Interrogating the austerity measures introduced by the Czech government under the Prime Ministry of Petr Nečas (2010–2013), this essay wishes to highlight the importance of the translations of the political into the registry of morality, which Chantal Mouffe identifies as features of post-politics, for (re)establishment of social hierarchies and inequalities based in difference. In particular, I demonstrate the strategic importance of “disability” and the racialised concept of “maladaptation” for such post-political reformulations of the political and normative outlines of abled citizenship. After mapping out the ideological deployment of the idea of crisis for the ethics of austerity, the essay concludes by posing questions about possible limits and drawbacks of relying upon crisis as a trope of intersectional feminist critique., Kateřína Kolářová., and Obsahuje seznam literatury
The article treats of the discussion of democracy in the Czech intellectual context of the first half of the 20th century. Its starting point is the thesis that the nature of this discussion is determined by two clearly defined types of approach. One of them understood democracy as the concerning the general level which alone enabled free discussion and the dignified life of citizens (E. Beneš, E. Rádl, F. X. Šalda, F. Peroutka, K. Čapek and others). The second approach is an attempt to found democratic social-political practice on reflected philosophical theory. This conception is represented by T.G. Masaryk and J.L. Fischer. Masaryk is the “ontotheologian” of democracy which is, for him, an expression of the active presence of Providence in history. J. L. Fischer is the “onto-epistemologist” of democracy. He understands democracy as the realisation of the hierarchical Order of Reality, interpreted along the lines of structural functionalism. For Masaryk a crisis of democracy is ex definitione impossible, for Fischer it is a real threat because “pathological structures”. In both cases, however, there is an attempt to legitimise everyday reality by Transcendence.
Czechoslovak republic was founded and grew as a parliamentary demo¬cracy whose theoretical ideological conception was Masaryk’s idea of democracy. Masaryk was convinced that democracy, expressing the meaning of modern Western humanity, could not find itself in a crisis as such. Only democrats could fail. However, the factual development of the Czechoslovak state in the 1920’s and 1930’s manifested signs of a crisis. The question thus became one of sustainability of Masaryk’s ideas. One of the serious attempts at their critical reflection is the structurally functionalist conception of crisis of democracy offered by Josef Ludvík Fischer, a sociologist and a philosopher, who saw the root of the problem in a structural pathology, not an individual failure. The crisis can be resolved, according to Fischer, by constituting a “composable society” which respects the order of reality. Masaryk and Fisher agree that democracy needs be built on a global understanding of what there is as a whole.
The article continues the ongoing debate about a “pre-state” tribal society and the nature of its transformation into an early medieval “state” (regnum). The methodological approach is to understand this transformation as an institutional crisis within the tribal society. The opportunities to detect the key moments of this process are tested on the narrative strategies of medieval chroniclers based on the expectation that creating Christian monarchic power took place under the control of the church that tried to influence its form to correspond to the characteristics of the given patrician tradition. It also benefits from the reality that the authors of these texts were clergymen for whom this idea was natural. Using comparative examination, it seeks out typical testimonies that can be considered traditional locations of literary memory of communication between the sovereign and the tribe. In this way, the study attempts to define the basic strategy the sovereign employed to subjugate “their” people within the framework of Christian ethical discourse.
Článek se zaměřuje na debaty o vztahu teorie, metody a praxe v meziválečné americké sociologii. Toto období je často vnímáno jako "zlatý“ věk empirického zkoumání, během něhož bylo zformováno mnoho metodologických přístupů. Na druhé straně, jak naznačuje zde rozpracovaná argumentace, požadavky profesionalizace a specializace vytvořily výzkumný model, jenž sice úspěšně analyzoval specifické problémy, současně však selhal v kontextu kkrize“ a "rozvratu“ americké společnosti, kdy se projevilo, že vědění, jež americká sociologie produkuje, je irelevatní ve vztahu k obecnému problému logiky vývoje společnosti., The article provides a historical contextualization of the debates on theory and method within interwar American sociology. This period is often portrayed as the “golden” age of empirical inquiry resulting in proliferation of methodological orientations. It is argued that the demands of professionalization and specialization within the discipline produced a research model which succeeded in analyzing specific issues, but failed to find (in the context of the “crisis” and “disruption” of American society) a convincing answer to the general question of the logic of society’s development., and Jan Balon.
The importance of the institution of family in housing practices has deep historical roots in Greece, and families tend to follow certain housing strategies such as late emancipation from the parental home, intergenerational house transfers and financial support for housing. Providing and maintaining a housing solution for young members is one of the top worries in this geographical region, and it is relieved via intergenerational micro-solidarities. Moreover, today’s crisis and austerity are threatening, through indirect budgetary cuts and rising taxation, the housing well-being of the citizenry which is supported only by family welfare. Nonetheless, the family still constitutes the main shock absorber of social and economic turbulence, but at what price?
This article argues that, despite Poland’s better situation during the economic crisis, the long-lasting rationalisation of permanent austerity overshadows and hinders any alternative solutions in the field of social policies. In this sense, the crisis that hurt the economies of many other countries represented a reference frame for adhering to the path of austerity policies in Poland. The neoliberal track in social and economic policies was accompanied by the strengthening of their conservative pillar: any slight improvements in family policies took a maternalist direction, with a well-paid maternity leave prolonged to one year without the same individual rights being granted to fathers. Finally, the crisis served as a background for the Catholic Church’s attack on the category of “gender”, an example of moral panic. The policy changes as well as the stronger anti-feminism in public discourse were in line with the institutional and ideological legacies of the period of transition, while the crisis served as a direct and indirect reference point for the actors behind these developments., Dorota Szelewa., and Obsahuje seznam literatury