“Des personnages de si près tenus”, TV Fiction and Moral Consensus

How can we understand the adaptations of literary classics made for French television? We simultaneously analyzed the works and the context in which they were produced in order to relate the moral configurations that emerge in the stories to activities carried out by identifiable members of the production team, in specific, empirically observable circumstances. This empirical approach to the constitution of the moral panorama in which characters evolve rejects the idea of the pure autonomy of ideological contents, suggesting instead a study of the way normative demands and professional ethics are combined in practice, thus combining a sociology of characters and a sociology of professionals and showing how professional priorities influence production choices. This detaches the moral question from the philosophical horizon it is associated with in order to make it an object of empirial study. Adopting this perspective produces unexpected findings. Observation shows that the moral landscape in which characters are located is neither stable, autonomous, transparent, or consensual. It is instead caught up in material logics, constrained by temporal dynamics, and dependent on professional coordination. It is traversed by tensions between professional logics, and logics of regulation.

The Legitimacy of Investment Arbitration

International investment arbitration remains one of the most controversial areas of globalisation and international law. This book provides a fresh contribution to the debate by adopting a thoroughly empirical approach. Based on new datasets and a range of quantitative, qualitative and computational methods, the contributors interrogate claims and counter-claims about the regime's legitimacy. The result is a nuanced picture about many of the critiques lodged against the regime, whether they be bias in arbitral decision-making, close relationships between law firms and arbitrators, absence of arbitral diversity, and excessive compensation. The book comes at a time when several national and international initiatives are under way to reform international investment arbitration. The authors discuss and analyse how the regime can be reformed and ow a process of legitimation might occur.

Wooden Facade Renovation and Additional Floor Construction for Suburban Development in Finland

Finnish urban settlements are in the age of restoration, and the suburbs need improvements in Finland. In this sense, wooden facade renovation and additional floor construction are viable and sustainable solutions for this development in the Finnish context. This chapter focuses on these important applications from the Finnish residents’ perspective as ecologically sound engineering solutions through a survey. In doing so, the challenges of facade renovation, as well as the benefits of additional floor construction, were presented. The main purpose of the survey was to get the opinions of the residents, find out which variables are important, make inferences for the planning and improvement of such areas, and determine what will be emphasized in the sustainable suburban development of the future. Therefore, the results were based on this empirical approach—survey—but further research such as energy analysis, wood-based facade renovation, and additional floor solutions will be done as part of other studies. It is believed that this study will contribute to the use of sustainable materials and decarbonization of buildings as well as zero energy building (nZEB) to overcome the challenges posed by climate change by the diffusion of wood in the renovation of buildings.