Showing papers on "Social theory published in 2009"

The Foundations of Social Theory

Abstract: This course will deal with the foundations of social theory, starting with the French and Scottish Enlightenments and the beginnings of a specifically sociological worldview. We will then move on to Durkheim’s organic view of society, to Marx’s dialectical materialism, finishing with Weber’s Verstehen sociology and ideal types of authority. We’ll try to understand their theories not just as historical relics, but as living sets of ideas relevant to contemporary social issues. Class attendance and participation will be strongly encouraged, as will a critical engagement with the ideas presented in the class.

Institutions and Social Conflict

Abstract: Many of the fundamental questions in social science entail an examination of the role played by social institutions. Why do we have so many social institutions? Why do they take one form in one society and quite different ones in others? In what ways do these institutions develop? When and why do they change? Institutions and Social Conflict addresses these questions in two ways. First it offers a thorough critique of a wide range of theories of institutional change, from the classical accounts of Smith, Hume, Marx and Weber to the contemporary approaches of evolutionary theory, the theory of social conventions and the new institutionalism. Secondly, it develops a new theory of institutional change that emphasises the distributional consequences of social institutions. The emergence of institutions is explained as a by-product of distributional conflict in which asymmetries of power in a society generate institutional solutions to conflicts.

Culture and Agency: The Place of Culture in Social Theory

Abstract: People are inescapably shaped by the culture in which they live, while culture itself is made and remade by people. Human beings in their daily lives feel a genuine freedom of thought and belief, yet this is unavoidably constrained by cultural limitations--such as those imposed by the language spoken, the knowledge developed and the information available at any time. In this book, Margaret Archer provides an analysis of the nature and stringency of cultural constraints, and the conditions and degrees of cultural freedom, and offers a radical new explanation of the tension between them. She suggests that the "problem of culture and agency" directly parallels the "problem of structure and agency," and that both problems can be solved by using the same analytical framework. She therefore paves the way toward the theoretical unification of the structural and cultural fields.

Food and eating as social practice--understanding eating patterns as social phenomena and implications for public health.

Abstract: Globally, public health agencies recognise obesity trends among populations as a priority. Explanations for population obesity patterns are linked to obesogenic environments and societal trends which encourage patterns of overeating and little physical activity. However, obesity prevention and nutrition intervention focus predominantly on changing individual level eating behaviours. Disappointingly, behaviour-based nutrition education approaches to changing population eating patterns have met with limited success. Sociological perspectives propose that underlying social relations can help explain collective food and eating patterns, and suggest an analysis of the sociocultural context for understanding population eating patterns. We propose a theoretical framework for the examination of eating patterns as social phenomena. Giddens' structuration theory, in particular his concept of social practices understood as an interplay of 'agency' and 'social structure' (rules and resources), is used to study food choice patterns. We discuss the application of these concepts for understanding routine food choice practices of families, elaborating how rules and resources configure the enabling or constraining conditions under which actors make food choices. The framework assists in characterising how social structural properties are integral to food choice practices, and could direct attention to these when considering nutrition interventions aimed at changing population eating patterns.

Globalization and Inequalities: Complexity and Contested Modernities

Abstract: 1. Introduction: Progress and modernities What is Progress? More money or longer life? Progress as a contested project Economic development Equality Human Rights Human development, well-being and capabilities Competing projects: neoliberalism and social democracy Contesting conceptions of progress Multiple Complex Inequalities Multiple and intersecting inequalities Complex inequalities: difference, inequality and progress Modernity? Postmodernity? Not yet Modern? Varieties of Modernity? Modernity or postmodernity? Late, second or liquid modernity? Multiple modernities? Not yet modern? Varieties of modernity Defining modernity Globalization Globalization as the erosion of distinctive and separate societies Resistant to globalization Already global Coevolution of global processes with trajectories of development Implications of globalization for social theory Complexity Theory 2. Theorising multiple social systems Multiple Inequalities and Intersectionality Regimes and Domains System and Its Environment: Over-Lapping, Non-Saturating, Non-Nested Systems Societalisation not Societies Emergence and Projects Bodies, Technologies and the Social Path Dependency Co-evolution of Complex Adaptive Systems in Changing Fitness Landscapes 3. Economies Redefining the Economy Domestic Labour as Labour State Welfare as part of the Economy What are Economic Inequalities? What is Progress in the Economy? From Pre-Modern to Modern: The Second Great Transformation Global Processes and Economic Inequalities What global processes? Country Processes Varieties of Political Economy Varieties of employment relations Varieties of Welfare Provision Critical turning points into varieties of political economy 4. Polities Reconceptualising Types of Polities States Nations Nation-States? Organised religions Empires Hegemon Global political institutions Polities Overlap and do not Politically Saturate a Territory Democracy Democracy and modernity Redefining democracy The development of democracy 5. Violence Developing the Ontology of Violence Modernity and Violence Path Dependency in Trajections of Violence Global 6. Civil societies Theorising Civil Society Modernity and Civil Society Civil Society Projects Global Civil Societies and Waves Examples of waves 7. Regimes of complex inequality Beyond Class Regimes Gender Regimes Ethnic Regimes Further Regimes of Complex Inequalities Disability Sexual orientation Intersecting Regimes of Complex Inequality 8. Varieties of modernity Neoliberal and Social Democratic Varieties of Modernity Path Dependency at the Economy/Polity Nexus? Welfare provision Conclusions on welfare Employment regulation Inequality Conclusions on political economy Path Dependency at the Violence Nexus Modernity and path dependency Indicators Development, inequality and violence Gendered violence Path dependency of the violence nexus in OECD countries Violence, economic inequality and the polity/economy nexus Conclusions on violence Gender Regime Public and domestic gender regimes Development and the public gender regime Domestic and public gender regimes and gender inequality Varieties of public gender regimes Democracy and Inequality 9. Measuring progress Economic Development Equality Economic inequality Global economic inequality Beyond the household Economic inequalities and flows Economic inequalities in summary Inequalities in non-economic domains Democracy Human Rights Human Development, Well-Being and Capabilities Key Indicator Sets: What Indicators What Underlying Concepts of Progress? Extending the Frameworks and Indicators of Progress: Where do Environmental Sustainability and Violence Fit? Environmental sustainability Violence Achievement of Visions of Progress: Comparing Neoliberalism and Social Democracy Economic development: neoliberalism vs. social democracy Equality: neoliberalism vs. social democracy Human rights: neoliberalism vs. social democracy Human development, well-being and capabilities: neoliberalism vs. social democracy Trade offs or complementary? 10. Comparative paths through modernity: neoliberalism and social democracy Political Economy Violence Gender Transformations: The Emergence of Employed Women as the New Champions of Social Democracy Employed women as the new champions of social democracy Dampeners and Catalysts of Economic Growth: War and Gender Regime Transformations Conclusions 11. Contested futures Financial and Economic Crisis 2007-9 Contesting Hegemons and the Future of the World 12. Conclusions The Challenge of Complex Inequalities and Globalization to Social Theory

A social theory of learning

Abstract: A social theory of learning integrate the components necessary to characterize social participation as a process of learning and of knowing. These components include the following: meaning, practice, community, and identity. There are many different kinds of learning theory. Each emphasizes different aspects of learning, and each is therefore useful for different purposes. To some extent these differences in emphasis reflect a deliberate focus on a slice of the multidimensional problem of learning, and to some extent they reflect more fundamental differences in assumptions about the nature of knowledge, knowing, and knowers, and consequently about what matters in learning. The primary focus of this theory is on learning as social participation. Participation refers not just to local events of engagement in certain activities with certain people, but to a more encompassing process of being active participants in the practices of social communities and constructing identities in relation to these communities.

The Cosmopolitan Imagination: The Renewal of Critical Social Theory

Abstract: Gerard Delanty provides a comprehensive assessment of the idea of cosmopolitanism in social and political thought which links cosmopolitan theory with critical social theory. He argues that cosmopolitanism has a critical dimension which offers a solution to one of the weaknesses in the critical theory tradition: failure to respond to the challenges of globalization and intercultural communication. Critical cosmopolitanism, he proposes, is an approach that is not only relevant to social scientific analysis but also normatively grounded in a critical attitude. Delanty's argument for a critical, sociologically oriented cosmopolitanism aims to avoid, on the one hand, purely normative conceptions of cosmopolitanism and, on the other, approaches that reduce cosmopolitanism to the empirical expression of diversity. He attempts to take cosmopolitan theory beyond the largely Western context with which it has generally been associated, claiming that cosmopolitan analysis must now take into account non-Western expressions of cosmopolitanism.

How Modernity Forgets

Abstract: Why are we sometimes unable to remember events, places and objects? This concise overview explores the concept of 'forgetting', and how modern society affects our ability to remember things. It takes ideas from Francis Yates classic work, The Art of Memory, which viewed memory as being dependent on stability, and argues that today's world is full of change, making 'forgetting' characteristic of contemporary society. We live our lives at great speed; cities have become so enormous that they are unmemorable; consumerism has become disconnected from the labour process; urban architecture has a short life-span; and social relationships are less clearly defined - all of which has eroded the foundations on which we build and share our memories. Providing a profound insight into the effects of modern society, this book is a must-read for anthropologists, sociologists, psychologists and philosophers, as well as anyone interested in social theory and the contemporary western world.

Being part of the peer group: a literature study focusing on the social dimension of inclusion in education

Abstract: Maximizing the interaction between pupils with and without special needs is generally considered an important aspect of inclusion. However, it is frequently questioned whether pupils with special educational needs (SEN) in regular classrooms have interactions and friendships with their peers. In order to be able to evaluate these relationships, it is necessary to clarify concepts such as social participation, social integration and social inclusion. At the moment there is much ambiguity regarding these concepts. This article aims to elucidate on these concepts and reveal its characteristic themes. An analysis of literature was carried out to identify these concepts. In the final analysis, 62 articles were included. This analysis showed that the concept social integration and the related concepts of social inclusion and social participation are often described inaccurately, with only a few researchers providing explicit definitions or descriptions. In the majority of articles, implicit descriptions can be derived from instruments used to measure social integration, social inclusion or social participation: it is apparent there is much overlap among the use of concepts by researchers. Based on the analysis of the 62 articles, it can be concluded that the concepts social integration, social inclusion and social participation are used as synonyms. In our opinion, social participation is the most suitable concept. The analysis of literature reveals four key themes central to all three concepts: friendships/relationships, interactions/contacts, perception of the pupil with SEN and acceptance by classmates.

Understanding 'marginal' perspectives: Towards a social theory of resilience

Abstract: This article contributes to a social theory of resilience. It critiques aspects of developmental and individual-level analyses in the resilience literature, arguing for the significance of social identities and collective experience to resilience. Drawing on a study of the experiences of young people from an inner-city public housing estate in Sydney, key themes of the young people’s accounts engage with both classic and constructivist perspectives. Resistance based resilience is claimed to indicate the social constitution of individuals in local relations, suggesting that interventions for resilience building need to recognize the embeddedness of resilience in social inequities, social processes and the differentiated societal and ideological expectations of young people. How resilience is conceptualized is central to resilience building interventions. Here the case is put for the importance of resources to support and strengthen the resilience of marginalized youth.

Researching Strategy Practices: A Genealogical Social Theory Perspective

Abstract: This paper explores the meaning and significance of the term `social practice' and its relation to strategy-as-practice research from the perspective of social theory. Although our remarks are also applicable to other practice-based discussions in management, we discuss strategy practices as a case in point and thus contribute to the strategy-as-practice literature in three ways. First, instead of simply accepting the existence of a unified `practice theory', we outline a genealogical analysis revealing the historical-contingent conditions of its creation. This analysis shows that social practices in general and strategy practices in particular can be approached from either a neo-structuralist and/or neo-interpretative perspective. Second, based on this theoretical argument, we discuss different characteristics of strategy practices and emphasize those aspects not yet fully considered by strategy-as-practice research (e.g. the physical nature of practices). Third, we show that, when studying strategy practices, given an understanding of the alternative theoretical approaches available, the practice of strategy research itself needs to be adjusted so as to accommodate a stronger emphasis on an ethnographic approach that is directed towards uncovering the contextual and hidden characteristics of strategy-making.

Solidarity in Europe: The History of an Idea

Abstract: Introduction: to study the idea of solidarity Part I. Three Traditions of Solidarity: 1. Solidarity in classic social theory 2. Politics: solidarity from Marx to Bernstein 3. Religion: solidarity in Catholicism and Protestantism Part II. The Idea of Solidarity in Politics in Western Europe: 4. European variations of solidarity discourses in social democracy 5. A comparative perspective on social democratic solidarity 6. The great challenger: the Christian democratic idea of solidarity 7. The languages of modern social democratic and Christian democratic solidarity 8. Two excursions: Marxist-Leninist and fascist solidarity Part III. Present Precariousness of Solidarity: 9. Solidarity in modern social philosophy and Christian ethics 10. Epilogue: hope and challenges - individualisation, consumerism and globalisation.

Towards a Theory of Social Practices

Abstract: The notion of social practice and a family of notions akin to it play an essential role in contemporary philosophical reflection, with particular reference to the conceptualisation of historical processes. Stephen Turner's book A Social Theory of Practices (1994) has provided a major challenge to this family of notions, and our purpose is to outline a grounding account of the notion of social practice in the form of an answer to Turner's criticisms. We try to answer three questions: first, if it is necessary to grant a tacit dimension to transmittable habits; second, if and how a tacit dimension of "meaning" could be intersubjectively transmitted; third, what is the possible role of rationality in changing social practices. Our discussion moves from Wittgenstein's argument on rule-following; in its wake we try to examine the nature of habits as a basis for rules and discuss their temporal sedimentation, inertia and modes of intersubjective transmission. In conclusion we support the idea that social practices must rely on a tacit dimension, that their tacit dimension does not represent a hindrance to intersubjective transmission, and that the possible dogmatism of social practices is not due to their "hidden" side, but to their explicit quasi-rational side.

Race, Empire, and the Idea of Human Development

Abstract: In an exciting study of ideas accompanying the rise of the West, Thomas McCarthy analyzes the ideologies of race and empire that were integral to European-American expansion. He highlights the central role that conceptions of human development (civilization, progress, modernization, and the like) played in answering challenges to legitimacy through a hierarchical ordering of difference. Focusing on Kant and natural history in the eighteenth century, Mill and social Darwinism in the nineteenth, and theories of development and modernization in the twentieth, he proposes a critical theory of development which can counter contemporary neoracism and neoimperialism, and can accommodate the multiple modernities now taking shape. Offering an unusual perspective on the past and present of our globalizing world, this book will appeal to scholars and advanced students of philosophy, political theory, the history of ideas, racial and ethnic studies, social theory, and cultural studies.

Who Counts as an American?: The Boundaries of National Identity

Abstract: 1. The need for a social theory of national identity 2. Commitment to the national group 3. The setting of national group boundaries 4. The desire to help the national group 5. Loyalty in the face of criticism 6. Is national identity good or bad? Appendix.

Contextualising the IT artefact: towards a wider research agenda for IS using institutional theory

Abstract: Purpose – This paper sets out to examine the use of institutional theory in information systems research. It also seeks to consider recent debates within information systems, that the field should develop its own social theories. The purpose of the paper is to demonstrate that IS researchers need to engage more fully with the institutional theory literature as the body of work is conceptually rich and is more appropriately used to analyse and understand complex social phenomena.Design/methodology/approach – Reviewing the institutionalist literature from the field of IS, the paper shows that most accounts engage in empirically testing institutionalist concepts, rather than analysing the richness of these concepts to further develop and build the theory.Findings – The paper finds that most institutionalist accounts within information systems research adopt an organisational unit of analysis as opposed to a multi‐level approach which encompasses societal and individual levels. Research further shows more stu...

Social Theory: Twenty Introductory Lectures

Abstract: Introduction 1. What is theory? 2. The classical attempt at synthesis: Talcott Parsons 3. Parsons on the road to normativist functionalism 4. Parsons and the elaboration of normativist functionalism 5. Neo-utilitarianism 6. Interpretive approaches (1): symbolic interactionism 7. Interpretive approaches (2): ethnomethodology 8. Conflict sociology and conflict theory 9. Habermas and critical theory 10. Habermas' 'theory of communicative action' 11. Niklas Luhmann's radicalization of functionalism 12. Anthony Giddens' theory of structuration and the new British sociology of power 13. The renewal of Parsonianism and modernization theory 14. Structuralism and poststructuralism 15. Between structuralism and theory of practice: the cultural sociology of Pierre Bourdieu 16. French anti-structuralists (Cornelius Castoriadis, Alain Touraine and Paul Ricoeur) 17. Feminist social theories 18. A crisis of modernity? New diagnoses (Ulrich Beck, Zygmunt Bauman, Robert Bellah, and the debate between liberals and communitarians) 19. Neopragmatism 20. How things stand Bibliography.

The Relational Ontology of Amartya Sen’s Capability Approach: Incorporating Social and Individual Causes

Abstract: While Sen has written extensively on the social factors of capabilities, the exact nature of these social factors and how they interact to form and influence capabilities is contested and unclear. Consequently, how to coherently integrate social components into capability research remains a concern for those attempting to put the capability approach to practical use. This paper proposes one approach to understanding and integrating the social nature of capabilities. Building upon two recent contributions by Martins, we argue that underpinning Sen’s notion of capabilities is an ontological conception of a relational society. In this perspective, an individual’s capabilities emerge from the combination and interaction of individual‐level capacities and the individual’s relative position vis‐a‐vis social structures that provide reasons and resources for particular behaviors. Crucially, this conception of society is predicated upon a contextual notion of causality that is flexible enough to incorpora...

Theoretical Foundations for Enhancing Social Connectedness in Online Learning Environments

Abstract: Group social structure provides a comfortable and predictable context for interaction in learning environments. Students in face‐to‐face learning environments process social information about others in order to assess traits, predict behaviors, and determine qualifications for assuming particular responsibilities within a group. In online learning environments, however, negotiating social information and maintaining social connectedness can pose challenges for participants. Nonverbal strategies one typically uses for enhancing communication and overcoming ambiguity – such as an approving smile or a questioning brow – must be approached differently while learning online where fewer sensory communication channels are typically available. We present the theoretical foundation for how social information processing and group structure theories may be combined to assist instructional designers in further examining the social system perceived by the online learner. We propose a framework for thinking more system...

Causation in International Relations: Reclaiming Causal Analysis

Abstract: Introduction: the problem of causation and the divided discipline of international relations Part I. The Humean Philosophy of Causation and its Legacies: 1. The Humean philosophy of causation and its legacies in philosophy of science 2. Controversy over causes in the social sciences 3. Humeanism and rationalist causal analysis in international relations 4. Reflectivist and constructivist approaches in international relations: more cases of Humeanism Part II. Rethinking the Concept of Cause: 5. Attempts to move beyond Humeanism: strengths and weaknesses 6. Rethinking causation: towards a deeper and broader concept of cause Part III. Reconfiguring Causal Analysis of World Politics: 7. Expanding horizons in world political causal inquiry 8. Reconceptualising causes, reframing the divided discipline.

Transforming World Politics: From Empire to Multiple Worlds

Abstract: This book provides a critical understanding of contemporary world politics by arguing that the neoliberal approach to international relations seduces many of us into investing our lives in projects of power and alienation. These projects offer few options for emancipation; consequently, many feel they have little choice but to retaliate against violence with more violence. The authors of this pioneering work articulate worldism as an alternative approach to world politics. It intertwines non-Western and Western traditions by drawing on Marxist, postcolonial, feminist and critical security approaches with Greek and Chinese theories of politics, broadly defined. The authors contend that contemporary world politics cannot be understood outside the legacies of these multiple worlds, including axes of power configured by gender, race, class, and nationality, which are themselves linked to earlier histories of colonizations and their contemporary formations. With fiction and poetry as exploratory methods, the authors build on their ‘multiple worlds’ approach to consider different sites of world politics, arguing that a truly emancipatory understanding of world politics requires more than just a shift in ways of thinking; above all, it requires a shift in ways of being. Transforming World Politics will be of vital interest to students and scholars of International Relations, Political Science, Postcolonial Studies, Social Theory, Women's Studies, Asian Studies, European Union and Mediterranean Studies, and Security Studies.

The Body, the Ghetto and the Penal State

Abstract: This article dissects the author’s approach to ethnography, social theory, and the politics of knowledge through a dialogue retracing his intellectual trajectory and the analytic linkages between his inquiries into embodiment, comparative urban marginality and the penal state. It draws out the practical connections and epistemological rationale behind his main research projects, explicates the distinctive ways in which he deploys observational fieldwork in each of them, and examines the roles of intellectuals in advanced society in the era of hegemonic neoliberalism. Rejecting both Humean empiricism and neo-Kantian cognitivism, the author argues for the use of ethnography as an instrument of rupture and construction, the potency of carnal knowledge, the imperative of epistemic reflexivity, and the need to expand textual genres and styles so as to better capture the taste and ache of social action. In the public sphere, he proposes that social science can act as a solvent of doxa and a beacon casting light on latent properties and unnoticed trends in social transformations so as to disrupt and broaden civic debate.

Theorising the Relationship between Major Sport Events and Social Sustainability

Abstract: The triple-bottom line of economic efficiency, environmental integrity and social equity is meant to be used to measure progress towards sustainable development. As major sport events are now used as part of public policy, these events and their legacies have been subjected to related analysis. However, as with more general evaluations, the scrutiny of major events has tended to neglect the social dimension. Major events projects are often justified with reference to their role in addressing urban inequity and promoting collective identities, whilst also criticised for their questionable ethics. This suggests more attention to social sustainability is urgently required. In this paper, the aim is to assess whether major sport events meet the social needs of present and future generations. The intention is not merely to the reveal the social outcomes resulting from previous events, but to review theoretical perspectives through which those effects can be understood. This facilitates understanding of why certain effects occur, rather than merely if they occur.

Standpoint Theories: Productively Controversial

Abstract: The ontology, epistemology, ethics, and political commitments of standpoint theory were transformed in feminists’ appropriation of earlier class analyses in the context of the women’s movements of the 1970s. African-American and other women of color in the United States and women in and from the former European colonies cannot just be added to the feminist standpoint theory developed initially by Western feminists in the context of Western women’s movements. Some of the disputes between standpoint theorists originate in their different disciplinary locations, the distinctive discursive histories and contemporary concerns of their disciplines, and the particular projects they adopt for transforming their own disciplines. Hartsock is interested in political philosophy’s discussions of the role of progressive social movements in transformations of political philosophy and social theory. This chapter argues that the continual renewal of the controversiality of standpoint theory is organically linked to its ever-expanding uses in actual research projects.

The Sociology of the European Union: An Agenda

Abstract: We seek to shape an agenda for the growing interest in using sociological approaches to study the European Union (EU). In order to deepen and broaden the Europeanization agenda, the article points to how sociology can help reveal the ‘social bases’ of European integration (i.e. processes of European Union), as well as identify effects on European society that might reconnect EU studies with key comparative political economy debates about the European ‘varieties of capitalism’ and its models of economy and society. Unfortunately, however, ‘sociological’ approaches towards the EU have mostly been wrongly equated with the ‘constructivist turn’ in EU studies, and its characteristic preference for ‘soft’ qualitative discursive methods and meta-theory. We argue that, rather than turning to culture, identity or social theory for inspiration, an empirical sociological approach to the EU would reintroduce social structural questions of class, inequality, networks and mobility, as well as link up with existing appr...

What Constitutes Good ICTD Research

Abstract: The emerging aeld of research that examines the link between information and communication technology and socioeconomic development (ICTD) has been carried forward by researchers mapping methods from their home disciplines onto this new terrain. With this journal logging six years of history (Best & Bar, 2003) and with the third International Conference on Information and Communication Technologies and Development (Dias et al., 2009) behind us, we have arrived at a point where it is worth taking stock of the distinctive challenges we have encountered as a research community. This article intends to propose some common criteria for identifying high-quality and promising research in the aeld, a signiacant challenge in itself, given the diverse range of disciplines involved—from engineering to public policy, from the social sciences to development theory. The seeds of this article were planted in an exchange on a mailing list between its two authors over what standards were truly applicable across disciplinary and methodological distinctions (Toyama & Burrell, 2008). Despite our initial disagreements, we believe that an understanding of interdisciplinary commonalities and differences will inform how ICTD researchers conduct research, how authors write research papers, how they are reviewed, and how conferences and journals select those for publication. Some of these activities require collaboration or evaluation of work across disciplines, and an explicit recognition of their paradigmatic differences could help build bridges between disciplines by allowing disagreements to remain as such. Given the nature of the topic, some disclaimers are in order. First, we emphasize that the ideas put forth in this article will naturally reoect its authors’ particular educational backgrounds, research experiences, and personal perspectives. Burrell’s formal background is in computer science and sociology; Toyama’s in physics and computer science. Thus, our comments apply primarily to what we believe can be said about the disciplines of engineering (including computer science and the various engineering disciplines), the qualitative social sciences (including some, but not all, of anthropology, sociology, etc.), the quantitative social sciences (including some, but not all, of economics, public health, etc.), and aelds with mixed methodologies drawn from the above (including information science, communications research, etc.). Although we have made an attempt to think through what is important in other disciplines (e.g., social theory, public policy), we refrain from claiming to speak for them. With this in mind, we hope that readers will be persuaded by the arguments we present. As with any aeld of study, what work constitutes ICTD and how quality is judged remain open questions to be determined by the community as a whole. It’s a cause for celebration, on the one hand, that such a varied group of people should unite in the quest to understand how technology inter-

Beyond Communication. A Critical Study of Axel Honneth's Social Philosophy

Abstract: Few thinkers have made such significant contribution to social and political thinking over the last three decades as Axel Honneth. His theory of recognition has rejuvenated the political vocabulary and allowed Critical Theory to move beyond Habermas. Beyond Communication is the first full-scale study of Honneth's work, covering the whole range of his writings, from his first sociological articles to the latest publications. By relocating the theory of recognition within the tradition of European social theory, the book exposes the full depth and breadth of Honneth's philosophical intervention. The book will be an indispensable resource for anyone interested in contemporary philosophy and the social sciences.

Hegemonic and Other Masculinities in Local Social Contexts

Abstract: This article is a theoretical examination of Connell's social theory of gender, discussing how hegemonic, complicit, subordinate, and marginalized masculinities interact and relate to one another in the men's everyday lives in particular social contexts. Connell's theory is articulated in global terms that need to be localized to examine the actual interactions of men with one another. The theory implies a multilevel framework that the authors develop more explicitly. They investigate two interrelated theoretical concerns: (a) inadequately detailed interdependencies between structural, individual, and cultural factors with respect to masculinities, and (b) the lack of contextualization of masculinities in specific relational settings. The authors suggest that theoretical insights gained from social network theory and analysis allow such issues to be addressed and assist in local-level accounts of gendered power relations. The authors conclude by specifying Connell's theory into particular, testable hypoth...

Hegel, Haiti, and Universal History

Abstract: Hegel, Haiti, and Universal History. By Susan Buck-Morss. Pittsburgh: University of Pittsburgh Press, 2009. 151 pages. ISBN 978-0-8229-5978-6. 160 pp. $45.00 cloth. $16.95 paper. Reviewed by Patti M. Marxsen Imagine a crowded courtroom on a hot day. The benches are filled with men and women dressed in what appear to be theatrical costumes: fashions spanning two centuries from European tailoring and taffeta ruffles to splashy sundresses and baseball caps. The galleries above the benches overflow with a less prosperous crowd. Like those down below, they represent all shades of the color spectrum from cafe au kit to ebony, but these observers come dressed in rags. Let's call this the Court of Historical Philosophy or, if you prefer, simply call it Judgment Day. On the witness stand is a somber German philosopher who died in Berlin in 1831. Before he left this world, Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel authored an enormously influential book entitled The Phenomenology of the Mind (1807), in which he introduced a new kind of individual consciousness, of self and other. In reaction to Kant's belief in the concept of absolute truth, Hegel envisioned a necessary struggle of opposition - a dialectic - that was destined to move civilization forward. In Hegel's system of thought, sociopolitical resolutions flow from a rational notion of progress. Inspired by the French Revolution, he believed that solutions could only be formulated by conscious individuals acting as active agents of social change. In more ways than one, Hegel was a man of his time, and philosophy, for him, was a practical matter. Among the topics Hegel treated in Phenomenology, and in his famous lectures at the University of Jena, were the global economy, individual freedom in the industrialized world, the division of labor to achieve efficiency, and the relationship between masters and slaves. His "Master-Slave Dialectic," often translated from the German as "Lordship and Bondage" Herrschaft und Knechtschaft), forms a key section of Phenomenology and stands as cornerstone of Hegel's theory of self-knowledge in a selfconstructed world. Clearly, Hegel was an "outside the box" thinker who argued for a certain kind of humanism. Why, then, do we have him squirming on the witness stand? Enter: Susan Buck-Morss, professor of political philosophy and social theory in the Department of Government at Cornell University, armed with a copy of her latest book, Hegel, Haiti, and Universal History. Like a prosecuting attorney in our imagined courtroom, Buck-Morss has a few pointed questions for Herr Hegel. To begin with, she finds it intriguing that he was creating his theory of history and human ethics as events in Saint-Domingue evolved from the 1791 uprising at Bois Caiman to full-tilt revolution. Having confirmed that Hegel was well aware of these events, given his documented familiarity with the German publication Minerva, in which detailed reports from Haiti were published as early as 1792, Professor Buck-Morss reasons that Haiti's struggle deserves a mention somewhere in Hegel's collected works. She also finds it curious that The Phenomenology of the Mind, a work centered on philosophical questions of human freedom, was published only three years after Haitian independence was declared on January 1, 1804. Finally, she is very nearly stunned that until recently, with the work of Pierre-Franklin Tavares, no historian or philosopher has seemed to notice Hegel's reticence on the subject of brutal slavery in Saint-Domingue and its resolution in the form of the first black republic. "What, then, would account for two centuries of historical oblivion?" she asks, noting that "The Haitian Revolution lies at the crossroads of multiple discourses as a defining moment in world history" and stands as ". . . the crucible, the trial by fire for the ideals of French Enlightenment." We can imagine Hegel, no doubt unaccustomed to such relentless pursuit, sitting speechless in his chair. …