Justice: what is it and how can you ensure your patients receive it?

This article discusses the important concept of justice, one of the four ethical principles developed by Beauchamp and Childress (2019) . Gillon (1994) divided justice into three categories: distributive justice, rights-based justice and legal justice. Justice also forms an important part of British values regarding democracy, the rule of law, individual liberty, mutual respect and tolerance of those of different faiths and beliefs. Following an introduction defining what is meant by the term ‘justice’, the relevant parts of the Nursing Midwifery Council code ( NMC, 2018a ) will be identified and presented. There will then follow a discussion on the three categories of justice as laid out by Gillon (1994) and how justice fits in with British values. Finally, this discussion will point towards how justice can be achieved for the patients in your care and the colleagues you work alongside.

Ugly Freedoms

In Ugly Freedoms Elisabeth R. Anker reckons with the complex legacy of freedom offered by liberal American democracy, outlining how the emphasis of individual liberty has always been entangled with white supremacy, settler colonialism, climate destruction, economic exploitation, and patriarchy. These “ugly freedoms” legitimate the right to exploit and subjugate others. At the same time, Anker locates an unexpected second type of ugly freedom in practices and situations often dismissed as demeaning, offensive, gross, and ineffectual but that provide sources of emancipatory potential. She analyzes both types of ugly freedom at work in a number of texts and locations, from political theory, art, and film to food, toxic dumps, and multispecies interactions. Whether examining how Kara Walker’s sugar sculpture A Subtlety, Or the Marvelous Sugar Baby reveals the importance of sugar plantations to liberal thought or how the impoverished neighborhoods in The Wire blunt neoliberalism’s violence, Anker shifts our perspective of freedom by contesting its idealized expressions and expanding the visions for what freedom can look like, who can exercise it, and how to build a world free from domination.

Machiavelli e la lezione di Lucrezio

Machiavelli’s knowledge of Lucretius’ text had been proven thanks to a very relevant discovery by Sergio Bertelli, who in 1961 published an article in which he recognized Machiavelli’s handwriting in the Vatican codex Rossianus 884. This paper analyses the possible repercussions of De rerum natura with respect to the political potential that Lucretius’ thought could had transmitted to Machiavelli, in view of his return to the vita activa. In particular, the notes posted by Machiavelli in the marginalia of the Lucretius’ text he transcribed, prove his reflection on the “clinamen theory”. In the various profiles of the world generated by the vital trigger that the clinamen causes, lies a possibility for us of having a libera mens: the possibility of intercepting and correcting, by our own virtue, the twists and turns of Fate, opposes the individual liberty to the whims of Fortuna, but also to the idea of an ineffable Divine Providence with its mysterious and intractable designs.

Practical Application of the Provisions of the Code of Criminal Procedure Regarding the Measure of Preventive Arrest

Preventive measures are coercive criminal law enforcement institutions, aimed at the deprivation or restriction of individual liberty, by which the suspect or defendant is prevented from undertaking certain activities that would adversely affect the conduct of the criminal proceedings or the achievement of its purpose. They have been instituted by the legislator for specific purposes, namely: to ensure the proper conduct of criminal proceedings, to prevent the abstraction of the suspect or defendant from trial and to prevent the commission of new offenses (art. 202 para. 1 of the Criminal Procedure Code). Preventive measures are not inherent in any ongoing criminal trial, but are exceptional measures (art. 9 para. 2 of the Criminal Procedure Code), and the court can decide to sease the measure or make use of the measure in the light of the specific circumstances of each case. Of the five preventive measures, three are deprivation of liberty - detention, house arrest and pre-trial detention, and two are non-custodial: judicial control and judicial control on bail. All these measures are only applicable to the natural person. Specific preventive measures may be taken against legal persons, but those are regulated by the provisions of art. 493 of the Criminal Procedure Code.

Brief History of Ethics in the Presence of a Pandemic

The current COVID-19 pandemic has had a strong effect on individual liberty versus a consequentialist ideal of the greater good for societal norms. Rather than arguing for the current situation, I have chosen to take a historical approach to address the ethics of dealing with these health situations in the past. Ultimately, I conclude that, while at risk of individual liberty, a rule utilitarian approach, as backed up by epidemiolocal data suggests that a mandate for the greater good is more ethical than a simple approach to individual liberty.

No Appetite for Change: Culture, Liberalism, and Other Acts of Depoliticization in the Australian Obesity Debate

There is wealth of evidence that points to the pernicious ways in which inequities in food, bodies, and health are disproportionally borne. Equally, there is a wealth of evidence that critiques the role of neoliberal imperatives for individuals to take responsibility for their health, and how this tenet reproduces inequity. However, health interventions and public policy remain immune to addressing social determinants of health and ignore the cultural dynamics of power in food systems, interventions, and policy. Drawing from ethnographic research in an Australian community that has high levels of socioeconomic disadvantage and obesity, and the Australian Government’s response to the ‘obesity epidemic’, this article examines the processes and tactics of depoliticization that are used to elide political and sociocultural phenomenon. I leverage the work of Brown and Povinelli to argue that liberalism’s hold on universalisms, autonomy, and individual liberty in obesity discourses subjugates a comprehension of political relations, positioning liberal principles and culture as mutually antagonistic. It is precisely this acultural positioning of liberalism that makes it possible to remove recognition of the power that produces and contours the ‘metabolic rift’ between food systems, public health, and equity priorities. In conclusion, I consider how obesity policy might be different if we paid attention to this culturalization of politics.

‘Not more democratic, but more moral’: Tocqueville on the suffrage in America and France

Tocqueville has been portrayed as a “strange liberal” for his singular defenses of individual liberty. This essay highlights an overlooked instance of Tocqueville’s distinctiveness by analyzing his thoughts on suffrage, which placed him at odds with his French liberal contemporaries. It uncovers Tocqueville’s attitude toward universal suffrage in America and his critiques of a capacitarian suffrage in France. I argue that Tocqueville articulated his hope not for a “more democratic, but for a more moral” electoral law during most of the July Monarchy, aiming to transcend existing debates over the extent of the electorate or the capacité politique of the individual elector. By arguing for Tocqueville’s singularity on the suffrage, this essay brings to light both his departures from the thought of the liberal Doctrinaires and his reflections on the particular character of democracy in France.

It's time we reclaim ‘British values’

Democracy, rule of law, individual liberty, mutual respect and tolerance are values to nurture in young children, helping them grow into caring, responsible citizens. It needs a whole community to work together for this to happen successfully.

Law and the public’s health

Public health law safeguards the health and safety of the population, promoting the human right to life and health, and the realization of social justice. There is sometimes a tension between public health regulation to promote community health and protecting individual liberty and autonomy. Governments must balance the common good with individual freedoms. In many countries, there are constitutional rights to health or to life that provide a positive duty on government to advance the right to health. Governments have multiple legal tools available to improve the public’s health and safety, ranging from the economic power to tax and spend, to the authority to alter the environments in which people live, through to direct and indirect regulation, including, where necessary, deregulation. Although the law can be a powerful agent for change, intervention can also raise critical social, ethical, or constitutional concerns. These issues are illustrated through four brief case studies on infectious diseases, non-communicable diseases, unintentional injuries, and violence to self or others.