Promotion Of Happiness Research Articles

Book Review: The Real Wealth of Nations: Creating a Caring Economics

The Real Wealth of Nations: Creating a Caring Economics Riane Eisler. San Francisco: Berrett-Koehler, 2007, 318 pages, $13.83. Riane Eisler's 30 years of research in evolutionary systems science led to her 11th book, The Real Wealth of Nations: Creating a Caring Economics. Because Eisler is not an economist by training, she offers a broader societal lens for economics. She views caring for and developing human resources as an essential and fundamental component of any economic system. Eisler uses economic systems in the United States and around the world as examples of positive and negative economic factors. Reading her book with an open imaginative mind allows the reader to discover a new and improved economic system. Eisler presents a partnership approach to an economic structure that includes a society in which caring for others is valued. She shows how caring for children and the sick leads to increased productivity and increased economic development in the society. This type of society recognizes that wealth is found among human and natural resources rather than solely financial. To nurture a people of caring and compassion requires recognition that neither socialism nor capitalism has resulted in the promotion of human welfare and happiness. These economic systems have led to environmental degradation, poverty (20% of children in the United States live in poverty), violence, and gender inequality within their societies. Women around the world are devalued, earn less than men, and are taught to serve men. In female-dominated professions, salaries are generally lower than in male-dominated professions. A problem with capitalism in the United States is that the wealthiest 1%, whose spending patterns are described by Eisler as wasteful, owns 40% of the nation's wealth. Traditional economics studies the market economy, the government economy, the unpaid (volunteer) economy, the illegal (drugs, arms trade, sex trade) economy, the household economy, and the natural economy. The caring view of economics is broader and also includes societal values such as respect, compassion, and caring. Instead of child care workers and nurses receiving low wages compared with many other careers, in a caring economy these services would be compensated as befits their importance to the society in supporting human survival and development. Universal health care, paid parental leave, and flexible work hours would also be valued because these benefits serve to develop society. A shiftfrom a dominator model (control, decreased trust, a top-down approach) to a partnership model would include cultural attitudes that value caregiving, a change in economic indicators, and partnership in which caring and nurturing are the motivators. …

ROUSSEAU, HAPPINESS, AND THE ECONOMIC APPROACH TO EDUCATION

Since the 1960s, the influence of economic thought on education has been steadily increasing. Taking Jean‐Jacques Rousseau's educational thought as a point of departure, Tal Gilead critically inquires into the philosophical foundations of what can be termed the economic approach to education. Gilead's focus in this essay is on happiness and the role that education should play in promoting it. The first two parts of the essay provide an introduction to Rousseau's conception of happiness, followed by an examination of the economic approach to education and the notion of human capital. In the course of this discussion, Gilead shows that increasing happiness is one of the economic approach's major aims. In the third part of the essay, he uses Rousseau's views to interrogate significant aspects of the economic approach to education. He then continues by highlighting some of the educational implications that stem from Rousseau's critique. Gilead maintains that Rousseau's ideas can provide valuable suggestions regarding how education might contribute to the promotion of happiness. The article concludes by proposing that while Rousseau's ideas on the matter should not necessarily be embraced, contemporary policymakers can learn some important lessons from them.

Kim są potrzebujący pomocy

The standard view of the duty to help those in need suggests that it is acceptable to refuse to help others who are known to be in need and who can be assisted. This conclusion can be avoided if helping is seen from the perspective of Kant’s idea of the duty of beneficence. On this view help should not be seen as stemming from the recognition of contingent differences between those who are inclined to help and those who are in need, nor as a one-time response to evil, or as an act close to heroism. Help should be seen as an element of the pursuit of one of the ends which are also duties, i.e. as the promotion of the happiness of others and, at the same time, the self-perfection of the helping person. Helping results from a stable readiness to act for the benefit of others, which stems from one’s recognition of the weakness, limitation, and lack of self-sufficiency which are common to all humans, and so are shared by both the helper and the person in need.

Happiness and Political Theory

I here tackle three topics: first, the lowly place of happiness among the goals of political action in the great tradition of political thought; second, the novelty of the idea of happiness is the proper aim or public policy; and last, the importance of the distinction between what was aptly described by T.H. Green as hindering hindrances to the good life and the promotion of happiness by political action. As that might suggest, I shall say some unkind things about the paternalism implicit in some recent emphasis on happiness as an object of state action.

Greater Happiness for a Greater Number

Utilitarian philosophy holds that public policy should aim at greater happiness for a greater number of people. This moral tenet meets many objections, on pragmatic grounds it is denounced as unfeasible and on ideological grounds as undesirable. As a result the principle is marginal in policy making. In this paper I consider these classic philosophical qualms in the light of recent empirical research on life-satisfaction. The data show first of all that the principle is feasible; happiness of a great number is possible in contemporary conditions and it is also possible to create more of it. The data also show that the promotion of happiness fits well with other ideals; happiness requires conditions that we value, such as freedom, and happiness fosters matters that we value, such as good health and civil behaviour. Though happiness can conflict with these values in theory, it appears to match them in practice.

What can the science of well-being tell the discipline of psychiatry – and why might psychiatry listen?

There is a field of knowledge that speaks of the promotion of positive mental health, well-being and happiness yet it may not be well-known to all psychiatric practitioners. Economists, geneticists, positive psychologists, evolutionary psychologists, neuroscientists and sociocultural researchers have all contributed to what might be termed the emerging science of well-being. This article provides a brief introduction to this complex topic. We outline some of the findings, theories and arguments from this comparatively new but burgeoning research area. We also rehearse some critical responses to this field which indicate that both the evidence on well-being and the implications for practice and policy might be less straightforward than researchers sometimes imply. We conclude by suggesting that psychiatrists, as leaders in the field of mental health, might want to consider the implications (positive and negative) of well-being research for the development of their own discipline and professional practice.

Intervention et laisser-faire chez Turgot (Le rôle de l'État selon le droit naturel)

Résumé Les historiens des idées écrivent souvent que Turgot et Adam Smith se contredisent puisque d’un côté ils avancent un "principe de non-intervention " tandis que d’un autre ils proposent de nombreuses mesures publiques. En fait, aucun de ces auteurs n’adhérait au principe selon lequel l’État "ne doit pas intervenir". Pour Turgot, le principe qui devait diriger l’action de la puissance publique était la "protection des droits naturels", pour Smith c’était la "promotion du bonheur de la communauté" ; la poursuite de ces buts exigeait que l’État intervienne dans certains cas et s’abstienne dans d’autres.

RICH theory: The promotion of happiness

AbstractThe acronym RICH stands for resources, intimacy, competence, and health. These characteristics are purported to define psychological health, which is assumed to be synonymous with happiness. The four characteristics encompass all possible reinforcers, are relatively obtainable by all individuals, are interrelated to the extent they incorporate each other in their definitions, and function to guide both the diagnosis of individual functioning, and the design of interventions. © 2004 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Psychol Schs 41: 43–49, 2004.

Homossexualidade e saúde: desafios para a terceira década de epidemia de HIV/AIDS

Neste artigo aponto alguns desafios que a epidemia de AIDS vem apresentando àqueles envolvidos com a promoção da saúde de homens com práticas homossexuais. Apesar de os homossexuais destacarem-se no empenho para enfrentar a epidemia, com uma mobilização que gerou ONGs, manuais sobre sexo seguro e promoção dos direitos humanos, continuam sofrendo com a associação AIDS-homossexualidade. Divido os desafios a serem enfrentados em três campos: epidemiologia, prevenção e assistência. Saliento a importância da interdisciplinaridade dos diferentes saberes, da solidariedade entre pesquisadores e ativistas e da integralidade das ações de prevenção e assistência. As lições aprendidas indicam que as relações entre homossexualidade e saúde devem se definir a partir da solidariedade e da promoção da felicidade.

Bertrand Russell's Characterization of Benevolent Love

·one of the most intriguing aspects of the writings of Bertrand Russell is his determination to somehow combine reverence for reason a love of love. Be is convinced that faith in reason is best coupled faith in love. Just as the old proverb tells us that butter is best bread, Russell maintains that love is best reason. It is this recognition, operating as a structural element, that gives his proto-theory its wisdom and genius. Russell writes thatethical theories may be divided into two classes, according as they regard virtue as an end or a and that he agrees mainly, though not wholly, with those who think the first business of ethics is to define the good, and that virtue is to be defined as actiori tending to produce the (HWP, p. 179). The fundamental principle of ethics should be the promotion of happiness. I He defines the morally good life as the life inspired by love and guided by knowledge. The end is happiness, the means are love and

Conference on Citizenship

Members of the MENC should be informed of the work of the National Education Association and its departments. The National Education Association and the Department of Justice have served as the auspices under which delegates from hundreds of public and private organizations may come together to pool their thinking for "the development of a more active, alert, enlightened, conscientious, and progressive citizenry in our country." An agency of good will and understanding, the National Conference on Citizenship is dedicated to the promotion and support of freedom, security, peace and happiness for people everywhere. In many ways the music educator is already seriously at work dealing with the problem of citizenship. Perhaps the report from the Conference can give added thought and stimulus to our work. John Paul, head of the Music Departmient of the Catholic University of America, Washington, D.C., represented the MENC at the 1952 meeting.

Insects injurious to vegetation

In 1837 a commission established by the State of Massachusetts to conduct a botanical and zoological survey was instructed by Governor Everett in the following terms:—“ It is presumed to have been a leading object of the Legislature, in authorizing this survey, to promote the agricultural benefit of the Commonwealth, and you will keep carefully in view the economical relations of every subject of your inquiry. By this, however, it is not intended that scientific order, method or comprehension should be departed from. At the same time that which is practically useful will receive a proportionately greater share of attention than that which is merely curious; the promotion of comfort and happiness being the great human end of all science.”

XVII. The Philosophy of Health; or an Exposition of the Physical and Mental Constitution of Man, with a View to the Promotion of Human Longevity and Happiness.

XVII. The Philosophy of Health; or an Exposition of the Physical and Mental Constitution of Man, with a View to the Promotion of Human Longevity and Happiness.