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Articles 1 - 17 of 17
Full-Text Articles in Political Theory
Gambling For Certainty: Luck, Chance, And Uncertainty In Politics, Mindy Peden, Nicole Rishel
Gambling For Certainty: Luck, Chance, And Uncertainty In Politics, Mindy Peden, Nicole Rishel
Mindy Peden
How much of what we do is the result of our will, and how much the result of chance or luck or fortune? This is a decidedly un-decidable question, but one that needs to be asked. The general assumption seems to be that a person’s “lot” in life is physically, morally, politically, even romantically linked to choice. But the use of the term “lot” betrays the underlying uncertainty of what “causes” our “lot”, laying bare questions of responsibility, burden, and even explanation. Much (perhaps at the very least 50% according to Machiavelli) of what happens in our lives can be …
Unmaking History: Seth's Europe's Indians, Mindy Peden
Unmaking History: Seth's Europe's Indians, Mindy Peden
Mindy Peden
Book review of: Vanita Seth. Europe’s Indians: Producing Racial Difference, 1500-1900.
Probable Futures, Mindy Peden
Probable Futures, Mindy Peden
Mindy Peden
This essay examines the status of "the future" in political theory and asks how views about the future contribute to, undermine, or otherwise interact with normative approaches in general.
Situating Race And Nation In The U.S. Context: Methodology, Interdisciplinarity And The Unresolved Role Of Comparative Inquiry, Mindy Peden
Mindy Peden
Philosophers and social theorists of color examine how racism can creep into defensive forms of nationalism.
'Democratic Taxation' And Quantifiable Action: Scientizing Dilemmas, Mindy Peden
'Democratic Taxation' And Quantifiable Action: Scientizing Dilemmas, Mindy Peden
Mindy Peden
Against the easy presupposition that such a thing as 'democratic taxation' not only exists but is also practicable, this paper points to the dilemma posed by what I call 'quantifiable action.' The essay develops an approach to theorizing the place of taxation in political theory that counters trends in fiscal sociology, political science, and liberal theory by highlighting how taxation presumably violates the requirement that self-government includes an absence of instrumental rationality on the part of democratic citizens. For this reason, taxation presents a persistent problem for any concept of self-government, and may usefully be regarded as a technology of …
The Entrepreneurial Assumption: Thinking About Taxes In Contemporary Political Theory, Mindy Peden
The Entrepreneurial Assumption: Thinking About Taxes In Contemporary Political Theory, Mindy Peden
Mindy Peden
This article argues that contemporary political theory often contains an obscured supposition that I call the entrepreneurial assumption. This assumption can be seen most clearly when political theorists who do not have economic expertise per se theorize the relationship between their political thought and taxation. In order to explicate the entrepreneurial assumption, the article engages in close readings of John Rawls, Robert Nozick, and Ronald Dworkin. By elaborating on each of these authors' views, the importance of preserving “talent” through a system of taxation, the centrality of the entrepreneurial assumption can be seen more clearly.
Lots Of Luck: Contextualizing Sortition In Approaches To Chance, Mindy Peden
Lots Of Luck: Contextualizing Sortition In Approaches To Chance, Mindy Peden
Mindy Peden
Explores the ways in which luck and chance have been understood by political theorists. Contemporary political thinkers understand luck to describe those situations in which the individual subject has no control. Chance, however, has been understood in a variety of ways over time, beginning with Aristotle suggesting that chance is the “coincidental intersection of two separate causes.” Enlightenment thinkers argue, however, from a more deterministic perspective suggesting that chance is an epistemological category resulting from a deficit of human knowledge. In other words, the world is deterministic and certain even if not predictable by humans. That the world is a …
Betting On Democracy: Luck And Possibility In The Modern Political Imagination, Mindy Peden
Betting On Democracy: Luck And Possibility In The Modern Political Imagination, Mindy Peden
Mindy Peden
If there are political implications to methodological choices, what are they? This paper is about the political implications of one particular methodology: probability theory. More correctly, this paper is about how social scientists, especially political scientists, use probability theory in understanding the actions of human beings.
Probably Democratic, Mindy Peden
Probably Democratic, Mindy Peden
Mindy Peden
I explore uses for the role of chance in theorizing democracy and explores how the potentially fortune friendly use of probability theory in the social sciences has been misrepresented to highlight an imaginary predictability of political life.
Brewed In Scotland, Bottled In Ulster, Uncorked In The Usa: The Ambiguity Of Diasporic Identity, Mindy Peden, Wendy Wiedenhoft
Brewed In Scotland, Bottled In Ulster, Uncorked In The Usa: The Ambiguity Of Diasporic Identity, Mindy Peden, Wendy Wiedenhoft
Mindy Peden
No abstract provided.
Learning To Work: Colonialism As Rule, Not Exception, Mindy Peden
Learning To Work: Colonialism As Rule, Not Exception, Mindy Peden
Mindy Peden
No abstract provided.
Gambling For Certainty: Luck, Chance, And Uncertainty In Politics, Mindy Peden, Nicole Rishel
Gambling For Certainty: Luck, Chance, And Uncertainty In Politics, Mindy Peden, Nicole Rishel
Mindy Peden
No abstract provided.
The Political Gamble: Government By Lot, Mindy Peden
The Political Gamble: Government By Lot, Mindy Peden
Mindy Peden
No abstract provided.
The Political Gamble, Mindy Peden
Taxation And The Scientization Of Politics, Mindy Peden
Taxation And The Scientization Of Politics, Mindy Peden
Mindy Peden
No abstract provided.
Contemporary Political Theory And The Problem Of Taxation, Mindy Peden
Contemporary Political Theory And The Problem Of Taxation, Mindy Peden
Mindy Peden
No abstract provided.
Language And Arrogance: Problems With A Principle Of Justice, Mindy Peden
Language And Arrogance: Problems With A Principle Of Justice, Mindy Peden
Mindy Peden
No abstract provided.