Interpersonal Obligations Research Articles

The social order of illegal markets in cyberspace: extralegal governance and online gambling in China

How do illegal markets operate in cyberspace? Drawing on interview data, this article examines the organizational structure of China’s illegal online gambling businesses and their use of extralegal governance institutions to marketize services, ensure fair play, enforce compliance, and reduce the risk of prosecution. The article also discusses the impact of China’s intensified efforts to repress illegal markets. It suggests that operators in the illegal online market now prefer to settle gambling debts using ex ante means, such as deposits, rather than ex post mechanisms, such as using interpersonal obligations or violence to enforce debt collection. This research contributes to the literature on extralegal governance, gambling, and illegal markets.

Teenagers' but not young adults' beliefs about intrinsic interpersonal obligations for group members.

Previous research has indicated that children perceive social category members as having intrinsic obligations toward each other, which shape their expectations for social interactions. However, it is unclear whether teenagers (aged 13 to 15) and young adults (aged 19 to 21) continue to hold such beliefs, given their increased experience with group dynamics and external social rules. To explore this question, three experiments were conducted with a total of 360 participants (N = 180 for each age group). Experiment 1 examined negative social interactions using different methods in two sub-experiments, while Experiment 2 focused on positive social interactions to examine whether participants viewed social category members as intrinsically obligated to avoid harming each other and to offer assistance. Results revealed that teenagers evaluated within-group harm and non-help as unacceptable, regardless of external rules, whereas they viewed between-group harm and non-help as both acceptable and unacceptable, depending on the presence of external rules. Conversely, young adults considered both within-group and between-group harm/non-help as more acceptable if an external rule permitted such behavior. These findings suggest that teenagers believe that members of a social category are intrinsically obligated to help and not harm each other, whereas young adults believe that individual social interactions are constrained mainly by external rules. That is, teenagers hold stronger beliefs than young adults about intrinsic interpersonal obligations to group members. Thus, in-group moral obligations and external rules contribute differently to the evaluation and interpretation of social interactions at different developmental stages.

From Misfit to Guide

In the last four decades, ‘otaku’ and ‘hikikomori,’ namely popular culture enthusiasts and reclusive shut-ins, have been at the center of a heated debate in Japan concerning their social alienation. On the one hand, public opinion and mass media consider them individualistic nonconformists who selfishly disregard their interpersonal obligations, thus posing a threat to the cohesion of the nation. On the other hand, cultural critics, social scientists, and professional psychiatrists argue that their isolation may actually be the consequence of the current disgregation of the relational ties and of a consequent psychological state of constant anxiety and dejection. The article explores the complex ways the computer game Persona 5 goes against the view held by many Japanese in favour of the latter's explanation. To this end, the article applies the method of cultural studies on the portrayal of a specific character in the game, Sakura Futaba, as a case study. Ultimately, the article aims to demonstrate that Persona 5 constructs a revisionist representation of ‘otaku’ and ‘hikikomori’ on the base of a thorough knowledge of contemporary Japanese societal problems, a revaluation of the pop culture fan and the hermit's condition and abilities, and a newly defined vision of sociability.

“New Private Law Theory” as a Mosaic: What Can Hold (Most of) It Together?

AbstractStefan Grundmann, Hans Micklitz, and Moritz Renner’s New Private Law Theory: A Pluralist Approach is a wide-ranging, ambitious, and fascinating project. In this article I offer one way to read the NPLT as a mosaic, rather than a patchwork, by first taking seriously the idea of legal theory as the core of NPLT’s methodological commitments, and second taking seriously its subject matter of private law as the source of its substantive underpinnings.Legal theory, I argue (much in line with GMR’s rich text), is distinctive from other discourses about law given its acute awareness to law’s normative filter, which furthermore implies a synthetic commitment that these other discourses do not share. But legal theory should also, I claim, be attentive to the constitutive role law plays in constructing the building-blocks of many of our interpersonal interactions, and it should thus be particularly cautious from relying on philosophical or social scientific inquiries that take contingent configurations of property or of contract as a given. This lesson, in turn, is crucial for contemporary discussions of private law obligations that go beyond the libertarian duty of non-interference. Rather than reifying the libertarian conceptions of property and contract and resorting to exogenous justifications for our interpersonal obligations of non-discrimination and accommodation, private law theory can—and indeed should—rely on happier conceptions of these core legal institutions, which vindicate the freestanding significance of these obligations and thus also validate their transnational applicability.

Rethinking relational architecture: Interpersonal justice beyond private law

This article takes as its starting point a particular idea about the nature of private law: that it is specially concerned with relational or interpersonal justice. The relational conception is meant to be juxtaposed against non-relational conceptions typically grouped under the heading of ‘instrumentalism’: the idea that law is a means to an end. But a question mark hovers over domains beyond the private. Are these non-relational or relational and anti-instrumentalist in different ways? To answer this question, this article articulates a more capacious framework of interpersonal justice that captures the continuities and discontinuities between private law and non-private fields. I rework the architectonic of relationality, untangling foundational concepts such as the notions of parties and identities; the process of reasoning to different structures of interpersonal obligations; and the multifaceted idea of instrumentalism. Working through moral philosophy, jurisprudence, criminal law, and constitutional and administrative law, I follow the golden thread of interpersonal justice that is woven through the conceptual architecture of all these fields and suggest further consolidations, extensions, and implications that are yet to be fully grasped.

Addressing Serious Harm, Reconsidering Policy and Building Towards Repair

This commentary draws on personal experiences, my time spent discussing acts of harm in the academy with activists, and a review of various incidences on issues of academic harm and responsibility. Over the last few years, I have observed numerous high-profile cases in anthropology – in various countries and various contexts – that have elicited a significant public response. Some frame this kind of harm as the proverbial ‘few bad apples’, an approach I reject as it ignores what enables harm. Alternatively, some attempt to use the idea of ‘academic freedom’ as a way to sidestep questions of interpersonal obligations. Recently, I have encountered this line of argument in defences made by some against allegations about John Comaroff, such as media pieces that I note have been later cross-posted to his own website (Comaroff 2022; Walsh 2022). Instead of settling into a debate about what is or is not ‘academic freedom’, I here highlight a different reorientation, a shift in framing: what I have called, in conversations with friends and collaborators, ‘academic responsibility’. This reminds us that whereas academic freedom is frequently framed as a freedom to or a freedom from, academic responsibility emphasises our responsibilities as scholars and the obligations which follow to others. This includes a refusal of what Zoe Todd (2019) calls a ‘failure of imagination’ – we can and must envision different ways of building scholarly spaces beyond what we ourselves have seen or experienced in the academy.

The role of epistemological beliefs in STEM faculty\u2019s decisions to use culturally relevant pedagogy at Hispanic-Serving Institutions

BackgroundThe growing understanding of the oppressive inequities that exist in postsecondary education has led to an increasing need for culturally relevant pedagogy. Researchers have found evidence that beliefs about the nature of knowledge predict pedagogical practices. Culturally relevant pedagogy supports students in ways that leverage students’ own cultures through three tenets: academic success, cultural competence, and sociopolitical consciousness. If STEM practitioners believe that their disciplines are culture-free, they may not enact culturally relevant pedagogy in their courses. We investigated how and in what forms 40 faculty from mathematics, physics, chemistry, and biology departments at Hispanic-Serving Institutions enacted culturally relevant pedagogy. We used the framework of practical rationality to understand how epistemological beliefs about the nature of their discipline combined with their institutional context impacted instructors’ decision to enact practices aligning with the three tenets of culturally relevant pedagogy.ResultsIn total, 35 instructors reported using practices that aligned with the academic success tenet, nine instructors with the cultural competence tenet, and one instructor with the sociopolitical consciousness tenet. Instructors expressed and even lauded their disciplines’ separation from culture while simultaneously expressing instructional decisions that aligned with culturally relevant pedagogy. Though never asked directly, six instructors made statements reflecting a “culture-free” belief about knowledge in their discipline such as “To me, mathematics has no color.” Five of those instructors also described altering their teaching in ways that aligned with the academic success tenet. The framework of practical rationality helped explain how the instructors’ individual obligation (to the needs of individual students) and interpersonal obligation (to the social environment of the classroom) played a role in those decisions.ConclusionsInstructors’ ability to express two contradictory views may indicate that professional development does not have to change an instructor’s epistemological beliefs about their discipline to convince them of the value of enacting culturally relevant pedagogy. We propose departmental changes that could enable instructors to decide to cultivate students’ cultural competence and sociopolitical consciousness. Our findings highlight the need for future research investigating the impacts of culturally relevant pedagogical content knowledge on students’ experiences.

Two Faces of Our Idea of Acting Together

In her 2021 Lebowitz Prize Lecture, ‘A Simple Theory of Acting Together’, Margaret Gilbert seeks to articulate the ‘idea’ of acting together that ‘animates’ our commonsense talk about this important phenomenon. I seek a model that provides illuminating sufficient conditions for this phenomenon. As I see it, these are not quite the same project. After all, our commonsense idea and talk may well have two interrelated faces: an inchoate understanding of what the phenomenon is; and an inchoate understanding of norms about, very roughly, what those who participate in this phenomenon normally thereby owe to each other. Gilbert develops a rich and complex articulation of this second element, one according to which the interpersonal obligations in question are not in general moral obligations. Broadly speaking, her strategy is then to take this web of interpersonal obligations and the like and directly build it into her account of what the phenomenon of acting together is. This leads her to say that that phenomenon involves a non-reducible phenomenon in which A and B are ‘jointly committed to endorse G as a body’––where such joint commitments are constituted at least in part by the interpersonal obligations and the like to which our commonsense idea of acting together alludes.

Why We Need a New Normativism about Collective Action

Abstract What do we owe each other when we act together? According to normativists about collective action, necessarily something and potentially quite a bit. They contend that collective action inherently involves a special normative status amongst participants, which may, for example, involve mutual obligations to receive the concurrence of the others before leaving. We build on recent empirical work whose results lend plausibility to a normativist account by further investigating the specific package of mutual obligations associated with collective action according to our everyday understanding. However, our results cast doubt on a proposed obligation to seek the permission of co-actors before exiting a collective action, and suggest instead that this obligation is a function of explicit promising. We then discuss how our results pave the path for a new normativism, a theory that neither under- nor overshoots the target given by our common conception of the interpersonal obligations present in collective action.*

Social Epistemic Normativity: The Program

AbstractIn this paper I argue that epistemically normative claims regarding what one is permitted or required to believe (or to refrain from believing) are sometimes true in virtue of what we owe one another as social creatures. I do not here pursue a reduction of these epistemically normative claims to claims asserting one or another (ethical or social) interpersonal obligation, though I highlight some resources for those who would pursue such a reduction.

The normative status of friendship: Do young children enforce sharing with friends and appreciate reasonable partiality?

Contemporary moral philosophy stresses the idea of reasonable partiality. This concept proposes that close relationships carry a normative obligation to be partial toward another person. This study explored in two experiments whether 4- to 6-year-old children (N = 185) enforce partiality toward friends from third parties (Experiment 1) and how they prioritize a norm of equality and interpersonal obligations toward friends (Experiment 2). Children were presented with protagonists who could distribute resources between a friend and a disliked peer. One protagonist complied with a norm of partiality by allocating more resources to his friend, whereas the other protagonist either behaved in the opposite way (Experiment 1) or distributed resources equally (Experiment 2). In Experiment 1, children enforced partiality by protesting against the protagonist who gave more to the disliked peer and by selectively affirming the protagonist who gave more to the friend. Yet, in Experiment 2, children showed stronger enforcement of a norm of equal sharing than partiality toward the friend. The study demonstrates how young children deal with normative demands in the context of friendship. At the same time, it suggests that fairness norms are given priority. Overall, our study demonstrates how young children handle normative demands and interpersonal responsibilities.

Tomasello on "we" and the sense of obligation.

Tomasello explores four interrelated phenomena: (1) joint intentional collaboration; (2) joint commitment; (3) "self-regulative pressure from 'we'"; and (4) the sense of interpersonal obligation. He argues that the version of (1) that involves (2) is the "source" of (3) and so the source of (4). I note an issue that arises once we distinguish two versions of (3).

Bipolar Obligations, Recognition Respect, and Second-Personal Morality

Any complete theory of “what we owe to each other” must be able to adequately accommodate directed or bipolar obligations, that is, those obligations that are owed to a particular individual and in virtue of which another individual stands to be wronged. Bipolar obligations receive their moral importance from their intimate connection to a particular form of recognition respect that we owe to each other: respect of another as a source of valid claims to whom in particular we owe certain treatment and, at the very least, an apology if we fail to accord that treatment. While some of the most prominent accounts of interpersonal morality fail to adequately accommodate bipolar obligations, I here investigate a recent proposal that explicitly seeks to improve on these accounts—Stephen Darwall’s second-personal theory of morality. Ultimately, I object to Darwall’s theory on the grounds that his second-personal theory normatively ties bipolar obligations too closely to non-directed moral obligations or those that we are under, period. The problem for Darwall’s account is that any obligations that at first appear to be bipolar and owed to someone in particular turn out to be instances of non-directed moral obligations period that have their normative source in the representative authority of the moral community. Adequately accommodating bipolar obligations requires taking seriously a novel second-personal approach, according to which we locate the normative sources of our interpersonal obligations in the claims and demands particular persons and deliberate from what I call the pairwise or bipolar standpoint.

Fichte’s Practical Response to the Problem of Other Minds

The present paper examines the problem of attributing mental predicates to anyone but myself. Traditionally, this has been a major issue at the intersection of epistemology and ethics, because whether we should consider someone in our moral deliberations is often thought to depend on their cognitive abilities or their capacity for consciousness. For both Kant and Fichte, we have direct moral duties only to other rational beings. The fact that the other is present to us as a representation (for Kant) or as a Not-I that is posited in opposition to the I (for Fichte) threatens our supposed moral obligations to them and risks a form of metaphysical solipsism and moral egoism. The bindingness of interpersonal obligations depends on overcoming the separation between me and other persons. It will be shown that in order to establish the other as a morally considerable being, Fichte reverses the direction of implication: I do not derive my moral duties from others’ personhood; rather, others’ personhood follows from my immediate sense of moral obligation toward them. The way that the problem of other minds is posed presupposes that the only appropriate answer would be a series of propositions that establishes the existence of other morally considerable beings outside of myself. The immediate moral feeling of considerability, however, is not a proposition. It will be argued that Fichte thus provides a radically different alternative to Kant’s approach. The problem of other minds is not answered or solved but is rather dispelled in Fichte’s philosophy by the feeling of moral obligation and the recognition of others as the object of our obligations.

Cause Analysis and Coping Approaches towards Job Burnout of College Counselors Based on Psychological Contract Theory

College counselor is one of the hit groups for job burnout, which directly harms psychological health and the college education quality. Based on localized psychological contract theory, the author analyzes four aspects: normative obligation: ambiguity in duty boundaries and non-identity in financial return; interpersonal obligation: lack of necessary interpersonal support and humanistic care; developmental obligation: obscurity in career development and limit of promotion; lack of effective interaction and humanistic care. It comes to a conclusion that psychological contract violation is the main cause to job burnout of college counselors. Therefore, colleges must take certain intervening measures to relieve job burnout of college counselors, such as making duty boundaries explicit and improving the performance evaluation; providing effective and on-going coaching and development, standardizing the career planning and affording honor motivation; creating the atmosphere of respect, opening communication channels and affording emotional stimulus.

Reincarceration Risk Among Men with Mental Illnesses Leaving Prison: A Risk Environment Analysis.

Reentry interventions for persons with mental illness leaving prison have consisted primarily of linkage to mental health services and have produced mixed results on psychiatric and criminal recidivism. These interventions primarily focus on intra-individual risk factors. However, social and environmental factors may also increase risk of reincarceration by constraining choices and pro-social opportunities for community reintegration upon release from prison. In order to add to the knowledge base on understanding reincarceration risk for men with mental illnesses leaving prison, we examined interpersonal and environmental factors that exposed men to heightened risk for reincarceration. As part of a larger study examining the effectiveness of Critical Time Intervention for men with mental illness leaving prison, in-depth interviews were conducted with 28 men within 6months of release from prison. Policies and practices at local and state levels, community conditions, and interpersonal obligation and conflict were identified as increasing risk for reincarceration.

The Hippocratic Dilemmas

Patients mobilising guanxi (interpersonal relations) to gain access to hospital care is prevalent in post-Mao China. Yet few studies have centred on how medical professionals deal with guanxi patients. Based on ethnographic research and applying an analytical frame of Chinese guanxi developed by Fei Xiaotong (1992 [1948]) and Cheris Shun-Ching Chan (2009), this article examines the dilemmas that Chinese physicians face in weighing professional standards versus guanxi. We divide the patients into three general categories: patients without any guanxi, patients with weak to moderate ties with physicians, and patients with strong ties with physicians. We find that physicians face few dilemmas when they interact with patients without guanxi. They largely adhere to their professional code of practice and generally display dominance over the patients. When interacting with patients with weak to moderate ties, however, physicians are caught in a dilemma between fulfilling renqing (interpersonal obligation) and adhering to a professional code of practice. They manage this dilemma through dramaturgical strategies such as information-sharing, emotional work, and face-giving. When interacting with patients with whom they have strong ties, however, affection and the sense of asymmetric obligation may take precedence over professional codes. Physicians deal with this dilemma through a different set of strategies, such as information-control, emotional avoidance, and altruistic care. Our analysis reveals the impacts of guanxi on medical professionals and the moral dilemmas they face in a guanxi-dominant societal context. It offers direction for possible policy reforms to mitigate the problem.

A Dual Aspect Theory of Shared Intention

AbstractIn this article I propose an original view of the nature of shared intention. In contrast to psychological views (Bratman, Searle, Tuomela) and normative views (Gilbert), I argue that both functional roles played by attitudes of individual participants and interpersonal obligations are factors of central and independent significance for explaining what shared intention is. It is widely agreed that shared intention (I) normally motivates participants to act, and (II) normally creates obligations between them. I argue that the view I propose can explain why it is not a mere accident that both (I) and (II) are true of shared intention, while psychological and normative views cannot. The basic idea is that shared intention involves a structure of attitudes of individuals – including, most importantly, attitudes of reliance – which normally plays the relevant motivating roles and creates the relevant obligations.

The Family Toxic: Triaging Obligation in Post-Welfare Chicago

This essay examines anxieties concerning interpersonal obligations that gathered within and around low-income households of a redeveloping Chicago public housing project in the years following comprehensive public housing and welfare reform. These households navigated competing demands. Leaseholders continued to feel beholden to expectations that they distribute any resources to which they had access, such as shelter. At the same time, increased monitoring of dwindling resources resulted in gossip and suspicion that made such expectations difficult to manage. Drawing on anthropological studies of witchcraft, I argue that what was at stake in the expression and management of resource anxieties was not households' “dysfunction” or “cooperation,” but something far more explosive: the constant triaging of obligations in relation to the risks they could pose at any moment.

Solitude Before Society: Emerson on Self-Reliance, Abolitionism, and Moral Suasion

Scholars have not reconciled Ralph Waldo Emerson’s anti-political individualism with his newly rediscovered abolitionism. This article attempts to unite the apolitical and political Emerson by showing that they are only temporally separated. Solitude prefaces politics. I first explain Emerson’s solitary contemplation as imagination that reveals interpersonal obligations. Second, I show how these obligations draw the thinker back to politics, and in Emerson’s case, to abolitionism, where he advocated small conversations to incite others to contemplation and then action. Conversation did not convert hostile slaveholders. But, third, I note that Emerson admired the abolitionists who attempted moral suasion in the South at great personal risk. Their political activism exemplified self-reliance within society.