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AbstractScholars of nation-building and secession tend to prioritize elite or broader nationalist activism when explaining the proliferation of nation-states. Yet, recent historical research reveals a major finding: the influence of great powers tended to eclipse nationalist mobilization for new states in Latin America, the Balkans, Anatolia, and Central and Eastern Europe. Drawing on recent trends in historical research largely unknown in other fields, this article examines context, timing, and event sequencing to provide a new approach to multi-case research on nation-state proliferation. Major power recognition of new states in the Balkans also emerges as transformational for the post-World War I replacement of dynastic empires with nation-states in Europe. These findings suggest a shift of focus to the interplay of nationalist activism and great power policy for explaining the spread of nation-states.

In this, a unique history of the America's postwar intellectual, David Paul Haney outlines the developoment of sociology as a discipline and why, given its focus of study, it failed to develop into a force in the intellectual currents of the United States. Arguing that sociologists attempted to develop both a science and an instrument for the spread of humanistic concern about socity, Haney shows how both attempts failed to connect sociology with larger questions of policy and social progress

Major societal challenges of a global nature include climate change, efficient energy supply, environmental sustainability, and health care. Science Technology Policy (ST) policy is an essential contributor to dealing with these challenges; moreover, international cooperation and collaboration in ST is vital to tackling these issues, since no single nation or even region is able to respond adequately by itself. Within this context, this book addresses recent developments in transatlantic ST cooperation between the European Union and the United States. The EU-U.S. relationship dates back to the 1950s, with regular EU-U.S. Summits to assess and develop transatlantic cooperation. In the area of ST, the EU and U.S. concluded an ST Cooperation Agreement in 1998, renewed it in 2004, and extended it for another five years in July 2009. The research underlying this study is based on interviews with key stakeholders in the field, with an emphasis on: • potential new opportunities and new mechanisms for increased transatlantic EU – U.S. ST cooperation under current conditions • examples of coordinated "science diplomacy" efforts • options for the development of effective joint efforts. While the project is focused on European-U.S. relationships, it also addresses issues of international ST cooperation involving other regions, including Africa and Asia. The author highlights the urgency of ST cooperation to address global issues, and the evolving roles of government, universities and research centers, and industry, in promoting successful strategies and programs.

Shows that the determinants of discourse developments have changed considerably from the period of disciplinary formation to the present stage. In the 'statist societies of continental Europe those discourses of social science which found their institutional legitimacy under a system of state academic institutions have always concentrated on the state. (AFH)

"The findings of scientific research often provide an important baseline to the formation of public policy. However, effective communication to the larger public about what scientists do and know is a problem inherent to all democratic societies. It is the prerogative of democratic societies to determine what kind of scientific research will be funded. Searching for Science Policy offers innovative ways of thinking about how the rhetoric and practice of science operates in various institutional contexts. The book is divided into two parts. Part 1, "Policy Uses and Misuses of Science," explores the various ways in which scientific claims are inevitably mediated by how they are used. Joel Best, draws on statistics involving missing children, violence against women, and attendance figures at political demonstrations to demonstrate how the motivations to use inaccurate and misleading numbers stems directly from the ideological and organizational interests of those using them. Judith Kleinfeld analyzes recruitment policies for women scientists at MIT, showing how hiring practices that may be justifiable on extra-scientific factors are carried out based on pseudo-scientific studies not subject to public scrutiny. Robert MacCoun addresses the journalistic misuse of drug and drug abuse statistics and shows how this profoundly distorts policy implications drawn from them. And Allan Mazur examines the role scientific evidence has come to play in the law, pointing out the pitfalls of its intrinsic quality and how such evidence may be interpreted or misinterpreted by judges and juries. Part 2, "Searching for Science Policy," extends discussion of the role of science to specific ideas about how public policy-making might be improved in matters of law, family, environment, drug use, and health. Mark Kleiman weighs the sometimes conflicting claims of science and social order in formulating drug policy. Norval Glenn calls for closer cooperation between professional associations, the media, and researchers in reporting provisional social science findings to the public. Stanley Rothman and S. Robert Lichter examine the dynamic by which environmental organizations shape public perceptions of risk and harm. And in the concluding chapter, Sheila Jasanoff looks closely at differences between the provisional nature of science as normally practiced and the more contentious sphere of litigation that demands ultimate resolution. In a time when scientists find themselves subject to more public scrutiny than ever before, the well-informed citizen is no longer a moral ideal but rather a social imperative. Searching for Science Policy helps to clarify the grounds and the circumstances of more effective use of science in public discourse."--Provided by publisher