Emancipatory Theory Research Articles

Big Data in online education

From classifying learners to predicting learner behaviour, the application of Big Data in online education has been vast. Besides the potential benefits of Big Data in education, it is necessary to critically engage with some ethical and social challenges that Big Data presents to the field of online learning. The increasing use of big data by large institutional actors and corporations raises questions not only about data privacy and ownership, but whether this data is used to genuinely improve learner and teacher online learning experiences, or primarily for commercial profits and institutional benefits. When addressing ethical concerns regarding the use of Big Data in education, critiques often follow a reasoning that is in line with corporate interests and neoliberal logic of marketization of education. Given the importance of the pursuit for democratic online education, the need for critical perspectives in the field is ever-more essential. This research tries to critically address the role and impact of Big Data on labour relations and economic fairness in online education by examining both corporate and institutional data practices in online learning. The study puts forward a provisional theory of the use of Big Data in two large online learning platforms (Coursera and Blackboard) using critical grounded theory. The core category of Exploitation of the learning community, the three constituent concepts; the Vendor-Institutional Complex, Use of learner generated value for profit, and the Behavioral monitoring and engineering; and the sustaining category, the Magic Trick, were the foundational blocks for developing an emancipatory theory that addressed ethical issues of economic fairness regarding the use of big data in online education.

Capitalism as “the best of all possible worlds”: a marxist critique of Boaventura de Sousa Santos' postmodern political thought

The general aim of this work is to critically analyse certain conceptions and political positions of Boaventura de Sousa Santos on the problems of Western modernity and postmodernity. For the Portuguese sociologist, Western modernity is going through an unprecedented crisis of civilisation that can be identified through three fundamental dimensions: the epistemological dimension (the problem of Western scientific knowledge), the theoretical dimension (the problem of the Marxist theory of social emancipation) and the political dimension (the problems of the liberal social contract, social fascism and the disunity of left-wing forces). Postmodernity, however, represents the possibilities and opportunities for overcoming that crisis in view of the epistemological (the ecology of knowledge), theoretical (the new emancipatory political culture) and political (high-intensity democracy) renewals that are underway. The main hypothesis to be presented is that Boaventura Santos' political conceptions and positions – in parallel with his limited understanding of Marxism, the main interlocutor and target of his often mistaken criticism – correspond to the postmodern ideology, which can be characterised, according to Marxism, by epistemological scepticism, contempt for history and political defeatism. In this vein, the theoretical framework adopted here necessarily comes from Marxism, understood, according to Michael Löwy, as a social worldview, that is, an organic, articulated and structured set of values, representations, ideas and cognitive orientations about man in his relationship with nature, society and history, internally unified by a determined perspective and a certain socially conditioned point of view.

Towards mutual recognition: Ricoeur against Kojève

In this article, we examine two philosophical theories of recognition: those of Paul Ricoeur and Alexandre Kojève. We trace this line of development in the theory of recognition as a return from Ricoeur to Kojève. Our hypothesis is that over the past twenty years, the theory of recognition has undergone a change in content and has transformed into a theory of misrecognition. In turn, the theory of misrecognition is grounded in the struggle between subjects and brings us back to the discourse of the struggle between the Slave and the Master. This transformation from struggle to reciprocity and vice versa, we argue, suggests that a theory of identity formation as a process of resistance to assujettissement is in demand at this moment in history. In the 2010s, as the theory of misrecognition took shape primarily in the English‑speaking world, the constitution of the subject began to be understood once again as the outcome of struggles within feminist, Marxist, and other emancipatory theories. We examine both Ricoeur’s arguments against Kojève, Althusser, and the theory of misrecognition in general, as well as the «return» of Kojève’s arguments in the contemporary theory of misrecognition.

Fun at work and employees’ communication behavior: a serial mediation mechanism

Purpose Building on evolutionary emancipation theory, the purpose of this study is to investigate the impact of workplace fun on employees’ scouting behavior through the serial mediation of employees’ psychological empowerment and megaphoning. Design/methodology/approach A questionnaire survey technique is used to elicit the responses of 445 employees from service organizations. Findings The statistical results revealed that fun at work influences employees scouting behavior through the serial mediation of psychological empowerment and megaphoning. The direction relationship between fun and scouting was not statistically significant, thus a full mediation mechanism was proved. Originality/value The value of employees’ communication behavior has increased in the recent past, and it overweighs the conventional mediums (e.g. TV, radio and newspaper). But the antecedents and mechanisms through which communication behavior can be influenced are an area that has not gained researchers’ attention. This study proposes such a conceptual model and empirically tests it.

Austrian national identity in the centre-periphery model

ABSTRACT This article deals with the question of Austrian national identity, seen as a case study set within the theoretical frameworks of the centre-periphery model, and in particular, the theories of cultural emancipation of a periphery from the preponderance of a centre. The article examines , firstly, the unequal partnership between Germany and Austria, whose roots are to be found in the rivalry between the Habsburgs and Hohenzollerns, and, secondly, the way Austria invented its concept of a cultural centre after 1945. Finally, emphasis is put on selected political, cultural, and social phenomena, as well as processes that have happened since the 1960s, which question the traditional image of Austria. The salient element of this deconstruction process is by means of unearthing Austria’s memory of the Nazi past, which facilitates the emergence of a critical culture of remembrance and undermines the artificial post-war construct of Austrian national identity.

Whats's critical about Critical Theory again? Critical Theory, ethnocentrism, sexism and racism

The purpose of the article is to examine some of the weaknesses of critical theory with regard to race and gender, as well as to critique the limitations of critical theory stemming from its ethnocentrism. In it the author argues for a return to the deeper engagement with the breadth of contemporary social, political, and emancipatory theories and movements as seen in the first generation of the Frankfurt School. As a case in point, he shows that Angela Davis' omission from the history of critical theory indicates the degree to which even critical theory is haunted by racism, ethnocentrism, and sexism. These shortcomings of critical theory make it necessary to revisit critical theory once again, carrying forward the provocation made by Nancy Fraser in her essay entitled “What’s Critical About Critical Theory?”. As a result of the argument, the author suggests that a new critical theory, which brings Herbert Marcuse and Angela Davis into contact with other recent theories, would lead to more fruitful forms of critical theory that would help overcome the one-dimensional concerns of traditional critical theory.

The Relevance of Human Security Approach in Assessing The Causes and Solutions to Food Insecurity in South Sudan (Case Study: South Sudan 2017 Famine)

The Relevance of Human Security Approach in Assessing The Causes and Solutions to Food Insecurity in South Sudan (Case Study: South Sudan 2017 Famine)

Identity Politics and the Decolonization of the Western Mind: The Intellectual Resilience of Alain de Benoist and the Nouvelle Droite

Abstract This article argues that parallel to and accompanying the populist backlash tormenting Western democratic societies, a new discourse has emerged to compete with liberal pluralism, progressive multiculturalism, and the ideology of universal human rights. It is a discourse running contrary to the positions expected of the exclusionist right. Rather than originating in a vulgar national-populist reaction against liberal democracy and minority rights, this competing perspective comes from an almost paradoxical synthesis of prefascist ideas developed in the early 20th century and current pro-diversity and anticolonialist theories. In attempting to understand this perplexing ideological conjuncture, it can help to follow the ideological evolution of the French writer and ideologue of the French and European new right, Alain de Benoist. The ideas he developed in the 1980s and 1990s, and expanded in recent years, have contributed to synthesizing an ideological trend that is becoming central in the current debate on the populist backlash in Western democratic societies – right-wing postcolonialism. While de Benoist was not alone in this, he was one of the first to introduce and weaponize the discourse of the Weimar Conservative Revolution as a theory of emancipation for both Western repressed identities as for Third-World ones.

Ontology as ideology: A critique of Butler's theory of precariousness

Ontology as ideology: A critique of Butler's theory of precariousness

More Is Required of Us: Complicating an Ontology of Experience at the Heart of Community-Based Research

More Is Required of Us: Complicating an Ontology of Experience at the Heart of Community-Based Research

Trust and Strength of Family Ties: New Experimental Evidence

We provide a conceptual replication of an experimental study that uncovered a robust correlation between the strength of individuals’ family ties and their distrust of strangers, striving to establish whether the link is causal. Using a different subjects pool and an online setting, we repeat the binary trust-game experiment from Ermisch and Gambetta and enrich it by manipulating the payoffs to create a low-trust and high-trust environment. The key finding is corroborated, but as expected, only in the high-trust environment. The two environments further allow us to impose a diff-and-diff design on the data, which rules out selection of low-trusting individuals into strong-tied families and gives us indirect evidence of causation, namely, that having strong family ties stunts the development of trust in strangers. Our findings support the emancipatory theory of trust proposed by Toshio Yamagishi and could be interpreted as uncovering the micro foundations of classic ethnographic studies, such as that by Edward Banfield, which described how subcultures fostering tight bonds within families or small groups make cooperation harder to be achieved.

A grounded theory of improvisation in therapy: Lessons from decoloniality

AbstractGrounded theory (GT) is a popular research methodology that has been used in various fields and disciplines. Its researchers face the paradox of their method being grounded in both data and theory, potentially resulting in researcher ambivalence towards existing knowledge and constructing “thin” or “descriptive” theory as a result. In this reflective paper, the researcher uses a case example of theorising the category “improvisation,” to explore the deliberate decolonial use of literature in GT. They share detailed examples of inductive coding, analytic memoing and abduction of the category. They describe a paradigm‐changing moment of realisation when they discovered their own colonial thinking towards this category and the subsequent perspective change that occurred when they attempted to “de‐link” from their colonial thinking and apply a decolonialised lens to their category. The work of Black and Indigenous authors enabled the researcher to theorise “improvisation” as a valid, transdisciplinary practice that lies at the heart of both therapy and art making. The researcher concludes that researchers intending to decolonialise their knowledge production should take a critical‐reflexive stance towards existing theory, deliberately seeking out alternate, decolonial ways of knowing, in order to construct more vital, convivial and emancipatory theories. They also offer a decolonial reimagining of therapy as a grounded, responsive, intentional and social improvisational practice, which is co‐created between client and therapist.

Freed from the Fear of Hell: Machiavelli's Restyling of Afterlife and His Theory of Emancipation

Abstract In several texts, Machiavelli alludes to an unorthodox idea of the underworld. Hell is presented as an exclusive environment where only the greatest souls are welcome to discuss the matter of state for all eternity. In his novella Belfagor, Machiavelli even describes the reign of Minos as a virtuous republic populated with fellow devils that are more naive than the diabolical Florentines. In this article, I propose that Machiavelli's unprecedented desecration of Hell aims to liberate his fellow citizens from the yoke of modern Christian morality. This is his attempt at dignifying people whose fear of transgressing the laws of men and God numbs their conscience and ultimately paralyzes civic activism. Therefore, it is also a way to emancipate the masses, both spiritually and politically. Freed from the fear of the afterlife's punishments, citizens can reawaken the once-lost civic virtue of the ancients.

Patriarchy and patriarchal customs in the Meitei Society of Manipur

Based on an auto-ethnographic insight and complementary ethnographic interactions with 52 women, we document and analyze the patriarchal customs in the Meitei society of Manipur; thereby challenging conventional wisdom which would have us believe that is replete with empowered women. We briefly comment on certain aspects of these customs including their relationship with the Sanskritization of the Meiteis and how they are affected by socio-economic indicators. We also identify two central mechanisms that legitimize such customs: the idea of touheidaba, which is the selective mystical prohibition/commandment of certain acts that cannot be committed/should be committed; and the eulogization of an “ideal Meitei woman”. Lastly, we locate such legitimizing mechanisms and the Meitei woman's response in extant literature on power, resistance, agency and consciousness; thereby seeking to construct a grounded emancipatory theory for the Meitei women.

Everyone’s an artist?

This article examines the endurance of traditional class labels among precarious workers in post-recession Dublin. It argues that tensions remain between creatives and non-creatives due to: (1) divergent class concepts, (2) a lack of social engagement, and (3) unequal access to economic, social, and cultural capital, which creatives mobilize to protect some highly vocational artistic labor. It is thus not a shared experience of the same kind of precarious exploitation that unites the precariat but a trap held in common, whereby self-actualization through labor is construed as a route to freedom. Drawing on Karl Marx’s theory of emancipation, I suggest that attempts to redress precarization should focus on undermining this encroachment of work into life, which I argue results in exploitation and alienation for all precarious workers.

Wilhelm Reich and Sexology from Below.

One of sexologist Wilhelm Reich's most ambitious and enduring theories claims that sexuality and sexual repression play a central role in the production and reproduction of class structures and hierarchies. From 1927-1933, Reich combined his sexological work with his communist political convictions in a movement that became known as sex-pol. Reich developed some of his most provocative and potentially emancipatory theories through this empirical work with members of working-class communities. Though they often remain anonymous in his writings, the traces of their voices remain audible throughout. In this paper, I employ a Gramscian method, developed by post-colonial scholars, to read for the trace of proletarian voices in Reich's archive. I argue that these subjects helped to theorize the role of sex in producing and reproducing class oppression. Reading for the trace of proletarian voices in the archive expands our understanding of how working-class subjects in early twentieth-century Germany and Austria helped to produce concrete sexological knowledge from below.

Two-Dimensional Models of Cultural Differences: Statistical and Theoretical Analysis

This study finds a common statistical pattern in all major quantitative studies of cultural differences, and discusses theories that explain this pattern. 92 cultural variables from 33 published cross-cultural studies including 125 countries are analyzed with an advanced factor analysis method. The study confirms previous findings that two factors can account for a large part of the variation in all major published cultural variables. While many previously published cultural variables represent arbitrarily rotated factor analysis results, the present study is improving the explanatory power by un-rotating the factors and by incorporating new theories that link cultural values to conditions in the physical and social environment. The first factor, accounting for 34% of the total variance, reflects general effects of development and welfare. This factor is explained by theories of development, modernization, emancipation, and secularization. This includes psychological effects of collective security that are explained by evolutionary psychology. The dimension formed by the first factor has one end in poor and war-torn countries, and the opposite end in North European welfare states. The second factor, accounting for 15% of the total variance, reflects relational mobility, long-term versus short-term orientation, differences in self-construal, and various other effects. Theoretical explanations of these effects are based on differences in subsistence economy, colonial history, ethnic diversity, and religion. The second factor has one end in East Asian countries, and the opposite end in Latin American countries. Analysis of business culture reveals the same two-factor pattern as national culture.

Radical Emancipation: The Theory of Biocentric Ecosocialism and the Principle of Dynamic Equilibrium

ABSTRACT In this study, I offer a radically biocentric conception of ecosocialism, which is based upon essentially Marxist considerations. In my interpretation, this version of ecosocialism could be conceived as a logical consequence of Marx’s original theory of emancipation. For this reason, biocentric ecosocialism can also be understood as the “theory of radical emancipation”. Radical emancipation entails never treating other living beings (or their communities and populations) entirely as instrumental means. A crucial insight of this study is that the emancipation of humankind can never be separated from the emancipation of nature. This is a moderately ecocentric and moderately holistic theory which, in my interpretation, is capable of founding fundamental rights to all living beings. At a practical level, biocentric ecosocialism encompasses the principle of “dynamic equilibrium,” which relates to the maximization of potential for all living beings. Dynamic equilibrium has three subprinciples: (1) maximizing biodiversity and potential for the entire ecosystem of the planet, (2) minimizing the suffering of living beings, and (3) maximizing the potential of humans, as self-conscious living beings.

Teachers’ Perspectives On ‘Duaw Tulunghaan’: A Qualitative Inquiry

This study focused on the teachers perspectives on Duaw Tulunghaan. A qualitative and phenomenological approach through in-depth interviews and focus group discussion method was used to gather the data needed. This study was gleaned through Interpretive-Practical Theory known as person centered supervision. Another theory anchored to this study was known as Critical Emancipatory Theory that encourages reflective action for both teachers and supervisors. This theory examines moral, ethical, and political dimensions embedded in the teaching practice. Another theory was the applied Science Theory or it is also associated to empirical analytical method. This theory emphasized the technical aspects during supervision. A researcher-made questionnaire, with a total of four main research questions and twelve sub-questions, was used to interview the fourteen participants. They were selected through purposive sampling technique. The data were gathered through audio recording, and were transcribed. As to the participants perspectives, five (5) major themes emerged: improves teaching competence assesses teachers needs serves as stressor or burden evaluates strengths and weaknesses and develops professional growth. Participants shared their experiences and four (4) major themes developed: stress in intensive preparation stress in preparing instructional materials apprehensions in facing higher authorities and memorable and productive learning. In addition, participants employed different ways of coping including proper preparations technical assistance time management self-motivation positive outlook and open-mindedness. Establish rapport between observers and teachers be ready and prepared inform the schedule ahead of time sustain the implementation provide instructional materials and be optimistic were the suggestions of participants. This study recommended modifying or strengthening DepEd orders on Duaw Tulunghaan

COVID-19 infection induces higher trust in strangers

How does the COVID-19 pandemic affect interpersonal trust? Most evidence shows that natural disasters reinforce trust and cooperation, but the COVID-19 virus differs from other calamities, since it spreads through contact with people, potentially increasing suspicion and distrust, as, according to contemporaneous writers' accounts, seems to have been the case with the Black Death, the London plague, and the Spanish influenza. We investigate the link between interpersonal trust and individuals exposed to COVID-19, either vicariously through their community or networks or directly by becoming infected. We rely on an original panel survey, including a survey experiment, with a representative sample of adults in Italy, one of the countries hardest struck by the pandemic. Our experimental findings reveal that priming people about the risk that the pandemic poses to their health leads to a substantial increase in their trust in strangers. Our panel data analysis of within-individual effects shows that those who become infected trust strangers more than those who are not infected. Our findings could be explained by people observing higher than expected altruistic behavior or becoming more dependent on other people's support, consistent with the "emancipation theory of trust." When people recover from COVID-19, however, they drop to trusting strangers as much as those who were not directly exposed to the virus, an indication that the positive effects on trust during the pandemic have an emotional source. Nonetheless, the evidence suggests that, in the aggregate, there has been a small but significant increase in trust among the general population relative to prepandemic levels.