Showing papers on "Contemporary society published in 1970"

Political Belief Systems and Political Behavior.

Abstract: This way beliefs, paper that political social is addressed scientists behavior, to have several and looked the conceptual way at political that the inadequacies attitudes, interrelationships political in the way that social scientists have looked at political attitudes, political beliefs, political be avior, d t e w y hat e interrelat n h ps between these concepts have been viewed. One set of these difficulties derives from our confusion of civic myth and empirical reality. Present in contemporary American society is the myth of the "informed citizen." The "informed citizen" takes an interest in political matters, thinks about and discusses politics with his neighbors, weighs all sides of all issues, and takes appropriate political action in pursuit of his rational self-interest. Research into the substance of this myth shows slight empirical foundation upon which a conception of the "informed citizen" might rest. Some scholars have reacted to such findings by suggesting that since this assumption of democratic theory is incorrect the theory is in need of revision.1 Other scholars have responded by asserting that we must find ways to make this myth a reality.2 In later studies the problem has been recast in terms of the development of political belief structures in ordinary citizens. Such studies have focused on the ability of citizens to recognize and be informed about public policy questions; and on their ability to see some relationship between a political action that they take (for example, voting) and the political outcome that they wish to achieve. Large numbers of people show by questions on policy issues that they cannot link the policy outcome that they desire with the stands of the public officials that they support. Philip Converse has shown, in a very extensive and competent discussion, that the great mass of people cannot recognize many policy issues, do not have a clear position of their own, cannot link a stand on one policy with stands on other policies, and cannot link their policy stands to appropriate political actions that will help to realize them.3 He finds by a very broad defini-

Moral Problems in Contemporary Society

Abstract: The aim of this course is to introduce students to a variety of controversial moral issues in contemporary society. In particular, students will be encouraged to carefully examine the philosophical arguments that arise in debates surrounding these controversial issues. The moral problems we will address in the course involve complex and often highly sensitive questions. The goal is to enable students to thoughtfully engage this subject matter and to learn how to articulate their opinions in the most persuasive way possible. The issues we will address in the course include the following: the ethical treatment of non-human animals, the basis for our obligation to protect the environment, the duty to help alleviate global poverty, the moral status of abortion, the moral status of pornography and the prospect of licencing parents. Class participation will be strongly encouraged in order to generate thoughtful discussion of the philosophical arguments proposed in the readings and their application to current events.

Law as a Tool of Directed Social Change: A Framework for Policy-Making

Abstract: : The document is concerned with the use of law as a tool of directed social change which is widespread in all contemporary societies whether underdeveloped or post-industrial, democratic or totalitarian. (Author)

Muslim Women and Sharia Implementation in Northern Nigeria: An Overview of Fomwan

Abstract: The status of Muslim women in the contemporary society has generated a lot of controversies and still generates serious debates and discussions in scholarly circle. Most scholars are of the views that Muslim women were subjugated, oppressed, and confined to domestic life that excludes their participation outside the home. In the wake of controversial implementation of Sharia (Islamic law) in the governance of some states, the Federation of Muslim Women Association of Nigeria (FOMWAN) served as an agency through which Muslim women speak as well as demonstrate that the implementation of Sharia is the greatest weapon against male domination. This paper examined the role of the FOMWAN in challenging the patriarchal ideology that is deeply rooted in the society. The paper argued that the activism of the organization was instrumental in the enlightenment and education of women especially on their rights. As such Muslim women of many different levels of educational attainment have become increasingly active in the organized articulation and pursuit of their interests and their rights under Islamic law. Keywords : Islam, Women, Right, Sharia, FOMWAN

The Art of Measuring the Arts.

Abstract: The transition to postindustrialism is marked by increasing political concern for the quality of life. The arts, an important determinant of the quality of life, are af fected by this transition in the following ways: growth of mass participation in cultural activities; elaboration of the institu tional framework of the arts; formation of a "culture lobby"; and politicalization. Decision-makers in government, busi ness, research, and education must begin to take into account, as one entry in their cost-benefit ledgers, the cultural conse quences of their actions. A cultural data system is needed to provide information for rational policy-making in the cultural field and to assist those outside the field in under standing their impact on it. A tentative model is constructed to facilitate the monitoring of qualitative, as well as quantita tive, changes in the arts in contemporary society. Fifteen variables are suggested, which, taken together, comprise an index of the state of health of a nation's culture. ...

Emerging Blackness in a White Research World

Abstract: The research methodology of behavioral science is, in part, a reflection of the social forces of our time. It is therefore not surprising that the methodological literature increasingly contains reactions against and challenges to research studies of social irrelevance, research methods which treat human beings impersonally and mechanistically, and research findings which are impotent in terms of improving or changing the status quo. These pressures toward increased relevance, humanism, and action are also major themes underlying some of the emerging values of contemporary society. The focus of the present study is precisely upon this sort of changing and developing research methodology which is embedded in an intricate network of personal, group, and organizational transactions. The quality and force of these transactions, in turn, is affected by major emerging social issues, and by institutions which themselves are undergoing rapid change.

The Living Wage in Australia: The Role of Government

Abstract: In contemporary societies the obligation to exercise some control of national economic and social affairs is judged to be the natural order of things. In the more advanced countries, the government inter venes to control the many divergent forces in the process of industriali sation, whilst in those at earlier stages of modernisation, the State's role is to somehow gear society up to a higher standard of living?and fast. In the nineteenth century, things were very different. Far more, individualism was the natural order of things. State intervention in anything other than law and order, and defence, was anathema to the leading power groups in society. Accordingly, governments were allowed to function only on the periphery of economic and social matters, venturing nearer the centre only where it suited the major political pressure groups ascendant at the time. There were exceptions, of course. The State was actively interventionist in Japan, for example, but as a generality we can hold that government intervention was just not wanted, and mostly was not forthcoming. Nineteenth-century Australia was betwixt and between. In the settlement years, government regulation and control of most aspects of economic and social life were vital for survival. Perhaps the experi ence of these formative years bit deeply into the character of both contemporaries and succeeding generations of Australians. It is possibly more true than false that once having 'taken off' in the social and institutional sense, private institutional control measures supplanted those of the state. Yet equally, it may be more true than false that the deeply rooted inclination to look to the State for help in difficult times was not dead but dormant.

Some Notes on Reality-Orientation in Contemporary Societies

Abstract: Alfred Schutz was not a political scientist in the conventional sense of the term, nor a political writer, stating his positions to the varying policy problems of his time. Yet his general social theory and philosophy, a body of thought on which he was working with persevering consistency throughout his entire scholarly life, contains at its core conceptions and categories that are eminently applicable to an analysis of the human polity, and which he himself on several occasions in fact applied to such an analysis.1

Social and Religious Aspects of Royal Power in Medieval Burma

Abstract: It is with the social and religious aspects surrounding kingship rather than the monarchy's own political structure that this study is mainly concerned. Kyansittha emphasised certain legendary aspects of his origins and by examining these, as they appeared in his inscriptions, it is possible to explore their wider significance for his contemporary society, and to make some deductions about the nature of that society and its relations with the court. In approaching these questions chiefly through the medium of the inscriptions, it may be possible to reduce the danger of viewing them by the standards of a different age and a different society. This danger is, however, very difficult to avoid when one is dealing, as here, with a society whose sense of time and causal relations is as fluid as the medieval Burmese. Rituals, names and events constantly refer to the past and to the future in order to emphasize their solemn importance for contemporary society. One vehicle for this was the Buddhist cycle of birth and rebirth; another was Kyansittha's skill in bringing together major symbols of former empires, or earlier religious cults, into a new synthesis which was subservient to the Buddha but paid due respect to old and disparate loyalties.