Truer Facts Through Stronger Values: Confronting Science's Sociopolitical Realities

Assaults on science have led scientists to demand “politics-free/values-free” science that safeguards science against error by grounding it in “politically neutral” evidence. Considering racial disparities in lead poisoning, HIV/AIDS, and COVID-19, we show the solution is doomed. Politically charged beliefs are essential for assessing public-health research; thus, the beliefs’ truth affects the research's accuracy. However, science's sociopolitical uses systematically distort politically charged beliefs. Since errors assimilate into our scientific corpus and inform new hypotheses, scientists need accurate sociopolitical theories of distorting forces to identify errors. Analyzing Black-Panther opposition to violence research, we argue since racial disparities structure society and science has been distorted to buttress racial inequities, knowledgeable anti-racist scientists exert corrective forces on research. They hold accurate politically charged beliefs about sociopolitical forces shaping science and health, and are committed to eradicating distortions. Thus, rather than quarantining politically charged beliefs, scientists should sharpen their sociopolitical theories and normative commitments.

Testing the relative effectiveness of marketing and political strategies

Purpose This paper aims to review the latest management developments across the globe and pinpoint practical implications from cutting-edge research and case studies. Design/methodology/approach This briefing is prepared by an independent writer who adds their own impartial comments and places the articles in context. Findings This research paper concentrates on companies' use of political or marketing strategies in relation to sociopolitical pressures. Managing sociopolitical forces is a practice that's separate from managing other market-based forces, due to this needing a different skillset. Engaging with sociopolitical agents does make firms more likely to attempt to influence threatening government public policy. A relationship-based strategy to engage with social and political agents was reliably shown to elevate the capacity of a company to respond to and manage sociopolitical forces with marketplace consequences, for example, in the arena of health. Originality/value The briefing saves busy executives, strategists and researchers hours of reading time by selecting only the very best, most pertinent information and presenting it in a condensed and easy-to-digest format.

Truer facts through stronger values: confronting science's sociopolitical realities

Recent assaults on science have led scientists to demand a "politics-free/values-free" science that safeguards science against error by grounding it in some politically-neutral class of evidence. Considering racial disparities in lead-poisoning in the US and HIV-transmission in southern Africa, we show the solution is doomed. Politically-charged beliefs about societies and groups are integral to, and ineliminable from, assessments of public-health research. Because politically-charged beliefs inform those assessments, the assessments’ truth affects the research’s accuracy. However, research shows that sciences' sociopolitical uses subject politically-charged beliefs to systematic distortion. Since resultant errors are incorporated into our scientific corpus and inform assessments of new hypotheses, scientists need accurate sociopolitical theories of those distorting forces to identify likely errors. Analyzing Black-Panther opposition to violence research, we argue that since our society is structured by racial disparities and science has been distorted to buttress racial inequities, knowledgeable anti-racist scientists are disposed to exert a corrective force on public-health research. They hold accurate politically-charged beliefs about the sociopolitical forces shaping both science and health, and they are committed to eradicating distorting forces. Thus, rather than quarantining politically-charged beliefs, we urge public-health scientists to sharpen their sociopolitical theories and normative commitments.

On Extraterritoriality

This introduction argues that Hong Kong cinema and media are best understood as a public sphere, where affects associated with Hong Kongers’ extraterritorial position of being doubly occupied and ostracised by contesting sociopolitical forces are being negotiated. It first examines why the national/transnational debate on Hong Kong cinema falls short of helping us understand the core of the sociopolitical perturbation it seeks to locate. It then expounds the term ‘extraterritoriality’ from both theoretical and historical angles. With these in mind, this chapter studies Mandarin musical Chang xiangsi [An All-Consuming Love, He Zhaozhang, 1947] as an example of an extraterritorial cinematic and musical experience. Finally, it introduces the specific topics and case studies discussed in each chapter of this book.

How Official Multilingualism Works

This chapter spells out major sociopolitical forces that have contributed to the widespread adoption of official multilingualism, and offers an explanation of how official multilingualism works through law. Jurisdictions that adopt multilingual law are primarily driven by pragmatic rather than normative forces. Official language law can perform a plethora of instrumental functions because such law works chiefly through its symbolic power. This discursive reading of law is contrary to the dominant, positivist view of law as command of a sovereign backed by force. Although symbolism is sometimes defined in opposition to what is real or substantive, law that works through symbolism is not necessarily empty in content or limited in impact. In fact, its semiotic flexibility has allowed it to be used to pursue a wide range of instrumental goals, which consist mostly of political and economic capital.

An Introduction to Baths in Rome and Methodologies of This Study

Given the fundamental importance of baths to daily life in ancient Rome, this chapter introduces the book and concentrates attention on the best preserved of Rome’s imperial thermae, the Baths of Caracalla, in order to unveil the cultural and sociopolitical forces that shaped monumental public spaces and their visual experience. By outlining the Baths’ architectural design and evocative decoration, this chapter foreshadows new insights into the multiple meanings underlying their embellishment and, therefore, the myriad ways in which imperial patronage can be understood. The chapter sets the stage by examining the importance of baths and bathing in ancient Rome generally before delving into the patronage of Rome’s imperial thermae and the Baths of Caracalla more specifically. Special attention is given to tracing the Baths of Caracalla’s ancient design and more modern history of excavation, as well as situating the author’s arguments and aims within recent scholarly contributions.

Was Muḥammad Amīn al-Astarabādī (d. 1036/1626-7) a Mujtahid?

The prevalent view that Muḥammad Amīn al-Astarabādī (d. 1036/1626-7) studied with a prominent uṣūlī (rationalist) jurist, namely, Shaykh Ḥasan Ṣāḥib al-Maʿālim (d. 1011/1602), the son of al-Shahīd al-Thānī (d. 965/1558), and that he was a mujtahid for most of his life before he converted to akhbārism (traditionism) in Mecca, is largely unfounded. This view surfaced during the late nineteenth century, through Muḥammad Bāqir al-Khwānsārī’s Rawḍāt al-Jannāt, and was uncritically integrated into the major bio-bibliographical accounts on al-Astarabādī’s life and scholarship afterwards. Many modern scholars in turn adopted this view, producing inadequate conclusions about the nature of his akhbārī movement. Based on a close assessment of al-Astarabādī’s extant works and his references to his teachers and places where he studied, Shiraz rather than Mecca was decisive in shaping his early traditionist stance in Shīʿa kalām (rational theology), which resonated with his traditionist positions in jurisprudence and ḥadīth. As far as one can tell through his ijāzās (scholarly licenses), he sought to transmit ḥadīth from one mujtahid, namely, Shaykh Muḥammad Ṣāḥib al-Madārik (d. 1009/1600), but did not receive training in ijtihād (rational legal inference) with him. He appears to have been well-versed in the methods used by ūṣūlī jurists to evaluate ḥadīth and derive the law, prior to that time, through his studies in Shiraz. All these findings, lead us to question the background and nature of his akhbārī thought as they were presented in much of the secondary literature, and to bring attention to a distinct set of intellectual and sociopolitical forces that shaped it.

From Betrayal to Violence: Dante's Inferno and the Social Construction of Crime

This essay reflects on contemporary justifications for the grading of crimes, especially the conception that the gravity of crimes is rooted in “desert,” understood to depend particularly on the offender's state of mind and to a lesser extent on the harm done or threatened to society. Drawing on Dante's Inferno, the essay shows how the gravity of crimes is socially constructed. For reasons rooted in the sociopolitical forces, as well as the philosophy and law of his day, Dante found the crimes most deserving of punishment to be those of betrayal of trust. He conceived such crimes to be the most deliberate and to do the most damage to the social fabric. Contemporary law has found that crimes of betrayal are generally less deserving of punishment than crimes of violence; the essay shows how social and historical forces, including even the traditions upon which Dante drew, have shaped this choice. In the course of grading crimes in this way, the law has altered its conceptions of “intent” as well as of harm to society so radically that the notion of “desert” has lost much of its coherence. The importance of trust in modern society, moreover, has been misunderstood in the contemporary grading of crimes.