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"This book reveals the complex relationship between elite perceptions and behaviour, and governance, in China. It moves away from existing scholarship by focusing on functionaries, grass-roots elites, leading intellectuals, and opinion-makers in China and by looking beyond the top leadership, makes a significant contribution to our understanding of shared governance and broadened political participation in China. The chapters in this collection explore the elites' role as opinion-makers, technical experts, producers of knowledge, and executives or managers, and pose a number of questions, the answers to which are crucial to understanding future political and economic development in China. What are elite perceptions of governance, inequality and justice; what do the elites mean by good governance; what is the influence of non-Chinese Communist Party elites in policy-making and implementation in China; how have they exerted their influence in the PRC and influenced its direction of future development; and what have grass-roots elites contributed to governance in local communities? Providing a keen insight into the role elites have played in governing China since 1978, this book is a pioneering effort to bring together elite studies and governance studies. As such, it will be highly relevant for policy-makers within international organizations, governments, and NGOs outside China as well as appealing to scholars and students interested in Chinese politics and governance."--Publisher's website

First published in 1978, this unique work throws much-needed light upon the exact nature of privilege and elite life-styles in the contemporary Soviet Union, under the Communist regime. Dr Matthews' study places these life-styles in a historical perspective, and characterises, in sociological terms, the people who enjoyed them.This study is based on an extensive programme of personal interviews among emigré groups and a close analysis of original and little-known legal historical sources. There are special sections on the nature of change in the Soviet elite and on social mobility. This reissu

The elites -- whether political, military, or economic -- constitute a determinant force in state formation and the nation-building project in post-colonial transitions. The absence of a scientific understanding of the socioeconomic and political configuration of South Sudan has obfuscated the liberation struggle and generated ethnic nationalism and the emergence of a parasitic class that is completely alienated from the masses of the people. South Sudan, the highly hyped youngest state in Africa and the world, is in a deep social, economic, and political crisis characterised by a low-intensity civil war, immense suffering and material deprivation of the people. It has internally displaced hundreds of thousands of people who live in "protection of civilian" sites in major towns under the care of United Nations Mission in South Sudan. Three and a half million have crossed international borders to seek refuge in Uganda, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Sudan, Ethiopia, and Kenya. The ruling elite, completely unperturbed by the deep humanitarian crisis and apparent near collapse of the state, clamour for power sharing. Together with foreign collaborators, they have enriched themselves and fuelled the war through the extraction and plunder of the country's natural resources. This book is a critical analysis of the socioeconomic and political failures of South Sudan's leaders who have plunged the nascent state into the abyss. South Sudan: Elites, Ethnicity, Endless Wars and the Stunted State is likely to achieve its objective of stimulating debate about the future of South Sudan as a viable polity. The hope is that readers, through the debate generated by this book, will rediscover the commonality that marked the struggle for freedom, justice, and fraternity, and abandon ethnic ideologies as a means of constructing a modern state in South Sudan. South Sudan: Elites, Ethnicity, Endless Wars and the Stunted State is a must-read for South Sudanese intellectuals who want to reshape the socioeconomic and political development trajectory

Intro -- Contents -- List of Acronyms and Abbreviations -- Introduction: Dissecting South Africa's Transition -- Part I. Power and Economic Discourses -- 1. Neoliberal Economic Constraints on Liberation -- UNCERTAIN CHANGE -- ECONOMIC CRISIS -- STALLING AND SHIFTING THE CRISIS -- FINANCIAL POWER AND VULNERABILITY -- INDUSTRIAL DECLINE DURING THE RISE OF GLOBALISATION -- COMPARATIVE DISADVANTAGES -- CONCLUSION: FROM ACCUMULATION CRISIS TO POLICY WHITEWASH -- 2. Social Contract Scenarios -- SCENARIO PLUNDERING -- THE SCENARIO OF ELITE COMPROMISE -- CORPORATE SCENARIOS -- LABOUR SCENARIOS -- SOCIAL DEMOCRATIC SCENARIOS -- THE NARROWING OF ECONOMIC POLICY DISCOURSE -- GEARING DOWN -- CONCLUSION: THE SCENARIOS' SUCCESS IN COERCING COMPROMISE -- Part II. Social Contract Scenarios -- 3. Rumours, Dreams and Promises -- CONFLICTING INTERPRETATIONS -- LEFT DEFENCE OF THE RDP -- TRAIN- WRECK 1: THE WHITE PAPER -- TRAIN- WRECK 2: THE DEVELOPMENT OF URBAN AND RURAL UNDERDEVELOPMENT -- TRAIN- WRECK 3: MARKET- DRIVEN SOCIAL POLICIES -- CONCLUSION: THE USE AND ABUSE OF DEVELOPMENT DISCOURSE -- 4. The Housing Question -- MATERIAL INTERESTS, IDEOLOGICAL CONFLICTS -- STORMTROOPERS OF MARKET- CENTRED HOUSING POLICY -- LATE APARTHEID POLICY PUZZLES -- THE NATIONAL TOILET FORUM -- THE ELITE TRANSITION IN HOUSING POLICY -- POST- APARTHEID NEOLIBERALISM IN THE WHITE PAPER -- CONCLUSION: AN ANSWER TO THE HOUSING QUESTION? -- Part III. International Lessons -- 5. The World Bank as 'Knowledge Bank' (sic) -- THE POWER OF GLOBAL NEOLIBERALISM -- A LEGACY OF FINANCIAL INDISCRETION -- CONTEMPORARY WORLD BANK WOES -- URBAN MISSIONAIRIES -- OPPOSITION TO LOANS AND MACROECONOMIC ADVICE -- LENDING DROUGHT -- CONCLUSION: THE BANK'S DIFFUSION OF 'KNOWLEDGE' -- 6. Beyond Neoliberalism? South Africa and Global Economic Crisis -- TALKING LEFT, ACTING RIGHT.

What are the origins of elite splits? Why do regional elites break away from central elites and develop regional parties? This paper contends that intra-elite differences are more likely to be politicized when an economic shock exacerbates pre-existing asymmetric economic preferences and disadvantaged elites can mobilize the electorate on the basis of identity. I employ constituency-level data from Catalonia spanning the late 19th and early 20th century to test which factors influenced regional elite decisions to form a regional elite political party. To understand elite divisions, I exploit a historical exogenous trade shock and its asymmetric impact within Catalonia, and the availability of identity-based mobilization agents. The results show that regional elite splits took place in areas more affected by the 1898 colonial trade shock and where elites had larger mobilization capacity.

Uses characteristic education, occupation, and job experience credentials of current elites in U.S. institutions to approximate the proportion of women in the pool of potential elites. Women's representation in elite positions is broadly consistent with their representation in these elite pools, and their status in elite pools is not expected to increase substantially until early next century. (Abstract amended)

HauptbeschreibungDer Elitebegriff hat besonders in den letzten Jahren Konjunktur und gewinnt fortlaufend an Brisanz. Allerdings fehlt seinem Gebrauch meist die nötige Trennschärfe: Häufig signalisiert er zum einen die Suche nach leistungsstarken gesellschaftlichen Führungskraften, zum anderen drückt er Empörung über die Unfähigkeit der politischen Klasse aus. Jenseits dieses Phänomens stellt sich die Frage nach dem theoretischen Gehalt des Elitebegriffes. Inwiefern ist er relevant für die politische Theorie? Worin liegt sein analytisches Potential? Die Antwort dieses Buches lautet: In der hi.

Social sciences between knowledge and ideologies: need for philosophy -- Part I. Social and cognitive roots for reflexivity upon the research process -- Social sciences, what for? On the manifold directions of social research -- Vitenskapsteori-- - what, how and why? -- Culture or Biology? If this sounds interesting, you might be confused -- Conditional Objectivism: A Strategy for Connecting the Social Sciences and Practical Decision-Making -- Towards Reflexivity in Science: Anthropological Reflections on Science and Society -- Part II. Philosophies of explanation in the social sciences -- Explanation: guidance for social scientists -- From causality to catalysis in the social sciences -- How to identify and how to conduct research that is informative and reproducible -- Explaining social phenomena: Emergence and Levels of Explanation -- Part III. Social normativity in social sciences -- Normativity in psychology and the social sciences: Questions of universality -- The crisis in psychological science, and the need for a person-oriented approach -- Open access, a remedy to the crisis in scientific inquiry? -- Part IV. Social processes in particular sciences: challenges to interdisciplinarity -- Fragmented and Critical? Some challenges for a social organization of Norwegian sociology, and implications for innovation -- How do economists think? -- Part V.General Conclusion -- What can social science practitioners learn from philosophies of science? -- Index.