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Abstract
'Why be quantitative?'Harold D. Lasswell asked that question several decades ago. His answer was: to take advantage of the rigor and precision that comes with quantification. Since then, quantification has spread across social science disciplines, putting qualitative approaches on the defensive. This paper examines the practices of quantitative sociologists in their study of historical processes. Much ritualism is found in those practices; much rhetoric in quantification. Alas, Lasswell's good intentions seem to have gone lost in a ritual called 'hypothesis testing.'The author reflects critically upon his own practices and on the forms of quantification and the strategies of explanations that he has adopted.

The increasing participation of lesbians and gay men in municipal politics is a product of the convergence of several processes: the creation of a movement among individuals, most of whom previously accepted collective invisibility; the mobilization of political resources by members of the community; and the opening of opportunities for participation by local political regimes. Here, the author examines how gay and lesbian community-building and political-mobilization processes in four New York cities (Albany, Buffalo, Rochester, and Syracuse) meshed with opportunities provided by local political regimes to encourage a greater voice for lesbians and gay men in municipal politics.

This article reframes the relationship between people and organization to reveal the constitutive quality of social relations. Although agreeing with Karl Weick that organization emerges in interaction, the author theoretically integrates the work of Mary Parker Follett and Bowenian family systems theorists to go beyond Weick's focus on behaviors, examining instead the interpersonal dynamics thatfuel behavior According to this theoretical orientation, people exist in relationship to one another and are made different by their interdependence. The quality of their interaction thus determines the consciousness they bring to the organizing process, and with it, the nature of organization itself

Employee attitudes toward implementation of Total Quality Management (TQM) are studied in a regional office of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency. The author condected more than a dozen interviews and adnistered questiousaires to 448 employees in the summer of 1991. Contrary to previous literature, clerical and managerial employees were most favorable toward the TQM program, whereas professionals were most negative. Apparently, professionals have experienced more work and few immediate rewands from the TQM implementation process, perhps because the agency stuied had not yet used TQM to simplify work processes for professionals. More behavioral research on TQM is calledfor.

The initial challenge that confronted the author was redesigning a course in small business ventures (SBVs) to make it more relevant to the needs of multiple course users. Are orientation from a conventional functional perspective to an entrepreneurial one led not only to a new course but to the reevaluation of the centrality of the functional approach in business education. The present preoccupation on functionality is seen as reflective of a historical classification of business engagements from a functional/structural perspective rather than from a rational/structural one. The question posed is whether this rational/structural approach might lead to a more effective teaching scheme.

Universal, scientific knowledge emerges from research practices. Scientists tinker with and align local conditions to produce scientific knowledge. Research equipment and scientific instruments are essential tools for knowledge production. Scientists differ, however, in their ability to handle these material resources of research. One type of scientist, who also represents a way of handling resources, is referred to by field scientists as a "gadget-man." Drawing upon a participant observation study of a marine labora tory in the Caribbean and a study in which the author traced the development of photographic identification of cetacean, this article characterizes "gadget-scientists" in their research quest for scientific knowledge.

Phra Sarasas, author of My Country Thailand, a historical work critical of the Thai monarchy, claimed to have shaped the 1932 overthrow of the absolute monarchy in Siam. He became Minister of Economic Affairs briefly in 1937, and promoted the pro-Japanese cause in Thailand with sufficient enthusiasm to be accused of war crimes after the Japanese surrender, but escaped prosecution when the Thai Supreme Court ruled that the War Crimes Act was illegal. His limited political career never matched his aspirations and Phra Sarasas remained a marginal figure, but his life and work nevertheless throw an interesting light on events during this formative period of modern Thai history.

The Kingdom of Afghanistan was often described by European writers as an "empire" of peoples. However, since the 1978 revolution and war, a consciousness of national identity as Afghans and citizens of Afghanistan has developed. The experience of exile in particular helped forge among millions of Afghan refugees a sense of belonging to a common homeland. The author explores the process of fragmentation in the country since the late 19th century, the prospects of disintegration of Afghanistan, regional pressures on this country, Tajik nationalism in Tajikistan and Afghanistan, the Ismaili factor in Central Asia, Afghanistan's geopolitics of survival and the prospects for peace for this country. (DÜI-Sen)

[ES] La cuestión social y la violencia política son problemas profundamente arraigados en la cultura brasileña. El autor analiza como éstos se reproducen en el cotidiano a partir de prácticas sociales, algunas amparadas jurídicamente, que despojan de los derechos de ciudadanía a los sectores populares marginados del mercado laboral formal. ; [EN] Political violence and the social question are deeply rooted in brasilian culture. The author analyzes how these problems are reproduced through social practices in everyday life, some of them being juridically protected and stripping off elemmental rights of citizenship from the popular sectors, excluded from the formal labour market.

Extends Tibor Scitovsky's analysis of the relation between the consumer society & pleasure from his The Joyless Economy: An Inquiry into Human Satisfaction and Consumer Dissatisfaction (1976). It is observed that, for Scitovsky, consumer society is biased toward the pleasure of moving from discomfort to comfort rather than the pleasure of replacing boredom with stimulation. It is argued that, following Georg Simmel (1984), other forms of pleasure might also be identified, eg, participation in public life. This third form of pleasure is discussed in terms of the common meal as a practice that belongs in both the public & private spheres. It is argued that eating a meal leads to both individual satiation &, as a result, to commensality, a consequence that has important social & public effects. This point is illustrated in a description of the banquet in Ancient Greece & its connection to the lottery, the basic mechanism of Athenian democracy. However, the example of the Germanic Mannerbund (men's association) is considered as an example in which commensality generates negative results. 42 References. Adapted from the source document.

SINCE THE END OF THE COLD WAR, ARMS CONTROL HAS BEEN STRONGLY ATTACKED FROM TWO QUARTERS. SOME CRITICS ARGUE THAT IT IS FLAWED IN ESSENCE, ELABORATING A CONSERVATIVE CRITIQUE. OTHERS ARGUE THAT ARMS CONTROL WAS A COLD WAR INSTITUTION AND, THEREFORE, ITS TIME HAS PASSED. BOTH ARE WRONG BECAUSE THEY DEFINE ARMS CONTROL TOO NARROWLY. IN THIS ESSAY, THE AUTHOR PROPOSES A TYPOLOGY OF ARMS CONTROL WITH FIVE DISTINCT FORMS: THE TRADITIONAL INTERPRETATION, FOCUSING ON STRATEGIC STABILITY; ARMS CONTROL AT THE END OF MAJOR CONFLICTS; ARMS CONTROL TO DEVELOP THE LAWS OF WAR; CONTROLS ON PROLIFERATION; AND ARMS CONTROL BY INTERNATIONAL ORGANIZATION.

INTERNATIONAL RELATIONS CONSISTS OF DIFFERENT CONCEPTUAL PERSPECTIVES, FRAMEWORKS OR APPROACHES. THE AUTHOR ARGUES THAT QUESTIONS CONCERNING THE EXISTENCE OF SOCIAL ENTITIES AND CAUSAL EXPLANATION ARE VERY CLOSELY RELATED BUT THAT IT FOLLOWS FROM THE CRITICAL REALIST NOTIONS OF CAUSALITY AND SOCIAL ONTOLOGY THAT THE LEVELS OF ANALYSIS PROBLEMATIC CANNOT BE PLAUSIBLY DEFENDED. HE CONTENDS THAT "INTERNATIONAL," "INSIDE-OF-A-NATION-STATE" AND "INDIVIDUALS" ARE NOT LEVELS IN ANY OF THE USUAL SENSES, AND SHOWS HOW EXPLANATION AND UNDERSTANDING ARE INTERRELATED. THAT THE AGENCY-STRUCTURE DEBATE CAN BE A WAY OUT OF THE INCREASINGLY OUTMODED "INTERPARADIGM DEBATE" IS SUGGESTED.