This paper considers discussions of the work of Alasdair MacIntyre in management literature. It argues that management scholars who have attempted to appropriate his After Virtue as a supportive text for conventional business ethics do so only by misreading or by ignoring his other work. It shows that MacIntyre does not argue for a reformed capitalism in which individual virtue overcomes institutional vice. Rather he argues that capitalist businesses are inherently vicious and that therefore individual virtue cannot be realised within (...) them. The job of the virtuous is to resist them.The paper first presents an account of MacIntyre’s position on management and introduces some of the critical and supportive uses of his work in management scholarship. It focuses on two papers typical of the approach taken by conventional business ethicists to his work. These have attempted to deploy concepts developed by MacIntyre while denying the account of management and organisation of which they form a part.The paper provides some tentative hypotheses as to why management scholars have approached MacIntyre in this way. It argues that these attempted appropriations not only have failed but also must fail as conceptual coherence is sacrificed when the account within which those concepts make sense is denied. (shrink)

Die hier versammelten Aufsatze gehoren in den Umkreis von Phanomenologie, Hermeneutik und Asthetik. Sie fragen nach dem Sinn des Gegenstandlichen, dem Erscheinen der Kunst und der Realitat des Raums. Dieses Fragen hat Gunter Figal angestossen, als er die Gegenstandlichkeit der Welt ins Zentrum seiner Philosophie gestellt hat. Kollegen, Weggefahrten und Freunde widmen ihm die Beitrage zum 70. Geburtstag. Der Titel nimmt Bezug auf die Antrittsvorlesung, die Gunter Figal 2003 in Freiburg gehalten hat. Die Philosophie der Gegenstandlichkeit als Frage nach der (...) Realitat und der Welt, hat Figal in seinem Buch Gegenstandlichkeit. Das Hermeneutische und die Philosophie (2006) entwickelt und mit Erscheinungsdinge. Asthetik als Phanomenologie (2010) und Unscheinbarkeit. Der Raum der Phanomenologie (2015). zu einer hermeneutischen Phanomenologie des Raumes ausgearbeitet. (shrink)

Journal Name: Apeiron Issue: Ahead of print.

The goal of this research is to understand the interaction of implicit and explicit psychological processes in dealing with emotional distractions and meta-cognitive control of such distractions. The questions are how emotional and meta-cognitive processes can be separated into implicit and explicit components, and how such a separation can be utilized to improve self-regulation of emotion, which can have significant theoretical and practical implications.

This paper explores an approach for autonomous generation of symbolic representations from an agent's subsymbolic activities within the agent-environment interaction. The paper describes a psychologically plausible general framework and its various methods for autonomously creating symbolic representations. The symbol generation is accomplished within, and is intrinsic to, a generic and comprehensive cognitive architecture for capturing a wide variety of psychological processes (namely, CLARION). This work points to ways of obtaining more psychologically/cognitively realistic symbolic and subsymbolic representations within the framework of (...) a cognitive architecture, and accentuates the relevance of such an approach to cognitive science and psychology. (shrink)

During the early part of the 20th century most embryologists were skeptical about the significance of Mendelian genetics to embryological development. A few embryologists began to study the developmental effects of Mendelian genes around 1940. Such work was a necessary step on the path to modern developmental biology. It occurred during the time when the Evolutionary Synthesis was integrating Mendelian and population genetics into a unified evolutionary theory. Why did the first embryological geneticists begin their study at that particular time? (...) One possible explanation is that developmental genetics was a potential avenue of alliance between embryology and evolutionary biology, two fields that had been separated since the 1890s. To assess this possible motive it is necessary to explore the methodological contrasts that obtained between embryology and both Mendelian-chromosomal genetics and neo-Darwinian evolutionary theory. Some of these contrasts persist to the present day. (shrink)

In this paper, I argue for the following claims. Contextualist strategies to tame or localize epistemic skepticism are hopeless if contextualist factors are construed internalistically. However, because efforts to contextualize externalism via subjunctive conditional analysis court circularity, it is only on an internalistic interpretation that contextualist strategies can even be motivated. While these claims do not give us an argument for skepticism, they do give us an argument that contextualism, as such, is not likely to provide us with an argument (...) against skepticism. (shrink)

This article recalls the fact that until the mid-19th century neither company legislation, nor jurists, nor economists, envisioned companies to be private or small. Nevertheless, once freedom of incorporation and general limited liability were enacted, a new practice was set in motion in Britain. Smaller companies were formed in growing numbers, replacing partnerships, family firms and even sole proprietorships. They operated in sectors in which corporations had not been found before. These companies did not seek access to the stock markets. (...) The article tracks the take-up pattern and changing characteristics of the corporate form in Britain between the enactment of free incorporation and general limited liability (1844–62) and the formal legal recognition of the private company (1907). It shows the dramatic increase in annual incorporation and the parallel decrease in the average capital and average number of shareholders in newly formed companies. The article then analyses the reasons for the decision of businesspersons to incorporate their small firms. The main motivations were the possibility to create asset partitioning between personal and business assets and the ability to use the floating charge. Finally, the article examines the legal reaction to the bottom up emergence of the private company. It examines the reactions of the courts (in the famous Salomon v Salomon case) and of the legislature to this unpredicted practice. It argues that incorporators and their lawyers used the available contractual flexibility to privately design Articles of Association and to adjust them to the specific needs of private and small companies, often by introducing partnership internal governance rules into company Articles. The present study relies on newly gathered data on the take-up of the company form and a newly produced sample of company files collected at Companies House and the National Archives. (shrink)

(2013). Pain, Chronic Pain, and Sickle Cell Chronic Pain. The American Journal of Bioethics: Vol. 13, No. 4, pp. 14-16. doi: 10.1080/15265161.2013.768859.

The concept of truth arises from puzzling over distinctions between the real and the apparent, while the origin of these distinctions lies in the neurobiology of mammalian cerebral lateralization, that is, in the evolution of brains that can address the world both indicatively and subjunctively; brains that represent the world both categorically and hypothetically. After some 2,500 years of thinking about it, the Western philosophical tradition has come up with three major theories of truth: correspondence, coherence, and pragmatist. Traditional philosophy (...) has nevertheless failed to arbitrate much among these views; certainly no clear winner has emerged. I argue, however, that contemporary neuroscience provides adequate theoretical grounds for a unified theory of truth. More specifically, I contend that the correspondence, the coherence, and the pragmatic utility of symbols are each biological features of our neurophysiological information processing systems—that is to say, our brains. On my view, the traditional trifurcation of philosophical accounts of the predicate, “is true”, stems from a trifurcation of focus on the information latent in sensory, motor, and somatosensory cortices of the human brain. (shrink)

Ideally, psychological and phenomenological studies of visual experience should be mutually informative. In that spirit, this article outlines parts of Maurice Merleau-Ponty's phenomenological view of visual experience as a kind of independently active opaque bodily synthesis, and uses those views to (a) help ground and extend Alva Noë's rejection of the “snapshot” theory of visual experience in favor of a more enactive view of visual content, (b) critique a failing of Noë's account, and (c) show how the assumptions underlying more (...) internalist and Cartesian views of visual experience can illegitimately creep in even when they are being carefully criticized. (shrink)

Dans cet article, je propose une analyse des débats récents sur la « justice climati­que », c’est-à-dire les enjeux de justice distributive liés aux phénomènes des changements climatiques. Je me propose d’y faire trois choses : premièrement, je propose une série de distinctions conceptuelles permettant de faire la cartographie des enjeux normatifs en cause et des taches que doivent réaliser nos théories en éthique environnementale. Deuxiè­mement, je tente d’attirer l’attention sur un problème de taille, mais quelque peu négligé dans la (...) littérature : le problème de la distribution des responsabilités. Troisiè­mement, je défends la désirabilité d’un passage des éthiques environnementales vers les philosophies politiques de l’environnement. (shrink)

Straightforward reinforcement learning for multi-agent co-learning settings often results in poor outcomes. Meta-learning processes beyond straightforward reinforcement learning may be necessary to achieve good (or optimal) outcomes. Algorithmic processes of meta-learning, or "manipulation", will be described, which is a cognitively realistic and effective means for learning cooperation. We will discuss various "manipulation" routines that address the issue of improving multi-agent co-learning. We hope to develop better adaptive means of multi-agent cooperation, without requiring a priori knowledge, and advance multi-agent co-learning beyond (...) existing theories and techniques. (shrink)

I argue herein for two claims. First, contextualist strategies to tame or localize epistemic skepticism are ineffectual if contextualist factors are construed internalistically. Second, since efforts to contextualize externalism via subjunctive conditional analysis threaten circularity, only internalistic interpretations of contextualism can even be motivated. These two contentions do not themselves give us a grounds for skepticism. However, they do give us reason to suspect that contextualism, as such, is unlikely likely to provide a cogent anti-skeptical strategy.

Despite increased academic and practitioner interest in codes of conduct, there has been little research into the actual compliance of suppliers in developing countries with the codes of conduct of multinational corporations. This paper addresses this lack by analysing Chinese suppliers' level of compliance with Swedish toy retailers' codes of conduct. Based on unannounced and unofficial interviews with employees of Chinese suppliers, the study shows that all of the nine studied suppliers breached some of the standards in the toy retailers' (...) codes, with over two-thirds of the suppliers not complying with the majority of the studied standards. While there are different explanations of this lack of compliance, the main explanation seems to be that Chinese suppliers successfully deceive toy retailers' monitoring organisations by decoupling the formal monitored part of their organisation from the actual operational part of their organisation. The paper concludes with a discussion of how to increase compliance with MNCs' codes of conduct. (shrink)

Does private regulation of workers’ rights in global value chains improve working conditions on the factory floor? Drawing on one of the first systematic longitudinal studies of supplier compliance with multinational corporation (MNC) codes of conduct, this paper finds—in contrast to previous research—substantial improvements over time. While in 2004, the four examined Chinese toy suppliers violated most of the evaluated code of conduct criteria and consciously decoupled the code of conduct policy from actual practices, by 2009 they had recoupled policy (...) and practice and complied with nearly all examined criteria (except working hours). The paper contributes to the private regulation literature by challenging previous research claims, identifying factors that could make private regulation effective, and outlining a research method for empirically studying the effects of codes of conduct over time. The paper also contributes to new institutional theory by discussing how recoupling could be influenced by two factors not identified in previous research: (i) trusting relationships between the organization and the stakeholder exerting pressure and (ii) factors unrelated to main external pressures leading to “accidental” recoupling. (shrink)

In 2003, James Ron published a book comparing state violence in Serbia and Israel. That work anticipated the violence witnessed in Gaza beginning in 2023.

In the current era, governments are playing smaller roles in regulating workers’ rights internationally, and transnational corporations (TNCs), non-governmental organisations (NGOs) involved in the struggle for workers’ rights, and labour/trade unions have started to fill this governance gap. This paper focuses on the least researched of the relationships among these three actors, the union–NGO relationship, by analysing the ways in which it affects definitions of TNC responsibility for workers’ rights at their suppliers’ factories. Based on a qualitative study of the (...) union–NGO relationship in the Swedish garment industry between 1996 and 2005, we propose that there are six main configurations of union–NGO relationships. By linking these configurations to their effects on TNC responsibility, we propose that co-ordination relationships between unions and NGOs, particularly high-commitment co-ordination relationships, are likely to result in a broadening of the definition of TNC responsibility, while conflictual relationships, both high and low commitment, result in a narrowing of the definition of TNC responsibility. The study indicates that co-operation is generally more beneficial for both unions and NGOs than is any form of conflictual relationship, in terms of broadening the definition of TNC responsibility. (shrink)

Following the offshoring of production to developing countries by transnational corporations, unions and non-governmental organisations have criticised working conditions at TNCs' offshore factories. This has led to the emergence of two different approaches to operationalising TNC responsibilities for workers' rights in developing countries: codes of conduct and global agreements. Despite the importance of this development, few studies have systematically compared the effects of these two different ways of dealing with workers' rights. This article addresses this gap by analysing how codes (...) of conduct and global agreements both independently and interactively affect workers' rights. We do this based on a qualitative study of the Sri Lankan operations of a Swedish TNC in Sri Lanka, and on interviews with union and NGO representatives actively involved in codes of conduct and global agreements. Our results indicate that global agreements independently address all the aspects included in codes of conduct, while also addressing additional, more process-oriented aspects of workers' rights. Hence, on their own, global agreements seem to comprise the superior approach to promoting workers' rights. Furthermore, our results indicate that promoting codes of conduct has negative interactive effects on global agreements. Based on these results, we argue that the current focus on codes of conduct is counterproductive for the promotion of workers' rights. (shrink)

Anti-sweatshop activists have turned global production networks into contested organizational fields. Although this contest has triggered the growth of an extensive literature on contested GPNs, the scholarly conversation is still limited in two important ways: First, it ignores or dismisses the role of small and medium-sized enterprises in GPNs and, second, it assumes that firms are driven solely by rational profit-maximizing motives. Based on a study of a Swedish SME’s payment of living wages at its Indian supplier, this article addresses (...) these limitations by demonstrating how SMEs’ peculiarities allow them to assume a distinct role in contested GPNs. Furthermore, this article contributes to the scholarly conversation about living wages by providing a much-needed move beyond conceptual discussions into empirical studies of the underlying trade-offs of paying living wages. (shrink)

While cross-sectoral partnerships are frequently presented as a way to achieve sustainable development, some corporations that first tried using the strategy are now changing direction. Growing tired of what are, in their eyes, inefficient and unproductive cross-sectoral partnerships, firms are starting to form post-cross-sectoral partnerships (‚post-partnerships’) open exclusively to corporations. This paper examines one such post-partnership project, the Business Social Compliance Initiative (BSCI), to analyse the possibility of post-partnerships establishing stable definitions of ‚corporate responsibility’. We do this by creating a (...) theoretical framework based on actor-network theory (ANT) and institutional theory. Using this framework, we show that post-partnerships suffer from the paradox of striving to marginalise those stakeholders whose support they need␣for establishing stable definitions of ‚corporate responsibility’. We conclude by discussing whether or not post-partnership strategies, despite this paradox, can be expected to establish stable definitions of ‚corporate responsibility’. (shrink)

Conflicts between labor unions and nongovernmental organizations often impede private labor regulatory attempts to protect worker rights at supplier factories. Based on a study of a failed private regulatory attempt for Swedish garment retailers, we contribute to existing research into union–NGO relations by demonstrating how conflict arises because unions and NGOs act upon different institutional logics. We also contribute to the institutional logics perspective by challenging the current emphasis on either coexistence or conflict among multiple logics, and showing the heterogeneity (...) in how multiple logics manifest on a local level, how this could shift over time, and suggesting an empirically derived typology of manifestations of multiple logics. (shrink)

Codes of conduct are the main tools to privately regulate worker rights in global value chains. Scholars have shown that while codes may improve outcome standards (such as occupational health and safety), they have had limited impact on process rights (such as freedom of association and collective bargaining). Scholars have, though, only provided vague or general explanations for this empirical finding. We address this shortcoming by providing a holistic and detailed explanation, and argue that codes, in their current form, have (...) limited impact on trade union rights due to (i) buyers paying lip service to trade union rights, (ii) workers being treated as passive objects of regulation in codes of conduct, (iii) auditing being unable to detect and remediate violations of trade union rights, (iv) codes emphasizing parallel means of organizing, (v) suppliers having limited incentives for compliance, and (vi) codes being unable to open up space for union organizing when leveraged in grassroots struggles. Our arguments suggest that there is no quick fix for codes’ limited impact on trade union rights, and that codes, in their current form, have limited potential to improve trade union rights. We conclude by discussing ways in which codes of conduct, and private regulation of worker rights more generally, could be transformed to more effectively address trade union rights. (shrink)

To address substandard working conditions in global value chains, companies have adopted private regulatory systems governing worker rights. Scholars agree that without onsite factory audits, this private regulation has limited impact at the point of production. Companies, however, audit only a subset of their suppliers, severely restricting their private regulatory attempts. Despite the significance of the placement of suppliers inside or outside firms’ “responsibility boundaries” and despite scholars’ having called for more research into how firms prioritize what suppliers to audit, (...) few, if any, systematic studies have examined the topic. This is problematic, as the placement of firms’ responsibility boundaries determines what suppliers and workers are included in firms’ private regulatory attempts. Based on a study of 12 Swedish firms and the theory of moral disengagement, this paper starts to fill this research gap by exploring how firms’ responsibility boundaries are placed. The paper illustrates how firms’ responsibility boundary placement is best described as a patchwork with firms defining and delimiting their responsibilities differently. The paper also demonstrates that three supplier types are particularly likely to be placed inside firms’ responsibility boundaries, while a fourth type is likely be placed outside. (shrink)

Stakeholder theory is one of the most influential theories in business ethics. It is perhaps not surprising that a theory as popular as stakeholder theory should be used in different ways, but when the disparity between different uses becomes too great, it is questionable whether all the ‘stakeholder research’ refers to the same underlying theory. This paper starts to clarify this definitional confusion by distinguishing between three different ways in which different lines of stakeholder research are connected with descriptive and (...) instrumental stakeholder theory. First, a distinction is made between research connected with descriptive and with instrumental stakeholder theory as defined by Donaldson & Preston in the narrow or broad sense. Second, a distinction is made between research that interprets descriptive and instrumental stakeholder theories as either hypotheses or research areas. Third, a distinction is made between research that interprets Donaldson & Preston’s central concept of ‘stakeholder management’ as either behaviour or rationale. Finally, the paper discusses the implications of these differences for empirical research into stakeholder theory. (shrink)

Landscape, Religion, and the Supernatural presents a summa of current and classic theorizing on religion and the supernatural in relationship to the land and develops this theorizing further by confronting it with a rich set of folkloristic and historical data. Focusing on the themes of "time and memory", "repeating patterns", "identity formation", "morality", "labor", "playfulness and adventure", "power and subversion", "sound", "emotions", "coping with contingency", "home and unhomeliness", as well as "nature and environment", the book engages with a broad range (...) of theoretical concepts and approaches from the interdisciplinary field of landscape theory and the study of religions. It brings this theorizing into dialogue with the rich culture of local storytelling and landscape-related traditional beliefs of the Strandir district of the Icelandic Westfjords. In this rural region, landscape-related traditions have been collected since the early nineteenth century and continue to be important to this day. Confronting this rich heritage with the insights of landscape theory both in and beyond the study of religions allows important new contributions to theorizing landscape and religion, especially when it comes to considering the perspectives on landscape held by rural populations rather than the urban upper classes that have stood in the focus of research to date. The example of the Icelandic Westfjords shows the extreme richness of religious and supernatural approaches to the landscape that can be developed in rural communities, and how they are significantly and characteristically different from the urban perspectives of literature and the arts. (shrink)

Over the past decade, discussion has flourished among practitioners and academics regarding workers’ rights in developing countries. The lack of enforcement of national labour laws and the limited protection of workers’ rights in developing countries have led workers’ rights representatives to attempt to establish transnational industrial relations systems to complement existing national systems. In practice, these attempts have mainly been operationalised in unilateral codes of conduct; recently, however, negotiated international framework agreements (IFAs) have been proposed as an alternative. Despite their (...) growing importance, few studies have empirically studied IFAs. This paper starts to fill this gap by studying why corporations adopt IFAs, based on a qualitative study of the process leading to the signing of a recent IFA. The study’s findings complement existing research into why corporations adopt IFAs, codes of conduct, and CSR policies by demonstrating that corporate motives can be linked to a desire to retain a trusting relationship with the labour union movement. In addition, the findings indicate that the discrete campaign model of stakeholder pressure dominant in previous research should be complemented by a continuous bargaining model of stakeholder pressure. The paper concludes by discussing differences between these conceptual models of stakeholder pressure and avenues for future research. (shrink)

The protection of workers' rights is at the heart of the ongoing debate on business ethics. In balancing transnational corporations' (TNCs) influence in private regulatory systems intended to protect workers' rights in emerging economies, several authors have emphasized the importance of cooperative relationships between unions and NGOs. In practice, however, conflict has often entered into union-NGO relations, weakening the protection of workers' rights. We argue that cooperative union-NGO relationships are difficult to form in part because of the differences existing between (...) how unions and NGOs organize. More specifically, based on two qualitative studies, we demonstrate that the problems stem from differences in organizing related to (i) identity construction, (ii) governance systems, and (iii) resources. The article concludes with a discussion on the possibility of successful union-NGO cooperation and improved protection of workers' rights in emerging economies. (shrink)

In twentieth century Europe and the USA, industrial relations, labour, and workers' rights issues have been handled through collective bargaining and industrial agreements between firms and unions, with varying degrees of government intervention from country to country. This industrial relations landscape is currently undergoing fundamental change with the emergence of transnational industrial relations systems that complement existing national industrial relations systems. Despite the significance of this ongoing change, existing research has only started to explore the implications of this change for (...) how workers' rights are governed around the globe. This paper addresses this gap by outlining an agenda for future research into the transnational governance of workers' rights. Fulfilling such a research agenda would be both challenging, as it requires combining the so far divergent industrial relations and business ethics research streams, and rewarding, as it provides ample scope for promising future research. (shrink)

This paper develops an empirically grounded, processual view of corporate social performance (CSP) by analyzing how internal organizational processes affect a firm’s social performance. Based on two case studies, we argue that changes in a firm’s social performance are triggered by continuously reoccurring instances of poor fit between the firm’s routines and its institutional environment. We propose that reactive change processes, initiated by stakeholder critique threatening the organization’s legitimacy, will result in isomorphic type of social performance changes. In comparison, proactive (...) change processes, initiated by slack resources, are more likely to result in nonisomorphic type of social performance changes. Furthermore, we propose that top-down driven processes will result in structural social performance changes in the direction of internationally influential stakeholders’ demands, while bottom-up driven processes will result in output social performance changes in the direction of locally influential stakeholders’ demands. (shrink)