Suchergebnisse

"Nach Ablauf des ersten Drittels seiner Mandatszeit sieht sich der brasilianische Präsident Lula mit einer rasant um sich greifenden Verunsicherung konfrontiert. Sie betrifft insbesondere die Austeritätspolitik und die für 2004 heiß ersehnten und doch noch weitgehend ausbleibenden Wachstums- und Beschäftigungseffekte. Innerhalb seiner Partei, seiner Regierung, seiner Koalitionspartner, in der Gesellschaft und auch bei vielen Beobachtern macht sich eine zunehmend kritische Haltung breit. Wird es einsam um Lula? Wie ist seine bisherige Politik, wie sind seine Leistungen, wie die weiteren Perspektiven zu beurteilen? Verspielt er mit Blick auf die internationale Glaubwürdigkeit des Landes die Glaubwürdigkeit des brasilianischen Staats als "sozialer Schuldner" gegenüber den Armen?" (Brennpkt. Lat.am/DÜI)

Die vorliegende Untersuchung setzt sich mit der Problematik auseinander, daß Daten als Basis historischer Theoriebildung und -überprüfung häufig auf der Ebene der Aggregate vorliegen, während Aussagen auf der Ebene der Individuen angestrebt werden. Hierzu werden Modelle zum 'Rückgängigmachen' von Aggregationen vorgestellt, die unter bestimmten Bedingungen Aussagen über Zusammenhänge auf individueller Ebene zulassen. Zur Illustration und Darstellung der Aggregatdatenanalyse werden Beispiele aus der Studie 'Wählerbewegungen zum Nationalsozialismus' präsentiert. Hierbei konzentriert sich die Darstellung auf den Aspekt der ökologischen Inferenz und vor allem auf den Goodman-Ansatz. (ICE2)

Der Autor untersucht die Lebensläufe von alten NSDAP-Mitgliedern unter einer doppelten Fragestellung. Zum einen sollen die Motive für den Parteieintritt und die Erwartungen an die Partei betrachtet werden. Zum anderen geht es dem Autor um die Einbeziehung quantitativer Methoden in die herkömmliche Geschichtswissenschaft, der von seiten der Historiker immer noch mit Vorbehalt begegnet wird. Als Basis seiner Untersuchung dient ihm die Abel-Sammlung, eine Sammlung von 581 Lebensläufen "Alter Kämpfer" von dem Soziologen Theodore Abel. Die Ursachen für den NSDAP-Beitritt will der Autor nicht auf Faktoren wie z.B. Beruf oder soziale Herkunft reduzieren. Die 79 Variablen der Abel-Sammlung bieten für ihn die Möglichkeit, ein realistisches Bild der individuellen Motivation zu geben. Der Autor stellt darüberhinaus noch die Beschränkungen der Abel-Sammlung und die Probleme ihrer Auswertung dar. (BG)

Anti-separatism and messianism in Quebec since 1960Confronted by a political debate now omnipresent in Quebec society, observers have naturally focused their attention – academic or not – on the content and proponents of the "séparatiste" solution to the current Canadian dilemma. Our contention is that it takes two sides to have a debate and that some light could be thrown on the intellectual history of French Canada by reversing the perspective and focusing instead on those who oppose independence for Quebec: the anti-separatists.Although widely diversified as to the specifics of their opposition and as to their own solution to the problem, anti-separatists nevertheless share certain ideological traits in their portrait of the French-Canadian Homus and in the characteristics and roles which they assigned to the French-Canadian collectivity. Individually, French Canadians are judged to be weak, unstable, verbose, and un-democratic; as a collectivity they are perceived as fulfilling all the requirements of a "chosen" people whose mission it is to reconquer Canada through the strength of their intellect and to show the world an example of binational co-operation.This schizophrenic vision of French Canada is hypothesized to be a secularized version of the traditional nationalist vision first enunciated by Garneau and Parent and later developed by Groulx, Barbeau, and others. The persistence of this messianic orientation in the intellectual history of French Canada is tentatively explained through the contributions of the sociology of utopia (French Canada as an aborted utopia) and of the sociology of colonial development (French Canada as a colonial society).

The study of policy alone often means domestic policy, of interest to generalist sociologists interested in how political ideas are turned into domestic legislation, executive action, and/or court litigation. Foreign policy, as the financial, commercial, diplomatic and military relations of a state with foreign states, remains a niche subfield. But foreign relations should be conceived of as the broader set of entanglements between societies, encompassing transnational movements, expert networks, and fields. Then, sociological theories of foreign relations can interest generalist sociologists. In this review, we illustrate how this broad view of foreign relations applies to the study of the United States in the world today (USitWT) by first surveying how sociologists of the world society and world system have focused on transnational relations and the place of the United States in their dynamics, and how they have engaged with the question of power. We then demonstrate how field theorists' study of transnational fields can allow sociologists to reconceptualize the historical role of the USitWT by highlighting continuities between European colonial governmentalities and current US transnational practices. This field perspective can allow sociologists to understand the USitWT as transnational, postcolonial, or neo-colonial governmentality, depending on the sociological and historical depth and range of its relation with different parts of the world.

The view that America is fragmenting is popular among both pundits and academics and may well be endemic to American culture. We review claims that between 1970 and 2005 American society fragmented along lines of cultural politics, social class, immigration, race, or lifestyle. Taking the twentieth century as historical context, we weigh evidence for both main variants of the fragmentation thesis—that there is an increasing divide between two Americas, or that America is fragmenting into a variety of "little worlds that touch but do not interpenetrate." We find a well-documented, widening gap in social class, whether measured by education or income. We also find that political elites and activists are demonstrably more polarized in 2005 than they were in 1970; this gap's effect on the electorate is debatable, however. Caveats aside, there is little evidence for increasing fragmentation of America along lines of race, ethnicity, or immigration status. American cultural tastes increasingly cluster into distinct lifeways, but there is little evidence about what effects, if any, this development has. The loudest claims of fragmentation, those concerning value issues, are based on the most contested evidence, but the widening gap between Americans by income and education—which receives less popular attention—is substantial and serious.

Despite years of research, methodological and practical obstacles make it difficult to conclude whether policies aimed at improving schools and communities are effective for improving youth outcomes. To complement existing work, we assess research on the educational and social outcomes for comparable youth who change school and neighborhood settings through unique housing policy and school voucher programs. Research shows that housing programs have helped poor families move to much safer, less disadvantaged, and less segregated neighborhoods. Some housing programs have also provided early educational benefits for young people who relocated to less poor and less segregated neighborhoods, but these gains were not maintained in the long run. School voucher programs have helped disadvantaged youth attend higher-performing private schools in less segregated environments with more middle-class peers. Although some voucher programs have shown small positive effects, the results of others are less certain owing to methodological weaknesses. Future research should directly examine families' selection processes and be cautious with quantitative research that uses naturally occurring variation to model the effects of potential social programs. Researchers should also recognize the family processes that interact with social policy to determine how youth development can be improved, alongside the structural and political processes that condition how programs work at a larger scale.

The 'Urban Century' has seen a rise in power of cities, and the emergence of city mayors as significant political actors both nationally and globally. The power of city mayors, which unifies pragmatic, techno-managerial leadership with the authority and legitimacy of public office, invites a reappraisal of the gendered construction of power in the 'Urban Century', and the particular notions of hegemonic masculinity that city mayors recreate. This article explores the example of Medellín, Colombia, whose mayor Sergio Fajardo is widely regarded to have stewarded the city's rapid reduction in violence. Fajardo's leadership can be characterised as typical of the phenomenon of smart, cosmopolitan, charismatic mayors who are seen to respond professionally to local needs by making smart investment decisions and attracting international capital. The emergence of a techno-managerial mayor in the city of Medellín, which during the 1990s was the epicentre of Colombia's multi-faceted conflict with the highest homicide rate in the world, represents a fundamental change to the identity and gender of power in a context of violent conflict where legitimate authority in terms of a monopoly on the use of force, was fiercely disputed. I use this example to explore how mayoral power is gendered and how it relates to violence, which is central to liberal theories of leadership and the focus of the feminist critique of them. The possibility that such a character attain power indicates underlying changes in the gendered structure of political space, including the institution of a Sub-Secretariat for Women and formalisation of participation in political process.

Nothing really matters. All the things that we do not do, have or become in our lives can be important in shaping self-identity. From jobs turned down to great loves lost, secrets kept and truths untold, people missed and souls unborn, we understand ourselves through other, unlived lives that are imaginatively possible. This book explores the realm of negative social phenomena - no-things, no-bodies, non-events and no-where places - that lies behind the mirror of experience. Taking a symbolic interactionist perspective, the author argues that these objects are socially produced, emerging from and negotiated through our relationships with others. Nothing is interactively accomplished in two ways, through social acts of commission and omission. Existentialism and phenomenology encourage us to understand more deeply the subjective experience of nothing; this can be pursued through conscious meaning-making and reflexive self-awareness. The Social Life of Nothing is a thought-provoking book that will appeal to scholars across the social sciences, arts and humanities, but its message also resonates with the interested general reader

AbstractThe appeal of meritocracy is plain to see, because it appears to promote equality of opportunity. However, in this paper we argue that meritocracy is also a deeply elitist project. Firstly, we place Michael Young in context to show how his critique of meritocracy should be understood as a socialist vision to ameliorate class divides. Secondly, we show how economic inequality in the UK has not generated systematic resistance: in fact, inequality and belief in meritocracy have gone hand in hand. Thirdly, we argue that people see their own lives as meritocratic rather than ascribed, and that such values are deeply embedded in popular life. We offer two explanations for how such views have come about, and show how they have helped construct a more unequal society.

Based on the empirical data of two sociological studies conducted in accordance with the uniform methodology using the personal questionnaire method in April 2012 and May 2018 (almost immediately after the election of the President of the Russian Federation), the article analyzes the structure of values of Russian urban voters, influencing their attitude to participation in the presidential elections and to the competing candidates. The socio-economic and socio-political conditions in Russia and their influence on the structure of values of urban voters are considered in the article. The article reveals the reasons why the fewer urban voters participated in the elections and a much larger number of them voted for Vladimir Putin when the economic situation of voters deteriorated in 2012 compared to 2018.The article shows that the structure of values of urban voters remains predominantly "materialistic" (according to Ronald Inglehart). The influence of the value structure of voters on their participation in voting at the presidential election and on the support of a certain candidate is revealed. On the basis of comparing the results of the presidential elections in 2012 and 2018, it is shown that during 6 years the ideological spectrum of candidates has expanded and began to express a wider range of political views on the further development of Russian society and state — from extremely liberal, democratic to extremely conservative, totalitarian, which is essential feature of the modern Russian party and political system. The middle of this spectrum was represented by liberal conservatism of Vladimir Putin, and his support in 2018 reflects a shift in the values of urban voters from the extreme right and the extreme left to the middle, toward liberal conservatism that is becoming inherent in an increasing number of urban voters.It is revealed that within the framework of the "materialistic" value structure of urban voters, the value of material wealth does not play a significant role when voters choose the future development of Russia. The value of unselfish patriotism and family is in the first place. The difficult political conditions in Russia in 2018 gave the voters patriotism a militant character that was absent in 2012. It united Russian society around Vladimir Putin even more and was the cause of a significant increase in his support from voters. Liberal component of conservatism in the program of Vladimir Putin (the expansion of economic, political, and spiritual freedoms) led to his support from moderately liberal voters. All these factors together predetermined the great success of Vladimir Putin in the presidential elections in Russia in 2018.

Nigeria as also most African countries have as yet nothing to show from receiving foreign aid and loans running into billions of dollars well over the past 40 years. The contention for an end to aids and loans to developing countries and Nigeria in particular especially holds from the immense harsh realities that have been endured by the masses of the people all through the decades external aids have subsisted. The paper carried out a documentary survey of the impact of International Monetary Fund's structural adjustment policies (SAP) on salient aspects of the Nigerian political ecology and found that IMF conditionalities are dubiously aimed at maintaining continued resource transfer from debtor countries to creditor nations with adverse impact on the environment and cost of living of the civic population of debtor countries. The adversities brought about by the policies ultimately violate international conventions on rights to life and well-being. The study therefore requests civil society groups, nongovernmental organisations and concerned international organisations to intervene and redefine the terms of engagement between debtor nations and their creditors with a view to redressing the disproportionate incidence of external debt and its conditionalities on the civic population of debtor nations especially those of Nigeria.

Information and communication technologies for development (ICT4D) are seen to have great potential for boosting democratization processes all over the world by giving people access to information and thereby empowering them to demand more accountability and transparency of authorities. Based on ethnographic research in Togo and Rwanda on an SMS-based citizen monitoring and evaluation system, this article argues that focusing on access to information is too narrow a view. We show that it is crucial to take into account the respective socio-political backgrounds, such as levels of mistrust or existing social hierarchies. In this context, mobile phone usage has rather varied and ambiguous meanings here. These dynamics can pose a challenge to the successful implementation of ICT4D projects aimed at political empowerment. By addressing these often overlooked issues, we offer explanations for the gap between ICT4D assumptions and people's lifeworlds in Togo and Rwanda.

Introduction -- Trajectory and Development of the Middle Income Group -- Consumption and Lifestyle of the Middle Income Group -- Social Security and the Risk Resistance Capacity of the Middle Income Group -- Social and Political Participation of the Middle Income Group -- Mid-Income Groups in Russian Metropolitan Cities.