Suchergebnisse

Focusing on the dilution of the state sovereignty, this book examines how the crossing of state boundaries by religious movements leads to the formation of transnational civil society. Challenging the assertion that future conflict will be of the "clash of civilizations" variety, it looks to the micro-origins of conflicts, which are as likely to arise between states sharing a religion as between those divided by it and more likely to arise within rather than across state boundaries. Thus, the chapters reveal the dual potential of religious movements as sources of peace and security as well as of violent conflict

I'm happy to be the recipient of an award recognizing the work of scholars who deploy literary and experiential resources in pursuit of meaning. And I am delighted that there is a conference-related group institutionalizing this honor. On this auspicious occasion, I thought I would offer a few remarks about my current work.

Discusses the notion of the "imperialism of categories" in the context of comparative political science that brings Anglo-American assumptions into contention with the non-Western other. Negative aspects of Lockean universalism & American liberalism are noted. Uday Singh Mehta's (1999) critique of European liberalism & Edmund Burke's epistemology, which anticipates contemporary area studies' valuing of difference, are then outlined. The endurance of modernization theory, as an extension of liberal historicity, in US social science is next discussed, highlighting the Talcott Parsons/Edward Shils paradigm as a "model for" masquerading as a "model of." It is contended that their dichotomies were incapable of grasping how social change occurred. Rational choice, which migrated from economics, is seen as one of the new generations of universalism that is more problematic than modernization theory in terms of its attribution of motive rather than examination of them. Dependency theory emerged to counter modernization theory & on its heels came area studies, which developed to overcome Lockean universalism & bring a Burkean or "gone-native" perspective to social science research. Situated knowledge is then considered as an alternative epistemology to that plied in universalist schemes like modernization theory & globalization studies. 33 References. J. Zendejas

The question, "What kind of political science would you like to see
in the next 10 years?" raises several problems: Should I consult my
self-serving or my communitarian self in framing an answer? Should I
say what practices I would prefer? Or should I recommend what
directions the profession should take? More generally, should we be
talking about the organization of political science? Or should we
refer to the profession's current epistemological conundrums? In his
Science as a Vocation, Max Weber first
addresses the structure and economic incentives of German university
careers, then turns to more philosophical questions: What is
"science"? What meanings and usages does "science" convey? What
questions can it answer? (Answer: it cannot tell us how to live.) Is
it cumulative? Or is Thomas Kuhn right about the noncumulative
nature of scientific revolutions? Focusing on the epistemological
issues, I'll try to avoid the monopolistic question, "What direction
should the profession take?" in favor of the pluralist question,
"What variety of knowledge regimes would I like the profession to
enable?"

Offers an epistemological comment on the future of political science as a discipline (or "knowledge regime") rather than as a profession. The field ought to be termed one of political "studies" instead of "science"; it should focus on problems rather than methods, & balance the current presentist tendency with a historical dimension; it should promote interdisciplinary "border crossing"; & finally, it should encourage the inclusion of women & minorities for their vital contributions to studying difference. K. Coddon

In an era that takes matters of religious faith lightly, it becomes difficult to consider thoughtfully a man who is suspected of saintliness. The task is particularly vexing for Americans, who have no feudal historic memories to remind them that saints were once important people. The obvious solution is to avoid the issue of saintliness altogether—to avoid, for example, questions about whether Gandhi's political shrewdness was compatible with the essential innocence of heart that one asks of saints; above all, to avoid trying to satisfy a generation of ambivalent skeptics who in one breath deny that saints exist and in the next maintain that Gandhi could not have been one because he did not meet such and such criterion of saintliness. The issue of saintliness is a diversion from a serious consideration of Gandhi's contribution.