Showing papers in "Comparative Sociology in 2007"

State and Society in the Philippines

Abstract: Promising to situate the Philippines in global and regional contexts, the authors aim to ‘reconsider the narrative of Philippine political development’, to attempt a ‘sustained analysis of state formation over the course of a millennium’ and to develop a ‘framework for understanding Philippine state-society relations over time’ (page xv). Whereas the standard narrative follows conventional historical periodisation – ‘“preHispanic”; Spanish; revolutionary; American; Commonwealth; Japanese; and, in the Republican era, by presidential administration’ – the authors have written a book that ‘acknowledges the Southeast Asian connections of the Philippines and the changing rhythm of state and social formation across times and regimes’ (page 4).

New Challenges, New Elites? Changes in the Recruitment and Career Patterns of European Representative Elites

Abstract: Long term changes in the recruitment patterns of European representative elites can be described as the aggregate result of selectorates' responses to a sequence of fundamental problems challenging polities since the emergence of modern representative political institutions in the 19th century. Recent data show that some long-term trends of (Western) European parliamentary recruitment like the increase of MPs with a public sector background have reversed or plateaued since the late 1980s. At the same time a rise in turnover, a decrease of incumbency and a growing diversity of recruitment patterns can be seen in the same group of polities. This paper explores whether and to what extent these changes are linked to changes in the party systems of Western European polities and whether new trends of parliamentary recruitment are emerging. It introduces the proposition that after the 'consensus challenge' of the post Second World War era a 'legitimacy challenge' is now shaping European legislative recruitment, increasing the value of social and cultural assets of candidates that are related to their expert-status and favouring properties signalling their moral integrity.

Elite Distinction: Grand Theory and Comparative Perspectives

Abstract: Most of the major social theorists have addressed the issue of distinction. Largely ignoring each other's views on the matter, they have mainly sought to integrate their discussion within their respective grand theories. The main defect is that, often extrapolating from the analysis of one particular case, they have claimed to provide sociological laws. On the basis of personal field work as well as a sound acquaintance with the literature dealing with elite groups, the author aims at suggesting how differences from one society to another challenge universalistic understanding. Although comparative research proves to make it impossible to accept any general theory of distinction, the article, however, shows that many classical perspectives are worthy of note if taken as partially valid.

Convergence Pressures and Responses: Recent Social Insurance Development in Modern Welfare States

Abstract: Pressures from global market forces along with austerity and retrenchment have generated predictions of converging welfare state institutions. The purpose of this paper is to examine the development of social insurance programs among 18 of the economically most advanced democracies during 1980–2000. Have social insurance rights converged and have changes been of such a character that we can discern converging trends of social insurance models? The results indicate convergence in the replacement rates, coverage and employer financing of social insurance benefits up to 1980, after which these signs of convergence tend to disappear or transform into divergence. Rather than countries becoming reclassified, changes implemented in social insurance rights appear to have strengthened the distinctive characteristics of social insurance models identified.

Elite and Leadership Change in Liberal Democracies

Abstract: This article presents and assesses the thesis that a shift in the character of governing elites and leaders has been occurring in several important liberal democracies during recent years. Ascendant elites are more leonine and top leaders are more pugnacious. We attribute the shift to strong centripetal pressures that now impinge on elites and leaders, and we ask about the shift's consequences for the operation of liberal democracies.

International Migration and Security: Opportunities and Challenges

Abstract: What do you do to start reading international migration and security opportunities and challenges? Searching the book that you love to read first or find an interesting book that will make you want to read? Everybody has difference with their reason of reading a book. Actuary, reading habit must be from earlier. Many people may be love to read, but not a book. It's not fault. Someone will be bored to open the thick book with small words to read. In more, this is the real condition. So do happen probably with this international migration and security opportunities and challenges.

Nordic Elites In Comparative Perspective

Abstract: The article compares the Nordic, ie, Danish, Finnish, Norwegian and Swedish, elite structures based on power studies which were completed in these countries in the 2000s Despite differences in data collection methods, all of these studies employ the positional approach, and the composition of national elites is defined identically Moreover, the four Nordic countries are associated with largely common history and political culture The Nordic elites will be compared on the grounds of three dimensions, ie openness of recruitment into the elites, interaction between various elite groups, and interaction between the elites and the people We will ask in what way the Nordic elite structures have changed as far as these dimensions are concerned and how many elites exist in the Nordic countries, ie, one power elite or several mutually competitive elites

Political Elite Circulation: Implications For Leadership Diversity And Democratic Regime Stability In Ghana

Abstract: This article proposes that elite theory is at the heart of understanding political conflict in Africa. A case study of Ghana analyses the historical origins of elite conflict in Ghana before and after independence. The article links high levels of political elite circulation resulting from the transformation of traditional social structures with high levels of political elite differentiation and instability in the post-colonial era. Since 1992 Ghana's new liberal democratic regime has flourished. There are indications that there is a gradual increase in unity amongst competing political elites. Diversity amongst political elites has resulted in greater representation at the leadership level. These factors may explain the sustained period of political stability and the gradual deepening of liberal democracy in Ghana.

Democracy, Economic Crisis, and Market Oriented Reforms

Abstract: In this paper I analyze the nexus between economic crises, market oriented reforms, and democratization in Indonesia and Korea since the 1997/98 Asian financial crisis. I provide some support for the hypothesis that democracies are better able to survive economic crises than authoritarian regimes. In both countries democratization facilitated a crisis resolution strategy based on market oriented reforms. However, I assert that in the long run the social consequences of market-oriented reforms tend to undermine democratization partly because both are so closely linked and the majority of the population sees them as one. This process does not necessarily destroy democracies but it leaves them more vulnerable to possible external shocks in the future.

The Paradox of Ethnic Minority Development in Beijing

Abstract: The educational attainments of Beijing's permanent ethnic minority population out perform or are on par with the dominant, local Hans. Yet, the Han demographic disproportionately dominates the high-wage, education-intensive employment sectors. What accounts for this paradox? What does this signify regarding the management of ethnic difference in the capital city? And how do we improve this situation? Drawing upon recent research, this paper will offer sociological explanations to answer these questions. Moreover, it will further suggest strategies for enhancing the development of ethnic minorities in Beijing.

Democracy, Capitalism, and Income Inequality: Seeking Causal Directions

Abstract: Recent research shows that lower levels of income inequality cause higher levels of democracy, and vice versa in a simultaneous relationship. A critical factor missing from these studies is a direct exogenous measure of capitalism in models explaining variation in income inequality and democracy. This study examines 50 countries over the years 1978–1993 and finds in a pooled two stage least squares modeling exercise that the Fraser Institute measure of capitalism appears to have a weakly positive linear impact on POLITY IV measures of democracy and a weakly positive linear impact on income inequality (more capitalism, more inequality). There appears to be no higher-order relationship between capitalism and democracy or income inequality, though there is a weak parabolic relationship between democracy and income inequality.

Political Elites In The Commonwealth Of Independent States: Recruitment And Rotation Tendencies

Abstract: This paper deals with the process of elite recruitment in the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS). The analysis of CIS countries' experiences allows a correlation to be drawn between the model of elite organization and the political and economic policies they pursue. As a rule, based on the mold of traditionalist (patron-client) relations, elites act as the agents of de-modernization and re-traditionalization. Organized on the principles of rational bureaucracy, elites are able to ensure modernization. Looking at the evolution of the CIS countries from this angle, the author investigates three groups of states. Two of these represent an almost 'ideal type' or 'clean' example of implementing the reference model. Byelorussia, at one end of the spectrum, is an example of a bureaucratically run state. On the other side of this spectrum are the countries of post-Soviet Central Asia, Azerbaijan, and Georgia, which embody the model of the clannish elite. The third group of countries are those states maintaining an in-between position within the proposed line of analysis, or those post-Soviet polities marked by a complicated plexus and sometimes also by an acute struggle between different models (Russia, Ukraine, Armenia, and Moldova).

Elite Integration And Institutional Trust In Norway

Abstract: In modern elite theory accommodation and compromise between national elite groups are seen as preconditions for the continuance and stability of a democratic society. It is claimed that elite accommodation is facilitated to the extent that the elites are integrated. In this article trust between the various elite groups and their respective institutions is investigated as a core aspect of elite integration. The analyses presented in the article demonstrate that in general there is a relatively high level of institutional trust among national elite groups in Norway. There is, however, some variation in how much trust the various elite groups accord the institutions to which other elite groups belong, and this is explained by (1) the extent to which one elite identifies with the functions of other elites, (2) has a similar ideological orientation, and (3) has social contact with members of other elites.

Social Structure and Personality during the Transformation of Urban China: A Preliminary Report of an Ongoing Research Project

Abstract: This paper presents the theoretical rationale and research design of an ongoing study of social structure and personality in transitional urban China. The study is designed to be precisely comparable to recent studies in Poland and Ukraine during the early stages of their transformation from socialism to nascent capitalism, as well as to earlier studies of the United States, Poland when it was socialist, and Japan during more stable times. The paper also presents evidence that the dimensions of personality measured in the previous studies, and the questions used to measure those dimensions, are as appropriate for a study of urban China as they were to studies of the United States, Poland, Japan, and Ukraine, during times both of relative social stability and of radical social change; moreover, these measures of personality are essentially invariant for Chinese cities of differing degrees of wealth and privatization, and for both genders.

Comparing Two Charismatic Leaders: Ataturk and de Gaulle

Abstract: Charismatic leaderships are comparable in spite of the specific character of each case, but not necessarily in spite of the socio-economic-cultural contexts. Significant analogies can be noticed between the political roles of Kendal Attar and Charles de Gaulle in the following respects: the dramatic historical circumstances of their emergence as leaders; the Resistance movement that they headed against foreign military occupation; the symbol of hope that they became in the eyes of the people; the faith they had in their historical mission and their determination; their luck in their undertakings; the outstanding political talents of these two military men; the direct contact with the people that these two leaders were able to establish; the paramount importance that they accorded to national independence; the reinforcement of the state bureaucracy that they imposed; the abandonment of the empire under the pressure of history; the foundation of a new political order and regime; the inevitable personalization of power and their routinization of their heritage. Except in the religious domain, the institutionalization of charisma has a relatively short life.

A New Test of Convergence Theory

Abstract: A classic version of convergence theory was proposed by Marion Levy (1966) as part of his theory of modernization: if and as the level of modernization increases (defined as a higher ratio of reliance upon inanimate energy and tools, relative to animate energy), the level of structural uniformity among relatively modernized societies continually increases. This hypothesis that there is more uniformity among modernized than among non-modernized societies is tested here with cross-national data from 148 non-modernized and 52 modernized societies. Using the coefficient of variation (V) as the measure of convergence, I analyze a wide range of variables: level of economic development, capitalist market economy, demographic variables, technology, the state and political democracy, cognitive modernization, health, income inequality and poverty, gender particularism-universalism, and information and communications. I find that the modernized societies do show more convergence (lower V scores) than the non-modernized societies on 49 of the 51 variables tested. Among the 21 societies that were already modernized in 1965, as they became more modernized during the period from1965 to the present, they also became more convergent on 32 of the 45 variables analyzed. Thus, variation in social structure is greater among less modernized than among more modernized societies, and this has implications for theories of globalization.

Parliamentarians as Errand Boys in France, Britain and the United States

Abstract: Comparison of three democracies that practice the single member constituency, the common denominator of which is the importance parliamentarians grant to the local issues in their electoral constituencies, often to the detriment of their roles as national legislators and holders of popular legitimacy. These "local servitudes" that entail frequent visits to the constituency and sustained contact with the electors, are examined in terms of tending to the local electoral garden. Emphasis is placed on the similarities between parliamentarians' local preoccupations, in spite of the differences that exist between these three political regimes.

Promoting Democracy: The Challenge of Creating a Civil Society

Abstract: Perhaps the most notable feature of "democracy" today is its almost universal acceptance as the only legitimate form of government. Most examples of open dissent against this view are so patently self-interested as to command little respect. Yet however attractive it may be, the development of modern democracy has been largely an incremental product of Europe and its colonial diaspora, which embody quite specific cultural and social assumptions. Now these states have become dedicated to democracy's extension around the world. This paper examines the nature and success of these attempts to extend democracy. It asks, in particular, whether the culture of a robust civil society on which democracy relies can be successfully exported and what challenges it faces from more traditional social relationships.

From Vietnam to Iraq: American Elites' Views on the Use of Military Force

Abstract: In this paper we present trends in US elites' opinions on the use of military force abroad in the period from the end of US military involvement in Vietnam in 1975 to 2004 during the 'war on terror.' With data from quadrennial surveys of US elites' foreign policy attitudes sponsored by the Chicago Council on Foreign Relations since 1975, we ask whether elites have become more militaristic or whether such views have been a long term characteristic of US elites. We find support for the view of United States leaders as prone to the use of military might, even without the support of allies. Yet the findings also indicate that American elites have held this military view of reality for a long time.