Slučaj Eichmann: kratka povijest zla: (izvod iz obimnijeg rada)

Author(s): Adnan Kurić / Language(s): Bosnian Issue: 1/2015

Adolf Eichmann was one of the leading officials involved in the implementation of the Nazi policy of killing Jews during the Second World War. His kidnapping in Argentina and trial in Jerusalem shook the world’s public and made troubles on political and scientific scene in the world, but at our area it did not get the deserved attention. In this paper, the author wishes to remind the scientific thought and political doctrine of an event that can be actualized now in Bosnia and Herzegovina, especially connected to the similarities and differences between the Holocaust against the Jews and genocide against Bosniaks, and the Jews’ search of war criminals after the Second World war and Bosniaks’ search after the aggression against Bosnia and Herzegovina ‘92 -’95. The most of the war criminals against Bosniaks prosecuted in The Hague, as well as Eichmann did not plead guilty and did not repent of their crimes and in their statements to the courts, you can reach the depths of evil against the other and the different. The case of Eichmann approached the victim to a necessity that has to have a strong state, which will be, as far as possible, the guarantor of that the evil does not happen again. It is a message to Bosniaks as the most numerous people in Bosnia and Herzegovina, over whom the genocide was committed, that together with other peoples, jealously guard and build the state of Bosnia and Herzegovina. Mustafa Imamović, a doctor of law and professor at the University of Sarajevo, in his capital work History of Bosniaks, Sarajevo, 1997, stated that the history is of one of the oldest social sciences and that it existed even before the advent of literacy. Therefore, the history of criminal and his intent deserve the scientific attention to be investigated as causes of evil and opportunities to stop and prevent such a terrible crime that has disturbed the conscience of humankind.

Political Freedom as an Open Question

Author(s): Karol Chrobak / Language(s): English Issue: 1/2019

This essay diagnoses the condition of contemporary liberal democracies. It assumes that the current crisis of democracy is not the result of an external ideological threat, but it is the result of the lack of a coherent vision of democracy itself. The author recognises that the key symptom of the contemporary crisis is the decreasing involvement of citizens in public life and their growing reluctance to participate in public debate. He claims that the reason for this is the increasing social polarisation. The article considers two forms of polarisation: vertical (on the line: politicians–voters) and horizontal (on the line of ideo-logical social divisions). The first form is illustrated by Colin Crouch’s considerations, while the second one by Fareed Zakaria’s thoughts. What finds its manifestation in both cases is the phenomenon of citizens’ resignation from participation in the public debate; in the first case it is because of the lack of faith in the effectiveness of this type of opinion-giving mechanism, while in the second case it is because of the lack of recognition of other political and ideological options in society. These reflections are concluded in the postu-late that the basic task facing democracy today is to maintain the public sphere as open as possible, i.e. not excluding any ideological position in advance. This kind of conclusion is illustrated with the concepts of Chantal Mouffe (political perspective) and Helmuth Pless-ner (philosophical-anthropological perspective).

Preventing the Atrophy of the Deliberative Stance: Considering Non-Decisional Participation as a Prerequisite to Political Freedom

Author(s): Michał Zabdyr-Jamróz / Language(s): English Issue: 1/2019

In order to be exercised meaningfully, political freedom requires the capacity to actually identify available policy options. To ensure this, society ought to engage in deliberation as a discussion oriented towards mutual learning. In order to highlight this issue, I define deliberation in terms of the participants’ openness to preference change, i.e. the delibera-tive stance. In the context of the systemic approach to deliberative theory, I find several factors causing the atrophy of such a deliberative stance. I note that this state can occur not only when debaters are representatives or are in the presence of an audience, but also when they face the prospect of a binding decision. It is the latter effect that is a serious challenge to the micro-deliberative strategy, one that strives towards decisional powers being granted to deliberative minipublics. Presenting my findings, I propose—as an alter-native to the power-oriented ‘ladder of participation’—a distinction between traditional co-decision and deliberative consultation, the latter one being (in certain systemic con-texts) an environment that is more conducive to deliberative stance. This new typology highlights factors that lead to preference petrification and allows for the appreciation of the non-decisional character of micro-deliberation. All of it leads to the conclusion that, in order to preserve their deliberative character in the systemic context, deliberative min-ipublics should not always be required to have decision-making powers.

POLITICAL ONTO-THEOLOGIES OR TOWARDS A POLITICAL METAPHYSICS. SOME CRITICAL ANALOGIES FROM PLATO TO JURGEN MOLTMANN

Author(s): Spiros MAKRIS / Language(s): English Issue: 5/2019

The fruitful revival of political onto-theology in the 20th century, just in the heartof the so-called Weimar Renaissance, is connected not only with the revised imageof the Middle Ages, but also with the total recall of the problem evil in theepicenter of late modernity, due to the bloody and barbaric World Wars. Both NewPolitical Theology and post-fundamental political onto-theologies, in the sense ofa radical onto-theologia negativa, brought to the forefront of contemporary social,political and ethical theory the essential issues of ontological, theological andmoral interpretation of the political. It is not by accident that New PoliticalTheology comes to the postwar theoretical and experiential scene as a rivalagainst Schmittian political theology. Now, the focal point of analysis is notpolitical power, in the sense of state sovereignty, but a radical return to theforgotten theologian principles of Christology and Trinitarianism. As far as NewPolitical Theology is concerned, the new content of political theology pursuesmore the republican and democratic aspects of a Crucified God on the Cross nextto Jesus Christ, the poor and the pariahs. It is no coincidence that Moltmanniantheology of hope is seen, in the final analysis, as a political theologia crucis. It isimportant to add that a significant role in the non-Schmittian political theology ofthe 20th century plays the messianic and/or apocalyptic Jewish political theologywith apparent Marxist connotations and strong links with Critical Theory.

Institutional Change and the Paradox of (Restitution and) Restauration of the Institution

Author(s): Petar Bojanić / Language(s): English Issue: 4/2019

My intention in this text is to present the most significant contribution of some French philosophers and anthropologists to the notion of reconstruction and advancement of institutions. The paradox of change, reform or transformation of the institution – is an entirely new institution possible? How do institutions die? – lies in the difficulty or even impossibility to change something that manifests what we are as a group. If institutions really present or represent the relations among all of us, how can they be changed in the first place? Whence the capacity for change? What allows for the idea of the “new”?

Constitutive Justice and Human Rights

Author(s): Rastko Jovanov,Marija Velinov / Language(s): English Issue: 4/2019

In order to show the validity of here proposed conception of social ontology and its advantages over descriptive theories of social reality, which in the analysis of the socio-ontological status of human rights find only legally understood normativity as present in social reality, we will first (1) lay out Searle’s interpretation of human rights. In the second step, we will (2) introduce the methodical approach and basic concepts of our socio-ontological position, and explain the structure of the relationship between justice, law, morality, social institutions and collective intentionality. At the end (3) we will show how our theory of social ontology is better than Searle’s legal positivism in examining the ontological status of human rights. At the end, (3) we show in what ways such a theory of social ontology more intuitively and with wider arguments explains the ontological status of institution of human rights than Searle’s legal positivism.

Anthropocene, Capitalocene, Machinocene: Illusions of Instrumental Reason

Author(s): Predrag Slijepčević / Language(s): English Issue: 4/2019

In their seminal work, Dialectics of Enlightenment, Horkheimer and Adorno interpreted capitalism as the irrational monetization of nature. In the present work, I analyze three 21st century concepts, Anthropocene, Capitalocene and Machinocene, in light of Horkheimer and Adorno’s arguments and recent arguments from the philosophy of biology. The analysis reveals a remarkable prescience of the term “instrumental reason”, which is present in each of the three concepts in a profound and cryptic way. In my interpretation, the term describes the propensity of science based on the notion of physicalism to interpret nature as the machine analyzable and programmable by the human reason. As a result, the Anthropocene concept is built around the mechanicist model, which may be presented as the metaphor of the car without brakes. In a similar fashion, the Machinocene concept predicts the emergence of the mechanical mind, which will dominate nature in the near future. Finally, the Capitalocene concept turns a perfectly rational ambition to expand knowledge into an irrational obsession with over-knowledge, by employing the institutionalized science as the engine of capitalism without brakes. The common denominator of all three concepts is the irrational propensity to legitimize self-destruction. Potential avenues for countering the effects of “instrumental reason” are suggested.

UTEMELJENJE POSTMODERNE

Author(s): Stipe Grgas / Language(s): Croatian Issue: 6/2012

Naredni doprinos raspravi koja ističe potrebu „promišljanja humanističkih nauka” proističe iz oblasti američkih studija koja od svojih početaka vrši pritisak na disciplinarne granice i institucionalne strukture, te izaziva njihovo pomjeranje u humanističkim i društvenim naukama. Pristupi zastupljeni u ovoj oblasti navode posmatrače da na nju gledaju kao na domen istraživanja u koji praktično sve spada. Jedno od nametnutih tumačenja u objašnjenu heterogenosti istraživačkog plana i mnogostrukosti metoda u okviru američkih studija je demografska dinamika unutar Sjedinjenih Američkih Država i način na koji je ovakva dinamika uticala na statistiku upisanih studenata na američkim univerzitetima i na promjene nastavničkog kadra.

Habermasova kritika Rawlsove teorije pravednosti

Author(s): Adem Olovčić / Language(s): Bosnian Issue: 1-2/2019

The purpose of this paper is to illustrate Habermas' critique of Rawls' theory of justice as fairness by reviewing Habermas’ study published in 1995 in The Journal of Philosophy, titled "Reconciliation through the Public Use of Reason: Remarks on John Rawls’ Political Liberalism". The primary goal in reviewing this critique was to point out the fact that the different theories developed by these authors share a common ground. Furthermore, another goal was to show the relationship between these theories understood precisely through the prism of Habermas' critique. This paper uses an analytical model approach to philosophical text, and, through that, provides direct insight into the Habermas' study.

PAUL J. WEITHMAN, RAWLS, POLITICAL LIBERALISM AND REASONABLE FAITH

Author(s): Marko Jakić / Language(s): Croatian Issue: 10/2017

Review of: PAUL J. WEITHMAN, RAWLS, POLITICAL LIBERALISM AND REASONABLE FAITH

THE ART OF SHIPWRECKING: THE INFORMATION SOCIETY AND THE RISE OF EXAPTIVE RESILIENCE

Author(s): Dávid Kollár,Jozef Kollár / Language(s): English Issue: 1/2020

We argue that the epistemological, ontological, locality and social structure of the world have undergone radical changes over the last decades. The greatest riddle of the information age is whether we can domesticate the “unstable chaos” to “productive anarchy.” We argue that this results in the appreciation of the creative use of the “we do not know that we know” type of knowledge that we conceptualize as exaptive resili- ence. We briefly clarify the difference between exaptation and adaptation, and we com- pare the concept of adaptive resilience with that of exaptive resilience. Our results will show that the effectiveness of complex systems in the information age depends on the capacity of adaptive and exaptive resilience.

AROUND RICHARD MÜNCH’S ACADEMIC CAPITALISM THEORY

Author(s): Stanisław Czerniak / Language(s): English Issue: 1/2020

The author reviews the main elements of Richard Münch’s academic capitalism the- ory. By introducing categories like “audit university” or “entrepreneurial university,” the German sociologist critically sets today’s academic management model against the earlier, modern-era conception of academic work as an “exchange of gifts.” In the soci- ological and psychological sense, he sees the latter’s roots in traditional social lore, for instance the potlatch ceremonies celebrated by some North-American Indian tribes and described by Marcel Mauss. Münch shows the similarities between the old, “gift ex- changing” model and the contemporary one with its focus on the psycho-social funda- mentals of scientific praxis, and from this gradually derives the academic capitalism conception. He concludes with the critical claim that science possesses its own, inalien- able axiological autonomy and anthropological dimension, which degenerate as capital- ism proceeds to “colonise” science by means of state authority and money (here Münch mentions Jürgen Habermas and his philosophical argumentation).The author also offers a somewhat broader view of Münch’s analyses in the context of his own reflections on the problem.

RAWLS’S JUSTIFICATION MODEL FOR ETHICS: WHAT EXACTLY JUSTIFIES THE MODEL?

Author(s): Necip Fikri Alican / Language(s): English Issue: 1/2020

This is a defense of Rawls against recent criticism, ironically my own, though it is also a critique insofar as it addresses a problem that Rawls never does. As a defense, it is not a retraction of the original charges. As a critique, it is not more of the same oppo- sition. In either capacity, it is not an afterthought. The charges were conceived from the outset with a specific solution in mind, which would have been too distracting to pursue in the same article. This is that solution. It also highlights the problem.The original charges were that Rawls’s decision procedure for ethics does not justify his own moral principles, namely his principles of justice, and that the underlying prob- lem may well keep the decision procedure from justifying any moral principles whatso- ever, or at least any normatively useful ones. The underlying problem was, and still is, the model’s inherent universalism, which is built into the decision procedure through design specifications precluding relativism, yet only at the cost of limiting the relevant moral principles to generalities that are already widely accepted, thereby rendering the procedure at best redundant and very likely vacuous as an ethical justification model.These difficulties are manifested in the work of Rawls as the dogmatism of champi- oning a distinctive conception of justice, a liberal one as he himself calls it, through a justification model that is too universalistic to permit such a bias and possibly also too universalistic to permit any substantive conclusions at all. The solution contemplated here is to position the decision procedure as a dynamic justification model responsive to moral progress, as opposed to a static one indifferent to such progress and equally open to all moral input, thus removing the inconsistency between the universalistic design and any distinctive or controversial principles, including the ones Rawls himself rec- ommends, so long as they are consistent with moral progress.

ARE DIGITAL TECHNOLOGIES TRANSFORMING HUMANITY AND MAKING POLITICS IMPOSSIBLE?

Author(s): Jonathan O. Chimakonam / Language(s): English Issue: 1/2020

My question in this paper is whether digital technologies transform humanity and make politics impossible. Digital technologies, no doubt, are revolutionary. But I argue that what they have done in the Post-Cold War era are: (1) to further contract the spaces between politicians and the people; (2) transform actors from subjects to objects, such that we may in addition to social identities, talk about digital identities; (3) relocate the public sphere from squares to ilosphere where individuals are granted enormous expres- sive powers but at the same time become vulnerable to large scale manipulations; (4) and escalate the tools of politics. My argument will be that digital technologies in a subtle way are transforming humanity in the digital space and that this might have costly moral consequences not only in politics generally but specifically in liberal de- mocracy. However, I will contend that this transformation of humanity does not make politics impossible; it only escalates it with troubling consequences like those we saw in the 2016 American presidential election.

Истина и актуалност: бележки към философския проект на Димитър Вацов

Author(s): Alexander Kanev / Language(s): Bulgarian Issue: 9/2019

CONDIȚIA LIBERTĂȚII

Author(s): Agata Mihaela Popescu / Language(s): Romanian Issue: 41/2020

For thousands of years, people have been discussing Freedom Day and night. They think about it, define it in the same way and image, make illusions and nourish hopes, put it in laws and customs, give it an aura of supremacy, divinity, natural, ancestral and moral law. Moreover, I die for her, I suffer for her, I fight for her, I rot for her. But what is freedom, in fact and right? How and by what means can it be known, understood, accessed and, above all, accepted? What is its field of definition and reference? What are its forms of manifestation?

SOCIJALNA SOLIDARNOST U EUROPSKOJ UNIJI. Zaboravljena pretpostavka pravednog društva

Author(s): Marita Brčić / Language(s): Croatian Issue: 2-3/2009

The idea of a nation-state was conceived in Europe and the ideals of freedom, equality and fraternity (solidarity) are the result of the French Revolution. Today Europe is trying to unite its nation-states on these ideals. The European Union is a unique and original project because it is an attempt to build a union through political and economic institutions between different peoples and nations without having to diminish their power and sovereignty. How can a nation state retain its sovereignty and power in the European Union or in the global context? Market mechanisms have no limits because no borders for capital exist. The mechanisms of social systems still end at the existing, but long-ago outgrown (because of special interests) borders. The European Union wants to make a union but it also wants to retain the nation-state. With this assumption I will attempt to perceive the status of ideas and the experience of (social) solidarity within the EU.

M. WALZER AND CONTEMPORARY COMMUNITARIANISM

Author(s): Jarmila Chovancová / Language(s): English Issue: 1/2018

The author in her article focuses on the views of M. Walzer, encompassed specifically in his works „Spheres of Justice“ – „The Defence of Equality and Pluralism“, and „The Just and Unjust Wars“. The focus is given to equality, pluralism, and justice which represent the main issues considered by the contemporary communitarianism.

SOCIAL CAPITAL: LIMITATIONS OF THE CONCEPT AND PARTICIPATION IN PUBLIC LIFE IN POLAND

Author(s): Kamil Aksiuto / Language(s): English Issue: 1/2019

The article examines some of the most common and crucial difficulties involved in the use of the concept of “social capital” for research purposes. Some of the limitations of the concept are subsequently exemplified in the ways in which it has been employed to explain the unwillingness of a large part of the Polish society to participate in the public life. Social scientists have often accounted for this by emphasizing the low level of social capital in Poland, i.e. absence of certain skills necessary for active engagement in public life and/or lack of trust (trust in public institutions as well as towards other people in general). The article argues that such explanations are either obscuring important factors which contributed to this state of affairs or might gloss over the resources of social capital which are present in the Polish society.

Justice and the Politics of Capabilities: Sen, Nussbaum and Navarro

Author(s): Hrvoje Cvijanović / Language(s): English Issue: 16/2019

Linking the idea of justice with human dignity through the 'politics of capabilities' is a recent theoretical project advanced by Amartya Sen and Martha Nussbaum and inspired by the shortcomings of Rawls's understanding of justice. Rawls's view on the redistribution of resources or primary goods has nothing to say about someone's capabilities to use these goods, so the idea of capabilities becomes central since it is focused on the way of life a person has a reason to value. The article discusses Sen and Nussbaum's development of the capabilities approach and their criticism of Rawls's fundamental premises about justice. Although the capabilities approach attempts to rectify injustices that Rawls failed to address properly, there are limitations of that approach as well. At the end, it is shown that capabilities are valued in relation to their contribution to the system of production – having more capabilities enhances someone's socio-economic position within the given structure – but this does not question the existing power relations and the very structure that perpetuate inequalities. Hence, the author agrees with the line of criticism that invokes the issue of power relations provided by Vicente Navarro, yet extending this criticism to Rawls's theory of justice for not fundamentally questioning the power relations inherent in the institutions reproducing social injustices.