Proceedings of the XXII World Congress of Philosophy

The metaphorical understanding of historical movement as spiral is due to the symbolism of the spiral. Spiral is the geometric pattern to depict a self-accumulative growth of energy or life force. For Ham, history neither reiterates “the eternal return” to the primal archetype nor generates “the unilateral straight move of teleology. If history is a living move, it should follow the basic principle of life evolution as all the living experiences the gradual and yet creative advance by long accumulative changes. There are several factors for Ham Sok Hon to establish the idea of the spiral history. First, he studied the Bible and newly experienced the ‘not-yet-being ontology’ in the Abrahamic religion, a view of a religious utopianism toward the future. It is not the view of “the eternal return” ofMircea Eliade but the view of historical reality that urges a life-formation in expectation of the novel emergence of the new. Second, among various streams of East Asian thoughts, Ham was greatly influenced from the neo-Confucian idea of the nature of mind and Hua-yen Buddhism, that is, ‘one is many; many is one’. Finally, Ham’s spiral history is different from Hegel’s phenomenology of spirit in that he denies the historical perspectives of heroism or classism and instead advocates the perspective of ssi-al, a perspective that ssi‐al bears all burden of historical suffering and opens a new chapter by overcoming the historical suffering.

This paper explores Ham's role as a maverick thinker, a pacifist and an innovator of religious pluralism in twentieth century Korea. Ham saw an individual's spiritual quest and the struggle for social justice as interrelated. As an idealist, Ham viewed human beings basically as moral beings, and perceived the Supreme Being or God not only as a transcendental being, but also as an imminent being both in the sense of existing everywhere and also in the sense of existing as `inner voice'. On this basis, my paper examines Ham as an intermediary between East Asia and the West and between `losers' and `winners' in history, and assesses how he was shaped by, and responded to, the challenges of his time. Firstly, I will look at Ham's search for Korea's national identity under Japaneseimperialism and his determination to write an account of Korean history from the standpoint of the oppressed, in order to inspire his downhearted countrymen. I will also examine how, using his own Biblical interpretation of Korean history, Ham provided a mission and vision not only for oppressed Koreans under Japanese colonialism, but also for 'losers' and ordinary people everywhere. In the second section, I will further explore Ham's sense of pacifism by examining how Ham's ideas were open-ended not only towards the Asian classical philosophies of Taoism, Confucianism, Buddhism and Hinduism, but also towards traditional Christianity, the non-church movement, Quakerism, Western sciences and rationalism. I will also consider why he had to respond as an individual to the challenges both of society and of the historical era. In the third section, I will concentrate on how Ham's Christo-centric views had fundamentally altered to a more universal perspective and also how he asserted the necessity for the restoration of Christianity from the ceremonial and `weird' to the ethical and socially just. Lastly, I will look at Ham's definition of Jesus and why he used the new terminology the 'Ssial' instead of the archaic expressions 'people' or 'national.' By doing so, I will examine how Ham achieved what is one of the most difficult things in this world, to be a genuinely conscientious leader despite corrupt surroundings.

The result of 2007’s presidential election in South Korea symbolizes the decline of the Left and the growth of the new Right. They say it goes with the global retrogression of democracy, or the consolidation of the hegemony of the rightist versions of democracy. According to Choi Jang-jip, the general public in Korea has thought that the Roh Moo-hyun’s administration had betrayed them, handing power over to the market, and seeking to form a coalition government with theconservatives. Similarly, Professor Jang Ha-jun asserts that the democratic governments of Kim Dae-jung and Roh Moo-hyun have mistaken economic democratization for neo-liberalistic structural adjustment.

The purpose of this article is to make apparent Hannah Arendt’s thought on the practical dimension of universality alluded throughout her works. The issue of universality has been one of the most pivotal questions in political philosophy until today. Beneath of her philosophical endeavor there is always her deep concern for it. In this article I will show the practical dimension of universality unintentionally pursued by Arendt and its political implications. By harshly criticizing Plato Arendt successfully shows how violent the truth claim in the political realm can be. What Arendt is critical of is the attitude to dictate philosophical ideals in politicalrealm, the attitude I named the “Philosopher King Complex.” Arendt’s bitter criticism of this attitude makes believe that she is critical of any claim of universality in the political realm, but her praise of Socrates clearly shows that she does not altogether blame the claim itself. We also need to note the debate with Gershom Scholem. Scholem’s charge that Arendt dealt with the Eichmann case from a humanitarian, universalistic viewpoint while neglecting the Jewish perspective could be serious considering Arendt’s emphasis on the pariah’s perspective. Arendt’s standpoint, however, includes both a particularistic view as a Jew and auniversalistic view as a human at the same time. This is possible because Arendt correctly understood the role of speech. Arendt’s use of Pastor Grueber’s example in Eichmann in Jerusalem implies that she believes in the power of speech to relate our consciousness to reality and to make communication possible. To retain human plurality along with universality, it is necessary but not sufficient to focus on speech alone. In this regard we learn a lesson from the Habermas-Henrich debate: that self-relation of consciousness plays the role of establishing self-identity. A successful example of combining these two insights is Arendt’s position since she delivered her hermeneutic insights in the language of philosophy of consciousness. Albrecht Wellmer’s unjustifiable charge of Arendt’s concept of judgment to be “mystic” is an example of misunderstanding of her peculiar position. If we admit this, we can say that Arendt establishes aposition to give an answer to the question “is democracy a universal truth?”: democracy, as far as it is a political truth, is neither equivalent to a universal truth as a mathematical one, nor just a particular cultural opinion of westerners. This interpretation of Arendt puts her position near to liberal-communitarian views of Michael Sandel or Charles Taylor. Sandel criticizes Arendt to be universalistic, but in fact his position is quite near to hers. For example, his method of analogy is almost the same as her concept of exemplary validity. Rather, it seems to me that Arendt provides more solid theoretical ground than Taylor or Sandel does. For Arendt’s position stands on a firm understanding of the power of speech and on an insight of self-relation of consciousness.

Specific character of globalization can be understood only in connection with deep crisis of the nation-state and thus with sovereignty. The sovereignty organically includes territory. During globalization territory factor is not anymore the key principle of social and cultural life. Such phenomenon as Islamic fundamentalism (Islamism) fits quite well the structure of the theory of globalization in postmodernist interpretation. For Islamism as a subject of the world order the determining identity (as sets of the ontological aims determining its outlook and purposes of political activity), i.e. determining, basic, fundamental to self-determination and activities is a creation of the Islamic world order, the world of Caliphate. Thus the Islamic fundamentalism focuses on universal nature of its identity. This activity ignores norms of international law and denies its key positions, such as state sovereignty, territorial integrity, firmness of borders, etc. Tolerance is an integral feature of the sovereignty. Weakening of sovereignty in conditions of globalization causes danger of strengthening of intolerance. Recognition of uniqueness, peculiarity and other civilization identity is a key to peaceful settlement of problems in conditions of the new global order as well as to establishment of philosophy of tolerance.

Although the accelerated globalization of recent decades has flourished in tandem with a notable growth of liberal democracy in many states where it was previously absent, it would be hard to say that the prevailed processes of neo-liberal globalization foster development of global democracy and the rule of law. On the contrary, globalization has undercut traditional liberal democracy and created the need for supplementary democratic mechanisms. In fact, neo-liberalism i.e.libertarianism, which has generally prevailed as the authoritative policy framework in contemporary globalization, does not have much in common with the ideal of liberal democracy of well-ordered society. The serious problem in the relationship between democracy and globalization is, however, related to differences among the global cultures and/or civilizations. Democratic rule of law and the problem of human rights are unquestionable values of the Western civilization. Do they have the same significance in each culture/civilization, in every part of the globalized world? Democratic control of globalization can be completed only through a sort of global governance, but who can realize it in our divided world?

This paper argues that the possibility of global justice is premised on the solutions of three-fold interrelated problems: (1) problem of heterogeneity, (2) problem of inequality, (3) problem of realpolitik. The problem of heterogeneity questions the assumed globality equated as universality or commonality underpinning global justice in lieu of the empirical human diversity and plurality that cannot be assumed away by the desirability of the normativity of global justice. The problem of inequality highlights the ineradicability of global inequality as a pervasive fact of international life. It also criticizes the fairness argument that tries to make do with the ineradicable inequalities as long as they work towards the least advantaged members of global society mainly by rendering such an attempt as futile considering the inapplicability of principles of justice, Rawls's difference principle for example, in the global context; the unwillingness of powerful states to relinquish their hierarchical positions in the global political structure that benefit them; and the difficulty of not knowing what in/equality would mean for the least well-off when the fairness argument is granted. The problem of realpolitik makes the subordination of realpolitik (power and interest) to idealpolitik (justice)unwarranted given that the global realities point to the converse of subordination, especially the realities of the hierarchical structure of global politics and its concomitant unequal power relations.

Korea Wave means the vigorous drive toward Korean mass culture among the young generation of East Asian countries. The Korea Wave has had great socio-cultural and economic effects on China and East Asian countries and even made a new word 'Hawhanzoo (哈韓族)' which mean the Korea Wave fan. The most important characteristic of the Korea Wave is that the followers are the young generation of the upper classes of those regions who are apt to learn and use the Internet and the culture of the Information Age. This means that the future leaders of the East Asia countries are sympathizing with the characteristics of modern Korean culture and its vision. They are absorbing positively the Korea Wave as their spiritual foundation upon which their world views and valuejudgments are conglomerated. In this article I'd like to consider new possibilities in the Korea Wave which pave roads to a cultural community around East Asia in the age of information. Therefore, I will analyze three dimensions of Korea Wave which are material, symbolic and experiential dimensions.

This is a comparative study on the 20th's century's Western philosophy Hannah Arendt(1906-1975) and the 16th century's Eastern Confucian thinker Wang Yang-ming(1472-1529). Wang-ming was a Neoconfucian thinker of the 16th century China. In his time, Chinese intellectual world was dominated by Neoconfucian Ch’eng-Chu School which laid much stress on scholastic work of learning. Yang-ming saw a huge obstacle of intellectualism in Ch’eng-Chu school’s theoretical scholasticism that emphasized overly book-learning to be required on the way to become a genuine person. He recognized this kind of rigidintellectualism as the true reason for the dichotomy in his time between knowledge and action, between learning and life, and between selfcultivation and social practice. According to his view, the dichotomy brought about serious political corruption and oppressed human creativity up to the point of total institutionalization of “truth”. Hannah Arendtwas sickened under the severe totalitarianism of the 20th century, especially as a Jew under the German Nazism. She undertook an extensive analysis of how Western civilization generated totalitarian imperialism, fascism, and communism, going through the modern times, all of which made human beings’ language and action superfluous, erupted, and destroyed. Through these experiences, she became disgusted with traditional Western hierarchy of thinking and doing, philosophy and politics, theory and practice, in short, vita contemplativa and vita activa. Although they both lived far away from each other in space and time and used completely different languages, they both, in my view, shared many common problems and concerns, not only in the contents of their thoughts but also in the way and form of construction of thoughts. To the similar extent that people were warned and judged by both thinkers respectively in their times of the totalitarianism of making human beings superfluous and puppet-like, we human beings in the 21st century are considered to be threatened by the totalitarian nullification caused by modern utilitarianism, automation, consumerism, etc. These principles are practiced limitlessly and boundlessly, so that our whole lives of politics, culture, and education are now suffering from that threat. It is my conviction that we can acquire some guide and wisdom from the twothinkers of East and West, because they discovered possible solutions of how to restore and revive human beings’ capacities of thinking and judging, and how to bring action and doing.

German idealist philosopher J. G. Fichte (1762‐1814), as an heir to Kant, sought to uniformity of reason in his own philosophical system Wissenschaftslehre. However, the political implications of his philosophy have dual aspects. The first is his own political theory presented in accordance with his philosophical principles. The second is a set of political influences concerning his practical position together with his philosophy. By and large it has been the second aspect that Fichte’s nationalistic perspectives were interpreted upon. So the political implications of his philosophy have been frequently reduced as a prophet of ethnic German nationalism and Nazism. But we need to distinguish his systematic theory from the influences resulted from his practical attitudes. Because he proposed an alternative idea of nationalism built on the basis of his philosophical principles. In reference to ‘nationality’, what Fichte has in mind was the activeness of man and the universality of the structure which operates while he or she is acting. For Fichte, activeness of consciousness and life are the one thing. With this presupposition, ‘nationality’ is conceptualized as the phase of commonness and reciprocity that comes into being among the self-forming conscious beings. Therefore his idea of ‘nationality’ couldn’t be grasped all in primordial dimension such as in ethnic nationalism. The original and fundamental base of nationality is man’s acting power working constantly toward perfection of man himself.

Democracy as one of the forms of a governance and political process is at the same time a political value. The value’s aspects of democracy are closely connected with the character of democratic political regime, democratic process and democratic political culture of society. in the structure of democratic values one may roughly point out horizontal facet of them and vertical one. Horizontal values include following values: general social domain; the sphere of political institutions; the aspects of political process and procedures; cultural sphere. As a rule, these values are out of doubt, though this fact doesn’t preclude there critic from various opponents of democracy. On the contrary, it’s a hierarchy of democratic values, which is the vertical facet of them is the point at scientific andpolitical debates. This fact also causes various approaches to democracy. The problems of democratic values inseparably linked with the questions about there universal character. Under an analysis of the universal character of democratic values it’s necessary to take into account its socioantropological aspect. The point is about developing essence of the human being under the impact of diverse internal and external factors.

Carl Schmitt’s Roman Catholicism and Political Form (1923) features a term, the importance of which political philosophy is yet to fathom. This notion is complexio oppositorum, describing Catholicism as “a complex of opposites”. Upon theorizing the complex as a non-dialectical, non-synthetical unity, I will graft its structure onto the concept of culture and its recent political incarnation, multiculturalism. I will argue that in order to remain a viable political concept, multiculturalism has to preserve an antagonistic composition, which will allow for 1) a concretion of the Schmittian understanding of culture as a plurality and 2) a non-consensusbased process of negotiating cultural co-existence.

The inequality as a social problem was in focus of attention of social philosophers since the early years of modern history when a person has ceased to perceive the social hierarchy as pre-established one and has understood the opportunity of its re-determination. Investigators studied in detail different aspects of the problem but their discussions were centered on the question about foundation of inequality. I argue that if we allow the possibility of change of the social positions as the main characteristic of contemporary society the primary attention should be directed on what criteria this or that society is ranged of its members andhow is it possible for a person or for a group/community to change its own position. The object of my paper is to drawn the possible strategies of work on inequality and to explore of what might be used to overcome of inequality. I consider it is possible to distinguish three groups of strategies in use to work through a problem of inequality: (1) The strategies of overcoming of inequality; (2) The strategies of maintenance of inequality; (3) The strategies of justification of inequality. These strategies will examine about how they could be applied and what outcomes it would be followed with. Special attention will give to the ideas formulated by P. Bourdien, F. Fukuyama, F. Parkin of those ways thanks to which equality/inequality are balanced. In conclusion I raise the question of the overcoming of inequality in light of the stable development of human society.

The inequality as a social problem was in focus of attention of social philosophers since the early years of modern history when a person has ceased to perceive the social hierarchy as pre-established one and has understood the opportunity of its re-determination. Investigators studied in detail different aspects of the problem but their discussions were centered on the question about foundation of inequality. I argue that if we allow the possibility of change of the social positions as the main characteristic of contemporary society the primary attention should be directed on what criteria this or that society is ranged of its members and how is it possible for a person or a group/community to change its own position. The object of my paper is to drown the possible strategies of work on inequality and to explore of what might be used to overcome of inequality. I consider it is possible to distinguish three groups of strategies in use to work through a problem of inequality: (1) The strategies of overcoming of inequality; (2) The strategies of maintenance of inequality; (3) The strategies of justification of inequality. These strategies are examined about how they could be applied and what outcomes of them would be followed with. Special attention is given to the ideas formulatedby P. Bourdien, F. Fukuyama, F. Parkin of those ways thanks to which equality/inequality are balanced. In conclusion I raise the question of the overcoming of inequality in light of the stable development of human society.

The plank of the dependency theory is that unless there is a transition to socialism and a complete break with the metropolitan countries, the peripheral status of the dependent countries would continue. After the Second World War with the emergence of many new nations, as a consequence of decolonization, the question of development assumed paramount importance for these countries. Raul Prebisch (1950) understood the nineteenth century paradigm of free trade as inoperative and disadvantageous to the raw materials exporting countries. The spectacular success of the Newly Industrialized countries‐ Hong Kong,Singapore, South Korea and Taiwan by integrating with the developed nations, have achieved a higher standard of living and negated the basic assumptions of the dependency theory.

In most countries, failed criminal attempts are punished less severely than those that succeed. Many philosophers, including myself, have argued that differential punishment can be justified. However, in a recent paper, Hanna raises objections to defenses of differential punishments, claiming that such policy goes against our “desert intuitions” and also cannot be justified on utilitarian grounds. I argue in this paper that Hanna’s desert-based and utilitarian objections can be undermined. Further, they are valid only within moral theories that take the agent to be an independent self, whose responsibility rests on his or her intentions and deliberations alone. However, differential punishment can be justified in a different kind of moral theory, in which there are good reasons to giveluck a role to play.

John Dewey’s stay in Tokyo in early 1919 coincided with the height of the social movement calling for parliamentary democracy in Japan. His lectures at Tokyo Imperial University offered a new way of viewing the world and human actions that emphasizes the importance of communication and the growth of democratic personality. Those who expected to hear from him something else were disillusioned. But the disillusionment was mutual. Dewey was disillusioned by the Japanese intellectuals whose affection for European philosophy led them to an uncritical acceptance of the emperor system and Japan’s imperialism abroad. His criticism toward the Japanese intellectuals grew severe as he saw the Japanese aggression while he was on the continent. Dewey’s lecture on democracy left some impact on a few of intellectuals who modified their view of person’s actions that was eventually to be crashed when Japan fell into the all-out war-making.

Biopolitics, originally interpreted as the subfield of political science focusing on biological (evolutionary) factors involved in political behavior, has faced conceptual and organizational differences during the forty-year period of its development. It has recently been redefined as the totality of all applications of biology to social and political concepts, problems and practical issues and concerns. In these new terms, biopolitics represents a promising interdisciplinary area of research, whose potential with respect to political philosophy and political science is exemplified by its application to the following issues: (i) Collective violence (war, terrorism, etc.); (ii) Ethnocentrism; (iii) Hierarchies and networks: and (iv) Neurochemical factors of social behavior. The prerequisite for the successof biopolitics is its collaboration with the humanities and social sciences in investigating the multi-level “Homo politicus”.

The purpose of this essay is to identify the characters of Ham's philosophy that have been formed through the historical process of the encounter between the Eastern and Western civilizations. Views of the academics on Ham have been divided in two; those who regard Ham as a philosopher characterizing oriental Korean cultural thought, and those who see him with the characteristics of Christianity and Western modern cultural thought. In this essay I will show that Ham formed an integrated thought which interweaves the Eastern and Western cultures and minds through accepting the Western Christian modern mind but with theoriental identity of Korean culture. Also, I will clarify the characteristics of Korean modern history as a process of the encounter between the Eastern and Western civilizations. I then discuss the way the basic elements of the Eastern and Western cultural thoughts were accepted and integrated in Ham's thoughts, in line with Korean modern history. This essay also reveals that Logos in Western Greek philosophy, the Word in Christianity (“agape”, love), Tao in Eastern Asia, and Han (Great one) of the Han people (Koreans) were the core concepts and principles of Ham’s philosophy. His main statement, “Thinking people will survive” can be confirmed by the Logos; his core concepts “will” and “love” in the Word; his organic oneness of thought that unifies process and purpose, and the comparative and the absolute, in the Tao (Way); and his integrated philosophy that covers the Eastern and Western, the old and the new, the material and the spiritual,and the individual and the group, in Han.

A Skeptical View of the Liberal Peace reflects on the place of democracy in the global community. The article pays particular attention to the widespread assumption that there is an inherent relationship between democracy and peace, and that peace most assuredly is derived from democracy itself. I find these assertions to be highly questionable and overstated. Reflection on the philosophy which underpins these claims can only be helpful for international relations. In particular, given the United States’ apparent imperialistic urge to force democracies on other nations as Iraq, the article seems especially timely.