The book analyses how today's capitalist ideology produces the idea of freedom of choice and how through the identification with this ideology one observes an increase of people's traumas. The book has been translated into more than ten languages. It was reviewed in The Independent (it was chosen as the book of the week, The Guardian, The Economist and The Financial Times as well as presented in many radio interviews. Following the rise of new liberalism at the end of last century, members of the late-capitalist countries tend to see in themselves sole authors of their own lives. Our own careers, sexual and gastronomic preferences, social ties and even our own bodies are no longer experienced as pure and simple given, but rather as a product of a set of deliberate choices. The new voluntarist interpretation of own conditions of life is indeed embedded into ideology of late capitalism. Nevertheless, the traps and paradoxes of this new way of self-understanding is often overlooked. The study suggests that the constant imposition of guilt inevitably results in the rise of anxiety, which has indeed became the main affective modus of contemporary society. Understanding one's life or even body as a product of deliberate choice obviously amounts to feeling responsible for it. But that means that we will experience every deviation from conformity as a failure attributable only to ourselves, causing great anxiety. To counter this indeed unbearable psychic situation, argues the study, we are led to give up our freedom of choice in favor of expert knowledge or some other form of outer authority. The tyranny of choice of late capitalism therefore leads to its very opposite, i.e. to the rise of outer authority (indeed often consisting of charlatans) which is supposed to help in the dreadful task of life-management.
COBISS.SI-ID: 1387854
The book co-edited and co-authored by Aleš Završnik (co-editor Alenka Šelih), analyses changes in criminal activities and crime control strategies in Central and Eastern Europe after the full-scale political, social, economic and legal changes over the past two decades. It explains the political background underlying these developments, and assesses their long-term social impact. Experts from Slovenia, Hungary, Croatia, Serbia, the Czech Republic, Poland, Bosnia and Herzegovina discuss the politicization of crime, the on-going paradoxes regarding civil liberties, and the future of crime policy in comparative and country-specific terms. The book features trends of crime in transitional countries; politics, the media, and public perception of crime; surveillance; penal policy and political change; emerging trends including economic and organized crime, human trafficking and juvenile delinquency; and new perspectives on corruption in the region. It tells a story of the so called ‘other Europe’ where the narratives of freedom and human rights – the corner stones of the critique of the old socialist regimes – are being subverted by the ideas imported from the West itself. It shows how the ‘great transition’ – ushered in by foreign experts and advisers, and more or less eagerly welcomed by the people hungry for change – has brought in more, rather than less repressive penal policies. The book encourages readers to rethink a more fundamental issue, namely, the difference between democracy and totalitarianism.
COBISS.SI-ID: 1558606
Sentencing issues are discussed at length in common law systems, but discussions infrequently include civil law systems. In an attempt to remedy this oversight somewhat, the article analyses the sentencing system in Slovenia, a fairly typical civil law country. The basis of the sentencing system is the concept of individualization of punishment, where proportionality is of the utmost importance and is set first by legislation determining sentencing ranges for specific offences and then by the judiciary aiming to narrow the ranges to an appropriate sentence in individual cases. The system is far from perfect, especially on the procedural side, butit offers a valid alternative to other sentencing solutions.
COBISS.SI-ID: 1642062
The scientific monograph analyses basic elements of tipically criminological problematics in the light of post-modern capitalism. The book is divided in eleven chapters dealnig with the following themes: (a) ideals, values, normative (legal and moral) systems and actual capitalist reality; (b) dominant perceptions of normality, deviance, conformism, problematic phenomena and rebellions in post-modern ("fluid") society and culture; (c) the question of resposibility and iresponsibility; (d) key characterisics of the regime of postive and negative sanctions (i.e. rewards and punishments) in the capitalist (global) system; (e) relationship between violence and culture; (f) prevalent forms of frauds; (g) work and theft (good and bad acquistion of goods); (h) the role of national state in defining and preventing socially harmful phenomena; (i) war and peace in criminological perspective(s); (j) relationship between post-socialist transition and global processes of post-modernization (neo-liberal and neo-conservative counter-revolution); (k) causes and consequences of actual structural crisis of private, profit-oriented economy. Special attention is paid to the relationship between crime and reproduction of capitalist exploitation, oppression and humiliation of structurally subordinated sellers of work force (or capabilities), normalization and even naturalization of structural violence, and functioning of repression (e.g. economic, financial, political and ideological sanctions) in the class struggle (between capital and labour or the rich and the poor). The monograph can be used as a study material (or text-book) at the under- and postgraduate study of criminology, security sciences, sociology and law. Moreover, the general public can find in the book many new insights in the nature and key characteristcs of capitalist violence that is directed towards people, nonhuman nature, society and culture.
COBISS.SI-ID: 268870400
Postindustrial society thrives on the idea of choice. The individual is not only perceived as able to choose among various consumer objects; he or she is also taken as someone who can choose his or her identity, sexual orientation, body shape, and so on. In the ideology of postindustrial capitalism, one's life is perceived as a work of art and as a particular kind of enterprise. The overemphasis of choice, however, does not seem to bring contentment to the individual, but rather increases feelings of anxiety and insecurity. In order to appease feelings of anxiety, people often resort to following random advice on how to fashion their lives. Psychoanalysis questions how the malaise of civilization affects the malaise of the individual and vice versa. A pessimistic conclusion about the changes in today's society holds that the increase of psychosis and of anxiety are related in a particular way to the ideology of choice. Psychoanalysis, however, has always understood choice in a complex way. Instead of perceiving the act of choosing as a purely rational gesture, psychoanalysis understands choice as linked to the unconscious. Since choice always involves a loss, it is per se anxiety provoking. Today's society has problems precisely with the idea of loss, which is why we see the emergence of options promising to impose control on what is often uncontrollable.
COBISS.SI-ID: 1261390