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These comments focus on some issues raised in the papers by Dimand, Peart and Levy, Cot, and Leonard. These papers are fascinating, but not without weaknesses. It is argued that Dimand's presentation of what he calls the “general principle” of classical economics is misconceived. There is a confusion in this paper between the classical view of equal capacity and the much newer concept of equally rational actual performance. Peart and Levy discuss the idea of unequal capacity for pleasure in Edgeworth, but do not draw a link back to the idea in J. S. Mill of different qualities of pleasure. Cot and Leonard provide informative accounts of the American eugenic movement and its links to progressivism, but with an insufficient degree of distinction between the various positions and agendas that were concerned. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Presents a bibliographies of books on anthropology, sociology and history.

This article comments on the position papers in the June 1967 issue of Rural Sociology. The author asserts that the papers are a mark of growing maturity of the rural sociology profession. It took years before the state universities and colleges assumed the dominant role of that they have achieved in the development of rural sociology. Contributions of the early sociologists to the applied field are presented to emphasize their historical value.

The article focuses on the annual meeting of the Rural Sociological society. This is not a new experience, but some of the changes that are taking place in rural sociology programs and in society indicate that the need for discussion is not yet satisfied. This is also one way of reaching the many members, subscribers, and readers who axe unable to attend the Society meetings, and of including them in the circle of discourse. Accordingly, few persons from various sections of the country and one to represent a view of rural sociology as it exists outside the U. S. to offer some of their views on important issues in the future of rural sociology were invited. They were asked to respond briefly and quickly enough for the papers to be presented in the June issue before the 1969 meeting.

Presents news notes and announcements involving the Rural Sociological Society. Highlights of the 1971 annual meeting of the Rural Sociology Section of Association of Southern Agricultural Workers; Call for papers for the 1971 annual meeting of the society to be held in Denver, Colorado on August 27 to 29, 1971; Programs and projects of the society.

Presents news notes and announcements involving the Rural Sociological Society. Call for papers for the 1969 annual meeting of the society; Tentative session topics; Best dissertations in rural sociology for the years 1967 and 1968.

This paper presents a multi-layered exploration of the diversity management field in the UK. In doing so, it aims to address two problematic tendencies in the current diversity research: the focus on single-level explorations, and the polarization between critical and mainstream approaches. Using Bourdieu's concept of field, I develop a theoretical framework that conceptualizes the field of diversity management in three constituents: diversity discourse, diversity practice and diversity practitioners. The framework is used to analyse empirical evidence generated through semi-structured interviews with 19 diversity managers of large private-sector companies. This study reveals the presence of a gap between the diversity discourse and practice, and the absence of any standard set of qualifications and skills requirement for practitioners. The findings demonstrate the twofold role of discourse in drawing the boundaries of the diversity management field. First, it is instrumental in constructing diversity management as distinct from equal opportunities. Second, the use discourse functions as a mechanism to control the entry of practitioners into this field, which otherwise has low entry barriers. The paper offers a contribution to management research in general and equality and diversity research in particular through its original use of Bourdieuan sociology in an empirical study. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Ludwig von Mises is often regarded as a “champion” of laissez faire. This characterization seems to contradict Mises's clear statement that economics is value free. The aim of this paper is to resolve this apparent contradiction. We accomplish this by distinguishing, as Mises did, between the advocacy of specific laissez-faire policies and the advocacy of a laissez-faire ideology vis-à-vis the alternative ideologies of socialism and interventionism. Mises argued that the logic of a value-free economics could be used to show that socialist and interventionist policies would not achieve a goal that the socialists and interventionists implicitly or explicitly aim to achieve, that of progress in terms of material wealth for the members of society. Thus, Mises resolved the contradiction by shifting the debate from the welfare analysis of particular policies to a logical analysis of the ends of a particular ideology and the means available to achieve those ends. In a seminal paper in neo-Austrian economics, Murray Rothbard criticized Mises. We analyze Rothbard's argument partly as a means of elucidating Mises's views and argue that Rothbard misinterpreted Mises and quoted him out of context. Rothbard failed to adequately support his claim that Mises held the beliefs that Rothbard attributed to him. Moreover, Rothbard's paper undermined the value freedom that Mises regarded as a crucial characteristic of economics. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

ABSTRACT. The aim of the paper is to present the economic sociology of Alfred Marshall (1842-1924). Three topics are discussed in the paper: Marshall's ideas of how preferences are generated, the theory of action, and finally the introduction of a fourth factor of production, organization. Throughout the paper Marshall's broad perspective is demonstrated. It is argued that Marshall's approach encourages a closer connection between sociologists interested in economic phenomena and economists. This conclusion is strengthened because of the resemblance of Marshall's analysis to those offered by Max Weber and Thorstein Veblen. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This short article pleads for research rather than rumor regarding Parsons' alleged role regarding the admittance to United States of an ex-Soviet citizen in 1948 or 1949. Some evidence on background issues that could be found among the Parsons papers at Harvard University Archives is being presented verbatim. I argue that the point is to refrain from fabrications. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article responds to sociologist Andy Pickering's comments, partly because of the inherent intellectual stimulation of exchanging ideas with such a distinguished colleague, but partly also because of the need for much greater interchange between the two fields, the sociology of environment and technology, on the one hand and the sociology of science on the other. Pickering's comments raise three important points about the analysis of Iron Mountain, Michigan. First, he praises what he calls papers symmetry in noting the importance of physical⁄environmental as well as social factors in understanding social outcomes. Second, he argues that people have not taken this point far enough, in large part because, he believes, the social is not sufficiently at stake in papers. Third, he argues that a fruitful antidote would be to trace the evolution of actual practices, in detail, over time.

The article comments on the essay "Durkheim's Division of Labor in Society," published in the March 1, 1994 issue of the journal "Sociological Forum." The author of the article feels that it has several dimensions. It begins by touching several dimensions like the quality of the translations, meta-theoretical aspects and contexts of the pioneering book and its meta-theoretical assumptions and one major research technique, empirical indicators. The paper opens with a rebuke to the translator. It takes no notice of the basic theoretical contributions of the work. It had a dismal quality of the translation. The graduate student evidently resonated to writer Emile Durkheim's early recognition of the importance of identifying indicators and devices indices of conceptualized social realities as a basic procedure in theory-based empirical enquiry. Two kinds of reductionist theories were rejected as both were categorized as undermined by facts.

This paper examines the relation between positivistic and interpretive sociology, using the stress research literature as a case study. Analyzing the cultural history of the stress concept, it uncovers four central themes: anxiety, performance, adjustment, and mentalism, Examining the self-criticismc made by scientific students of stress, it focuses on the problems of temporal order, confounding, and interaction. Comparison of the cultural and scientific literatures shows that while some of the positivists' complaints derive from general methodological choices, others come from inescapable aspects of the culture's general idea of stress. Considering the past development of stress research, the paper argues that positivism and interpretation have not been Cartesian opposites but interpenetrating fractals. It then speculates about what this relation implies for future positivistic studies, both in the stress literature and more generally. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Previous research on adopter categories has found several relationships between time of adoption and various social, economic, and demographic characteristics of the adopters of innovations. This paper extends the focus to include the spatial dimension in the context of two approaches to explaining innovation diffusion. The communications approach emphasizes information flows, whereas the market and infrastructure approach stresses the availability of the innovation to potential adopters. The study produces two major findings: (1) that locational characteristics are an important aspect of both explanations and therefore should be considered along with the traditional set of variables in describing adopter categories; (2) that the conceptual model associated with adopter categories should be broadened to reflect marketing strategy characteristics as well as innovativeness characteristics. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article presents the research papers published in this issue of the journal "Rural Sociology." The first paper by James H. Copp represents a stage in the maturation of research on farm practice acceptance. It is one of the first attempts to compare the results of studies conducted in different agricultural regions. Using data from Wilkening's study in Wisconsin and from his own study in Kansas, he developed comparable measures of certain personal, social, and economic variables. Another paper by Copp and colleagues deals with the informational aspect of the acceptance of new farm practices. They attempt essentially to specify the function of information sources in the adoption process. By asking a series of questions about the sources of information at various times, from the awareness of a new practice until its adoption, they find that institutionalized sources tend to perform a function separate from that of noninstitutionalized sources. The study by Charles R. Hoffer and Dale Stangland is a worthy attempt to take into account the farmer's value orientations as they affect his adoption of practices.

The tendency for neighborhood patterns of association to localize the exchange of farm information on a person-to-person basis is demonstrated in this paper by the analysis of two types of interpersonal relationships. Conditions which help to explain this relationship are examined and evaluated, and the relationship of neighborhood residence to the evaluation of sources of farm information is considered. Although consideration of the relative influence of neighborhood and clique patterns of association is beyond the scope of this study, the data show that clique members are more likely to live outside neighborhoods than inside. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper addresses a conundrum that merits scholarly attention--why social scientists' ability to generate high quality research has outpaced their ability to disseminate research into the policymaking process. The paper describes Family Impact Seminars, a series of seminars, briefing reports, and follow-up activities that provide up-to-date, solution-oriented information to state policymakers. In support of the proposed "three-communities" theory, the utilization of research in policymaking appears to depend upon several pragmatic practices and procedures, ten which are detailed in the paper. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Drawing on the sociology of moral panic, this paper argues that the media will shift from alarming to reassuring coverage when a `hot crisis' portends a possible grass root panic. To determine whether this moderation effect follows from dread-inspiring events that are developing in unpredictable and potentially threatening ways, the paper compares newspaper and magazine coverage of emerging diseases with their coverage of Ebola Zaire. The results reveal that the mutation-contagion package, with its frightful account of emerging diseases, was quickly abandoned and subverted during the Ebola epidemic. In its place, the media fashion a containment package that uses a strategy of 'othering' to allay the fear. The conclusion discusses the flexibility in the tool kits used by the media to frame events. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article traces the career of the concept scientific community through three discernible stages. The formative stages is presented by Ludwik Fleck's Genesis and Development of a Scientific Fact. It was learned that one of the early expositions of the theme that scientific knowledge is socially conditioned, Fleck's work revolves around the correlative concepts of thought collective and thought style. Thomas Kuhn's The Structure of Scientific Revolutions, was discussed. Stage three in the career of the concept scientific community is marked by criticism and the development of alternative models. During the 1960s and 70s, the view prevailed among metascientists that scientific knowledge is produced by communities of specialists. In the works of leading contemporary philosophers of science, as in many historical studies, the existence of scientific communities was assumed without question or argument. Kuhn's paper represents a watershed in the histories of both the concept itself and the entire discipline of sociology of science. Social integration in science was considered a result of a consensus about strategic norms or standards. Findings on the examination of the concept scientific community through the related works of Kuhn and Fleck, the Polish scientist and scientist knowledge, was presented.

This paper offers an analysis of the continuing crisis in sociology that is different from those that have appeared in the literature. In contrast to the ideological and technical readings, it suggests that the origins of the crisis are to be found in the hermeneutic challenge that has resulted from the linguistic and multicultural turns. Both of these developments have given rise to new discourses within the academy that are competing with subfields such as the sociology of the arts and race/ethnic relations. The nature and impact of this new competition is examined in greater detail through the case of the sociology of race. The analysis reveals that these competitive challenges are hermeneutic in nature and not primarily technical or ideological. The paper concludes with some suggestions for crisis resolution. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Rural Sociology began and continues as a medium of intellectual exchange for scholars concerned with rural issues. For fifty years editors have tried to publish articles that make social science useful, that bring the most relevant theory and methods of a particular time to bear on rural problems. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Presents an index of various literature on rural sociology.

Presents minutes of the Council Meeting on August 26, 1973. Attendees; Speakers; Balance sheet for the 1973-1974 proposed budget.

According to its critics, the "old" secularization paradigm has been tried, convicted, and executed by recent scholarship in the social sciences of religion, and is being replaced by a "new" (postsecularization) paradigm which highlights the continued vitality of religion in modern societies. This paper argues that claims to have definitively refuted secularization theory are exaggerated. It mounts a defense of a neosecularization paradigm which retains the core insights of the old paradigm while incorporating criticisms leveled against the hubris and laziness of some deployments of the concept of "secularization." Following Chaves (1994), this paper argues that the core of neosecularization theory is the proposition that secularization means not the decline of religion but the declining scope of religious authority at the individual, organizational, and societal levels of analysis. Three exemplars of this perspective in the area of religion and politics are highlighted: the work of Hertzke (1988), Demerath and Williams (1992), and Casanova (1994). [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper argues that the belief in and reverence for superhuman beings cannot be understood as the chief distinguishing characteristic of religious phenomena. The consideration of Buddhism has always been central to the discussion of what religion is, and this paper focuses on the limitations of the human-superhuman dichotomy as it might be used to apply to Buddhist traditions. The argument makes three points: a) There are important sects of Buddhism that do not rely on reverence for superhuman beings, and the concept "superhuman" is difficult (if not impossible) to use in cross-cultural studies because of cultural variations in what it means to be human; b) the insistence that "philosophies" should be systematically distinguished from "religions" is arbitrary and culturally biased; and c) Buddhist doctrines that assert that reality is ultimately "nondual" provide the conceptual context for understanding superhuman beings in Mahayana, and this conceptuality is not consonant with superhuman definitions of religion. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper examines the relationship between ‘formal’ and ‘informal’ social action with reference to recent research in ethnomethodology and conversation analysis. Evidence is presented in support of the proposal that a taken for granted model of conversational interaction is used by analysts, both lay and professional, as a comparative reference point against which certain actions are categorized as ‘formal’. Such a procedure, it is suggested, results in evaluative interpretations which fail to address the question of how such interactions may be operating to produce orderliness in the settings where they are found. This theme is developed mainly in relation to the way a number of recurrent features of multiparty interaction may provide practical solutions to a general problem which appears to be common to all such settings, namely that of how to create and preserve the conditions for sustaining the shared attentiveness of all co-present parties to the proceedings at hand. The general themes are also briefly considered with reference to small-scale interactions that are likely to be regarded as ‘formal’. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The importance of Basil Bernstein's work on language in relation to education and child rearing is widely recognized, but his contributions to the sociology of the school are less well-known. It is not the purpose of this article to make an extended critique of the theoretical and other propositions made in Bernstein's series of writings, but to report an attempt to put some of them to the empirical test. The results of the investigation give only limited support for some of the propositions made by Bernstein about the sociology of the school. This statement must be qualified by a number of reservations. Firstly, the variables used to test the propositions were not constructed for this specific purpose, and may not therefore represent the best use of the concepts involved. Secondly, they do not cover all the examples suggested by Bernstein. Thirdly, the schools to which the measures apply are secondary schools. With these reservations, the results suggest that Bernstein's explanation of the relationship between the different aspects of the school should be reconsidered. The explanations appear to be based upon an adaptive view of education, in which its form and change are determined by, or closely related to, the nature of and changes in superordinate sectors of society.

In this paper, I reflect on the life and work of Everett Hughes. I discuss the similarities and differences between his writings and those of Robert Park; I describe his biographical influences and the use he made of marginality; I consider the relevance of his professional commitments for contemporary sociology and his unique vision of sociology's mission. I conclude by calling for renewed interest in his concepts and principles. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Reflexive predictions are self-defeating or self-fulfilling. However, it was shown that in most cases of self-defeating public predictions of social events conceptually at least one correct prediction exists. Unfortunately the term "reflexive prediction" is applied in the literature to quite distinct phenomena. A. Grünbaum, moreover, argued that reflexive prediction occurs also in the natural sciences using as example the fire-control system which "obeys only natural laws." The purpose of this paper is two-fold: first, it clarifies the terminological confusion Second, it argues that every man-made tool (fire-control systems are tools) obeys natural laws and so does the person. The question of a person's higher functions, such as expectation and decision is only acknowledged. The conclusions are (1) that there is a fundamental difference between reaction to public (predictive) utterances and reaction to discriminatory behavior based on private prediction. (2) The reflexivity of public prediction is a phenomenon characteristic of the social sciences. … at least as long as these disciplines are set apart from the natural sciences. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Framing this paper is the question: what research problem and hypotheses suggested by symbolic interaction theory give promise, if pursued, of significantly advancing the sociology of the family? The problem delineated revolves around the concepts of identity and commitment. After explication of a set of premises and needed refinements in concepts basic to symbolic interaction theory, a number of hypotheses are offered. These purport to account for the position of identities in a salience hierarchy and tie identity salience to role performance. Finally, it is noted that these hypotheses could profitably be studied in the research setting of responses to first pregnancy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Presents news notes and announcements involving the Rural Sociological Society. Professional opportunities abroad; Announcements of events; Career developments of sociology professionals; Theses and dissertations.

This paper examines and describes patterns of migration, changes in birth rates, and the relationship of these two factors for the rural and urban population in state economic areas of 13 North Central States, 1940–1950. Analysis of the data clearly shows the concentration of population through net in-migration in the rural parts of metropolitan areas, and especially in the older and larger metropolitan areas. The 64 state economic areas of net in-migration had gains of 19, 36, and 14 per cent in total, rural, and urban population, respectively. The 109 areas of net out-migration maintained a stationary total population, lost 5 per cent in rural population, and gained 10 per cent in urban population. Areas of net in-migration showed a numerical increase of 7.2 births per 1,000 population, 1940–1950, and those of net out-migration an increase of only 4.6. Areas showing the rural-in, urban-out migration pattern had the largest increase, 7.5, while the rural-out, urban-out areas had the least increase, 3.8. The data point up the need for expanded study of the various demographic, social, and economic factors affecting migration and fertility and their relationships. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

According to what might be regarded as a basic postulate in sociology, when a number of persons are in interaction over a period of time, mutual expectations and norms develop concerning the behavior of the persons involved, and the individual's actions are not independent of these norms and expectations. the postulate is the basis of the hypothesis that relationships among neighbors affect many of the individual operator's decisions concerning the farm business. The author of this paper seeks to test the hypothesis that the extent to which farm operators adopt recommended farm practices is, in part, a function of the operator's neighborhood of residence.

The sociological analysis of factions has been developing rapidly in sociological research. According to the definition, a faction is stipulated to be an ephemeral group which emerges in order to operate in the interest of a specific aim or conflict. The criteria of recruitment of members to the different factions in the community are based on upon personal aspirations which are involved in the acute cause of rivalry or conflict and not upon any pre-existing connection among its members such as kinship ties, religious affiliations, common caste membership etc. By this definition, it follows that when a faction develops into a more stable group based on some permanent criteria of membership, it is no longer a faction. The paper discusses the phenomenon of factions in communities of immigrants. It presents findings of a research project in Israel which tried to reconstruct and analyze the history and conditions under which factions first emerged and then disappeared in some newly created communities of immigrants in the course of ten years. It attempts to develop further analysis about the conditions under which factions may arise, some possible variations they may display in their composition and structure and most importantly, the function that they possibly perform in the process of adjustment of immigrants to the new social, political and economic conditions.

The article presents comments of the author on his article "Profiting from a Comprehensive School," published in the "British Journal of Sociology," to draw attention to the sociological study of comprehensive schools. Author defends his article on two grounds presentation and analysis, and conclusions. Any inadequacies on presentation are probably determined by the limitations of the article-intended as a research note and not a fully developed paper. The criticism in conclusions seems largely directed at presentation. The conclusions are in fact valid on the basis of the findings of the research itself. The same applies to statistical techniques employed. In short it would seem that no valid critique of the conclusions themselves is presented. However, here is a point-by-point reply. The tables present the most outstanding deviations in keeping with the summary nature of the article. They are condensations of tables in the thesis. Thus class categories are included or omitted in accordance with the importance of variations.

The article presents information about the 12th International Conference on the Sociology of Religion. The general theme of the conference "Contemporary Metamorphoses of Religion," was interpreted more as dealing with organizational change, including the emergence of "new" religious movements and attitude changes, than with any basic transformation in the current conceptions of the nature of religion or of religious faith. The plenary sessions were carefully planned and conducted in a very formal way marked by procedures of protocol, written requests for "interventions," like questions and comments by others than the announced participants. The only free wheeling spontaneous participation of the sort familiar to us occurred in the much smaller contributed papers sessions. Spontaneity was, unfortunately, limited even in these sessions by linguistic factors. There was one area, according to several European scholars, in which the conference may have presented a somewhat misleading picture of European academic life to the North American participants. Very little attention was paid to the debate between the Marxists and the non Marxists which is so much a part of daily European academicia.

How might the social scientific study of religion (SSSR) benefit from adjusting some of its journal article publishing standards and practices? This article builds on five presuppositions about the purpose and nature of good sociology in order to advance five specific proposals for changes in how we write, review, and make use of journal articles in the field. Those proposals concern the publishing of descriptive empirical research notes, meta-analysis review essays, detailed methodological information, arguments about causation, and analytical emphases on the substantive power of variables rather than mere statistical significance. The purpose and expected result of these proposed publishing adjustments is to increase the quality, value, and cumulative nature of the scholarship produced in the SSSR. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Adverse events such as disasters are interpreted through a system of meaning provided by culture. Historically, research into society's response to disasters provides numerous examples of community resilience in face of adversity. However, since the 1980s, numerous researchers have challenged the previous optimistic accounts and argue that such incidents result in long-term damage to the community. It is claimed that community response to a disaster episode is far more likely to be defined by its vulnerability than its resilience. This new vulnerability paradigm of disaster response is underpinned by the belief that contemporary technologically driven disasters have a peculiarly destructive outcome. This paper explores the changing conceptualisation of adversity. It suggests that the shift from the expectation of resilience to that of vulnerability is best understood as an outcome of a changing cultural conceptualisation of adversity. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Management academics have tended to rely on ethics codes developed by social researchers in related fields to inform their research practice. The point of this paper is to question whether this remains a viable approach in the current climate that is characterized by a significant increase in ethical regulation across the social sciences. We suggest that management researchers face ethical issues of a different nature to those most frequently confronted by other social science researchers, and argue for more explicit acknowledgement of contextual factors involved in management research. An exploratory analysis of the content of ethics codes formulated by nine social scientific associations is undertaken to identify the main ethical principles they cover and to analyse their underlying ethical tone. Drawing attention to the principle of reciprocity, which is found in very few codes, we suggest that an ethics code could be used to formulate new ways of thinking about management research relationships. Despite the risk that ethics codes may encourage instrumental compliance with minimal ethical obligations, we suggest they also have the potential to reflect a more aspirational agenda. The development of an ethics code for management research should therefore be seen as a potentially worthwhile project. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Economic sociology furthers a healthy alternative to price-theory–oriented economics as it sets out to remedy the invisibility of the market within the latter. There is, however, no doubt that such a market-oriented sociology is still in its infancy, given among other issues its inability to shoulder market change. The void thus recognized opens up the potential for a market idea with both social and dynamic properties. There is good reason to believe that such an endeavor would benefit from the constructive blending of economic sociology and Austrian economics. This paper argues that such a “socio-Austrian” connection is in the position to enrich the socioeconomic discourse in general and its market conception in particular. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Fisher's virulent positions on such themes as “race degeneration”, the necessity of sterilization measures for certain categories of the American population, and his urgent call for the control of the genetic quality of new immigrants are hardly consistent with the opalescent subtlety of academic disputes over the nature of capital and interest. Although Fisher repeats it often: in his work, this question of the nature of capital and interest is directly linked to eugenic assumptions and analysis. This second body of Fisherian work illuminates the strong epistemological and theoretical references in Fisher's work as an economist. This paper addresses this question through three major themes: the constant denunciation of a «racial decay» of the American population and its corollary: the project of setting up a «scientific humaniculture»; the plea against the eugenic effects of World War I, and the then haunting question of the closing of the «Golden Door». [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

One objective of regulatory investigations of possible improprieties by publicly traded corporations and the imposition of sanctions if malfeasance is found is to deter other corporations from engaging in such behavior. Although the magnitude of the deterrent effect is an empirical issue, this paper provides an a priori analysis as to why the deterrent effect will be blunted in many cases, why its strength will not be uniform over time, and why, based in part on prospect theory, the deterrent effect will be weaker for ongoing questionable practices than for practices in their formative stages. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In these comments, Professor Smith discusses the preceding group of symposium papers and reminds us that eugenic ideas are still part of the society in which we live. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper examines the transition from cardinal to ordinal utility. We begin with the egalitarian utilitarianism of J. S. Mill and Herbert Spencer, in which everyone was supposed to count as one. That is their phrase to explain how the happiness of existing people was to be maximized. We compare Spencer's goal with Darwin's goal of the “general good,” in which the number of perfect people was to be maximized. Spencer's goal was egalitarian, while Darwin's entailed biological perfection or hierarchy. We consider Edgeworth's hedonic calculus, in which the notion of hierarchy enters economics. For Edgeworth, agents have differential capacities for happiness. Throughout, we consider normative aspects of Darwin's work, in particular Darwin's challenge to the early utilitarianism of Mill and Spencer. We suggest that the Paretian principle returns utilitarianism to its egalitarian roots. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Recent criminological research has produced inconsistent findings in its attempts to establish a statistical relationship between economic marginalization and the spatial distribution of crime rates. This paper contends that this inconsistency is partly attributable to the way in which economic marginalization has been conceptually defined and measured. By focusing strictly on unemployment and poverty as the processes that produce economic marginalization, researchers have ignored other important economic dynamics that can marginalize workers and provide an environment conducive to crime. Further, commonly used indicators of economic marginalization, such as the unemployment rate and poverty rate, fail to measure the full range of dynamics that produce marginalization. It is our contention that employment volatility represents an important source of economic marginalization that can help foster higher levels of criminal activity. This hypothesis is tested using regression procedures to analyze the effects of employment volatility measures and frequently identified structural correlates of crime on change in the rate of property crime offenses across 683 U.S. metropolitan counties during the 1980–1983 period. The findings suggest that high levels of employment volatility are conducive to the maintenance of higher levels of property crime in general, as well as less severe forms of property crime such as larceny, when such crimes are examined on an individual basis. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Comments on the paper 'The Diversity of Diversity,' by David Voas and Paul Williamson. Background on the concept of census enumeration district in the context of geodemographics; Effectiveness of geodemographic classification; Ways of improving classification techniques.

Presents the authors' response to a critique on their paper 'The Diversity of Diversity.' Advantages and limitations of adopting problem-specific or general purpose area classifications; Ways by which new classifications could take advantage of the emerging microdata; Accuracy of problem-specific area classifications.

This paper considers the application of Foucauldian perspectives within sociology. While Foucault's epistemology has generated novel historical and philosophical interpretations, when transposed to sociology, problems arise. The first of these concerns the association of knowledge and power, and the concept of 'discourse'. Foucault suggested that there are 'rules' of discursive formation which are extraneous to the 'non-discursive' realm of 'reality'. This formulation is consequently both deterministic and incapable of supplying explanations of why some practices become discursive which others do not. This determinism is reflected in some sociological analyses of embodiment, offering a model of the 'body' which is passive, and incapable of resisting power/knowledge. Secondly, Foucault's notion of the 'self' moves to the other extreme, inadequately addressing the constraints which affect the fabrication of subjectivity. Sociological accounts do not always recognize the ambiguities which consequently result from efforts to use Foucauldian positions. It is argued that post-structuralists other than Foucault may offer more to sociology. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The purpose of this paper is to challenge selected aspects of Professor J. A. Banks' discussion of Morris Ginsberg's view of the place of historical research in sociological work as they are presented in 'From Universal History to Historical Sociology' (BJS, rot. LX, no. 4, 1989:521-43). Specifically, it challenges Professor Banks' argument that Ginsberg believed that sociologists need not -- perhaps even should not -- do their own empirical research; that they should rely instead on historians and other disciplinary specialists for their data. It is true that Ginsberg was dismissive of a narrow positivist conception of empiricism and of sociology as a science more generally. At the same time, however, he saw empirical research (historical research included) as a necessary part of the sociological enterprise. Indeed, while the formulation of an all-inclusive theory of social development was the first purpose of general sociology, this was not possible without empirical contributions from a variety of smaller-scale specialized sociologies. Thus, it was not a question of historians doing one thing and sociologists another, but a question of emphasis. The paper concludes by noting that part of the difficulty in determining Ginsberg's position on this issue and other related theoretical matters is that, following Hobhouse, he styled himself as a 'rational empiricist'. According to this perspective, which from the dominant contemporary perspective incorrectly conflates philosophy and science (and sociology), the rational analysis of values can be described as a 'scientific' endeavour. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper I outline some of the key ideas within Zygmunt Bauman's sociology; both in terms of his contribution to the creation of a postmodern sociology and his substantive texts. The critique that I develop, is that Bauman's work is assembled upon a modernist notion of `the social' which he not only accepts without question, but which undermines his attempts to devise a distinctly postmodern sociology. His substantive texts still contain many personal insights, but they need not make any use of postmodernist abstractions, which in the last analysis provide little more than a gloss over his own reflections on the world. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]