Living Together With Disagreement

In this incisive and thought-provoking study, legal expert Iain Benson confronts crucial and controversial issues in the relation between religion and to-day's pluralistic, secular state. He reminds us of the original and proper sense of the "secular", not as meaning "anti-religious" but as encompassing without prejudice differing forms of religious belief and disbelief. Analysing recent judicial pronouncements, mainly but not exclusively from his native Canada, Benson demonstrates how this correct understanding of the secular has protected religious rights in the public square by preventing a totalistic state endorsement of any one form of belief. In the second part of his work, Benson draws on the conclusions of leading legal philosophers to show that recognizing the dignity of individuals in no way precludes open, public dissent from their views on such disputed topics as same-sex marriage. Envisaging the development of "a richer conception of diversity and genuine tolerance with an appropriately communitarian focus", Benson also issues an important warning against emerging tendencies to constrict such diversity in the name of a pseudo-liberal uniformity.

This volume attempts to critically analyze Chaim Kaufman's ideas from various methodological perspectives, with the view of further understanding how stable states may arise after violent ethnic conflict and to generate important debate in the area. After the Cold War, the West became optimistic of their ability to intervene effectively in instances of humanitarian disasters and civil war. Unfortunately, in the light of Bosnia, Somalia and Rwanda, questions of the appropriate course of action in situations of large scale violence became hotly contested. A wave of analysis considered the traditional approach of third parties attempting to ensure that the nation was built on the basis of a ruling power-share between the opposing sides of the conflict to be overwhelmingly problematic, and perhaps impossible. Within this movement Kaufman wrote a series of articles advocating separation of warring sides in order to provide stability in situations of large scale violence. His theorem provoked extreme responses and polarized opinion, contradicting the established position of promoting power-sharing, democracy and open economies to solve ethnic conflict and had policy implications for the entire international community. This book was previously published as a special issue of Security Studies.

In this book, Michele S. Moses offers a crucial new way for thinking about the affirmative action debate, one that holds up the debate itself as an important emblem of the democratic process. Central to her analysis is the argument that we need to understand disagreements about affirmative action as products of conflicts between deeply held beliefs about race consciousness as either a pernicious political force or a necessary variable in political equality. --Back cover.

Is moral philosophy more foundational than political theory? It is often assumed to be. David Schmidtz argues that the reverse is true: the question of how to live in a community is more fundamental than questions about how to live. This book questions whether we are getting to the foundations of human morality when we ignore contingent features of communities in which political animals live. Schmidtz disputes the idea that reflection on how to live needs to begin with timeless axioms. Rather, theorizing about how to live together should take its cue from contemporary moral philosophy's attempts to go beyond formal theory, and ask which principles have a history of demonstrably being organizing principles of actual thriving communities at their best. Ideals emerging from such research should be a distillation of social scientific insight from observable histories of successful community building. What emerges from ongoing testing in the crucible of life experience will be path-dependent in detail even if not in general outline, partly because any way of life is a response to challenges that are themselves contingent, path dependent, and in flux. Building on this view, Schmidtz argues that justice evolved as a device for grounding peace in the mutual recognition that everyone has their own life to live, and everyone has the right and the responsibility to decide for themselves what to want. Justice, he says, evolved as a device for conveying our mutual intention not to be in each other's way, and beyond that, our mutual intention to build places for ourselves as contributors to a community. Any understanding of justice should thus rely not on untestable intuitions but should instead be grounded in observable fact.

Offers a careful analysis of how Aristotle understands civil war, partisanship, distrust in government, disagreement, and competition, and explores ways in which these views are relevant to contemporary political theory. Do only modern thinkers like Machiavelli and Hobbes accept that conflict plays a significant role in the origin and maintenance of political community? In this book, Steven Skultety argues that Aristotle not only took conflict to be an inevitable aspect of political life, but further recognized ways in which conflict promotes the common good. While many scholars treat Aristotelian conflict as an absence of substantive communal ideals, Skultety argues that Aristotle articulated a view of politics that theorizes profoundly different kinds of conflict. Aristotle comprehended the subtle factors that can lead otherwise peaceful citizens to contemplate outright civil war, grasped the unique conditions that create hopelessly implacable partisans, and systematized tactics rulers could use to control regrettable, but still manageable, levels of civic distrust. Moreover, Aristotle conceived of debate, enduring disagreement, social rivalries, and competitions for leadership as an indispensable part of how human beings live well together in successful political life. By exploring the ways in which citizens can be at odds with one another, Conflict in Aristotle’s Political Philosophy presents a dimension of ancient Greek thought that is startlingly relevant to contemporary concerns about social divisions, constitutional crises, and the range of acceptable conflict in healthy democracies. “Through debate with other scholars, this book clarifies the meaning of stasis, a central term in Aristotle’s Politics; speculates about the limits of Aristotle’s notion of practical wisdom; and puts in dialogue Aristotle’s historical thought with contemporary debates about the nature of political conflict.” — Thornton Lockwood, Quinnipiac University

This case study contributes to discussions about religious education and its relation to young people's concerns and to social cohesion in Estonia. However, the book also makes an important contribution to the international debate about religions and education. It brings together empirical studies conducted in Estonia in the framework of a major European project, REDCo (Religion in Education: A contribution to Dialogue or a factor of Conflict in transforming societies of European Countries?) setting the research in the context of wider international debates. The mixed methods research investigates the attitudes of 14-16 years old Estonians towards religion and religious diversity, exploring their views on the role of the school in promoting dialogue and tolerance among representatives of different worldviews, and establishing the ways in which their experience of religious education affects their views on these issues. Dr Schihalejev draws on three of her empirical studies, each utilising a different methodology. The qualitative and the quantitative studies investigate students' attitudes to religion and religious diversity, while two contrasting classroom-based studies of religious education explore patterns of interaction, both using video-ethnography and incident-analysis respectively to collect and interpret the data. Grounded in the findings of the empirical studies, the author explores dialogical pedagogies for non-confessional approaches to religious education and discusses policies for strengthening active tolerance in the school context. Dr. Olga Schihalejev is a researcher and a lecturer in the Faculty of Theology at Tartu University, Estonia. She has worked as a teacher of religious education and has written teaching-learning resources for students in Estonia. She is a board member of the Estonian RE Teachers' Association, actively involved in improving the national syllabus for RE and organising annual conferences for RE teachers in Estonia. She worked on the EC Framework 6 project REDCo (Religion in Education. A contribution to dialogue or a factor of conflict in transforming societies of European Countries). Within the REDCo Project her research was on how religion is perceived by young people in a secular context. Additionally she is interested in the perception of religion and tolerance by different ethnic groups in Estonia. Her current research interest is the study of the competences young teachers of different subjects have for implemeting values education.

Personal finance problems like college loans, credit card debt, and badly planned "budgets" have helped identify young adults these days as "Generation Debt." Written in an easy-to-read, accessible Q&A format, this comprehensive book acts as a financial advisor for folks who are just starting out on their own. You will get the basics of money management as you learn how to: make a budget and stick to it; build an emergency fund; get out of debt as easily and quickly as possible; splurge--the smart way; and more. Saving young adults from feeling like they're facing impossible odds, this book will explain, ease, and eliminate your worst financial fears.

This volume attempts to critically analyze Chaim Kaufman's ideas from various methodological perspectives, with the view of further understanding how stable states may arise after violent ethnic conflict and to generate important debate in the area. After the Cold War, the West became optimistic of their ability to intervene effectively in instances of humanitarian disasters and civil war. Unfortunately, in the light of Bosnia, Somalia and Rwanda, questions of the appropriate course of action in situations of large scale violence became hotly contested. A wave of analysis considered the traditional approach of third parties attempting to ensure that the nation was built on the basis of a ruling power-share between the opposing sides of the conflict to be overwhelmingly problematic, and perhaps impossible. Within this movement Kaufman wrote a series of articles advocating separation of warring sides in order to provide stability in situations of large scale violence. His theorem provoked extreme responses and polarized opinion, contradicting the established position of promoting power-sharing, democracy and open economies to solve ethnic conflict and had policy implications for the entire international community. This book was previously published as a special issue of Security Studies.