Healthy Conflict in an Era of Intractability

The essay responds to four critical essays by Rosemary Kellison, Ebrahim Moosa, Joseph Winters, and Martin Kavka on the author’s recent book, Healthy Conflict in Contemporary American Society: From Enemy to Adversary (2018). Parts 1 and 2 work in tandem to further develop my accounts of strategic empathy and agonistic political friendship. I defend these accounts against criticisms that my argument for moral imagination obligates oppressed people to empathize with their oppressors. I argue, further, that healthy conflict can be motivated by a kind of “secular” love. This enables my position to immanently critique and mediate the claims that one must either love (agapically) one’s opponent in order to engage them in “healthy conflict,” on one hand, or that one must vanquish, exclude, or “cancel” one’s opponent, on the other. In Part 3, I demonstrate how my account mediates the challenge of an alleged standing opposition between moral imagination and socio-theoretical critique. I defend a methodologically pragmatist account of immanent prophetic criticism, resistance, and conflict transformation. Finally, I respond to one critic’s vindication of a strong enemy/adversary opposition that takes up the case of white supremacist violence in the U.S. I argue that the time horizon for healthy conflict must be simultaneously immediate and also long-term, provided that such engagements remain socio-critically self-reflexive and seek to cultivate transformational responses.     

Impact of the 2016 U.S. Presidential Election on Politically Divided Relationships

Political identity represents a salient component of counselor and client identity tied to one's values and beliefs. The 2016 U.S. presidential election has been viewed as an especially divisive political environment that may have heightened emotion and elevated personal and collective political identities to new levels of awareness. We present findings from a consensual qualitative research study exploring personal and relational impacts of the election and discuss participants' (N = 16) strategies for relationship maintenance.     

The self in deep ecology: A response to Watson

ABSTRACT

Richard Watson maintains that deep ecology suffers from an internal contradiction and should therefore be rejected. Watson contends that deep ecology claims to be non-anthropocentric while at the same time is committed to setting humans apart from nature, which is inherently anthropocentric. I argue that Watson’s objection arises out of a fundamental misunderstanding of how deep ecologist’s conceive of the ‘Self.’ Drawing on resources from Buddhism, I offer an understanding of the ‘Self’ that is fully consistent with deep ecology, and does not lead to the anthropocentric contradiction that Watson identifies. The paper will proceed as follows: First, I articulate Watson’s objection, and briefly discuss the traditional deep ecology position. Next, I turn to a discussion of the ‘Self’ and show that there are conceptions of human nature that are not separate from ‘Nature.’ It will thus be shown that deep ecology is not inconsistent and need not be rejected.     

The Geopolitics of Gulf Sport Sponsorship

ABSTRACT

The names of two major Gulf airlines, Qatar Airways and Emirates, have saturated the European football scene for many years, sponsoring some of the most prominent European teams and FIFA itself. These state-backed airlines are also active in motorsports, rugby, cycling, tennis, golf, cricket, and equestrian sport, while several prominent Gulf elites and royal family members have recently taken over major sports franchises in Europe and elsewhere. How should we understand these far-reaching sponsorship agendas in the Gulf? What can they tell us about the politics and ethics of international sport on the Arabian Peninsula? Moving beyond the general readings of Gulf sport sponsorship as an exercise in ‘soft power,’ this article shows how these deals are strategic nodes for diverse actors in the Gulf and in the international sporting community to advance various interests: personal, political, financial, and otherwise. Informed by a critical geopolitics lens that questions the coherence of the ‘state’ as an actor, I ask what it means to say that ‘the Gulf’ sponsors sport, and more specifically investigate the relevant actors behind these sponsorship deals. To do so, this article examines regional and global political economy through a focus on three Gulf airline sponsors, Emirates, Etihad, and Qatar Airways, and three elite sports sponsors—the UAE’s Sheik Mansour, Qatar’s Nasser bin Ghanim Al-Khelaïfi, and Sheikh Nasser of Bahrain. By decentering ‘soft power’ approaches to sport that unduly emphasize the ‘state’ as an actor, this article suggests a more grounded approach to the geopolitics of sport in the Arabian Peninsula, which simultaneously acknowledges the complicity of Western actors and institutions in the rise of Gulf sports sponsorship deals in the past decade.     

How to Stand for Something: Toward a Genealogy of Exemplars

This paper responds to the focus issue on exemplarity that includes contributions by Kyle Lambelet, Brian Hamilton, and Gustavo Maya. The paper calls attention to ancient, medieval, and modern precedents that ought to inform our thinking about the ethical and political significance of exemplars.     

Religion–state relations and public opinion: norms,institutions and social consensus

ABSTRACT

Are levels of religion–state regulation associated with cross-national variation in attitudes related to the place of religion in public life? Data sources measuring both the institutional relationship between religion and state and public opinion on the political role of religion have significantly improved in recent years, but scholars have just begun to examine relationships between political institutions and public attitudes. This contribution tests several potential examples of such links by exploring the relationship between religion–state institutions and norms of religion and politics, both between and within countries. The contribution first develops theoretical expectations regarding the institutional correlates of public opinion, then conducts initial tests of these expectations by blending data from the Religion and State project with comparative survey data drawn from Waves 4 and 5 of the World Values Survey. Analysis demonstrates modest links between institutions and aggregate public views, a relationship between institutions and social consensus, and, most robustly, consistent variation in institutional effects across political regime type.     

Political opportunity structures and the activism of first- and second-generation Muslims in two Italian cities

ABSTRACT

The present contribution describes Muslims’ opportunities for activism and political participation, as shaped institutionally and discursively, in Milan and Turin. It analyses the interplay between the national level and the local level, and assesses the implications that contrasting local arrangements have for Muslims’ activism, claims-making and, to a certain extent, even self-identifications – especially with reference to young, second-generation Muslims. In Milan Muslims are confronted with a very closed system of political opportunities, while in Turin there appears to be a much more open system, which aims at co-opting second-generation organisations in particular. The consequence is that while in Milan Muslims – especially second-generation ones – are resigned to being merely the recipients of integration policies, in Turin they can conceive themselves more as partners of the city’s institutions, by resorting to a strategy of ‘active citizenship’.     

The unwelcoming experience of abusive supervision and the impact of leader characteristics: turning employees into poor organizational citizens and future quitters

ABSTRACT

Over three studies (i.e., two 2 × 2 experiments and a multi-source field study), we examine the relationship between abusive supervision, leader characteristics, and organizational inclusion on employee outcomes. Drawing on the group value theory of organizational justice and multiple needs theory of organizational justice, we argue that abusive supervision is counterproductive to making employees feel welcome. Specifically, we demonstrate that abusive supervision demoralizes employees’ feelings of organizational inclusion. Additionally, we draw upon research that suggests that the display of hostility inherent in abusive supervision can be perceived differently when it comes from a strategic versus impulsive source. We build upon this reasoning to examine and explain how leader characteristics might alter the effect of abusive supervision on organizational inclusion. More specifically, we suggest that leader political skill (i.e., strategic source) and leader neuroticism (i.e., impulsive source) act as moderators of the relationship between abusive supervision and organizational inclusion. We integrate organizational justice and inclusion theories to demonstrate that abusive supervision can be interpreted as an unwelcoming experience that ultimately has the ability to turn employees into poor organizational citizens (i.e., decrease engagement of OCBs) and future quitters (i.e., increase of turnover intentions). Theoretical and practical implications are discussed.