bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025 huggingface dataset:
Invisible Weapons
Authors: Board Jr. Marcus
Published: August 2022

This book explains how grassroots communities are infiltrated and politically co-opted in ways that render their resistance harmless. It reveals contemporary practices of domination, as power-holding elites—from elected officials to welfare bureaucrats—are teaching oppressed people to internalize their grievances and silence their needs. In the end, politics becomes a space where advocating for social justice makes less and less sense to people. The book therefore explains the politics of radical inaction through disempowerment, dissonance, and disengagement. It considers multiple sites of resistance to police violence, including the police killing of Akai Gurley, Freddie Gray, and Korryn Gaines in particular. It also considers the mass protest associated with the wider Movement for Black Lives (M4BL). The book argues that anti-radicalism is an embedded feature of neoliberalism, that the widespread adoption of neoliberal politics has reinforced ongoing racial and gender oppressions, and that these same oppressed communities are being infiltrated in order to minimize their commitments to radical political resistance. Covering multiple sites and methods—from in-depth interviews on the resistance politics of Black welfare recipients in Chicago, to nationally representative survey data on hard-work beliefs in politics and the labor force, and case study analyses of police violence in Baltimore and New York—the book shows how political domination today is about ensnaring minds, constraining imaginations, and upending resistance. With the creation of the invisible weapons framework, future research can better explain sites of political disengagement and the connection to the erosion of whatever remains of democracy in the United States.
Introduction
Authors: Board Jr. Marcus
Published: August 2022

The Introduction explains the dilemma presented when anti-radicalism is anti-democratic. Distinct from notions of extremism, this sense of radicalism is about the liberatory possibilities of dismantling oppressions. Set in the context of the Movement for Black Lives—a movement grounded in radical Black feminist praxis from the beginning—the Introduction situates the wider book as an attempt to address the apparent disconnect between the grassroots masses and engagement with radical race and gender politics. Specifically, the chapter highlights the final days of the 2015 Baltimore Uprising and the relative non-response to the extreme circumstances surrounding Korryn Gaines’s murder in 2016. Finally, the Introduction addresses questions of fascism, partisan divide, and even challenges the left’s posterchild for change in former President Barack Obama. The book therefore emphasizes the connections between white supremacy, patriarchy, politics, and justice.
A Radical View of Evolving Oppression and Resistance
Authors: Board Jr. Marcus
Published: August 2022

This chapter establishes the historical foundations of the Movement for Black Lives (M4BL) and neoliberalism. It begins with a discussion of the Combahee River Collective and their 1977 Black feminist statement. This roots the M4BL to its radical, Black, feminist, queer politics, as evident in Alicia Garza’s statement in “A Herstory of Black Lives Matter.” Then the chapter transitions to discussing the women’s anti-violence movement. Connecting to Beth Richie’s work on movement co-optation, the chapter addresses the Violence Against Women Act corresponding with the rise and entrenchment of mass incarceration—a neoliberal staple. It then addresses the march to roll back the gains of the Civil Rights Movement, proceeding into the 2000s and the anti-radical foundations of today’s police state.
The Gaines Dilemma
Authors: Board Jr. Marcus
Published: August 2022

This chapter deconstructs the events surrounding the 2016 police killing of Korryn Gaines just outside of Baltimore. The analysis focuses on autonomy—people’s sense of choice—and the way mass resistance was not embraced on account of Gaines’s apparent radicalism. Gaines’s politics were explicitly radical, including her being armed with a shotgun. However, the chapter argues that as a Black woman, her combined race and gender are interpreted as a type of radicalism and thus disqualify her and others from support. This analysis is juxtaposed with a discussion of political intersectionality—where justice initiatives focusing on race or gender can miss the oppressive implications of race and gender oppression overlapping. In the end, Gaines is not the only woman whose experiences are overlooked, and that is the basis of the #SayHerName campaign began by Kimberlé Crenshaw and organizers at the African American Policy Forum (AAPF). This exemplifies radical engagement.
Conclusion
Authors: Board Jr. Marcus
Published: August 2022

The Conclusion provides an overview of the preceding chapters while addressing potential critiques, considering implications, and asking questions yet unanswered about the Gaines dilemma. The Conclusion is particularly focused on assessing the dispossession of sovereignty, as neoliberalism follows the trajectory of neocolonialism and takes away people’s capacity to fully participate in US democracy. It ends with some considerations about how protests in the summer of 2020 exemplify the issues identified through the invisible weapons framework and how the election of a president from the Democratic Party is not as far from a fascist future as some might anticipate.
Research on Jihadist Terrorism, Rebel Governance, and Civil Resistance
Authors: Svensson Isak , Finnbogason Daniel , Krause Dino , Lorenzo Luís Martínez , Hawach Nanar
Published: August 2022

This chapter traces the three fields of literature on which the book builds: jihadist terrorism, rebel governance, and civil resistance. It outlines the rise of global jihadism since the mujahideen anti-Soviet resistance movement in Afghanistan during the 1980s, placing special emphasis on the organizational split between al-Qaeda and IS in 2014, which eventually manifested itself on the local level in different governing strategies. Theoretically, this chapter locates jihadist proto-states within the wider category of rebel governance, arguing that—just like other rebel groups—they depend on different pillars of civilian support to provide effective governance and derive legitimacy. Therefore, the chapter claims that civilians can also withdraw their support from, and thereby undermine, the jihadist state-building project. It further carves out both similarities and differences between jihadist proto-states and other forms of rebel governance, based on which a theoretical argument is presented that draws on a grievance- and resource mobilization–based framework.
When Does Civil Resistance Against Jihadists Occur?
Authors: Svensson Isak , Finnbogason Daniel , Krause Dino , Lorenzo Luís Martínez , Hawach Nanar
Published: August 2022

This chapter explores the circumstances in which civil resistance occurs. Adopting a country-level perspective, it focuses on three jihadist proto-states: Islamic Emirate of Azawad in Mali (2012) in which organized civil resistance occurred, and two cases without comparable nonviolent resistance: the Islamic State of Iraq (2006–2008) and the Islamic Principality of al-Mukalla in Yemen (2015–2016). Whereas the Islamic State of Iraq was met with mainly armed resistance (the Sunni Awakening campaign), the Islamic Principality saw no armed and only sporadic unarmed organized and collective resistance by locals under its rule. The chapter argues that civil resistance is more likely when locals perceive the jihadists’ rule as alien and when organizational structures capable of collective nonviolent mobilization are activated. It demonstrates how variation in the jihadists’ governance (especially the degree of adaptation to local conditions) and in the social structures for mobilization (i.e., whether opposition was channeled through civil society or tribal networks) created different conditions for civil resistance.
Civil Resistance Against Jihadists
Authors: Svensson Isak , Finnbogason Daniel , Krause Dino , Lorenzo Luís Martínez , Hawach Nanar
Published: August 2022

This chapter asks why civil resistance is—sometimes—successful. A set of regression analyses based on the dataset on anti-jihadist demonstrations during the Syrian Civil War shows that protests formulating non-maximalist demands were more likely to be successful, as well as events accompanied by other protests in the spatial environment. Moreover, there is evidence for a form of “political jiu-jitsu,” as jihadist repression of protests backfired. The second part of the chapter, building on interviews with activists, traces the evolution of protests around Maarat al-Numan in Syria. While lending support to the statistical findings, the case illustrates that maximalist goals are not bound to fail, but they may require more time. Second, a case study of anti-GIA resistance in Algeria shows the important role played by women while illustrating the difficulty of separating the effects of nonviolent campaigns from those of military actions.
Social Perspective
Authors: Delgado Melvin
Published: August 2022

Social sciences play an important role in demonstrating the effectiveness of interventions of those at highest risk of perpetrating gun violence or being gun violence victims. Contextual grounding plays an instrumental role in social work and other professions by helping us understand urban gun violence occurrence and the circumstances leading to the use of guns. More importantly, this chapter approaches gun violence interventions as establishing a foundation using the latest thinking and data. A social perspective on gun injuries allows for casting a wide net in capturing this phenomenon, helping readers develop a wide lens for gun injury. Grasping the social meaning of guns is essential in coordinating public health campaigns on the outcomes they cause.
Cultural Perspective
Authors: Delgado Melvin
Published: August 2022

Gun cultural symbolism has many meanings and can translate into a social cause. The social context covered in earlier chapters focuses on gun violence as an epidemic, silent or public. Culture should not be restricted because its power shapes behavior and crosses all spheres of influence. It is also important to be cognizant of how culture can be used to marginalize groups of color, such as “the culture of poverty,” with all of its destructive forces, or “blaming the victim” for their dire situations. Victim purity captures this latter perspective. Guns have powerful symbolic cultural meanings of what constitutes manhood and power for men, often forming an integral part of their identity. It makes sense that the consequences, too, bring similar meanings, including hiding the ramifications, in the case of trauma, or eschewing services that aid in the rehabilitation process.
Economic Perspective
Authors: Delgado Melvin
Published: August 2022

To comprehend gun violence consequences, we cannot ignore economics. An ability to assess economic costs assists policymakers and organizations in developing cost-effective strategies and more insightful evaluations of intervention strategies. Health problems take a personal physical toll but also an economic one. Gun injuries are no exception. Society’s views on the economic consequences from violence are in desperate need of updating. Injuries, and the legal consequences they bring, are grounded within a legal-medico context, calling attention to how to punish gun violence perpetrators, particularly when focused on incapacity to work. Social scientists and helping professions have examined the human toll guns take on our society and the disproportional effect this violence has on people of color. Examining the economic costs of gun injuries does not take away from humanistic perspectives. Economics introduces trade-offs between funding the consequences of gun violence and using funds for community programs that address the root causes of inequities.
Guitar and the Rise of “Innovative” Ensembles
Authors: Swick Bill
Published: August 2022

Chapter 1 includes an outline of the history of guitar education in the United States and addresses the growing popularity of guitar in the classroom, along with the many other innovative music ensembles. This chapter explains why so many music educators are being asked to teach guitar and other ensembles even though the educators were not prepared to do so while in college. The chapter also addresses the many qualities of an effective music educator—over eighty—and directs the reader to a self-reflection quiz. Getting a perfect score on this quiz is not as important as becoming aware of the qualities that you recognize within yourself and the ones that you may need to work on. The quiz and the rest of the chapter form a starting point.
Building an Infrastructure for Success
Authors: Swick Bill
Published: August 2022

Chapter 2 focuses on the meaning of American author John Maxwell’s quotation, “It takes a team to build a dream.” He later wrote a book titled Teamwork Makes the Dream Work. This chapter explains that it is necessary to start by taking inventory of who is on your campus. Make a list of faculty, administration, and staff members and what their skills may be. Many of these people will have skills you may not have or time to do tasks you do not have time to do. Though each school is different, the chapter offers a listing of positions found on most campuses filled by professionals who may assist you in building a team to fulfill your dreams. Besides describing school personnel, the chapter offers effective suggestions about how to attract parents to volunteer to be on your team.
Gaining Recognition
Authors: Swick Bill
Published: August 2022

Before dismissing the shallowness of trophies, plaques, and certificates, be mindful that administrators tend not to cancel or discontinue programs that are successful and are actively bringing recognition to their school. Chapter 3 includes thirty activities directors may do to bring recognition to their programs. This chapter includes an outline of what students may be doing to generate recognition and also introduces the need to define a line of excellence that is never compromised even during challenging years. In addition, this chapter discusses the importance of having a YouTube presence, understanding what a terrific resource YouTube is, and creating a YouTube channel. Finally, Chapter 3 promotes the need to network and provides suggestions for networking on local and national levels.
Concerts and On-Campus Performances
Authors: Swick Bill
Published: August 2022

Learning to play a musical instrument lends itself by its nature to performing in front of others. That is just one part of the picture. Performing as an ensemble teaches collaboration, teamwork, self-confidence, and belonging to an organization that is larger than yourself. Donning the performance uniform transforms individuals into team members. Chapter 4 focuses on the steps toward performing, the importance of creating a concert season, and the tasks necessary toward building an audience. This chapter offers fifteen detailed steps to prepare for an on-campus performance. The content in this chapter should prove to be helpful in the organization required to put on a successful show and give your audiences reasons to want to attend the next performance and each one thereafter.
Solo and Ensemble and Other Festivals
Authors: Swick Bill
Published: August 2022

State music educators’ associations have been sponsoring solo and ensemble festivals for decades. As guitar and other innovative ensembles gain popularity, many states are creating opportunities for innovative music students to participate. Chapter 7 focuses on solo and ensemble festivals, as well as other festivals in which innovative ensembles like honor ensembles may participate. This chapter covers the steps of preparing guitar students for solo and ensemble and offers suggestions about how and where to find appropriate music, including the Texas UIL list. In addition, steps are outlined on how to prepare students for honor ensembles and how to create an honor ensemble if there is not one currently in your area.
Funding Your Program
Authors: Swick Bill
Published: August 2022

Chapter 9 walks you through the complexities of funding in a school setting, underlines the importance of advocating for funding where it exists, and offers ideas and practical tips for fundraisers and other financial alternatives. This chapter explains that fundraising is often another topic not covered in college when you are preparing to be a music educator yet may possibly be the single most important element in building an award-winning music program. It is rare to find award-winning music programs that are lacking in such items as materials, musical instruments, and sheet music. Fundraising is essential in building an award-winning program, and this chapter offers many solutions to finding the money needed for providing the gear students need to be successful.
Social Media and First Amendment Fault Lines
Authors: Strauss David A.
Published: August 2022

The popularity of social media forces us to confront what might be called fault lines in the law of freedom of expression. These are principles that have always been a little problematic but that have arguably worked well enough with legacy media: the distinction between government and private restrictions on speech, the general protection given to false statements, the treatment of speech directed at specific individuals, and the idea that “good counsels” are an effective way to deal with harmful speech. Social media place those fault lines under stress, revealing weaknesses in existing law in a way that legacy media do not. As a result, we may have to reconfigure important First Amendment principles. But we need not say either that the First Amendment is obsolete and should be rethought from the ground up or that existing law is fully adequate to address the problems presented by social media.
The Limits of Antidiscrimination Law in the Digital Public Sphere
Authors: Lakier Genevieve
Published: August 2022

Complaints regarding private censorship abound in the digital age, united by the underlying fear that the private companies that control platforms may use that control to distort public debate. Legislators and scholars have turned, in part, to antidiscrimination law as a potential solution. This essay argues that it would be possible and desirable to craft a constitutional nondiscrimination law for the platforms. However, such a law, if it is to be both constitutional and beneficial to the vitality of the digital public sphere, will not be able to address most of what gets described as platform censorship these days. Antidiscrimination law can require the social media companies to enforce their rules in a nondiscriminatory manner and prevent platforms from discriminating against users because of their race, gender, and sexual orientation. However, this does not achieve what most of those who advocate for antidiscrimination laws want those laws to accomplish: preventing social media companies from writing rules that shape the boundaries of public conversation. To the extent that platform power over public discourse is a legislative concern—as it surely should be—lawmakers will have to find tools from other reaches of law to cabin it.
To Reform Social Media, Reform Informational Capitalism
Authors: Balkin Jack M.
Published: August 2022

Because of their business models, the most powerful new players in the digital public sphere—social media—have not become the trustworthy organizers and curators of public discussion they need to be. The result is that we have a new kind of public sphere that lacks the connective tissue of institutions and practices that are necessary to sustain the values that underlie and justify freedom of expression. The problem is not First Amendment doctrines that protect harmful speech. The problem is the health of the digital public sphere, and whether the digital public sphere adequately protects the values of political democracy, cultural democracy, and the growth and spread of knowledge. Instead of tinkering with First Amendment doctrines at the margins, we should focus on the industrial organization of digital media and the current business models of social media companies. The real battleground for reform is in competition law, privacy law, and consumer protection; hence courts must resist the expansion of First Amendment doctrines that would make it harder for Congress to regulate digital businesses.
An Exchange of Letters
Authors: Ambar Saladin
Published: August 2022

Thomas Jefferson was the first American founder to publicly engage intellectually with an African American thinker in a manner suggesting social equality. After being hired by Jefferson to survey the area that would become the nation’s capital, Banneker engaged Jefferson in a series of letters that challenged the then Secretary of State on questions of race; but the epistles also state that Banneker and Jefferson were “brethren”—a suggestion of friendship that caused political controversy for Jefferson, and made Banneker famous. Their short relationship suggested what the possibilities and limitations were for multiracial democracy in the late eighteenth century. Chapter 1 presents the limits of public interracial friendships among the founding generation, in the exchange of letters between the Black scientist Benjamin Banneker, and then Secretary of State, Thomas Jefferson.
A Bestowal
Authors: Ambar Saladin
Published: August 2022

Barack Obama and Joe Biden’s friendship may be the most covered interracial friendship in modern American history. And for good reason: both men have served as president and both have been shaped by crisis, loss, and a sense of destiny. Yet, below the surface bonhomie between the forty-fourth and forty-sixth presidents of the United States is a sense of how far multiracial democracy has come over the past two centuries. It is also a relationship that raises new questions about why the symbolic value of interracial friendship may remain with us for some time.
Abu Dharr al Ghifari
Authors: Baker Raymond William
Published: August 2022

Islamic justice is not simply an abstract value. Rather, it is a call to action. The Qur'an teaches that neither the performance of religious rituals nor even the cultivation of a personal relationship with God will in themselves fulfill the obligations of believers. They must act for social justice. Muslims are called to build the righteous community. Abu Dharr modeled bold action to challenge injustice, whatever its provenance. He did not hesitate to challenge the Caliph Osman himself when he saw tendencies toward unjust rule. Abu Dharr directly condemned the use of public funds to build a caliphal palace. The funds would be better spent, he pronounced, to assist the poor. Not even the richest or most powerful should escape accountability. For his bold actions on behalf of the downtrodden, Abu Dharr earned the sobriquet of “lawyer of the poor.”
Sa’id Nursi
Authors: Baker Raymond William
Published: August 2022

Sa’id Nursi holds a virtually unchallenged position as the preeminent modern-day Turkish Islamic scholar. Gifted intellectually, Nursi stood out even as a child for his exceptional talent. In his early adulthood, he further distinguished himself as a fighter in World War I in defense of Turkish territories. Nursi seemed destined for the classic Turkish role of warrior turned public figure. He was actively courted by Kemal Attaturk, the secular founder of the Turkish republic. However, when Attaturk’s extreme secular orientation and virulent hostility to Islam became clear, Nursi turned down his lucrative offers of public service. He retreated into a private realm of prodigious scholarship. Nursi’s writings inspired the Nurcu mass movement. Today, Islam is a vibrant force in Turkey, and much of the credit for that by no means certain outcome is given to Sa’id Nursi. For his achievements as an Islamic scholar, Nursi earned the honorary title of “Wonder of the Age.”
Muhammad Ali
Authors: Baker Raymond William
Published: August 2022

Muhammad Ali did pronounce himself the “Greatest.” However, he had trouble seeing himself as an intellectual. Ali was acutely aware of how limited his formal education was. Islam came to Ali’s rescue. There are only two requirements for the status of Islamic intellectual. The “caller” to Islam must love Islam and have the communication skills to convey the reasons for that love to others. Ali radiated a profound passion for his adopted faith. He also had mastery of an inventive language all his own to project that love and deflect the racism he faced. Islamic scholars welcomed Ali into their ranks. Even more moving to Ali himself was the way impoverished masses in the poorest of Islamic lands rushed to greet “their hero.” Muhammad Ali’s most compelling story was his lifelong spiritual journey. What made Muhammad Ali distinct was the fact that he waged his moral and intellectual struggles for self-realization as a Muslim on a global stage with a worldwide audience of millions.
Introduction
Authors: Waxman Matthew C.
Published: August 2022

New technologies, new geopolitical alignments, new interests and vulnerabilities, and other developments are changing how, why, and by whom conflict will be waged. Just as militaries must plan ahead for an environment in which threats, alliances, capabilities, and even the domains in which they fight will differ from today, they must plan for international legal constraints that may differ, too. The authors in this volume bring to their chapters a wide range of normative perspectives. Common to all of them, however, is the view that the law of armed conflict must continue to adapt if it is to retain its vitality.
Future War, Future Law
Authors: Roberts Adam
Published: August 2022

How people think about war, and especially about its future, is a problem. They often get it wrong. This chapter explores some of the hazards in thinking about future war as well as future law. It looks not only at the making and implementation of international law applicable to military operations but also at cases where there was a lack of applicable law, or a general tendency not to apply such law as existed. This chapter also touches on the work of one political economist of war, I.S. Bloch, who wrote the most famous and perhaps most influential book on the future of war—a book that addressed one of the central themes of the present work—the effect of changing technology on war. The author suggests the value of a historical approach to the future of the laws of war with respect to three questions. (1) What are the hazards in assessing the changing character and technology of war? (2) How well have the laws of war responded to technological change? (3) Is there a case for new treaties, or other forms of lawmaking, to address the new developments discussed in this book
Being More than You Can Be
Authors: Liivoja Rain
Published: August 2022

Warfighters are both the strongest and the weakest link of an armed force. The parallel processing capability of the human brain and the agility of the human body are still unmatched by technology. At the same time, as human beings, warfighters require oxygen, water, nutrition, and sleep to survive; they are not adapted to what many other species excel at, and they are susceptible to illnesses and injuries. Armed forces generally attempt to mitigate these factors by means of equipment and training. Biomedical human performance enhancement, however, will increasingly be used to improve the performance of warfighters, raising a range of legal, ethical, and social issues. This chapter considers how human enhancement will affect the application of the law of armed conflict in future warfare. After providing a brief conceptual and technical background to human enhancement, the chapter looks at whether the law prohibits or restricts the enhancement of warfighters, and what consequences the enhancement of warfighters has under the law.
The Future Law of Naval Warfare
Authors: McLaughlin Rob
Published: August 2022

Currently, the world is witnessing renewed potential for State-against-State naval engagements at sea. The macro-context is animated by tensions between a number of major powers and blocs of powers. Additionally, there is an evolving acceptance of the legal consequences of more pointed recognition of a “status mixtus” spectrum of overt competition between peace and conflict—not least in renewed appreciations of the power and place of lawfare, and (re)emerging strategic concepts of hybrid warfare and gray zone operations. It is inevitable—indeed already evident—that States will look to increased utilization of lower cost merchant vessels and auxiliaries for some naval operations tasks. This evolution will in turn drive legal appreciations and questions as to naval combatant status and rights, with follow-on consequences that will challenge or even erode existing concepts, notions, and interpretive biases relating to the Law of Naval Warfare (LoNW). This chapter focuses upon status and characterization of vessels in LoNW as indicative of the broader challenges faced when applying LoNW designed for 1907 to naval warfare in the coming decades. To this end, the analysis focuses upon two substantive matters and raises for further discussion another. The first substantive matter is possible maritime militia status within LoNW; the second is the characterization of MAS within LoNW. The third matter—which is merely raised for discussion, rather than resolved in any way—is the future understanding of the concept of “belligerent rights” in LoNW.
The Second Space Age
Authors: Borgen Christopher J.
Published: August 2022

This chapter considers what space activities are, what they might be in the near future, and the implications for the interaction of space law with the law of armed conflict (LOAC). After an introduction, Section II and III describe the past, present, and possible future of space activities, noting especially the roles of military space and the evolution of private actors. Section IV then turns to two sources of regulation of military space activities: space law and LOAC. Section V surveys certain regulatory challenges, with an emphasis on the interaction of private companies and governments in military and national security space activities. The chapter concludes by noting the importance of core doctrinal questions related to sources of law, state responsibility, and neutrality in clarifying the regulation of military space operations.
Bernard Williams’s Debt to Nietzsche
Authors: Leiter Brian
Published: August 2022

Bernard Williams was one of just two prominent figures within the mainstream of Anglophone moral philosophy in the second half of the twentieth-century to devote serious attention to Nietzsche. (Philippa Foot was the other comparably famous figure to do so, and she, unsurprisingly, shared with Williams skepticism about many orthodoxies of analytic moral philosophy during this time.) The author’s aim is to assess the Williams–Nietzsche relationship, the extent to which Williams learned from Nietzsche, and the extent to which he retreated from or ignored Nietzsche’s actual views. The author argues that the alleged influence is mostly superficial and that Williams’s limited engagement with Nietzsche tells us something about the distinctive and conservative nature of Anglophone philosophy over the past century. The author focuses mainly on Ethics and the Limits of Philosophy (1985) and Shame and Necessity (1993), as well as some of Williams’s articles.
Confidence
Authors: Łukomska Agata
Published: August 2022

The claim that confidence can be an alternative to ethical knowledge is widely considered to be a rare miss among many hits in Bernard Williams’s Ethics and the Limits of Philosophy. If we understand confidence as the psychological manifestation of conviction, Williams’s critique of ethical cognitivism leaves almost no grounds for being reasonably confident in one’s moral outlook. But it is not the only way we can understand it. The author proposes a model of practical deliberation within which confidence makes sense, suggesting that, by championing confidence rather than conviction, Williams argues implicitly for an unorthodox approach to action, one in which the agent is construed as essentially dependent, in her identity and in her capacity for continued action, on the outcomes of her own decisions. The author argues that such an agent is necessarily committed, on the one hand, to identifying strongly with the preconceptions of her own community and, on the other, to take into account the beliefs, including moral beliefs, of other people. The author suggests that the capacity to continuously enlarge one’s moral outlook in this way is what Williams means by ethical confidence. The author also examines the extent to which his position can be understood as a form of anti-intellectualist moral cognitivism.
Moral Realism with a Human Face
Authors: Rosen Gideon
Published: August 2022

This chapter restates and regiments Williams’s main metaethical theses in light of advances in metaethics during the past three decades. It is argued that Williams’s Ethics and the Limits of Philosophy aimed to find a middle way between full-strength realism about ethical judgment and various forms of skepticism and noncognitivism. The author attributes to Williams the claim that while ethical judgments are sometimes simply true and so correspond to genuine facts, ethical judgments are “perspectival” and so enjoy at best a “limited objectivity.” However, according to the author, this view is best understood as an epistemological thesis according to which the warrant for ethical judgments can never be intersubjectively compelling in the broadest sense. Consequently, Williams’s metaethical position is not a metaphysical view and has nothing to do with the mind- or practice-independence of ethical facts.
Free Will and the Tragic Predicament
Authors: Russell Paul
Published: August 2022

This chapter presents an interpretation of Bernard Williams’s significant and substantial contributions on the topic of free will and moral responsibility. Williams’s fundamental objective, it is argued, is to vindicate moral responsibility by way of freeing it from distortions and misrepresentations imposed on it by “the morality system.” Although his earlier work is primarily concerned with the critique of “morality” and its associated understanding of responsibility and blame, Williams nevertheless rejects any extreme or unqualified skepticism. On the contrary, in Shame and Necessity he advances a vindicatory genealogy—one that unmasks the “illusions” and “fantasies” of our current ethical ideas as they relate to agency and responsibility. Any truthful understanding of free and responsible agency, he argues, must acknowledge the ways in which luck and fate are infused into human ethical life. This is the fundamental (“pessimistic”) lesson that we can learn from the ancient Greeks and that Williams seeks to “recover” for us.
Luck and Responsibility According to Bernard Williams
Authors: Heuer Ulrike
Published: August 2022

In his seminal paper, “Moral Luck,” Bernard Williams begins to develop an account of responsibility for unintentional aspects of our agency. It rests on a crucial distinction of success and failure, internal or external to an agent’s project. In this chapter, the author argues that a success which results from conditions that are internal to a project is not a lucky success, nor is a failure which results from something that is internal to the project just unlucky. There is no internal luck. Responsibility-defying luck is always external. An important result of this exploration is that Williams’s view opens a path for understanding responsibility neither as being concerned with reactive attitudes such as indignation or blame, nor in a common rationalist way as being based on an agent’s reason-responsiveness. Instead, responsibility depends on how a person’s actions relate to the exercise of her abilities in the pursuit of her projects and how they are integrated into her life.
Bernard Williams as a Philosopher of Ethical Freedom
Authors: Fricker Miranda
Published: August 2022

Interpreting Bernard Williams’s ethical philosophy is not easy. His style is apparently direct yet argumentatively inexplicit and allusive. He is moreover committed to evading philosophical “isms.” This gives the impression that his philosophy is a web of interrelated commitments where none has priority. Against this impression, in this chapter it is proposed that there is a single, unchanging root conviction from which Williams’s ethical philosophy grows. This is argued by reference to three signature theses: internal reasons, the relativism of distance, and the porous borders of philosophy and history. These are represented as the fruits of the conviction that the constraints of universal rationality seriously underdetermine how one should live. This vision of the human condition constitutes the inexplicit yet fundamental presupposition beneath Williams’s ethical philosophy. The object of this root conviction is labeled ethical freedom and thus Williams is portrayed as a philosopher of ethical freedom.
Blame Without Reasons
Authors: Ng Geraldine
Published: August 2022

Williams argues that A’s reasons are restricted to facts about actions that would serve A’s subjective motivational set S. A challenge to this internalist perspective on reasons comes from our ordinary conception of blame. We blame A if we think A had reasons to act otherwise. If blame is connected with reasons, this suggests a blame-implies-reasons restriction: blame is restricted to reasons to act otherwise related to A’s S. But this restriction conflicts with our everyday understanding of the scope of blame. To meet this worry, Williams advances a qualified blame-implies-reasons restriction: blame is restricted to proleptic reasons A might have had to act otherwise. The author argues that Williams’s strategy is unconvincing and proposes a practice-based view of blame that is not connected to reasons. By focusing on the practice of blame rather than its function, the practice-based view conserves both internalism and our intuitions about the scope of blame.
Introduction
Authors: Perkoski Evan
Published: August 2022

This chapter introduces readers to the main question motivating this book: why do splinter groups survive and radicalize to different extents? It begins with a discussion of how conflicts have changed in recent decades, and specifically, how they have become increasingly subnational, fragmented, and complex. It then defines terms like splintering and fragmentation in relation to other organizational transformations. From here, the chapter reviews five widely held myths and misconceptions about splinter groups. Some of these are based in fact, while others are shaped by media bias and political posturing. Finally, the chapter concludes with a review of what we actually know about splinter groups and what is to come in the rest of the book.
How Armed Groups Divide
Authors: Perkoski Evan
Published: August 2022

This chapter outlines a theory of how armed groups divide and how splinter groups behave. The argument is simple: to understand the extent to which splinters will radicalize and survive, we must understand their motivations for breaking away. The chapter develops this argument by drawing upon a wealth of research from fields like organizational studies and social psychology, and by leveraging analogies to business firms, religious sects, and political parties. More specifically, this chapter reveals that both the number of disagreements and the specific issues motivating splinters to exit their parent critically shape its trajectory by influencing its membership composition. The number of disagreements has ramifications for membership cohesion and therefore survivability, while the specific issues influence its appeal to hardliners and therefore strategic and tactical choices. The chapter concludes with a brief case study of the Basque militant group, Euskadi ta Askatasuna (ETA), and its split in 1974 into ETA-político-militar, and ETA-militar.
Statistically Evaluating How Splinter Groups Emerge and Behave
Authors: Perkoski Evan
Published: August 2022

This chapter evaluates the book’s theory quantitatively. It begins by describing a new data set detailing the causes of organizational splits among 300 randomly-selected armed groups between 1970 and 2014. This offers some of the first insight into the different causes of organizational splits and their relative frequency over time. Then, using this new data, the chapter presents statistical analyses of the radicalization and survival of armed groups. It examines how splinters behave in their first recorded year of activity, just after they break away, and throughout their entire existence. Across both periods, the findings support the book’s theoretical expectations. Splinter groups motivated by strategy are highly radicalized and conduct particularly lethal attacks, whereas those forming unidimensionally around single issues are especially durable.
Civil Society II
Authors: Levenson Zachary
Published: August 2022

This chapter provides a contrasting account of civil society articulation in the 2012 Siqalo land occupation. In that occupation, participants viewed the municipal state as their antagonist from the outset—not as a partner, as in Kapteinsklip. This was for two reasons. First, most of the occupiers had faced regular police violence in their former living arrangements, with their tenure rights being called into question. And second, they had come from established informal settlements—communities—rather than atomized backyard shacks as in Kapteinsklip. In practice this meant that they mobilized collectively, electing a single leadership to represent the entirety of the occupation, forming a fused group rather than a series. Much as in Kapteinsklip, participants’ prior views of the state determined the organizational form they used to mobilize, or what this book calls civil society articulation.
Rediscovering Party Government
Authors: Santucci Jack
Published: August 2022

As argued in Chapter 2, realigning episodes can be “messy,” as it may not be clear who will govern after the fact. But party organization is a fact of political life. This chapter documents that recognition, pointing to the “messiness” of early reform episodes. These STV adopters faced several problems: voter confusion, non-use of rankings, shifting elite coalitions, and repeal. The national movement comes under new leadership, then responds in two ways. First, it cracks down on larger-than-recommended assemblies. Second, it advises converting reform coalitions into pre-election “good government” organizations. These groups have many hallmarks of party: policy committees, voter-mobilization arms, and public-facing party “brands.”
The Price of Coalition
Authors: Santucci Jack
Published: August 2022

This chapter looks at working of “good government” slates. Despite having traits associated with parties, they were mainly coalitions of neighborhood groups whose purpose was to hold down dominant-party seat share. Accordingly, government spending under STV is higher than in reformed cities without STV, as well as in unreformed cities. Campaigns are geographically focused, consistent with experience in non-U.S. contexts. But efforts at “vote management” are imperfect, with slates running as many candidates as there are seats to fill. This is a rational response to the fact that slate-based party systems defy the overarching ones. The “good government” parties bank on transfers from hopeless candidates to deliver seat majorities.
On the Causes and Consequences of Cross-Cultural Differences
Authors: Nunn Nathan
Published: August 2022

This review summarizes a recent body of research within economics that seeks to explain contemporary cross-societal differences in culture. One line of research traces the effects of determinants in the distant past and studies how they affect the evolution of cultural traits and their transmission across multiple generations. Another line takes a shorter-term and more micro-level perspective to study how events faced by an individual or group affect their culture. Most recently, this line of inquiry has turned to the question of how cultural traits interact with economic factors, in particular how cultural differences can inform the optimal design of economic and social policy and how such policies can, in turn, shape the evolution of cultural traits.
Dissenting Devotional Taste
Authors: Dumler-Winckler Emily
Published: August 2022

Variously called the Age of Taste, of Revolution, of Democracy, and of Virtue, the eighteenth century fueled a series of conversations and disputes about questions of authority. The first three chapters of this book demonstrate Wollstonecraft’s contributions to these debates. The first chapter argues that Wollstonecraft democratizes and radicalizes the neoclassical view that qualified or virtuous judges identify standards of taste. Wollstonecraft’s moral psychology of taste and judgment shares more in common with that of Edmund Burke than either Immanuel Kant or David Hume. Even so, she uses Burke’s metaphor of the wardrobe of a moral imagination to challenge his own tastes. Wollstonecraft scholars who notice the prominence of theology in her work tend to argue that it is either foundational or ornamental to her feminist arguments. Her devotional taste, which integrates theology, religion, ethics, politics, and aesthetics, is better understood as part of the inherited, ever-revisable wardrobe of the moral imagination.
Imitating Christ
Authors: Dumler-Winckler Emily
Published: August 2022

Innovatively imitating Christ, Wollstonecraft suggests, calls for a “revolution in female manners” and a denial of “sexual virtues.” Chapter 3 demonstrates that Wollstonecraft’s account of the virtues is radical in the dual sense of that term. Rooted in a premodern perfectionist theological anthropology, her account nonetheless revolutionizes those of her forebears in keeping with what Judith Butler calls performativity. But whereas Butler alternately celebrates virtue as critique or provides a critique of virtue, Wollstonecraft presents an account of ethical formation in the virtues of social criticism. These enable one to distinguish true virtues from their sexed semblances. Her denial of sexual virtues means the cultivation of virtue is neither determined by sexual difference as some worry, nor completely disconnected from embodied differences as others charge. This chapter also presents Wollstonecraft’s extensive list of the virtues, ultimately comparing her notion of modesty with Saba Mahmood’s findings.
Kant’s Early Defense of the Contemplative Life
Authors: Church Jeffrey
Published: August 2022

Chapter 1 discusses Kant’s earliest naturalistic genealogy of the vocation of humanity as expressed in his Universal Natural History (1755), a speculative history of the genesis and development of the cosmos. Before his transformative encounter with Rousseau, Kant held that to understand the purpose of human life, we must first understand nature as a whole. Kant adopted the ancient view that the contemplative life is the highest life. However, he argued, the conflict within human nature made it difficult if not impossible for us to live this sort of life. The Universal Natural History concludes by questioning the value of human existence and raising the question of the purpose of humanity, which, at this point in his career, Kant could not answer.