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Comparative sociology is stranded; as a result of globalization, it is losing the ground upon which it was built. In cross-national studies, a longstanding research tradition in sociology, globalization blurs the national in material and non-material ways, and thus erodes two fundamental principles any comparative studies need to obey: case independence and case comparability. Two familiar solutions—the nationalist approach and the globalist approach—do not work in the face of globalization. This paper argues instead that the emergent property approach and the variable approach, strategies that respect both global and national–local forces, are viable alternatives for future comparative sociologists to follow. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article traces briefly the use of the comparative method in sociology. It documents that what is currently called "cross-national research" is an interest that has antecedents running back for at least a century in a great variety of fields. Secondly, the article argues for a closer interplay between sociological theory construction and cross-national data. Because current sociological theory is exceedingly culture-bound, basing its propositions largely on data derived from modern American and Western European societies, the need for testing hypotheses within truly cross-cultural settings is most timely and urgent. Thirdly, the paper article delineates three major methodological problems in cross-national research. These problems include the requirement of equivalence of meaning, the requirement of concept equivalence and the requirement of equivalence of cultural variability. It concludes with a recommendation for furthering interest in cross-national research in rural sociology.

This paper discusses the reasons why Edward Westermarck's reputation as a sociologist began to decline in the 1920s. It begins with some personal recollections of Westermarck, who was the author's great-uncle. Then follows an account of how Westermarck in both The History of Human Marriage and The Origin and Development of the Moral Ideas made original contributions to the discussion concerning several issues, which were at that time regarded as central in the sociological debate. Although Westermarck and Durkheim held very similar ideas concerning some of these problems, they disagreed on other important points. Of particular consequence for the subsequent development of sociology was Durkheim's utter rejection of Westermarck's and the other comparativists' method of quoting examples from various societies which were detached from their context as support for their theories. During the inter-war decades Durkheim's ideas were taken up and championed by Radcliffe-Brown and Malinowski, with the effect that Westermarck's comparative method was definitely regarded as passé when he died in 1939. Also other factors, which are discussed in some detail in sections V and VI of the paper contributed to this development. The paper ends with the conclusion that Westermarck's magna opera are today mainly of historical interest, whereas his Moroccan monographs and his Ethical Relativity will retain their value. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article focuses on comparative sociology. The purpose of this paper is in part to explain this apparently paradoxical situation by looking at the historical development of comparative sociology, but more important, it tries to assess the role of comparison and the inter-relationship of theory and method in the generation of social theory, through a discussion of the methodological problems inherent in comparative analysis. The association of evolutionism with comparison was a major reason for the comparative method being devalued, if not discredited. Unfortunately comparison has also been linked with functionalism, a link which is not inevitable, and is certainly undesirable. Sampling is another attempt at solving the central problem of how one compares a potentially vast quantity of social facts. Choice of unit or level, specification, quantification, and randomization are all attempts to handle this basic dilemma, while controlling against the chance of generalizing from the atypical.

Subjective adulthood, or feeling like an adult, captures identity development relative to the local context that shapes life course processes. Most research on this topic is conducted in wealthy developed countries. Instead, we draw on household‐based survey data from the Family Migration and Early Life Outcomes project (FAMELO) to estimate ordinal logistic regression models predicting how often adolescents aged 11–17 in Jalisco, Mexico (n = 1,567); Gaza Province, Mozambique (n = 1,368); and the Chitwan Valley, Nepal (n = 1,898), identify as adults. The relationships between adult roles, family capital, youth characteristics, and youth's adult identities vary substantially across the sites. The findings highlight how the transition to adulthood reflects the cultural and structural conditions of adult identities. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Sociological research has overlooked the political consequences of charismatic leadership that arises in existing democratic political bureaucracies. In this article, we theorize the consequences of charismatic leadership in democratic nations by revisiting Max Weber's theory of charismatic authority. Our extension of Weber's theory of charismatic authority helps to address a gap in the political polarization literature concerning the role of charismatic leadership. This article provides a foundational link in the research on charismatic authority–bridging the literatures on charisma and cross‐national comparative sociology. This bridging is enabled by advances in data collection that include information on charismatic authority in cross‐national context. This article makes use of a Driscoll and Kraay fixed‐effects analysis across 76 democracies from 1960 to 2009 to explore the relationship between charismatic leadership and political polarization. Our findings suggest that nations with higher levels of charismatic leadership tend to have higher levels of political polarization. These results contribute to both the literature on political polarization and charisma—as well as support our extension of Weber's theory of charismatic authority. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

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Children who live with or near a parent provide more care and receive more help from parents than geographically distant children. Stepfamily ties may be weaker than ties between biological kin, but little is known about the geographic proximity of step- versus biological kin. The authors used data from the Health and Retirement Study (N = 13,239 mothers and 45,675 biological and stepchildren) to show that stepchildren and stepmothers are less likely to live together, less likely to live nearby, and less likely to move closer than biological children and mothers. When mothers have only stepchildren, they are less likely to have a coresident child or a child nearby than mothers with both step- and biological children. Coresidence and geographic proximity are lower in stepfamilies formed after divorce than after widowhood. The findings are consistent with a legacy of conflict and strain and the likely competing needs of biological and stepmothers. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The authors extend comparative research on educational differences in divorce by analyzing data from Korea. A primary motivation was to assess whether the theoretically unexpected negative educational gradient in divorce in Japan is also observed in Korea. Using vital statistics records for marriages and divorces registered between 1991 and 2006, the authors calculated cumulative probabilities of divorce, by marriage cohort (N = 5,734,577) and educational attainment. The results indicated that the relationship between education and divorce was negative even in the earliest cohort and that this negative gradient has become more pronounced in more recent cohorts. Contrary to expectations, however, little evidence was found that the concentration of divorce at lower levels of education was exacerbated by the Asian economic crisis in the late 1990s. The authors discuss these findings in light of conventional emphases on the costs of divorce and highlight the importance of better understanding this distinctive east Asia pattern of divorce. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Are cohabiters different than married couples who cohabited before marriage? This study used the 2002 wave of the National Survey of Families and Households to determine how work behavior might differ for 4 relationship types: (a) cohabiters with uncertain marriage plans, (b) cohabiters with definite marriage plans, (c) premarital cohabiters who recently married, and (d) premarital cohabiters married 5 or more years (n = 638). The results are compared with differences found in overall comparisons of all cohabiters and married couples (N = 916) and were markedly different, indicating that overall comparisons do not adequately capture the range of behavior across cohabitation and marriage. Evidence of increased specialization was found in marriage, yet steep behavioral differences were not found between cohabiters with definite marriage plans and recently married couples but instead were associated with longevity in marriage. This implies that any possible causal effect of marriage on behavior may accrue with time spent married. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Although several factors condition mental health differences between married and never-married adults, given recent increases in marriage delay and permanent singlehood, one modifying factor-deviation from desired age at marriage-has yet to be examined. Using data from the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth 1979 (N = 7,277), the author tested whether deviation from desired age at marriage shapes the mental health of married and never-married adults as well as mental health differences between them. The results showed that most respondents failed to meet their initial preference for age at marriage. Marrying both earlier and later than desired (compared to on time) resulted in poorer mental health and fewer benefits compared to never marrying. For the never-married, mental health was best, and differences compared to the married were nonsignificant, for those nearest their desired age at marriage. As timing deviations increased, however, a mental health deficit among the never-married emerged. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study is the first to explore the relationship between cohabitation and U.S. adult mortality using a nationally representative sample. Using data from the National Health Interview Survey-Longitudinal Mortality Follow-up files 1997-2004 (N = 193,851), the authors found that divorced, widowed, and never-married White men had higher mortality rates than cohabiting White men, and never-married Black men had higher mortality rates than cohabiting Black men. In contrast, the mortality rates of nonmarried White and Black women were not different from those of their cohabiting counterparts. The results also revealed that mortality rates of married White men and women were lower than their cohabiting counterparts and that these mortality differences tended to decrease with age. The authors found no significant mortality differences when they compared married Black men or women to their cohabiting counterparts. The identified mortality differences were partially-but not fully-explained by income, psychological, or health behavior differences across groups. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The literature on development in economics and sociology has tended to focus on capital flows, investments, and, more recently, institutions as key causal factors. International migration, when discussed, is relegated to the status of a symptom of underdevelopment and even a factor contributing to it. The more recent literature on migrant remittances has partially reversed this view by documenting large hard currency transfers made by expatriates to their home countries. This changed approach to migration and development does not go far enough because it does not take into account the organized efforts of immigrant communities themselves. Nor does it consider important developmental synergies produced by the rising interactions between immigrant organizations and sending-country governments. Using data from a recently completed comparative study, we document these processes for two major countries of out-migration-Mexico and China. The study compiled inventories of migrant organizations from both countries in the United States, interviewed leaders of the major ones, and complemented these data with interviews with officials and community leaders in each sending country. Profiles of these transnational ties were constructed, exemplifying their increasing density and developmental impact at the local and national levels. Theoretical and policy implications of the findings are discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

What sociological attributes characterize the form of an enduring social organization that empowers individually rational self-interested actors to provide themselves with a common property or collective goods resource? To address this question, two common property/collective goods organizations for water management-located in the Arkansas River Basin of Colorado-were compared. The method was to assess attributes of each organization against those of conceptual benchmarks that reflect a tradition of common property resource and collective goods organizational research. The organizations were the Arkansas River Water Bank Pilot Program and the Lower Arkansas Valley Water Management Association. The Arkansas River Water Bank Pilot Program lacked the characteristics that theorists advancing the conceptual benchmarks have hypothesized as important to success. The pilot program also failed to generate local interest. The program was decommissioned in 2005 after the pilot trial period concluded. The Lower Arkansas Water Management Association possessed the attributes. It was considered a success as defined by member support for the organization and the capacity of that organization to re-time flows on the Arkansas River. This program has been operating a water market in the lower Arkansas River Basin for over 30 years and continues to successfully move groundwater and surface water around the landscape. Implications for policy and theory are addressed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This essay attempts to shed light on why aggressive ideas gain support within established western states. To do that it attempts to answer the question why the armed conflict against Iraq received such varied support during the first four months of 2003 within the United States, the United Kingdom, Australia, France and Spain. A comparative study indicates that the justifications for the armed conflict must be endorsed in the national identities of the particular states. If not, either the justifications or national identities have to be modified. The dominant elite emerge as essential to this process, as does the public experience of vulnerability. It appears that the war against Iraq received such varied support because the initial definitions of national identities endorsed the justifications for the war to different degrees, the dominant elites promoted different opinions and the people experienced different degrees of vulnerability. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article addresses the need to establish a comprehensive conceptual framework for analysing healthcare systems and their transformations. It begins by offering an overview of the current state of the art in the field, pointing to the literature's absence of conceptual robustness in the definition of system types. By exploring the dimensions ‘financing’, ‘provision’ and ‘regulation’ of healthcare, the article then proceeds deductively in line with the ‘Weberian method of ideal-types’ to establish a taxonomy of 27 healthcare systems, of which three can be identified as ‘ideal-types’. When applying this concept, not only can differences between healthcare systems be analysed, but also changes over time. The article concludes by identifying three forms of healthcare system transformation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This essay articulates a comparative approach to the sociology of science. It suggests that even historically there have been numerous scholars interested in the national components of scientific knowledge. I develop a model which allows me to compare the differences in scientific growth in Sweden and Denmark. My model consists of three interrelated levels: metaphysical bias, national scientific interests, institutional structures. The comparison between the two countries shows them to be markedly different on all three levels. Finally, I suggest how the model can be applied to contemporary material. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article discusses the author's experience in teaching sociology to Ugandan students, and the reasons for and against cross-cultural sociological survey studies. While contemporary East African societies provide fertile ground for descriptive, theoretical and comparative sociological study, the author had previously decided against conducting research among his students due to value reasons associated with post-imperialism in education. The problems encountered by the author in the course of his research are discussed.

The article discusses the activities and purposes of the Centre for Comparative Sociology (CSC) of Torcuato Di Tella Institute which began in January 1964 in Argentina. The main purposes of the CSC include research activities on comparative studies in the social structure, cooperation with Argentina and Latin America's institutions, promotion of advanced training through research, and cooperation with individual scholars and institutions. CSC also initiated projects from extension of political vote in Argentina to the change of Argentine society's demographic structure, the Buenos Aires Conference in September 1964, and the publication of the "Latin American Journal of Sociology."

In the September 1941, issue of "Rural Sociology," Professor Heberle applied Tönnies' well-known contrasting concepts gemeinsehaft and geseilsehaft, to North American rural communities and suggested that consideration of such communities in the light of these concepts will clarify problems and advance knowledge. The reference made by Professor Brunner to anthropological materials provides one who has some familiarity with such materials with an excuse for entering into the discussion. The comparative study of societies tends to become a reality on the level of intensive empirical study of particular communities. The societies of the world are ranged, under the eye of the student, in a single continuum. The rural sociologists occupy the strategic center of this continuum. The anthropologist may make a contribution toward the development of understanding of society by formulating the ideal society which, according to the guidance of these antithetical concepts, lies at one hand of the bipolar continuum. Within the ideal folk society its members are bound by religious and kinship ties and there is no place for the motive of commercial gain.

This article presents information related to historical sociology of science. The sociology of science, not unlike the general discipline of sociology, studiously has avoided comparative/historical investigations. Notwithstanding the fact that comparative/historical work has merited the most prestigious awards available in the profession,' this style of work does not fill the pages of sociology journals. Rather, work in the sociology of science generally has focused on factors contributing to productivity on the part of individual scientists, the normative structure of science and the social organization of science. Most studies, including recent ethnographic analyses, focus on a selected science in a particular country. Yet, however interesting ethnographic investigations may be in generating certain kinds of insights concerning the "constructed" or craft like quality of science, they simply cannot generate hypotheses about the embeddedness of science in larger cultural traditions and institutions.

The popularity and success of social psychology in the U.S. have created the impression that social psychology is purely a Western, if not a U.S. product. Many scholars from African and Asian continents accept this claim that the roots of social psychology are American, and have tried to emulate their research strategies and methodology. Only recently, the European social psychologists have established their identity and distinctness different from the culture of American social psychology. Among Asian social psychologists, there is a growing awareness of a distinct identity and a rediscovery of their cultural heritage. In particular, Indian social psychologists emphasize functional interrelatedness of the self, relations, society, and universe. With this indigenization process, social psychology in India is taking on a character distinctive from that of the West, is imparting a new look to social psychology, and promises to provide what the mainstream social psychology lacks. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]