Search

Division of classes by sexes and sectors (capitalist goods and services versus the state) reveals different focal points in five advanced capitalist societies: the United States, Canada, Norway, Sweden and Finland, Using data from the Comparative Class Structure Project, this paper offers a 'minimalist' set of class categories (capitalist/executive, old middle class, new middle class and worker) based upon commanding the means of production and the labour of power of others. The paper emphasizes the importance of distinguishing classes by sex. The results report on how men and women distribute in the working and new middle classes over sectors in the five nations, revealing a strong Nordic/North American difference. Some implications for the strength of political blocks for men and women in these classes, sectors and nations are tentatively presented. While Nordic working and new middle class women have a solid base of strength in the state sector, North American women are concentrated in the much weaker capitalist service sector. Men continue to dominate the capitalist goods sector for the working class but for the new middle class men there is a Nordic/North American split between their respective strengths, with the Nordic new middle class stronger in the state sector and the North American equivalents stronger in the capitalist sector. These patterns suggest different national bases for alliances in class politics. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The collection of census information about pluriactivity or "part-time farming," as it was initially termed, began as early as the 1930s in the United States and the 1940s in Canada. Researchers have since moved beyond reporting basic descriptive statistics to detailed investigations of the various non-farm sources of total family income, types of off-farm employment, and underlying motivations. Although interest in the topic has waned somewhat, further analysis of pluriactive households is warranted, particularly in light of rural restructuring, farm depopulation, and the "farm crisis." Social scientists have pursued divergent lines of inquiry into the nature of pluriactivity; however, much of this work is related to Sustainable Rural Livelihoods (SRL) concepts such as adaptive strategies, diversification and resilience. This paper explores the utility of SRL analysis for interpreting the presence, persistence, and varied forms and functions of pluriactivity among Canadian farm households. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Dans cet article, nous examinons la célèbre thèse de SM Lipset, qui affirme que la révolution américaine a créé des différences durables entre les valeurs canadiennes et américaines Nous reconsidérons tout d'abord l'affirmation centrale de la thèse selon laquelle l'exode des loyalistes vers le Canada a ancré de façon permanente des systèmes de valeurs distincts dans les deux sociétés Notre analyse suggère que, au sein de la population générale, les loyalistes n'ont joué qu'un rôle négligeable dans la promotion de différences fondamentales. Nous comparons ensuite les deux sociétés sur le plan historique en utilisant plusieurs indicateurs - classes sociales et structure économique, compositions ethnique et religieuse, modèles d'immigration et d'urbanisation, culture et organisation politiques - afin de cerner des divergences importantes dans l'expérience et le milieu dans lequel vivaient les deux peuples, divergences qui auraient pu favoriser ces différences Nous concluons que les deux populations so ressemblaient étonnamment, ce qui sous-entend qu'elles partageaient probablement le même quotidien, les mèmos perspectives et valeurs au cours de la période révolutionnaire et pendant plusieurs dizaines d'années par la suite [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Benjamin Barber draws a connection between corporate globalization and the resurgence of ethno-cultural nationalisms. Both weaken democracy, he contends. Barber does not discuss the effects of globalization on the other variety of nationalism--the civic, state-based kind that predominates in highly diverse, democratic countries such as Canada. This paper examines the state-based ethos and traditions that have kept Canada distinct from the United States and explores whether the new right liberalism of the 1980s and 1990s has eroded Canada's raison d'etre as a separate country. Counter trends to new right liberalism in Canada are also discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article compares the handling of the acid rain problem by the United States with the approach of Canada during the 1970s and 1980s. Social studies of environmental problems and controversies are focusing more attention on the entrepreneurial activities of scientists. This case study of the U.S. acid rain problem analyses the "claimsmaking" and "translation" activities of early, university-affiliated, acid rain scientists and how they enabled scientists and scientific research to be situated in a central position in the controversy. The paper focuses on several areas of the U.S. acid rain controversy; the construction of acid rain as a scientific and environmental problem in the 1970s, the formation of the National Atmospheric Deposition Program and the National Acid Precipitation Assessment Program, and the construction of boundaries between acid rain science and politics. The centrality of science in the U.S. acid rain controversy is then compared with the role of science in the Canadian context. Even though science was centrally placed in each context, acid rain science policies were shaped by different institutional actors and for different goals and interests.

This paper explores the variation in class consciousness in three Western democracies: Canada, Sweden and the United States. Its main empirical finding is that Swedish levels of working class identification, conflict consciousness and capacity to envisage an alternative form of social organization are considerably higher than their North American counterparts. While this finding is not surprising to comparative political sociologists, it does provide an occasion for an argument that the differences were basically established in the postwar period and are the product of the different outcomes of the social conflict that surrounded the Great Depression. In its reduced form, our argument is that outcomes of social conflict have had an impact on the distribution of social power and the working classes' sense of collective efficacy which, in turn, have profoundly influenced the consolidation and extension of class consciousness. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper brings together two related hut distinct issues in the analysis of culture and values in Canada and the United States. The first of these is Lipset's well-known thesis on the differences in national character and belief systems between Canadians and Americans. The second issue is the purported existence of distinct regional cultures within both countries. Using national sample survey data, we assess both cross-national and regional differences on a range of attitudes and perceptions. The results indicate that the pattern of regional cultures is not significantly affected or defined by the national border separating Canada and the United States. Instead, hierarchical tests of several different models suggest that, with a few exceptions, the map of regional cultures involves three major segments: a relatively left-liberal Quebec, a more conservative southern United States, and a comparatively moderate sector that largely encompasses the remainder of the two countries. The implications for Lipset's thesis on Canadian-American differences, and for the analysis of regional distinctions in both nations, are briefly discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper examines feminist social movements in both the United States and Canada and describes and analyses the anti-feminist countermovements that have repeatedly arisen in response to them. The dialectical relationship that has existed between these movements for the last century is documented in an effort to further understand the nature and character of these two groups. Specific attention is paid to the role of the pro-family movement in Canada in opposing contemporary feminist goals. It is shown that an interdependence has developed - with the formulation of sophisticated programs, ideologies and strategies on both sides - as the struggle for dominance has intensified. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]