Fundamental value: a category in transformation

Abstract

‘Fundamental value’ is a canonical category in both Marxian and neo-classical economics. In application to finance and financial crisis, it is laden with complexity. For Marxists, it has underscored a focus on the distinctions between production and circulation, real and fictitious capital. These debates have dominated Marxian responses to the financial crisis. In mainstream finance and economics, the term has undergone transformation and historically driven adaptation. Marxian analysis could fruitfully follow this lead. This paper identifies that transformation as an expression of capital's transforming calculation project. As capital becomes more liquid, the concept of fundamental value itself must embrace liquidity, yet, in embracing liquidity, fundamental value loses its established definitive capacity.     

Citizenship and social justice

Discussions on the problems of the welfare state are increasingly framed in terms of citizenship rather than social justice. The popularity of the concept of citizenship raises the question of its implications for social justice theory and research. In this article it is argued that whereas the dominant approach in social justice is essentially individualistic, the concept of citizenship focuses rather on individuals as members of a societal community, from which both rights and obligations are derived. This focus on communal membership suggests three important topics for social justice theory and research: (i) the need to distinguish between a civic and a justice motive for human behavior, (ii) the need to specify the frame of reference respondents should use when they make their justice judgments, and (iii) the need to recognize the fact that justice judgments may result from both adhering to criteria of justice and considering the consequences of their application.     

Alcohol loss arising from microbial contamination of drivers' blood specimens

This paper describes the circumstances in which some drivers' blood specimens containing added sodium fluoride (1% w/v concentration) deteriorated as a result of microbial contamination, accompanied by a decrease of alcohol concentration. Strains of the bacteria Serratia marcescens and a Pseudomonas sp. were isolated from the specimens and proven capable of growing at ambient temperature in blood containing sodium fluoride at 1% w/v concentration. They were shown to be active in alcohol degradation in preservatised blood, the activity being dependent on sodium fluoride concentration and storage temperature. Blood diluters were assumed to be a source of microbial cross contamination from one blood specimen to the next. It is recommended that postmortem blood specimens be analysed in separate batches from drivers' specimens when automated blood diluters are used, that the content of fluoride ions be increased to an equivalent of 2% w/v sodium fluoride, and that storage of specimens at temperatures above 4 degrees C be minimised.     

Pseudoscience and Minority Religions: An Evaluation of the Brainwashing Theories of Jean-Marie Abgrall

An analysis of Jean-Marie Abgrall's cultic brainwashing theory shows that the theory is essentially identical to the pseudoscientific theory that was developed first by the American CIA as a propaganda device to combat communism, and second as an ideological device for use by the American anti-cult movement to rationalize efforts at persecution and control of minority religious groups. The CIA theory has been evaluated scientifically in research in several contexts (i.e., communist coercive indoctrination of Western prisoners, the CIA's attempted development of brainwashing techniques, and with American new religions or cults). In each context, it has been shown to be ineffective in coercively changing worldviews. Because of this pattern of disconfirmation, testimony based on brainwashing theory has been opposed as unscientific by relevant professional academic organizations and repeatedly excluded from American legal trials. Consequently, neither legal decisions nor public policy with respect to minority religions should be based on Abgrall's appropriation of this pseudoscientific theory.     

Fatal Wrong‐Way Collisions on New Mexico’s Interstate Highways, 1990–2004

Abstract: Medical examiner files from 1990 through 2004 were reviewed to identify fatalities caused by drivers traveling the wrong direction on interstate highways and identify risk factors and prevention strategies. Other fatal nonpedestrian interstate motor vehicle crashes served as a comparison group. Data abstracted included decedent demographics, driver/passenger status, seatbelt use, blood alcohol concentration, weather and light at time of occurrence and types of vehicles involved. Of 1171, 79 (6.7%) interstate motor vehicle fatalities were because of drivers traveling against the posted direction in 49 crashes, with one to five fatalities per crash. Wrong‐way collisions were significantly more likely to occur during darkness (p < 0.0001) and involve legally intoxicated drivers (p < 0.0001). In 29/49 (60%) wrong‐way crashes, alcohol was a factor. Prevention strategies aimed at reducing the incidence of driving while intoxicated, as well as improved lighting and signage at ramps, could help reduce the occurrence of fatal wrong‐way collisions on interstates.     

EU FTA negotiations with India, ASEAN and Korea: the question of fair labour standards

The EU sets considerable store by the need for its Free Trade Agreements (FTAs) now under negotiation with Asian countries to contain a sustainable development chapter with clear references to respect for the core ILO labour standards. While they reject the sanctions-based approach demanded by the European trade unions, they accept that some real enforcement mechanisms will be needed. Among Asian countries, Korea is most likely to accept some form of a social clause, while India and certainly some ASEAN countries strongly oppose it. This article explores the prospects for mutual agreement on this thorny issue at the bilateral level which, to date, has failed at the multilateral level.

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Advocating for the Right: Alliance Defending Freedom and the Rhetoric of Christian Persecution

In this article I trace the legal and cultural advocacy work of Alliance Defending Freedom (ADF), the single largest Christian conservative legal organisation operating in the US today. I begin by locating ADF strategy within the longer history of Christian persecution rhetoric articulated by the Moral Majority during the 1970s and 1980s. I then analyse both legal and cultural outputs of the organisation in two key cases: the so-called bathroom bills limiting transgender access to public facilities in several states, and the service denial of florist Barronelle Stutzman. I argue that by emphasising the perceived vulnerability of white cisgender women and girls in these cases, ADF litigators and cultural producers advance a narrow conception of religious freedom rights located in the specific cultural politics of neoliberal, white evangelicalism. As a result, while these cases have been legislative and policy failures for ADF they nevertheless provide useful insight into the rhetorical project of Christian persecution.

     

Working-Class Identities in Europe, 1850s–1930s

This paper notes that the emergence of class-based politics preceded the advent of factory manufacture and that artisans or skilled workers continued to dominate the labour movement before 1914. It recognises that industrialisation alone does not explain the emergence of socialist politics and that working-class responses to the process have often been fragmented rather than characterised by solidarity. It first explains this in terms of the uneven nature of industrial growth between nations and within nations, and between and within industrial sectors. Hierarchies of pay and other employer strategies to divide the labour force made it even more unlikely that collective action and belief could result simply from common economic problems. Even where a repressive state, intransigent employers, as well as residential and cultural factors, did produce a large socialist movement, as in the German case, that movement did not monopolise working-class identity, which was fractured by issues of skill, gender, generation, religious confession and ethnicity. However, this does not mean that gender, generation, religious and ethnic identities necessarily obliterated the issue and awareness of class. Indeed these multiple identities often enjoyed a simultaneous existence.