The aim of the present study was to investigate the association between work-related moral stress, moral climate and moral sensitivity in mental health nursing. By means of the three scales Hospital Ethical Climate Survey, Moral Sensitivity Questionnaire and Work-Related Moral Stress, 49 participants’ experiences were assessed. The results of linear regression analysis indicated that moral stress was determined to a degree by the work place’s moral climate as well as by two aspects of the mental health staff’s moral sensitivity. The (...) nurses’ experience of ‘moral burden’ or ‘moral support’ increased or decreased their experience of moral stress. Their work-related moral stress was determined by the job-associated moral climate and two aspects of moral sensitivity. Our findings showed an association between three concepts: moral sensitivity, moral climate and moral stress. Despite being a small study, the findings seem relevant for future research leading to theory development and conceptual clarity. We suggest that more attention be given to methodological issues and developing designs that allow for comparative research in other disciplines, as well as in-depth knowledge of moral agency. Copyright © 2011 by SAGE Publications. (shrink)

Research on ethical dilemmas in health care has become increasingly salient during the last two decades resulting in confusion about the concept of moral distress. The aim of the present paper is to provide an overview and a comparative analysis of the theoretical understandings of moral distress and related concepts. The focus is on five concepts: moral distress, moral stress, stress of conscience, moral sensitivity and ethical climate. It is suggested that moral distress connects mainly to a psychological perspective; stress (...) of conscience more to a theological–philosophical standpoint; and moral stress mostly to a physiological perspective. Further analysis indicates that these thoughts can be linked to the concepts of moral sensitivity and ethical climate through a relationship to moral agency. Moral agency comprises a moral awareness of moral problems and moral responsibility for others. It is suggested that moral distress may serve as a positive catalyst in exercising moral agency. An interdisciplinary approach in research and practice broadens our understanding of moral distress and its impact on health care personnel and patient care. (shrink)

The interconnection between moral distress, moral sensitivity, and moral resilience was explored by constructing two hypothetical scenarios based on a recent Swedish newspaper report. In the first scenario, a 77-year-old man, rational and awake, was coded as “do not resuscitate” (DNR) against his daughter’s wishes. The patient died in the presence of nurses who were not permitted to resuscitate him. The second scenario concerned a 41-year-old man, who had been in a coma for three weeks. He was also coded as (...) “do not resuscitate” and, when he stopped breathing, was resuscitated by his father. The nurses persuaded the physician on call to resume life support treatment and the patient recovered. These scenarios were analyzed using Viktor Frankl’s existential philosophy, resulting in a conceivable theoretical connection between moral distress, moral sensitivity, and moral resilience. To substantiate our conclusion, we encourage further empirical research. (shrink)

This paper presents the case of the post-crisis discursive defence of shadow banking in the Netherlands to argue, first, that there is a need to dust off older elite theories and adapt them to post-democratic conditions where there are no widely shared ‘political formulas’ to secure mass support for elite projects. Second, that temporality should be taken more seriously; it is when stories fail that elite storytelling can be observed in practice. As new ‘political formulas’ are minted and become established, (...) elites can again hope to withdraw from the political scene and leave policy-making to the self-evidence of output legitimacy and/or the perpetuum mobile of There-Is-No-Alternative. This suggests that elite theory should replace an epochal reading of post-democracy with a more conjunctural one. (shrink)

This commentary examines Glenberg's characterization of “suppression” in light of negative priming and related phenomena. After offering a radically different slant on suppression, an attempt is made to weave this alternative version into Glenberg's provocative discussion of embodied memories.

This massive two-volume reference presents a comprehensive selection of the most important works on the foundations of mathematics. While the volumes include important forerunners like Berkeley, MacLaurin, and D'Alembert, as well as such followers as Hilbert and Bourbaki, their emphasis is on the mathematical and philosophical developments of the nineteenth century. Besides reproducing reliable English translations of classics works by Bolzano, Riemann, Hamilton, Dedekind, and Poincare, William Ewald also includes selections from Gauss, Cantor, Kronecker, and Zermelo, all translated here for (...) the first time. (shrink)

"Kant and the Capacity to Judge" will prove to be an important and influential event in Kant studies and in philosophy.

The care for older and disabled people has been described as a core area of the Nordic model. The Nordic countries’ welfare model has also been described as women friendly, as women are not forced to make harder choices than men between work and family. The Swedish eldercare system has, during the last several decades, undergone significant changes. Previously, eldercare could be described as universal, meaning a publicly provided, comprehensive, high-quality service available to all citizens according to need and not (...) based on the ability to pay. In later years transformation of eldercare has been influenced by neoliberal politics, which emphasize economic efficiency and cost reduction through competition. Eldercare has become a more diverse multidimensional system, and a private market for home-based eldercare has been created. The numbers of eldercare providers have increased considerably, and new ways of organizing eldercare have been established. In January 2009, the Act on System of Choice in the Public Sector was introduced. The Act was supposed to provide an opportunity for interested municipalities and county councils to expose their publicly provided services to market competition, and to enable users to choose their providers. This article aims to illustrate how neoliberal reasoning dominated the policy process leading to adoption of the Act on System of Choice in the Public Sector. With the use of a discursive policy analysis the authors specifically explore how neoliberal logic dominated, and also how choice and equality were understood and interpreted in the policy process. They conclude that the neoliberal turn in eldercare claiming to centre on the individual choice of persons in need of care runs the risk of creating unequal care that decentres the eldercare worker and creates precarious work situations. (shrink)

_Critique of Violence_ is a highly original and lucid investigation of the heated controversy between poststructuralism and critical theory. Leading theorist Beatrice Hanssen uses Walter Benjamin's essay 'Critique of Violence' as a guide to analyse the contentious debate, shifting the emphasis from struggle to dialogue between the two parties. Regarding the questions of critique and violence as the major meeting points between both traditions, Hanssen positions herself _between_ the two in an effort to investigate what critical theory and poststructuralism have (...) to offer each other. In the course of doing so, she assembles imaginative new readings of Benjamin, Arendt, Fanon and Foucault, and incisively explores the politics of recognition, the violence of language, and the future of feminist theory. This groundbreaking book will be essential reading for all students of continental philosophy, political theory, social studies and comparative literature. Also available in this series: _Essays on Otherness_ Hb: 0-415-13107-3: £50.00 Pb: 0-415-13108-1: £15.99 _Hegel After Derrida_ Hb: 0-415-17104-4: £50.00 Pb: 0-415-17105-9: £15.99 _The Hypocritical Imagination_ Hb: 0-415-21361-4: £47.50 Pb: 0-415-21362-2: £15.99 _Philosophy and Tragedy_ Hb: 0-415-19141-6: £45.00 Pb: 0-415-19142-4: £14.99 _Textures of Light_ Hb: 0-415-14273-3: £42.50 Pb: 0-415-14274-1: £13.99 _Very Little... Almost Nothing_ Pb: 0-415-12821-8: £47.50 Pb: 0-415-12822-6: £15.99. (shrink)

Since the late 1980s, social scientists have argued that advanced economies have undergone a process of financial concentration that is resulting in a growing unevenness of the accessibility of capital. Households, small and medium-sized businesses as well as non-standard economic activities have increasing difficulties in finding funds. There are both sound economic and compelling moral reasons to address this issue. In order to ensure a more equal accessibility of capital, the author proposes a mandatory levy on the surpluses of mainstream (...) pension funds to fund an alternative financial infrastructure as a first step to redressing unevenness. The underlying rationale is that “financial pluralism” is the key to a more even accessibility of capital. (shrink)

Critique of Violence is a highly original and lucid investigation of the heated controversy between poststructuralism and critical theory. Leading theorist Beatrice Hanssen uses Walter Benjamin's essay 'Critique of Violence' as a guide to analyse the contentious debate, shifting the emphasis from struggle to dialogue between the two parties. Regarding the questions of critique and violence as the major meeting points between both traditions, Hanssen positions herself between the two in an effort to investigate what critical theory and poststructuralism have (...) to offer each other. In the course of doing so, she assembles imaginative new readings of Benjamin, Arendt, Fanon and Foucault, and incisively explores the politics of recognition, the violence of language, and the future of feminist theory. This groundbreaking book will be essential reading for all students of continental philosophy, political theory, social studies and comparative literature. Also available in this series: Essays on Otherness Hb: 0-415-13107-3: £50.00 Pb: 0-415-13108-1: £15.99 Hegel After Derrida Hb: 0-415-17104-4: £50.00 Pb: 0-415-17105-9: £15.99 The Hypocritical Imagination Hb: 0-415-21361-4: £47.50 Pb: 0-415-21362-2: £15.99 Philosophy and Tragedy Hb: 0-415-19141-6: £45.00 Pb: 0-415-19142-4: £14.99 Textures of Light Hb: 0-415-14273-3: £42.50 Pb: 0-415-14274-1: £13.99 Very Little ... Almost Nothing Pb: 0-415-12821-8: £47.50 Pb: 0-415-12822-6: £15.99. (shrink)

L’objectif de cette communication est d’aborder la question des revues scientifiques du point de vue des chercheurs : dans quelle mesure le système de publication est-il contraignant pour l’activité scientifique et à quel point lui est-il, dans le même temps, indispensable ?\nL’empreinte du système de publication sur l’activité des chercheurs peut s’observer au moins à\ntrois niveaux. Tout d’abord, dès leur apparition, les publications scientifiques ont été le lieu de la mise en place d’une « technologie littéraire », d’une standardisation progressive (...) du mode de présentation des\nrésultats de la recherche, participant ainsi de manière essentielle au processus de légitimation\ndes savoirs scientifiques. Parallèlement, mais sur un plan plus général, le développement d’un\nmarché de l’édition scientifique a contribué à l’organisation de la sphère scientifique en spécialités\net en disciplines, avec leurs frontières et leurs propres normes. Enfin, que ce soit lors de leurs\néchanges, dans le cadre de leurs collaborations mais aussi pour l’évaluation de leurs travaux, les\npublications sont fortement impliquées dans la pratique quotidienne des scientifiques. L’activité\nde publication est alors l’occasion de multiples régulations du travail collectif des chercheurs.\nQuelles sont les transformations que le développement de l’édition numérique peut entraîner à\ntous ces niveaux ? (shrink)

Kvist seeks to ascertain, in terms of Kant’s own linguistic usage, his views on the topics mentioned. Though primarily historical, this procedure does not keep Kvist from raising objections. The resulting study resembles most Paton’s Kant’s Metaphysic of Experience—apparently Kvist’s model —both methodologically and in its massive scholarship. The text, containing countless references, is augmented by 629 footnotes, covering seventy pages of small print, and a bibliography of some thirty pages. The latter is fairly complete though omitting (...) the highly pertinent work of Kant’s immediate successors. Only Hegel’s Faith and Knowledge is mentioned, and set quickly aside on the curious ground that it is philosophically an original work. (shrink)

Heideggers Topologie des Seins kann als eine Chaos- und Emergenztheorie des Seins gelesen werden. Die einzelnen Topoi sind emergente Selbstkonstituierungen des ur-sprünglich fraktgenen Seinsgeschehens, der Physis, des Naturprozesses. Unsere Selbstgegebenheit, unsere Wirklichkeit und unsere Freiheit sind solche Konstituierungen und stehen nicht im Widerspruch zum Naturprozess, sondern werden von ihm getragen und ausgetragen. Das Seinsgeschehen ist zwar schon im Anfang fatal fraktal, aber kein blindes Geschick, kein blindes Fatum. Zum Fatum gehört die Autonomie als ein Aus-sich-selbst-für-sich-selbst-sein. Freiheit ist schon im Ur-Sprung (...) unser Verhängnis. Naturgesetz und Freiheit stehen sich nicht unversöhnlich gegenüber, doch das Fatum unserer Freiheit wurde uns wiederholt zum Verhängnis. Als Teil des ganzen großen Wirkgefüges können wir die Hoffnung hegen, auf Grund unseres immanenten Logos, der nur eine Selbstkonstituierung des >großen Logos. (shrink)

Our reality constitutes itself as being one of pictures. Landscape is a product of aesthetic reflection as well as the perception of reality and virtual reality of the first order (VR 1). Pictorial representation of a landscape is virtual reality of the second order (VR 2). A picture is a structure of relations with a specific topology or an interrelationship. A picture is set in relation. Topology relates to relational similarities and differences as well as their transfer into other interrelationships, (...) other topologies. The differences between nature, landscape (VR 1), metaphor of landscape and pictorial representation of landscape, etc. (VR 2) describe a change of the interrelationship. These changes happen in a physical-psychic-mental production of reality. We are involved in the events of particular relationships of the picture. The Topology of Being and Appearance reflects the inconspicuous similarities of relations and proportions in the relationship of the world in association with our physical-psychic-mental existential orientation in the world. (shrink)