Suchergebnisse

Marks the 25th anniversary of the founding of the Club of Rome as a formal organization by reviewing its contributions to solving the global problems of population growth, resource depletion, & pollution. The role of Italian industrial manager Aurelio Peccei, together with former British chief science advisor, Alexander King, & Eduard Pestel, Minister of Science of Lower Saxony, in creating the club is discussed, documenting how they assembled 30 experts in sociology, economics, science, industry, & government planning, drawn from different countries with different political ideologies & economic systems, to address common problems. Their classic 1972 report "The Limits of Growth" is reviewed, along with subsequent publications, & the club's development of a computer model of world problems is described. K. Hyatt Stewart

The article addresses the reasons for Brazil's 40-year delay in adopting reforms to its unemployment insurance system. Although Brazil followed Unemployment Insurance (UI) models created by First World countries, its system is unique with respect to the diversity of unemployment benefits. B. Boyce

Internationale Schulleistungsvergleiche erlauben es, repräsentative Aussagen über die gesamte Schülerschaft, aber auch über Teilgruppen von Schülerinnen und Schülern zu treffen. In diesem Beitrag werden vielseitig hochkompetente fünfzehnjährige Jugendliche untersucht, die in den Untersuchungen des Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA) 2000 und 2003 in allen drei Kompetenzbereichen (Mathematik, Lesen bzw. Textverstehen und Naturwissenschaften) zum besten Zehntel der Stichproben gehören. Diese Gruppe umfasst in Deutschland etwas über drei Prozent aller Fünfzehnjährigen an allgemeinbildenden Schulen. In einem ersten Schritt wird gezeigt, wie das Kompetenzniveau dieser Gruppe im internationalen Vergleich einzuordnen ist. Anschließend werden die Jugendlichen nach ihrem Geschlecht, der Schulart und der Klassenstufe, die sie besuchen sowie nach dem Bundesland und dem sozioökonomischen Milieu, in dem sie leben, charakterisiert. Weiterhin wird gefragt, inwieweit die erhaltenen Befunde übereinstimmen, wenn man zwei unterschiedliche Kohorten (Fünfzehnjährige in PISA 2000 und Fünfzehnjährige in PISA 2003) betrachtet. (DIPF/Orig.).;;;Results from international student assessments are representative both for the student population in the participating countries, and for sub-groups of students in the population. The present paper examines highly competent 15-year old students in Germany, who have shown excellent performance in all competency tests of the Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA), implemented in 2000 and 2003. These students, about 3 percent of the population of 15-year-old students, were scored among the most successful ten percent of students tested in Germany in the domains of reading, mathematical and scientific literacy. After exploring how the performance of this group compares internationally, high-performers are characterized according to their gender, type of school, grade, as well as the German federal state and socio-economic milieu in which they live. Investigating two different cohorts (15-year old students in PISA 2000 and 15-year old students in PISA 2003) serves to assess the stability of the findings. (DIPF/Orig.).

The idea of the public intellectual arises concurrently with the Enlightenment. Another way of understanding this historical fact is to say that the public intellectual arises at the same time that science begins to become the foundation for society & for understanding society. The pre-modern, & especially the classical world, did not lack philosophers, & intellectuals such as Cicero & Marcus Aurelius played an important role in public life. However, they did not hold their public role because they were intellectuals. It is not until the Enlightenment, until there were concerted efforts to make the fruits of science & philosophy generally known to the public, that the role of the public intellectual could be imagined & filled by such as Voltaire, Diderot, & Neckar. D. Knaff

An examination of the infrastructure for the production/reproduction of global capital reveals a wide variety of work cultures, including secretaries, delivery persons, maids, child care workers, & other low-skilled workers, that are overlooked in studies focusing on the hypermobility of capital & the power of transnationals. Although the flexibility of the labor market has created greater equality between educated middle-class women & men, it has produced greater inequality among women, especially between professional women & those who work in the informal economy. Social differentiation & globalization are described as "complementary processes which are restructuring both the private & the public arenas." The increase in both professional women & those who do paid work in households marks the end of the Fordist family breadwinner model, reveals a new power relationship between women, & represents a connection between the formal & informal labor markets that is directly linked to the neoliberal character of globalization reflected in state policy. Suggestions are made for ways to avoid the creation of a new ethnically defined female underclass. J. Lindroth

Considers the normative question of the state's role in the economy & polity, raising issues surrounding democratic accountability. A literature review traces the development of state theory since Thomas Hobbes, John Locke, & Jean-Jacques Rousseau. The state is defined here as a "complex apparatus of centralized & institutionalized power that concentrates violence, establishes property rights, & regulates society in a given territory while being formally recognized as a state by international forums." A distinction is drawn between issues examined in the study of the state vs those looked at in analyses of government. Sticking with the domestic side, the state's part in economic & political development is explored. The state enforces contracts & provides public goods & social insurance. However, there are different kinds of states that impact the economy & polity in different ways. The state as Leviathan & predatory is addressed as a form that is a threat to liberty & a source of economic decline. However, states can also facilitate economic growth & democratization by enhancing physical, human, & social capital, building social networks & relationships of trust & authority. Despite this growth, democracy can still come under pressure from the state if accountability is reduced, the state is captured by interests with goals other than general welfare, or governance fails to meet public wants & needs. It is argued that political inquiry must move beyond thick descriptions of specific states at specific times to build models & falsifiable hypotheses generated from realistic & logical presuppositions about the state & its relationship to society. The manner in which to derive testable hypotheses is outlined. J. Zendejas

In analyzing the 2000 US presidential election, of particular interest have been the elections of 1876 & 1888, in which the winner of the popular vote lost the electoral college, & that of 1968, which many have cited as bringing about a near-complete realignment of the American political landscape. This claim of political realignment in 1968 is, however, questionable, & it is instead more apparent that a true political realignment has not taken place at all in the 20th century. In fact, it can be argued that the elections of 1992 & 1996 resulted in perhaps the most distinct patterns of realignment since the 1800s, spurred in part by Perot's strong showing in 1992. The 2000 election accentuated the country's 8-year division along party, geographic, & ethnic lines, while the election's aftermath served only to strengthen this division. Though the existing political gulf between the two dominant parties must be overcome, the task will prove difficult. 4 Figures. K. A. Larsen

The author asks: "Where have all the intellectuals gone?" & answers this by saying that they have mainly turned to academia -- rather than to milieux like the Left Bank or Bloomsbury, as an earlier generation would have. However, there is something essentially contradictory & even self-destructive about the pubic intellectual living within the academia, for this blunts the public aspect of the role. Liberation from economic uncertainty should benefit the life of the intellectual as well as the intellectual life of the nation, but it has failed to do so. Those who write from the bureaucratic comfort of large universities cannot claim to be alienated from society. Neither can they spend all of their time on purely intellectual pursuits but rather must dedicate a considerable time on demonstrating the kinds of expertise that are required of academics. Beyond these problems is the fact that public intellectual requires a public audience, & this has in large measure disappeared. D. Knaff

Considers the role of the economy in the 2000 US presidential elections with an eye toward discerning why voter forecasting models that rely on economic retrospective voting theories were unable to predict the election results. Relevant economic issues in the election are delineated, & economic retrospective voting & the models' predictions for the 2000 election are discussed. The election is examined in this light, providing six explanations that may account for the inadequacy of the forecasting: (1) Al Gore won the popular vote, so the models did work. (2) A third-party candidate, Ralph Nader, undermined Gore's chances. (3) The economy lacks salience with the voters. (4) Gore ran a bad campaign. (5) The models might have worked with a different mix of variables. (6) Some unique dimension of the 2000 election rendered the models ineffective. It is concluded that the economy was not the only reason for the outcome of the 2000 elections. 1 Table. J. Zendejas