Social theory and the progressive era
TL;DR: The first two decades of the twentieth century constitute a crucial period in the development of the United States because, although the processes of urbanization and industrialization had begun well before 1900, it was only after the turn of the century that Americans first recognized and tried to grapple with the structural changes and problems wrought by those twin processes as discussed by the authors.
Abstract: Even the mass media have noticed that many of our current societal maladies are basically the same as those faced by Americans at the turn of the century: gross political corruption, corporate arrogance coupled with consumer impotence, environmental pollution and failed conservation, ethnic antagonism, pockets of acute poverty, and urban decay. Such recognition suggests that it is high time that scholars and laymen alike turned with renewed interest to comprehending what transpired during the early 1900's. The first two decades of the twentieth century constitute a crucial period in the development of the United States because, although the processes of urbanization and industrialization had begun well before 1900, it was only after the turn of the century that Americans first recognized and tried to grapple with the structural changes and problems wrought by those twin processes. Indeed, the period roughly spanning the years from 1900 to 1920 has been termed the "Progressive era" because of the extensive amount of thought and action directed at the ill effects of massive urbanization, industrialization, and immigration. It would seem that if we are to deal with these problems today, it would be wise to study how they were confronted yesterday. That is, before we can ask "what is to be done?" in the current context we must first undertake to understand "what has happened before."
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Dissertation•
05 Dec 2009
TL;DR: Les Dodgers, equipe professionnelle de Brooklyn, gigantesque circonscription (borough) de New York, offrent an illustration exemplaire de cette interaction rarement etudiee entre identites urbaines, passion populaire pour le sport and histoire des entreprises de loisirs as mentioned in this paper.
Abstract: Le base-ball joua des la fin du 19eme siecle un role preponderant dans la formation des cultures urbaines aux Etats-Unis Les Dodgers, equipe professionnelle de Brooklyn, gigantesque circonscription (borough) de New York, offrent une illustration exemplaire de cette interaction rarement etudiee entre identites urbaines, passion populaire pour le sport et histoire des entreprises de loisirs De leur naissance en 1883 a leur delocalisation vers Los Angeles en 1957, les Dodgers s'imposerent comme club de Brooklyn (home-team) au point que ces deux entites formaient pour beaucoup les deux faces d'une meme medaille identitaire Le club revendiqua des caracteristiques locales et la ville l'associa, particulierement a travers son eloge du monumental stade Ebbets Field, a un « esprit de Brooklyn » imagine a la fois bien-pensant, gouailleur, ouvrier et multiethnique Cette these se propose d'etudier les mecanismes sociohistoriques presidant a la construction de cette homologie entre ville et club en insistant sur le poids de la longue duree et sur les complexes dispositifs identificatoires propres au jeu et au spectacle sportifs D'aucune maniere le fruit d'une immanence essentielle, la relation ville/club resulta d'une construction lente et incertaine, alimentee tantot « par le haut » (les dirigeants, la presse, les notables locaux), tantot « par le bas » (le public, les joueurs, les Brooklynois) Matrice narrative, le club offrait un vaste repertoire d'identites coherentes qui le rendait federateur pour un tres grand nombre de Brooklynois et lui permettait d'influer, hors de la sphere sportive stricto sensu, sur les grands themes de son temps, comme le progressisme, la formation de la jeunesse, la lutte anti-communiste, le maintien de rapports de genre asymetriques ou la mise a l'ecart des Africains-Americains
54 citations
Dissertation•
01 Jan 2013
32 citations
TL;DR: This paper argued that the intensive anger that scholars have dismissed in Margaret Sanger's The Woman Rebel functioned rhetorically to redefine morality in the Progressive Era, arguing that the angry rhetoric not only laid a new cultural ideal for the morality of contraception, but also constituted a militant identity for those oriented by their anger at the Woman Rebel suppression and Sanger’s criminal indictments.
Abstract: This essay maintains that the intensive anger that scholars have dismissed in Margaret Sanger’s The Woman Rebel functioned rhetorically to redefine morality in the Progressive Era. After advancing a theory of angry rhetoric as a public moral emotion, I offer a reading strategy of emotional adherence to track anger’s diffuse discursive power in The Woman Rebel . The angry rhetoric of The Woman Rebel not only laid a new cultural ideal for the morality of contraception, it also constituted a militant identity for those oriented by their anger at The Woman Rebel’ s suppression and Sanger’s criminal indictments. This essay closes by meditating upon the lasting role that anger has played in energizing the International Planned Parenthood Federation over the past 60 years.
22 citations
TL;DR: The role of accounting in the attempted reform of the corporation during the "progressive era" in the United States is explored in this article, focusing on the activities of three institutional bodies in the early twentieth century.
Abstract: This paper explores the role of accounting in the attempted reform of the corporation during the “progressive era” in the United States. Focusing on the activities of three institutional bodies in the early twentieth century, the paper documents how their repeated recourse to “publicity,” which relied crucially on accounting technologies, failed to turn the corporation into an entity more sensitive to the public interest. Specifically, two interrelated contributions are made to existing literature on accounting and corporate governance. Firstly, the paper documents the early historical development of the now taken-for-granted phenomenon of accounting and adjudicating at the entity level (Miller and Power 2013). Secondly, the paper offers a rejoinder to present-day projects of corporate governance which identify better and enhanced accountability as key to the successful reform of the corporation. During the progressive era, accounting expanded and territorialized new spaces, bringing trusts out of a hitherto secretive, private realm and into the view of the public. Yet this was not enough to engender substantive corporate reform.
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22 citations
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Book•
01 Jan 1948
TL;DR: The American Political Tradition as discussed by the authors is one of the most influential and widely read historical volumes of our time, and its elegance, passion, and iconoclastic erudition laid the groundwork for a totally new understanding of the American past.
Abstract: The American Political Tradition is one of the most influential and widely read historical volumes of our time. First published in 1948, its elegance, passion, and iconoclastic erudition laid the groundwork for a totally new understanding of the American past. By writing a "kind of intellectual history of the assumptions behind American politics," Richard Hofstadter changed the way Americans understand the relationship between power and ideas in their national experience. Like only a handful of American historians before him—Frederick Jackson Turner and Charles A. Beard are examples—Hofstadter was able to articulate, in a single work, a historical vision that inspired and shaped an entire generation.
252 citations
TL;DR: The origins of the Progressive movement have been investigated in several ways as mentioned in this paper, including the continuation of the western and southern farmers' revolt, a desperate attempt by the urban gentry to regain status from the new robber barons, and a campaign by businessmen to prevent workers from securing political power.
Abstract: RECENT historians have explained the origins of the Progressive movement in several ways. They have represented progressivism, in turn, as a continuation of the western and southern farmers' revolt,' as a desperate attempt by the urban gentry to regain status from the new robber barons,2 as a thrust from the depths of slum life, and as a campaign by businessmen to prevent workers from securing political power.4 Behind such seemingly conflicting theories, however, rests a single assumption about the origins of progressivism: the class and status conflicts of the late-nineteenth century formed the driving forces that made men become reformers. Whether viewed by the historian as a farmer, worker, urban elitist, or businessman, the progressive was motivated primarily by his social position; and each scholar has painted a compelling picture of the insecurities and tensions felt by the group that he placed in the vanguard of progressivism. Pressures and threats from other social groups drove men to espouse reform. In these class and status conflicts can be found the roots of progressivism. How adequately does this focus on social tensions and insecurities explain the origins of progressivism? Since some of these scholars have invoked concepts from social science to support their rejection of earlier approaches, the validity and application of some of the sociological and psychological assumptions which make up the conceptual framework for the
43 citations