Showing papers in "American Journal of Sociology in 1989"

Media Discourse and Public Opinion on Nuclear Power: A Constructionist Approach

Abstract: Media discourse and public opinion are treated as two parallel systems of constructing meaning. This paper explores their relationship by analyzing the discourse on nuclear power in four general audience media: television news coverage, newsmagazine accounts, editorial cartoons, and syndicated opinion columns. The analysis traces the careers of different interpretive packages on nuclear power from 1945 to the present. This media discourse, it is argued, is an essential context for understanding the formation of public opinion on nuclear power. More specifically, it helps to account for such survey results as the decline in support for nuclear power before Three Mile Island, a rebound after a burst of media publicity has died out, the gap between general support for nuclear power and support for a plant in one's own community, and the changed relationship of age to support for nuclear power from 1950 to the present.

Community Structure and Crime: Testing Social-Disorganization Theory

Abstract: Shaw and McKay's influential theory of community social disorganization has never been directly tested. To address this, a community-level theory that builds on Shaw and McKay's original model is formulated and tested. The general hypothesis is that low economic status, ethnic heterogeneity, residential mobility, and family disruption lead to community social disorganization, which, in turn, increases crime and delinquency rates. A community's level of social organization is measured in terms of local friendship networks, control of street-corner teenage peer groups, and prevalence of organizational participation. The model is first tested by analyzing data for 238 localities in Great Britain constructed from a 1982 national survey of 10,905 residents. The model is then replicated on an independent national sample of 11,030 residents of 300 British localities in 1984. Results from both surveys support the theory and show that between-community variations in social disorganization transmit much of the effect of community structural characteristics on rates of both criminal victimization and criminal offending.

Secondary School Tracking and Educational Inequality: Compensation, Reinforcement, or Neutrality?

Abstract: This article examines the effects of academic tracking in secondary schools on educational stratification and considers how that tracking may affect levels and dispersions of academic achievement and high school graduation rates among social groups. Data from the High School and Beyond survey of students who were sophomores in 1980 show that placement in the college track substantially benefits growth in mathematics achievement and the probability of high school graduation, even when measured and unmeasured sources of nonrandom assignment to tracks are taken into account. Track assignment reinforces preexisting inequalities in achievement among students from different socioeconomic backgrounds. However, track assignment and differential achievement in tracks partially compensate blacks and girls for their initial disadvantages and makes racial and sexual inequalities smaller than they may have otherwise been. The article provides qualified support for the view that students are assigned to the tracks that...

The Social Meaning of Money: "Special Monies"

Abstract: Classic interpretations of the development of the modern world portray money as a key instrument in the rationalization of social life. Money is reductively defined as the ultimate objectifier, homogenizing all qualitative distrinctions into an abstract quantity. This paper shows the limits of such a purely utilitarian conception of "market money." A model of "special monies" is proposed to examine the extraeconomic, social basis of modern money. The article argues that, while money does indeed transform items, values, and sentiments into numerical cash equivalents, money itself is shaped in the process. Culture and social structure mark the quality of money by institutionalizing controls, restrictions, and districtions in the sources, uses, modes of allocation, and even the quantity of money. The changing social meaning and structure of domestic money, specifically married women's money in the United States, 1870-1930, are examined as an empirical case study of a special money.

Self-Perceptions of Black Americans: Self-Esteem and Personal Efficacy

Abstract: This study examines the determinants of personal self-esteem, racial self-esteem, and personal efficacy in a 1980 national sample of black Americans. The findings show that the three dimensions are interrelated and each is anchored in interpersonal relations with family and friends. However, the three dimensions are produced by fundamentally different processes. Personal self-esteem is most strongly influenced by microsocial relations with family, friends, and community, while personal efficacy is generated through experiences in social statuses embedded in macrosocial systems of social inequality. We conclude that black self-esteem is insulated from systems of racial inequality, while personal efficacy is not, and suggest that this explains why black Americans have relatively high self-esteem but low personal efficacy. The belief that racial discrimination, rather than individual failure, accounts for low achievement among blacks is irrelevant to personal self-esteem and personal efficacy. In contrast, racial self-esteem is produced by a combination of education, interracial contact, and ideological processes.

Age and the Distribution of Crime

Abstract: This paper examines the age/crime distribution to determine whether there is a single pattern that is constant over time and across crime categories. Using arrest data of the FBI's Uniform Crime Reports for the periods of 1940, 1960, and 1980, the article compares parameters including age of maximum criminality, overall shape of the age-crime curve, and rate of decline from the peak age. Not only is there variation by crime type when the age-crime statistics for 1980 are examined; there is considerable change between 1940 and 1980. The most significant change has been the progressive concentration of offending among the young; this suggests increasing discontinuity in the transition from adolescence to adulthood in modern times. Variations found in the age distribution for different crime types support the traditional sociological view that, although crime rates typically decline throughout life after the initial rise in adolescence, certain crimes peak later, or decline more slowly, or both.

Similarity of Political Behavior Among Large American Corporations

Abstract: Political sociologists have debated for decades, without resolution, whether elites in advanced capitalists societies are integrated. Rather than ask whether elites are integrated, this study examines the conditions under which convergence of political behavior occurs, focusing on campaign contributions of political action committees in the American business community. A model of similarity in corporate political behavior is proposed that draws on principles developed by resource-dependence and social class theorists of intercorporate relations. The model was supported by an examination of the 1,596 dyads created by relations among 57 large U.S. manufacturing firms in 1980. Membership in the same primary industry or several similar industries, geographical proximity of headquarters locations (but not plant locations), market constraint, and common relations with financial institutions (through either stock ownership or directorate ties) were positively associated with the similarity of political behavior ...

New Social Movements and the New Class in the Netherlands

Abstract: The class base of the so-called new social movements is analyzed using data from the Dutch national election survey of 1986. This analysis is linked to the theory on the "new class," reconceptualized as those in the new middle class who try to defend their relative autonomy against the encroachment of the "technocrats." The analysis shows that, although the Dutch new social movements are supported by broad segments of the population, their inner circles are predominantly constituted by segments of the reconceptualized new class: the young specialists in social and cultural services, and some of the yound administrative specialists in public service. In addition, the analysis documents the liberalizing effect of education for the younger cohorts and suggests a profound change of values in the postwar period.

From Peaceful Protest to Guerrilla War: Micromobilization of the Provisional Irish Republican Army

Abstract: Concentrating on the development of one politically violent organization, the Provisional Irish Republican Army (IRA), leads to conclusions that differ from more aggregate approaches. A quantitative examination of the development of IRA violence in a community mobilized for peaceful protest shows that state repression, not economic deprivation, was the major determinant of this violence. Intensive interviews with IRA supporters help to interpret these quantitative results by showing that, before endorsing political violence, victims of repression must (1) view the authority repressing them as illegitimate, (2) view peaceful protest in the face of repression as ineffective, and (3) consider the reactions to repression of people with whom they have close ties. These responses to repression appear to be continued by social placement; that is, in contrast to members of the middle class, members of the working class and student activists are more likely to experience repression, to be available for constly vio...

Travel as Performed Art

Abstract: Although travel has been performed, appreciated, and formally criticized as an art for at least five centuries, this cultural classification has yet to be taken seriously in the nascent field of tourism research. Present-day tourism is best understood as a recent manifestation of an enduring art of travel whose performance entails movement through space in conventionally stylized ways. Sociological research on current and historical manifestations of this art can benefit from theoretical traditions developed in the study of other domains of expressive culture. Drawing on the sociology of art as well as on recent literary scholarship, this paper proposes that the reproduction and modificaton of distinctive travel styles be examined in terms of the social worlds of their producers.

Long-Term Trends in Occupational Segregation by Sex'

Abstract: This paper reexamines long-term trends in occupational segregation by sex, using the double-coded 1900 and 1910 Public Use Samples. The analysis addresses the ambiguity in the measurement of longterm trends that arises from using inconsistent or highly aggregated occupational classifications. The revised measures indicate that occupational segregation by sex remained quite constant from 1900 through 1970, although segregation in nonfarm occupations declined slowly. Occupational sex segregation declined between 1970 and 1980 and continued to decline through 1986. An accurate assessment of historical trends is a necessary starting point for theoretical explanations of occupational sex segregation.

The Divergence of Black and White Marriage Patterns

Abstract: This article examines the patterns and determinants of first marriage among black and white women in the United States. Three major differences exist between the first-marriage patterns of black and white women: (1) lower proportions of blacks marry than whites; (2) the proportion of women who ever marry has declined substantially across cohorts for blacks but modestly across cohorts for whites; and (3) while increased education is associated negatively, if slightly, with the probability of ever marrying among whites, it is associated positively among blacks. The observed racial divergence is consistent with three factors experienced differentially by blacks and whits: the marriage squeeze, labor-market success, and out-of-wedlock childbearing. Given the traditional age differences between spouses, there are far fewer eligible male mates for black women than for white women among cohorts born before the late 1950s. For both blacks and whites, employment status is positively associated with the propensity ...

The Fall and Rise of the Petty Bourgeoisie: Changing Patterns of Self-Employment in the Postwar United States

Abstract: This article explores the historical trajectory of the self-employed segment of the labor force in the United States, particularly since 1940. Self-employment declined in the United States almost steadily from the 19th century to the early 1970s. Since then, it has risen every year. Explaining this reversal in the historical fortunes of the petty bourgeoisie is the central task of this article. We reach four basic conclusions: first, the reversal in the decline of the self-employed is statistically significant and robust across a range of definitions of self-employment rates. Second, this reversal is not a simple countercyclical response to the increase in unemployment since the middle 1970s. Third, part of the resurgence of self-employment result from the expansion of various postindustrial services that tend to have higher levels of self-employment within them. Within postindustrial sectors, however, there has not generally been any increase in self-employment. Fourth, a significant part of the expansio...

Collegiality, Bureaucratization, and Professionalization: A Weberian Analysis

Abstract: This article analyzes Weber's writing on the topic of collegiality in Economy and Society in order to reintegrate the concept of collegiality with his other concepts of legitimate domination, status group closure, bureaucracy, and legal formalism. An ideal-type of collegiate organization is identified, and the consequences of the emergence of collegial social structure of this form in professional contexts are examined. These arguments provide a critique of the predominant understandings of the relationship between professionalization and bureaucratization, in which professional ideology is conceived of as ethical commitment. The article calls for ar restoration of Weberian understandings of the rationalization of modern life as the outcome of a contest for domination between interest groups rather than as the institutionalization of transcendent normative structures.

From high school to work: market and institutional mechanisms in Japan

Abstract: Market models posit that institutional linkages interfere with efficient labor markets. Many Japanese high schools have agreements with employers to hire their students, and this article examines the ties between Japanese schools and employers, the reasons they make these ties, and the criteria they use to select students. Interviews with teachers and recruiters indicate that the Japanese system shifts the competition for jobs from the labor market into schools and among schools, and employers also compete for dependable sources of labor. Multivariate analyses of surveys of 1,408 high schools and 964 seniors indicate that desirable jobs are allocated more on the basis of academic than nonacademic criteria, contrary to the predictions of some models. Moreover, contrary to a hypothesis that institutional linkages reduce achievement effects, achievement has greater effects on jobs with linked employers than on jobs with nonlinked employers. Institutional linkages differ from both economic market models and f...

The Maturational and Role Perspectives on Aging and Self Through the Adult Years: An Empirical Evaluation

Abstract: The role theory of aging and the maturational perspective differ with regard to whether aging is a problematic or positive process. This article looks at the self-concept and self-evaluation of men and women over the adult life course, using data from a large national probability sample. The evidence indicates that as persons age their self-concepts, while not qualitatively different from that of younger persons, contain more positive attributes, fewer negative attributes, and become better integrated. Age is also associated with a positive self-evaluation, as indicated by life satisfaction, self-esteem, and an index of meaninglessness. Ther are some odest gender differences in these age relationships, but, overall, males and females appear to experience aging in similar ways. The general impression is that as persons age they become increasingly comfortable with themselves and their situation. Because it is unlikely that these relationships are due primarily to cohort, period, or compositional effects, t...

Labor Unrest, Immigration, and Ethnic Conflict in Urban America, 1880-1914

Abstract: Did strikes effect the extent of ethnic and racial conflicts in late 19th-and early 20th-century America? If so, How? Data on the occurrence of conflicts and of violence against various ethnic or racial groups in the 81 largest cities, 1880-1914, show that the growth of the union movement and the rising supply of low-wage labor increased levels of ethnic competition in urban labor markets, thus raising rates of ethnic comflict. The findings support the argument that ethnic conflict and labor unrest are parallel forms of collective action and that each depends on the number and foundings of national labor unions. The effect of labor union organization is strongest for all attacks on blacks. In addition, sharp increases in immigration, a downturn in economic fortunes, and contagion processes all raise rates of ethnic conflict.

Structure After 50 Years: The Anatomy of a Charter

Abstract: In the half century since its publication, The Structure of Social Action has emerged as one of the classics of the sociological tradition. At the present time, however, there is scarcely any agreement about the status of the book's argument among all those who still appeal to the volume. After 50 years, the vast scholarship generated by Structure is in disarray, with separate literatures existing for different aspects of the book and controversies present in all these literatures. This paper examines each major aspect of Structure: its (1) sociohistorical context, (2) writing style, (3) methodological argument, (4) account of the history of social theory, (5) analysis of action, (6) view of the social world, (7) perspective on the actor, (8) treatment of the problem of order, and (9) approach to voluntarism. The paper argues that, when Structure is embedded in the sociointellectual context where it was produced, and is interpreted as a "charter" intended to defend the science of sociology against forces ...

Worker Control and Attachment to the Firm

Abstract: This article asks whether the exercise of choice and discretion over task-related aspects of a job strenghtens or weakens the bond that ties workers to their employers. Past work on the relationship between worker control and attachment has been theoretically vague, and the empirical evidence generally consists only of positive association between indicators of control and attachment. The research reported here changes this situation in two ways. First, is systematizes prevailing commentary through the formulation of a series of hypotheses that specify the intervening mechanisms through which control shapes attachment. Second, it incorporates these hypotheses into a model of the causal relations generating the association between control and attachment. The results of a covariance structure analysis largely confirm the hypotheses derived from past work even as they show that the total effect of control on attachment is virtually zero because positive indirect effects offset a negative direct effect. The f...

Democratic Transition and Breakdown in Western Europe, 1870-1939: A Test of the Moore Thesis

Abstract: Barrington Moore's Social Origins of Dictatorship and Democracy is widely regarded as a contemporary classic, yet there have been few attempts to evaluate the validity of his argument on a large number of comparable cases. This article makes such an attempt with all Western European countries experiencing democratic rule between 1870 and 1939. It seeks (1) to explain what structural and historical features distinguish the breakdown cases from those that remained democratic, and (2) to trace the process of class coalition formation in the transition to democracy and the subsequent breakdown. Moore's thesis does fit, with some modification. All four breakdwn cases were characterized historically by an authoritarian coalition of labor-repressive landlords, the state, and the bourgeoisie that contributed to the breakdown of democratic rule in the 1920s and 1930s. In contrast, in none of the democratic survivors did such a coalition materialize. This difference can be traced largely to the strenght of the agra...

Markets in hierarchies: organizational and market influences on gender inequality in a state pay system

Abstract: A pivotal issue in sociological theories of labor markets, as well as legal and policy debates on pay equity, is the relative importance of market and organizational forces in determining pay differences between jobs held predominantly by men and those held predominantly by women. This article develops two models of the market organization relationship-an administered-efficiency model and a bureaucratic-politics model. Quantitative analyses of individual and job-level data in a state government pay system indicate that the administered efficiency model does not adequately explain malefemale earnings differences. Documentary, testimonial, and interview data strongly suggest the significance of bureaucratic politics in the pay-determination process. We conclude that market forces influence wage rates but are heavily mediated by organizational factors unrelated to efficiency considerations in the type of organization studied here.

Interlocks, PACs, and Corporate Conservatism

Abstract: Two alternative corporate political strategies are identified for Political Action Committee (PAC) contributions to candidates in the 1980 congressional elections: (1) a pragmatic effort to promote a particular company's best interests and (2) an ideological effort to promote conservatism. With the use of multiple regression, this article examines three theoretical explanations of corporate political strategies. The expectations of corporate liberal theory are not confirmed. Rather, there is support for both state structure and interlock theories. It is argued that, at least in 1980, business political behavior was ideologically conservative, which business understood to represent classwide rational interests.

The Production of Punctuality: Social Interaction, Temporal Organization, and Social Structure

Abstract: Social occasions can be distinguished by the degree to which their temporal length is locally variable or predetermined. Using the live television news interview as an extreme example of the latter, this paper describes how an interactional encounter is brought to a close at a prespecified time. The larger aim is to explore linkages between the organization of interaction and institutional forms generally regarded as social structural in character. The closing process is first examined in casual conversation, which has a variable duration. News interview closings are then examined and are shown to adhere to a systematically modified format that provides for closing at a prearranged time. It is suggested in conclusion that sociotemporal and institutional structures are reproduced through the situated adaptation of generic interactional mechanisms, and that this formulation preserves the integrity of both interaction and social structure while providing for their interconnection.

Setting the Record Straight on Organizational Ecology: Rebuttal to Young

Abstract: To conserve space for the publication of original contributions to scholarship, the comments in this section must be limited to brief critiques. They are expected to address specific errors or flaws in articles and reviews published in the AJS. Comments on articles are not to exceed 1,500 words, those on reviews 750 words. Longer or less narrowly focused critiques should be submitted as articles. Authors of articles and reviews are invited to reply to comments, keeping their replies to the length of the specific omment. The AJS does not publish commenters' rebuttals to authors' replies. We reserve the right to reject inappropriate or excessively minor comments.

The Normative Foundations of Emancipatory Theory: Evolutionary Versus Pragmatic Perspectives

Abstract: From the start, emancipatory theory has been plagued by contradictory and incompletely elaborated normative underpinnings that weaken its sociological and ethical credibility. Jurgen Habermas, the leading contemporary critical theorist, has attempted to address this problem in an extensive reconstruction of the theories of Marx and Weber that appropriates elements of American pragmatist thought. Yet he resorts to an evolutionary normative argument that undermines the sociological powers of the two classical theories and contradicts the pragmatists' historical approach to values. This essay explains the significance of Habermasian theory for the emancipatory tradition, analyzes certain problems of the theory, and argues that an expanded dialogue with American pragmatism would strengthen both its sociological and its normative dimensions. Though the explicit focus is on the emancipatory tradition, the essay raises broader critical questions about pseudohistorical, normative justification in general sociolog...

State Timing of Policy Adoption: Workmen's Compensation in the United States, 1909-1929

Abstract: Using event-history analysis, this study of workmen's compensation analyzes how fast American state legislators responded to the work accident problem. States were quicker to adopt legislation when productivity and work-accident litigation were high and when nonagricultural workers outnumbered agricultural ones. Despite the influence of capital and labor in shaping workmen's compensation in other analyses, the speed of state legislation was unaffected by the presence or interests of capital and labor groups. This suggests that the speed of adoption was shaped by a different aspect of capital-labor relations than is seen when studies focus on the activities of specific actors or groups.