In this wide-ranging interview, Dave Elder-Vass discusses his main contributions to critical realist theory over two decades. In the first half, he explains his early work on emergence, agency, str...

ABSTRACT In this wide-ranging interview, Bob Jessop discusses the development of, and many of the main themes in, his work over the last fifty years. He explains how he became interested in realism and Marxism; and he describes the various influences on his highly influential theory of the state. The discussion explores his strategic-relational approach, his thoughts on regulation theory, variegated capitalism, post-disciplinarity, cultural political economy and his ‘spatial-turn’, as well as neoliberalism, contemporary events and looming problems of climate change (...) and crisis. (shrink)

In this wide-ranging interview, Bob Jessop discusses the development of, and many of the main themes in, his work over the last fifty years. He explains how he became interested in realism and Marx...

In Part 1 of this wide-ranging interview, Tony Lawson discussed his role in, and relationship to, Critical Realism as well as various defences of mathematical modelling in economics. In Part 2 he t...

In this wide-ranging interview Alan Norrie discusses how he became involved with Critical Realism, his work on Dialectical Critical Realism, and responses to it amongst the Critical Realist communi...

In Part 1 of this wide-ranging interview Tony Lawson first discusses his role in the formation of IACR and how he relates to the generalized use of the term ‘Critical Realism’. He then provides com...

In this wide-ranging interview Professor Margaret Archer discusses a variety of aspects of her work, academic career and influences, beginning with the role the study of education systems played in...

The usual way of discussing normativity and naturalism is by running through a standard range of issues: the relations of fact and value, objectivity, reason and emotion, is and ought, and the so-called ‘naturalistic fallacy’. This is a naturalism that is virtually silent on nature. I outline an alternative approach that relates normativity to our nature as living beings, for whom specific things are good or bad for us. Our nature as evaluative beings is shown to be rooted in and (...) emergent from this biological normativity. There is also significant downward causation, such that our brain-bodies are continually modified by our experience and thoughts. Cultures, as emergent from the affordances of our brain-bodies, create further extensive, irreducible sources of normativity, albeit ones which do not wholly escape biological normativity and can impact back on it. (shrink)

The dominant focus of thinking about economic justice is overwhelmingly distributive, that is, concerned with what people get in terms of resources and opportunities. It views work mainly negatively, as a burden or cost, or else is neutral about it, rather than seeing it as a source of meaning and fulfilment—a good in its own right. However, what we do in life has at least as much, if not more, influence on whom we become, as does what we get . (...) Thus we have good reason also to be concerned with what Paul Gomberg has termed contributive justice , that is, justice as regards what people are expected and able to contribute in terms of work. Complex, interesting work allows workers not only to develop and exercise their capacities, and gain the satisfaction from achieving the internal goods of a practice, but to gain the external goods of recognition and esteem. As Gomberg’s analysis of the concept of contributive justice in relation to equality of opportunity shows, as long as the more satisfying kinds of work are concentrated into a subset of jobs, rather than shared out among all jobs, then many workers will be denied the chance to have meaningful work and the recognition that goes with it. In this paper I examine the contributive justice argument, suggest how it can be further strengthened, arguing, inter alia, that ignoring contributive injustice tends to support legitimations of distributive inequality. (shrink)

ABSTRACT In this wide-ranging interview Professor Douglas V. Porpora discusses a number of issues. First, how he became a Critical Realist through his early work on the concept of structure. Second, drawing on his Reconstructing Sociology, his take on the current state of American sociology. This leads to discussion of the broader range of his work as part of Margaret Archer’s various Centre for Social Ontology projects, and on moral-macro reasoning and the concept of truth in political discourse.

First published in 1983. Routledge is an imprint of Taylor & Francis, an informa company.

The paper assesses the aims and arguments of critical social science and the reconstructions of it provided by critical realist philosophy. It argues that attempts to derive normative conclusions on the basis of explanatory critiques of social phenomena are flawed in several important respects. Accounts of critical social science standardly underestimate the problems of justifying critical standpoints and finding alternative social forms which generate fewer problems than those they replace, and hence lead to net improvement. By arguing that value positions (...) can be derived from explanatory critiques, the philosophical reconstructions make light of the normative issues raised by proposals for social change. They also ignore the question of the feasibility of alternative systems and the prevalence of structures which generate both good and bad effects. While the reconstructions succeed in defending critiques centering on straightforward cases of false beliefs or the frustration of universal human needs, in others, where culturally-specific needs and issues of social responsibilities are involved, they fail to recognise the need to address prior normative questions. It is therefore argued that the aims and claims of critical social science need to be moderated and its dependence on normative discourse properly acknowledged. (shrink)

Professor Nicholas Rescher (1928-) is an unusually prolific philosopher who has published more than 175 books between 1960 and 2016.1 When I first came across his work I thought that it might be th...

Since the publication of Roy Bhaskar's A Realist Theory of Science in 1975, critical realism has been evolved as one of the new developments in the areas of philosophy of natural and social science which offers an alternatively fresh view to the existing theories including positivism and post-modernism. Bhaskar's intellectual movement, which is now fully international and multi-disciplinary, and continues to influence the philosophies of natural and social science, has transformed into 'Dialectical Critical Realism' and the philosophy of 'meta-Reality.' MinGyu (...) will conclude that his anti-anthropic Non-duality continues through all the steps of Bhaskar's thought, maintaining the consistency of his scientific, metaphysical, and spiritual journey. The anti-anthropic motif is fully realized in the philosophy of Non-duality - the 'constellational identification of dualism, duality and non-duality' in his meta-Reality. Defending Bhaskar against Collier, Agar, and Morgan, MinGyu tries to show how its anti-anthropic and non-dualistic foundation is sustained through the whole of Bhaskar's journey, involving a transformation of its subject matters from reality, to the dialectic of reality, to the real truth underlying the former stages. This book provides an indispensible resource for all students of philosophy and the human sciences. (shrink)

The paper offers a wide-angle view of ethics and welfare through the lens of ‘moral economy’. It examines economic activities in relation to a view of welfare as well-being, and to ethics in terms of economic justice. Rather than draw upon abstract ideal theories such as Rawlsian or Capabilities approaches, it calls for an evaluation of actually existing sources of harm and benefit in neoliberal capitalism. It argues that we need to look behind economic outcomes in terms of how much (...) money different people have, examine their economic relations to others, and evaluate the justifications of these relations and their associated rights and practices. It distinguishes three sources of income – earned income, transfers, and unearned income, and argues that the last of these has no functional or ethical justification but has major implications for welfare. It then comments on the policy implications of the argument, including brief comments on asset-based welfare and universal basic income policies, and concludes. (shrink)