scholarly journals How Should We Respond to the Global Pandemic: The Need for Cultural Change

Challenges ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 12 (1) ◽  
pp. 8
Author(s):  
Ben Gray
Keyword(s):  
Cultural Change ◽  
Normative Ethics ◽  
Ethical Framework ◽  
World War ◽  
Global Culture ◽  
World War 2 ◽  
Moral Failure ◽  
Global Pandemic ◽  
The World ◽  
Ethical Norms

The Covid pandemic has had a terrible effect on the world and government responses have been described as “Catastrophic Moral Failure”. The approach of bioethics of developing “normative ethics” has provided frameworks on how to act but despite the fact that we knew what to do to prevent the pandemic, we did not do it. In this paper I argue that ethics is culture bound: it is the stories that “we” live by. I illustrate this with examples of cultures with differing values that were developed as a result of the particular circumstances of those cultures. I then argue that after World War 2 in response to the risks of further large wars and atrocities, work was done to further establish a “global culture” and a detailed normative ethical framework was developed by negotiation through the United Nations for that “culture”. Whilst this approach has been necessary, it has not been sufficient. I argue that we need to reframe the approach as one of achieving cultural change rather than complying with ethical norms. Some societies that were unable to adapt to changed circumstances failed to survive, others failed to thrive. A similar fate awaits the whole planet if we cannot change the stories we live by.

scholarly journals In memoriam Jacques Tixier (1925–2018)

2019 ◽  
pp. 9-11
Author(s):  
Zsolt Mester
Keyword(s):  
Prehistoric Archaeology ◽  
World War ◽  
World War 2 ◽  
The World ◽  
In Memoriam

On 3rd April 2018, the world-famous scholar Jacques Tixier died at the age of 93. He was the last one of the three great French prehistorians who made fundamental imprints on prehistoric archaeology after World War 2.

The Shattered Dream: Postwar Modernism, Urban Planning, and the Career of Walter Bunning

1996 ◽  
Vol 28 (4) ◽  
pp. 731-752 ◽  
Author(s):  
R Freestone
Keyword(s):  
Urban Planning ◽  
Le Corbusier ◽  
Professional Life ◽  
World War ◽  
New Paradigm ◽  
Planning History ◽  
Avant Garde ◽  
World War 2 ◽  
The World ◽  
Biographical Approach

The vision of modern urban planning after World War 2 was a remarkably standardized project around the world. Implementation was also universally problematic, the heady reformism of 1940s reconstructionism never being comprehensively realized. Moreover, by the 1970s the early ‘heroic’ modernism had evolved into a counterrevolutionary ‘high’ modernism. Exemplifying these themes was the career of the Sydney-based architect—planner Walter Bunning (1912–1977). In this paper I provide an overview of his particular brand of modernist thought, his central planning ideas, and his physical planning work, with special reference to a disastrous redevelopment scheme near the end of his life. The nature and scope of Walter Bunning's professional life represent a virtual microcosm of the uneven course of planning in Australia in the postwar years: genesis in the avant-garde Le Corbusier-tinged modernism of the 1930s, the early priorities, the broadening agenda but ever moderating tone, the difficulties in translating heady dreams into reality, and the crises which led to the emergence of a new paradigm. I will demonstrate how a biographical approach to planning history can illuminate the origins, meanings, hopes, and outcomes of modernist planning in the urban arena.

scholarly journals The Hypocrisy of Dutch Actions in Indonesia

2021 ◽  
pp. 8-23
Author(s):  
Julie A. Keil
Keyword(s):  
The Netherlands ◽  
War Crimes ◽  
Research Paper ◽  
Dutch Government ◽  
World War ◽  
World War 2 ◽  
International Action ◽  
The World ◽  
Specific Order ◽  
The Military

At the end of World War 2 the Netherlands, through its own military tribunals, tried and convicted several members of the Japanese and German militaries for their participation in the war crime of extra judicial executions in Indonesia and the Netherlands.  Several of the convicted men were executed by the Netherlands while others sentenced to lengthy prison terms.  From 1946-1949 the Netherlands, primarily through commando Raymond Westerling, engaged in the same actions they accused the Japanese of having committed.  While no specific order was ever revealed showing that Westerling’s actions were ordered by the military, the Netherlands tacitly approved his actions by failing to control him and his men and by their unwillingness to take responsibility for his actions before or after the Netherlands withdrew its forces from Indonesia in 1949.  This research paper explores the extrajudicial executions conducted by Westerling, his men, other Dutch military and the Dutch government in order to provide a better and more thorough understanding of these events and the lack of national or international action against war crimes committed after World War 2.  It concludes that the Netherlands has failed to try or even accuse Westerling and others of war crimes or take actions to discipline them, and in fact has covered up his actions and failed to make public those war crimes.  Further that the reason for this continued hypocritical refusal is a concern for the reputation of the Netherlands in the world and a belief that high levels of government would be found complicit.

scholarly journals Why were Latin America's tariffs so much higher than Asia's before 1950?

2011 ◽  
Vol 30 (1) ◽  
pp. 11-44 ◽  
Author(s):  
Michael A. Clemens ◽  
Jeffrey G. Williamson
Keyword(s):  
Political Economy ◽  
Latin America ◽  
Latin American ◽  
Import Substitution ◽  
World War ◽  
Tariff Policy ◽  
World War 2 ◽  
The World ◽  
The Difference ◽  
Natural Barriers

AbstractLatin America had the highest tariffs in the world before 1914; Asia had the lowest. Heavily protected Latin America also boasted some of the most explosivebelle époquegrowth, while open Asia registered some of the least. What brought the two regions to the opposite ends of the tariff policy spectrum? We find that limits to Asian tariff policy autonomy may have lowered tariffs substantially there, but by themselves they cannot explain why Asian tariffs were so much lower than the Latin American tariffs before 1914; that natural barriers, domestic political economy and strategic tariff policy seems to have contributed much to the difference and that the origins of Asian post-World War 2 import-substitution policies seem to lie in the interwar years when Asian tariff levels caught up with those of Latin America.

Barth and Modernity

2019 ◽  
pp. 161-177
Author(s):  
Georg Pfleiderer
Keyword(s):  
First World War ◽  
Theory And Practice ◽  
Christian Theology ◽  
World War ◽  
Avant Garde ◽  
Moral Failure ◽  
Dialectical Theology ◽  
The First World War ◽  
The World ◽  
First World

The struggle with modernity is a characteristic feature of Barth’s theology throughout his career. Because of the moral failure of his ‘liberal’ teachers in the First World War, Barth came to insist that Christian theology be based on a transparent epistemology, and that theory and practice be integrated. From 1915, Barth developed an avant-garde dialectical theology, initially in a neo-idealistic and expressionistic manner, with an implicit methodology, and later in an academic manner, with an explicit methodology. The result of this endeavour was an interpretation of God’s acting in the world through a (dialectically conceived) church.

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