Digital List Price:	$15.95
Kindle Price:	$9.99 Save $5.96 (37%)
Sold by:	Amazon.com Services LLC

Add an

audiobook with Audible narration for $7.49

eBook features:

Highlight, take notes, and search in the book

You've subscribed to ! We will preorder your items within 24 hours of when they become available. When new books are released, we'll charge your default payment method for the lowest price available during the pre-order period.

Update your device or payment method, cancel individual pre-orders or your subscription at
Your Memberships & Subscriptions

There was an error. We were unable to process your subscription due to an error. Please refresh and try again.

Follow the author

Kwame Anthony Appiah

Follow

The Honor Code: How Moral Revolutions Happen Reprint Edition, Kindle Edition

by Kwame Anthony Appiah (Author) Format: Kindle Edition

4.0 83 ratings

See all formats and editions

Price

New from

Used from

Kindle

"Please retry"

$9.99

—

Audible Audiobook, Unabridged

"Please retry"

$0.00

Free with your Audible trial

Hardcover, Deckle Edge

"Please retry"

$14.22

$2.20

Paperback

"Please retry"

$13.96

$9.49

$1.22

"[Appiah's] work reveals the heart and sensitivity of a novelist. . . .Fascinating, erudite and beautifully written."—The New York Times Book Review

In this groundbreaking work, Kwame Anthony Appiah, hailed as "one of the most relevant philosophers today" (New York Times Book Review), changes the way we understand human behavior and the way social reform is brought about. In brilliantly arguing that new democratic movements over the last century have not been driven by legislation from above, Appiah explores the end of the duel in aristocratic England, the tumultuous struggles over footbinding in nineteenth-century China, the uprising of ordinary people against Atlantic slavery, and the horrors of "honor killing" in contemporary Pakistan. Intertwining philosophy and historical narrative, he has created "a fascinating study of moral evolution" (Philadelphia Inquirer) that demonstrates the critical role honor plays a in the struggle against man's inhumanity to man.

ISBN-13

978-0393340525
Edition

Reprint
Kindle feature

Sticky notes
On Kindle Scribe
Publisher

W. W. Norton & Company
Publication date

2011
September 6
Language

EN
English
File size

666 KB
See all details

Read with the free Kindle apps (available on iOS, Android, PC & Mac), Kindle E-readers and on Fire Tablet devices. See all supported devices

Kwame Anthony Appiah
350
Kindle Edition
1 offer from $9.99
Kwame Anthony Appiah
380
Kindle Edition
1 offer from $9.99
Kwame Anthony Appiah
44
Kindle Edition
1 offer from $18.95
Robert Baker
3
Kindle Edition
1 offer from $27.99
Toby Ord
898
Kindle Edition
1 offer from $14.99
Philip Kitcher
5
Kindle Edition
1 offer from $13.79

Editorial Reviews

Review

... the author ... often achieves a Malcolm Gladwell-like balance between argument and storytelling. He stirs in spoonfuls of narrative honey to help his medicinal tea go down.
Dwight Garner --The New York Times

From the Inside Flap

How does moral progress happen? How are societies brought to repudiate immoral customs they have long accepted? In The Honor Code, Kwame Anthony Appiah explores a long-neglected engine of reform. Examining moral revolutions in the past--and campaigns against abhorrent practices today--he shows that appeals to reason, morality, or religion aren't enough to ring in reform. Practices are eradicated only when they come into conflict with honor.
In gripping detail, Appiah begins his work with a portrait of the often-deadly world of aristocratic Britain, where for centuries gentlemen challenged each other to duels. Recounting one of the last significant duels in that world--between a British prime minister and an eccentric earl--Appiah shows a society at the precipice of abrupt change. Turning to the other side of the world, Appiah investigates the end of footbinding in China. The practice had flourished for a thousand years, despite imperial attempts at prohibition, yet was extinguished in a generation.

Appiah brings to life this turbulent era and shows how change finally came not from imposing edicts from above, but from harnessing the ancient power of honor from within.

In even more intricate ways, Appiah demonstrates how ideas of honor helped drive one of history's most significant moral revolutions--the fast-forming social consensus that led to the abolition of slavery throughout the British empire, and recruited ordinary men and women to the cause. Yet his interest isn't just historical. Appiah considers the horrifying persistence of "honor killing" in places like Pakistan, despite religious and moral condemnation, and the prospects for bringing it to an end by mobilizing a sense of collective honor--and of shame.

With a storyteller's flair and a philosopher's rigor, The Honor Code represents a new approach toward moral inquiry. Ranging from a great mandarin's abandonment of an ancient Chinese tradition to Frederick Douglass's meetings with Abolitionist leaders in London, Appiah reveals how moral revolutions really succeed.

Product details

ASIN ‏ : ‎ B00403NO3I
Publisher ‏ : ‎ W. W. Norton & Company; Reprint edition (September 6, 2011)
Publication date ‏ : ‎ September 6, 2011
Language ‏ : ‎ English
File size ‏ : ‎ 666 KB
Text-to-Speech ‏ : ‎ Enabled
Screen Reader ‏ : ‎ Supported
Enhanced typesetting ‏ : ‎ Enabled
X-Ray ‏ : ‎ Not Enabled
Word Wise ‏ : ‎ Enabled
Sticky notes ‏ : ‎ On Kindle Scribe
Print length ‏ : ‎ 226 pages

Best Sellers Rank: #951,811 in Kindle Store (See Top 100 in Kindle Store)
- #1,171 in Social Philosophy
- #1,415 in Ethics & Morality
- #4,667 in World History (Kindle Store)

Customer Reviews:
4.0 83 ratings

Brief content visible, double tap to read full content.

Full content visible, double tap to read brief content.

Videos

Help others learn more about this product by uploading a video!

Upload your video

About the author

Follow authors to get new release updates, plus improved recommendations.

Kwame Anthony Appiah

Brief content visible, double tap to read full content.

Full content visible, double tap to read brief content.

Kwame Anthony Appiah is the author of “The Ethics of Identity,” “Thinking It Through: An Introduction to Contemporary Philosophy,” “The Honor Code,” and the prize-winning “Cosmopolitanism.” Raised in Ghana and educated in England, he has taught philosophy on three continents and is currently Professor of Philosophy and Law at New York University. In the 1990’s he published three mystery novels—“Avenging Angel,” “Nobody Likes Letitia,” and “Another Death in Venice”—and he hopes to return to novel writing someday soon. Professor Appiah writes the “Ethicist” column in the New York Times Sunday Magazine. President Obama presented him with the National Humanities Medal in 2010; he gave the 2016 BBC Reith Lectures and he was the 2018 chair of the Man-Booker Prize jury. His 2018 book “The Lies that Bind: Rethinking Identity” was a Washington Post Notable Book of the Year. He maintains a website at www.appiah.net.

Customer reviews

4 out of 5

83 global ratings

How customer reviews and ratings work

Sort reviews by

Top reviews from the United States

There was a problem filtering reviews right now. Please try again later.

Brian Forst

The Overlooked Path to Dousing the Flames of Hatred and Intolerance

Reviewed in the United States on October 7, 2010

Verified Purchase

For all the handwringing over how to defend ourselves against violent Islamic extremists, the central point raised by Professor Appiah in "The Honor Code" has been widely overlooked: We can do better than accept codes of honor that harm us all. Mainstream Muslims can be supported to rein in and pacify their extreme factions by changing the codes of honor that drive young men to commit acts of violence in the name of a holy cause in the first place. It took some 200 years for Christians to change the codes of honor that gave rise to toxic notions of martyrdom, holy war and infidels during the Crusades, and in today's world of instant communication technology, Muslims who operate under the very same notions should be convertible in much less time -- perhaps in a few short years, and certainly in our lifetimes. As Appiah writes, honor killings in Pakistan have already been reduced by a decline in the acceptability of that practice, and the emergence of such websites as Arabs and Muslims Against Honor Killing (whose slogan is "No honor in honor killing") should give us all reason to be more positive about the future.

This book may also encourage us to shift our own codes of honor from ones that encourage our lunatic fringes to produce international frenzy in threatening to burn Korans in public to alternatives that recognize that we pray to the same God as Muslims and share interests of living good lives, experiencing the warmth of family and friends, and raising our children in a healthier, more peaceful world.

Appiah exposes the problem of harm done in the name of honor to a bright light. He may have earned himself a major peace prize in so doing. He may have earned for us all genuinely enhanced prospects for peace.

26 people found this helpful

Helpful

Jim Namaste

Calling Attention to Topics that Need Much More Attention

Reviewed in the United States on July 7, 2015

Verified Purchase

Having done a fair amount of thinking about the idea and importance of honor codes I was disappointed in this book from an analytical point of view. It does not really explain much in that regard. However, considering that there has been practically no work done in this rather significant area, this is certainly a good start, plus the material in it is interesting and needs to be known more widely.
From a social scientist perspective, when it comes to analyzing how moral revolutions happen this is relatively light thinking, but again, the author has identified a topic that needs more scientific investigation.
In any case this is a book everybody ought to read and do more than just read. What exactly makes honor (codes) so significant and why do they have such little "real" relevance in practically all cultures?

2 people found this helpful

Helpful

Jaylia

How do moral revolutions happen?

Reviewed in the United States on December 19, 2010

Verified Purchase

Dueling, foot-binding, slavery and "honor" killings were once considered honorable practices but today most people find them repellent. In THE HONOR CODE Appiah analyzes these four examples to illustrate how traditional beliefs about honor came to be in sharp contrast with evolving views of morality. In each case, arguments against the practices were well known long before they were given up, but knowledge alone wasn't enough. "Honor" killing has not been completely eliminated, but for each of the other practices Appiah details how the development of an expanded, less insular world view or "honor world" changed cultural beliefs and overthrew these long held customs. With this book Appiah is hoping to help spark modern moral revolutions.

Appiah talks about what these modern revolutions might be in an excellent September 2010 article in the Washington Post. Just as we look back with horror at slavery and foot binding, people in the future may condemn one or more of our current practices. To determine what might cause our descendants to wonder "What were they thinking?!" Appiah provides three guidelines: first, arguments against the practice have long been in place, second, defenders of the practice cite tradition, human nature or necessity as reasons to continue (How could we grow cotton without slaves?), and third, supporters of the practice engage in strategic ignorance, for instance wearing slave-grown cotton without considering where it comes from. Appiah's contemporary candidates for moral revolutions include industrial meat production, the current prison system, the institutionalization and isolation of the elderly, and the devastation of the environment.

Appiah is a philosophy professor at Princeton and his writing is sometimes a little choppy in a logician's proof solving style, but the material is well thought out, timely and fascinating.

35 people found this helpful

Helpful

Top reviews from other countries

Nicholas

com Appiah argue that far from deserving a bad name, honour provides a motivating force for morality

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on February 4, 2015

Verified Purchase

Review courtesy of www.subtleillumination.com

Appiah argues that far from deserving a bad name, honour provides a motivating force for morality; it compels people to be honourable out of a desire to avoid shame.

There are two kinds he suggests. Competitive honour is about being better than others; winning a race or gaining victory in war. Peer honour governs relations among equals: being born a lord in medieval England would give you peer honour, to be beheaded instead of hanged if you were found guilty of a crime, for example, even if you were a completely incompetent lord. The modern conception of human rights is perhaps similar to a universal extension of peer honour.

Appiah examines three case studies, dueling, footbinding, and slavery, and discusses the role honour had in ending each of them. Each activity had critics long before it actually ended, he points out, but what actually ended them was a shift in the perception of what was honourable, from the activity itself being honourable to the activity being shameful.

To my mind, there is some question of correlation versus causation in his case studies, but they are interesting nonetheless. Some of examples feel a bit incomplete, though, or like they were oversimplifications of what is admittedly a very complicated issue. I would tend to prefer Steven Pinker's Better Angels, on a related topic, for that reason. Still, an interesting topic.

4 people found this helpful

Cosmo

Four Stars

Reviewed in Canada on April 27, 2017

Verified Purchase

Super original book and topic! It provides a new perspective on the concept of honor, and how people die and kill to preserve a system of honor.