scholarly journals Àsùwàda Principle and Inter-Ethnic Conflict in Nigeria

2021 ◽  
Vol 3 (1) ◽  
pp. 1-14
Author(s):  
Yunusa Kehinde Salami
Keyword(s):  
Social Theory ◽  
Ethnic Conflict ◽  
Human Beings ◽  
Ethnic Conflicts ◽  
Human Group ◽  
Ethnic Pluralism ◽  
Individual Human

This paper examines the àsùwàdà principle as an indigenous social theory, which is based on alásùwàdà, a body of doctrines according to which the creator of human beings and everything in nature, dá (created) individual human beings as à-sù-wà (beings who can only live successfully as part of a human group with a purpose). By establishing a teleological or purposeful unity and interconnectedness among all human beings, the àsùwàdà principle suggests that all human beings are created to be gregarious in nature and enjoy the best ìwà (existence or character) when they sù-wà (live in group). This paper interrogates the àsùwàdà principle in relation to the problem of ethnic conflicts in Nigeria. The paper concludes that if as human beings, we are dá (created) to be àsùwà, then, with the complementary ideas of alájọbí, alájọgbé, and ìfọgbọ́ntáyéṣe, ethnic pluralism should not necessarily lead to ethnic antagonism or conflict.

More than Mere Weather: James's Talks to Students About Life

2003 ◽  
Vol 30 (1) ◽  
pp. 38-40 ◽  
Author(s):  
Randall D. Wight
Keyword(s):  
William James ◽  
Human Beings ◽  
Life Meaning ◽  
Human Interest ◽  
Individual Human

William James addressed the last 3 lectures in Talks to Teachers on Psychology and to Students on Some of Life's Ideals (1899/1958) specifically to students. The first of these lectures, “The Gospel of Relaxation,” encouraged students to be both relaxed and active. The second, “On a Certain Blindness in Human Beings,” promoted awareness of and empathy for the diversity of individual human interest. The last lecture, “What Makes Life Significant,” argued that neither ideals nor passion alone gave life meaning but that the 2 in confluence yield significance. In all, James shared insights suggesting how students might improve their lives.

On the Harm of Genocide

2018 ◽  
Vol 22 (1) ◽  
pp. 31-49
Author(s):  
Paul Kucharski
Keyword(s):  
Human Nature ◽  
The State ◽  
Human Condition ◽  
Human Beings ◽  
Community Or ◽  
The World ◽  
Scholarly Discussion ◽  
Insight Into ◽  
Individual Human ◽  
The Human Condition

My aim in this essay is to advance the state of scholarly discussion on the harms of genocide. The most obvious harms inflicted by every genocide are readily evident: the physical harm inflicted upon the victims of genocide and the moral harm that the perpetrators of genocide inflict upon themselves. Instead, I will focus on a kind of harm inflicted upon those who are neither victims nor perpetrators, on those who are outside observers, so to speak. My thesis will be that when a whole community or culture is eliminated, or even deeply wounded, the world loses an avenue for insight into the human condition. My argument is as follows. In order to understand human nature, and that which promotes its flourishing, we must certainly study individual human beings. But since human beings as rational and linguistic animals are in part constituted by the communities in which they live, the study of human nature should also involve the study of communities and cultures—both those that are well ordered and those that are not. No one community or culture has expressed all that can be said about the human way of existing and flourishing. And given that the unity and wholeness of human nature can only be glimpsed in a variety of communities and cultures, then part of the harm of genocide consists in the removal of a valuable avenue for human beings to better understand themselves.

The September Program: Reflections on the Evidence

1978 ◽  
Vol 11 (4) ◽  
pp. 348-354 ◽  
Author(s):  
Wayne C. Thompson
Keyword(s):  
The State ◽  
Human Beings ◽  
Diary Entry ◽  
Indirect Control ◽  
The Press ◽  
Political Warfare ◽  
Revolutionary Movements ◽  
War Aims ◽  
Individual Human

In August 1914 Kurt Riezler accompanied Chancellor Theobald von Bethmann Hollweg to the Supreme Headquarters in Koblenz and Luxembourg. His duties were not clearly defined and included a variety of things: He worked on war aims, parliamentary speeches, revolutionary movements, and domestic political questions. He helped interpret the chancellor's policies to the press, establish guidelines for censorship, and write anonymous articles supporting Bethmann Hollweg's policies. He could be called Bethmann Hollweg's assistant for political warfare.Unlike most Germans Riezler sensed from the beginning that a German victory was not assured. On August 14, 1914, in his first diary entry after the outbreak of war, he noted that although “everybody was apparently happy to be able for once to dedicate himself unreservedly to a great cause, … no one doubts or appears to consider even for an instant what a gamble war is, especially this war.” Riezler also realized that the “ideas of 1914” would not retain their strength forever. “Just as the storm frightens the vermin out of the air—when it becomes quieter again, everything crawls out of its refuge—and emerges again in the state as well as in individual human beings.” This realization protected Riezler from the naive belief that Germany could bear a long war without an obvious effort to achieve a negotiated peace, without a new European order which at most allowed Germany indirect control, and without domestic political concessions to the German masses.

scholarly journals Social Responsibility: Can it Contribute for Sustainable Welfarism?

2017 ◽  
Vol 3 (1) ◽  
pp. 25-37
Author(s):  
Indra P. Tiwari
Keyword(s):  
Social Responsibility ◽  
Human Beings ◽  
Sustainable Society ◽  
Social Responsibilities ◽  
Professional Responsibilities ◽  
Voluntary Contribution ◽  
The Government ◽  
Government Corporations ◽  
Individual Human

Human beings as natural persons as well as other juristic persons are expected to contribute to the society as part of social responsibility in addition to their defined legal and professional responsibilities with a view to continuously building a better and equally equitable, peaceful and sustainable society. If defined “social responsibility” as the voluntary contribution of the juristic and natural persons, i.e. government, corporations/ companies, organizations/ associations, and individual human beings, should the matter of contributing for the betterment of the society through social responsibility be left to the contributor? Contrarily, in a situation of functioning within the stringent laws, rules and regulation of the Government by all juristic and natural persons, should we expect something more than their legal and main responsibilities from them on the name of social responsibilities? Do society, moreover communities and individuals, expect special/additional social responsibilities from all persons, and if so, what sorts of responsibilities are included with what priorities? Similarly, are there different approaches in defining responsibilities of various persons, juristic and natural? If yes, in what situations and what conditions? Debates are going on about the functions and procedures for undertaking social responsibilities as well. This paper in the above context is discussing the objectives and missions, functions, structure(s), processes, the expectations from social responsibilities fulfilled and unfulfilled, and the impacts in the society as expected and not expected, thereby open up the areas for comprehensive and holistic discussion.

Role of Traditional and New Media in Ethnic Conflict in Nigeria's Middle Belt Region

2015 ◽  
pp. 23-37
Author(s):  
Bala A. Musa
Keyword(s):  
New Media ◽  
Ethnic Conflict ◽  
Ecological Model ◽  
Political Conflict ◽  
Ethnic Conflicts ◽  
Critical Approach ◽  
Theoretical Frameworks ◽  
Functional Roles ◽  
Sub Saharan ◽  
Peace Journalism

A chief obstacle to community development and progress in sub-Saharan Africa is persistent, widespread, low-scale, yet catastrophic, ethnic and communal conflicts. Nigeria is no exception! Nigeria's Middle-Belt region has experienced long-standing ethno-religious and political conflict/crises. Frequent and intermittent ethnic conflicts have persisted among the various ethnic groups. This research looks at the seemingly contrasting, yet complimentary, roles of traditional and new media in ethnic conflict transformation in the area. Using a peace journalism media-ecological model that incorporates spiral of silence, priming, agenda-setting, and framing theoretical frameworks, the research analyzes the (dis)functional roles legacy and new media play in conflict exacerbation, resolution, and mediation. It employs a qualitative interpretive critical approach to examine how traditional and new media respond to ethnic conflicts in the region. It proposes a new ethic for ethnic conflict reporting, suitable for professional and citizen journalists.

Accounting for genocide after 1945: Theories and some findings

1993 ◽  
Vol 1 (2) ◽  
pp. 79-106 ◽  
Author(s):  
Helen Fein
Keyword(s):  
Social Theory ◽  
Civil Wars ◽  
Empirical Relation ◽  
Ethnic Discrimination ◽  
Authoritarian Regimes ◽  
Policy Implications ◽  
High Likelihood ◽  
Ethnic Conflicts ◽  
Political Exclusion ◽  
Plural Society

AbstractGenocide has been related in social theory to both social and political structure: i.e., plural society (ethnoclass exclusion and discrimination) and types of polities - revolutionary, totalitarian and authoritarian regimes. War has also been noted as an instigator or frequent context of genocide. This paper reviews theoretical expectations and examines the empirical relation between genocides (and other state massacres) and indices of ethnic discrimination, polity form, and war among states in Asia, Africa and the Mid-East from 1948 to 1988. Findings show that (1) most users of genocide are repeat offenders. (2) There is a high likelihood of political exclusion and discrimination of ethnoclasses producing rebellions which instigate genocides and other state-sponsored massacres. (3) As expected, unfree, authoritarian, and one-party communist states (in ascending order) are most likely to use genocide. Democratic states in this era are not perpetrators against their citizens but have been patrons and accomplices of genocidal regimes elsewhere. One-party communist states are 4.5 times more likely to have used genocide than are authoritarian states. (4) States involved in wars are many more times as likely to have employed genocide than other states. Exploring these cases, we find that genocides both lead to war and war leads to genocide through several processes. (5) The use of genocide in conflicts within the state in the regions surveyed tripled between 1968-88 compared to the preceding score of years (10:3 cases). Genocide and genocidal massacres occur so often that they may be considered normal in these regions. Both the theoretical and the policy implications of these findings are discussed. Observing on the latter, we note that journalists and scholars have often confused recognition of genocide and genocidal massacres by framing these cases as 'ethnic conflicts', by confounding the toll of war and massacre and by conflating concepts. To deter genocide, we should promote nonviolent change in order to eliminate ethnoclass domination and monitor civil wars to detect

Human Dignity as a Protected Interest in Criminal Law

2011 ◽  
Vol 44 (1-2) ◽  
pp. 143-167 ◽  
Author(s):  
Tatjana Hörnle ◽  
Mordechai Kremnitzer
Keyword(s):  
Criminal Law ◽  
Human Dignity ◽  
Child Pornography ◽  
Penal Code ◽  
Media Content ◽  
Human Beings ◽  
The Third ◽  
Objective Value ◽  
The Individual ◽  
Individual Human

Human dignity can be a protected interest in criminal law. This paper starts with some reflections about the meaning of human dignity and then examines offense descriptions in the German Penal Code and the Israeli Penal Code. These codes are used as sources for identifying possibly relevant prohibitions. One can indeed find numerous examples of offense descriptions that can be justified by pointing to human dignity, either as a main protected interest or as a protected interest in addition to other interests. The protected interest can be either the individual victim's right to human dignity or human dignity as an objective value. Offense descriptions that can be connected to “protection of human dignity” should, for analytical purposes, be divided into three groups: violations of the dignity of individual human beings through acts other than speech; violations of the human dignity of individuals through speech; and media content that does not contain statements about individuals but shows scenes of severe humiliation (e.g., fictional child pornography). Questions that need further discussion primarily concern the second group (what role should free speech play in cases of human dignity violations?) and the third group (does the acknowledgement of human dignity as an objective value mean to endorse a re-moralization of the criminal law?).

What is a Psychological Unit?

1995 ◽  
Vol 12 (2) ◽  
pp. 98-108 ◽  
Author(s):  
Vicki L. Lee
Keyword(s):  
Daily Life ◽  
Human Being ◽  
Human Beings ◽  
The Individual ◽  
Individual Human

This paper considers the question “What is a psychological unit?”. The ubiquity of units in daily life and in science is considered. The assumption that the individual human being or animal is the psychological unit is examined and rejected. The units represented by the data collected in operant laboratories are interpreted as a subset of the well-defined changes that individual human beings or animals can bring about. The departure of this interpretation from the traditional interpretation in terms of the behaviour of the organism is acknowledged. The paper concludes by noting the relation of the present interpretation of operant research to the problem of identifying psychological units.

Die Objektivität einer Moral der sorgenden Achtung für menschliche Lebewesen

2014 ◽  
Vol 62 (2) ◽  
Author(s):  
Björn Sydow
Keyword(s):  
Final Section ◽  
Human Agency ◽  
Human Potential ◽  
Human Beings ◽  
Moral Objectivity ◽  
The Subject ◽  
Formal Feature ◽  
Do So ◽  
Individual Human

AbstractThe paper starts with the intuition that morality basically consists in a caring respect for human beings: Moral subjects have to respect human beings in their individual human potential, and they have to do whatever is necessary for this potential to be realized. The main aim of the paper is to defend the claim that this understanding of morality is connected with objectivity as a formal feature of morality. I begin by considering constructivist and cooperation-based accounts of morality. Their explanation of moral objectivity is not compatible with caring respect as fundamental content of morality. (1) Thus, in order to argue for my claim I have to put this explanation of moral objectivity into question. To do so, I turn to its action theoretic background. Since this background consists in a dualistic understanding of action I sketch and argue for a non-dualistic alternative based on the notion of practical conceptual capacities. (2 & 3) This understanding of human agency leads to the conception of objectively good actions in which the subject is determined by the reality of bodily substances. (4) In the final section, I propose to conceive of human beings as a certain kind of bodily substances, namely as bearers of conceptual capacities. Consequently, moral actions can be seen as a certain type of objectively good actions. These actions correspond to what has to be done out of caring respect because this is exactly what bodily substances with conceptual capacities oblige moral subjects to do. (5)

scholarly journals Under Darwin’s Cosh? Neo-Aristotelian Thinking in Environmental Ethics

2005 ◽  
Vol 56 ◽  
pp. 22-23
Author(s):  
Michael Wheeler
Keyword(s):  
Environmental Ethics ◽  
Natural Environment ◽  
Moral Status ◽  
General Position ◽  
Well Being ◽  
The Other ◽  
Human Beings ◽  
The One ◽  
The Right ◽  
Individual Human

As a first shot, one might say that environmental ethics is concerned distinctively with the moral relations that exist between, on the one hand, human beings and, on the other, the non-human natural environment. But this really is only a first shot. For example, one might be inclined to think that at least some components of the non-human natural environment (non-human animals, plants, species, forests, rivers, ecosystems, or whatever) have independent moral status, that is, are morally considerable in their own right, rather than being of moral interest only to the extent that they contribute to human well-being. If so, then one might be moved to claim that ethical matters involving the environment are best cashed out in terms of the dutes and responsibilities that human beings have to such components. If, however, one is inclined to deny independent moral status to the non-human natural environment or to any of its components, then one might be moved to claim that the ethical matters in question are exhaustively delineated by those moral relations existing between individual human beings, or between groups of human beings, in which the non-human natural environment figures. One key task for the environmental ethicist is to sort out which, if either, of these perspectives is the right one to adopt—as a general position or within particular contexts. I guess I don’t need to tell you that things get pretty complicated pretty quickly.

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