Michael Kühn Livres

Although educational research advocates the perspective of the learner, who or what is it advocating against? The governments of all European Union countries give learning the most prominent place on their policy agendas; the European Commission wants Europe to become a knowledge based society; companies across the European Union are no longer interested primarily in profit, but want to be learning organisations; social scientists detect the emergence of a learning society and economists advocate a learning economy. What does European educational research do, if nowadays everybody in the European Union wants nothing else but knowledgeable people?

"The social sciences and humanities worldwide are discovering the necessity to self-critically reshape their theorizing: The first critique of social science theorizing calls for ‘globalizing’, the second, parallel critique, for ‘de-colonizing’ social thought. In his highly topical book, Michael Kuhn discusses why and how the ‘globalization’ of social science theorizing introduces thinking through nation state perspectives as an up-to-date methodological must; how the ‘de-colonialization’ of social science theorizing with the critique of Eurocentrism and its thinking through space paves the way for the worldwide implementation of thinking through nation-state views, transforming the social science world into a multiplicity of ’provincialized’ theories; with which odd argumentations the ’indigenization’ of thought produces contributions to the ideological armament of the new states in the so-called 3rd world after their transformation into the very society system of the former colonizers; how these indigenized theories make discourses among de-colonized theories a matter of which ‘provincialized’ theory manages to rule the worldwide creation of theories; how the masterminds of globally de-colonized thinking present imperial thought as guiding theories for mankind’s thinking; what templates for the turn from anti-capitalist towards nationalistic thinking Historical Materialism has provided, and what consequences all this has for the social sciences as a voice in political debates about the world."--Publisher description

Internationalization of the social sciences rests on the setup of international scientific infrastructures, networks, and research agendas. Yet it has also stimulated discussions on academic dependency and the need for the indigenization of theories and methods. This book traces phenomena that accompany the internationalization of social sciences in different parts of the world. Contributions from East Asia, India, Russia, Turkey, Lebanon, Jordan, South Africa, and Latin America offer manifold perspectives on the pathways and desiderata of internationalization and make this volume an important basis for future debates.

In our globalized world economical processes get constantly more and more connected with each other. Therefore they demand an effective and optimized business communication between all involved partners. Michael Kuhn presents in his book an overview of the needs and requirements which occur during the application of communication systems in modern business management, as well as of the possible solutions. The author gives a detailed description of the communication process and communication systems, which is crucial for a better understanding of aspects of business communication in modern business. A general analysis of three modern communication systems provides a practical focus. The systems are presented briefly with their general features and criticized in the focus of the needs and requirements defined beforehand. A profound analysis of one communication system at the example of a fictive counselling company consolidates the theoretical and practical knowledge about communication systems in modern business structures. The analysis shows that today’s communication systems are able to handle various needs and requirements of modern companies. The book is directed mostly to decision-making units and managers in modern businesses.

At the beginning of the new millennium, the social sciences discover an epochal “turn” making it necessary to revolutionize their theory-building: As a response to what they call the globalization of the social, they find the need to globalize their theorizing as well. It is odd to discover after two centuries of colonialism and imperialism, after two world wars and several economic world crises that there is a world beyond the national socials; it is even more strange that the social sciences globalize their theorizing by comparing theories about nationally confined socials and by creating all sorts of, preferably, “local theories”, just as if any national social was a secluded social biotope. Discussing how to globalize the social sciences, they argue that globalizing social science theorizing means finding a way of theorizing that must, above all, be liberated from “scientism” in order to allow a “provincialization” of thinking. Not surprisingly, the globalizing social sciences also rediscover mythological and moral thinking as a means for a “true scientific universalism”. Michael Kuhn’s new book presents many thought-provoking arguments on the oddities of the globalizing social sciences and on how these oddities are not accidents, but a consequence of the nature of how the social sciences theorize about the social.

In the past, the European social sciences labelled and discredited knowledge that did not follow the definition for scientific knowledge as applied by the European social sciences as an alternative concept of knowledge, as “indigenous” knowledge. Perception has changed with time: Not only has indigenous knowledge become an entrance ticket to the European social science world, but the indigenization of European theories is seen by some as the contribution of “peripheral” social sciences to join the theories of the “centers”. This book offers contributions to the discourses about alternative concepts of knowledge, inviting the reader to decide if they are alternative, indigenous, or European types of knowledge. However, in order to make this decision, the reader must know what the nature of the European concepts of science and of scientific knowledge is; this might be a motivation to read a book that presents thoughts claiming to be alternative concepts of knowledge, alternative to the European concept of science.

The European social sciences tend to absorb criticism that has been passed on the European approach and re-label it as a part of what the critique opposes; criticism of European social sciences by “subaltern” social sciences, their “talking back”, has become a frequent line of reflection in European social sciences. The re-labelling of the critique of the European approach to social sciences towards a critique from “Southern” social sciences of “Western” social sciences has somehow turned “Southern” as well as “Western” social sciences into competing contributors to the same “globalizing” social sciences. Both are no longer arguing about the European approach to social sciences but about which social thought from which part of the globe prevails. If the critique becomes a part of what it opposes, one might conclude that the European social sciences are very adaptable and capable of learning. One might, however, also raise the question whether there is anything wrong with the criticism of the European social sciences; or, for that matter, whether there is anything wrong with the European social sciences themselves. The contributions in this book discuss these questions from different angles: They revisit the mainstream critique of the European social sciences, and they suggest new arguments criticizing social science theories that may be found as often in the “Western” as in the “Southern” discourse.

This innovative book provides new perspectives on the globalization of knowledge and the notion of hegemonic sciences. Tying together contributions of authors from all across the world, it challenges existing theories of hegemonic sciences and sheds new light on how they have been and are being constructed. Examining more closely the notions of ´human rights´ and ´individualization´, this much-needed volume offers new and alternative ideas on how to transform the universalization of the Western model of science and can serve as an eye-opener for all those interested in non-hegemonic scientific discourse. This book is published within the Series ´Beyond the Social Sciences´.

Global, local, glocal – reflecting on world social science emphasizes the significance of space. In these spatial dichotomies, the global lacks a specific location, while localities seem detached from this realm. Discourses on world social science distinguish social thought based on the spaces of their origin. Space influences how social scientists perceive social reality, with Southern, Western, and Northern knowledge reflecting not just the thinker’s address but also their theoretical perspective. Social thoughts are often viewed as confined within their spatial contexts, with thinkers seen as representatives of specific spaces—political, cultural, or otherwise—implying that their ideas are mere reflections of their environments. This raises the question of whether the world social science arena, filled with these spatially bound thoughts, can foster shared understanding, or if such encounters are futile unless rooted in a common spatial context. The book examines examples of spatially constructed knowledges and the challenges they face in trying to connect and transcend their spatial confines. Ultimately, it questions whether the Western approach to contextualizing social thought is a dead-end for social inquiry globally.