Most conceptions of public and private life within political and social theory do not adequately consider the networks or fluidities involved in contemporary social relations. The distinction of ...public and private is often conceived of as statically `regional' in character. This article, following an extensive analysis of the multiple meanings of the `public' and `private', criticizes such a static conception and maintains that massive changes are occurring in the nature of both public and private life and especially of the relations between them. We consider flows and networks that enable mobility between and across apparent publics and privates. These mobilities are both physical (in the form of mobile people, objects and hybrids of humans-in-machines) and informational (in the form of electronic communication via data, visual images and texts). We consider the transformations of public and private life that have arisen from `complex' configurations of place and space: the dominant system of car-centred automobility whose spatial fluidities are simultaneously private and public; and various globalizations through the exposure of `private' lives on public screens and the public screening of mediatized events. These mobile, machinic examples demonstrate the limitations of the static, regional conceptualizations of public and private life developed within much social and political theory, and suggest that this divide may need relegation to the dustbin of history.
Fifteen years ago, Rydgren (Scand Polit Stud 25(1):27–56,
2002
) asked why no electorally successful radical right-wing party had yet emerged in Sweden. In this respect, Sweden was a negative case. ...Rydgren posited four main explanations: (1) social class mattered more in Sweden than elsewhere. Working-class voters identified strongly with their social class and with the Social Democratic party, making them largely unavailable to radical right-wing mobilization; (2) socioeconomic issues still structured most politics in Sweden, and issues belonging to the sociocultural dimension—most importantly immigration—were of low salience for voters; (3) voters still perceived clear policy alternatives across the left-right divide; and (4) the leading radical right-wing alternative, the Sweden Democrats, was perceived as being too extreme. Since 2010, however, Sweden can no longer be considered a negative case, and in this article, we argue that in order to understand the rise and growth of the Sweden Democrats, we should focus on changes in the factors enumerated above.
Major controversies in moral and political theory concern the rights, if any, Indigenous peoples should have over their traditional knowledge. Many scholars, including me, have tackled these ...controversies. This Article addresses a highly important practical issue: Can we come up with a solid framework for resolving disputes over actual or proposed intellectual property rights in traditional knowledge? Yes, we can. The framework suggested here starts with a preliminary distinction between control rights and income rights. It then moves to four categories that help to understand disputes: nature of the traditional knowledge under dispute; dynamics between named parties to disputes; unnamed Indigenous claimants; and the various normative systems (for example, custom, U.N. documents, treaties, statutes, administrative regulations) within which disputes are decided. Throughout, examples that inform the framework come principally from Indigenous peoples in the Pacific rim. Lastly the Article tests the framework against some disputes over traditional knowledge in Samoa and New Zealand. This framework is comprehensive and sensitive to context. It is flexible regarding which normative systems are best suited to settling disputes. A test run shows that the framework helps to resolve practical legal issues.
Resumo: O construtivismo de Nick Onuf é urna das contribuiçôes mais importantes para o campo das relaçôes internacionāls no que diz respeito ao intercambio entre as teorías social e política e a ...filosofía. Neste texto, engajo-me com o conjunto da obra de Onuf O fio condutor da problematizaçâo que proponho é tecido por meio da atençâo ao modo como o oficio e o esforço criativo de Onuf estabelecem certos começos na construçâo de sua abordagem, e como essa definiçâo tem implicaçôes importantes para (a concepçâo de) política. Argumento que a concepçâo de política de Onuf é sustentada por dois começos centrais: a concepçâo dos seres humanos como agentes racionais e o enquadramento do que veio a ser chamado de modernidade. Dessa forma, enfatizo o que me parece ser a contribuiçâo mais duradoura que seu trabalho pode oferecer nao so para o campo das relaçôes internacionāls, mas também para as teorías social e política contemporáneas de modo mais gerai. A primeira seçâo delineia a relaçâo que Onuf estabelece entre rules e rule, enquanto as duas seçôes seguintes tratam, respectivamente, de suas concepçôes de agencia e do mundo moderno. Meu objetivo nessas trés primeiras seçôes é reconfigurar o construtivismo de Onuf A quarta e ultima seçâo avança, dando um passo adiante - talvez longe demais, talvez radical demais -, traçando um engajamento crítico com sua obra por meio de (re)começos periféricos.
ABSTRACTRecently political theorists have voiced a desire for political theory to be more involved in and relevant to political science and practice. Turning to a concrete instance, the case of ...social progress indices, we observe that political theory is already to some extent involved in both. Political theories in some instances inspire well-reasoned and systematic construction of measurements, although the conception of social progress in an index is not always overt. At the same time, social progress indicators and conceptions provide a substantial context to aid the self-reflections of political theorists. This note articulates the bidirectional actual and potential processes at play, with an emphasis on the cases when the conceptions represented by measurement are value-laden and contested. It further differentiates manners by which indicators may contribute to the internal and external assessments of concepts and theories. The study highlights the significance of recognizing and enhancing these multi-level and bidirectional processes. Such improvements would be achieved when political theory, political science and practical consideration come together.
Although social work engagement with Hannah Arendt (1906–1975) has been meagre, it has been recently suggested that her conceptualisations are significant for the profession. This article seeks to ...problematise the presentation of Arendt to a social work readership, highlighting the failure to adequately historicise her work. In terms of her ideas, there is much to gain in examining this intellectual’s prolific and often controversial contributions, and seven dimensions are identified as significant for the times in which we live. Nevertheless, there are still major criticisms which can be levelled at her core conceptualisations. The article dwells on Arendt’s theorisation of the ‘private’, the ‘public’ and the ‘social’, and it is suggested that she is unaligned with sociologically informed theorisation underpinning critical and radical social work.
In this article I discuss Bernard Williams' realist conception of legitimacy. According to his critics Williams tacitly incorporates various moral claims, endorses a philosophically suspect ...‘consensus’ view of politics, and employs an unrealistic and moralised conception of political rule. I argue that these criticisms mischaracterise the nature of the basic legitimation demand and the judgements about the acceptability of the state at its core and conclude that political theorists who object to the direction and style of much contemporary political theory should take seriously the possibility of developing an appropriately ‘political’ political theory on Williamsian lines.
Type II Audience Costs Quek, Kai
The Journal of politics,
10/2017, Volume:
79, Issue:
4
Journal Article
Peer reviewed
Open access
Traditional audience costs are the political losses a leader incurs for backing down after threatening to fight (type I). Type II audience costs are the losses incurred for entering a conflict after ...promising not to fight. I develop the idea and decompose it experimentally into its constituents: an inconsistency cost plus the loss of a nonbelligerence dividend. Type II audience costs have deep implications, including the reversal of certain microfoundational challenges against type I audience costs in the context of type II audience costs, the credible signaling of a state’s resolve not to fight, and a reassurance mechanism with attractive properties.
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