Practice Then and Now

Human Affairs ◽  
2007 ◽  
Vol 17 (2) ◽  
Author(s):  
Stephen Turner
Keyword(s):  
Social Theory ◽  
Mirror Neurons ◽  
Current Practice ◽  
Collective Mode ◽  
Practice Theory ◽  
Mental Content ◽  
Social Character ◽  
Practical Activity ◽  
The Social ◽  
Mode Of Transmission

Practice Then and Now"Practice theory" has a long history in philosophy, under various names, but current practice theory is a response to failures of projects of modernity or enlightenment which attempt to reduce science or politics to formulae. Heidegger, Oakeshott, and MacIntyre are each examples of philosophers who turned to practice conceptions. Foucault and Bourdieu made similar turns. Practice accounts come in different forms: some emphasize skill-like individual accomplishments, others emphasize the social character or presupposition-like character of the tacit conditions of activities. The Social Theory of Practices problematized the idea of sameness, the idea that participants in an activity had the same tacit possessions, which undermined the idea that practices were collective objects in which individuals participated. Later critics, such as Schatzki and Rouse, emphasized the normative coherence and character of practice, which has a collective aspect. Pickering and others suggested a notion of practices that was de-mentalized and focused on the objects that were part of the practical activity, which provided for the continuity and sociality of practice without collectivizing its mental content. The discovery of mirror neurons suggested a non-collective mode of transmission of practices. The implications of these developments can be seen in connection with ethics, where the conflict between the ethical and the practical can be understood in terms of the intrinsic conflict between the need to behave successfully and our learned ethical intuitions.

Christ Existing as Community

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Michael Mawson
Keyword(s):  
Social Sciences ◽  
Social Theory ◽  
Christian Ethics ◽  
Dietrich Bonhoeffer ◽  
Human Community ◽  
The Social ◽  
Theological Study ◽  
Sanctorum Communio ◽  
The Church

How can theologians recognize the church as a historical and human community, while still holding that it has been established by Christ and is a work of the Spirit? How can a theological account of the church draw insights and concepts from the social sciences, without Christian commitments and claims about the church being undermined or displaced? In 1927, the 21-year-old Dietrich Bonhoeffer defended his licentiate dissertation, Sanctorum Communio: A Theological Study of the Sociology of the Church. This remains his most neglected and misunderstood work. Christ Existing as Community thus retrieves and analyses Bonhoeffer’s engagement with social theory and attempt at ecclesiology. Against standard readings and criticisms of this work, Mawson demonstrates that it contains a rich and nuanced approach to the church, one which displays many of Bonhoeffer’s key influences—especially Luther, Hegel, Troeltsch, and Barth—while being distinctive in its own right. In particular, Mawson argues that Sanctorum Communio’s theology is built around a complex dialectic of creation, sin, and reconciliation. On this basis, he contends that Bonhoeffer’s dissertation has ongoing significance for work in theology and Christian ethics.

Feudal Europe, 800–1300: communal discourse and conflictual practices

1992 ◽  
Vol 46 (2) ◽  
pp. 427-466 ◽  
Author(s):  
Markus Fischer
Keyword(s):  
Critical Theory ◽  
Social Science ◽  
International Relations ◽  
Social Theory ◽  
Structural Theory ◽  
Historical Change ◽  
Fundamental Significance ◽  
The Social ◽  
Social Scientific ◽  
Scientific Argument

The discipline of international relations faces a new debate of fundamental significance. After the realist challenge to the pervasive idealism of the interwar years and the social scientific argument against realism in the late 1950s, it is now the turn of critical theorists to dispute the established paradigms of international politics, having been remarkably successful in several other fields of social inquiry. In essence, critical theorists claim that all social reality is subject to historical change, that a normative discourse of understandings and values entails corresponding practices, and that social theory must include interpretation and dialectical critique. In international relations, this approach particularly critiques the ahistorical, scientific, and materialist conceptions offered by neorealists. Traditional realists, by contrast, find a little more sympathy in the eyes of critical theorists because they join them in their rejection of social science and structural theory. With regard to liberal institutionalism, critical theorists are naturally sympathetic to its communitarian component while castigating its utilitarian strand as the accomplice of neorealism. Overall, the advent of critical theory will thus focus the field of international relations on its “interparadigm debate” with neorealism.

scholarly journals The Social Theory of Jacques Maritain

2007 ◽  
Vol 12 ◽  
pp. 155-172 ◽  
Author(s):  
D. Q. Mclnerny ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Social Theory ◽  
Jacques Maritain ◽  
The Social

The Social Character of College Students in the 1990s

1998 ◽  
Vol 40 (10) ◽  
pp. 6-33
Author(s):  
Iu. R. Vishnevskii ◽  
L. IA. Rubina
Keyword(s):  
College Students ◽  
Social Character ◽  
The Social

Reading a water menu: Bottled water and the cultivation of taste

2017 ◽  
Vol 19 (2) ◽  
pp. 231-251 ◽  
Author(s):  
Andrew Biro
Keyword(s):  
Willingness To Pay ◽  
Human Nature ◽  
Market Segmentation ◽  
Economic Inequality ◽  
Leading Edge ◽  
Bottled Water ◽  
Water Market ◽  
Anthropogenic Influence ◽  
Social Character ◽  
The Social

The market for bottled water is growing and increasingly segmented. How do we explain not just the willingness to pay for a substance (water) that is almost free but also the increasing discernment in a drink generally considered tasteless? We argue that bottled water market segmentation is a leading edge of processes of water commodification, associated with the crisis of Fordism and rise of consumerist capitalism, where the assertion of status through commodity consumption is increasingly necessary. The extensive Ray’s & Stark water menu is analyzed to show how the taste for bottled waters is cultivated. In the menu, references to gustatory sensation are limited. Instead, the tastefulness of water inheres in the distance from anthropogenic influence, made visible through scientific (geological) discourses. The tension between the desire to consume unmediated nature and the scientific abstraction necessary to recognize it reveals the social character of the taste for bottled waters. The highly refined sense of taste that the water menu’s readers are presumed to have is a reflection of consumerist capitalism’s distinctive ways of reproducing socio-economic inequality and metabolizing non-human nature.

The Imposter as Social Theory

2021 ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Social Theory ◽  
Social Relations ◽  
Business Leaders ◽  
The Social ◽  
Cultural Forms

Edited by expert scholars, this volume explores the 'imposter' through empirical cases, including click farms, bikers, business leaders and fraudulent scientists, providing insights into the social relations and cultural forms from which they emerge.

Days of post-pandemic future: re-imagining corruption practices in a world that won’t stop changing

2021 ◽  
Vol ahead-of-print (ahead-of-print) ◽  
Author(s):  
Hendi Yogi Prabowo
Keyword(s):  
Practice Theory ◽  
Social Ontology ◽  
Social Reality ◽  
Analytical Framework ◽  
Safety Net ◽  
Social Practices ◽  
Multiple Perspectives ◽  
Content Type ◽  
International Agencies ◽  
The Social

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to propose a new analytical framework in examining corruption from the social ontology perspective by using the Schatzkian practice theory to assess the interconnectedness among social practices constituting the social reality. Design/methodology/approach This exploratory paper is part of the author’s study to assess the complex corruption phenomenon in Indonesia from multiple perspectives to gain a better understanding of its nature and dynamics. By drawing from the existing literature on the Schatzkian practice theory, the COVID-19 pandemic and the corruption phenomenon, this study investigates the potential changes of the new constellation of practice-arrangement bundles within the social reality and how such changes may alter corruption practices in the future. Furthermore, this study also uses publicly available reports from several national and international agencies to explore possible future scenarios from the interconnectedness of corruption, anti-corruption and pandemic practices. This paper constructs a new analytical framework for assessing the corruption phenomenon and designing the most appropriate anti-corruption strategy from such an exploration. The framework also serves as a reference for future anti-corruption research. Findings The author establishes that all social phenomena are constructed by an interconnected, dynamic and ever-changing constellation of practice-arrangement bundles within the social reality. As a largely social phenomenon (at least in Indonesia), corruption is also constructed by webs of practice-arrangement bundles. For decades, corruption practices in Indonesia have always been interconnected with anti-corruption practices in ways that changes in one group of practices will drive changes in the others. With the adoption of the pandemic practices centered around social distancing, social restriction and social safety net, corruption practices appear to transform to adapt to the new environment. Therefore, future anti-corruption research should aim to examine the structure and dynamics of corruption, anti-corruption and pandemic practices to highlight changes or potential changes within the three groups of practices to determine the most appropriate intervention measures and anti-corruption strategy. Research limitations/implications This exploratory study is self-funded and relies primarily on documentary analysis to explore the corruption phenomenon in Indonesia. Future studies will benefit from in-depth interviews with former corruption offenders and corruption investigators. Practical implications This exploratory paper contributes to developing a sound corruption prevention strategy by proposing a new analytical framework for assessing various social practices, particularly those associated with corruption and the COVID-19 pandemic. Originality/value This paper highlights the importance of understanding the structure, interconnectedness and dynamics of social practices, particularly associated with the COVID-19 pandemic, to better understand the corruption phenomenon.

Dynamics of Pakhtun Social Structure: Implications for Economic Development

2021 ◽  
pp. 27-42
Keyword(s):  
Social Psychology ◽  
United States ◽  
Economic Development ◽  
Saudi Arabia ◽  
Social Structure ◽  
The United States ◽  
Protestant Work Ethic ◽  
Social Character ◽  
Capitalist Economy ◽  
The Social

Every region and people has peculiar economic characteristics and these features largely have roots in that region‟s social structure, social psychology and its dynamics. The capitalist economy of the United States has roots in individualismand Protestant Work Ethic, influenced both by Protestant religion and the social character of the Americans; the Client Economy of Saudi Arabia has deep linkages to its tribal social structure and the so-called Bazaar Economy of Afghanistan is profoundly embedded in the Pakhtun social structure of the country. The Pakhtuns of Pakistan have a peculiar social structure and social psychology thereof having profound and extensive influence on the region‟s economy particularly its largely underdevelopedcondition. The paper explores the characteristics of Pakhtun social structure and the interactive linkages between the social edifice and economic development or lack of it.

“*Pseudonyms Are Used Throughout”: A Footnote, Unpacked

2021 ◽  
pp. 107780042110483
Author(s):  
Janet Heaton
Keyword(s):  
Social Sciences ◽  
Current Practice ◽  
Social Sciences And Humanities ◽  
The Social ◽  
Textual Data

Pseudonyms are often used to de-identify participants and other people, organizations and places mentioned in interviews and other textual data collected for research purposes. While this is commonplace, the rationale for, and limits of, using pseudonyms or other methods to disguise identifying information are seldom explained in empirical works. Following an illustrated outline of pseudonyms, epithets, codenames and other obscurant techniques used in the social sciences and humanities, this paper considers how they variously frame the identities of, and position the relations between, participants and researchers. It suggests ways in which researchers might improve on current practice.

Confrontation and Responsiveness

2006 ◽  
Vol 40 ◽  
pp. 44-56
Author(s):  
Eric Nelson ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Human Existence ◽  
Being And Time ◽  
Moral Code ◽  
Ethical Dimension ◽  
Rule Based ◽  
Practical Activity ◽  
System A ◽  
The Social ◽  
Ethical Failures ◽  
Identity And Difference

Heidegger’s critique of ethics has been interpreted as an abolition of the ethical that nihilistically precludes the possibility of ethics. Yet Heidegger questioned ethics as systematizing discourses about hierarchies of values, prescriptions, norms, and axioms cut off from their worldly and factical contexts. I argue that this questioning of rule-based ethics does not necessarily entail a denial of the ethical, since it has its own ethical preoccupations in the sense of reflection on practical activity (praxis) and the formal indication of how Dasein factically exists. This reading is supported by Heidegger’s later depiction of the ethical as the ethos of an originary dwelling. Further, Heidegger’s practice of thinking indicates and enacts the ethical as confrontation and responsive encounter: (1) even if he did not formulate an ethical system, a universal prescriptive principle, or a moral code; and (2) despite his own undeniable ethical failures. This promising yet underdeveloped ethical dimension is visible both in the style, method, and event of his philosophizing and in his attention to the issue of individuation in the context of the Dasein’s conformity to the power of everydayness and the social. Individuation, a primary issue of Being and Time and other works of the 1920’s, occurs through the attuned comportment and understanding that Dasein each time is, yet as individuation it takes place in being-with others. The identity and difference of human existence is formed in social comportment and understanding—in addressing and being addressed, in the interdependent and interpretive setting apart of encountering and being encountered, in the responsive confrontation, differentiation, and separation of Auseinandersetzung.

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