums, over their own protests (unwilling representatives) or even (...) without their knowledge (unwitting representatives)—that is, they are conscripted. None of the few theories of informal political representation extant accommodate conscripted IPRs. The account detailed here introduces the phenomenon of conscripted informal political representation and explains its place in a complete theory of informal political representation. Conscripted IPRs can, like their voluntary counterparts, come to have significant power to influence how various audiences regard those for whom the conscripted IPRs speak or act. Upon attaining such power to influence, conscripted IPRs, like their voluntary counterparts, come to have pro tanto duties to those they represent—duties that arise despite IPRs’ unwittingness or unwillingness. Understanding the phenomenon of conscripted informal political representation allows us to surface essential normative questions about informal political representation that are otherwise occluded. (shrink)

Corporate and commercial values are inducing some healthcare organizations to prescribe a customer service model that reframes the provision of nursing care. In this paper it is argued that such a model is incommensurable with nursing conceived as a moral practice and ultimately places nurses at risk. Based upon understanding from ongoing research on compassion fatigue, it is proposed that compassion fatigue as currently experienced by nurses may not arise predominantly from too great a demand for compassion, but rather from (...) barriers to enacting compassionate care. These barriers are often systemic. The paradigm shift in which healthcare environments are viewed as marketplaces rather than moral communities has the potential to radically affect the evolution of nursing as a discipline. (shrink)

Concern for human vulnerability seems to be at the heart of bioethical inquiry, but the concept of vulnerability is under-theorized in the bioethical literature. The aim of this article is to show why bioethics needs an adequately theorized and nuanced conception of vulnerability. We first review approaches to vulnerability in research ethics and public health ethics, and show that the bioethical literature associates vulnerability with risk of harm and exploitation, and limited capacity for autonomy. We identify some of the challenges (...) emerging from this literature: in particular, how to reconcile universal human vulnerability with a context-sensitive analysis of specific kinds and sources of vulnerability; and how to reconcile obligations to protect vulnerable persons with obligations to respect autonomy. We then briefly survey some of the theoretical resources available within the philosophical literature to address these challenges, and to assist in understanding the conceptual connections between vulnerability and related concepts such as harm, exploitation, needs, and autonomy. We also sketch out a taxonomy of sources and kinds of vulnerability. Finally, we consider the implications for policy evaluation of making vulnerability an explicit and central focus of bioethics. Our investigation is in the form of a broad survey motivating a research agenda rather than a detailed analysis. (shrink)

A participatory democracy necessarily minimizes legal restraints on its citizens, substituting, for the common good, moral obligations to contribute with their activities. This article argues that a democratic society is endangered unless both media and citizens accept reciprocal moral obligations related to the distribution and use of information. Journalists are expected to facilitate distribution of information and engage citizens usefully in the knowledge process, fueling the participatory engine that drives a democracy. Citizens, in return, have a reciprocal obligation to expose (...) themselves to useful information, respond publicly, tolerate (and even encourage) diversity, and protect media autonomy. (shrink)

Wendy Rogers ist Professorin für klinische Ethik und Catriona Mackenzie ist Professorin für Philosophie. Beide lehren an der Macquarie University in Sydney, Australien. Susan Dodds ist Professorin für Philosophie an der La Trobe University in Melbourne, Australien. Alle drei befassen sich seit Jahren intensiv mit feministischer Theorie, angewandter und biomedizinischer Ethik sowie mit Moralphilosophie.

The men and women who serve in the armed forces, in the words of Major General Joseph Caravalho, “sign a blank check, co-signed by their families, payable to the Army, Navy, Air Force, or Marines, up to and including their lives.” It is human nature to consider such a pact in polarized terms; the pact concludes in either a celebratory homecoming or funereal mourning. But in reality, surviving catastrophic injury may incur the greatest debt. The small but real possibility of (...) losing the ability to bear biological children due to genitourinary combat injury has been a topic of discussion in hushed tones, behind closed doors. But as policy changes move the conversation into the open, we must be fully aware of the far-reaching and long-term impacts of decisions on those who have sustained genitourinary injury. In January 2016, Secretary of Defense Ashton Carter outlined a set of reforms that would improve the quality of life for military families by recognizing the importance of maintaining fertility, even in the face of severe injury. This first promising step could build a solid foundation of insuring fertility preservation for wounded service members with genitourinary injury, and it could set a precedent beyond the military for insuring treatment for people who have lost their reproductive capacity. Thus, the ethical challenges raised by the new policy require careful analysis. (shrink)

This comprehensive reader represents the history, intellectual breadth and diversity of feminist theory.