Civilization is the progress toward a society of privacy. The savage’s whole existence is public, ruled by the laws of his tribe. Civilization is the process of setting man free from men. (Ayn Rand) In this essay I want to consider three interconnected ways in which we can view privacy: its meaning in organic society;… Continue reading Three views on privacy in the digital age, part 1: the value of the self
Author: Don Trubshaw
Don Trubshaw is a co-founder of the website Societal Values. He has a PhD in the philosophy and sociology of education and teaches in Higher Education.
The Just Society: Equality or Freedom?
In A Theory of Justice John Rawls conducted a famous thought experiment. He asked, if we were to imagine, behind a ‘veil of ignorance’, being born into a world in a position somewhere on the scale of unalloyed privilege and crushing poverty, what would be the type of social system we would advocate. Rawls assumed… Continue reading The Just Society: Equality or Freedom?
Respect, rights and freedoms in an era of identity activism
The British actor Ben Kingsley, probably most famous for his eponymous role in the film Ghandi, has, since being knighted in the 2001 honours list, apparently insisted on being referred to as ‘Sir Ben Kingsley’. This is his right and he is, from all accounts, quite offended if the honorific is overlooked. Not all recipients… Continue reading Respect, rights and freedoms in an era of identity activism
The coming struggle: individualism versus the bureaucratic state
Introduction Modernity has been characterised not only by the great benefits brought by the increase in scientific knowledge and the technologies that have flowed from it, such as increasing wealth and convenience, improvements in health and well-being, and access to enormous amounts of information by ordinary citizens, but also by the increased possibilities for… Continue reading The coming struggle: individualism versus the bureaucratic state
National sovereignty considered as a rule-based game
The Cambridge dictionary defines sovereignty as “The power of a country to govern itself”. As opposed to what? the power of a country not to govern itself? Defined in this way, the idea of sovereignty is a tautology; power, nationhood and government are effectively a closed loop. This historical weight of sovereignty is the… Continue reading National sovereignty considered as a rule-based game
The Korean Dilemma
Never formally concluded, the wound of the Korean war has been festering for over 60 years; but quietly sidelined by matters considered more geopolitically important, the two Koreas now threaten to be the ground zero of a nuclear Armageddon. The hateful totalitarian nightmare of North Korea has nothing worthwhile to offer the community of nations… Continue reading The Korean Dilemma
Universal Basic Income and the promises and perils of a leisured economy
‘From each according to his abilities, to each according to his needs’ (Karl Marx, Critique of the Gotha Program) Introduction Until recently few people would have heard of Universal Basic Income (UBI), despite the idea having been around for more than 200 years.1 Although it has gone under various names and had various proposed… Continue reading Universal Basic Income and the promises and perils of a leisured economy
Freedom and Belonging
The following article is extracted from a longer essay entitled “‘The Re-Enchantment of the World’ as Social Theory and Critique”, which readers who are interested can view in full at https://theaxiologicalperspective.wordpress.com/ Shortly after communist regimes in Russia and Eastern Europe were tumbling, the American political scientist Francis Fukuyama produced a seminal essay entitled ‘The… Continue reading Freedom and Belonging
The Limits of Tolerance
Attacks like the one we saw in the heart of London last week always set in motion a series of political spasms on the right and the left, the right decrying the lack of calling a spade a spade in the establishment media, in that the danger is posed not just by Islamist terrorism, or… Continue reading The Limits of Tolerance
Reflections on the Nature of Truth in a Post-Relativist Age
If a man says that there is no such a thing as truth, you should take him at his word and not believe him. (Roger Scruton) In classical times there were considered to be three absolute values: truth, beauty and goodness, which were considered to be rooted in the unbroken order of things, the… Continue reading Reflections on the Nature of Truth in a Post-Relativist Age