Conclusion: Technocracy at the End of the World

2020 ◽  
pp. 251-258
Author(s):  
Anders Esmark
Keyword(s):  
Climate Change ◽  
Decision Making ◽  
Scientific Evidence ◽  
Political Decision ◽  
Current State ◽  
The World ◽  
The Face ◽  
Important Challenge ◽  
State Of Affairs ◽  
Political Decision Making

Taking up the case of climate change, the conclusion considers the argument for moretechnocracy in the face of ‘the end world as we know it’. Climate change is probably the strongest case for a technocratic model of political decision-making. At the very least, insufficient political adherence to the scientific evidence on climate change is an almost commonsensical part of the problem of in the current state of affairs. While fully acknowledging this problem, the chapter argues that attention to the destructive and mutually reinforcing interplay of technocracy and populism is necessary also in to the all-important challenge of climate change.

scholarly journals The crisis of modernity as the crisis of the political: Towards a critique of the reason of the ethos

2003 ◽  
pp. 61-85
Author(s):  
Simo Elakovic
Keyword(s):  
Decision Making ◽  
Political Philosophy ◽  
Political Action ◽  
Political Power ◽  
The Political ◽  
Political Decision ◽  
The World ◽  
Political Act ◽  
Crisis Of Modernity ◽  
Political Decision Making

The crisis of modernity as the crisis of the political is seen by the author primarily as a crisis of the "measure" of the criterion of political decision making and action. This crisis is understood in the first place as a crisis of self-awareness and practice of the ethos. Machiavelli was the first to attempt a solution to this problem by introducing the concept of virtus, which became the fundamental principle of modern political philosophy. However, many modern and contemporary interpreters of Machiavelli's thought often ignore the social and political context in which the political doctrine of the Florentine thinker arose. Namely, Machiavelli's effort to find an authentic form of the political act that would make possible a harmonization and stabilization of the dramatic political circumstances then prevailing in Italian cities required a reliable diagnosis and adequate means for a successful therapy of the sick organism of the community. The epochal novelty in Machiavelli's political theory was the shift from the ancient theorization of virtue to its modern operationalization. Nevertheless, this shift is often interpreted as a radical opposing of the Greek concept of arete to the Roman virtus, which is crudely and simplistically reduced to bravery and strength necessary for taking and keeping political power. Hegel in his political philosophy travels an important part of the road - unconsciously rather than consciously - along with Machiavelli and Shelling. This particularly holds for his understanding of the necessity of strength and bravery in the process of operationalizing the spirit of freedom in history through the mediation of "negation" as "the power of evil". The mediation of subjectivity and substantiality, according to Hegel, takes place in the state by the brutal bridling of the world spirit where not just individuals but whole peoples are sacrificed - toward freedom, i.e. its realization in the community of the ethos. The "trouble of the times" is a consequence of the separation between I and the world (Entzeiung) and stems from a reduced political reason which lacks the criterion of the ethical totality for political action and decision making. By the separation of the ethos this reason get routinized and political action is reduced to naked technique of winning and keeping political power. In the concluding segment of the paper the author points to some global consequences of the crisis of political decision making in the historical reality at the end of 20th century.

Equivalency Framing in Political Decision Making

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Asmus Olsen
Keyword(s):  
Decision Making ◽  
Political Behavior ◽  
Real World ◽  
Standard Form ◽  
World Politics ◽  
Controlled Environment ◽  
Political Decision ◽  
The World ◽  
Actual Use ◽  
Political Decision Making

Politics is increasingly reliant on numerical descriptions of the world. Numbers are relied upon for their ability to communicate some unambiguous facts of life. Equivalence frames are equivalent descriptions of the same quantity and they help us understand how different ways of presenting the objectively same piece of numerical information affect political behavior. Equivalence framing effects denote that these different presentation of the fundamentally same fact have very profound effects on preferences. However, most research in political behavior have relied on other forms of framing and largely regarded equivalence framing as a well-defined concept without much relevance to real-world politics. The standard form of equivalence framing changes the valence of a label which describes the same numerical fact. This form of negative and positive framing of the same metric will often elicit very different responses for the recipient of the information. A less studied type of equivalence framing in political behavior manipulates the same numerical fact but with a different metric or scale. These have often not been explicitly recognized as equivalence frames but are clearly an important example in a world of numbers. As for valence manipulation, changing the metric can also have profound effects. Moving forward studies of equivalence framing must both gain a better descriptive understanding of the actual use and abuse of equivalence frames in observational setting and at the same time aim to understand the causal properties of equivalence frames in the field—outside the controlled environment of the survey or lab where they most often are studied.

Whither Science in WTO Dispute Settlement?

2008 ◽  
Vol 21 (4) ◽  
pp. 823-846 ◽  
Author(s):  
ALEXIA HERWIG
Keyword(s):  
Decision Making ◽  
Dispute Settlement ◽  
Scientific Evidence ◽  
Political Decision ◽  
Risk Regulation ◽  
Novel Technologies ◽  
Wto Dispute Settlement ◽  
Precautionary Action ◽  
Contested Knowledge ◽  
Political Decision Making

AbstractThis article understands risk dialectically as a decision-making resource stressing probability but as also giving rise to further uncertainties. It shows that the panel report in EC – Biotech reflects an understanding of risk as decision-making that is deterministic and leaves little room for the application of precautionary approaches and non-scientific factors. It submits that such an approach is unsuitable for novel technologies with limited background knowledge and reduces the accountability of risk regulators. A different approach is put forth, which allows members greater scope for precautionary action while preventing trade protectionism. The article concludes that law can enhance its authority and epistemic validity through scientific evidence but only if it recognizes science's epistemic and its own limitations. Law has to approach science as contested knowledge and risk regulation as political decision-making, leading – inevitably – to more indeterminate solutions to legal conflicts.

Direct Democracy and Institutional Change

2001 ◽  
Vol 34 (6) ◽  
pp. 651-665 ◽  
Author(s):  
SUSAN E. SCARROW
Keyword(s):  
Decision Making ◽  
Institutional Change ◽  
Direct Democracy ◽  
Direct Control ◽  
Political Decision ◽  
The World ◽  
Political Decision Making

Is direct democracy on the rise around the world? Previous efforts to answer this question have investigated patterns of referendum usage and have found only small and isolated increases. In contrast, the current study focuses on patterns of institutional change and finds a broad movement to redesign institutions in ways that give citizens more opportunities to exercise direct control over political decision making.

Citizens' Juries and Deliberative Democracy

2000 ◽  
Vol 48 (1) ◽  
pp. 51-65 ◽  
Author(s):  
Graham Smith ◽  
Corinne Wales
Keyword(s):  
Decision Making ◽  
Deliberative Democracy ◽  
Institutional Design ◽  
Political Decision ◽  
Democratic Deliberation ◽  
Democratic Practice ◽  
The Face ◽  
Decision Making Processes ◽  
Political Decision Making

In the face of widespread dissatisfaction with contemporary democratic practice, there has been a growing interest in theories of deliberative democracy. However theorists have often failed to sufficiently address the question of institutional design. This paper argues that recent experiments with citizens' juries should be of interest to deliberative democrats. The practice of citizens' juries is considered in light of three deliberative democratic criteria: inclusivity, deliberation and citizenship. It is argued that citizens' juries offer important insights into how democratic deliberation could be institutionalized in contemporary political decision-making processes.

The American Jail in Perspective

1971 ◽  
Vol 17 (4) ◽  
pp. 446-455 ◽  
Author(s):  
Henry Burns
Keyword(s):  
Decision Making ◽  
Remedial Action ◽  
Political Decision ◽  
Policy Makers ◽  
Main Obstacle ◽  
The Face ◽  
Political Decision Making

Despite many years of severe criticism, the American jail has shown little sign of improvement. The main obstacle to remedial action is conflict. Individuals with different interests and opin ions disagree about what—if anything—is to be done. The process of administrative and political decision-making is sensi tive to pressure from several directions. Reform is usually a threat to the administration in power. Thus, any attempt—no matter how small—to reform a system risks opposition, which is likely to be far greater than the amount of support the reform ers are able to mount. In the face of public indifference, policy- makers cannot be expected to sustain the reformers' initiative.

Failure Knowledge of Political Decision Making on Risks with Uncertain Scientific Evidence

2004 ◽  
Vol 107 (1029) ◽  
pp. 669-673
Author(s):  
Jun KAWAI ◽  
Naohiro YABUTA ◽  
Masahiro TERABE ◽  
Takeo OHASHI ◽  
Masayuki NAKAO
Keyword(s):  
Decision Making ◽  
Scientific Evidence ◽  
Political Decision ◽  
Political Decision Making

Engendering Political Decision-Making

1998 ◽  
Vol 42 (1) ◽  
pp. 141-143 ◽  
Author(s):  
John Hatchard
Keyword(s):  
South Africa ◽  
Decision Making ◽  
World Wide ◽  
The Political ◽  
Political Decision ◽  
African Countries ◽  
Public And Private ◽  
The World ◽  
Women In Decision Making ◽  
Political Decision Making

In November, 1996, the Fifth Meeting of the Commonwealth Ministers Responsible for Women's Affairs recommended that member countries be encouraged to achieve a target of not less than 30 per cent of women in decision-making in the political, public and private sectors by the year 2005. This is an ambitious target for, according to the Inter-Parliamentary Union, the proportion of women involved in politics world-wide declined from 12.1 per cent in 1985 to 11 per cent in 1995. The situation throughout Africa is especially bleak for, as the following table indicates, with the notable exceptions of Mozambique, Seychelles, South Africa, Eritrea and Uganda, most African countries fall well below the world average.

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