A Theory of Shopping

This innovative approach to freedom starts from an account of what we mean by describing someone, in a psychological vein, as a free subject. Pettit develops an argument as to what it is that makes someone free in that basic sense; and then goes on to derive the implications of the approach for issues of freedom in political theory. Freedom in the subject is equated with the person's being fit to be held responsible and to be authorized as a partner in interaction. This book is unique among contemporary approaches – although it is true to the spirit of classical writers like Hobbes and Kant – in seeking a theory that applies to psychological issues of free agency and free will as well as to political issues in the theory of the free state and the free constitution. The driving thesis is that it is only by connecting up the different issues of freedom, psychological and political, that we can fully appreciate the nature of the questions involved, and the requirements for their resolution. The book does not not seek a comprehensive reach just for its own sake, but rather for the sake of the illumination it provides. A Theory of Freedom is a ground-breaking volume which will be of wide interest to scholars and students in political philosophy and political science.

As an exile in America during the War, Theodor Adorno grew acquainted with the fundamentals of empirical social research, something which would shape the work he undertook in the early 1950s as co-director of the Frankfurt Institute for Social Research. Yet he also became increasingly aware of the ‘fetishism of method’ in sociology, and saw the serious limitations of theoretical work based solely on empirical findings. In this lecture course given in 1964, Adorno develops a critique of both sociology and philosophy, emphasizing that theoretical work requires a specific mediation between the two disciplines. Adorno advocates a philosophical approach to social theory that challenges the drive towards uniformity and a lack of ambiguity, highlighting instead the fruitfulness of experience, in all its messy complexity, for critical social analysis. At the same time, he shows how philosophy must also realise that it requires sociology if it is to avoid falling for the old idealistic illusion that the totality of real conditions can be grasped through thought alone. Masterfully bringing together philosophical and empirical approaches to an understanding of society, these lectures from one of the most important social thinkers of the 20th century will be of great interest to students and scholars in philosophy, sociology and the social sciences generally.

At the beginning of his career in the 1920s, Adorno sketched a plan to write a major work on the theory of musical reproduction, a task he returned to time and again throughout his career but never completed. The choice of the word reproduction as opposed to interpretation indicates a primary supposition: that there is a clearly defined musical text whose precision exceeds what is visible on the page, and that the performer has the responsibility to reproduce it as accurately as possible, beyond simply playing what is written. This task, according to Adorno, requires a detailed understanding of all musical parameters in their historical context, and his reflections upon this task lead to a fundamental study of the nature of notation and musical sense. In the various notes and texts brought together in Towards a Theory of Musical Reproduction, one finds Adorno constantly circling around an irresolvable paradox: interpretation can only fail the work, yet only through it can musics true essence be captured. While he at times seems more definite in his pronouncement of a musical scores absolute value just as a book is read silently, not aloud his discourse repeatedly displays his inability to cling to that belief. It is this quality of uncertainty in his reflections that truly indicates the scope of the discourse and its continuing relevance to musical thought and practice today.

The word ‘addiction’ these days is used to refer to a chronic condition where there is an unhealthily powerful motivation to engage in a particular behaviour. This can be driven by many different factors – physiological, psychological, environmental and social. If we say that it is all about X, we miss V, W, Y and Z. So, some people think addicts are using drugs to escape from unhappy lives, feelings of anxiety and so on; many are. Some people think drugs become addictive because they alter the brain chemistry to create powerful urges; that is often true. Others think that drug taking is about seeking after pleasure; often it is. Some take the view that addiction is a choice – addicts weigh up the pros and cons of doing what they do and decide the former outweigh the latter. Yet others believe that addicts suffer from poor impulse control; that is often true… And so it goes on. When you look at the evidence, you see that all these positions capture important aspects of the problem – but they are not complete explanations. Neuroscience can help us delve more deeply into some of these explanations, while the behavioural and social sciences are better at exploring others. We need a model that puts all this together in a way that can help us decide what to do in different cases. Should we prescribe a drug, give the person some ‘tender loving care’, put them in prison or what? Theory of Addiction provides this synthesis. The first edition was well received: ‘Throughout the book the reader is exposed to a vast number of useful observations…The theoretical aims are timely, refreshing, ambitious and above all challenging. It opens up a new way of looking at addiction and has the potential to move the field of addiction a considerable leap forward. Thus we wholeheartedly would like to recommend the book for students as well as scholars. Read and learn!’ Nordic Studies on Alcohol and Drugs ‘The book provides a comprehensive review of existing theories – over 30 in all – and this synthesis of theories constitutes an important contribution in and of itself… West is to be commended for his synthesis of addiction theories that span neurobiology, psychology and social science and for his insights into what remains unexplained.’ Addiction This new edition of Theory of Addiction builds on the first, including additional theories in the field, a more developed specification of PRIME theory and analysis of the expanding evidence base. With this important new information, Theory of Addiction will continue to be essential reading for all those working in addiction, from student to experienced practitioner – as urged above, Read and learn!

An authoritative textbook on construction management offering a clear model for understanding theoretical aspects. The construction industry has become a truly global network of interconnected stakeholders making demands which require the involvement of skilled workforces from all over the world. Construction Management Strategies sets the foundations for understanding and managing construction’s inherent complexity and uniqueness. It establishes clear definitions of commonly accepted terms like built environment, construction, civil engineering, etc. which are often given confusing and conflicting interpretations. It cuts through the plethora of overlapping role titles currently used in the construction sector that make it difficult to establish how projects are actually managed. Construction Management Strategies: Offers a robust and consistent theoretical basis to explain the performance of the main approaches to construction management. Describes corporate and project management in construction as an integrated whole. Provides the basic toolkit a student needs to think through the practical situations they will later face. Helps bring the theory of construction management to international students who struggle to find a solid grounding in this complex and fragmented subject. Includes a companion website featuring a wealth of directly transferable examples for students, as well as PPT slides and topic discussion ideas for lecturers.

Presents the theory of NMR enhanced with Mathematica© notebooks Provides short, focused chapters with brief explanations of well-defined topics with an emphasis on a mathematical description Presents essential results from quantum mechanics concisely and for easy use in predicting and simulating the results of NMR experiments Includes Mathematica notebooks that implement the theory in the form of text, graphics, sound, and calculations Based on class tested methods developed by the author over his 25 year teaching career. These notebooks show exactly how the theory works and provide useful calculation templates for NMR researchers

The most accessible expression of Fran ois Laruelle's non-philosophical, or 'non-standard', thought, General Theory of Victims forges a new role for contemporary philosophers and intellectuals by rethinking their relation to victims. A key text in recent continental philosophy, it is indispensable for anyone interested in the debates surrounding materialism, philosophy of religion, and ethics.Transforming Joseph de Maistre's adage that the executioner is the cornerstone of society, General Theory of Victims instead proposes the victim as the cornerstone of humanity and the key figure for contemporary thought. Laruelle condemns philosophy for participating in and legitimating the great persecutions of the twentieth century, and lays out a new vision of victim-oriented ethics. To do this, he engages the resources of both quantum physics and theology in order to adapt a key concept of non-philosophy, Man-in-person, for a new understanding of the victim. As Man-in-person, the victim is no longer exclusively defined by suffering, but has the capacity to rise up against the world?s persecution. Based on this, Laruelle develops a new ethical role for the intellectual in which he does not merely 'represent' the victim, but imitates or 'clones' it, thereby assisting the victim?s uprising within thought.

In this book Jeffrey C. Alexander develops an original social theory of trauma and uses it to carry out a series of empirical investigations into social suffering around the globe. Alexander argues that traumas are not merely psychological but collective experiences, and that trauma work plays a key role in defining the origins and outcomes of critical social conflicts. He outlines a model of trauma work that relates interests of carrier groups, competing narrative identifications of victim and perpetrator, utopian and dystopian proposals for trauma resolution, the performative power of constructed events, and the distribution of organizational resources. Alexander explores these processes in richly textured case studies of cultural-trauma origins and effects, from the universalism of the Holocaust to the particularism of the Israeli right, from postcolonial battles over the Partition of India and Pakistan to the invisibility of the Rape of Nanjing in Maoist China. In a particularly controversial chapter, Alexander describes the idealizing discourse of globalization as a trauma-response to the Cold War. Contemporary societies have often been described as more concerned with the past than the future, more with tragedy than progress. In Trauma: A Social Theory, Alexander explains why.

This book is a detailed and wide-ranging account of the birth of social theory as a distinctive and modern intellectual genre, providing a brilliant account of the «pre-history» of sociology and a vivid portrayal of intellectual culture between the Enlightenment and the age of Romanticism.

The Handbook of Phonological Theory, second edition offers an innovative and detailed examination of recent developments in phonology, and the implications of these within linguistic theory and related disciplines. Revised from the ground-up for the second edition, the book is comprised almost entirely of newly-written and previously unpublished chapters Addresses the important questions in the field including learnability, phonological interfaces, tone, and variation, and assesses the findings and accomplishments in these domains Brings together a renowned and international contributor team Offers new and unique reflections on the advances in phonological theory since publication of the first edition in 1995 Along with the first edition, still in publication, it forms the most complete and current overview of the subject in print