<abstract xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml">

Russia’s invasion of Ukraine has clearly shown how fragile the global geopolitical order is, in particular regarding the energy and food systems. International media picture a human tragedy of war <italic>intertwined with</italic> discussions of food and energy security. In addition, subjective fears of a decline in the quality of life and consumer welfare in developed European economies are voiced. The article aims to describe this specific dialectic related to the war as it reaches beyond warfare itself and increasingly affect the social welfare of European countries. Results of surveys conducted in ten European countries confirm the dominance of respondents’ concerns for their own socio-economic situation and their desire to end the war as soon as possible, even at the expense of Ukrainian concessions to Russia. These social attitudes are decisive when it comes to whether the Ukrainians may further be supported or not. Moreover, these sentiments must be taken into account by those in power in individual European countries. Ultimately, such attitudes may exert the pressure that could contribute to ending the war.
</abstract>

Dialectic of Russia’s war in Ukraine: between geopolitics and energy welfare

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The freedoms offered by individualistic-democratic societies are marked by an intrinsic ambiguity: they are both real and (partly) illusory. They are rooted in the universe of representation, which, by proclaiming them, manages to force reality, but without this reality ever attaining the purity of the proclaimed principles. By subtle perverse mechanisms, new limits to freedom are actually introduced on a massive scale, eventually leading to the apparent paradox of a normative production that is much more abundant than in the ancient societies. There is nothing surprising about that. The individual autonomy proper to democratic societies necessarily induces a social activity of producing various norms and regulations, infinitely more intense than in a society where institutions run their established program and construct individuals in accordance with them. Freedom, in individualist-democratic societies, is an illusion, but one which creates reality. The individual, less free than s/he imagines her/ himself to be, is nevertheless in the middle of a range of choices which does not cease, at least theoretically, to extend.
</abstract>

How norms are formed in a democracy

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The following paper is about care1. It proposes a political vision to move towards a care-centred society that will allow the flourishing of everyone while keeping the planet inhabitable and thriving. For this utopian horizon that we name <italic>an ecology of care</italic>, we propose the creation of a Basic Income system that is constituted outside of and beyond the realm of the nation-state, as a means of changing humanity’s relationship to itself and transitioning from capitalism to a commons-based society. It argues for a dis-embedding of work—and the time allocated to it—from money, through a reformulation of the production of money in the form of an income distributed as an equal share to all those who are part of the planetary commons. Finally, it connects this Basic Income proposal with degrowth as a radical and necessary reformulation of society that considers its ecological roots and replaces the obsession with endless economic growth with the principle of taking care of people.
</abstract>

Towards an ecology of care: Basic Income after the nation-state

<abstract xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml">

The paper aims to determine the extent of the rationality of Vladimir Putin’s decision to begin a war with Ukraine. Its central argument is that this decision was irrational on three levels. Firstly, the Russian decision-making elites failed to foresee the ability of the Ukrainian army and people to resist efficiently. It might have resulted from the imperial superiority syndrome reinforced by the experiences of 2014. Secondly, the elites treated the reports on the Russian army’s combat readiness as reliable and did not make an effort to verify them. Probably no one can determine the scale of the kleptocracy, and therefore no one has reliable data on the quality of the Russian army’s combat preparation. Thirdly, the elites failed to envisage the scale of support for Ukraine from Western democracies. What is more, they did not take into account the democratic rationality of Western politicians. The same politicians who appeared to Putin to be weak and incapable of action, immediately after the mass social protests and condemnation of Russia’s aggression by public opinion, acted following the clearly expressed will of the political nation. The article reflects on the systemic reasons for such a poor definition of the decision-making situation and then tries to formulate the general relationship between the quality of the decision-making elite and the acceleration of the bifurcation processes of the Russian autocratic regime.
</abstract>

Faculty of Political Science and Security Studies

Faculty of Political Science and Journalism

Why did Putin go too far? The rationality of Vladimir Putin’s decision to begin a war with Ukraine

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This article outlines ideas about a people’s history of economics. The goal of such a history is to use economic theory to understand the formation of classes, political projects and historical blocs and history as a history of class struggles instead of the unfolding of economic laws. The article discusses the shortcomings of existing histories of economic thought and peoples’ histories. It suggests a synthesis that offers insights into the production and diffusion of economic ideas and their role in the making and remaking of class- and state relations from industrial capitalism to the present. The last part of the article offers an outline organized around the ideas of Smith, Marx, the Marginalists, Keynes and Hayek. Though using the common big names as entry points to class- and state-formation during different periods of capitalist and imperialist development, the peoples’ history is mainly concerned with the lives, thoughts and struggles of the toiling, primarily invisible, hands performing paid and unpaid work in capitalist centres and peripheries.
</abstract>

Economic ideas, capital logic and class struggle: reflections towards a people’s history of economics

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Based on Bronfenbrenner’s (1979) ecological model, this article focuses on the multidimensionality of radicalization and its relationship with community culture by observing the problem of social isolation. In this framework, sports provide contexts in which forms of social collaboration are necessary, the “rules of the game” must be embraced, and there is close interaction among fellow players. These characteristics can turn organized sports into observatories on (potential) juvenile radicalization through identifying “early warning signals” that are mainly detected by observing those conducts that may reveal a potential risk. In the provided extensive literature review, it comes that these signs can be traced, for instance, in the lack of self-esteem, in the absence of significant bonds, in the intolerance towards values, as well as in extreme introverted behaviour of the young subjects. Alongside such premises, this paper aims to understand whether and to what extent it is possible to hypothesize the shaping of strategies able to prevent radicalization in various contexts. Alongside such premises, this paper is aimed at understanding whether, and to what extent, it is possible to hypothesize the shaping of strategies able to avert radicalisation in various contexts, prevention based on the idea that the interaction between the individual and the environment—in the sense provided by the Chicago School—is heavily influenced by the progressive adaptation of human organism to its surrounding environment.
</abstract>

Sport and deradicalization: a proposal for an analysis and prevention model

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This article aims to address the processes of social changes in terms of the theory of social acceleration. It begins with an outline of the theory of social acceleration and discusses how an investigation into the driving forces of social acceleration can be used to explain the dynamics of social stability and change. It criticizes the acceleration theory because its focus is merely on high-industrialized western societies as well as the neglect of normative and religious aspects in the processes of social acceleration and change. This article proposes a revised model of social acceleration and applies it to Iranian society. It identifies the main features of acceleration-cycle formed in Iranian society in the 1960s and 1970s to answer the question of why the cycle of acceleration could not establish a self-propelling acceleratory formation as a prime requirement for preserving social stability.
</abstract>

Revised model of social change and acceleration: the case of Iranian society in the 1960s and 1970s

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Volume 7 (2023): Issue 4 (December 2023)

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