ABSTRACT. In Human Nature and Conduct Dewey put his approach to moral education on a sound psychological footing by linking it to his theory of growth. This approach, however, has received scant attention in the moral education literature and is not even mentioned in the leading Handbook on moral and character education.

One reason for its neglect is that Human Nature and Conduct is a complex and difficult work. As Ruth Heilbronn notes, “Deweyan concepts cannot be taken in isolation from one another because they are linked together in a nexus of concepts.” This paper aims to make Dewey’s approach to moral education through growth more accessible by providing a compelling account of this nexus of central concepts: impulse, habit, intelligence and deliberation, character, the moral good, education and growth.

ABSTRACT. Recently, there has been a resurgence of interest in theories of moral judgment. New discoveries in social psychology and neuroscience have revitalized the languishing debate between intuitionist and rationalist takes on our morality. The ‘discovery’ of intuitive moral judgments has revived interest in intuitionist accounts of moral judgment. Both intuitionist proponents and theorists studying dual-process theories of cognition have argued that intuitive judgments are strong evidence in favor of intuitionist over rationalist models of morality. In this paper I argue against the prevailing view that intuitive judgments are evidence for the intuitionist account of morality. My view is that on an appropriate construal of their function, intuitions do not operate like intuitionist theorists claim. In fact, intuitions are more appropriately understood as one element in an experientially-rich ongoing transactive process of organism and environment. As such, intuitive judgments fit in better with some sort of habitual account of cognition. I offer a positive account of habit, based on classical pragmatism and cognitive science, which better explains the role of intuitive judgment in morality from the perspective of ‘embodied cognition’, or what Dewey called ‘lived experience’. This account also re-appropriates the moral foundations theory co-developed by Jonathan Haidt (Haidt 2007, 2012; Haidt and Graham 2007; Haidt and Joseph 2004, 2008; Graham et al. 2013), one of the leading social psychologists and self-proclaimed intuitionist, into the socio-cultural context and experiential building blocks (Flanagan, 2017) out of which the (moral) habits of particular individuals emerge. The foundations of care, fairness, loyalty or ingroup, authority or respect, sanctity or purity can all be understood within historically situated practices of human embodied conduct and the sociality of meaningful experiences for human life. On my account (following Johnson, 2014) of intuitive judgments, as arising out of the need for allostatic regulation of processes for organism-environment balance, (Schulkin, 2011) a judgment is pre-reflectively made from a set-point, or somatic marker (Damasio, 1994, 2000). The need for reflective judgments, as thoughtful deliberation, arises when this dynamic organism-environment balance can no longer be done by our automatic emotional response patterns. Moral problem-solving thus is a remaking of experience, making use of our conscious awareness of felt tension, in situations that are indeterminate. I argue that Haidt’s social intuitionist model is inadequate for fully accounting for moral ‘lived experience’, focusing mainly on reciprocal rhetorical influencing of intuitions between moral agents. Furthermore, I contend that Haidt’s theory focuses mainly on custom, or group level morality, thereby not being able to give insight of how social institutions, as objectivation of habits, are formed. My pragmatist reconstruction of intuitive judgments as part of habitual experience can play a role in overcoming the intuition/reasoning, judgment/action, and valuing/valuation dualisms.

ABSTRACT. What is the practical upshot of Deweyan democracy? The traditional answer is that we should engage in practices that cultivate democratic habits. But is it possible to instantiate this collaborative spirit when power is unequally distributed? Dewey doubted it but offered no direct practical remedy. Alinsky’s community organizing offers a potential way forward, but it is fraught with risks of its own. In this paper, I will argue that Deweyans would be well served by drawing on Gramscian, Ganzian, and Ostromian strategic insights to further the practical project of democracy as a way of life in the 21st century.

ABSTRACT. My presentation offers a Deweyan reading of the Sixties movement based on The public and its problems. By approaching this historical reality through Dewey’s political paradigm, I hope to identify the democratic and the non-democratic elements in the movement, those traits that should be affirmed alongside those that should be criticized, and finally those which enabled its powerful advance during the first half of the decade —nonviolent forms of protest— next to those which led to its unraveling after 1968, as was the dissolution of any stable form of community life, or the movement’s embrace of violent means for democratic aims.

ABSTRACT. Given the location, it seems appropriate to comment upon Dewey’s relationship to European philosophy. Several scholars have argued that Dewey’s break from Hegel was more cosmetic than real - a form of Hegelianism largely “emancipated from Hegelian garb.” I largely agree, although I will argue that Dewey was inspired by the somewhat unorthodox Hegelianism of the St. Louis movement (led in part by William Torrey Harris). Unlike orthodox Hegelianism, this form was democratic in that it demanded individuals to be responsible, not only for obeying the law, but also for crafting it as well. Dewey would agree, though he likely preferred to view this development as ushering in a distinctly American, democratic form of social thought.

ABSTRACT. This text intends to show the importance of John Dewey's political thought in the current historical panorama. At a time when all critical thinking seems exhausted with regard to the political situation, Dewey's philosophy and Dewey's pragmatism contributes to a renewal of the common world.

ABSTRACT. Toward the end of John Dewey’s Ethics, he includes five relatively short chapters in which he explores the ethics of economics and business. Arguably prescient in his consideration of the tensions between family and work life, artisanship and unionism, capitalism and Marxism, etc., Dewey attempts to navigate a middle path. This paper considers the primary arguments Dewey offers regarding business ethics and explores whether his meliorism is too optimistic. Specifically, is Dewey’s structural view of economics antithetical to his otherwise functional pragmatist philosophy? The paper proceeds in three parts: 1) a brief overview of the main claims Dewey makes toward the end of Ethics; 2) an exploration of structural differences in Dewey’s view of economics of his time and current fiscal contexts; and 3) an analysis of Dewey’s hopeful view that democratic, public spheres can contain the worst ethical lapses of business fundamentals and provide ameliorative options for contemporary life. The ultimate point of this paper is to situate Dewey’s ethics in educational contexts and reconsider if and how a public-private nexus for schooling is ethically defensible.

ABSTRACT. Critical social theorists such as post-Marxists, feminists and post-colonial theorists approach social relations with the goal of contributing to emancipating societies from injustice and oppression. They often undertake three interrelated tasks: They provide conceptual resources to diagnose social pathologies and injustices; they reconstruct normative criteria for engaging in social critique, finally, they contribute to identifying emancipatory potentials in society – e.g., by exploring how social actors can develop their own critical perspectives and engage in struggles for emancipation from injustice and oppression. The aim of this panel is to explore the social-critical potential of John Dewey’s work regarding these three tasks.

ABSTRACT. Facing conditions of democratic decline and authoritarian political trends in educational spheres, this project takes up meanings of, and challenges to democratic faith. This project focuses on two questions: What is democratic faith, from a critical pragmatist’s perspective? Is it both warranted and productive in the contemporary struggles for democratic, shared governance in public education? We examine democratic faith through Deweyan pragmatism (1927; 2003) and more critical variants (Rogers 2023) seeking to confront democracy’s failures and fissures.

ABSTRACT. Against the backdrop of heightened political polarization and the proliferation of disinformation, this paper argues for the critical role of public philosophy in fostering public dialogue and debate. Although Dewey never used the term ‘public philosophy’ himself, this paper posits that Dewey's pragmatism provides a nuanced blueprint for understanding public philosophy. The examination begins with an overview of the evolving definition of public philosophy. The paper then navigates Dewey's metaphilosophical framework, unraveling a public philosophy intricately interwoven with societal, political, and scientific concerns which unfolds dynamically through ongoing public deliberation—a manifestation consistent with Dewey's vision of philosophy as inherently public and transformative.

ABSTRACT. This paper is part of a collective project on “Democratic Education" and is aimed at identifying the main sources of pragmatist understanding of democracy, devised as an ethical and practical narrative of democracy which contrasts both with the Western and neo-liberal interpretation as well as with its counter narratives; it shows how Addams’ and Dewey’s visions of democracy are the main references to be explored in depth in order to highight their influence and persistence. Dewey published «The Ethics of Democracy» in 1888, a few years before arriving in Chicago (1894) and encountering Jane Addams, who in 1889 had established there Hull House, an innovative experience of settlement aimed at supporting a process of empowerment and social growth among disadvantaged children and adults. The Hull House experience was inspirational for Dewey since it was in some way the living portrait of his idea of Democracy, intended not as a form of government but as an associated form of life, which embeds: ethical and "practical" elements regarding individual and collective action; emotional and relational elements regarding ways of being together and of building and cultivating relationships; and epistemic and cognitive elements, regarding types of judgment, reasoning and thought, which support the maintenance and development of a democratic community based on reflective processes. Dewey’s vision of democracy is consistent with Jane Addams’s vision of the ethical implications of Democracy highlighted in «Democracy and Social Ethics» (1902) where she points out that democracy is, first of all, a normative and practical reference for individual and collective life and that therefore democratic life requires an ethical transformation of social structures. Both Addams and Dewey have an ethical and practical understanding of democracy intended as a form of associated living and mutual engagement that offers us the possibility to highlight its educational potential. .