Die kleine Serie ‘Ein Essay für Freunde’ soll wöchentlich meinen Freunden ans Bein pinkeln und ihnen etwas polemisch ein bisschen Moral einprügeln. Hier kommt also die erste Angriffswelle zum übermässigen Fleischkonsum der Schweiz, wo 1kg Fleisch pro Kopf pro Woche gegessen wird und weitere 0.5kg direkt im Abfall landen.
Archive for the ‘Society’ Category
Ein Essay für Freunde: 1. Fleischkonsum
Tuesday, June 22nd, 2010Towards a general theory of action alienation
Monday, May 10th, 2010In this entry I will try to formalise Marx’s theory of alienation into a general theory of action alienation and apply it to classified footage from the US army in Iraq that was released by Wikileaks on the 5. April 2010 (Anonymous 2010b). (more…)
Structure, agency and female leg hair
Thursday, April 1st, 2010There is a structural constraint that affects nearly 50% of my friends and that I directly observe; it happens everywhere in Britain and all the time. The social structure of Britain today makes nearly one half of her population do something that one cannot explain otherwise. They do it with blades, with wax or with laser: they remove their leg hair. This removal of female leg hair is the norm, around 90% of women of child bearing age do it (Toerient & Wilkinson 2003, p. 333).
A call for religious moderation
Sunday, March 21st, 2010Much verbiage has been lost over whether ‘religion’ is good or bad, whether god exists or not, and whether science disproves god or not. Even though I make no secret out of my atheistic beliefs, I fundamentally disagree with the binary nature of the public debate. Is it not crucial to realise that a belief or disbelief in god does not force one to adhere to any group or share any particular characteristic? As much as I wish not being equated with Stalin, my Christian friends wish not being equated with crusaders and my Muslim friends not with suicide bombers. Neither religion nor atheism or agnosticism are ‘the root of all evil’, and similarly neither is the root of all good. How easily would world peace be achieved if we only had to uproot one.
A world view that postulates either as universally ‘better’ dropped a crucial ingredient during its construction – that is reality. We significantly underestimate our sisters and brothers’ power to think, feel and act freely if we hold that adherence to one particular belief or disbelief causes them to be immoral. Can we imagine our own selves turning into a violent fanatic just because of one belief or disbelief? If yes, do we not underestimate our own moral capacity? And if not, why should ‘the Others’ be different? Making a distinction between Us the Enlightened and Them the Ignorant seems to bear the stigma of arrogance for it is effectively saying our own belief is the only valid one. It claims certainty where there should be doubt.
And thus I conclude: Doubt is the ally of moderation and peace. War happens where people are certain.
Amartya Sen’s Development as Freedom – A Discussion
Thursday, March 11th, 2010‘Freedoms are not only the primary ends of development, they are also among its principle means.’ – Amartya Sen (1999, p. 10)
Amartya Sen’s quote which I am to discuss in this paper stems from his work Development as Freedom, which has been described by The Economist as ‘a personal manifesto [and] a summing up’ (Anonymous 1999). A summing up of what?
Kopftücher und Beinhaare
Thursday, January 28th, 2010Ein Artikel in der NZZ hat mich angeregt, diesen Eintrag zu schreiben. Da wurde einer Basketballspielerin in Luzern verboten, mit Kopftuch Basketballmatches zu spielen.
Die ungefühlte Wirklichkeit
Tuesday, January 26th, 2010Wir leben in einer Weltwirtschaft, was niemanden mehr überrascht. Wir fühlen aber weiterhin lokal, weil wir halt eben Menschen sind. So wird über einen Todesfall in der Nachbarschaft vielleicht monatelang geredet, über eine Schlammlawine mit mehreren Toten vielleicht zwei drei Wochen und über den Bürgerkrieg in Darfur im Sudan mit tausenden Toten gar nicht. Das Problem, das ich in diesem Essay aufzeigen möchte, ist, dass die Weltwirtschaft und die Technologie unser Handeln jeder Zeit mit der grossen Welt verbinden, wir den Konsequenzen unserer Taten aber unmöglich nachfühlen können.
Three frameworks for understanding violence
Saturday, December 19th, 2009“The strongest man is never strong enough to be always master, unless he transforms his power into right, and obedience into duty.” – Jean-Jacques Rousseau (1762, 103)
To rule indefinitely, Rousseau suggests three tools: strength, right and duty. These translate smoothly into direct, structural and cultural violence – the topic of this essay. I will first give a definition of violence in general and then explain these sub-terms. This essay will explore the value of these three concepts for defining or understanding violence but eventually stress its value for guiding research.
How is power distributed in modern democratic states?
Thursday, December 17th, 2009“In the political system of today, inequalities in political resources remain, but they tend to be noncumulative. The political system of New Haven, then, is one of dispersed inequalities.”
“[C]ommon interpretations that depict the American or any other market-oriented system as a competition among interest groups are seriously in error for their failure to take account of the distinctive privileged position of businessmen in politics.”
These two quotes stem from the two perspectives looking at the distribution of power in modern democratic states that I chose to compare – pluralism and neopluralism. Why I did not pick elitism is a decision that will require some justification early on. After that, I will outline the two perspectives in some detail and contrast them like required. What will help this comparison is the fact that both quotes actually stem from the same scholar – Robert Dahl (Dahl 1961, 85; Dahl and Lindblom 1976, xxxvi). His change of mind will guide this comparison. Because of his and Charles E. Lindblom’s influential weight in this debate, and surely in this essay, I will work with their definition of power as power over somebody. “A” possesses power over “B” if “A” can make “B” do what “A” wants.