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This article proposes a novel way to understand the oppression of ableism through the modal device of counterfactual bodies. I begin with an overview of counterfactual bodies, defined here as the reimagining of disabled individuals without their disability. Some counterfactual bodies become vehicles of oppression when distorted by the imperative of cure, under which striving to actualize a counterfactual body becomes a morally laden aim for disabled bodies. Next, I outline some of the material, psychological and physical costs of striving to actualize a counterfactual body, which includes the disproportionate distribution of resources, suspended body grief, and pain and suffering. Finally, I consider the conditions under which a counterfactual body becomes a manifestation of ableism.
This article examines a tension between María Lugones’ critique of the universality of gender, and her view of the role of categorial thought in resisting what she calls the coloniality of gender. I argue that Lugones seeks alternatives to oppressive gender arrangements, advocating for a world where multiplicity replaces fragmentation and sexual differences exist without categories. However, the text challenges the necessity of abandoning categorial thinking altogether for transformative resistance, emphasizing instead the importance of solidarity, coalition-building, and alliances among people with diverse cosmologies in struggle against colonial and structural oppression.
Cet article propose une critique de la définition individualisante du spécisme formulée par François Jaquet dans Le pire des maux. Éthique et ontologie du spécisme (2024), au profit d’une approche systémique. En mobilisant la théorie des systèmes sociaux de Talcott Parsons, j’y soutiens que le spécisme contemporain s’organise comme un système social, structuré autour de sous-systèmes culturels, politiques et économiques interdépendants. Cette perspective pourrait permettre d’identifier les racines profondes du spécisme dans les institutions et les normes qui le perpétuent. Elle dépasse ainsi l’analyse des comportements individuels et ouvre la voie à une compréhension plus politisée du spécisme.
Building on Kant’s idea of the ‘free play of the imagination’, we argue that sexual fantasy reveals both deep insights into our desires and emotional wounds as well as the impact of oppressive conditions on our sexual selves. After clarifying Kant’s distinctions between experience, dreams, and fantasy, insofar as they are important to defining the unique character of sexual fantasy, and incorporating feminist theories into our reading of Kant and sexual fantasy, we examine the intersection of aesthetic expression and moral significance, suggesting that fantasy is not morally neutral but deeply formative; indeed, viewed comprehensively, sexual fantasy can become a site for wise personal resistance and growth. Contrary to what seems to be Kant’s own worry, a Kantian view of sexual fantasy can provide resources for liberation from a tendency to regard oneself, and others, as mere objects in sexual fantasy, towards a more integrated sense of our multifaceted nature.
Chapter 3 analyzes some of the ways that stereotypes harm people’s sense of self and identity. One way is through expressive harm, which is the harm that results from the unwitting and inevitable perpetuation of stereotypes. Stereotypes have a pervasive cultural power that enables them to control people’s thoughts, feelings, behavior, and social interactions even when people actively disavow the stereotype. Other ways that stereotypes harm people’s sense of self and identity are through the internalization of oppressive social scripts, which ascribe motivations and expectations for behavior, and through stereotype threat, in which people inadvertently and paradoxically act in ways that correspond to stereotypes even as they are trying hard to avoid fitting stereotypes. When people with mental illness internalize oppressive social scripts and experience stereotype threat, they incorporate negative stereotypes into aspects of their experience and identity, which damages their identity and sense of self and also diminishes their autonomy.
While research on oppression has focused on the various ways in which oppressed or marginalized individuals are disadvantaged, standpoint epistemologists have long been arguing that the standpoints achieved from oppressed social locations can provide the marginalized with an epistemic advantage. While in themselves laudable, we venture, discussions of the advantage thesis tend to continue a tradition in mainstream epistemology that undermines the crucial role affectivity plays in disclosing facts about the world by framing the debate in purely epistemic terms. Bringing standpoint theory into conversation with contemporary philosophy of emotions, we argue, allows us to recognize the epistemic value of emotions and to see that some knowledge the marginalized can gain about the workings of oppression while cultivating their standpoint is at root fundamentally and irreducibly affective. This lends not only more credibility to the advantage thesis in general, but it also allows to arbitrate between two different readings of this thesis that are currently a matter of controversy: marginalized standpoints afford knowledge that is, due to its fundamentally affective nature, not just easier for the marginalized than the dominant to obtain, but in principle inaccessible to the dominant.
In this paper, I argue that the literature on victims’ duties to resist their own oppression has not paid enough attention to the heterogeneity of victims and how this affects their duties. The main aim of the paper is to introduce considerations and complications—informed by an intersectional analysis, and particularly the concept of privilege—that must be taken into account when determining how to assign duties to resist. I argue that failure to recognize these nuances results in an overcautiousness when it comes to assigning duties of resistance, and that a blanket reluctance to assign such duties is of most detriment to the most marginalized.
The final section reflects on the future of white supremacy, challenging the notion that it is an intractable, unchangeable force. While acknowledging its stubborn persistence over three centuries, the final reflection argues that describing racism as “timeless” or “complicated” often serves to justify inaction. It points to recent global protests following George Floyd’s murder as evidence of growing solidarity across different justice movements. These intersecting struggles against various forms of oppression – from police violence to denial of indigenous land rights – suggest increasing recognition of how different systems of power reinforce each other. The conclusion emphasizes that major social systems have fallen before, and encourages readers to imagine a future beyond white supremacy without limiting themselves to short-term or small-scale thinking.
What relevance does Mary Wollstonecraft's thought have today? In this insightful book, Sandrine Bergès engages Wollstonecraft with contemporary social and political issues, demonstrating how this pioneering eighteenth-century feminist philosopher addressed concerns that resonate strongly with those faced by twenty-first-century feminists. Wollstonecraft's views on oppression, domination, gender, slavery, social equality, political economics, health, and education underscore her commitment to defending the rights of all who are oppressed. Her ideas shed light on challenges we face in social and political philosophy, including intersectionality, health inequalities, universal basic income, and masculinity. Clear and accessible, this book is an invaluable resource for students and anyone interested in discovering who Mary Wollstonecraft was and how her ideas can help us navigate the struggles of today's feminist movement.
This chapter investigates the mechanisms of sexist domination and women’s apparent complicity in their own oppression in the Vindication of the Rights of Woman. It takes as its starting point Wollstonecraft’s claim that aristocratic women are as birds in cages who swap their freedom and reason for clothes and food. I ask whether this can be interpreted as a form of adaptive preferences, and, secondly, existentialist bad faith. I argue that while these theories are useful for understanding Wollstonecraft’s schema, they do not suffice to explain it.
Despite negative effects on their health and social lives, many informal carers of people living with dementia claim to be acting in accordance with a moral obligation. Indeed, feelings of failure and shame are commonly reported by those who later give up their caring responsibilities, suggesting a widespread belief that professional dementia care, whether delivered in the person’s own home or in an institutional setting, ought always to be a last resort. This chapter, however, suggests that this common intuition gets things the wrong way around. The most serious injustices engendered by present-day dementia care services are contingent on broader societal structures – they can thus be ameliorated relatively easily (if resource intensively). Informal dementia care, on the other hand, carries similar risks of injustice and is much more resistant to structural reform. While there may be moral obligations to provide informal dementia care in present-day societies, then, they arise because of the deficiencies of professional care, not the virtues of its informal counterpart.
The framework set out in this book reconceptualises the problem of dementia care as a problem of power and social exclusion. At every stage, the goal should be to empower recipients of care to meet their own needs and participate fully in social life as equals, necessitating restrictions on the power of carers and radical changes to our cultural assumptions about and depictions of dementia. Though few would disagree that Western dementia care services are in need of reform, the book’s emphasis on social equality means that the depth and character of the proposed reforms differ significantly from many of those under public discussion. Indeed, as demonstrated in this chapter, significant changes would be needed to the way the UK treats people living with dementia under the law in order to support the reforms recommended in this book.
Secure dementia units (SDUs) rely on a degree of coercive control that might strike many of us as intuitively unjust. This chapter, however, cautions against the idea that justice demands their elimination. Setting out the limits of community care models, it makes the case for the limited use of suitably reformed SDUs. While they ought not to be the first choice for meeting the care needs of people living with dementia, the chapter defends the view that these institutions are essential to the social care infrastructure of a just society.
The case highlights how White privilege penetrates the welfare system in unsuspecting ways. Public assistance programs, like TANF, play an important role in helping families face economic crises. However, the way these programs are implemented can block already vulnerable populations from getting the help they need. White privilege is a CRT tenet that can impact the experiences of welfare recipients. According to CRT, whiteness can perpetuate advantages for White individuals and conversely convey burdens for people of color. Understanding White privilege can help workers to understand some of the unique reasons why individuals end up on public assistance in the first place, and how implicit biases impact the way people of color receive or do not receive benefits.
This chapter addresses the rights of company members to protect their own interests or those of the company. The chapter focuses on the rights of shareholders in a company limited by share capital, but the principles and rules discussed here apply equally to members of companies limited by guarantee. The legal protections and remedies discussed here can arise in a number of situations.
This chapter is concerned principally with the legal remedies that can be sought by minority shareholders. We will see that these are mainly found in the Corporations Act, but we begin by looking at the common law history behind the statutory provisions. Then we turn to the statute, the three main remedies being actions for oppression and unfairness, the statutory derivative action, and the winding up remedy. The chapter then looks at three other forms of legislative action: injunctive relief, access to company information, and the use of civil proceedings by ASIC.
This Element analyses how Kant's practical philosophy approaches social suffering, while also taking into account the elusiveness of this concept in his work, especially when viewed through a contemporary lens. It claims that Kant's theory of human dignity is a vital tool for detecting social structures in need of improvement, even if the high demands it imposes on the subject show a propensity to conceal situations of domination and oppression. In his writings, Kant investigated various societal challenges such as widespread poverty, duties towards animals, care for the mentally ill, and motherhood out of wedlock, suggesting that the state should solve most of these through financial support from the wealthier segments of society. Although the direct testimony of victims of social suffering does not play a role in Kant's approach, the author holds that he views social interdependence – including, notably, non-humans – as a fundamental commitment underpinning human development.
This article clarifies two choices at two different levels of analysis—that theologians make (often implicitly) in employing social science to clarify how social structures affect moral agency. The first is the choice of a general causal account of how all social structures “work,” where this article endorses the view provided by critical realist sociology. The second is the choice of some particular causal account of the functioning of a specific kind of social structure. It proposes a new definition that applies to all, not simply the most egregious sinful social structures that accounts for both the oppression of the marginalized and the complicity of the privileged. To illustrate the analysis, we end by examining three features important in the transformation of sinful social structures that have received inadequate attention in the literature of theological ethics: nonmoral cognitive categories, bodily practices, and the penalties for noncompliance.
Exodus 2:1–10 has been thoroughly analyzed from a feminist perspective. This is appropriate because women play a significant role in the story. However, it is important to note that these female characters are not only defined by gender but also by ethnicity and social status. Combining analyses of ethnicity, gender, and class, this article demonstrates how the female figures in Exod 2:1–10 ignore, challenge, and subvert the polarizations established in Exod 1:8–22 by the Egyptian king. Exodus 2:1–10 can even be read as an example of cross-ethnic, cross-class, and cross-generational solidarity against a despotic regime that marginalizes and oppresses by using marks of differences. However, upon closer analysis it becomes evident that the female figures’ interactions are also determined by an unequal power dynamic. The article demonstrates how examining differences in gender, ethnicity, and class provides a nuanced understanding of power relations within biblical texts.
This chapter identifies and examines the elements determining the legal content of any given theory of, or positive law provision for, the human right to resist. It reviews the primary triggers or conditions for activation, indicating the ‘right to resist what’, including ‘tyranny’, ‘oppression’, and ‘other violations’. It reviews the secondary triggers or conditions for activation, indicating the ‘right to resist when’, in particular the necessity condition. It also reviews both aspects of the personal scope, being the rights-holders, indicating ‘who may resist’, and also the duty-bearers, indicating ‘whose corresponding duty’. It identifies a four-fold typology of legitimate ‘object and purpose’, or ‘right to resist why’, being for human rights enforcement, for self-defence, for self-determination, and for ‘peace’ or human security. The final element examined is the material scope of application, or ‘right to resist how’, identifying three competing approaches to permissible means, and affirming proportionality limitations and other applicable limitations in international human rights law and international criminal law, as well as grounds for discretionary non-exercise. This general analytical template for identification and comparison of elements and therefore content is then applied to the evidence of legal sources of the right considered in Chapters 5–7.
This chapter explores Schopenhauer’s views of the political systems in North America, Europe, and China. Schopenhauer understood the United States as a modern republic geared toward maximum individual freedom. He also took note of its high levels of interpersonal violence. Importantly, he repeatedly returned to US slavery as the most egregious example of institutionalized exploitation and brutality. In his treatment of the United States, he then connected republicanism to slavery and concluded that they were tightly associated. Schopenhauer’s argument against American republicanism does not, however, suggest that he endorsed traditional European monarchies. Against both North America and Europe, Schopenhauer instead held up the example of China as an advanced state that was hierarchical and imperial and yet resolutely nontheist. For Schopenhauer, China combined political stability and peacefulness with a philosophically sound atheism and thus demonstrated the realization of his political and his philosophical ideals.