Political Power

At the heart of the tension between state autonomy and international law is the question of whether states should willingly restrict their freedom of action for the sake of international security, human rights, trade, communication, and the environment. David Hume offers surprising insights to answer this question. He argues that the same interests in cooperation arise among individuals as well as states and that their interactions should be regulated by the same principles. Drawing on his model of dynamic coordination, I (...) will reconstruct the Humean case for developing international law into a more robust legal system and also highlight the limitation of Hume’s account of justice for such a reconstructive project. Hume’s lessons are enduring; we must strengthen the essential features of international law that allow states and individuals to reap the benefits of its protections, such as nonoptional rules that articulate a moral minimum, courts with compulsory jurisdiction, and stronger mechanisms of enforcement. (shrink)

Despite women’s increased labor force participation, household divisions of labor remain highly unequal. Properly implemented, gender egalitarian political interventions such as work time regulation, dependent care provisions, and family leave initiatives can induce families to share work more equally than they currently do. But do these interventions constitute legitimate uses of political power? In this article, I defend the political legitimacy of these interventions. Using the conception of citizenship at the heart of political liberalism, I argue that citizens would accept (...) political interventions aimed at protecting the ‘genuinely available option’ to enact gender egalitarian lifestyles. More strongly still, I argue that under certain circumstances, citizens would insist on the enactment of political interventions to protect this option. According to political liberalism’s constraints on legitimacy, this insistence renders these interventions not only legitimate but positively mandatory. It is legitimate for a state to exercise power to preserve the genuinely available option to enact a gender egalitarian lifestyle, and under certain circumstances, it is illegitimate for a state to fail to do so. (shrink)

Populism is widely thought to be in tension with liberal democracy. This article clarifies what exactly is problematic about populism from a liberal–democratic point of view and goes on to develop...

This review essay focusses on Gelderloos's normative theory of diversity of tactics. The book is worth serious attention by political theorists because of its sustained analysis of violence, nonvio...

Political realism is frequently criticised as a theoretical tradition that amounts to little more than a rationalisation of the status quo and an apology for power. This paper responds to this crit...

It has been argued recently that tyranny is a persisting phenomenon very much alive today, a greater danger than newer forms of misrule such as totalitarianism. One argument is based on human nature being such that the temptation to abuse political power in the form of tyranny remains a possibility in all societies. Another defines tyranny as a spiritual disorder of the soul and polity. Both date the 19th century as the time when tyranny dropped out of the western political (...) vocabulary. In this view, modern political thought, like political science generally, has been impoverished by ignorance of, or indifference to, the nature of tyranny. By contrast, I treat tyranny not as possessing an essential, unchanging nature, but as a contested political concept used for a variety of purposes by different regimes and groups. Nor do I agree that, because ‘tyranny’ was used infrequently during the 19th century, systematic abuses of political power went unnoticed and unclassified. I treat a number of cases by postulating a family of controversial and contested regime types: tyranny, despotism, absolute monarchy, Bonapartism, Caesarism, and dictatorship. From them I conclude that, after tyranny was conflated with despotism at the end of the 18th century, both concepts were redescribed in terms of newer classifications belonging to the same conceptual family. Because ‘tyranny’ was then extended to many non-political arenas, it became so trivialized as to leave no prospect of our retrieving its once potent political meanings. If ‘tyranny’ is equally applicable to teachers, husbands, fashions, or public opinion, the concept has lost its political cutting edge. It now lacks any distinctive meaning that might frame a situation and define it as calling for urgent and decisive action, especially in foreign policy. (shrink)

Monografia ta traktuje o ograniczaniu konfliktów w relacjach między segmentami społecznymi (takimi jak grupy etniczne, wspólnoty religijne), w których członkostwo opiera się na podstawach askryptywnych i kulturowych, a także między nimi a władzą centralną w Nigerii i Indonezji. Państwa te mają burzliwą historię niepodległego bytu, ogromne wieloetniczne i wieloreligijne populacje, duże gospodarki oraz zasoby surowców energetycznych. Jak wskazują liczne raporty, będą wkrótce należeć do najważniejszych w świecie. W Nigerii i Indonezji funkcjonują systemy polityczne oparte na tzw. power-sharing (współrządzeniu), tj. takie, (...) które za pomocą specyficznych formalnych i nieformalnych instytucji (rozumianych jako zespoły reguł) dopuszczają do udziału we władzy elity polityczne wywodzące się z różnych segmentów etnicznych i religijnych. Celem instytucji power-sharing jest budowanie pokoju i stabilności politycznej. Autor badań, których owocem jest ta praca, dokonał identyfikacji, wyjaśnienia i analizy roli oraz genezy najistotniejszych z nich, dowodząc zarazem, że w Nigerii i Indonezji współistnieją instytucje dwóch głównych modeli power-sharing, tj. konsocjonalizmu i centrypetalizmu. W konsekwencji wykazał, że międzysegmentowe współrządzenie w obu państwach ma charakter hybrydowy. Jest to poszerzenie empirycznej teorii power-sharing. Jej klasycy, Arend Lijphart (konsocjonalista) i Donald L. Horowitz (centrypetalista), nie przywiązywali większej wagi do możliwości implementacji instytucji dwóch modeli w ramach tego samego systemu politycznego. Tymczasem w Nigerii i Indonezji łączenie instytucji centrypetalnych i konsocjonalnych przyczyniło się do ograniczenia konfliktów. (shrink)

This chapter examines what role new behaviour-modification policies – commonly known as “nudges” – might play in cultivating virtues. At first sight, they would appear to be ruled out as a candidate means; but, by offering a more nuanced analysis, the chapter argues that some nudges have virtue-cultivating properties. It distinguishes between two kinds of nudges – 'automatic-behavioural' and 'discernment-developing' – and shows that what divides them is the ability of the latter, which the former lacks, to play an ecological-educative (...) role in developing the virtue of practical reason, which is required for the other virtues too. It thus provides an answer to the question of whether virtue-cultivating nudges are possible, while remaining neutral on whether virtue cultivation is, or under what conditions it could be, a legitimate aim of liberal-democratic states. (shrink)

This article presents Minobe Tatsukichi’s emperor organ theory as a novel understanding of the temporality of founding. In contrast to a conventional framework of founding which legitimizes the con...

Disagreement persists about when, if at all, disenfranchisement is a fitting response to criminal wrongdoing of type X. Positive retributivists endorse a permissive view of fittingness: on this view, disenfranchising a remarkably wide range of morally serious criminal wrongdoers is justified. But defining fittingness in the context of criminal disenfranchisement in such broad terms is implausible, since many crimes sanctioned via disenfranchisement have little to do with democratic participation in the first place: the link between the nature of a criminal (...) act X (the ‘desert basis’) and a fitting sanction Y is insufficiently direct in such cases. I define a new, much narrower account of the kind of criminal wrongdoing which is a more plausible desert basis for disenfranchisement: ‘political wrongdoing’, such as electioneering, corruption, or conspiracy with foreign powers. I conclude that widespread blanket and post-incarceration disenfranchisement policies are overinclusive, because they disenfranchise persons guilty of serious, but non-political, criminal wrongdoing. While such overinclusiveness is objectionable in any context, it is particularly objectionable in circumstances in which it has additional large-scale collateral consequences, for instance by perpetuating existing structures of racial injustice. At the same time, current policies are underinclusive, thus hindering the aim of holding political wrongdoers accountable. (shrink)

This review essay focusses on Gelderloos's normative theory of diversity of tactics. The book is worth serious attention by political theorists because of its sustained analysis of violence, nonviolence, tactics and strategy, but the normative theory fails. The essay endorses Gelderloos's nuanced analysis of the violence-nonviolence distinction and aspects of his account of tactics-strategy-goals. But the concepts ‘state' and ‘politics' are both treated by him in an overly simple way. Although aspects of his account show how complex any state-society distinction (...) is, in other contexts he suggests that it is easy for actors to divide state enemies from oppressed society friends. He rejects politics as the capture of state power for dominating and self-interested purposes, and dismisses all other aspects of political power, institutions and relationships. He thereby denies any role for politics in the sustainability of the anarchist activism he wishes to defend and endorse. In particular his disavowal of any political power base to coalitions, means that coalitional action can only be depicted as evanescent and episodic, while anarchist action is premissed on putting fellow actors who are not comrades beyond the realm of care of concern. (shrink)

Dirty hands cases are often seen as a crucial challenge for political ethics. Michael Walzer’s analysis of dirty hands cases has been especially influential. On closer inspection, however, Walzer’s analysis contains some serious flaws. This article examines how and to what extent the political ethics of Paul Ricoeur can remedy the problems in Walzer’s approach. It is shown that Ricoeur’s approach can offer a better understanding of what is at stake in dilemmas in political action and that it can provide (...) guidance for dealing with such issues. Ricoeur’s analysis, furthermore, provides the foundation for a more critical political ethics than Walzer can offer. (shrink)

This essay considers Denis Diderot’s Letter on the Blind for the Use of Those Who Can See as a work that can contribute to a disability political theory. By recounting the experiences of visually impaired persons in their own words, Diderot opens up possibilities for a disability politics of self-representation, maintaining that sighted persons should listen to blind persons’ accounts of their own experience rather than relying on their own imaginings and assumptions. By using blind experiences to challenge a philosophical (...) problem that intrigued philosophers of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries amid often-unsuccessful efforts to “cure” blindness through cataract surgeries, Diderot develops a powerful critique of the empiricist stress on vision as the primary source of perception and provides a remarkably forward-looking critique of disablist attitudes toward the blind. Through this philosophical discourse, he engages a political argument about the way knowledge is gathered, evaluated, and interpreted through relationships of power. (shrink)

Journal of Social Philosophy, EarlyView.

(English below) Rechte Intellektuelle berufen sich oft auf Nietzsches Konzept der Sklavenmoral, um damit ihre Kritik an ‚political correctness‘ zu untermauern. Diese Verschaltung von Nietzsches Sklavenmoral und ‚PC‘-Kritik ist zutreffend, wie die systematische Analyse ihrer gemeinsamen Elemente zeigt, die zu einer Neubeschreibung von ‚PC‘-Kritik als Privilegienverteidigung führt. Im Gegensatz zur rechtsnietzscheanischen ‚PC‘-Kritik zeigt der linksnietzscheanische Begriff des privilegienkritischen ‚politischen Urteilens‘, dass Politik ein Kampf um Macht und Ansprüche ist, wobei der politische Raum und seine Diskurse immer verregelt und ein Verteilungssystem (...) für Ressourcen und Privilegien sind. Deshalb ist es für eine emanzipatorische Position angebracht, die etablierten Normen kritisch zu hinterfragen und politische Projekte, die sie emanzipativ umschreiben wollen, zu unterstützen. Weil ‚PC‘ als emanzipatives politisches Urteilen Privilegien abbaut, ist es kein zu vermeidender Nebeneffekt, sondern ihr vernünftiger Kern, wenn Privilegierte davon eingeschränkt werden. Der Linksnietzscheanismus hilft, nicht von rechter Aggression überrascht zu werden und ihr entsprechend kämpferisch durch strikte Normsetzung zu begegnen. Right-wing intellectuals often invoke Nietzsche's concept of slave morality to underpin their criticism of 'political correctness' ('PC'). This interconnection of Nietzsche's slave morality and 'PC' criticism is correct, as a systematic analysis of their common elements shows, which leads to a new description of 'PC' criticism as a defense of privilege. In contrast to the right-wing Nietzschean 'PC' critique, the left-wing Nietzschean concept of a privilege-critical ‘political judgement' understands politics as a struggle for power, in which the space of the political and related discourses are always already regulated and determine the conditions under which resources and privileges are distributed. Therefore, it is appropriate for an emancipatory position to critically question the established norms and to support political projects that aim to rewrite them. Because 'PC', as emancipative political judgement, dismantles privileges, its restricting of the privileged is not a side effect to be avoided but one of its reasonable core effects. Left-wing Nietzscheanism helps to avoid being surprised by right-wing aggression and to counter it vigorously by setting strict political norms. (shrink)

Political realism is frequently criticised as a theoretical tradition that amounts to little more than a rationalisation of the status quo and an apology for power. This paper responds to this criticism by defending three connected claims. First, it acknowledges the moral seriousness of rationalisation, but argues that the problem is hardly particular to political realists. Second, it argues that classical International Relations realists like EH Carr and Hans Morgenthau have a profound awareness of the corrupting effects of rationalisation and (...) see realism as an antidote to this problem. Third, it proposes that Carr and Morgenthau can help us to recognise the particular ways in which realist arguments may nonetheless rationalise existing power relations and affirm the status quo by default, if not by design. (shrink)

Artykuł traktuje w zarysie o istocie i głównych modelach power-sharing. Choć powersharing może być pojmowane w sposób bardzo szeroki, tematyka tego artykułu dotyczy jego wąskiego rozumienia. Odnosi się ono do fenomenu dzielenia się władzą państwową przez różne segmenty (np. grupy etniczne lub wspólnoty religijne) społeczeństw pluralnych (podzielonych, sfragmentaryzowanych), w tym zwłaszcza wieloetnicznych i/lub wieloreligijnych. Głównym celem artykułu jest wyjaśnienie treści power-sharing we wskazanym wąskim rozumieniu i wytłumaczenie w zarysie jego głównych modeli (konfesjonalizm, model Lewisa, konsocjonalizm, centrypetalizm).

Claude Ake was interested in how the depoliticization of African societies has led to their existing in a state of permanent crisis, and, in particular, to the impossibility of their development. He understood depoliticization as a situation where the right to possess a political sphere of life is withheld from most members of the state and, at the same time, politics is monopolized by those in power. He showed the error of seeing the African crisis primarily as an economic crisis (...) and emphasized that in the literature concerning African problems it was mistakenly assumed that African political elites were interested in development. Ake’s thoughts about the connection between, on the one hand, authoritarian power and the depoliticization of African societies, and, on the other, the lack of development does not exhaust the question of the crisis of the African state. But his opinions are valuable as an African viewpoint, which is not often taken into account. (shrink)

In many African states, numerous different pre-colonial systems of power – such as kingships, sultanates or chieftaincies – which have a traditional legitimacy often confirmed in colonial and post-colonial times, have survived till our day. Their role in the contemporary republican state has been studied by many African intellectuals, and the views of Kwame Anthony Appiah, a thinker originating from Ghana, are of particular interest. He believes that in order to understand the significance of traditional authority and the phenomenon of (...) its continued existence in contemporary Africa, it is important to consider the source of its legitimacy. Appiah presents various sources – symbolic, religious and state – from which local African rulers derive the right to exert power and to exact obedience from their subjects. He minimizes the significance of most of these, however, and concludes that the basic source of legitimacy for traditional authority in the contemporary African state is the fact that this power, being a very important point of reference for the group over which it is wielded, reinforces its members’ sense of self-respect, and helps form their identity. He uses this idea to attempt to reconcile the continued existence of African power systems with liberal theory. Appiah, who is very unfavorably disposed towards most political and social hierarchies, views the political rights of individuals as the rights of citizens, not as the rights of persons who are the depositaries of some attributed or hereditary status. He enumerates the costs, in terms of liberal principles, of allowing traditional monarchy to persist. In his view, it is contrary to the liberal principle of public offices being open to persons of merit for the king of the Ashanti to be chosen from among persons of royal lineage. Such a perspective should generate a generally negative attitude towards the monarchy of the Ashanti, a people from whom Appiah originates, and yet he views Ashanti’s traditional monarchy as a source of pride. Published in "Africana Bulletin" 2010, No. 58, pp. 47-74. (shrink)

There are various ways of reducing conflicts and of stabilizing the political situation in states where society is made up of many different ethnic groups and religious communities, and where relations between these segments – or between them and the central government – are tense. A particularly important way is the establishment in those states of a political system based on power-sharing (PS), which allows members of various ethnic and religious segments to take part in the exercise of power. The (...) literature on the subject usually discusses two models of PS: consociationalism and centripetalism. A third model is encountered in practice, however, that of hybrid power-sharing (HPS), which combines the institutions of the first two. The main objective of this article is to explain the nature and origins of HPS. (shrink)

Europe has never had a single definition for the term ‘citizen.’ Indeed, over the centuries the significance of this term has undergone far-reaching evolution. In different historical periods, different states, and different European languages, this term has had diverse meanings and has been used in varying contexts. The concept of ‘citizen’ has repeatedly been defined anew depending upon specific political, social, and economic conditions. At various periods, the term ‘citizen’ has related to a wider or narrower portion of a given (...) state’s society. The criteria by which an individual was said to form a part of the body of citizens have also differed. The changes which have taken place in the definition of a ‘citizen’ over the centuries are enormous. This is not to say, however, that there has been no common core to the concept of citizen as it has taken shape over the course of hundreds of years. As far back as ancient times, a member of the state could influence the shaping of that state’s authorities and could participate in government. It is the Aristotelian concept of the citizen – a concept that has influenced all historical models of citizenship since – which is at the root of the citizen understood as a political animal (politikon zoon). In addition, personal freedom has always been a sine qua non for possessing citizen status. Thus, a citizen has always been, and remains, the opposite of a slave. It has also come to be accepted that citizenship implies the primacy of an individual’s rights in a state over an individual’s obligations to that state. The polar opposite of this situation in the historical dimension is subjection to the monarch in an absolute monarchy. Thus the ‘citizen’ also stands in opposition to the ‘subject.’ When speaking of the historical models containing the said ‘citizenship traits’ of a person’s status in the state, we usually refer to the model of the citizen in ancient times, in medieval municipal citizenship, and in modern times, in the fully−formed nation-state. It is difficult to imagine a citizen in an absolute monarchy, and in a world of subjection. Still, it is possible to give rein to one’s imagination and perceive citizens in such a setting; one could even go a step further and call the subject of an absolute monarch a citizen. But is imagination truly necessary in order to conduct such a seemingly obvious reversal of perspective? Published as a chapter in Krzysztof Trzciński (ed.), The State and Development in Africa and Other Regions, Warsaw University & ASPRA, Warsaw 2007, pp. 319-332. (shrink)

Kara – jako immanentny element społeczeństwa – jest obiektem szeroko zakrojonych badań teoretyków różnych dziedzin – prawników, filozofów jak i socjologów. Bardzo często refleksje na jej temat wiązały się z artykułowaniem określonych postulatów – analiza tego, czym jest kara, przybierała tu postać twierdzeń o tym, czym kara być powinna. Dopiero wiek XIX przyniósł głębsze zainteresowanie historią kary. To wtedy właśnie analizy karania zaczęły przyjmować charakter deskryptywny, starając się ująć, jaką funkcję przypisywano karze w danym społeczeństwie w określonym momencie historycznym. Wydaje (...) się, że właśnie w tym paradygmacie należy osadzić to, co na temat przeobrażeń systemów karania miał do powiedzenia Michel Foucault. Charakterystyczne dla Foucaultowskiego ujęcia procesu przeobrażeń systemu karania byłoby przy tym to, że karę traktuje on jako „złożoną funkcję społeczną” a towarzyszące jej metody analizuje nie jako „proste konsekwencje przepisów prawa (…), ale jako swoiste techniki, które należałoby widzieć w szerszym kontekście metod sprawowania władzy”. Dokonana przez Foucaulta analiza ukazuje, że dana forma karania jest ściśle sprzężona z aktualną technologią władzy – służy wsparciu władzy i realizacji właściwych jej celów. Przyjęte przez Foucaulta założenie, by karę ujmować w pierwszym rzędzie jako funkcję polityczno-społeczną, a właściwie środek sprawowania władzy, otwiera nowe możliwości zrozumienia nie tylko historycznych metod karnych, lecz umożliwia również zrozumienie wciąż kontrowersyjnego zjawiska więziennictwa. Opis dostarczony przez francuskiego historyka idei pozwala uzasadnić fakt, że trwające od prawie 200 lat więziennictwo, mimo często druzgocącej krytyki, wciąż stanowi podstawę systemu karnego. Paradoksalny - bo permanentny - kryzys więziennictwa oznacza, że więziennictwo – w takiej samej mierze, w jakiej kiedyś starało się realizować funkcje właściwe władzy dyscyplinarnej – dzisiaj jest narzędziem realizującym funkcje właściwe biowładzy. Na kanwie analizy karania zaproponowanej przez Foucaulta trwanie więziennictwa wynika z faktu, że to, co z perspektywy starego modelu władzy dyscyplinarnej jawi się jako porażka - a więc zjawisko recydywy czy niesprawiedliwość systemu karnego – z perspektywy biowładzy jawi się jako pochodna nowych sposobów sprawowania władzy. (shrink)

This essay examines Étienne Balibar's readings of Jacques Derrida and deconstruction. The text is framed as a review of two books by Balibar: 'Equaliberty' and 'Violence and Civility'. After describing the context of those readings, I propose a broader reflection on the ambiguous relationship between 'post-Marxism' and 'deconstruction', focusing on concepts such as 'violence', 'cruelty', 'sovereignty' and 'property'. I also raise methodological questions related to the 'use' of deconstructive notions in political theory debates.

Power is often taken to be a central concept in social and political thought that can contribute to the explanation of many different social phenomena. This article argues that in order to play this role, a general theory of power is required to identify a stable causal capacity, one that does not depend on idiosyncratic social conditions and can thus exert its characteristic influence in a wide range of cases. It considers three promising strategies for such a theory, which ground (...) power in (1) the ability to use force, (2) access to resources, or (3) collective acceptance. It shows that these strategies fail to identify a stable causal capacity. The lack of an adequate general theory of power suggests that the concept lacks the necessary unity to play the broad explanatory role it is often accorded. (shrink)

The issue of political violence is mostly absent from current debates about power. Many conceptions of power treat violence as wholly distinct from or even antithetical to power, or see it as a mere instrument whose effects are obvious and not in need of political analysis. In this paper, I explore what kind of ontology of power is necessary to properly take account of the various roles that violence can play in creating and maintaining power structures. I pursue this question (...) by contrasting the views of Hannah Arendt and Michel Foucault. For Arendt, power is generated and maintained by communicative practices. She argues that power and violence are ‘opposites’ because violence can only destroy but not create these practices. In contrast, Foucault’s conception explicitly allows violence to play a constitutive role in generating power. I argue that while Arendt is right to insist that power and violence are not identical, it does not follow that violence cannot play any role in constituting power. Guided by Foucault’s approach, I formulate a non-dualist account of the relationship between power and violence that takes seriously the role that bodies, material things, and built infrastructures play in making social relations ‘more durable’ and constituting power. (shrink)

This book offers a detailed study of the political philosophies of Thomas Hobbes and Benedict de Spinoza, focussing on their concept of power as potentia, concrete power, rather than power as potestas, authorised power. The focus on power as potentia generates a new conception of popular power. Radical democrats–whether drawing on Hobbes's 'sleeping sovereign' or on Spinoza's 'multitude'–understand popular power as something that transcends ordinary institutional politics, as for instance popular plebsites or mass movements. However, the book argues that these (...) understandings reflect a residual scholasticism which Hobbes and Spinoza ultimately repudiate. Instead, on the book's revisionist conception, a political phenomenon should be said to express popular power when it is both popular (it eliminates oligarchy and encompasses the whole polity), and also powerful (it robustly determines political and social outcomes). Two possible institutional forms that this popular power might take are distinguished: Hobbesian repressive egalitarianism, or Spinozist civic strengthening. But despite divergent institutional proposals, the book argues that both Hobbes and Spinoza share the conviction that there is nothing spontaneously egalitarian or good about human collective existence. From this point of view, the book accuses radical democrats of pernicious romanticism; the slow, meticulous work of organizational design and maintenance is the true centre of popular power. (shrink)

According to a recent interpretive orthodoxy, Spinoza is a profoundly democratic theorist of state authority. I reject this orthodoxy. To be sure, for Spinoza, a political order succeeds in proportion as it harnesses the power of the people within it. However, Spinoza shows that political inclusion is only one possible strategy to this end; equally if not more useful is political exclusion, so long as it maintains what I call the depoliticised acquiescence of those excluded.

On December 3, 2014, in a piece entitled “White America’s Scary Delusion: Why Its Sense of Black Humanity Is So Skewed,” Brittney Cooper criticizes attempts to deem Black rage at state-sanctioned violence against Black people “unreasonable.” In this paper, I outline a problem with epistemology that Cooper highlights in order to explore whether beliefs can wrong. My overall claim is there are difficult-to-defeat arguments concerning the “legitimacy” of police slayings against Black people that are indicative of problems with epistemology because (...) of the epistemic power they accumulate toward resilient oblivion, which can have the effect of normalizing oppressive conditions. That is to say, if one takes the value of lessening oppression as a key feature of normative, epistemological conduct, then it can generate demands on epistemological orientations that, in turn, generate wrongs for beliefs and, more specifically, beliefs as wrongs. (shrink)

Tractatus Politico-Philosophicus (Political-Philosophical Treatise) is an original work of political philosophy that aims to establish the principles of the good state and of a happy society, and to open up new directions for the future development of humankind. It is also, in part, a response to the Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus of Ludwig Wittgenstein. The main objective of the book is to demonstrate the necessity of, and provide a guide for, the redirection of humanity. I argue that this paradigm shift must involve (...) changing the character of social life and politics from competitive to cooperative, encouraging moral and intellectual virtues, providing foundations for happy societies, promoting peace among countries and building a strong international community. (shrink)

Статтю присвячено чинному президенту Сполучених Штатів Америки Дональду Трампу. Здійснено спробу показати елементи тоталітарного дискурсу у його публічній політичній діяльності і проаналізувати правомірність прямих порівнянь із вождями тоталітарних режимів XX ст., зокрема з Гітлером. Показано тло політичної та культурної історії Америки, на якому стала можливою перемога Дональда Трампа, відзначено ключові моменти, найбільш важливі для розуміння поточної ситуації. Приділено увагу основній виборчій базі та соціальним медіа, а також запропоновано перспективу для боротьби проти тоталітарних тенденцій.

This contribution develops two objections to Hans Lindahl’s legal philosophy, as exhibited in his Authority and the Globalization of Inclusion and Exclusion. First, his conception of constituent power overstates the necessity of violence in initiating collective action. Second, his rejection of the distinction between participatory and representative democracy on the grounds that participation is representation is misleading, and compromises our ability to differentiate qualitatively among various forms of (purportedly) democratic involvement. Both problems stem from the same root. They result from (...) conflating two distinct senses of ‘representation’: acting-for-someone (or representative agency) and portraying-something-as-something (or representation-as). (shrink)

The review argues that Lovett’s theory of domination suffers from a problem. Lovett is aware of the problem and bites a fairly large bullet in response to it. What he does not seem aware of is that the problem can be avoided by opting for an account of welfare that he unfortunately ignores, despite the fact that it would serve his purposes well.