Social and political philosophy Books

This book confronts the key questions surrounding comparative secularism in historical perspective. The contributions critically consider the normative ideas and alternative political arrangements that govern religion's relation to politics and to the...

This book makes a relevant contribution to a Marxist critical explanation of social conflicts, social movements and protests. There is abundant literature on social conflict and social movements from Marxist perspectives. However, rigorous criticism,...

This Handbook provides a comprehensive survey of major topics in the philosophy of punishment from many of the field's leading scholars. Key featuresPresents a history of punishment theory from ancient times to the present.Evaluates the main proposed...

This book addresses the topic of 'being bound' from a philosophical and a sociological perspective. It examines several ways in which we are bound. We are bound to acknowledge the truth and to follow laws; we are bound to others and to the world. Who we...

This volume contains fresh scholarly contributions to mark the birth centenary of John Hick, the internationally well-known philosopher of religion, whose works continue to have significant global relevance in today's religiously diverse and...

This book uses a philosophy of technology to demonstrate that guns are predisposed for an intentional use, making them inherently non-neutral artifacts. This argument rejects the often-cited value neutral thesis and instrumentalist view that "guns don't...

This book addresses the fate of intellectuals in modern culture and politics. Russell Jacoby's seminal The Last Intellectuals: American Culture in the Age of Academe (1987, 2000) introduced the term "public intellectual" and gave rise to heated...

In this book, translated into English for the first time, Lelio Demichelis takes on a modern perspective of the concept/process of alienation. This concept-much more profound and widespread today than first described and denounced by Marx-has largely...

This book addresses the manifold crisis of current societies and understands it as a failure of normative social structuration. As an exemplar for this development, it analyses the decline of welfare state models and the corresponding societal compromise...

This book considers the work of Charles Taylor from a theological perspective, specifically relating to the topic of ecclesiology. It argues that Taylor and related thinkers such as John Milbank and Rowan Williams point towards an "Aesthetic...

This book offers a conceptual map of Habermas' philosophy and a systematic introduction to his work. It does so by systematically examining six defining themes-modernity, discourse ethics, truth and justice, public law and constitutional...

This book analyzes the implication of secular/liberal values in Western and human rights law and its impact on Muslim women. It offers an innovative reading of the tension between the religious and secular spheres. The author does not view the two as...

This book offers a cognitive-semantic insight into the roots of the human decisionmaking process, using the metaphor of CHOICE as CUBE. The areas of key interest are language, culture, and education as forms of social organization. This...

This book offers the first comprehensive philosophical examination of the free speech 'battles' of the last decade, arguing for a critical republican conception of civility as an explanatory and prescriptive solution. Issues such as no-platforming...

This book interrogates the nature and state of African American citizenship through the prism of Social Contract Theory. Challenging the United States' commitment to African American citizenship, this book explores the idea of Social Nullification, the...

L'agonie du christianisme : quand il jeta ce brûlot d'Espagne dans les méditations heu-reuses d'un monde encore égal, Unamuno savait et voulait être provocant. Il ne pouvait en douter, rares seraient ceux qui gardaient assez de grec pour entendre qu'il...

Machiavel a la réputation d'être un penseur immoral. Son ouvrage le plus célèbre, Le Prince, est accusé d'être un manuel de rouerie et de cynisme en politique.Au contraire, il nous invite à regarder en face la réalité politique et humaine. Contre les...

If we assume, as both the new scientists and ancient wisdom traditions tell us, that all of reality is actually composed of interlocking dynamic energy fields, that life is a continuous process of organising energetic information into form, then what...

"The Ideology of Fascism" was written by Oswald Mosley in 1967 and provides a post WW2 analysis of the strengths and weaknesses of Fascism as a political doctrine, and utilising its strengths proposes a United Europe, in union with science, as...

Le développement de ce qu’on appelle la civilisation moderne tend à donner aux forces matérielles un avantage croissant sur les forces morales.Si l’on se fie à elle pour réaliser la justice sociale ou...

Nearly 80 years ago, Karl Popper gave a spirited philosophical defence of the Open Society in his two-volume work, The Open Society and Its Enemies. In this book, J. McKenzie Alexander argues that a new defence is urgently needed because, in the decades...

'Institutional critique' is best known through the critical practice that developed in the late 1960s and early 1970s by artists who presented radical challenges to the museum and gallery system. Since then it has been pushed in new directions by new...

Imagine that in the cold heart of a secret military facility, a new form of intelligence awakens. It is a synthetic mind born from intricate algorithms and complex computations, operating in ways unfathomable to its human creators. Charged with...

This book is addressed to everyone who is struggling and experimenting today, to everyone who is a true contemporary of what Stengers dares to call "the intrusion of Gaia," this "nature" that has left behind its traditional role and now has the power to...

The Analects of Confucius is a collection of teachings and sayings attributed to the Chinese philosopher Confucius and his disciples, compiled after his death. The text, structured as a series of dialogues and reflections, conveys Confucius's philosophy...

Donald J.Trump lives for their applause. Without it, he is lost. He doesn't know why he seeks their plaudits. He reassured the public in a rally by saying that he was "a very stable genius", and again, everyone clapped.In his own mind, he is more like...

In this book, Rebekka Hufendiek explores emotions as embodied, action-oriented representations, providing a non-cognitivist theory of emotions that accounts for their normative dimensions. Embodied Emotions will be of interest to philosophers working on...

This book provides a philosophical exposition of Ubuntu ethics, which is grounded in the understanding that 'a person is a person through other persons'. The book will be an important read for researchers of African philosophy, and of the philosophy of...

This volume demonstrates how Wittgenstein's philosophy can illuminate our understanding of politics and open new ways of conceptualizing democratic theory and practice. Its focus is on language, reason and communication as central to identifying present...

This volume examines the nature and significance of transformative experiences as they occur across a variety of contexts in human life. By treating these events as social as well as individual phenomena, the essays bring to light the various ways in...

Critique and Affirmation in Erich Fromm explores the relations between Erich Fromm's theory and practice in politics and the psychoanalytic clinic - their points of continuity and contradiction.

This book explores the philosophical foundations of communication studies, suggesting that communication phenomena extend beyond the scope of traditional scientific methods. It argues that communication, deeply intertwined with human behavior, cannot be...

This Open Access book examines many of the challenges posed by the COVID-19 pandemic through the distinctive lens of civility. The idea of civility appears often in both public and academic debates, and a polarized political climate frequently leads to...

"This is an outstanding contribution to both libertarian political philosophy and communication theory. It is far and away the most comprehensive work on communication issues in libertarian theory ever published. The author has integrated successfully...

Compulsory voting has operated in Australia for a century, and remains the best known and arguably the most successful example of the practice globally. By probing that experience from several disciplinary perspectives, this book offers a fresh,...

​This book uses Chinese version of dialectics to present interpretations of ocean governance, international regimes, issues in the South China Sea in general and the Chinese U-shaped line in particular, through the one-dot theory. It especially serves...

This book brings a much-needed re-examination of the concepts of social fairness and justice in light of the COVID-19 crisis. Through careful analysis of issues as diverse as the allocation of vaccines through the global system COVAX, women and gender,...

The book examines how medical knowledge is produced around bodies that do not fit in the heteronormative framework of the state's rationale and processes. The marginal bodies studied in this research are termed MSM, men who have sex with men, categorized...

This book brings the tools and ideas of Anglo-American analytic philosophy to bear on how we think about issues of contemporary significance, in a way that is accessible to a broad audience. While acknowledging empirical findings within the social...

The Ethics of Governance: Moral Limits of Policy Decisions offers a toolbox drawn from normative ethics which finds applications in public governance, primarily focusing on policy making and executive action. It includes ethical concepts and principles...

This book uniquely recovers and assesses Stoic political thought by tracking its uptake into Western modernity and exploring the extent of its impact. Classical Stoicism has lately seen a popular resurgence inspiring self-help books and therapeutic...

This book focuses on the ethical demands of extreme poverty and develops a political theory of practical change. Welding together political realism and moral aspirations, it argues that a re-imagined form of development NGO can help the global North...

Qualifying post-Westphalian sovereign statehood as a 'power' as argued for in Hendrik Berkhoff's political theology, this book addresses the decades-long theological-spiritual debate between Christian realism and Christian pacifism in U.S. foreign policy...

Considering the different traditions of cosmopolitan thinking and experimentation, this cutting edge volume examines the contemporary revival of cosmopolitanism as a response to the challenges of living in an interdependent world. Through a unique...

This book offers a comprehensive account of the great Neo-Confucian Master Cheng I (1033-1107), showing his philosophical ideas in a modern light. It systematically examines Cheng's extensive literature and provides an ingenious interpretation of Cheng's...

This work illustrates China's values and how they are practiced. After introducing readers to the theories, systematical structure, historical status, and influence of traditional Chinese values, it points out major developmental trends in connection...