Author: Laurent Dobuzinskis
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 1000305414
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 208
Book Description
Is the study of living systems a useful metaphor for political science? In this book, Dr. Dobuzinskis argues for further exploration of biopolitical models to explain the complexity of political theory and social change. His discussion emphasizes the new cybernetics, which considers not only self-regulating but also self-organizing or self-producing systems. Self-organizing systems operate in an autonomous sphere comparable to the autonomy of the political community and the political actors who compose this community. The autonomy of these systems is maintained through dynamic equilibration processes that entail not only the preservation of a given structure but also, at crucial times, the creative rearrangement of the existing structure and its transformation into a new pattern of relations. From this perspective, a political crisis is both a threat to the political system and the occasion of its renewal; stability may also mean decay. Emphasizing the links that have developed historically between the natural and social sciences, this book is a reflection on the merits of and difficulties involved in representing the evolutionary process at the political level as the problematic reproduction of national communities and states.
The Self-organizing Polity
Author: Laurent Dobuzinskis
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 1000305414
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 208
Book Description
Is the study of living systems a useful metaphor for political science? In this book, Dr. Dobuzinskis argues for further exploration of biopolitical models to explain the complexity of political theory and social change. His discussion emphasizes the new cybernetics, which considers not only self-regulating but also self-organizing or self-producing systems. Self-organizing systems operate in an autonomous sphere comparable to the autonomy of the political community and the political actors who compose this community. The autonomy of these systems is maintained through dynamic equilibration processes that entail not only the preservation of a given structure but also, at crucial times, the creative rearrangement of the existing structure and its transformation into a new pattern of relations. From this perspective, a political crisis is both a threat to the political system and the occasion of its renewal; stability may also mean decay. Emphasizing the links that have developed historically between the natural and social sciences, this book is a reflection on the merits of and difficulties involved in representing the evolutionary process at the political level as the problematic reproduction of national communities and states.
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 1000305414
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 208
Book Description
Is the study of living systems a useful metaphor for political science? In this book, Dr. Dobuzinskis argues for further exploration of biopolitical models to explain the complexity of political theory and social change. His discussion emphasizes the new cybernetics, which considers not only self-regulating but also self-organizing or self-producing systems. Self-organizing systems operate in an autonomous sphere comparable to the autonomy of the political community and the political actors who compose this community. The autonomy of these systems is maintained through dynamic equilibration processes that entail not only the preservation of a given structure but also, at crucial times, the creative rearrangement of the existing structure and its transformation into a new pattern of relations. From this perspective, a political crisis is both a threat to the political system and the occasion of its renewal; stability may also mean decay. Emphasizing the links that have developed historically between the natural and social sciences, this book is a reflection on the merits of and difficulties involved in representing the evolutionary process at the political level as the problematic reproduction of national communities and states.
Persuasion, Power and Polity
Author: Gus DiZerega
Publisher: Hampton Press (NJ)
ISBN:
Category : Language Arts & Disciplines
Languages : en
Pages : 392
Book Description
This interpretation of classical sources of democratic theory describes routes to self-government. It meshes interpretations of Aristotle's political and ethical writings and the republican ideals of Jefferson and Madison with insights derived from modern sciences of complexity.
Publisher: Hampton Press (NJ)
ISBN:
Category : Language Arts & Disciplines
Languages : en
Pages : 392
Book Description
This interpretation of classical sources of democratic theory describes routes to self-government. It meshes interpretations of Aristotle's political and ethical writings and the republican ideals of Jefferson and Madison with insights derived from modern sciences of complexity.
Axel Honneth
Author: Christopher Zurn
Publisher: John Wiley & Sons
ISBN: 0745686788
Category : Philosophy
Languages : en
Pages : 240
Book Description
With his insightful and wide-ranging theory of recognition, AxelHonneth has decisively reshaped the Frankfurt School tradition ofcritical social theory. Combining insights from philosophy,sociology, psychology, history, political economy, and culturalcritique, Honneth’s work proposes nothing less than anaccount of the moral infrastructure of human sociality and itsrelation to the perils and promise of contemporary sociallife. This book provides an accessible overview of Honneth’s maincontributions across a variety of fields, assessing the strengthsand weaknesses of his thought. Christopher Zurn clearly explainsHonneth’s multi-faceted theory of recognition and itsrelation to diverse topics: individual identity, morality, activistmovements, progress, social pathologies, capitalism, justice,freedom, and critique. In so doing, he places Honneth’stheory in a broad intellectual context, encompassing classic socialtheorists such as Kant, Hegel, Marx, Freud, Dewey, Adorno andHabermas, as well as contemporary trends in social theory andpolitical philosophy. Treating the full range of Honneth’scorpus, including his major new work on social freedom anddemocratic ethical life, this book is the most up-to-date guideavailable. Axel Honneth will be invaluable to students and scholarsworking across the humanities and social sciences, as well asanyone seeking a clear guide to the work of one of the mostinfluential theorists writing today.
Publisher: John Wiley & Sons
ISBN: 0745686788
Category : Philosophy
Languages : en
Pages : 240
Book Description
With his insightful and wide-ranging theory of recognition, AxelHonneth has decisively reshaped the Frankfurt School tradition ofcritical social theory. Combining insights from philosophy,sociology, psychology, history, political economy, and culturalcritique, Honneth’s work proposes nothing less than anaccount of the moral infrastructure of human sociality and itsrelation to the perils and promise of contemporary sociallife. This book provides an accessible overview of Honneth’s maincontributions across a variety of fields, assessing the strengthsand weaknesses of his thought. Christopher Zurn clearly explainsHonneth’s multi-faceted theory of recognition and itsrelation to diverse topics: individual identity, morality, activistmovements, progress, social pathologies, capitalism, justice,freedom, and critique. In so doing, he places Honneth’stheory in a broad intellectual context, encompassing classic socialtheorists such as Kant, Hegel, Marx, Freud, Dewey, Adorno andHabermas, as well as contemporary trends in social theory andpolitical philosophy. Treating the full range of Honneth’scorpus, including his major new work on social freedom anddemocratic ethical life, this book is the most up-to-date guideavailable. Axel Honneth will be invaluable to students and scholarsworking across the humanities and social sciences, as well asanyone seeking a clear guide to the work of one of the mostinfluential theorists writing today.
Foucault
Author: Lois McNay
Publisher: John Wiley & Sons
ISBN: 0745667856
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 302
Book Description
This work provides an introduction to the work of Michel Foucault. It offers an assessment of all of Foucault's work, including his final writings on governmentality and the self. McNay argues that the later work initiates an important shift in his intellectual concerns which alters any retrospective reading of his writings as a whole. Throughout, McNay is concerned to assess the normative and political implications of Foucault's social criticism. She goes beyond the level of many commentators to look at the values from which Foucault's work springs and reveals the implicit assumptions underlying his social critique. The author also provides an account and assessment of recent literature on Foucault, including that of Habermas and Taylor. She discusses Foucault's position in the modernity/postmodernity debate, his own ambivalence to Enlightenment thought and his place in recent developments in feminist and cultural theory.
Publisher: John Wiley & Sons
ISBN: 0745667856
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 302
Book Description
This work provides an introduction to the work of Michel Foucault. It offers an assessment of all of Foucault's work, including his final writings on governmentality and the self. McNay argues that the later work initiates an important shift in his intellectual concerns which alters any retrospective reading of his writings as a whole. Throughout, McNay is concerned to assess the normative and political implications of Foucault's social criticism. She goes beyond the level of many commentators to look at the values from which Foucault's work springs and reveals the implicit assumptions underlying his social critique. The author also provides an account and assessment of recent literature on Foucault, including that of Habermas and Taylor. She discusses Foucault's position in the modernity/postmodernity debate, his own ambivalence to Enlightenment thought and his place in recent developments in feminist and cultural theory.
Self-Organization and the City
Author: Juval Portugali
Publisher: Springer Science & Business Media
ISBN: 3662040999
Category : Science
Languages : en
Pages : 359
Book Description
This book integrates the theories of complex self-organizing systems with the rich body of discourse and literature developed in what might be called ‘social theory of cities and urbanism’. It uses techniques from dynamical complexity and synergetics to successfully tackle open social science questions.
Publisher: Springer Science & Business Media
ISBN: 3662040999
Category : Science
Languages : en
Pages : 359
Book Description
This book integrates the theories of complex self-organizing systems with the rich body of discourse and literature developed in what might be called ‘social theory of cities and urbanism’. It uses techniques from dynamical complexity and synergetics to successfully tackle open social science questions.
The Fragility of Things
Author: William E. Connolly
Publisher: Duke University Press
ISBN: 0822377160
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 254
Book Description
In The Fragility of Things, eminent theorist William E. Connolly focuses on several self-organizing ecologies that help to constitute our world. These interacting geological, biological, and climate systems, some of which harbor creative capacities, are depreciated by that brand of neoliberalism that confines self-organization to economic markets and equates the latter with impersonal rationality. Neoliberal practice thus fails to address the fragilities it exacerbates. Engaging a diverse range of thinkers, from Friedrich Hayek, Michel Foucault, Hesiod, and Immanuel Kant to Voltaire, Terrence Deacon, Friedrich Nietzsche, and Alfred North Whitehead, Connolly brings the sense of fragility alive as he rethinks the idea of freedom. Urging the Left not to abandon the state but to reclaim it, he also explores scales of politics below and beyond the state. The contemporary response to fragility requires a militant pluralist assemblage composed of those sharing affinities of spirituality across differences of creed, class, gender, sexual orientation, and ethnicity.
Publisher: Duke University Press
ISBN: 0822377160
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 254
Book Description
In The Fragility of Things, eminent theorist William E. Connolly focuses on several self-organizing ecologies that help to constitute our world. These interacting geological, biological, and climate systems, some of which harbor creative capacities, are depreciated by that brand of neoliberalism that confines self-organization to economic markets and equates the latter with impersonal rationality. Neoliberal practice thus fails to address the fragilities it exacerbates. Engaging a diverse range of thinkers, from Friedrich Hayek, Michel Foucault, Hesiod, and Immanuel Kant to Voltaire, Terrence Deacon, Friedrich Nietzsche, and Alfred North Whitehead, Connolly brings the sense of fragility alive as he rethinks the idea of freedom. Urging the Left not to abandon the state but to reclaim it, he also explores scales of politics below and beyond the state. The contemporary response to fragility requires a militant pluralist assemblage composed of those sharing affinities of spirituality across differences of creed, class, gender, sexual orientation, and ethnicity.
Adorno
Author: Stefan Müller-Doohm
Publisher: John Wiley & Sons
ISBN: 0745694640
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 828
Book Description
'Even the biographical individual is a social category', wrote Adorno. ‘It can only be defined in a living context together with others.’ In this major new biography, Stefan Müller-Doohm turns this maxim back on Adorno himself and provides a rich and comprehensive account of the life and work of one of the most brilliant minds of the twentieth century. This authoritative biography ranges across the whole of Adorno's life and career, from his childhood and student years to his years in emigration in the United States and his return to postwar Germany. At the same time, Muller-Doohm examines the full range of Adorno's writings on philosophy, sociology, literary theory, music theory and cultural criticism. Drawing on an array of sources from Adorno's personal correspondence with Horkheimer, Benjamin, Berg, Marcuse, Kracauer and Mann to interviews, notes and both published and unpublished writings, Muller-Doohm situates Adorno's contributions in the context of his times and provides a rich and balanced appraisal of his significance in the 20th Century as a whole. Müller-Doohm's clear prose succeeds in making accessible some of the most complex areas of Adorno's thought. This outstanding biography will be the standard work on Adorno for years to come.
Publisher: John Wiley & Sons
ISBN: 0745694640
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 828
Book Description
'Even the biographical individual is a social category', wrote Adorno. ‘It can only be defined in a living context together with others.’ In this major new biography, Stefan Müller-Doohm turns this maxim back on Adorno himself and provides a rich and comprehensive account of the life and work of one of the most brilliant minds of the twentieth century. This authoritative biography ranges across the whole of Adorno's life and career, from his childhood and student years to his years in emigration in the United States and his return to postwar Germany. At the same time, Muller-Doohm examines the full range of Adorno's writings on philosophy, sociology, literary theory, music theory and cultural criticism. Drawing on an array of sources from Adorno's personal correspondence with Horkheimer, Benjamin, Berg, Marcuse, Kracauer and Mann to interviews, notes and both published and unpublished writings, Muller-Doohm situates Adorno's contributions in the context of his times and provides a rich and balanced appraisal of his significance in the 20th Century as a whole. Müller-Doohm's clear prose succeeds in making accessible some of the most complex areas of Adorno's thought. This outstanding biography will be the standard work on Adorno for years to come.
Liberty and Security
Author: Conor Gearty
Publisher: John Wiley & Sons
ISBN: 0745669980
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 108
Book Description
All aspire to liberty and security in their lives but few people truly enjoy them. This book explains why this is so. In what Conor Gearty calls our 'neo-democratic' world, the proclamation of universal liberty and security is mocked by facts on the ground: the vast inequalities in supposedly free societies, the authoritarian regimes with regular elections, and the terrible socio-economic deprivation camouflaged by cynically proclaimed commitments to human rights. Gearty's book offers an explanation of how this has come about, providing also a criticism of the present age which tolerates it. He then goes on to set out a manifesto for a better future, a place where liberty and security can be rich platforms for everyone's life. The book identifies neo-democracies as those places which play at democracy so as to disguise the injustice at their core. But it is not just the new 'democracies' that have turned 'neo', the so-called established democracies are also hurtling in the same direction, as is the United Nations. A new vision of universal freedom is urgently required. Drawing on scholarship in law, human rights and political science this book argues for just such a vision, one in which the great achievements of our democratic past are not jettisoned as easily as were the socialist ideals of the original democracy-makers.
Publisher: John Wiley & Sons
ISBN: 0745669980
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 108
Book Description
All aspire to liberty and security in their lives but few people truly enjoy them. This book explains why this is so. In what Conor Gearty calls our 'neo-democratic' world, the proclamation of universal liberty and security is mocked by facts on the ground: the vast inequalities in supposedly free societies, the authoritarian regimes with regular elections, and the terrible socio-economic deprivation camouflaged by cynically proclaimed commitments to human rights. Gearty's book offers an explanation of how this has come about, providing also a criticism of the present age which tolerates it. He then goes on to set out a manifesto for a better future, a place where liberty and security can be rich platforms for everyone's life. The book identifies neo-democracies as those places which play at democracy so as to disguise the injustice at their core. But it is not just the new 'democracies' that have turned 'neo', the so-called established democracies are also hurtling in the same direction, as is the United Nations. A new vision of universal freedom is urgently required. Drawing on scholarship in law, human rights and political science this book argues for just such a vision, one in which the great achievements of our democratic past are not jettisoned as easily as were the socialist ideals of the original democracy-makers.
Cognitive Capitalism
Author: Yann Moulier-Boutang
Publisher: Polity
ISBN: 0745647324
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 258
Book Description
This book argues that we are undergoing a transition from industrial capitalism to a new form of capitalism - what the author calls & lsquo; cognitive capitalism & rsquo;
Publisher: Polity
ISBN: 0745647324
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 258
Book Description
This book argues that we are undergoing a transition from industrial capitalism to a new form of capitalism - what the author calls & lsquo; cognitive capitalism & rsquo;
Against Management
Author: Martin Parker
Publisher: Polity
ISBN: 9780745629261
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 256
Book Description
Against Management argues that management is increasingly being seen as a problem, and not a solution. Martin Parker argues that managing is not the only way to organize and that managerialism is a global form of ideology, which is being used to justify considerable cruelty and inequality. He also suggests that, in a variety of places, an odd collection of people seem to be coming to similar conclusions. It is possible to identify cracks in the religion of managerialism as some of its converts begin to lapse and others intensify their protest. In order to illustrate his argument, Parker draws from a wide variety of sources - anti-corporate activism; books and films which use management as their backdrop; the movement for business ethics and corporate social responsibility; as well as critical management studies and general social theories of the present. Parker's overall argument is that we can see the beginnings of a cultural shift in the image of management and that this is a significant historical change. Perhaps most importantly, it opens up the possibility of exploring non-managerial alternatives to contemporary assumptions about organizing. Against Management deliberately attempts to blur the boundaries between academic and popular writing, and encourages some radical questioning of the common sense that tells us that we need management, managers and management schools. This will be essential reading for second-year undergraduates and above in business and management studies (including MBA), sociology and cultural studies.
Publisher: Polity
ISBN: 9780745629261
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 256
Book Description
Against Management argues that management is increasingly being seen as a problem, and not a solution. Martin Parker argues that managing is not the only way to organize and that managerialism is a global form of ideology, which is being used to justify considerable cruelty and inequality. He also suggests that, in a variety of places, an odd collection of people seem to be coming to similar conclusions. It is possible to identify cracks in the religion of managerialism as some of its converts begin to lapse and others intensify their protest. In order to illustrate his argument, Parker draws from a wide variety of sources - anti-corporate activism; books and films which use management as their backdrop; the movement for business ethics and corporate social responsibility; as well as critical management studies and general social theories of the present. Parker's overall argument is that we can see the beginnings of a cultural shift in the image of management and that this is a significant historical change. Perhaps most importantly, it opens up the possibility of exploring non-managerial alternatives to contemporary assumptions about organizing. Against Management deliberately attempts to blur the boundaries between academic and popular writing, and encourages some radical questioning of the common sense that tells us that we need management, managers and management schools. This will be essential reading for second-year undergraduates and above in business and management studies (including MBA), sociology and cultural studies.