Ethics and Political Philosophy Commons^™

Imposing Duties And Original Appropriation, Bas Van Der Vossen

Philosophy Faculty Articles and Research

"To justify property rights, two things must be shown. First, the kind of exclusive rights over goods or land that property rights involve must be justified. Second, it must be possible for such property rights to come into being. These are two separate issues. It is one thing to say that it is a good idea for there to be such rights, quite another to say that some person or procedure can bring them about."

Review Of D. Chatterjee (Ed.), The Ethics Of Preventive War, Bas Van Der Vossen

Philosophy Faculty Articles and Research

A review of The Ethics of Preventive War, edited by Deen K. Chatterjee.

Amazon Book Review Of Dwayne Tunstall's Doing Philosophy Personally (2013), Theodore Walker

Perkins Faculty Research and Special Events

An Amazon.com customer book review of Doing Philosophy Personally: Thinking about Metaphysics, Theism, and Antiblack Racism (Fordham University, 2013) by Dwayne A. Tunstall

Here Come The Nones! Pluralism And Evangelization After Denominationalism And Americanism, William L. Portier

Theology and Religious Studies Faculty Publications

This essay begins with a four-part overview of American Catholic history focused on the building and dissolution of an immigrant Catholic subculture. The final period, “Catholics and the Dynamics of Pluralism (1968-present)” leads naturally into a discussion of the demography of Catholics in the United States. Particular attention is given to the trend to disaffiliation among millennials and how best to interpret it. Pastoral and theological reflections on the demography of disaffiliation emphasize the need for the church in the United States to take on an evangelical form more suited to a pluralism that is post-denominational and post-Americanist, and how …

The Morality Of Human Rights, Michael J. Perry

San Diego Law Review

My discussion of the morality of human rights in this Article presupposes that the reader is familiar with the internationalization of human rights: the growing international recognition and protection, in the period since the end of the Second World War, of certain rights as human rights. The Appendix to this Article is for readers not familiar with the internationalization of human rights. I begin, in the first Part of the Article, by explaining what the term human right means in the context of the internationalization of human rights. I also explain both the sense in which some human rights are, …

Does The Existing Human Rights Regime Have Political Authority?, Christopher Heath Wellman

San Diego Law Review

In this Article I consider whether the existing international legal human rights regime enjoys political authority over sovereign states. In particular, I explore whether, just as states can cite their role as the primary institutions that protect human rights in order to justify their claim to authority over their citizens, perhaps the current human rights regime might plausibly cite its secondary role in securing human rights in order to ground its authority over these states.

The Ethics Glass Ceiling: A Historical Analysis Of Actions By The U.S. House Of Representatives Committee On Ethics, Michael James Gordon

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

The breaking of moral and ethical codes has been with humankind since history was first recorded. As such, the public wants to know that their elected officials are held accountable and cannot disregard enshrined legal rights without incurring broader personal and societal consequences. Within the hallowed halls of government, the "unrequested" House Committee on Ethics (HCE) provides the forum of accountability.

In this qualitative, historical case study, HCE documents are analyzed and both the internal and external motivating factors behind the actions of the HCE members are examined. Computer assisted qualitative data analysis software, namely ATLAS.ti, was used to look …

An Awareness Of What Is Missing: Four Views On The Consequences Of Secularism, Rachel E. Hunt Steenblik, Heidi Zameni, Debbie Ostorga, Nathan Greeley

LUX: A Journal of Transdisciplinary Writing and Research from Claremont Graduate University

While the issues regarding widespread secularization in contemporary Western culture are difficult to properly assess, it can be argued that certain prerequisites are necessary for the well-being of any society and, furthermore, that certain of these necessary conditions are only provided by a given civilization's major religious tradition. All societies need to perpetually engage in collective action and decision making, and as any given community faces the challenges of the future, its governing religious worldview is an indispensable source of guidance and time-honored wisdom. With this in mind, it will be argued that Western civilization is dependent upon a Judeo-Christian …

The Need To Include Animal Protection In Public Health Policies, Aysha Akhtar

Animal Welfare Collection

Many critical public health issues require non-traditional approaches. Although many novel strategies are used, one approach not widely applied involves improving the treatment of animals. Emerging infectious diseases are pressing public health challenges that could benefit from improving the treatment of animals. Other human health issues, that overlap with animal treatment issues, and that warrant further exploration, are medical research and domestic violence. The diverse nature of these health issues and their connection with animal treatment suggest that there may be other similar intersections. Public health would benefit by including the treatment of animals as a topic of study and …

The Animal Question In Deconstruction, Rafe Mcgregor

Between the Species

Review of The Animal Question in Deconstruction, edited by Lynn Turner (Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 2013)

Ethics And Analytics: Limits Of Knowledge And A Horizon Of Opportunity, James E. Willis Iii, Matthew D. Pistilli

Teaching and Learning Technologies Presentations

The realms of academic and learning analytics are in need of ethical frameworks to address issues associated with student autonomy, information confidentiality, and predictive modeling. This interactive session will involve small-group discussion surrounding a frontier of ethics and its contribution to innovation in and use of new analytics systems.

War And Peace Theology In German And Swedish Christian Zionism, Kristian Steiner

International Dialogue

This is a comparative study of how Swedish and German Christian Zionist literature from 1967–2012 portrays the chances for peace and the risk for war, globally and in the Middle East. Christian Zionism is a theology supporting the establishment and the preservation of the modern state of Israel as a Jewish homeland. Christian Zionist literature, in Germany and Sweden, demonstrates very little hope for peace, since this world is assumed fallen, heading for the apocalypse, in the hands of the Devil, and inhabited by a sinful humanity beyond improvement. The image of Arabs is clearly that of an enemy image; …

Is Multiculturalism Good For Children? The Rights Of The Child And Multiculturalist Policies In Sweden, Pernilla Ouis, Göran Adamson, Aje Carlbom

International Dialogue

In the present paper, the objective is to investigate if multiculturalism is good for children. The method is to use secondary sources, as well as current examples from Swedish society, to show how multiculturalist policies have negative consequences for minority children's rights. The paper, as well as previous research, reveals that parents of immigrant origin often forbid children to attend school activities such as camps, gymnastics, swimming, and lessons in music and religion. Parents motivate their actions with reference to their traditions and religion, and a fear that their children might learn sexual immorality. The wishes of parents are accepted …

The Duty To Rescue And The Duty To Aid The Starving, Per Bauhn

International Dialogue

In this article I intend to argue that while there are certainly important similarities between the duty to rescue and the duty to aid the famine-stricken and starving, there are also important differences between these two duties. Both the duty to rescue and the duty to provide aid need to be qualified by conditions regarding necessity, possibility, and comparable cost, as well as by a principle concerning special relationships of responsibility. However, while the duty to rescue can be fulfilled by individual agents, the duty to aid the famine-stricken and starving requires large-scale interventions to change political and social structures, …

Jerusalem Obscured: The Crescent On The Temple: The Dome Of The Rock As Image Of The Ancient Jewish Sanctuary, Curtis Hutt

International Dialogue

To begin with, what is it? In order to answer this question one must, of course, qualify it by asking—to whom? Pamela Berger in The Crescent on the Temple: The Dome of the Rock as Image of the Ancient Jewish Sanctuary has done a great service by supplying us with a history of the iconographic representation of Jerusalem's Dome of the Rock (the Qubbat al-Sakhrah). While no publication could ever exhaustively summarize the countless visual and literary portrayals of this world heritage site, Berger not only makes a valiant attempt at such but necessarily changes the way that almost all …

The Transgressive Allure Of White Gold In Peruvian Amazonia: Towards A Genealogy Of Coca Capitalisms And Social Dread: Andean Cocaine: The Making Of A Global Drug; Coca's Gone: Of Might And Right In The Huallaga Post-Boom, Bartholomew Dean

International Dialogue

“I have tested this effect of coca, which wards off hunger, sleep, and fatigue and steels one to intellectual effort, some dozen times on myself; I had no opportunity to engage in physical work.”—Sigmund Freud, from ‘Über Coca’, Centralblatt für die ges. Therapie, 2, 1884.

Circulating through multiple regimes of value, the transgressive allure of coca has gripped the Occidental imagination for more than a century and a half, shaping the contours of modernity; first as a magical elixir, then to a demonized underground drug, and eventually being transformed into a lucrative global commodity with grievous effects. Coca and cocaine …

Notes From The Editor, Rory J. Conces

International Dialogue

Notes from International Dialogue's Editor-in-Chief, Rory J. Conces for Volume 3.

Sites Of Contestation: What Apology Debates Tell Us About International Relations: Sorry States: Apologies In International Politics; Troubled Apologies Among Japan, Korea, And The United States, Elizabeth S. Dahl

International Dialogue

Some scholars have stated that an “age of apology” began in the 1990s (Brooks 1999: 3)—that apologies now are considered standard and beneficial practice in business, domestic politics, and international affairs. Some praise this trend, seeing it as a sign that a new space has opened up in the post-Cold War world for moral concerns and “national self-reflexivity” (Barkan 2000: xvii).1 Such scholars and other commentators see a great deal of potential in apology to change relationships for the better.2 While more discussions public apologies occurred in the 1990s,3 however, it is unclear what this change means. After all, despite …

Twilight Of Impunity: The War Crimes Trial Of Slobodan Milosevic, Sabrina P. Ramet

International Dialogue

Judith Armatta, a lawyer and journalist, attended the proceedings of the trial of former Serbian president Slobodan Milošević over a period of nearly three years. During this period, the court was in session for 466 days, interrupted by repeated breaks necessitated by the accused’s increasing health problems. Charged with sixty-six counts of war crimes, crimes against humanity, and genocide, Milošević declined to have counsel appointed, electing instead to defend himself. The court’s willingness to allow Milošević to do so and to do so on his own terms proved to be a huge mistake, as Armatta stresses. The fallen Serbian leader’s …

The Fate Of Greenland— Lessons From Abrupt Climate Change, Ólafur Ingólfsson

International Dialogue

In times of chronic lack of resources for academic research and ever increasing competition for grants it was every scientists dream coming true: a billionaire patron comes along and hands you unlimited resources to pursue the research that lies closest to your heart. In this case, the late Gary Comer (1927–2006), who had in 2001 taken his yacht through the notorious Northwest Passage then free of sea ice, engaged a team of outstanding climate scientists to lead a search for causal links controlling abrupt global climate change: Wallace (Wally) S. Broecker of Columbia University, George H. Denton of the University …

Laws, Outlaws And Terrorists: Lessons From The War On Terrorism, Malin Isaksson

International Dialogue

No abstract provided.

Sayyid Qutb And The Origins Of Radical Islamism, Ramazan Kılınç

International Dialogue

In August 2013, the Egyptian military, which deposed the elected president Mohammed Mursi a month earlier, harshly cracked down on the protestors. The protestors, led by the Muslim Brotherhood, aimed to restore the Mursi government through their sit-ins. The military crackdown left hundreds, if not thousands, died and several thousand arrests behind. While scholars are trying to account for what is happening in Egypt and states are searching for relevant policies to respond to these developments, only a few books can offer as nuanced insights as John Calvert’s Sayyid Qutb and the Origins of Radical Islamism offers. Based on diligent …

International Human Rights, 4th Ed., Eric A. Heinze

International Dialogue

Jack Donnelly’s most recent edition of his well-known text, International Human Rights, provides an updated discussion of the evolution of international human rights since the end of World War II. Like previous editions, this book provides an accessible, relatively comprehensive, and self-consciously analytical treatment of the broad subject of international human rights. While the book is clearly intended for classroom use, and is indeed accessible enough to be understood by most upper-division undergraduates, it is not a “textbook” in the traditional sense, in that Donnelly is not shy about offering his own arguments and interpretations about a variety of controversial …

Kicking Away The Ladder: Development Strategy In Historical Perspective, Seb Bytyçi

International Dialogue

Although it has been a decade since this book’s publication, it is worth bringing attention to it due to its significance. Many important events have taken place in the world since Kicking Away the Ladder: Development Strategy in Historical Perspective was published; most notably the global financial crisis, the Eurocrisis, the continued economic growth of the BRICS, the enlargement of the European Union in ex-communist Eastern Europe, and the raw materials-based growth of many developing countries fueled mainly by Chinese demand. All these developments in the global arena make it worthwhile reviewing and rereading this book. Another key reason for …

Queer Activism In India: A Story In The Anthropology Of Ethics, Rahul Rao

International Dialogue

The queer movement in India has been adept at documenting itself. A succession of anthologies compiled by leading voices from within the movement has made available to a wider reading public the lives and longings of many of its diverse participants (Sukthankar 1999; Bhattacharyya and Bose 2005; Narrain and Bhan 2006; Narrain and Gupta 2011). Naisargi Dave’s book on queer activism in India offers something new and valuable. A book-length account of the queer political landscape with a focus on lesbian activism, this study is distinctive both for its longer temporal view and for the productively ambivalent positionality of its …

Michael Oakeshott: Religion, Politics And The Moral Life, Noël K. O'Sullivan

International Dialogue

Although students of Michael Oakeshott have special reason to be grateful to Timothy Fuller for this carefully selected volume of ten of Oakeshott’s early and mid-career essays, as well as for the scholarly introduction Fuller has provided, his book will also appeal to general readers concerned to grapple with the central issues of modern life and thought with which Oakeshott constantly wrestled. Four of the essays have never been previously published and six are now made available in a more accessible form.

U.S. Cultural Diplomacy And Archeology: Soft Power, Hard Heritage, Nicholas J. Cull

International Dialogue

The U.S.-led invasion of Iraq in 2003 generated a maelstrom of images. There were cities lit by the “shock and awe” bombardment, the falling statues, the traumatized civilians and scene after scene of coalition forces vainly searching for weapons of mass destruction. But among the most peculiarly troubling were the images of the looting of Iraq’s national museum. The human suffering was sadly familiar to the TV audience around the world but the looting broke new ground. The images of looting spoke of the depth of the anarchy into which Iraq was tumbling. They represented the destruction of something greater …

Cutting The Fuse: The Explosion Of Global Suicide Terrorism And How To Stop It, Sunil K. Sahu

International Dialogue

Since 9/11 there has been a burgeoning literature on terrorism written by journalists, scholars, policy makers, diplomats, and military professionals. The last decade has also witnessed a dramatic increase in suicide terrorist attacks—violent attacks designed to kill others where the death of the attacker is a necessary part of the action—especially against American interests. There were twenty suicide terrorist attacks worldwide in 2000, one of which was anti-American inspired; the number of such attacks increased ten-fold by 2010, 90% of which were anti-American inspired. Although suicide bombing was used by imperial Japan at the end of World War II, the …

The Power Of Religion In The Public Sphere, Robin Alice Roth

International Dialogue

Of the numerous topics current philosophy is attentive to certainly the issue of religion is central. This anthology starts with Jürgen Habermas’ notion of “the public sphere” and works to connect this notion to the issue of religion. Of course, religion has long been part of the public sphere. For much of human history, people established their various formations of society and state in a manner continuous with religion. Their discourses were compact. Habermas’ early works argue for a differentiation of the religious and political spheres from the public sphere that eventually overcame “representational” culture, with its authoritarianism, particularly with …

Genocide And The Europeans, Kate Ferguson

International Dialogue

Next year the world will commemorate twenty years since the Rwandan genocide and the following year will mark twenty years since the genocide at Srebrenica. As the International Community prepares to honor these grim milestones, somber deliberation of the mistakes of the past must inform the development of a more committed future. Karen Smith’s book, Genocide and the Europeans, provides just such a reflection for Europe, tracing the continent’s policy responses to incidents of genocide since the Holocaust. It is an important text that draws a detailed history of the past sixty years, pairing the careful analysis of an international …