The contract of mutual indifference

The contract of mutual indifference PDF Author: Norman Geras
Publisher: Manchester University Press
ISBN: 1526104776
Category : Philosophy
Languages : en
Pages : 196

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Book Description
The idea which I shall present here came to me more or less out of the blue. I was on a train some five years ago, on my way to spend a day at Headingley, and I was reading a book about the death camp Sobibor... The particular, not very appropriate, conjunction involved for me in this train journey...had the effect of fixing my thoughts on one of the more dreadful features of human coexistence, when in the shape of a simple five-word phrase the idea occurred to me.' The contract of mutual indifference In this classic work, newly reissued here with a preface by Oliver Kamm, Norman Geras discusses a central aspect of the experience of the Holocaust with a view to exploring its most important contemporary implications. A bold and powerful synthesis of memorial, literary record, historical reflection and political theory, Geras’s argument focuses on the figure of the bystander – the bystander to the destruction of the Jews of Europe and the bystander to more recent atrocity – to consider the moral consequences of looking on without active responses at persecution and great suffering. This book argues that we owe a duty of help to those who are suffering under terrible oppression. Geras contends that the tragedy of European Jewry – so widely pondered by historians, social scientists, psychologists, theologians and others – has not yet found its proper reflection within political philosophy. Attempting to fill the gap, he adapts an old idea from within that tradition of enquiry, the idea of the social contract, to the task of thinking about the triangular relation between perpetrators, victims and bystanders, and draws a sombre conclusion from it. Geras goes on to ask how far this conclusion may be offset by the hypothesis of a universal duty to bring aid. The contract of mutual indifference is an original and challenging work, aimed at the complacent abstraction of much contemporary theory-building. It is supplemented by three shorter essays on the implications of the Jewish catastrophe for conceptions of human nature and progress.

The contract of mutual indifference

The contract of mutual indifference PDF Author: Norman Geras
Publisher: Manchester University Press
ISBN: 1526104776
Category : Philosophy
Languages : en
Pages : 196

Get Book Here

Book Description
The idea which I shall present here came to me more or less out of the blue. I was on a train some five years ago, on my way to spend a day at Headingley, and I was reading a book about the death camp Sobibor... The particular, not very appropriate, conjunction involved for me in this train journey...had the effect of fixing my thoughts on one of the more dreadful features of human coexistence, when in the shape of a simple five-word phrase the idea occurred to me.' The contract of mutual indifference In this classic work, newly reissued here with a preface by Oliver Kamm, Norman Geras discusses a central aspect of the experience of the Holocaust with a view to exploring its most important contemporary implications. A bold and powerful synthesis of memorial, literary record, historical reflection and political theory, Geras’s argument focuses on the figure of the bystander – the bystander to the destruction of the Jews of Europe and the bystander to more recent atrocity – to consider the moral consequences of looking on without active responses at persecution and great suffering. This book argues that we owe a duty of help to those who are suffering under terrible oppression. Geras contends that the tragedy of European Jewry – so widely pondered by historians, social scientists, psychologists, theologians and others – has not yet found its proper reflection within political philosophy. Attempting to fill the gap, he adapts an old idea from within that tradition of enquiry, the idea of the social contract, to the task of thinking about the triangular relation between perpetrators, victims and bystanders, and draws a sombre conclusion from it. Geras goes on to ask how far this conclusion may be offset by the hypothesis of a universal duty to bring aid. The contract of mutual indifference is an original and challenging work, aimed at the complacent abstraction of much contemporary theory-building. It is supplemented by three shorter essays on the implications of the Jewish catastrophe for conceptions of human nature and progress.

A Scrap of Time and Other Stories

A Scrap of Time and Other Stories PDF Author: Ida Fink
Publisher: Northwestern University Press
ISBN: 9780810112599
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 180

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Book Description
Named a New York Times Notable Book Winner of the PEN/Book-of-the-Month Club Translation Prize Winner of the Anne Frank Prize These shattering stories describe the lives of ordinary people as they are compelled to do the unimaginable: a couple who must decide what to do with their five-year-old daughter as the Gestapo come to march them out of town; a wife whose safety depends on her acquiescence in her husband's love affair; a girl who must pay a grim price for an Aryan identity card.

Solidarity in the Conversation of Humankind

Solidarity in the Conversation of Humankind PDF Author: Norman Geras
Publisher: Verso Books
ISBN: 1789607132
Category : Philosophy
Languages : en
Pages : 169

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Book Description
What are the sources of solidarity? Do universalist motives have an important place among them? And how are they related to arguments about human nature and about truth? In this new book, Norman Geras engages with the work of Richard Rorty to explore the paradoxes of a liberalism which rejects any determinate view of human nature. He begins by examining Rorty's thesis concerning rescuer behavior during the Holocaust. Measuring it against existing research on the subject and the testimony of rescuers themselves, Geras questions Rorty's use of their moral example as a challenge to universalist assumptions. He then considers some of the problems in Rorty's anti-essentialism: his shifting usages of "human nature"; the paradoxical plea for extensive forms of solidarity on the basis of parochial communitarian premises; the relationship of pragmatist notions of truth to issues of justice; and the project of a democratic, would-be "humanist" utopia grounded only on contingencies. Solidarity in the Conversation of Humankind is an imagined dialogue with Rorty-influential, eloquent and unorthodox champion of a human radical liberalism.

Literature of Revolution

Literature of Revolution PDF Author: Norman Geras
Publisher: Verso Books
ISBN: 1786630095
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 350

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Book Description
Essential essays on key Marxist writers from a leading political thinker Literature of Revolution explores the pivotal texts and topics in the Marxist tradition, drawing on the works of Marx, Trotsky, Luxemburg, Lenin, and Althusser. In close dialogue with common themes and arguments in revolutionary Marxist thought, Geras brings some of his persistent preoccupations to the fore: the relationship between Marxism and justice; the debates on political organization; and the role of revolutionary mass action and party pluralism; as well as an enthralling exploration into the literary power of Trotsky’s writing.

Power, Politics and Influence at Work

Power, Politics and Influence at Work PDF Author: Tony Dundon
Publisher:
ISBN: 9781526146410
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 168

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Book Description
This book explores how power operates in workplace settings at local, national and transnational levels. It argues that how people are valued in and out of work is a political dynamic, which reflects and shapes how societies treat their citizens. Offering vital resources for activists and students on labour rights, employment issues and trade unions, this book argues that the influence workers can exert is changing dramatically and future challenges for change can be positive and progressive.

The Contract and Domination

The Contract and Domination PDF Author: Carole Pateman
Publisher: John Wiley & Sons
ISBN: 0745636217
Category : Philosophy
Languages : en
Pages : 520

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Book Description
Contract and Domination offers a bold challenge to contemporary contract theory, arguing that it should either be fundamentally rethought or abandoned altogether. Since the publication of John Rawls's A Theory of Justice, contract theory has once again become central to the Western political tradition. But gender justice is neglected and racial justice almost completely ignored. Carole Pateman and Charles Mills's earlier books, The Sexual Contract (1988) and The Racial Contract (1997), offered devastating critiques of gender and racial domination and the contemporary contract tradition's silence on them. Both books have become classics of revisionist radical democratic political theory. Now Pateman and Mills are collaborating for the first time in an interdisciplinary volume, drawing on their insights from political science and philosophy. They are building on but going beyond their earlier work to bring the sexual and racial contracts together. In Contract and Domination, Pateman and Mills discuss their differences about contract theory and whether it has a useful future, excavate the (white) settler contract that created new civil societies in North America and Australia, argue via a non-ideal contract for reparations to black Americans, confront the evasions of contemporary contract theorists, explore the intersections of gender and race and the global sexual-racial contract, and reply to their critics. This iconoclastic book throws the gauntlet down to mainstream white male contract theory. It is vital reading for anyone with an interest in political theory and political philosophy, and the systems of male and racial domination.

Model Rules of Professional Conduct

Model Rules of Professional Conduct PDF Author: American Bar Association. House of Delegates
Publisher: American Bar Association
ISBN: 9781590318737
Category : Law
Languages : en
Pages : 216

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Book Description
The Model Rules of Professional Conduct provides an up-to-date resource for information on legal ethics. Federal, state and local courts in all jurisdictions look to the Rules for guidance in solving lawyer malpractice cases, disciplinary actions, disqualification issues, sanctions questions and much more. In this volume, black-letter Rules of Professional Conduct are followed by numbered Comments that explain each Rule's purpose and provide suggestions for its practical application. The Rules will help you identify proper conduct in a variety of given situations, review those instances where discretionary action is possible, and define the nature of the relationship between you and your clients, colleagues and the courts.

Consentability

Consentability PDF Author: Nancy S. Kim
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
ISBN: 1107164915
Category : Law
Languages : en
Pages : 257

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Book Description
Proposes a reconceptualization of consent which argues that consent should be viewed as a dynamic concept that is context-dependent, incremental, and variable.

Norman Geras's Political Thought from Marxism to Human Rights

Norman Geras's Political Thought from Marxism to Human Rights PDF Author: MARK. COWLING
Publisher: Palgrave MacMillan
ISBN: 9783030089061
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 224

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Book Description
This book provides a critical account of the main controversies involving Norman Geras, one of the key modern political thinkers. It moves from his youthful Trotskyism on to his book on Rosa Luxemburg, then his classic account of Marx and human nature, and his highly regarded discussion of Marx and justice. Following this, Geras tried to elaborate a Marxist theory of justice, which involved taking on-board aspects of liberalism. Next he attacked the post modernism of Laclau and Mouffe and criticised Rorty's pragmatism, and then elaborated a contract of mutual indifference from a detailed study of the Holocaust. Lastly he wrote a book on human rights and humanitarian intervention, defending the 2003 invasion of Iraq. Cowling varies from exposition and admiration, to ideas about how Geras's work should be interpreted, to criticism of his Trotskyism and of his support for the invasion of Iraq. The book will appeal to readers interested in Norman Geras and Marxism in particular, and social and political theory in general.

The Law of Nations

The Law of Nations PDF Author: Emer de Vattel
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : International law
Languages : en
Pages : 668

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Book Description