Search results for ""Author Seyla Benhabib""

The language of human rights has become the public vocabulary of our contemporary world. Ironically, as the political influence of human rights has grown, their philosophical justification has become ever more controversial. Building on a theory of discourse ethics and communicative rationality, this book addresses the politics and philosophy of human rights against the background of the broader social transformations that are shaping the modern world. Rejecting the reduction of international human rights to the Trojan horse of a neo-liberal empire's bid for world power, as well as the conservative objections to legal cosmopolitanism as encroachments upon democratic sovereignty, Benhabib develops two key concepts to move beyond these false antitheses. International human rights norms need contextualization in specific polities through processes of what she calls 'democratic iterations.' Furthermore, such norms have a 'jurisgenerative power,' in that they enable new actors to enter fields of social and political contestation; they promote new vocabularies for public claim-making and anticipate a justice to come. Ranging over themes such as sovereignty, citizenship, genocide, European anti-semitism, the crisis of the nation-state, and the 'scarf affair' in contemporary Europe and Turkey, this major new book by one of our leading political theorists reflects upon the political transformations of our times and makes a compelling case for a cosmopolitanism without illusions.

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An examination of the intertwined lives and writings of a group of prominent twentieth-century Jewish thinkers who experienced exile and migrationExile, Statelessness, and Migration explores the intertwined lives, careers, and writings of a group of prominent Jewish intellectuals during the mid-twentieth century—in particular, Theodor Adorno, Hannah Arendt, Walter Benjamin, Isaiah Berlin, Albert Hirschman, and Judith Shklar, as well as Hans Kelsen, Emmanuel Levinas, Gershom Scholem, and Leo Strauss. Informed by their Jewish identity and experiences of being outsiders, these thinkers produced one of the most brilliant and effervescent intellectual movements of modernity. Political philosopher Seyla Benhabib’s starting point is that these thinkers faced migration, statelessness, and exile because of their Jewish origins, even if they did not take positions on specifically Jewish issues personally. The sense of belonging and not belonging, of being “eternally half-other,” led them to confront essential questions: What does it mean for the individual to be an equal citizen and to wish to retain one’s ethnic, cultural, and religious differences, or perhaps even to rid oneself of these differences altogether in modernity? Benhabib isolates four themes in their works: dilemmas of belonging and difference; exile, political voice, and loyalty; legality and legitimacy; and pluralism and the problem of judgment.Surveying the work of influential intellectuals, Exile, Statelessness, and Migration recovers the valuable plurality of their Jewish voices and develops their universal insights in the face of the crises of this new century.

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The global trend toward democratization of the last two decades has been accompanied by the resurgence of various politics of "identity/difference." From nationalist and ethnic revivals in the countries of east and central Europe to the former Soviet Union, to the politics of cultural separatism in Canada, and to social movement politics in liberal western-democracies, the negotiation of identity/difference has become a challenge to democracies everywhere. This volume brings together a group of distinguished thinkers who rearticulate and reconsider the foundations of democratic theory and practice in the light of the politics of identity/difference. In Part One Jurgen Habermas, Sheldon S. Wolin, Jane Mansbridge, Seyla Benhabib, Joshua Cohen, and Iris Marion Young write on democratic theory. Part Two--on equality, difference, and public representation--contains essays by Anne Phillips, Will Kymlicka, Carol C. Gould, Jean L. Cohen, and Nancy Fraser; and Part Three--on culture, identity, and democracy--by Chantal Mouffe, Bonnie Honig, Fred Dallmayr, Joan B. Landes, and Carlos A. Forment. In the last section Richard Rorty, Robert A. Dahl, Amy Gutmann, and Benjamin R. Barber write on whether democracy needs philosophical foundations.

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Bibliography: http://www.nyupress.org/webchapters/9780814775998_benhabib_biblio.pdf In an increasingly globalized world, the movement of peoples across national borders is posing unprecedented challenges, for the people involved as well as for the places to which they travel and their countries of origin. Citizenship is now a topic in focus around the world but much of that discussion takes place without sufficient attention to the women, men, and children, in and out of families, whose statuses and treatments depend upon how countries view their arrival. As essays in this volume detail, both the practices and theories of citizenship need to be reappraised in light of the array of persons and of twentieth-century commitments to their dignity and equality. Migrations and Mobilities uniquely situates gender in the context of ongoing, urgent conversations about globalization, citizenship, and the meaning of borders. Following an introductory essay by editors Seyla Benhabib and Judith Resnik that addresses the parameters and implications of gendered migration, the interdisciplinary contributors consider a wide range of issues, from workers' rights to children's rights, from theories of the nation-state and federalism to obligations under transnational human rights conventions. Together, the essays in this path-breaking collection force us to consider the pivotal role that gender should play in reconceiving the nature of citizenship in the contemporary, transnational world. Contributors: Selya Benhabib, Jacqueline Bhabha, Linda Bosniak, Catherine Dauvergne, Talia Inlender, Vicki C. Jackson, David Jacobson, Linda K. Kerber, Audrey Macklin, Angela Means, Valentine M. Moghadam, Patrizia Nanz, Aihwa Ong, Cynthia Patterson, Judith Resnik, and Sarah K. van Walsum.

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Bibliography: http://www.nyupress.org/webchapters/9780814775998_benhabib_biblio.pdf In an increasingly globalized world, the movement of peoples across national borders is posing unprecedented challenges, for the people involved as well as for the places to which they travel and their countries of origin. Citizenship is now a topic in focus around the world but much of that discussion takes place without sufficient attention to the women, men, and children, in and out of families, whose statuses and treatments depend upon how countries view their arrival. As essays in this volume detail, both the practices and theories of citizenship need to be reappraised in light of the array of persons and of twentieth-century commitments to their dignity and equality. Migrations and Mobilities uniquely situates gender in the context of ongoing, urgent conversations about globalization, citizenship, and the meaning of borders. Following an introductory essay by editors Seyla Benhabib and Judith Resnik that addresses the parameters and implications of gendered migration, the interdisciplinary contributors consider a wide range of issues, from workers' rights to children's rights, from theories of the nation-state and federalism to obligations under transnational human rights conventions. Together, the essays in this path-breaking collection force us to consider the pivotal role that gender should play in reconceiving the nature of citizenship in the contemporary, transnational world. Contributors: Selya Benhabib, Jacqueline Bhabha, Linda Bosniak, Catherine Dauvergne, Talia Inlender, Vicki C. Jackson, David Jacobson, Linda K. Kerber, Audrey Macklin, Angela Means, Valentine M. Moghadam, Patrizia Nanz, Aihwa Ong, Cynthia Patterson, Judith Resnik, and Sarah K. van Walsum.

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This collection of ten essays offers the first systematic assessment of Jürgen Habermas's "Philosophical Discourse of Modernity," a book that defended the rational potential of the modern age against the depiction of modernity as a spent epoch. The essays (of which four are newly commissioned, five were published in the journal "Praxis International," and one -- by Habermas -- first appeared in translation in "New Critique" ) are divided into two sections: "Critical Rejoinders" and "Thematic Reformulations." An opening essay by d'Entrè ves sets out the main issues and orients the debate between Habermas and the postmodernists by identifying two different senses of responsibility: a responsibility to act versus a responsibility to otherness (an openness to difference, dissonance, and ambiguity). These are linked with two alternative understandings of the primary function of language: action-orienting versus world-disclosing. This is a fruitful way of looking at the issues that Habermas has raised in his attempt to resurrect and complete the project of Enlightenment. Habermas's essay discusses the main themes of his book in the context of a critical engagement with neoconservative cultural and political trends. The main body of essays offer an interesting collection of points of view, for and against Habermas's position by philosophers, social scientists, intellectual historians, and literary critics. SECTIONS CONTRIBUTORS: "Introduction," Maurizio Passerin d'Entrè ves. "Modernity versus Postmodernity," Jü rgen Habermas. Critical Rejoinders: Fred Dallmayr. Christopher Norris. David C. Hoy. James Schmidt. Joel Whitebook. ThematicReformulations: James Bohman. Diana Coole. Jay M. Bernstein. David Ingram

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This book is an attempt to defend the tradition of universalism in the face of a triple-pronged critique by engaging with the claims of feminism, communitarianism, and postmodernism and by learning from them. It situates reason and the moral self more decisively in contexts of gender and community.

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An examination of the intertwined lives and writings of a group of prominent twentieth-century Jewish thinkers who experienced exile and migrationExile, Statelessness, and Migration explores the intertwined lives, careers, and writings of a group of prominent Jewish intellectuals during the mid-twentieth century—in particular, Theodor Adorno, Hannah Arendt, Walter Benjamin, Isaiah Berlin, Albert Hirschman, and Judith Shklar, as well as Hans Kelsen, Emmanuel Levinas, Gershom Scholem, and Leo Strauss. Informed by their Jewish identity and experiences of being outsiders, these thinkers produced one of the most brilliant and effervescent intellectual movements of modernity. Political philosopher Seyla Benhabib’s starting point is that these thinkers faced migration, statelessness, and exile because of their Jewish origins, even if they did not take positions on specifically Jewish issues personally. The sense of belonging and not belonging, of being “eternally half-other,” led them to confront essential questions: What does it mean for the individual to be an equal citizen and to wish to retain one’s ethnic, cultural, and religious differences, or perhaps even to rid oneself of these differences altogether in modernity? Benhabib isolates four themes in their works: dilemmas of belonging and difference; exile, political voice, and loyalty; legality and legitimacy; and pluralism and the problem of judgment.Surveying the work of influential intellectuals, Exile, Statelessness, and Migration recovers the valuable plurality of their Jewish voices and develops their universal insights in the face of the crises of this new century.

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This is an outstanding collection of essays which brings together for the first time the work of a group of writers well-known in the Marxist-feminist tradition. The essays range from Marx to Foucault and go beyond them to offer genuine advances in the way social and political life can be reconceptualized in the light of feminist critique. This is an outstanding collection of essays which brings together for the first time the work of a group of writers well-known in the Marxist-feminist tradition. The essays range from Marx to Foucault and go beyond them to offer genuine advances in the way social and political life can be reconceptualized in the light of feminist critique.

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Sind kosmopolitische Ideale heute frommes Wunschdenken? Historisch und begrifflich nähert sich Seyla Benhabib der Paradoxie von Gleichheit und Differenz im Denken der westlichen Moderne. Ausgehend von autobiographischen Reflexionen präsentiert sie Episoden der kulturellen und politischen Erfahrungen des deutschsprachigen Judentums und seine Antworten auf die Dilemmata von Gleichheit und Differenz, Souveränität und Assimilation. Die unterschiedlichen Reflexionen Leopold Lucas' oder Moritz Goldsteins, Hans Kelsens, Leo Strauss' oder Hannah Arendts helfen, die paradoxe politische Erfahrung im modernen Nationalstaat angesichts der Hybridität kultureller Identitäten und Leistungen zu reflektieren. Benhabibs zentrale Konzepte hierbei sind "Hospitalität" als Verweis auf unsere eigene Fremdheit und problematische Vielfalt, die jurisgenerative Kraft kosmopolitischer Normen und die Idee demokratischer Iterationen als Prozesse der Ausformung des Politischen durch Recht.

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