Suchergebnisse

Recent discussion of social change implies that, for a number of reasons, to do with globalisation, shifts in family life styles and labour markets, more critical attitudes toward the authority of officials and experts and greater awareness of possibilities and options, social life is more strongly affected by a sense of uncertainty. It also implies that uncertainty is pervasive and not specifically linked to fears about specific contingencies. It is associated with an orientation towards self-direction and a rejection of tradition and conformity. This thesis has been widely discussed, but rarely tested using quantitative data. This paper uses data from a recent national survey carried out by the ESRC Social Contexts and Responses to Risk network to show that uncertainty and security concerns are strong, but are in fact linked to traditionalism and conformity rather than to a critical and reflexive awareness. A high value is attached to self-direction, but this is linked to privileged social status rather than attitudes of pervasive social uncertainty. In general the values posited by recent discussion seem to be associated more closely with immediate social position than with the society-wide impact of social change.

"Der Autor präsentiert Ergebnisse aus dem Projekt 'Mobilitätspioniere. Zum Strukturwandel der Mobilität unter den Bedingungen reflexiver Modernisierung' im Münchner Sonderforschungsbereich 536. Er beschreibt unterschiedliche idealtypische Strategien von 'Mobilitätsmanagement', wobei er den Akzent auf die Beschreibung von Konstellation von Mobilität und Immobilität, Bewegung und Bewegungspotenzialen (Motilität) legt. Er wirft die Frage auf, ob die gezeigten subjektorientierten Strategien im Umgang mit dem Mobilitätsdruck der Moderne eine veränderte Perspektive auf den strukturellen Wandel im modernen Mobilitätskonzept und der Mobilitätspraxis eröffnen. Die Relevanz dieser Frage und der empirischen Ergebnisse wird hier vor dem gesellschaftsdiagnostischen Hintergrund der Theorie reflexiver Modernisierung diskutiert. Als Fazit im Hinblick auf weiterführende Forschungen schlägt der Autor eine Unterscheidung von Transit- und Connectivity-Räumen vor. Dadurch werden die neuen Konfigurationen aus räumlicher, sozialer und virtueller Mobilität unter den Bedingungen reflexiver Modernisierung sinnvoll erforschbar." (Autorenreferat)

Retirement and later life are taking on new forms and these may be related to what Ulrich Beck and others have referred to as the birth of the 'quasi-subject'. This article addresses the ways in which retirement, for some, is actively constructed as a lifestyle option or choice. We present findings from a study based on 20 qualitative interviews with UK men and women who had previously worked in executive and higher management posts and who had recently taken early retirement as a matter of choice. Our aim was to explore the experiences of retirement, changes in lifestyle and social roles and the meanings associated with retirement. We focused on the extent to which the attitudes and beliefs of retired people resonated with the idealized 'quasi-subject'. Our article concludes by considering the extent to which these reported experiences and understandings reflected a generational habitus in retirement.

This article revisits the individualization debate in the context of Polish migration to the UK. Drawing on empirical research with young Polish migrants in Scotland and Poland, I argue that as new opportunities for migration have shaped Polish family life, the family plays ideological, affective and practical roles in shaping and supporting young people's mobilities. The pursuit of an apparently individualistic, mobile life in the context of post-accession Polish mobility is confounded by the persistence of family structures and relations that underpin and shape individual decisions and mobility pathways. I discuss three 'ruptures' to the individualization thesis (Beck and Beck-Gernsheim, 2001) that relate to the process of migration over the lifecourse: 'moving out', 'keeping in touch', and 'coming back'. Through these discussions I argue that individual mobility is a relational process and one that can, and should, be analysed alongside family structures rather than separate from it.

While international scholarly momentum continues to build around Ulrich Beck's ideas on risk, politics and reflexivity, his commentary on transformative democracy is only beginning to attract scholarly interest. To better understand the theoretical and conceptual dynamics of transformative democracy in the age of second modernity, I use Mark Poster's work on digital media and the culture of under-determination to focus analytical attention on the socio-technical domains from which the democratic-cosmopolitan imperative should be expected to garner strength. I argue that Beck's largely structuralist cosmopolitanization thesis can be strengthened by a supplemental understanding of the material-communicative dimensions inherent to processes of individualization, reflexive modernization and sub-political mobilization. Introducing certain correctives to Beck's `cosmopolitan manifesto', I explore the complexities of second modern communicative agency and the constitution of the reflexive, socio-technical subject. My primary purpose is to develop theoretical and conceptual insights into the socio-technical aspects of transformative democracy in second modernity.

Media, communication and information flows now define the logic and structure of social relations, a situation that affects almost every dimension of cultural life and activity. This article analyses the transformation of the relationship between computer gaming, media and sport in the global age of 'second modernity'. This analysis is undertaken through a critical case study of the World Cyber Games (WCG). This popular event and the 'cyber-athletes' that compete in it cannot be explained fully by reference to existing studies of computer and video gaming, media and sport, media events or organized sporting competition. It is not possible to think in terms of sport and the media when considering the WCG and organized competitive gaming. This is sport as media or e-sport, a term that signifies the seamless interpenetration of media content, sport and networked information and communications technologies.