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The aim of these issue of 'International Review of Sociology' is to present some reflections, which, starting from the analysis of several mediterranean countries, highlight the overall employment context of graduates in Sociology, characterised by widespread underemployment (or over-education) and difficulties in accessing the labour market. In particular, the papers highlight the need for a greater connection between academic sociology and professionals and the university's responsibility to establish adequate training paths and provide both specific and transversal skills, which are fundamental in the work of the sociology professionals. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The paper compares the lives of three female social scientists born in the first two decades of the twentieth century and belonging to the first generations that had the opportunity not only to study at universities, but also to realistically consider a professional career in academia. Marie Jahoda, Herta Herzog and Patricia L. Kendall made their ways separately and interacted only rarely with each other, but shared at least one characteristic which influenced their careers: they were married to Paul F. Lazarsfeld, one of the eminent sociologists of the twentieth century, prominent as someone who encouraged and supported many of his collaborators and students. The comparison of these three women shows that they were professionally successful but did not completely prioritize academic work before other interests, ambitions, and obligations. These priorities found a correspondence in their underperformance in academia with regard to the particular preconditions to enter the pantheon of an academic discipline. Both their oeuvres and their academic records suggest that they were not actively striving to become academic 'immortals.' Here it is shown that women, even if they are to be located below the 'ultra elite,' produced remarkable and memorable intellectual achievements. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The main focus of the Italian literature on the profession of the sociologist is the transmission of sociological knowledge and the occupational outcomes of sociology graduates. In my paper, I try to examine additional aspects in depth that I believe to be crucial for the development of the profession: the absence of a sociological community of interests, the weak forms of association not supporting sociologists working in non-academic settings with regards to interprofessional conflicts and a public presence that conveys and transmits the usefulness of the profession and the discipline. Sociologists rarely use the skills acquired through formal education to strengthen their position in the labour market through collective actions. Their effort to control the market of particular services is too weak. In the paper, I argue for the need to construct a community of interest that intends to include practitioners and academic sociologists in their entirety, independently from institutional membership and to promote sufficient control on the dynamics of supply and demand of professional services. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper I present and summarize the theoretical proposals of four leading scholars of the so-called ‘relational sociology’. First of all I try to contextualize its emergence and developments in the increasingly globalized scientific system. From this particular (and international) point of view, relational sociology seems to develop through a peculiar scientific path opened and charted by well-identified actors and competitors, their invisible colleges, their global connections, cleavages, and coalitions. Whatever the structuring of this field, it accomplishes the criticism of classical individualistic and collectivistic sociological theories, a task strongly facilitated by the development of new methods and techniques of empirical research, and by the increasingly powerful computing capabilities. After this brief historical reconstruction, and following very strictly the contributions of the four scholars, I try to synthetize their theoretical designs, focusing the analysis on two scientific issues of great significance for the future of relational sociology: the specific ontology of ‘social relations’ and the methodologies used to observe it adequately. Finally, I wonder if we are facing a new sociological paradigm, already well structured and internationally established, or rather a ‘relational turn’ that probably will develop into a new ‘sociological field’ internally very differentiated and articulated. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

In recent years, many different versions of relational sociology have appeared. In this paper, I present a critical realist version developed since 1983, which is also called ‘relational theory of society’ (CRRS). It shares with the other relational sociologies the idea of avoiding both methodological individualism and holism. The main differences lie in the way social relations are defined, the kind of reality that is attributed to them, how they configure social formations, and the way in which their changes are conceived (morphogenesis and emergence). In particular, this approach is suitable to understand how the morphogenesis of society comes about through social relations, which are the connectors that mediate between agency and social structure. The generative mechanism that feeds social morphogenesis resides in the dynamic (that is, in their ways of operating) of the social relations networks that alter the social molecule constituting structures already in place. Social morphogenesis is a form of surplus of society with respect to itself. Society increases (or decreases) its potential for surplus depending on processes of valorization (or devalorization) of social relations. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

The Social Sciences and, specifically, the sociological research, have progressively assumed the gender factor as one of the strategic keys to understand contemporary phenomena. In fact, as a variable for socio-statistical analysis or as a characterizing trait of individual identity, it is a decisive factor in the interpretation of the deep social transformations, and it inspires the self-reflection of the sociologists about the analytical tools of their discipline. The contribution proposes, through a lexicometric approach, an analysis of the articles published in the last two decades by the oldest journal of Sociology, published by Routledge. The main aim is to highlight the different ways in which gender issues are declined in the international sociological researches presented in the repertoire of the International Review of Sociology and to outline, both on the lexical level and on the topic level, the changes occurred over time. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The historical development of Ethiopian sociology was traced from 1951 with the influence of western sociologists. It does not mean that no native sociologists could create a new Ethiopian sociological thinking; however, these perspectives could not rampant worldly due to cultural, economic, social, political, and environmental encumbrances. Due to such factors, Western sociologists have been not only influenced to create sociological researches and development but also create a new country's national identity so far in Ethiopia, especially for Karl Marx, Max Weber, and Emile Durkheim's philosophical beliefs. In sum, there is no clear-cut school of sociology in Ethiopia. Some scholars have followed up France School of Sociology and the other one frequently performed the premises of the German School of Sociology. In my observation, the Ethiopian sociologists have rigorously executed both schools of Sociologies after the colonialism period. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Statistics are impossible without concepts. As the sociologist of invention Colum Gilfillan put it in 1952, ‘counting begins with definition of the thing to be counted’. This article is concerned with statistics on science, technology and innovation (STI). It documents how official statisticians have, over time, defined the concepts used for measurement. Debates on definitions of the concepts measured started at the very beginning of STI measurement in the first half of the twentieth century. Then, from the early 1960s onward, methodological manuals were developed to conventionalize the definitions. This article claims that the manuals did not have the expected result. They did not stabilize the definitions and the statistics based thereon. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]