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The Generative Power of Hope

Anticipating Possibilities in Times of Crises

  • Book
  • © 2022

Overview

Authors:
  1. Frederick Bird

    1. Political Science Department, University of Waterloo, Waterloo, Canada

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  • Explores how one can find grounds for hope to address the challenges and crises of our time
  • Revisits important reflections on major crises by thinkers such as Niebuhr, Jaspers, Camus and Arendt
  • Analyses hope from both a practical and philosophical perspective

Part of the book series: Library of Public Policy and Public Administration (LPPP, volume 17)

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Table of contents (17 chapters)

  1. Front Matter

    Pages i-vii
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  2. Introduction

    1. Front Matter

      Pages 1-1
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    2. Can You Give Us Good Reasons to Hope?

      • Frederick Bird
      Pages 3-11

    3. A Critical Moment

      • Frederick Bird
      Pages 13-22

  3. The Generative Power of Hope

    1. Front Matter

      Pages 23-23
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    2. The Virtue of Hope

      • Frederick Bird
      Pages 25-41

    3. Cultivating Hope

      • Frederick Bird
      Pages 43-54

    4. Habits of Hoping

      • Frederick Bird
      Pages 55-68

    5. The Social Practice of Hoping

      • Frederick Bird
      Pages 69-81

    6. Hope Makes a Difference

      • Frederick Bird
      Pages 83-92

  4. Learning from History

    1. Front Matter

      Pages 93-93
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    2. The Critical Value of a Due Regard for History

      • Frederick Bird
      Pages 95-113

    3. After the Fall: Mid-Twentieth Century Reflections on the Crises of Those Times

      • Frederick Bird
      Pages 115-153
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Keywords

About this book

This book analyses how and why we are living at a critical moment in the history of human life on earth and explores how we find grounds for the hopes that will enable us to address the challenges and crises of our time. The author analyses hope both practically and philosophically as a generative virtue to realistically discern the situations in which we find ourselves, and imaginatively to anticipate possibilities when the future is unknown and uncertain. The author argues that hope is a mean between anomy, disillusionment, and despair, on the one hand, and wishful thinking, dreaming, and fanaticizing, on the other hand. The book not only examines – and analyzes from a historical perspective - the contemporary crises such as climate change, environmental degradation and its effects such as the social costs of these developments, but also further analyzes the character and micro-dynamics of hope and how it makes a difference in how we manage the crises which inevitably emerge.Though contemporary crises are those we tend to focus on, the author also engages with what is involved in a due regard for history and the relevance of a sense of history for addressing the crises of our time. He shows us what we can learn from revisiting some thoughtful reflections by thinkers like Niebuhr, Jaspers, Camus, and Arendt. Finally, the author shows us what is involved practically in anticipating possibilities, by looking at hope as a social practice and noting how hopeful people make a difference.

Authors and Affiliations

  • Political Science Department, University of Waterloo, Waterloo, Canada

    Frederick Bird

About the author

Frederick Bird is a Distinguished Professor Emeritus at Concordia University in Montreal, where previously he held a Concordia University Research Chair in Comparative Ethics and taught in the Departments of Religion, Sociology and Management. He is also an adjunct professor in Political Science at the University of Waterloo, in Waterloo, Canada. He recently organized and co-authored a book on The Practices of Global Ethics. He organized and led an international research project examining the practices of international businesses in developing countries. This project resulted in the publication of 4 books and 2 special issues of the Journal of Business Ethics, which he co-edited. He is the author, co-author, editor, or co-editor of 10 books including The Muted Conscience: Moral Silence and the Practice of Ethics in Business (1996), Good Management (1995), Peace is Everyone’s Business (2021), The Practices of Global Ethics (2016), International Businesses and the Challenge of Poverty in the Developing World (2004), and Voices from the Voluntary Sector (2011). He recently published articles on “A Defence of Objectivity in the Social Sciences, Rightly Understood,” “What is the Business of Business? Time For a Fundamental Re-Thinking,” “The Practices of Mining in Developing Countries and Inclusive Wealth Development,” and “The Crisis of Economic Growth: An Inescapable Ethical Challenge.” In the early 1960s, Bird helped to organize a student civil rights movement in the area of Boston and in the mid-1960s he organized anti-poverty programs in downtown San Francisco. He is a magna cum laude graduate of Harvard College (Modern European History), Harvard Divinity School, and the Graduate Theological Union.

Bibliographic Information

  • Book Title: The Generative Power of Hope

  • Book Subtitle: Anticipating Possibilities in Times of Crises

  • Authors: Frederick Bird

  • Series Title: Library of Public Policy and Public Administration

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-95021-7

  • Publisher: Springer Cham

  • eBook Packages: Religion and Philosophy, Philosophy and Religion (R0)

  • Copyright Information: The Editor(s) (if applicable) and The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2022

  • Hardcover ISBN: 978-3-030-95020-0Published: 27 April 2022

  • Softcover ISBN: 978-3-030-95023-1Published: 28 April 2023

  • eBook ISBN: 978-3-030-95021-7Published: 26 April 2022

  • Series ISSN: 1566-7669

  • Edition Number: 1

  • Number of Pages: VII, 312

  • Number of Illustrations: 1 b/w illustrations

  • Topics: Political Philosophy, Political Science, Modern History

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