On Willing Selves: Neoliberal Politics VIS-A-VIS the Neuroscientific Challenge - Hardcover

Currently, the neurosciences challenge the concept of will to be scientifically untenable, specifying that it is our brain rather than our "self" that decides what we want to do. At the same time, we seem to be confronted with increasing possibilities and necessities of free choice in all areas of social life. Based on up-to-date (empirical) research in the social sciences and philosophy, the authors convened in this book address this seeming contradiction: By differentiating the physical, the psychic, and the social realm, the neuroscientific findings can be acknowledged within a comprehensive framework of selves in neoliberal societies.

JOHN CLARKE Professor of Social Policy, Open University, UK BARBARA CRUIKSHANK Associate Professor at the Department of Political Science, the University of Massachusetts, USA STEFANIE DUTTWEILER Research Assistant, the University of Basel, Switzerland KENNETH J. GERGEN Mustin Professor of Psychology, Swarthmore College, USA ALOIS HAHN Professor of Sociology, Trier University, Germany AMIN NASSEHI Professor of Sociology, University of Munich, Germany JANET NEWMAN Professor of Social Policy, The Open University, UK NIKOLAS ROSE Professor of Sociology, the London School of Economics and Political Science, UK MAREN SCHORCH Research Assistant, the Department of Sociology, the University of Trier, Germany MARIANA VALVERDE Professor of Criminology, the University of Toronto, Canada TILLMAN VIERKANT Lecturer in Philosophy of Mind at the University of Edinburgh, UK LOUISE WESTMARLAND Lecturer in Criminology, The Open University, UK