Work and Freedom

Many hold the belief that work, as appearing around us in advanced economies, compromises freedom. But this claim raises a number of theoretical difficulties and puzzles. This talk surveys the different articulations of this freedom problem that the philosophical literature has offered, and argues that they are all unsatisfactory — for either analytic shortcomings or empirical inaccuracies. But this doesn’t entail that this intuition is mistaken. I present an alternative formulation — an argument from conformity pressures. I suggest that the structure of work in advanced economies is inconsistent with our freedom intuitions because market environments, in an overlooked manner, attempt to maximize the diversion of people from their own plans and projects. This new diagnosis also implies new remedies; I conclude by offering four modest “imaginaries” for enhanced individual autonomy inside a market-centred world of work.

Iddan Sansino
https://www.politics.utoronto.ca/people/directories/graduate-students/iddan-sonsino
PhD Candidate
Department of Political Science
University of Toronto

About the Speaker:

Iddan’s research mainly lies at the intersection of political philosophy and political economy. He employs a variety of normative and empirical perspectives to gain a better understanding of the desirable attributes of economic institutions. Iddan also has broader interests in political theory, in particular in democratic theory and in philosophical theories of freedom. The working title of his dissertation is "The Impulsive Society: a Political Theory of the Market in the New Economy".

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This is a talk with audience Q&A presented by the University of Toronto's Centre for Ethics that is free to attend and open to the public. Free pizza and refreshments will be provided at the event. The talk will also be streamed online with live chat here [to be posted].

About the Centre for Ethics (http://ethics.utoronto.ca):

The Centre for Ethics is an interdisciplinary centre aimed at advancing research and teaching in the field of ethics, broadly defined. The Centre seeks to bring together the theoretical and practical knowledge of diverse scholars, students, public servants and social leaders in order to increase understanding of the ethical dimensions of individual, social, and political life.

In pursuit of its interdisciplinary mission, the Centre fosters lines of inquiry such as (1) foundations of ethics, which encompasses the history of ethics and core concepts in the philosophical study of ethics; (2) ethics in action, which relates theory to practice in key domains of social life, including bioethics, business ethics, and ethics in the public sphere; and (3) ethics in translation, which draws upon the rich multiculturalism of the City of Toronto and addresses the ethics of multicultural societies, ethical discourse across religious and cultural boundaries, and the ethics of international society.

The Ethics of A.I. Lab at the Centre For Ethics recently appeared on a list of 10 organizations leading the way in ethical A.I.: https://ocean.sagepub.com/blog/10-organizations-leading-the-way-in-ethical-ai