Charismatic violence and the sanctification of the super-rich

Abstract

Drawing historical comparisons between the nineteenth century and the present, this paper describes and analyses how an elite section of the global rich, through mega-giving and a re-emerging notion of ‘noblesse oblige’ that is enshrined in the philanthrocapitalism movement, have fostered a sacred rationale for their extreme wealth. Not only do the new nobles hold the power of wealth but, through mega-giving, they generate a moral imagery akin to religious figures who ostensibly self-sacrifice for the good of everyone else. This generates a form of charismatic authority that affords the super-rich an influential space from which to spread a ‘theodicy of privilege’ – shielding growing wealth concentration from criticism and sanctifying the claim that individual mega-wealth is collectively beneficial. Through its contribution to and facilitation of the inegalitarian status quo, this theodicy engenders various forms of structural violence. Here we explore the mechanisms that enable wealthy donors to position themselves as apparent benefactors of humanity, including a reliance on metrics that appear to justify the claim that targeted philanthropic expenditures can and are reducing global wealth and health inequalities, but which raise unanswered questions surrounding the actual effects of the outcomes claimed.     

Educação do Campo [Education for and by the countryside] as a political project in the context of the struggle for land in Brazil

Latin American and Brazilian rural social movements believe that significant social transformation requires the collective construction of a political project of an historical character. Education is conceived as an historical–cultural and political project to transform the peasantry into an historical subject through emancipatory educational–pedagogical praxis. The Landless Workers Movement (MST), the most emblematic peasant movement in Brazil, has played the leading role in this debate, which also includes many other peasant organizations. The MST has identified education as the key element in forging an historical–political actor out of the landless peasantry. This is articulated through the struggle for education for rural peoples, and along a theoretical–epistemic axis that revolves around the emergent concept of Educação do Campo (‘Education for and by the Countryside’). I ask how the MST conceptualizes education, and what the role is of education in strengthening peasant resistance and sharpening the dispute between political projects for the countryside. I focus on the epistemic dimensions of the concepts of education and pedagogy in the trajectory of the MST in Brazil, and I examine Educação do Campo as an educational-political project and in terms of policy conquests in the political dispute between the rival political projects for the Brazilian countryside of peasants and capital.     

Gender discrimination in Vietnam: the role of personal face

This paper examines gender discrimination using two novel perspectives: its relationship with personal face and its manifestation in contemporary Vietnam. Interviews with a sample of college teachers in Nha Trang city suggest that gender discrimination is reflected in and institutionalised through learning and enacting ‘acceptable’ face-related behaviours. These processes are exemplified in gender based linguistic conventions, role differentiation and segregation, the higher value associated with male roles, the (surface) acceptance of double standards by both genders and the recognition of public sanctions as effective reinforcers of gender inequality. Despite limitations in generalising from this research, an approach based on personal face-related language, behaviour and attitudes has promise for understanding how gender inequality functions at both individual and societal levels.     

Political Fact-Checking on Twitter: When Do Corrections Have an Effect?

Research suggests that fact checking corrections have only a limited impact on the spread of false rumors. However, research has not considered that fact-checking may be socially contingent, meaning there are social contexts in which truth may be more or less preferred. In particular, we argue that strong social connections between fact-checkers and rumor spreaders encourage the latter to prefer sharing accurate information, making them more likely to accept corrections. We test this argument on real corrections made on Twitter between Janurary 2012 and April, 2014. As hypothesized, we find that individuals who follow and are followed by the people who correct them are significantly more likely to accept the correction than individuals confronted by strangers. We then replicate our findings on new data drawn from November 2015 to February, 2016. These findings suggest that the underlying social structure is an important factor in the correction of misinformation.     

Social semiotics and platform studies: an integrated perspective for the study of social media platforms

ABSTRACT

The development of web 2.0 was powered by web services that are software systems designed to support interoperable machine-to-machine interaction over a network. It was the choice of standards enabling such interactions that favored communication among different systems and their mash ups. Facebook was the first social networking site to launch a service for developers that exposed its web services and the correlated APIs (application programming interfaces). This choice allowed programmers to create tools that could live within Facebook and turned the social networking site into a platform by enacting its programmability. In order to investigate the possibilities and the constraints offered by social media platforms, there seems to arise the necessity to integrate the analysis of frontend texts (such as posts or comments) and of social media communicative properties with the exploration of an underlying layer constituted by the network of relationships created within an application ecosystem and developed by using web services. The aim of the paper is to present a multi-layered approach to the study of social media platforms that combines the emerging subfield of Semiotic Technology with Platform Studies. The model is here applied to the analysis of Facebook Login Service.     

Brandom on Norms and Objectivity

The aim of this paper is to investigate Brandom’s conception of the objectivity of norms. In Making It Explicit Brandom supports a weak notion of objectivity based on his understanding of the perspectival structure of linguistic practices. In his following works, he resorts to the Hegelian notion of recognition, adding a historical dimension to his account. I contend that this notion of objectivity can be successfully defended against the objections raised by the commentators. In particular, it does not jeopardise the same possibility of communication, as claimed by Habermas and others, unless a strongly objective notion of communication is assumed. However, the paradigm shift from a strong to a weak understanding of objectivity entails a consequent revision of the conception of social criticism.     

Raising citizens in ‘mixed’ family setting: mothering techniques of Filipino and Thai migrants in Belgium

As states increasingly regulate ‘mixed’ family formation, self-positioning has become central to the lives of migrant spouses, including women. To understand this process, the present article investigates the mothering techniques of Filipino and Thai migrant women in Belgium, that is, the decisions, actions and ways of being they consciously enact in response to state policies ‘here’ and/or 'there' to secure the mother–child bond in space and time. Interviews and observations reveal these women’s main techniques: obtaining Belgian nationality for themselves, prioritising a single nationality (Belgian) for their children and staying at home (in the case of Filipino migrant women) or working (in the case of Thai women). This self-positioning sets these women’s own path and prepare their children’s route towards full, active membership in the nation. Mothering appears therefore as a fertile site of citizenship, which from afar echoes the public–private divide but in close-up reveals the porosity of such dichotomy.     

Negotiating a New Social Contract for Work: An Online,Distributed Approach

A massive open online course (MOOC) entitled “Shaping the Future of Work” (offered through MITx, the Massachusetts Institute of Technology's online learning division) has been the context for a multiparty simulation designed to produce classroom negotiation results that will have social impacts. After running the course in the MOOC context three times and in face‐to‐face settings eight times, we noticed that key themes emerged. Participants have brought their own workforce perspectives to their simulation roles as employers, worker representatives, elected officials, and educators. They have called for reciprocal agreements centered on fair treatment and representation in the workplace, improved organizational performance, investments in skills and capabilities, aligned rewards and benefits for workers, and work–life balance in communities. We continue to use the simulation in the classroom and are exploring ways to expand its use. In the meantime, in this article, we discuss how the insights gleaned from this simulation could be used to crystallize and advance a new social contract at a time when the public policies, institutions, and organizational practices governing employment relations have not kept up with the dramatic changes taking place in the workforce, nature of work, and overall economy.     

The Impact of Advertising and Media on the Arab Culture: The Case of the Arab Spring,Public Spheres,and Social Media

The Arab world has experienced some unprecedented social movements, labeled by the media as the Arab Spring. The purpose of this paper is to investigate the role of public policy, advertising, media, and public spheres on the Arab Spring. The media and economic policies enacted in the Arab world in the 1990s played a significant role in changing consumer culture in the Arab region, resulting in significant changes in public policy. Two studies were conducted to test how the change in consumer culture along with new public polices in the region contributed to the uprisings.     

Examining the Effects of Social Media Use on Job Satisfaction in the Australian Public Service: Testing Self-Determination Theory

The purpose of this study is to investigate the relationship between social media usage for work purposes and employee job satisfaction in the public sector. Because social media is a relatively recent phenomenon, the ways in which it affects employee attitudes such as job satisfaction are not well-known. Using self-determination theory (SDT) as a framework, this study tests whether perceived competence, relatedness, and autonomy mediate the relationship between social media usage for work purposes and employee job satisfaction. Data were obtained from the Australian Public Service Commission (APSC). Overall, results generated from the structural equation models support SDT, suggesting that employees using social media for work purposes have higher self-determination and higher self-determination increases their job satisfaction. In particular, the effect of competence to job satisfaction is very high. However, while social media usage for work purposes can enhance employees’ need for autonomy and competence, it does not have any statistical effect to employees need for relatedness. In addition, social media does not have any statistical and direct effect to job satisfaction. The results suggest that social media has an indirect effect to job satisfaction. This article discusses the implications of these findings.