A growing body of work suggests that the presence of women and of independent directors on boards of directors is associated with higher corporate environmental performance. However, the mechanisms linking board composition to corporate environmental performance are not well understood. This study proposes and empirically tests the mediating role of sustainability-themed alliances in the relationship between board composition and corporate environmental performance. Using the population of public oil and gas firms in the United States as the sample, the study relies (...) on renewable energy alliances to measure sustainability-themed alliances and longitudinally analyzes lagged data for independent and control variables. The study found that the higher the representation of women on a firm’s board, the more likely the firm is to form sustainability-themed alliances, and the higher the representation of independent directors on a firm’s board, the more likely the firm is to form sustainability-themed alliances. Such alliances, in turn, positively contribute to corporate environmental performance. This paper discusses the study’s contributions to the board composition-social performance literature. (shrink)

In response to national trends calling for increasing accountability and an emerging dialogue within bioethics, we describe an effort to credential clinical ethicists at a major academic medical center. This effort is placed within the historical context of prior calls for credentialing and certification and efforts currently underway within organized bioethics to engage this issue. The specific details, and conceptual rationale, behind the New York-Presbyterian Hospital’s graduated credentialing plan are shared as is their evolution and ratification within the context of (...) institutional policy. While other programs will design their credentialing schema consistent with their local context and demographics, the description of one such effort is offered to be instructive to others who want to bring additional standardization to the assessment of the readiness and credentials of those who will engage in the practice of clinical ethics case consultation. (shrink)

The premise of this article is straightforward: cheap art as a method and movement, though often ignored in the aesthetics literature, is ideally suited for creative activism. To understand this claim, we must have a working definition of the term "cheap art", which I develop in the first section. In doing so, I focus on four features of cheap art, united by the core idea of anti-elitism, that make it well suited to support creative activism: (1) Cheap art is light, (...) quick, sloppy, and easy to do. (2) Cheap art is made from cheap materials. (3) Cheap art rejects the idea of art as a business created for the artworld elite and aims instead to provide art of the people and for the people. (4) Cheap art challenges its audience members rather than seeking to placate or soothe them. After a brief defense of the claim that cheap art is in fact art, I discuss each aspect in detail, emphasizing its advantages for creative activism. I close with two suggestions for evaluating cheap art, which I argue can be extended to creative activism more broadly. (shrink)

An extensive research program surrounding a phenomenon called inattentional blindness is reported by Mack and Rock in their book of the same name. The general conclusion that is drawn from the work is that no conscious perception can occur without attention. Because the bulk of the evidence surrounding inattentional blindness comes from memorial reports of displays, it is possible that inattentional blindness reflects a problem with memory, rather than a problem with perception. It is argued here that at least some (...) instances of inattentional blindness are better characterized as memorial failures than perceptual failures. The extent to which unattended stimuli fail to engage perceptual processing is an empirical question that the combination of inattentional blindness and online measures of processing can be used to address. (shrink)

At the intersection of science studies and higher education research, this contribution looks at the way in which the requirements of universities as organizations release development dynamics in academic disciplines and it analyses the interaction between discipline and organization. We will analyse German educational science, bearing in mind it is an example of disciplines that are fractured and consequently have little consensus in terms of fundamental theories and basic concepts. Firstly, we take on a quantitative approach and analyse the changes (...) in degree courses at the structural level and the symbolic boundaries or conceptual distinctions following the transition to the Bachelor and Master system. Secondly, we take a close look at the negotiating processes and practices, as well as at the disciplinary orientations that determine these boundary shifts, using a qualitative approach that focuses on the actors. In group discussions with representatives of the German educational science at different universities it stood out that actors involved in course design are compelled to find an equilibrium between the demands of the discipline and those of the organization, and do so in very different ways. Finally, we discuss the extent to which close interaction between higher education reforms and academic disciplines can be figured out, particularly for disciplines seen as fractured and which do not have consensual common disciplinary standards. (shrink)

El Paso Times journalists routinely face ethical dilemmas as they cover difficult stories amid all of the violence in neighboring Ciudad Juarez. This ethnographic study, which utilizes participant-observation and in-depth interviews, examines how journalists deal with tough ethical choices. It reveals how reporters and editors at the El Paso Times consider the needs of the public and the ramifications of their stories. The journalists strive to be accurate and fair while protecting their sources and themselves. They weigh the importance of (...) each story with its potential for risk. (shrink)

When one thinks about inclusive pedagogy, it is tempting to focus solely on adding more diverse voices to one’s syllabus. While this technique is valuable and important, one can also promote inclusivity by encouraging and supporting the diverse voices of one’s own students. In this paper, I argue that two practices—low-stakes journal assignments and the pre-theoretical discussion of student thoughts about a topic before any readings have been assigned—promote inclusivity by encouraging and supporting a wide range of perspectives in the (...) classroom, because such methods foster the students’ individual voices, experiences, and beliefs and demonstrate that they are valued and respected. (shrink)

Pylyshyn argues that early vision is cognitively impenetrable, and therefore – contrary to knowledge-based theories of perception – that perception is noncontinuous with cognition. Those processes that are included in “early vision,” however, represent at best only one component of perception, and it is important that it is not the component with which most knowledge-based theories are concerned. Pylyshyn's analysis should be taken as a possible source of refinement of knowledge-based theories of perception, rather than as a condemnation of them.

Surveying the field of the economics of the household, the second edition of this text reviews the theory of the consumer at the intermediate undergraduate level. It then applies and extends it to consumer demand and expenditures, consumption and saving, time allocation among market work, home work, and leisure, human capital emphasizing investment in education, children and health, fertility, marriage, and divorce. Influenced by Gary Becker and his associates, the models developed are used to help explain modern U.S. trends in (...) family behavior. Topics are discussed with the aid of geometry and a little algebra. For those with calculus, mathematical endnotes provide the models on which the text discussions are based and interesting applications beyond the scope of the text. (shrink)

This article considers challenges facing the pro-life movement after Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization (2022). It identifies four questions the movement must face: (1) whether to adopt a combative or conciliatory rhetorical stance; (2) how to prioritize new legislative goals; (3) how to define the limits of acceptable compromise; and (4) how to respond to Americans with ambivalent attitudes toward abortion. The article argues that each of these issues could precipitate serious division in the pro-life movement that will impact (...) likelihood of future success. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Reviewed by:The Reader’s Eye: Visual Imaging as Reader ResponseCathleen M. BauschatzThe Reader’s Eye: Visual Imaging as Reader Response, by Ellen J. Esrock; xii & 241 pp. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1994, $36.50.Ellen Esrock’s The Reader’s Eye is a call for greater attention to the process of visual imaging in the study of readers and reading. Much of the book summarizes earlier research, showing the bias against readerly imaging (...) on the part of scholars who have viewed the reading process as solely cognitive and linguistic, rather than affective and visual.Part One summarizes some of these earlier views, finding phenomenological approaches the most friendly to visualization, while linguistic (semiotic) and psychoanalytic studies downplay its importance. Freudian approaches to reading, for example, view images as “hallucinations,” and value displacement from image to word. Lacan likewise minimizes the importance of imagery, despite the fact that concepts like the “mirror stage” could obviously benefit from visualization.The second part of the book summarizes recent advances in cognitive psychology, leading to the development of experimental tools for measuring readerly imaging. While late nineteenth-century psychology expressed interest in image-formation, behaviorism put a stop to this work. In the 1960s, interest in imagery returned, and with it the study of “mental maps,” verbal learning, and the role of the visual in memory. Esrock details the use of images in teaching children to read, but shows that this process has not been taken seriously in research on adults. The most promising direction in contemporary research, she finds, is the discovery that visualization and affective experience are interwoven. Considerations about the pleasure of reading, right/left brain function, and the role of the visual in psychosexual stages (readerly voyeurism, for example) are detailed here.The last chapter contains an interesting opposition between the objections of critic William Gass to readerly imaging and the use of visual images by writer Italo Calvino (Castle of Crossed Destinies, Invisible Cities). Esrock shows that it is almost impossible to interpret Calvino’s work without forming visual images.The conclusion finally presents the author’s case for the importance of visualization to both the cognitive and affective sides of the reading process. She admits the presence of differences among genres, authors, and readers, but still finds a set of general principles which should apply to all. Among these are the claims that imaging affects memory, that it clarifies spatial descriptions, and thus makes a fictional world concrete. Esrock calls for more attention to imaging by reader-response critics, classroom pedagogy, linguistics, and gender/cultural studies.The Reader’s Eye provides a solid history and summary of the current positions of a variety of fields on the hitherto neglected topic of readerly imaging. One criticism of the book might be that the author waits until the conclusion to [End Page 363] present her own findings, which occupy only twenty-seven of the volume’s 205 pages. Enthusiasts of this topic will hope that Professor Esrock may expand on some of these ideas in her next book.Cathleen M. BauschatzUniversity of MaineCopyright © 1995 The Johns Hopkins University Press... (shrink)

In this “Response to Critics,” Cathleen Kaveny continues the conversation in the JRE symposium centered on her recent book, Prophecy without Contempt: Religious Discourse in the Public Square. The book's central argument is that adequate discussion of contention in the contemporary public square requires attending to matters of rhetoric, particularly the rhetoric of prophetic indictment. Kaveny engages the comments of four interlocutors: Alda Balthrop-Lewis, James Childress, William Hart, and Martin Kavka. The first section, “Overarching Goals,” summarizes the objectives of (...) the book. The second section, “Methodology,” engages critics regarding methodological issues, highlighting Kaveny's commitment to a version of MacIntyre's tradition theory and her indebtedness to her legal training. The third section, “Structure,” responds to particular questions her interlocutors raise about the four parts of the book. The fourth section, “Larger Questions,” ponders the next stages of the academic and political discussion about contention in the public square. (shrink)

Against the common view that a European identity is a functional precondition for legitimate EU governance, this article argues that conceptual weaknesses of the term ‘collective identity’ have led to a confusion of several analytic dimensions of ‘identity’ and to an overestimation of strong forms of collective identity. Insights provided by analytic philosophy will be introduced in order to redefine and differentiate ‘collective identity’. The ways in which people refer to themselves as members of we-groups will be outlined and illustrated (...) in order to contribute to an innovative model of the problem and therefore the policy-related formation of collective identities. The article concludes that a strong European identity is not a functional precondition for legitimate everyday democratic governance in the EU. Only in extraordinary situations and in order to institutionalize integration in ethically sensitive policy fields is it necessary that EU citizens discursively agree on an ethical self-understanding of their way of life. (shrink)

This article considers the sort of diversity in perspective appropriate for a presidential commission on bioethics, and by implication, high-level governmental commissions on ethics more generally. It takes as its point of comparison the respective reports on human cloning produced by the National Bioethics Advisory Commission, appointed by President Bill Clinton, and George W. Bush's President's Council on Bioethics, under the leadership of its original chair, Leon Kass. I argue that the Clinton Commission Report exemplifies forensic diversity (the type of (...) diversity between contesting parties in a legal case), while the Kass Council Report exemplifies academic diversity (the diversity found in a medieval disputatio). Drawing upon Thomas Aquinas, I argue that the type of diversity most appropriate for such advisory bodies is deliberative diversity, which facilitates the President's process of taking counsel. After considering their respective charges, I suggest that neither the Clinton Commission nor the Kass Council possessed an adequate degree of deliberative diversity for their respective tasks. (shrink)

Martha A. Hall’s artists’ books documenting her experience of living with breast cancer offer future health professionals a unique opportunity to sit in the patient’s position of vulnerability and fear. Hall’s books have become a cornerstone of our medical humanities pedagogy at the Maine Women Writers Collection because of their emotional directness and their impact on readers. This essay examines the ways that Hall’s call for conversation with healthcare providers is enacted at the University of New England and provides a (...) model for how such works might be used at other educational institutions to encourage empathy between practitioners and patients by engaging in conversations about anger, fear, and other common reactions to life-threatening illness. We explore the unruly nature of Martha A. Hall’s narratives of illness and care, as well as how the form of the books themselves engages the reader in a deep relationship with Hall’s personal pain and her humanity itself. We explore, too, the cumulative effect of these powerful books on readers who handle them regularly, as we do in our roles as professor and archivist. (shrink)

Religious traditions in the United States have been characterized by an ongoing tension between assimilation to the broader culture, typically reflected by mainline Protestant churches, and defiant rejection of cultural incursions, as witnessed by more sectarian movements such as Mormonism and Hassidism. But legal theorist and theologian Cathleen Kaveny contends that religious traditions do not need to swim in either the Current of Openness or the Current of Identity. There is a third possibility, which she calls the Current of (...) Engagement, which accommodates and respects tradition but which recognizes the need to interact with culture to remain relevant and to offer a prophetic critique of social and political and legal and economic practice. In fifty-six brief articles Kaveny illustrates the implications of the Current of Engagement in American public life. The articles are organized into five chapters or sections: Law as Teacher; Religious Liberty and its Limits; Conversations about Culture; Conversations about Belief; and Cases and Controversies. Kaveny provides astonishing insights into a range of hot-button issues: abortion, assisted suicide, government-sponsored torture, contraception, the Ashley Treatment, capital punishment, and the role of religious faith in a pluralistic society. (shrink)

The authors discuss the connections between the ethical, economic, and entrepreneurial dimensions of a life well-lived.

Part I. Narratives and Norms -- 1 Tradition and development: Engaging John T. Noonan, Jr. -- 2 Creation and covenant: Engaging Stanley Hauerwas -- 3 Examples and rules-Engaging Jeffrey Stout -- Part II Love, Justice, and Law -- 4 Neighbor love and legal precedent: Engaging Gene Outka -- 5 Compassionate respect and victims' voices: Engaging Margaret Farley -- 6 Covenant fidelity and culture wars: Engaging Paul Ramsey -- Part III Legal Categories and Theological Problems -- 7 Juridical insights and theological (...) disputes: Engaging Robert E. Rodes, Jr. -- 8 Second chances and statutes of limitations: Engaging Walter Kasper -- 9 Legalism and christian ethics: Engaging Grisez and Engelhardt. (shrink)