Showing papers in "Theory and Society in 1995"

Territorialization and state power in Thailand

Abstract: Weber and many other theorists have defined the state as a political organization that claims and upholds a monopoly on the legitimate use of physical force in a given territory.1 Writers who draw on this Weberian approach have devoted considerable theoretical attention to political organization, legitimacy, and physical coercion in the making of modern states. Until recently, however, the meaning of territory as a key practical aspect of state control has been relatively neglected by many theorists of the sources of state power. Territorial sovereignty defines people's political identities as citizens and forms the basis on which states claim authority over people and the resources within those boundaries.2 More important for our purposes here, modern states have increasingly turned to territorial strategies to control what people can do inside national boundaries. In this article, we aim to outline the emergence of territoriality in state power in Thailand, formerly called Siam. In particular, we examine the use of what we call internal territorialization in establishing control over natural resources and the people who use them.

Local market socialism: Local corporatism in action in rural China

Abstract: Since the rural reform was launched in China in 1978, its growth and success, along with its problems, have received much research attention.1 Conceptualizing the reform process and experience beyond descriptive materials has also gained momentum. Two theoretical perspectives are of particular current saliency: market transition theory, as advanced by Nee2 and local state corporatism, as recently proposed by Oi.3 Both perspectives focus on the economic dynamics and analyze institutional consequences. This essay builds on these perspectives and proposes a perspective underlining the sociocultural forces that allow the simultaneous and coordinated incorporation of market and collective mechanisms. To be emphasized is the embeddedness of these forces in the local networks that lend enduring institutions and functioning to the transformation.

Circulation or reproduction pf elites during the postcommunist transformation of Eastern Europe

Abstract: This special issue of Theory and Society reports the results of a crossnational comparative study of elite recruitment in postcommunist Eastern Europe An international team of social scientists (composed of scholars from the United States and several Eastern European countries) conducted a large-scale survey under the title Social Stratification in Eastern Europe After 1989 These surveys were conducted in Russia and in five Eastern European countries (Bulgaria, the Czech Republic, Hungary, Poland, and Slovakia)

The end of what modernity

Abstract: When I went to college in the late 1940s, we learned about the virtues and the realities of being modern. Today, almost a half-century later, we are being told of the virtues and the realities of being post-modern. What happened to modernity that it is no longer our salvation, but has become instead our demon? Is it the same modernity of which we were speaking then and are speaking now? Of which modernity are we at an end?

Fast food in France

Abstract: There is a vantage point situated at the intersection of economic and cultural sociology from which we can discern ever more clearly the material dimensions of culture and the non-material dimensions of goods. From this increasingly busy intersection, a recent focus on the consumption process has drawn attention to, among other things, the ways that consumption is mediated by the images, ideologies, the desires, the "texts" that are inscribed within them, so that the consumer often consumes more (or less) than he or she bargained for. Thus, all industries that produce commodities for mass consumption are essentially "cultural industries" involved in circulating cultural goods as much as they are in circulating economic goods, whether blue jeans, motor scooters, or safari gear from the "Banana Republic."' More pointedly, as Igor Kopytoff has asserted, "...the production of commodities is also a cultural and cognitive process: commodities must be not only produced materially as things, but also culturally marked as being a certain kind of thing."2

Poland: Winding road from the Communist to the post-Solidarity elite

Abstract: The aftermath of the Second World War brought about not only a new political elite, but also entirely new conditions and rules of social and political life. On the basis of the theory of elites, the best explanation of this radical shift or power would probably be the circulation of elites hypothesis. The question remains whether the second radical shift of power can also be explained in terms of the circulation of elites or in terms of the reproduction of elites. There are many studies dealing with the emergence of new elites in the postcommunist Poland,1 but none of them addresses this hypothesis directly.

Small leap forward: Emergence of new economic elites

Abstract: The collapse of Communism is often explained as resulting primarily from those economies' inherent inability to adjust to global change, to provide sustained economic growth, and to satisfy increasing consumer demand Thus, many observers have expected rapid and farreaching structural changes in the economy and the quick replacement of economic leadership during the transition from state socialism

Wittgenstein's kitchen: Sharing meaning in restaurant work

Abstract: Talk is poetry: sociological poetry rhythmic webs of connotative meaning bound together within a social structural matrix. Meaning depends upon a community of shared understanding in which strings of lexical items are interpreted. When we talk about things we do not directly refer to the whole of our thought our language is necessarily imprecise and capable of variable interpretations. Garfinkel's recognition of the presence of the "etc. rule" underlines that much of what we know we must leave unstated full explication is a never-ending process.1

Rethinking democratic transition: A culturalist critique and the Spanish case

Abstract: In the last few years, we have seen unprecedented shifts in the democratic world. The Soviet Union has ceased to exist, Germany has been reunited, and so many Eastern and Central European countries are now in transition that to call attention to this reality almost sounds trivial.1 As these countries struggle with transition and as struggles in some cases turn into outright civil war it becomes increasingly clear that the transformation from authoritarianism to democracy is no easy task. Recent cases of stalled and failed transitions abound. In the Phil-

The making of the Hungarian postcommunist elite: Circulation in politics, reproduction in the economy

Abstract: Vilfredo Pareto once argued that "history is a graveyard of aristocracies"' Ruling elites are unable to reproduce themselves over long periods, because their members are subject to cyclical circulation On the surface, the fall of communism in Central Europe appears to corroborate Pareto's claim The highly publicized (re-)burial of Imre Nagy, the public execution of Nicolae Ceau?escu, and the political backlash against Erich Honecker collectively sent a clear message across the world about the defeat of the old bureaucratic order and the victory of a new political elite Was this message merely symbolic or did it reflect a more fundamental reorganization of the class structure of postcommunist societies? This question has generated intense theoretical and political debates in Central Europe, as well as in the successor states of the former Soviet Union

Knowledge politics and anti-politics: Toward a critical appraisal of Bourdieu's concept of intellectual autonomy

Abstract: While intellectuals have for centuries stood rather close to God, they have lately come down in the world in the footsteps of their former employer. They are less magisterial and solemn than they used to be. In the postmodern and post-Marxist West, intellectuals have massively renounced their exalted position as guardians of universally grounded values and truths, or as spokesmen for classes that they first endowed with a solemn historical mission. They no longer claim an exquisite calling, an obligatory normative identity, or a special accountability for the whole. Shorn of its rationalistic paraphernalia and missionary ideology, the intellectual profession reveals itself to be as beautiful and ugly as all other occupations, and vulnerable to the temptations that wait upon all forms of professional specialization.1

Bakhtin and Habermas: Toward a transcultural ethics

Abstract: No matter how widely Mikhail Bakhtin and Jiirgen Habermas might be recognized as key figures of twentieth-century critical theory, they are rarely considered together. ~ The separation of the two is encouraged by disciplinary boundaries - Bakhtin's work is usually considered from within literary criticism or cultural studies, whereas Habermas's audience is located in various branches of philosophy, political science, and sociology. A close comparative reading of each thinker's work is in many ways a formidable if not intimidating task given their voluminous production and vast range of interests. I have chosen to limit the scope of the comparison in order to avoid overwhelming the uninitiated on one side or another while maintaining the interest of those who are familiar with each. Members of both audiences are invited to consider aspects of Bakhtin's and Habermas's work that address one of the most perplexing problems of contemporary social theory - diversity and the dilemma of reconstructing a transcultural (universal) ethics. Although important conceptual shifts occur in the evolution of their respective writings, each corpus maintains a remarkably unified philosophical response to this problem. Neither thinker gives in to pluralism or relativism, yet each, in different ways, recognizes that modern societies develop "polyphonically" and that modern jurisprudence is founded on the attempt to take into consideration the care of unique individuals and their actions in the context of increasingly disparate communal definitions of the "good life. ''a Elements of this complex neo-Kantian theme appear in Habermas's early works on political sociology, critical theory, and philosophy and return in more mature forms across his recent writings on communicative action, discourse ethics, law, and radical democracy. Bakhtin's lifelong preoccupation with the themes of dissimilarity, answerability, and consummation can be discerned from his earliest essays in 1919 to notes on metalinguis

The social composition of the Communist nomenklatura: A comparison of Russia, Poland, and Hungary

Abstract: Reflecting, in conclusion, upon the significance of our inquiry into the social origins of the nomenklatura, we suggest that the main reason the term nomenklatura remains a loaded one in East European political discourse is that it raises the question of what the Communist period in East Europe meant, and what it might mean now. Was Communism an artificial break in the “organic” history of these societies, a history that now resumes? Or, were Communist institutions deeply embedded in the social logic of East European development in ways that mean the Communist legacy will endure into postcommunism? Our usage of the term “upper class” was calculated precisely to capture this notion of embeddedness. We argue that in some East European countries, most notably Russia, and probably Hungary as well, where the Communist elite became an organic component of the emerging social order as an upper class, it is not enough to ask if the Communistelites have “reproduced” or “circulated.” Whether an upper class existed, and to what degree, forms the class context of personnel changes: a lot of circulation at the individual level, for example, may mean nothing but the reproduction of privileges and advantages institutionalized during the Communist period via the upper class. Reproduction on the individual level, on the other hand, may indicate precisely the opposite; that an upper class did not form and therefore nomenklatura members were unable to enjoy such institutionalized mechanisms during the transition to postcommunism. To put it in the language of our introduction: to answer the question of whether the Communists are still in power, one has first to determine what kind of a social order Communism was in each country. It was these different social orders, comprising concrete groups and group identities, as distinct from the mechanisms of surplus allocation or the individuals who staffed them, which may have been left intact through the post-Communist transition.

Swallowing their pride: Indigenous and industrial beer in Peru and Bolivia

Abstract: In this article, we examine the relations between food and social identity through an analysis of consumption in Peru and Bolivia, where food and drink are central components of many social gatherings. The key dimensions of social inequality in these countries are well known: a sharply skewed distribution of income and wealth along lines of social class, a separation between more dynamic urban areas and the more static countryside, regional differentials between more developed core areas and poorer interior and frontier zones, ethnic distinctions between national majority populations and indigenous minorities. In these countries, food systems also combine distinct and unequal elements. Indigenous and European crops are both widely consumed, though the latter are usually more prestigious. Moreover, simple peasant technologies of food preparation coexist with higher-status modern industrial technologies of food processing. What connections, then, exist between the sharp class, regional, and ethnic divisions on the one hand, and the composite food systems on the other? Does the patterning of food consumption simply reflect pre-existing social identities, or does food consumption play a more active role in forming and expressing these identities?

The new political and cultural elite

Abstract: This article introduces the political leaders and opinion makers who came to power after the "velvet revolutions" in Hungary, Poland, and Russia. Who are these people? In the photographs taken during the first few, ecstatic months after the breakdown of the communist regime, we see the faces of middle-aged men, full of youthful anticipation. They seem to be aware that they were entrusted with the dreams of millions improving living standards, achieving political sovereignty, freedom of speech, religion, and civil association, more goods on the shelves, shorter queues, access to MTV, and shedding the negative connotations of the term "Eastern" in describing their geographic location in Europe. In this article, we describe this group in terms of their family backgrounds, political affiliations, credentials, and their past appearances in positions of authority. In painting this picture, we hope to assess the extent of the changes in the upper echelons of power, which, we expect is indicative of the institutional changes that have and will in the future influence the character of the new regimes themselves.

Female consciousness and feminism in Africa

Abstract: The 1970s saw a number of significant works on women's collective action and protests in Africa, inspired firstly by a recognition that, despite the significant roles played by African women in their anti-colonial struggles, they remained politically and economically disadvantaged vis-a-vis men; secondly, by the participation of African women in their armed liberation struggles of the 1970s; and finally, by the impact of the women's movement in the West on scholarship by and about women.1 But academic scholarship follows the cycles of social movements and the 1980s and 1990s have been a period of relative quiescence for the study of women's movements in Africa. Instead, work has focussed on gender, economic development, and the state. This literature points to the gendered process of state formation in colonial and post-colonial Africa. Rather than addressing women's political confrontations, it emphasizes their exit or withdrawal from politics due to their marginalization by male-dominated states that ignore women's social needs.2

Resonance and reverberation: Ritual and bureaucracy in the state funerals of the French Third Republic

Abstract: A reading of the literature on "modem" i.e., large-scale, complex, industrialized nation-states, often uncovers contradictory views regarding the essential quality of these entities. On the one hand, we find convincing analyses like Shils's,1 or Geertz's2 which underscore the importance of social centers where leading ideas, institutions, and personages come together to create an arena in which the events that most vitally affect society's members take place. These kind of studies counter the social scientific tradition that has posited an increased rationalization i.e., specialization, mechanization, and depersonalization of the modem world.3 They do so by focusing on the continued importance of public rituals in the production and reproduction of contemporary nation-states. Rather than viewing such occasions as vestiges of a "transitional" past soon destined to disappear, Geertz posits that:

Farmers' movements and cultural nationalism in India: An ambiguous relationship

Abstract: How do the New Farmers' Movements relate to cultural and political nationalism in India today? The farmers' agitations and communalism Hindu, Muslim, and Sikh represent the two major kinds of social and political mobilizations in the past two decades in India that have come to influence national politics. The former type of movement is largely represented by democratically oriented, secular-interest organizations in the context of an increasingly state-directed capitalist agricultural economy. The latter, by contrast, are ethnic (cultural and political) movements that seek to damage the multi-ethnic character of the Indian state and society by attempting to enforce a social order based on particular religious and cultural values. This might lead one to believe that the two types of movements are completely at variance with each other, and that the strengthening of democracy would depend on the progressive development of secular interest organizations like the farmers' movements, whilst the increased proliferation of cultural identities and movements, on the other hand, would thwart efforts at secular mobilizations and democratic decision-making in a multi-cultural society.

The abortive revolution continues: East German civil-rights activists since unification

Abstract: What has become of the groups and individuals that were so prominent in the movements that toppled Communist rule in Eastern Europe in 1989? In Poland, the Czech Republic, and Hungary, many of them such as Lech Walesa, Adam Michnik, Vaclav Havel, and Janos Kis have continued to play a leading part in the project of reconstruction. At the same time, many have been shoved aside in the post-revolutionary squabbling. The skills, attitudes, and values that proved so useful in opposition have lost their relevance in the nitty-gritty of party politicking. More broadly, intellectuals often lonely heroes revered as the standard-bearers of national redemption in the dark years of Communist rule have lost much of their cachet, as mass-market culture floods in from the West and the problems of economic reform take precedence over the vaunted freedoms of "civil society."

Moving in the Wrong Direction in Social Movement Theory

Abstract: A discussion of Barbara Epstein, Political Protest & Cultural Revolution: Nonviolent Direct Action in the 1970s and 1980s (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1991); Arturo Escobar and Sonia Alvarez, editors, The Making of Social Movements in Latin America: Identity, Strategy, and Democracy (Boulder, Co.: Westview Press, 1992); Aldon Morris and Carol Mueller, editors, Frontiers in Social Movement Theory (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1992).

Collective actors and urban regimes: Class formation and the 1946 Oakland General Strike

Abstract: Studies of political sociology and of collective behavior have increasingly come together in the debate over the relationship of "state vs. society."' Previous research in these fields often counterposed these concepts, taking the perspective of either state or societal actors alone or assuming relatively well-defined and continuous boundaries between them. Current studies now emphasize the complex interplay of such actors over the course of political conflict and historical change. Much of this work, however, has focused on the relations of states with societal elites, or on the ways in which political institutions serve to channel or control insurgent challenges.2 Less well understood have been the ways social movements, in turn, affect the process of political change, beyond the sheer emergence of mass protest and disorder. This article attempts to place these problems in a common frame, and examine the organization of state and societal actors (elite and insurgent) in the context of both popular mobilization and political institution-building. My focus here is on a historical case study of class formation, collective action, and local state-making in the city of Oakland, California, beginning at the turn of the century and culminating in the 1946 Oakland General Strike.