Most of the replies about intentionality have come close to my own position
on this so i won't elaborate. However, I am always really concerned at the
way some important insights from Foucault, for example, get trivialised
through a process of radicalisation that occurs at the level of
(un)intentional interpretation. On, this and the related thread to do with
F&D. For example, Foucault and Marx. Foucault clearly didn't reject in toto
the marxist corpus, thinking instead that although marxism and psychoanalyis
had provided useful tools for local research they needed supplementing, and
sometimes superceding with a plurality of forms of knowledge and
microanalyses (I should add that to a philsophical realist such as I am,
this all makes perfect sense, since it is the object of inquiry which sets
the cognitive for us, not the other way round. Put trivially since there are
lots of differeing objects there will by necessity be lots of different
knowledges. Thus the attainment of knowledge of subatomic particles will
differ from that attainted of persons. I mean you do go out and interview
atoms?)
Equally, intentionality, to say that social interaction has unintended
consequences is not to say that there are no intended consequences. It's
simply naive to think that 'some' capitalists and others are unaware of the
effects of their actions. Transnational corporations regularly intentionally
remove funds from host countries to home countries, and the Khmer Rouge,
clearly intended to depopulate cambodian cities.
>I strongly doubt that anyone makes economic policy with the conscious intention
>of causing more poverty.
Really? You actually doubt this? I would give it an even stronger spin and
say that some people not only make economic policy with the intention of
causing more poverty, but also intentionally make legislative policy with
the intention of eradicating policy by eradicating groups of people.
I would agree that poverty does RESULT from certain
>conservative economic practices which have become more frequent recently.
>However, the people who lobby for or who institute such policies are
undoubtedly
>doing so because they truly believe a certain type of discourse abotu the
>"goddness" of free market systems, or meritocracy or even the creation of jobs
>"trickle down" economics.
Doesn't this view rest on a somewhat rose-tinted view of persons? Ah those
nice people.
>my actions (if any) will be. Is that intentional action in reaction to
>intentional action? Have we brought back agency, or am I misreading the
>conversation. (I admit to having skimmed some of the letters.)
I think the bringing back of agency is a vital move to any social-theory.
Devoid of it discourses take on a reified life of their own looking much
like Durkhiemian 'social facts' able to exist without (un)knowing agents.
They also sound like stopping it is a relatively simple matter. In fact (and
>like Quetzil I am far from an "expert" in this area) as far as I understand, it
>is a practice which has deep social and spiritual significance, which is
>undertaken out of love for the woman or small girl on whom the surgery is
>performed, and involves making her an integral part of society as well as
>eligible for marriage in parts of the world in which women still have few
>economic options outside of marriage.
There is an awful lot one could say here, but without being too sarcastic,
again this is a remarkably rose-tinted view of the practice, and/or culture.
What people as diverse as Paglia, Mohanty and Mackinnon might reply to the
above para doesn't bear thinking about. Still, the practices exist and hence
must be. The real is the rational said Hegel in one of his more overtly
conservative moments.
might disengenuiousIn fact I know Africans who I otherwise
>consider "progressive" or even "pro-feminist" who either defend this practice
>for members of their own culture only, or remain neutral on the topic.
And there are as many, if not more, from inside these cultures which
disagree with it. I'm not saying that I have all the answers on this, but
the basic point seems to be that the authenticity and/or homogeneity of
cultures is up for grabs and should not, a priori, be taken as a given.
cultureshe fact the RESULTS of this surgery are
>to my mind (and that of most people raised in my culture the RESULTS of this
>procedure are loathesome and disbling has nothing to do with the INTENTIONS of
>the parents and/or relatives who submit their girls or young women to this act.
This statement rests on the mistaken assumption that the writer knows the
intentions of the parents and/or relatives. A curious claim in the light of
the denial of the fact of intentionality.
>Clitoridectomy IS a fascinating topic to discuss in terms of intention and
>result, but not when the discussion is based on the presumption of shared
values
>which do not exist.
How do we 'know' that such values do not exist?
>
>Another interesting topic to discuss in this vein might be individuals who
>commit what we, as outsiders consider "war crimes" because they have created a
>community of discourse which justifies this behavior. In most cases they were
>not raised to commit this type of act. At the same time they are different from
>the lone criminal. As one Serb father said on National Public Radio "I don't
>know what happened. I didn't raise my son to be a racist, a murderer, or a
>rapist, but because of this war he has become one." People like his son were
>raised with different values. What are their "intentions" when committing war
>crimes?
I agree, but a colleague of mine doing research on mass rape in war is
rapidly discovering that at the moment of any specific act intentionality is
crucial.
>
>These questions are important for discussing agency, but let's not pretend that
>we can decide right or wrong in some simple manner by second guessing other
>people's "intentions."
Including I presume, the assumption that capitalists don't intend to cause
poverty. i wonder how you know this: by second guessing them/me?
Thanks.
--------------------------------------------------------
"What I try to achieve is the history of the relations which
thought maintains with truth; the history of thought insofar as it is the
thought of truth. All those who say truth does not exist for me are
simple minded."
(Foucault)
Colin Wight
Department of International Politics
University of Wales, Aberystwyth
Aberystwyth
SY23 3DA
--------------------------------------------------------
on this so i won't elaborate. However, I am always really concerned at the
way some important insights from Foucault, for example, get trivialised
through a process of radicalisation that occurs at the level of
(un)intentional interpretation. On, this and the related thread to do with
F&D. For example, Foucault and Marx. Foucault clearly didn't reject in toto
the marxist corpus, thinking instead that although marxism and psychoanalyis
had provided useful tools for local research they needed supplementing, and
sometimes superceding with a plurality of forms of knowledge and
microanalyses (I should add that to a philsophical realist such as I am,
this all makes perfect sense, since it is the object of inquiry which sets
the cognitive for us, not the other way round. Put trivially since there are
lots of differeing objects there will by necessity be lots of different
knowledges. Thus the attainment of knowledge of subatomic particles will
differ from that attainted of persons. I mean you do go out and interview
atoms?)
Equally, intentionality, to say that social interaction has unintended
consequences is not to say that there are no intended consequences. It's
simply naive to think that 'some' capitalists and others are unaware of the
effects of their actions. Transnational corporations regularly intentionally
remove funds from host countries to home countries, and the Khmer Rouge,
clearly intended to depopulate cambodian cities.
>I strongly doubt that anyone makes economic policy with the conscious intention
>of causing more poverty.
Really? You actually doubt this? I would give it an even stronger spin and
say that some people not only make economic policy with the intention of
causing more poverty, but also intentionally make legislative policy with
the intention of eradicating policy by eradicating groups of people.
I would agree that poverty does RESULT from certain
>conservative economic practices which have become more frequent recently.
>However, the people who lobby for or who institute such policies are
undoubtedly
>doing so because they truly believe a certain type of discourse abotu the
>"goddness" of free market systems, or meritocracy or even the creation of jobs
>"trickle down" economics.
Doesn't this view rest on a somewhat rose-tinted view of persons? Ah those
nice people.
>my actions (if any) will be. Is that intentional action in reaction to
>intentional action? Have we brought back agency, or am I misreading the
>conversation. (I admit to having skimmed some of the letters.)
I think the bringing back of agency is a vital move to any social-theory.
Devoid of it discourses take on a reified life of their own looking much
like Durkhiemian 'social facts' able to exist without (un)knowing agents.
They also sound like stopping it is a relatively simple matter. In fact (and
>like Quetzil I am far from an "expert" in this area) as far as I understand, it
>is a practice which has deep social and spiritual significance, which is
>undertaken out of love for the woman or small girl on whom the surgery is
>performed, and involves making her an integral part of society as well as
>eligible for marriage in parts of the world in which women still have few
>economic options outside of marriage.
There is an awful lot one could say here, but without being too sarcastic,
again this is a remarkably rose-tinted view of the practice, and/or culture.
What people as diverse as Paglia, Mohanty and Mackinnon might reply to the
above para doesn't bear thinking about. Still, the practices exist and hence
must be. The real is the rational said Hegel in one of his more overtly
conservative moments.
might disengenuiousIn fact I know Africans who I otherwise
>consider "progressive" or even "pro-feminist" who either defend this practice
>for members of their own culture only, or remain neutral on the topic.
And there are as many, if not more, from inside these cultures which
disagree with it. I'm not saying that I have all the answers on this, but
the basic point seems to be that the authenticity and/or homogeneity of
cultures is up for grabs and should not, a priori, be taken as a given.
cultureshe fact the RESULTS of this surgery are
>to my mind (and that of most people raised in my culture the RESULTS of this
>procedure are loathesome and disbling has nothing to do with the INTENTIONS of
>the parents and/or relatives who submit their girls or young women to this act.
This statement rests on the mistaken assumption that the writer knows the
intentions of the parents and/or relatives. A curious claim in the light of
the denial of the fact of intentionality.
>Clitoridectomy IS a fascinating topic to discuss in terms of intention and
>result, but not when the discussion is based on the presumption of shared
values
>which do not exist.
How do we 'know' that such values do not exist?
>
>Another interesting topic to discuss in this vein might be individuals who
>commit what we, as outsiders consider "war crimes" because they have created a
>community of discourse which justifies this behavior. In most cases they were
>not raised to commit this type of act. At the same time they are different from
>the lone criminal. As one Serb father said on National Public Radio "I don't
>know what happened. I didn't raise my son to be a racist, a murderer, or a
>rapist, but because of this war he has become one." People like his son were
>raised with different values. What are their "intentions" when committing war
>crimes?
I agree, but a colleague of mine doing research on mass rape in war is
rapidly discovering that at the moment of any specific act intentionality is
crucial.
>
>These questions are important for discussing agency, but let's not pretend that
>we can decide right or wrong in some simple manner by second guessing other
>people's "intentions."
Including I presume, the assumption that capitalists don't intend to cause
poverty. i wonder how you know this: by second guessing them/me?
Thanks.
--------------------------------------------------------
"What I try to achieve is the history of the relations which
thought maintains with truth; the history of thought insofar as it is the
thought of truth. All those who say truth does not exist for me are
simple minded."
(Foucault)
Colin Wight
Department of International Politics
University of Wales, Aberystwyth
Aberystwyth
SY23 3DA
--------------------------------------------------------