Discourse Ethics

In this paper we suggest an alternative approach to ethics in social work: virtue ethics. We argue that Habermas's theory of communicative action and discourse ethics needs to be supplemented with virtue ethics to provide an account useful to social work. In these times, sensitivity to others is needed for social work to succeed as a profession interested in combating the complacency, self-interest and lack of compassion evident in cutbacks to social welfare programs and the resultant concerns with outcomes and efficiencies that have all but obliterated care and compassion. We see in Habermas a furthering of Aristotelian and Thomist philosophy, most importantly with respect to his focus on emancipatory knowingthe critically reflective knower who knows self as the person doing the knowing.

In this paper we analyze the role trust plays in an ethical evaluation of PT. We distinguish between trust in PT itself, and trust in those humans who design, produce and deploy it and draw on Discourse Ethics to further distinguish two types of communication embodied in PTs: asymmetrical and symmetrical communication.

Eine Theorie der globalen Verantwortung Was wir Menschen in extremer Armut schulden © Suhrkamp Verlag suhrkamp taschenbuch wissenschaft 2173 978-3-518-29773-5 suhrkamp taschenbuch wissenschaft 2173 Auch zu Beginn des 21. Jahrhunderts lebt ein großer Teil der Menschheit in bitterer Armut. Daraus ergibt sich die brennende Frage, was die Bürgerinnen und Bürger wohlhabender Länder extrem armen Menschen moralisch schulden. Valentin Beck beantwortet sie im Rahmen einer umfassenden Theorie der globalen Verantwortung. In seinem glänzend geschriebenen Buch behandelt er zentrale Fragen der Theorie globaler Gerechtigkeit, unterzieht unsere Verflechtung in globale soziale Strukturen einer detaillierten Analyse und wirft so ein neues Licht auf eine der größten moralischen Herausforderungen unserer Zeit. Wir müssen mit Blick auf den politischen und individuellen Umgang mit der Weltarmut umdenken, so lautet die zentrale Forderung dieser Studie.

In diesem Essay soll die praktische Philosophie von Jürgen Habermas, dessen Diskursethik vor allem in der modernen deutschen Unternehmensethik eine große Rolle spielt, vorgestellt und in Verhältnis zu seinen Überlegungen zur Diskurstheorie der Wahrheit und zur Theorie des kommunikativen Handelns gesetzt werden.

Recent years have seen an influx of medical technologies capable of remotely monitoring the health and behaviours of individuals to detect, manage and prevent health problems.  Known collectively as personal health monitoring (PHM), these systems are intended to supplement medical care with health monitoring outside traditional care environments such as hospitals, ranging in complexity from mobile devices to complex networks of sensors measuring physiological parameters and behaviours.  This research project assesses the potential ethical implications of PHM as an emerging medical technology, amenable to anticipatory action intended to prevent or mitigate problematic ethical issues in the future.

PHM fundamentally changes how medical care can be delivered: patients can be monitored and consulted at a distance, eliminating opportunities for face-to-face actions and potentially undermining the importance of social, emotional and psychological aspects of medical care.  The norms evident in this movement may clash with existing standards of ‘good’ medical practice from the perspective of patients, clinicians and institutions.    By relating utilitarianism, virtue ethics and theories of surveillance to Habermas’ concept of colonisation of the lifeworld, a conceptual framework is created which can explain how PHM may be allowed to change medicine as a practice in an ethically problematic way.  The framework relates the inhibition of virtuous behaviour among practitioners of medicine, understood as a moral practice, to the movement in medicine towards remote monitoring. 

To assess the explanatory power of the conceptual framework and expand its borders, a qualitative interview empirical study with potential users of PHM in England is carried out.  Recognising that the inherent uncertainty of the future undermines the validity of empirical research, a novel epistemological framework based in Habermas’ discourse ethics is created to justify the empirical study.  By developing Habermas’ concept of translation into a procedure for assessing the credibility of uncertain normative claims about the future, a novel methodology for empirical ethical assessment of emerging technologies is created and tested.  Various methods of analysis are employed, including review of academic discourses, empirical and theoretical analyses of the moral potential of PHM.  Recommendations are made concerning ethical issues in the deployment and design of PHM systems, analysis and application of PHM data, and the shortcomings of existing research and protection mechanisms in responding to potential ethical implications of the technology.

In  this  present  work,  I  have  made  an  attempt  to  discuss  the  concept  of discourse  ethics  with  its  basic  characteristics,  and  finally  the  main problems  concerning  Habermasian  discourse  theory  of  morality. Discourse  ethics  is  an  approach  to  ethics  that  is  founded  upon  rules  of dialogue,  and  which  encourages  participants  to  approach  an  ethical dilemma  with  both  pure  rational  reason  and  experience  firmly  in  hand. Habermasian  discourse  ethics  is  widely  known  as  deliberative democratic  theory  often  praised  for  its  ideals.  The  concept  of communicative  action  plays  a  central  role  in  the  development  of Habermas‟  discourse  morality.  It  is  a  theory  of  morality,  which  claims that  moral  norms  concerning  justice  can  be  tested  rationally  in  an argumentative  dialogue;  the  ideal  precondition  is  that  dialogue  should be  free  from  domination.  With  its  various  characteristics,  some  main problems  concerning  Habermasian  Discourse  ethics  is  also  discussed  in this  paper.

Hans-Hermann Hoppe contends that the fact that a person has the capacity to argue entails that she has the moral right of exclusive control over her own body. Critics of Hoppe’s argument do not appear to have pinpointed its flaws. I expose the logical structure of Hoppe’s argument, distinguishing its pragmatic-contradiction and its mutual-recognition components. I provide three counterexamples to show that Hoppe’s mutual-recognition argument is invalid and I argue that the truth that appears to motivate the argument is simply a banality. I show that Hoppe’s pragmatic-contradiction argument is invalid, has a false premise and fails to link up with his mutual-recognition argument in the way that he requires to reach his conclusion. I conclude by outlining three perils of pragmatic-contradiction arguments, the weakness of mutual-recognition arguments, and the implausibility of attempts to derive a universal moral status from a specialised activity such as argumentation.

This article discusses Seyla Benhabib's transformation of Jürgen Habermas's discourse ethics. It focusses on her interpretation of communicative moral reason by reference to actual 'moral conversations'. While she does not draw on universal pragmatics, Benhabib still claims that her ethical theory represents a form of universalism. This study argues that this claim is misleading: Benhabib's discourse ethics points to a culture of moral judgment that is essentially open to different kinds of moral thinking. Such a culture, however, needs moral humility and cannot appropriately be called 'universalism'.

"In this paper, the Habermasian approach to discourse ethics is summarized and criticized in a systematic way in order to give the reader a comprehensive but short review of the central ideas, strengths and shortcomings of the Habermasian discourse ethics. The following points are considered: The Kantian origin of discourse ethics and its central theorems; the genesis and necessity of morals as a result of the individual reciprocal vulnerability in a social world; the difference between moral and evaluative questions; the moral point of view of the practical discourse; the problem of ultimate justification; the problem of practical application of discourse ethics; and finally further critique. The paper bases on the anthology „Erläuterungen zur Diskursethik“ by Jürgen Habermas (1991).

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Dieses Paper möchte den Versuch unternehmen, anhand des 1991 erschienenen Habermasschen Buches „Erläuterungen zur Diskursethik“ dessen Diskursethik systematisch darzustellen und sich auch inhaltlich mit ihr auseinanderzusetzen. Dabei wird zuerst der Kantische Ursprung der Diskursethik herausgestellt und deren zentrale Sätze vorgestellt. Anschließend wird der theoretische Ansatz des Habermas inhaltlich aufgegliedert. Als Erstes wird mit Habermas die Entstehung und Notwendigkeit der Moral aufgezeigt, die sich insbesondere aus der Verletzlichkeit des Individuums in der Gesellschaft ergäbe. Im Anschluss werden kurz moralische von evaluativen Fragen unterschieden, um danach ausführlicher auf den moral point of view des praktischen Diskurses einzugehen. Zudem wird die Frage der Letztbegründung der Ethik bei Habermas erörtert und das Problem der praktischen Anwendung der Diskursethik diskutiert. Unter diesen Punkten werden auch Kritikpunkte aufgegriffen, die Habermas selbst behandelt. Im letzten Kapitel möchte ich mich selbst argumentativ mit der Habermasschen Diskursethik auseinandersetzen, wobei auch der Philosoph Albrecht Wellmer kurz zu Gehör kommen soll.

Gordon and Burckhart have assembled a collection of essays that are grouped together complimentarily and flow well from one to the next. As to the strengths and weaknesses of the individual essays, they are predominantly well written, well researched, and constructively critical while remaining true to the spirit of Jonas’ thought.

The following paper will trace the recently established field of Information Ethics through it’s various evolutions, from it’s origins in Librarianship to it’s role as a global player in areas as diverse as technology, media, global humanitarianism, and the philosophy of information. The praxis of the field will be outlined for the uninitiated reader, followed by an intimate history of the founding players and their continued contribution to this ever-evolving field. The current evolutions of Information Ethics will then be explored in the context of their application to the viral global phenomena of Intercultural Information Ethics (IIE), and finally, the paper will conclude with projections towards future evolutions in Information Ethics, as well as an exploration of potential definitions for the field.

How should the relationship between Pascal and Montaigne be defined? Commentators have used words such as source, influence, reminiscence, model, reference, library or mine to describe this relationship 1 , but the existence of textual similarities and references to Montaigne in Pascal's writings does not reveal the meaning of these quotations. Should we understand them as repetitions of Montaigne's theses by Pascal? Misrepresentations? Radicalizations? Reductions? It is striking that what is remarkable in Montaigne for Pascal is a certain apprehension of relationships between oneself and others. Indeed, one of the few laudatory mentions of Montaigne in Pascal's work can be found in the opuscule De l'Esprit géométrique et de l'art de persuader, while examining the question of meaning: Tous ceux qui disent les mêmes choses ne les possèdent pas de la même sorte ; et c'est pourquoi l'incomparable auteur de l'Art de conférer s'arrête avec tant de soin à faire entendre qu'il ne faut pas juger de la capacité d'un homme par l'excellence d'un bon mot qu'on lui entend dire ; mais, au lieu d'étendre l'admiration d'un bon discours à la personne, qu'on pénètre, dit-il, l'esprit d'où il sort, qu'on tente s'il le tient de sa mémoire ou d'un heureux hasard ; qu'on le reçoive avec froideur et avec mépris, afin de voir s'il ressentira qu'on ne donne pas à ce qu'il dit l'estime que son prix mérite. On verra le plus souvent qu'on le lui fera désavouer sur l'heure, et qu'on le tirera bien loin de cette pensée meilleure qu'ils ne croient, pour les jeter dans une autre toute basse et ridicule. Il faut donc sonder comme cette pensée est logée en son auteur; comment, par où, jusqu'où il la possède. Autrement, le jugement précipité sera jugé téméraire 2 .

This is a 99% complete long book manuscript. It defends the thesis that democracy in a robust (deliberative democratic) sense is a basic human right. In the process, it defends a theory of human rights in general that seeks to bridge the moral - political divide, which has been a key issue in recent years. The book draws together sources from analytic moral philosophy along with Habermasian critical theory / discourse ethics. It also features a chapter on democratic theory, and discussions of revolution and secession (with thinkers such as Allan Buchanan, Michael Walzer, and Abraham Lincoln). One unusual feature of this work is the detailed chapter on the nature of culture and the contrast between two basic cultural paradigms. This involves a new version of the Axial transition idea, different than either Jaspers' or Habermas's versions.

Η εργασία αυτή καινοτομεί στο πλαίσιο της πρόσφατης βιβλιογραφίας σχετικά με το έργο του Χάμπερμας, επαναφέροντας στο προσκήνιο τα πρώιμα έργα του μεγάλου θεωρητικού και αναζητώντας τον μίτο που τα συνδέει με τις ύστερες θεωρητικές του επεξεργασίες (στις οποίες αφιερώνεται το μεγαλύτερο μέρος του βιβλίου). Το αποτέλεσμα είναι μια συναρπαστική διαδρομή μέσα από ολόκληρο το χαμπερμασιανό έργο, η οποία συνδυάζει την επιμελημένη παρουσίαση με την κριτική ανάλυση της οπισθοχώρησης του Χάμπερμας από μια ριζοσπαστική κοινωνική και πολιτική τοποθέτηση σε μια πιο "θεωρητική" φιλοσοφική και κοινωνική επιλογή, απολογητική του δυτικού ορθολογισμού. Ο συγγραφέας ασκεί κριτική στις συγκεκριμένες θεωρητικές επιλογές του Χάμπερμας, διαγράφοντας έτσι τις βασικές κατευθύνσεις μιας εναλλακτικής κριτικής θεωρίας που μένει να συγκροτηθεί.

The performative, as an utterance that changes the social order, is the fundamental building block of law's soft power. I begin by sketching J L Austin's original formulation of the performative, and Émile Benveniste's parallel discovery of the binding enunciation, explored in his work on the oath and blasphemy.

Then the empirical, or case study element of this investigation looks at some ways performatives fail. Austin himself began this promising line of inquiry, with his work on 'misfires'. And Benveniste explored the way the oath is mirrored in blasphemy and the curse (further elaborated by Agamben). I will show how these failures are in themselves particularly relevant to current legal issues and public debate.

Finally I consider some boundary cases of speech act theories which try to accommodate a wider range of discursive practices: hate speech and (transgressions of) discourse ethics are the case studies here. The work concludes looking for a formulation more adequate to the range of social tasks required of law. Austin's approach is overdetermined by convention and authority, Benveniste's is predicated on the speaker's own subjectivity. My 'third way' considers the role of intersubjectivity: the underdetermined, shifting positions of various speakers in the legal and political field.

Habermas' project of reformulating the critical theory of society was characterized from the very beginning by a dispute with Marx. Habermas' critique of the so-called “Production Paradigm” of Marx claims that it involves a reduction of “rules of social interaction” to “technical-utilitarian rules of production and the use of products” and thus amounts to a truncated conceptualization of social praxis.
This article will demonstrate that Habermas, through his approach to Marx oriented toward the latter's early writings, and due to his dualistic theoretical construction of “labour” and “interaction” or “system” and “life world” respectively, not only fails to perceive the central categories of Marx's social theory, but also fundamentally misses the point of the specificity of capitalist social constitution. Above all, Habermas ignores the form-analytical distinction, first elaborated by Marx in Capital, between concrete and abstract labour. It turns out that the core problem of Habermas' social theory is that by substituting the concept of “institutional framework” for that of “relations of production”, or respectively the concept of “interaction” on the one hand and the subsystem of “purposive rational activity” on the other, he misses the innovative content of the concept of society in the critique of political economy, thus transforming social theory into an extrinsic combination of symbolic-interactionist reductionism and the systems-theoretical affirmation of social alienation. Society is dissolved into the dualisms of labour and interaction, technics and ethics, relations between people and things and relations between people.  Habermas thereby consummates a separation of the class relation from its objective mediation, i.e. its economic character in a narrower sense, as well as trivializing independent economic mechanisms as primarily mediums of communication that unburden activity with the goals of increasing utility and optimal material reproduction.
Following Dieter Wolf and Moishe Postone, I will demonstrate that production and labour in Marx's work, contrary to Habermas' interpretation, are two-dimensional categories, which definitely, alongside the content of normative regulations, also represent forms of social unity in capitalism, and are constitutive for an understanding of modern relations of domination.

Habermas’ Projekt einer Reformulierung der kritischen Gesellschaftstheorie stand von Beginn an im Zeichen einer Auseinandersetzung mit Marx. Habermas’ Kritik am sogenannten ‚Produktionsparadigma’ von Marx lautet, dass es eine Reduktion von „Regeln der sozialen Interaktion“ auf „technisch-utilitäre[...] Regeln der Produktion und der Verwendung von Produkten“ mit sich bringe und so eine verkürzte Konzeptualisierung gesellschaftlicher Praxis darstelle.
Der Aufsatz zeigt, dass Habermas durch seinen von den Frühschriften ausgehenden Zugang zu Marx und aufgrund seiner dualistischen Theorieanlage von ‚Arbeit‘ und ‚Interaktion‘ bzw. ‚System‘ und ‚Lebenswelt‘, nicht nur zentrale sozialtheoretische Kategorien von Marx nicht wahrnimmt, sondern grundlegend die Spezifik kapitalistischer Vergesellschaftung verfehlt. Habermas ignoriert vor allem die formanalytische Differenzierung von abstrakter und konkreter Arbeit, die Marx erst im Kapital ausformuliert. Als Kernproblem der Habermasschen Gesellschaftstheorie erweist sich, dass mit der Ersetzung des Begriffs ‚Produktionsverhältnis’ durch den des ‚institutionellen Rahmens’, bzw. der ‚Interaktion’ einerseits und des Konzepts des ‚Subsystems zweckrationalen Handelns’ andererseits, der innovative Gehalt des ökonomiekritischen Gesellschaftsbegriffs verfehlt wird, wobei Sozialtheorie in eine äußerliche Kombination von symbolisch-interaktionistischem Reduktionismus und systemtheoretischer Affirmation gesellschaftlicher Entfremdung transformiert wird. Gesellschaft löst sich in die Dualismen von Arbeit und Interaktion, Technik und Ethik, Mensch-Ding- und Mensch-Mensch-Verhältnissen auf. Dabei vollzieht Habermas eine Trennung des Klassenverhältnisses von seiner gegenständlichen Vermittlung, d.h. seinem im engeren Sinn ökonomischen Charakter, sowie eine Verharmlosung verselbständigter ökonomischer Mechanismen zu vor allem handlungsentlastenden Kommunikationsmedien mit dem Ziel der Nutzenmehrung und optimalen materiellen Reproduktion.
In Anlehnung an Moishe Postone und Dieter Wolf wird dagegen gezeigt, dass Produktion und Arbeit bei Marx im Gegensatz zur Habermasschen Deutung zweidimensionale Kategorien darstellen, die sehr wohl neben dem Inhalt normativer Regelungen selbst eine Form gesellschaftlicher Einheit im Kapitalismus darstellen und konstitutiv zum Verständnis moderner Herrschaftsverhältnisse sind.

At first glance, the discourse ethics which is proposed by Jürgen Habermas may seem to be idealistic and very difficult to achieve. Giving priority to one’s duty or obligation for the welfare of the society over one’s pursuit of interests and end-goals is not as simple as black and white. Leading the commensurable moral languages into consensus is seemingly a Promethean task. Following the procedures of an intersubjective discourse and giving opportunity not to one but to all constituents of society to express their desires, needs and aspirations are not as comfortable as a bed of roses. This paper thenceforth renders an exposition of the characteristics of Habermas's discourse ethics. Moreover, it gives a closer look on the role which such discourse ethics play in the exercise of democracy.

El tema del libro es la fundamentación ético discursiva propuesta por Karl-Otto Apel en el marco de su pragmática trascendental. El examen crítico de esta propuesta filosófica tiene el objetivo de reforzar los argumentos a favor de una fundamentación trascendental de la ética. Se enfrenta inicialmente a la pragmática apeliana con una serie de críticas provenientes del debate analítico sobre los “argumentos trascendentales”, iniciada en los años sesenta del siglo XX. Se reconstruyen tres líneas principales: una que atañe a la forma de los argumentos trascendentales,  otra a su capacidad para demostrar validez objetiva, y la otra a su capacidad  para demostrar la unicidad de un esquema conceptual (iniciadas respectivamente por M. Gram, B. Stroud y S. Körner).
La discusión y posterior aplicación a Apel de  las críticas de este debate conduce a tres conclusiones principales. La primera  es que no existen razones concluyentes en contra de realizar una reflexión trascendental sobre las condiciones de posibilidad del conocimiento válido. La segunda es que la fundamentación trascendental debe hacerse en el marco de un  modelo filosófico dialógico y auto-reflexivo (diferente al asumido por los  autores del debate). Precisamente, la tercera conclusión es que todo método trascendental debe ser “interno”, es decir, debe asumir las condiciones que  investiga. Se aborda entonces el problema de concebir un  método que asuma la circularidad de la investigación y le dé un contenido  concreto a la fundamentación. En lugar de la fórmula apeliana, se sostiene la conveniencia de entender la pragmática trascendental como una continuación, corregida en un sentido trascendental, de la hermenéutica iniciada por Heidegger y renovada por Gadamer. Un método interno “hermenéutico trascendental” puede describirse con los rasgos de la  dialogicidad, la auto-reflexión y la crítica del sentido. El interés  fundamental es, como para Apel, la reconstrucción de aquellos presupuestos que  conforman la base de la ética discursiva, la cual transforma de manera comunicativa el imperativo categórico kantiano. Se discute finalmente la cuestión de cómo es  posible pensar que los presupuestos argumentativos no están sometidos a cambios históricos. La respuesta apunta a señalar que la objeción de “otra razón  posible” carece de argumentos sustantivos en contra de la fundamentación.

Prøveforelesning for mastergraden i filosofi – «Finnes det desisjonistiske element i diskursetikken?» 1.-INTRO-70-og 80-tallet var viktige tiår for diskursetikken. To av teoriens mest sentrale tenkere, Jürgen Habermas og Karl-Otto Apel skrev begge sine viktigste diskursetiske tekster på denne tiden. Flere ting er endret siden de dager, men både diskursetikken og dagens tema har sitt grunnlag her. I '73 kommenterer Habermas på Apels kapittel om kommunikasjonsfellesskapet som grunnlag for en rasjonell begrunnelse for etikken i en vitenskapelig tidsalder fra verket transformasjon av filosofien. Habermas' kommentar er en anklage, som går på at Apels teori angivelig skal inneholde en «desisjonistisk restproblematikk». Utvekslingen mellom Habermas og Apel kan betraktes som utgangspunktet for denne prøveforelesningen, som skal svare på følgende problemstilling. «Finnes det desisjonistiske element i diskursetikken?». Problemstillingen må forstås i kontekst av masteroppgaven min som jeg leverte like før jul. I oppgaven tok jeg for meg Habermas forståelse av kraften til den praktiske fornuft og viste ut i fra det hvordan man kan etablere gyldigheten til moralske dommer. Desisjonisme ble ikke eksplisitt tatt opp i masteroppgaven, men problematikken er veldig lik. Desisjonisme er en posisjon der man forfekter at man har anledning til å velge å bry seg om rettferdiggjøring. Man ser for seg at valget om å vaere rasjonell går forut for det å vaere rasjonell, at man må velge å bry seg om grunner, fra et perspektiv der man ikke bryr seg om grunner. Det korte svaret på spørsmålet om hvorvidt det finnes desisjonistiske element i diskursetikken er ET SVAKT JA. Det finnes desisjonististke element i diskursetikken. Men det er også slik at det forblir bare element, for diskursetikken kan ikke sies å vaere en desisjonistisk teori, i den forstand at den er prisgitt desisjonistiske valg for å vise gyldigheten til moralske dommer. Og det er hvordan vi skal forholde oss til gyldigheten til moralske dommer som er det overordnede problemet, som gjør at

While organizations today make extensive use of complex algorithms, the notion of algorith-mic accountability remains an elusive ideal due to the opacity and fluidity of algorithms. In this article, we develop a framework for managing algorithmic accountability that highlights three interrelated dimensions: reputational concerns, engagement strategies, and discourse principles.

PDF-PowerPoint presentation of the talk I gave on Thursday, 20th July 2017 at the XXVIII World Congress on the Philosophy of Law and Social Philosophy, School of Law of The University of Lisbon, July 16 to 21 2017
Abstract
The expression „the right to have rights“, which is the title of my text, is contained in different works of Seyla Benhabib: it points, in the thought of Benhabib, to the birth of a new constellation of Human Rights. The new constellation of Human Rights consists in the claim, which every individual may raise, to be acknowledged and protected as a person by the world community. It belongs to Benhabib’s profound conviction the idea that the rights and the interpretation of the rights have profoundly changed after and because of the different covenants signed by the countries belonging to the world community for the protection of the Human Rights: this process of transformation of the interpretation of Human Rights has begun with the Universal Declaration of Human Rights of 1948.
The new dimension of the Human Rights is a cosmopolitan one, that is, it is not a merely national dimension: this new dimension surpasses the dimension of particular countries; it promotes and, at the same time, it calls for the creation of new juridical spaces. Through this new dimension, moreover, individuals are no longer seen as being only citizens of a particular country: the individuals are elevated, thanks to the new dimension of the rights, to the condition of world citizens. Cosmopolitan norms do create a new universe of values, of juridical meanings and of social relationships that did not exist at all before the creation of these norms. Seyla Benhabib has expressed the birth of the new constellation of rights in many of her works such as, for instance, “The Rights of Others. Aliens, Residents and Citizens”, “Another Cosmopolitanism”, and “Dignity in Adversity. Human Rights in Troubled Times”.
The new dimension of rights directly (that is, without mediation of a particular country) connects every individual to the world community: the right dimension does not depend on a particular country and it is not limited to the validity it possesses within a particular country. The authority that corresponds and is responsible for, at least, some rights of the individuals is the world community. The right of the men qua men, that is, the rights not depending on the possession of a determined citizenship and not coinciding with a determined citizenship do emerge step by step, even though this process is steadily being affected by backlashes. Benhabib mentions as Covenants signed by the countries of the world community towards the completion of the Universal Declaration of the Human Rights Convention, the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide of 1948, the Convention Relating to the Status of Refugees of 1951, the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR) of 1966, the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights (ICESCR) of 1966, and the Convention on the Elimination of all Forms of Discrimination Against Women (CEDAW) of 1979.
Within the new constellation of Human Rights, particular countries are being surpassed by the world community: particular countries do not represent the first and last authority for the acknowledgment of rights. As a correspondence to this point, individuals possess rights qua human beings: to have rights does not depend on the individuals’ possession of a citizenship; to have rights depends on the fact that individuals belong to the mankind. A new dimension of the individuals come about: individuals are not only citizens of a country, they are, first of all, human beings, and they have to have been acknowledged as human beings.
Benhabib sees a fundamental difference between the westphalian and the post-westphalian concept of country and rights. Within the westphalian interpretation of rights, countries are the first and last authority for the acknowledgment of rights. Within the post-westphalian interpretation of rights, countries do depend on common values and on common principles: countries obligate themselves to the protection of definite rights and definite principles; this means that countries acknowledge these rights and these principle as being over the sovereignty of the countries themselves. A new dimension of countries, a new dimension of rights and a new dimension of individuals arise at the same time.
A right to integration can be derived from the “right to have rights”: Benhabib often express her own positions regarding the subject “integration”. An indispensable presupposition for the promotion of the integration between inhabitants of a country consists, in the opinion of Benhabib, in the citizenship not depending on the “ethnos”, that is, in not establishing the condition of belonging to a definite ethnos as the condition for the possession of a citizenship: If the condition for possessing a citizenship depends on the belonging to a definite ethnos, all the inhabitants of a country not belonging to the definite ethnos are automatically excluded from the citizenship. This kind of condition for possessing the citizenship of a country is steadily being used to bring about the exclusion of definite inhabitants and of groups of inhabitants, for instance, the exclusion of all the inhabitants that have been compelled to or are compelled to migrate to a country.
Benhabib strongly differentiates between the concepts of ethnos and of demos as criteria for the possession of the citizenship: Whereas the concept “ethnos” represents a closed concept, the concept “demos” does represent a completely different conception: demos is a flexible concept, since demos can always be modified by the political decision. Benhabib is particularly severe as to all the structures founding the right to citizenship on the belonging to an ethnos and as to all the structures excluding a priori inhabitants of a country from the right to citizenship: a democratic institution may not afford to forever exclude inhabitants from the acquisition of the citizenship; every kind of such an exclusion is in the opinion of Benhabib simply not compatible with a democratic order. About the acquisition of a citizenship Benhabib pleads for the concept of Jus Soli as the condition for the possession of the citizenship of a country.
As a conclusion of this short presentation of my contribution it has, in my opinion, to be pointed out that Benhabib endorses a kind of flexible, dynamic interpretation regarding concepts like “civilization”, “identity”, “culture”: this means that neither civilizations, nor cultures, nor identities constitute unchangeable patterns; cultures, identities, civilizations are structures continuously changing: they are dynamic patterns. Moreover, Benhabib considers every individual as not being a prisoner of his own culture; Benhabib does not accept concepts like culture essentialism or culture reductions, as if individuals essentially belonged to only a culture and as if individuals could be reduced to only a culture: individuals possess identities, they are not possessed by them. Every individual maintains, in the opinion, of Benhabib an autonomy in relation to his own culture: individuals are more than only a culture.

This paper illustrates how the possibilities for normative social critique from a critical discourseanalytical perspective are substantively enhanced by drawing on argumentation theory. We advocate viewing political discourse as primarily argumentative discourse, and as typically involving practical arguments, arguments about what to do. We discuss two distinct cases of rationalization, showing in what way they are defective, unreasonable arguments, and we indicate in what way critical questioning of such arguments involves ethical questions: questions of sincerity and deception, on the one hand, and, on the other hand, questions having to do with the rational acceptability of the values that inform action and their relationship to the other premises of the argument and its conclusion.

En este trabajo se analiza el problema del “idealismo lingüístico” en la pragmática formal (Habermas) y la pragmática trascendental (Apel). El hilo conductor de tal discusión consiste en determinar si efectivamente ambos autores pueden ser comprendidos bajo esa categorización. En la primera parte me ocuparé brevemente de la concepción del realismo post-giro lingüístico tal como lo presenta Habermas en la introducción de Verdad y justificación. Luego, analizaré las críticas de C. Lafont a la presunta concepción hermenéutica del lenguaje en Habermas, y en consecuencia su “caída” en el idealismo lingüístico. En tercer lugar, intentaré transpolar tales críticas a la concepción apeliana del lenguaje y el significado. En cuarto lugar, analizaré la posible adscripción al idealismo lingüístico de Apel, a partir de algunas reflexiones planteas por A. Crelier. Finalmente, realizaré un análisis del texto de Apel “Falibilismo…” (Apel, 1991) para ofrecer un marco al problema de la realidad, del “idealismo lingüístico”.

En la primera sección me ocupo de aquellas limitaciones inherentes a la “ética discursiva” que son objeto de una recepción crítica en la obra de Axel Honneth; sólo desde esta base es posible apreciar en su justa medida las influencias del Sistema de la Eticidad hegeliano en la “ética del reconocimiento” –segunda y tercera sección-. De los impedimentos existentes a un verdadero reconocimiento ético da cuenta la cuarta sección del artículo. En la quinta y última parte analizo la respuesta de Honneth ante las críticas de procedencia althusseriana donde el reconocimiento es equiparado a “ideología”.

Sprache und Gerechtigkeit hängen auf vielfältige Weise zusammen. Wir verständigen uns im Medium der Sprache, durch das Geben von Gründen und Gegengründen darauf, was als gerecht gelten kann. Sprache kann jedoch auch selbst zur Herstellung von Ungerechtigkeit beitragen, auf der Ebene intentionalen sprachlichen Handelns genauso wie auf der Ebene überindividueller Sprachstrukturen. Schließlich stellen sich Fragen der Gerechtigkeit angesichts der Vielfalt menschlicher Sprachen: Wenn manche Sprachen als Minderheitensprachen marginalisiert und andere sogar vom Verschwinden bedroht sind, dann ergeben sich Probleme der Sprachengerechtigkeit.

Immanuel Kant's moral thesis is that reason alone must identify moral laws. Examining various interpretations of his ethics, this essay shows that the thesis fails. G. W. F. Hegel criticizes Kant's Formula of Universal Law as an empty formalism. Although Christine Korsgaard's Logical and Practical Contradiction Interpretations, Barbara Herman's contradiction in conception and contradiction in will tests, and Kenneth Westphal's paired use of Kant's universalization test all refute what Allen Wood calls a stronger form of the formalism charge, they are not free from a weaker form of it. Some philosophers try to avoid both forms of the formalism charge in the following ways: First, some underline the roles of Kant's other formulas. Second, some interpret the Formula of Universal Law teleologically. Third, some claim that a maxim must be something all those potentially affected by it can rationally accept. Fourth, Robert Louden introduces the empirical to evaluate a maxim. All those attempts introduce heteronomy into Kant's ethics. Besides, on the third response, from the fact that all those potentially affected accept a maxim, it does not follow that it is morally right. It is impossible to avoid the formalism charge without making his ethics heteronomous. Thus, Kant's ethics is either empty or heteronomous. Either way it fails to identify moral laws by reason alone.

Arguing against the view that populists oppose the idea of political representation, the chapter builds on J.S Mill’s view of representative government to develop an interpretation of populism as a theory of political representation. This framework can allow us to distinguish between practices of representation that can claim to stand for the people and those that cannot.

The attempt to establish a unified taxonomy for the field of Information Ethics is both unattainable and unwarranted. The categorization of Information Ethics as a defined discipline, an applicable practice, a philosophy and a worldview remains constantly in flux due to, what Luciano Floridi terms, ‘philosophical naturalism’. As such, a broadening understanding of the field will only serve to further collapse categorization. The following paper will outline, using a discourse analysis methodology, how the nature of the field of Information Ethics at a foundational level must necessarily defy classification. The assumptions behind the current classifications of the field will be questioned. Beginning with the history of the inception of the field through Librarianship and Cybernetics and questioning the yet unresolved ontological debates between information philosophers such as Rafael Capurro and Floridi, this paper will explicate how any such attempt to develop an agreed upon taxonomy will and should always remain incomplete.

El presente trabajo tiene por objetivo reconstruir sistemáticamente la “hermenéutica trascendental” de Karl-Otto Apel. En primer lugar, se describe el desarrollo de la interpretación apeliana de Heidegger, la cual consideramos que puede ser dividida en cuatro momentos. En segundo lugar, se explican los principales puntos de disenso de Apel con la hermenéutica filosófica de Gadamer. A lo largo del trabajo sugerimos, además, posibles caminos teóricos abiertos para la hermenéutica trascendental en tanto programa filosófico de investigación.

Alison Jaggar, in her treatment of feminist discourse
ethics, expresses worries about using “idealized and imaginary
communities” as elucidatory tools for discursive ethics. In
response, this paper presents the history of 924 Gilman (an allages
punk rock collective in the San Francisco Bay area) as a case
study of a non-imagined and real discursive community. While
the example of 924 Gilman, with its overtly feminist agenda and
democratic ethos, bolsters Jaggar’s claims about the need for
“closed communities” within discourse ethics, it also challenges
some of her basic assumptions and raises important pragmatic
and theoretical criticisms against discourse ethics.

The following review explores Intercultural Information Ethics (IIE) in terms of comparative philosophy, supporting IIE as the most relevant and significant development of the field of Information Ethics (IE). The focus of the review is threefold. First, it will review the core presumption of the field of IIE, that being the demand for an inter- mission in the pursuit of a founding philosophy for IE in order to first address the philosophical biases of IE by western philosophy. Second, a history of the various philosophical streams of IIE will be outlined, including its literature and pioneering contributors. Lastly, a new synthesis of comparative philosophies in IIE will be offered, looking towards a future evolution of the field. Examining the interchange between contemporary information ethicists regarding the discipline of IIE, the review first outlines the previously established presumptions of the field of IIE that posit the need for an IE as grounded in western sensibilities. The author then addresses the implications of the foregoing presumption from several non-western viewpoints, arguing that IIE does in fact find roots in non-western philosophies as established in the concluding synthesis of western and eastern philosophical traditions.

This paper will begin with an explication of the central tenets of Nussbaum’s capabilities theory. The next section examines Nussabum’s two-fold justification of capabilities; namely, the substantive good approach (or intuitionism), which serves as the primary justification, and a version of Kantian proceduralism, which provides ancillary support. The following section focuses on Jaggar’s critique of Nussbaum. Here, I will discuss three criteria of adequacy for a global ethic and their importance, why we should accept them and how both of Nussbaum’s justification strategies fail to satisfy them. In the fifth section, I propose a version of discourse ethics as an alternative justification for capabilities that can satisfy the adequacy discerned from Jaggar’s critique. This account of discourse ethics reveals that intersubjective dialogue under certain conditions is more likely to provide adequate justification of capabilities, and those engaged in dialogue are also likely to develop practical reason and affiliation. So this method of justification does not merely ground the capabilities, but helps people realize them. Finally, the sixth section presents an example from the Self-Employed Women’s Association as a real-life case illustrating how this version of discourse ethics can be manifested.

“Philosophie générale” refers to the common form of philosophical teaching in French high schools, universities, and all the way up to the highest teaching diploma, the agrégation. Because of the wide range of topics it covers, the notion seems to defy precise definition and has therefore been criticized. After examining the criticisms raised against “philosophie générale,” this article aims to define its pedagogical value in its broadness and its legitimacy as a foundational teaching method. More specifically, we will explore the sense of universality put forward by Pascal through the concept of honesty. This concept sheds light on the value of “philosophie générale” as a specific form of relationship to knowledge and to others, rather than a set of themes or subjects.


Le syntagme « philosophie générale » renvoie en France à une épreuve de l’agrégation, à une matière enseignée à l’université et à l’enseignement obligatoire de philosophie au lycée. Ce syntagme échappe souvent à une définition formelle claire, si bien que la cohérence d’un tel enseignement a été discutée. Dans cet article, après avoir examiné les critiques qui ont été adressées à cet enseignement en raison de son extension et de son indétermination méthodologique, nous essayons à rebours de discerner ce qu’il peut y avoir de fécond sur le plan pédagogique dans cette approche généraliste. Nous nous appuyons en particulier sur une pensée de Pascal qui associe universalité et honnêteté. Le concept d’honnêteté permet en effet d’éclairer l’intérêt de la philosophie générale comme rapport à nos connaissances et aux autres hommes, plutôt que comme ensemble de contenus thématiques divers.

The concept of distributed moral responsibility (DMR) has a long history. When it is understood as being entirely reducible to the sum of (some) human, individual, and already morally loaded actions, then the allocation of DMR, and hence of praise and reward or blame and punishment, may be pragmatically difficult, but not conceptually problematic. However, in distributed environments it is increasingly possible that a network of agents, some human, some artificial (e.g. a program) and some hybrid (e.g. a group of people working as a team thanks to a software platform) may cause distributed moral actions (DMAs). These are morally good or evil (i.e., morally loaded) actions caused by local interactions that are in themselves neither good nor evil (morally neutral). In this article, I analyse DMRs that are due to DMAs and argue in favour of the allocation, by default and overridably, of full moral responsibility (faultless responsibility) to all the nodes/agents in the network causally relevant for bringing about the DMA in question, independently of intentionality. The mechanism proposed is inspired by, and adapts, three concepts: back propagation from network theory, strict liability from jurisprudence, and common knowledge from epistemic logic.

Considering the German idea of Bildung, I argue that it is a central concern of Habermas’s. First, he criticized the idea of being educated as a sign of innate abilities, emphasizing instead the significance of the social conditions of the upbringing. Subsequently, inspired by Adorno, he performed an analysis of Bildung, based on critique of ideology, in The Structural Transformation of the Public Sphere. The basic critique is that Bildung is too tightly connected to societal dominance, but still the ideal holds some truth. His comments on Bildung over the subsequent years are sparse. However, in Knowledge and Human Interest he works his way out of the framework of philosophy of consciousness, which results in the Theory of Communicative Action, and with this approach he can discuss Bildung in relation to discourse ethics and the role of the university. In this new version, Bildung finally becomes crucial to Habermas’s political philosophy in Between Facts and Norms.

Este trabajo aborda la pregunta de si resulta posible incorporar o identificar elementos democráticos-deliberativos en el interior de la Iglesia Católica. Para comenzar, repasamos esquemáticamente algunos postulados del enfoque deliberativo, enfatizando su horizonte universalista que –potencialmente- traspasaría los límites del Estado de Derecho para inscribirse en otro tipo de organizaciones tal como la Iglesia Católica. En segundo término, y siguiendo el planteo de Claude Lefort, abordamos dos condiciones abiertas a partir de la “revolución democrática” que resultan necesarias para articular el ejercicio democrático del poder: la concepción intersubjetivista de la soberanía y la pérdida de fundamentos metasociales.  Finalmente, nos enfocamos en dos tipos de pensamiento religioso o visiones eclesiológicas actualmente en puja. Una de ellas, dentro de la que ubicamos el planteo de P. Hünermann y C. Schickendantz, podría resultarnos de gran utilidad a la hora de tender puentes e identificar componentes democráticos-deliberativos en el interior de la Iglesia Católica.