Michael Polanyi's Social/Political Order: Design for a Society of Explorers

Abstract

Michael Polanyi's fascinations throughout his lifetime were threefold: (1) science—specifically physical chemistry; (2) philosophy—specifically epistemology and ontology; and (3) political society, understood, in the British tradition, to include economics. In developing his recommendations for political society, Polanyi draws broadly upon insights and even concepts from his experiences and reflections in both science and philosophy. His search for meaning in all of his philosophical works provides for him the definition of what he considers the most important human endeavor and is that which the political order must strive to encourage and protect. In addition, the gratification he found in the collegiality and conviviality of scientific research, conducted most productively in what Polanyi identified as “societies of explorers,” suggested to him the diverse groups—as in science, “polycentrically” ordered—and engaged in all kinds of productive activities that came to represent, for him, the grassroots source of a society's creative vitality. Having come to appreciate the necessity of freedom for scientific discovery, freedom became a paramount value in the model he proposed for political society. But this freedom, he realized, had to operate within the boundaries of legal and moral constraint if it was not to dissolve into the oppressions of anarchy. So we find in Polanyi's model of political society a dynamic very similar to that which he had developed in his epistemology: an indwelling of tradition for the purpose of social stability but also a “breaking-out” of established ways to engage in creative endeavors. Similarly, as Polanyi had recognized higher and lower “orders” of existence in his ontology that were necessary for the “emergence” of more comprehensive and novel entities, “greater than the sum of their parts,” he provided for a similar vertical, or qualitative, “layering” in his social order. These insights, and more, that Polanyi draws from his scientific and philosophical reflections in the process of constructing his model of a political society are what I attempt to develop in this essay.     

Richard Tawney: Moral Theology and the Social Order

Abstract

After noting the impressive scope of Tawney's contribution as an economic historian, labour theoretician and Christian moralist, attention is given to his three classic socialist texts: The Acquisitive Society, Equality, and Religion and the Rise of Capitalism. Tawney's critique of capitalism is rooted in his Christian convictions concerning the worth of each human person and also informed by his historical analysis of the evolution of capitalist social relations. His telling exposure of the transitory historical nature of so much of capitalism's vaunted absolutes has lent an authority to his contribution. Wealth, property and the mechanisms of the market are not sacrosanct, and must be subject to measures that will ensure more equitable social objectives. As a social theorist he straddled the Christian and secular humanism that formed the lifeblood of the labour movement, and this remains relevant to our more pluralist society, where agreement upon basic moral norms can help construct a social consensus that will promote a greater justice and human flourishing.     

The Adelaar: a Dutch East-Indiaman Wrecked in 1728 off Barra, Outer Hebrides, Scotland

The Adelaar , a Dutch East-Indiaman outward bound from Middleburg to Batavia, was wrecked on Greian Head, Barra, in Scotland's Outer Hebrides in 1728. Although heavily salvaged at the time, and situated in an extremely dynamic location, the wreck demonstrates that exposed sites can retain meaningful levels of archaeological integrity, and historically valid conclusions can be drawn from them.
© 2005 The Nautical Archaeology Society     

Private Body and Social Order: Problems of Sex among Pre-Modern Middle Eastern Jews

This article centres on a case that was brought to the Jewish court in Egypt around the middle of the seventeenth century. The protagonist was a man who was diagnosed with melancholy. The proposed cure, coitus, led the arbiter, Rabbi Mordechai Halevi, to discuss the ethical dilemma concerning its realisation, because the man's wife lived in Istanbul. The article contains two inter-related parts. The first analyses the legal case as a meeting of complementary interests. The second discusses the aetiology and the prevalence of two parallel diseases that were mentioned in the case: sperm-retention melancholy and suffocation of the womb. The article examines the social functions of these diseases, against the background of cultural perceptions of sexuality and gender in the Jewish communities of the pre-modern Middle East, thus shedding new light on patients as historical agents.     

Some Second Thoughts about Theory in the Social Sciences

When Professor Papageorgiou submitted his brief essay in the spring of 1982 (“Some Thoughts about Theory in the Social Sciences, GA [October 1982], pp. 340-46), I decided to use it as a vehicle to provoke a discussion of the issues he raised. I invited a number of scholars to submit brief and informal statements on these issues and these responses are assembled in the following pages. The variety of styles and contents of the submissions reflects the diversity that is contemporary human geography. I hope that this forum enhances our appreciation of the points-of-view of others. Convergence towards a single widely accepted epistemological framework appears to be further away than ever.     

汪中礼俗观念的思想线索和社会背景

清乾隆年间,著名学者汪中尊崇汉学,排斥宋学,而礼学造诣深厚,对如何践履孝道、改良贞节礼俗和救助孤寡均不乏己见。他的主张既是与宗宋学者及当时名流进行对话,又受现实生活激发,其局限性同样应从思想和社会的双重背景来理解。汪中的礼学思想产生了不同反响,南菁书院即为典型事例。