Dr. Peter Herrmann is a sociologist of German origin -- well, he was, before moving forward, being now ..., well, some say: social philosopher, permanently crossing borders between arts, economics, jurisprudence, philosophy, political science and .., yes, still sociology ... and having lost many links to the origins as fasr as nationality is concerned, trying to imagine that there is no border ...
Enlightenment — there is no “one international day of enlightenment”, if there would be, it would be a European one as Eurocentrism prevails; and if there would be it would also be difficult to decide on a date – too many could be reasonably suggested (see also here). One that may be of outstanding meaning, simply due to the fact that is always used as reference, could be linked to the publication of Immanuel Kant’s piece “Beantwortung der Frage: Was ist Aufklärung?” (In: Berlinische Monatsschrift, 1784 – 2019 it would be 235 years ago) – At the end there are three aspects that really matter, shown in the photo below:
(photo taken in Berlin, October 2019)
See here for the “solution”. And see here for …, well, is this documentation on Light in the Cities the metaphorical presentation of the socio-economico-philosophical meaning of light or is the socio-economico-philosophical real advancement a result of power-technical developments?
(There may be a version with translations, or the original French …?)
… – and still it is a field of reflection that has to be entered, not aiming on mocking anybody or anything as it is suggested as part of the debate on “little Eichmanns”, supposedly denying the sincerity and the difference of war crimes, as argued by Henri Clemens (Clemens Heni, November 2, 2008: Secondary Anti-Semitism: From Hard-Core to Soft-Core Denial of the Shoah). Such position may easily be seen as denial of the banality of evil, waiting until it is too late ….
First they came for the Jews
and I did not speak out
because I was not a Jew.
Then they came for the Communists
and I did not speak out
because I was not a Communist.
Then they came for the trade unionists
and I did not speak out
because I was not a trade unionist.
Then they came for me
and there was no one left
to speak out for me.
****
It is the time of the year again, students worrying about their future, teachers eager to support them finding their way …, and going it. It is about writing academic references that are nowadays increasingly administratively defined ….. It is the time of the year again …institutions – schools of different kind, employers, training centre, parties and NGOs …. well, and if needed hospitals for the burned-out, welfare offices for the drop-outs, prisons for the forced-outs and whoever else comes to mind being waiting …, opening their doors to help everybody finding a place in this democracy of which
T&C apply – and when it comes to terms & conditions, one of the decisive questions, easily forgotten, is: Who is, who is the actual actor? Or is it a What-Actor?
It had been frequently mentioned on these pages that in the academic world – as in so many other worlds – it is administrative systems, paralysing people who then paralyse people … – does the law of six degrees of separation also apply here? Will the fifth who has to be paralysed, end in a coma; the sixth immediately going down into the grave, even if physically still alive?
Preparing a presentation I gave some time ago in Ostrava, Neil Postman’s book on Amusing ourselves to Death came to my mind, shifting the at the time frequent attention from Orwell toward Huxley, his excelling grasp of the tantalising effect of totalising amusement, entertainment …
Part of this is the increasing fragmentation – each little act needing a rule, every two rules in need of another rule by which the two are linked, brought together, of course being in need of another rule that keeps them together …., an exponentially growing rule-you-machine, rolling out a net in which also responsibility gets lost, simply not felt …, but not felt because the brain is forced into the Procrustean bed of a surveillance state, lurking around every corner:
Torturing a prisoner on the rack, Middle Ages. A 19th-century representation of a medieval torture device in use, from World of Wonders, published by Cassell and Co, (London, 1894). (Photo by Ann Ronan Pictures/Print Collector/Getty Images)
Every wee commodity not only claiming to be an entire world but loudly demanding – Thou shalt have no other commodities before me.
Every little rule not only claiming to be an entire world but loudly stating – Thou shalt have no other rules before me.
Every little act not only claiming to be an entire world but loudly enforcing – Thou shalt think about no other act before me. …
… NO EXCUSE – NO EXCUSE – NO EXCUSE – NO EXCUSE …
The consequences you have to bear, equally singular as every single commodity, rule and act. No, the consequences ARE NOT singular, they are paralysing, comatising, engraving as bringing-into-the-grave …
This points on the underlying problem – the methodological segmentation of actor, referential space, action seen as relevant and time:
If the public is only me – not in terms of individualisation but in terms of relevance: an earthquake, fire as also the beauty of a sunrise, and the relevance of my action are equally only me, my maintenance and security, safety, comfort …., enjoyment, career, arousal or anything relevant as matter of satisfaction when facing the need of emergency management, protecting against drowning in the tsunami of threats from nature, including emotions.
Hannah Arendt wrote about the banality of evil, following and analysing the process against Eichmann in Jerusalem. The massmurderer claimed that he did only what he had been asked, told to do … – rule is rule, act is act, outcome is outcome …. Eichmann’s argument: I had not been responsible, I knew, though only followed the rule … others …
Supposedly he accepted in hindsight
I am guilty – that is the larger rule for those who accept responsibility beyond the tiny, singular rule
another Big Bang, ending in another singularity.
It is worth to make a little side remark, looking at the work of Georg Jellinek, who studied form 1867 onwards jurisprudence, arts history, philosophy and history. He emphasised in his work not least that law – and one can thus say also administrative norms are only part of a wider setting. They cannot explain their acceptance and implementation which are a matter of society and people living in it. Or in the present context we may say: law and order is nothing that emerges simply from legally valid acts and individuals executing them orderly, i.e. within the order – the conflict Gustav Radbruch had been investigating in 1946, suggesting that in law it has to be considered that there are possible conflicts between the positive law and the requirement of material justice. Though Radbruch came to the conclusion of the superiority of positive law, he always faced the problematique of falling short where that law would stand in extreme conflict with being unbearable. It should be read as where the consequence in reality means they are not able to give an answer to the needs of reality. And as such they are not sufficient to deal with the contradictions of reality … – realities of bureaucratic and other machines:
On the other hand, when a person is called an “automaton” or a “robot” it is usually a derogatory comment denoting someone who is stiff and awkward in speech or movement; one who lacks imagination, emotion, spontaneity or a sense of humor; a fanatical follower of rules and regulations; a social or political conformist who is easily manipulated due to an inability to think critically and independently. In a recent issue of Perspectives, the news magazine of the American Historical Association, a history teacher objected to a Florida state education bill that asserted the view that Amer- ican history is “factual, not constructed,” by declaring that making students memorize information without teaching them analytic skills was tantamount to turning them into “little robots.”
(Kang, Minsoo, 2011: Sublime Dreams of Living Machines. The Automaton in the European Imagination; Cambridge, Massachusetts, and London, England: harvard university press 4)
****
It is the time of the year again, students worrying about their future, teachers eager to support them finding their way …, and going it. It is about writing academic references that are nowadays increasingly administratively defined ….
…. paradoxically so many complaining, criticising …., and clicking the link, ticking the box ….. it is the rule – a rule I cannot change …., and isn’t clicking, ticking …. an act of banality …. a wee act, not doing any harm, and if it does do any harm it is actually done by others … Providing the garrote is not using it, is not even telling others to do so …., we may even warn them while handing it over to the tyrant:
Not cruelty is the attribute of tyranny, but the destruction of the public political realm, monopolised by the despot by claiming ‘wisdom’ … or based on thirst for power, i.e. insisting on citizens looking after their private concerns, leaving it to him, the ‘ruler, to take of the public matters’.
(Arendt, Hannah, 1958: Vita Activa oder Vom Tätigen Leben; München/Zuerich: Piper, 1981, new edition: 215; translated from the German edition; with reference to Aristotle: Athenische Verfassung; XV, 5)
****
on administrative issues, simple money issues …Well the many other things: professional ones or …, well, what is called “private/personal” – and being in the middle of it .., and trying to resist: cosy links, giving in when certain requirements are put forward …, and permanently asking if there is a definitive frontier line where TREASON begins, if and where. Knowing well, that there had been and still is very interesting stuff going on. But the latter makes it somewhat more difficult. Recently I had been reading some “old stuff”, 60s, more 70s and even 80s. So many wise things said – then it had been dealing with other “items” as Postman’s look at TV which could be written today, with wee alterations, now on computers and the WWW.
Who listened and listens?
There are so many things going on about critique of using SSCI- or SCOPUS as standard …, and when it comes to the point … , bubbles not only in the economy. Or, of course I have to say this: it is part of the economy: the material basis, the way in which people price and reproduce their daily life, and that is a matter of the economy …
Of course, it my sound like being over the top, but how often do we have to ask questions that are at least in structural terms, in principle, like those we see dealt with in the theatre play Terror, in legal cases as the one Fuller had been writing about under the title Case of the Speluncean Explorers … where is the tipping point that marks the step into the middle of the banality of evil …, and the step where resistance turns into “integration on a higher level” – I could have used this expression as one line of the Ostrava-talk mentioned earlier: there it had been Bansky, apparently protesting, revolting … attempted subversion coming out at the other end as submerging: the stream of the banality: in that case “arts as object of speculation”, in other cases – and they bother me again: letting one student down, because I cannot accept what I think is “terror of administration” against studentship: Warwick (again) writing something as ‘We cannot accept reference letters sent as mail attachment, you have to create an account, log in, …. Well, I wrote, answering:
I am terribly sorry that you submitted yourself under the rule of technological dictatorship – and I am upset that you force other people to do the same – which is …
Read Hannah Arendton The Banality of Evil – that is where you will find yourself.
You may accept the letter attached or otherwise I feel sorry for the student for the fact that I cannot do the secretarial service for a university that did not learn from its own history, and is dealing with colleagues in a highly disrespectful and offending way, using outdated procedures.
Upset, sincerely upset
Peter Herrmann
And what happens: an automated reply
Sometimes it may be even better getting this kind of reply than getting another lie, directly and personally stated, with a smile. I wanted to write “credenced with a smile” – thinking there would be something in English like the German Kredenzen: “present, in a more or less celebratory way … “ – there is no such term, but in English we have the term “credence”, of which the dictionary says:
Well, at least for me it is difficult to live with such tension – being aware of it, assuming that people are actually not “bad”, not all people .. , and still: there is the ultimate need to overcome such banality …, before we really end up sliding into it again … – well, you see, I still try to make sense, even trying to gain energy from all this, against the odds, and against the temptation to give in into the ultimate urge of the ultimate paralysis.
It is in this way that the Christmas-hustle and bustle put me off, as every year, like so many celebrations. Bubble-happiness then, perhaps it is the complement of bubble economies that are living in the stream of … bubbles, a huge stream, being fed by a spring of foam.
****
As stated in the beginning
It surely is in some respect a no-go-area for reflection. Eichman and the little bailiffs … – and still it is a field of reflection that has to be entered, unmasking the authoritarian personality ….
And then we arrive at the strangulation of young people, eager to study, though pushed towards pressing a button …. call it gamification of applications, then of studying, then of work – you may get the gamification also without the detour …. – no studies needed, many of the new gods with their temples in Silicon Valley, are drop outs, many even (quasi-) criminals ….
strangulating everybody who … resists the need to go beyond the excitement of
click
for like
click
for excitement – and do not allow any negative feeling, critique, discourse ….
****
Indeed,
Principiis obsta. Sero medicina parata, cum mala per longas convaluere moras.
Wehre den Anfängen! Zu spät wird die Medizin bereitet, wenn die Übel durch langes Zögern erstarkt sind
And indeed, Ovid’s words are relevant … – can’t we see some amorousness when looking at the pedantic errand boys and errand girls , proud and nescient …?
First they came for the Jews
and I did not speak out
because I was not a Jew.
Then they came for the Communists
and I did not speak out
because I was not a Communist.
Then they came for the trade unionists
and I did not speak out
because I was not a trade unionist.
Then they came for me
and there was no one left
to speak out for me.
Or in the words of C. Wright Mills, written in 1956 in his book on The Power Elite
It is much safer to celebrate civil liberties than to defend them; it is much safer to defend them as a formal right than to use them in a politically effective way. Even those who would most willingly subvert these liberties usually do so in their very name. It is easier still to defend someone else’s right to have used them years ago than to have something yourself to say now and to say it now forcibly. The defense of civil liberties—even of their practice a decade ago—has become the major concern of many liberal and once leftward scholars. All of which is a safe way of diverting intel- lectual effort from the sphere of political reflection and demand.
A year coming to its end – most part of it I spent in Germany – after having left the country over twenty years ago for the ongoing ‘Odyssee’, only occasionally returning, for short visits …
… many things are still in the olden places or are put back into place, re-establishing hope; others are obviously changed; and some of these are creeping changes, barely mentioned, while very obvious for the attentive … stranger, eternal tourist as I had been occasionally classified. One of the latter is here suggested as the
“All-Good-Model”
When it comes to politics and economic policies it is for instance veiled in proposals to regulate a little bit better, to include some special clauses and quotas, the premise however being “all is good” After having lived in Munich after my return end of 2017 for some weeks, I was getting used to the expression “all is good” – a standard phrase that didn’t to exist when I left in the 1990s – the time when the “new, large, Germany” was surely still in its infancy, the new empire already very self-conscious, though still learning to walk on its clumsy feet.
Sure, I know the All-Good from earlier, noticing something similar during my “Italian journey” – in the country where the lemons bloom, it always occured to me to be the central good (good as in what is produced and also as in what is judged as valuable) of the language: nessun problema! and so was the lifestyle – wonderful, if you had completely immersed in it, knowing that an idiot crossing the street and forcing you to emergency break is ‘una bella’ and a turbulent stock-market is un incredibile sviluppo in questi giorni and non c’è dubbio, la vita è bella – e non si dovrebbe guardare a ciò che è brutto – there is no doubt, life is beautiful – and you should not look at what is ugly; if you were there as a visitor, knowing that it is only some limited time; often difficult to handle, if you live there as a stranger in Georg Simmel’s sense – in a way where abstract time and concrete time, as Henri Bergson defined it, can never unite; and in the long run the nessun probelma is extremely dangerous as we can see in the “soft-fascist” Mussolini, in Berlusconi and M5S.
Now it arrived in Germany as All-Good – I think it is something with which we all have to engage much more strongly. In short, part of the generation change, which also paves the way to a very special field on which a new generation seems to meet with a weird mix of individualism and pragmatism about which I talked a bit more on other occasions:
As important as it is to set the “old class analysis” against it, I think it often lacks a rather critical reference to the way of life, making it difficult to detect the move of a new generation of an all good mood … – panem et circenses, the games go on – and for some these neo-feudal structures are most enjoyable – the Plutocrats, being even aware of what they are … – it is a matter of obtaining a space that allows the own ambitions to unfold – ‘clarity’ in their terms is what the Plutocrats stand for, and where real people do not accept this, they are victim of new strategies of cleansing, whipping Valley’s reality of extreme income polarisation out.
Many tech companies solved this problem by having the lowest-paid workers not actually be employees. They’re contracted out’, Schmidt explained. ‘We can treat them differently, because we don’t really hire them. The person who’s cleaning the bathroom is not exactly the same sort of person.
(Freeland, Chrystia, 2012: Plutocrats: The Rise of the New Global Super Rich and the Fall of Everyone Else; New York: The Penguin Press)
At least that changed – the previous all-good-lords did not even problenatise it, despite few:
If anything is wrong this is wrong. If we will not endure a king as a political power we should not endure a king over the production, transportation, and sale of any of the necessaries of life. If we would not submit to an emperor we should not submit to an autocrat of trade, with power to prevent competition and to fix the price of any commodity.
One prime social function of a university is to inquire freely and to criticize freely And the more managed, the more planned, the more ‘efficient’ the rest of society grows, the more important this function becomes.
There is always something new, or at least one can find always something new – and recently I stumbled upon more good-doers news, this time from google, saying
I would not suggest that there are people at work who are absolutely evil, or even more: I firmly believe that many of them are good-willing people, eager to make their knowledge available for a better world.
But Santa, just around the corner … knowing very well, that is need of a radical change in our thinking, leaving individualism and nationalism as methodological guides behind, search gin for long-term programmes that guarantee sustainability, I may still come up with too small suggestions, that can be taken up without much ado:
payment of taxes, possibly to a global fund that is based in and linked to rights that deserve to be seen as Global Human Rights and as such guaranteeing peoples’ and people’s freedom from exploitation, which, of course, entails that value chains are not established as poverty-chains.
and a really tiny thing: can’t providers of services like wordpress, computers like apple (it would take any single coin from the ca 14 billion they owe the people of Ireland) etc. stop setting the spell-check on US-English as default, often impossible to change … – yes, it is a wee thing – though I am sometimes wondering ion there is a connection between them, called the mental and intellectual trap(ing) coming from US-imperialism.
Not cruelty is the attribute of tyranny, but the destruction of the public political realm, monopolised by the despot by claiming ‘wisdom’ … or based on thirst for power, i.e. insisting on citizens looking after their private concerns, leaving it to him, the ‘ruler, to take of the public matters’.[1]
Of course, there are good reasons for proper referencing, based on sound and serious work with books, how, otherwise, should we climb up on the shoulders of giants ….., to borrow from Isaac Newton.
But if serious work is ridiculed by paranoia-infected, formalist series-killers of intellectual freedom one may have to think if one should change discipline, from giant-climbing to em–powerwalking, enabling the intellect to breath again … Or as Frédéric Gros writes:
Many others have written their books solely from their reading of other books, so that many books exude the stuffy odour of libraries. By what does one judge a book? By its smell (and even more, as we shall see, by its cadence). Its smell: far too many books have the fusty odour of reading rooms or desks. Lightless rooms, poorly ventilated. The air circulates badly between the shelves and becomes saturated with the scent of mildew, the slow decomposition of paper, ink undergoing chemical change. The air is loaded with miasmas there. Other books breathe a livelier air; the bracing air of outdoors, the wind of high mountains, even the icy gust of the high crags buffeting the body; or in the morning, the cool scented air of southern paths through the pines. These books breathe. They are not overloaded, saturated, with dead, vain erudition.[2]
At least such setting comes to mind if a publisher, and not only one, is now asking to mention, when inserting tables, matrices etc. something like “own calculation”…. – next step up the ladder of mental tyranny: every sentence requires a footnote: this sentence had been written by myself …. .
The policing ideas are surely not coming from mentally healthy people, who’re are able to make use of the qualification the surely have. It may be that they are actually not coming from people at all – instead emerging from weird apparatuses, independent as a quasi-demon, reminding of The Sorcerer’s Apprentice:
What is astonishing is that we factually – we = at least too many in academia, factually = in too many cases of writing, administratively and political-economically defining performance – simply accept the bending of law, perhaps with a grumble and an acquaintance, more or less certain within, but factually without counter-censorship and without demanding two, nevertheless, generally valid legal principles:
the acceptance of innocence until proven otherwise
the obligation of the plaintiff to prove the accusation
It is much safer to celebrate civil liberties than to defend them; it is much safer to defend them as a formal right than to use them in a politically effective way. Even those who would most willingly subvert these liberties usually do so in their very name. It is easier still to defend someone else’s right to have used them years ago than to have something yourself to say now and to say it now forcibly. The defense of civil liberties – even of their practice a decade ago – has become the major concern of many liberal and once leftward scholars. All of which is a safe way of diverting intellectual effort from the sphere of political reflection and demand.[4]
In the piece The Roads Around Pisa, Karen Blixen wrote
How difficult it is to know the truth. I wonder if it is really possible to be absolutely truthful when you are alone. Truth, like time, is an idea arising from, and dependent upon, human intercourse. What is the truth about a mountain in Africa that has no name and not even a footpath across it? The truth about this road is that it leads to Pisa, and the truth about Pisa can be found within books written and read by human beings. What is the truth about a man on a desert island? And I, I am like a man on a desert island.[5]
Why? Why can truth be characterised this way, as part of walking together one road? And why can one feel this way, deserted, (a)lone(ly) on an island? One reason behind it will be that we are not really acknowledging the fact that we are ourselves only by others – call it ubuntu if you need a name, though remain aware of the fact that it is probably a term that can only be understood by people who ubuntued instead of growing up Western-ly enlightened (or should we say something like who Montesquieu-ed?).[6]To ubuntu then is about knowing the wings of freedom it gives, also feeling the marks of strangulation that come with it, and knowing that no arithmetic sum can be gained to measure its value.
Truth, as much as it is about ‘objective facts’ which includes social facts as approached by Durkheim in sociology, existing independent of any consciousness, is importantly also itself a social fact, on the one hand by being result of our common action, on the other hand by being important element of and for our common action: experiences we have – together with others, or at least together in one space – are the foundation of further experience, further action, further contest, be it contest between people or between people and the objective environment which itself is changed depending on how we approach it, what we do with our experience of it. Though this may sound difficult, it actually is trivial. Go out one of these winter days, just wearing a t-shirt, at the side of your friend who is properly wrapped up … . You will start to feel cold (most likely at least); s/he will say that you are silly, you will physically eventually suffer, may have to stay in bed, put up the heating etc. … it will not necessarily be warmer when you go for a walk next time but, as small as it may be, there is some contribution also from here with regards to global warming. So, yes, there is some reason for saying
Now, there is also some link from here to the referencing. Without denying in any way the need for proper referencing, it is easy to see that it is simply breeding lies when it is getting over the top. The following illustration tries to show this:
Of course, any knowledge comes from somewhere, and thus anything we state comes from somewhere. This ‘somewhere’ develops by way of differentiation, roles historically and individually into some form of formal education [which is also the education in form(alitie)s], cascades up the stream of higher education in humanities and finally evaporating into general knowledge, be it general academic knowledge or ‘general literacy’. Thinking, writing, discoursing surely needs referencing. However, it only makes sense if it is about a definite reference as quote or paraphrasing or reflection of … in the sense of ‘see’ and ‘conferatur’. It does not make sense as matter of claiming ‘property’ where t property does already exist = it does to make sense to say: this is said by me (there are exceptions: to reclaim property: “This is what I said, the other took it from me.” or: “This is what I say, even if all others do not accept it.”) Strangely enough, publishers and academics are easily accepting extremely sloppy references taking the form of name and date stated, without letting the reader know why they forget mentioning the ‘cf.’ It equally accepted to refer to …, let’s say
Kant, Immanuel. Observations on the Feeling of the Beautiful and Sublime. Trans. John T. Goldthwait. University of California Press, 1961, 2003
@ from Wikipedia and similar things can be found in books, journals … – oh folks, the Kant who wrote the ‘observations’ in 1764, published 1799 in English language was in 1861 simply dead as a doornail.
– Over-Referencing is surly not much more than an intellectual masturbation of pity bourgeois, not knowing much, having read a lot and completely lacking the courage to say the little they may think quasi-independently, or lacking the courage to think independently …. Or is it about pushing academics – and all of us – finally to take Whithead’s words in Process and Reality
The safest general characterization of the European philosophical tradi- tion is that it consists of a series of footnotes to Plato.
literally. That is surely equally misleading …
Only Problems of Academics?
As such, these are indeed problems of academics – and let’s face it: many widely abused their power by reputation, the lack of control of performance and ethical standards, one of the “highlights” the former minister for education resigning over PhD-plagiarism.
This is of course already something that goes beyond the academic world and effects everybody – as matter of such people being in positions where they decide for instance over the future of our children. Coincidentally, while writing, I receive a mail from the Council of Europe, talking about
But there is even more to it: it is the spirit that pervades in such attitudes: such request for permanent proof, such spirit of distrust is lurking behind so many forms we have to complete, so many authorisations we need – it is the spirit of tyranny Hannah Arendt was talking about starting from the assumption that we are all criminals while giving us an opportunity to show that we are not – it is the opportunity within a strangulated public of a surveillance state.
Far reaching, indeed, and a matter of The Struggle for Law, about which Rudolph Jhering writes[7]and which is really relevant even when it comes to The Tip and how to deal with it – as the same author writes[8]
Ob die hier gemachten Vorschläge Aussicht auf Verwirklichung haben? Man giebt uns Deutschen Schuld, dass wir einen Stein im Wege, an dem wir uns stossen, ruhig liegen lassen — Jeder verwünsche ihn, aber Niemand nähme sich die Mühe, ihn aus dem Wege zu räumen oder, wenn er für ihn allein zu schwer sei, Andere zur Hülfe herbeizuziehen. Das Trinkgelderunwesen ist ein solcher Stein, Jeder klagt über ihn, aber Jeder lässt ihn liegen. Der Vorwurf, den wir gegen den Stein erheben, richtet sich gegen uns selber; wer eine Unsitte bloss verwünscht, anstatt für seinen Theil mitzuwirken, sie zu beseitigen, klagt sich selber an — für das Bestehen einer Unsitte ist Jeder, der nicht den Muth hat, ihr entgegenzutreten, selber mit verantwortlich, Niemand hat das Recht, sich über sie zu beklagen, als derjenige, der sich das Zeugniss ausstellen kann, seinerseits Alles gethan zu haben, was in seinen Kräften stand, um ihr ein Ende zu machen. Jeder meiner Leser kann sich damit in Bezug auf das Trinkgelderunwesen sein eigenes Urtheil sprechen.
Do the proposals made here have any prospect of being implemented? We Germans are blamed for leaving a stone in our way lying quietly – everyone desires it, but no one takes the trouble to remove it or, if it is too heavy for him alone, to bring others to help. The unbeing of tips is such a stone, everyone complains about it, but everyone leaves it lying. The reproach which we make against the stone is directed against ourselves; he who merely curses a bad habit, instead of cooperating for his part in eliminating it, accuses himself – everyone who does not have the courage to oppose it is himself responsible for the existence of a bad habit; no one has the right to complain about it, as he who can give the testimony has done everything in his power to put an end to it. Each of my readers can thus speak his own judgment with regard to the tipping misdemeanour.
Kant, in his Metaphysics of Ethics summarised it in a short sentence – the simple thing, of which it is so difficult to get it right:
… he who first makes himself a worm, does not complain when he trampled under foot.
***********
[1] Arendt, Hannah, 1958: Vita Activa oder Vom Tätigen Leben; München/Zurich: Piper, 1981, new edition: 215; translated from the German edition; the 2nd English edition: Arendt, Hannah, 1958: The Human Condition; Introduction by Margaret Canovan; Chicago: University of Chicago Press; second edition 1998 does not contain the passage in this way
[2] Passi di: Frederic Gros. “A Philosophy of Walking”. Apple Books.
[3] Goethe, Johann Wolfgang von, 1797: Zauberlehrling [The Sorcerer’s Apprentice]; translation by Edwin Zeydel
[4] Mills, C. Wright, 1956: The Power Elite; Oxford University Press, 2000: 334
[6] Of course, making such statement evokes the need to qualify it, stating at least: such characterisations have to be taken with care, they are based on out limited knowledge, they are ideal-types/idealisations and as such they are also based on the current view, neglecting for instance several ‘ubuntu qualities’ and also individualist aspects in both our histories.
[7] Jhering, Rudolph von, 1879: The Struggle for Law
The shooting … Of course, critique is critical in such a moment, and criticising too, if not even reprehensible.
“We must move forward. This is why the European Parliament keeps working.”
It all comes down to a battle of ideas, in which society needs to demonstrate that there is value in freedom, democratic institutions, the free and peaceful expression of ideas, fundamental rights. We need a resilient democracy. And we need a strong Europe.
The show, as they say, must go on.
oosting the number of completed forms increases security and replaces proper management
apital is reinterpreted: being the thing in itself, it’s increase is the main thing, even if such increase results from the factual deception of increased amount of input of labour as operand – simply as figure
All show, all glimmer, all appearance, spectacle …
Doesn’t it make more sense to emphasise the need of a move to serious work, beyond the show:
beyond and different to sham activities?
beyond a bureaucratisation that is searching for justification by remaining self-reflective, not oriented on dealing with people’s and peoples’ life?
beyond the glamour of GDP-growth, aiming on sustainable production but also inclusive ways of determining what to produce and how to organize it?
I guess we all need LESS show and more genuine engagement and solid spheres to engage. May be it would be a kind of revolution against le roi, the new king.
The value of it, the distribution of what is produced, actually leaves more the people naked, while the new rulers are really something like members of a new feudal class.
In Gedenken an das wissenschaftliche Werk und das gesellschaftspolitische Engagement des kritischen Ökonomen Jörg Huffschmidwird 2019 zum fünften Mal der nach ihm benannte Preis für herausragende Arbeiten aus dem Feld der Politischen Ökonomie ausgeschrieben. Der Preis soll insbesondere junge Wissenschaftlerinnen und Wissenschaftler ermutigen, kritische Forschung im Sinne des Wirkens dieses herausragenden Wissenschaftlers betreiben.
Jörg Huffschmid, der im Dezember 2009 im Alter von 69 Jahren gestorben ist, verband in seinen Arbeiten scharfsinnige Analysen mit Kapitalismuskritik und politischer Vernunft. Als einer der Gründer der Arbeitsgruppe Alternative Wirtschaftspolitik und der EuroMemo Gruppe sowie in seinem Wirken im Wissenschaftlichen Beirat von Attac und der Rosa-Luxemburg-Stiftung war sein persönliches, politisches und wissenschaftliches Zieleine sozial gerechte Gesellschaft – gegen die vermeintliche Alternativlosigkeit des wirtschaftswissenschaftlichen Mainstreams. Diese vier Organisationen schreiben daher den Preis seit 2011 alle zwei Jahre gemeinsam aus.
Eingereicht werdenkönnenneben Dissertationen auch Magister-, Master- und Diplomarbeiten in der Kategorie Abschlussarbeiten. Für Dissertationen ist eine Auszeichnung über 1.500 Euro und für Studienabschlussarbeiten über 500 Euro vorgesehen. Die Arbeiten sollten dem Feld der Politischen Ökonomie entstammen, zum Beispiel:
Finanzmarkt-, Fiskal-, Handels- und Industriepolitik
Alternativen zu Austerität und Privatisierung
Militarisierung europäischer Außen-, Grenzsicherungs- und Rüstungspolitik
Herausforderungen im digitalen Zeitalter
Sozial-ökologischer Umbau
10 Jahre nach dem Zusammenbruch von Lehman Brothers – Lehren aus der jüngsten globalen Finanz- und Wirtschaftskrise
20 Jahre Euro – Kontroversen um die Europäische Währungsunion
Dabei ermutigen wir ausdrücklich zur Einreichung disziplinübergreifender Arbeiten, die ökonomische mit sozial- oder politikwissenschaftlichen Ansätzen kombinieren.
Berücksichtigung finden Arbeiten, die seit dem April 2017 an einer europäischen Hochschule in deutscher oder englischer Sprache eingereicht und bewertet wurden. Arbeiten von Mitgliedern der ausschreibenden Arbeitsgruppen, Beiräte und den Beschäftigten der RLS können nicht berücksichtigt werden. Ihre Bewerbung richten Sie bitte vollständig und ausschließlich in elektronischer Form bis zum 1. April 2019 anJoerghuffschmidpreis@esosc.eu. Ihrer Arbeit fügen Sie bitte bei:
Anschreiben
Zusammenfassung im Umfang von 800 Wörtern – in der der Bezug zum wissenschaftlichen Werk von Jörg Huffschmid dargestellt wird
Lebenslauf
die hochschulischen Gutachten zur Arbeit.
Die Jury des Jörg-Huffschmid-Preises besteht 2019 aus:
Gerstenberger,Heide,Wissenschaftlicher Beirat Attac, Universität Bremen;
Hafkemeyer,Jörg;Wissenschaftlicher Beirat der Rosa-Luxemburg-Stiftung, Universität der Künste Berlin;
Herrmann, Peter, EuroMemo Gruppe, Corvinus University Budapest;
Huffschmid, Anne,FU-Berlin
Mahnkopf,Birgit,Wissenschaftlicher Beirat Attac, Hochschule für Wirtschaft und Recht Berlin
Ötsch, Silke, Wissenschaftlicher Beirat Attac
Sablowski, Thomas, Rosa-Luxemburg-Stiftung
Sauer, Thomas, Arbeitsgruppe Alternative Wirtschaftspolitik, Ernst-Abbe-Hochschule Jena;
Schrooten, Mechthild,Arbeitsgruppe Alternative Wirtschaftspolitik, Hochschule Bremen,
Beratend arbeitenBärbel RompeltienundRainer Rilling(Mitglied des Vorstands der Rosa-Luxemburg-Stiftung) in der Jury mit.
Die Preisverleihungist für den 18. Oktober 2019 in Berlin geplant.
In memoriam of the scientific work and the political engagement of the critical economist Joerg Huffschmid the call for the award that is named after him is now announced for the 5thtime, awarding outstanding works in the field of Political Economy. The aim is to encourage in particular young scholars to take up on the tradition of critical thinking for which the outstanding name giver of the prize stands.
Joerg Huffschmid, who passed away in December 2009, at the age of 69 years, combined in his work astute analyses with a critique of capitalism and political reason. As one of the founders of the Arbeitsgruppe Alternative Wirtschaftspolitik, the EuroMemo group and member of the scientific council of attac and the Rosa Luxemburg Foundation he aimed in his personal, political and scientific life on a socially just society, engaged against the supposed lack of an alternative as suggested by mainstream economics. Therefore the four organisations publish since 2011 the call for this award.
We invite final degree-theseson level of PhD, Magister, Master and Diploma. The selected PhD-thesis will be awarded with 1500 Euro, the other collected degree thesis will be awarded with 500 Euro. The work should be related to the field of Political Economy, and look, for instance at the following:
finance, fiscal, trade and industrial policy
alternatives to austerity and privatisation
militarisation of European foreign-, border-security and armament policies
challenges arising from processes of digitalisation
socio-ecological remodelling
social and technological innovation and new economic systems
10 years after the collapse of Lehman Brothers – consequences of the recent financial and economic crisis
20 years Euro – controversies concerned with the European Monetary Union
Encouraged are especially theses that apply an approach that brings different disciplines together, integrating economics and approaches from social and political science.
We will consider submissions that had been accepted since April 2017at a European university/third-level institution, submitted in German or English language.Submissions by members of one of the four organisations and members of the respective scientific councils will not be considered. Applications are only accepted in electronic form, to be sent before or at the very latest on April 1st, 2019to the following address:
oosting the number of completed forms increases security and replaces proper management
COMMEDIA DELLA VITA OR PÁNTA RÊI'S FIRM GROUND 
