The Theory of Social Democracy

The Theory of Social Democracy

Author: Thomas Meyer

Publisher: John Wiley & Sons

Published: 2013-09-30

Total Pages: 263

ISBN-13: 0745654614

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The ascendancy of neo-liberalism in different parts of the world has put social democracy on the defensive. Its adherents lack a clear rationale for their policies. Yet a justification for social democracy is implicit in the United Nations Covenants on Human Rights, ratified by most of the worlds countries. The covenants commit all nations to guarantee that their citizens shall enjoy the traditional formal rights; but they likewise pledge governments to make those rights meaningful in the real world by providing social security and cultural recognition to every person. This new book provides a systematic defence of social democracy for our contemporary global age. The authors argue that the claims to legitimation implicit in democratic theory can be honored only by social democracy; libertarian democracies are defective in failing to protect their citizens adequately against social, economic, and environmental risks that only collective action can obviate. Ultimately, social democracy provides both a fairer and more stable social order. But can social democracy survive in a world characterized by pervasive processes of globalization? This book asserts that globalization need not undermine social democracy if it is harnessed by international associations and leavened by principles of cultural respect, toleration, and enlightenment. The structures of social democracy must, in short, be adapted to the exigencies of globalization, as has already occurred in countries with the most successful social-democratic practices.


Revolutionary Social Democracy: Working-Class Politics Across the Russian Empire (1882-1917)

Revolutionary Social Democracy: Working-Class Politics Across the Russian Empire (1882-1917)

Author: Eric Blanc

Publisher: BRILL

Published: 2021-06-29

Total Pages: 469

ISBN-13: 9004449930

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This groundbreaking comparative study rediscovers the socialists of Russia’s borderlands, upending conventional interpretations of working-class politics and the Russian Revolution. Researched in eight languages, Revolutionary Social Democracy challenges long-held assumptions by scholars and activists about the dynamics of revolutionary change.


Freedom's Right

Freedom's Right

Author: Axel Honneth

Publisher: John Wiley & Sons

Published: 2014-03-11

Total Pages: 441

ISBN-13: 0745680062

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The theory of justice is one of the most intensely debated areas of contemporary philosophy. Most theories of justice, however, have only attained their high level of justification at great cost. By focusing on purely normative, abstract principles, they become detached from the sphere that constitutes their “field of application” - namely, social reality. Axel Honneth proposes a different approach. He seeks to derive the currently definitive criteria of social justice directly from the normative claims that have developed within Western liberal democratic societies. These criteria and these claims together make up what he terms “democratic ethical life”: a system of morally legitimate norms that are not only legally anchored, but also institutionally established. Honneth justifies this far-reaching endeavour by demonstrating that all essential spheres of action in Western societies share a single feature, as they all claim to realize a specific aspect of individual freedom. In the spirit of Hegel’s Philosophy of Right and guided by the theory of recognition, Honneth shows how principles of individual freedom are generated which constitute the standard of justice in various concrete social spheres: personal relationships, economic activity in the market, and the political public sphere. Honneth seeks thereby to realize a very ambitious aim: to renew the theory of justice as an analysis of society.


The Third Way

The Third Way

Author: Anthony Giddens

Publisher: John Wiley & Sons

Published: 2013-05-29

Total Pages: 130

ISBN-13: 0745666604

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The idea of finding a 'third way' in politics has been widely discussed over recent months - not only in the UK, but in the US, Continental Europe and Latin America. But what is the third way? Supporters of the notion haven't been able to agree, and critics deny the possibility altogether. Anthony Giddens shows that developing a third way is not only a possibility but a necessity in modern politics.


The Primacy of Politics

The Primacy of Politics

Author: Sheri Berman

Publisher: Cambridge University Press

Published: 2006-08-07

Total Pages: 219

ISBN-13: 1139457594

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Political history in the industrial world has indeed ended, argues this pioneering study, but the winner has been social democracy - an ideology and political movement that has been as influential as it has been misunderstood. Berman looks at the history of social democracy from its origins in the late nineteenth century to today and shows how it beat out competitors such as classical liberalism, orthodox Marxism, and its cousins, Fascism and National Socialism by solving the central challenge of modern politics - reconciling the competing needs of capitalism and democracy. Bursting on to the scene in the interwar years, the social democratic model spread across Europe after the Second World War and formed the basis of the postwar settlement. This is a study of European social democracy that rewrites the intellectual and political history of the modern era while putting contemporary debates about globalization in their proper intellectual and historical context.


In Search of Social Democracy

In Search of Social Democracy

Author: John Callaghan

Publisher:

Published: 2009

Total Pages: 328

ISBN-13:

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The first work to reflect in detail on the Left's experiences in government in the 1990s and early twenty-first century.


Social and Political Foundations of Constitutions

Social and Political Foundations of Constitutions

Author: Denis J. Galligan

Publisher: Cambridge University Press

Published: 2013-10-14

Total Pages: 693

ISBN-13: 1107434572

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This volume analyses the social and political forces that influence constitutions and the process of constitution making. It combines theoretical perspectives on the social and political foundations of constitutions with a range of detailed case studies from nineteen countries. In the first part leading scholars analyse and develop a range of theoretical perspectives, including constitutions as coordination devices, mission statements, contracts, products of domestic power play, transnational documents, and as reflection of the will of the people. In the second part these theories are examined through in-depth case studies of the social and political foundations of constitutions in countries such as Egypt, Nigeria, Japan, Romania, Bulgaria, New Zealand, Israel, Argentina and others. The result is a multidimensional study of constitutions as social phenomena and their interaction with other social phenomena.


Sustaining Civil Society

Sustaining Civil Society

Author: Philip Oxhorn

Publisher: Penn State Press

Published: 2011

Total Pages: 296

ISBN-13: 0271048948

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"Devoting particular emphasis to Bolivia, Chile, and Mexico, proposes a theory of civil society to explain the economic and political challenges for continuing democratization in Latin America"--Provided by publisher.


Friedrich Engels and the Foundations of Socialist Governance

Friedrich Engels and the Foundations of Socialist Governance

Author: Roland Boer

Publisher: Springer Nature

Published: 2021-10-08

Total Pages: 134

ISBN-13: 9811646953

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This book states that the political systems of China, Vietnam, Cuba and other socialist countries are showing distinct maturity and ability to deal effectively with challenges – the most recent being the COVID-19 pandemic. In order to understand how they have developed their structures, it is time to return to the roots of the Marxist tradition and re-examine the question of socialist governance. It was Friedrich Engels (and less so Marx) who laid out some of the theoretical foundations for socialist governance. On the basis of extensive research in 1870s and 1880s, Engels developed his analysis of the nature of hitherto existing states as a ‘separated public power’; the role of the dictatorship of the proletariat and its exercise of power; the actual meaning of the ‘withering away of the state’, which would be one of the very last outcomes of socialist construction; and the nature of socialist governance itself. On this matter, he proposed a de-politicised public power that would stand in the midst of society and focus on managing the processes of production for the sake of the true interests of society.