Suchergebnisse

Replies to Michael Rustin's response -- A New Social Evolutionism, NLR 234 -- to the author's Treatise on Social Theory. Reviews and assesses various addresses presented to scholarly societies dealing with the book's subject matter, implications of the "neo-Darwinian" paradigm for evolutionary sociology being proposed, differences with Rustin over methods and values, matters of continuity and rupture, and the new microsociology. Concludes by commenting on the scientific and activist role of the sociologist as scholar, suggesting a more modest scientific and cultural role than that of cultural or political prophet. R. Rodriguez

After a brief review of some aspects of current evolutionary theory which bear on the explanation of human social behaviour, the question is raised whether a recognizably neo-Darwinian research programme could be designed for sociology on the basis that social change is seen as a process analogous but not reducible to natural selection. Some implications of such a programme are outlined and the strength of the objections likely to be raised against it assessed. In conclusion, the potential value of the paradigm is illustrated by reference to current debates about the incidence of lethal violence in human societies.

Circumstances responsible for capitalism's emergence as the prevailing mode of production or failure to become the predominant mode of production within various historical societies are investigated. It is contended that the capitalist mode of production is not necessarily affiliated with particular modes of coercion or persuasion; although the theory of social selection recognizes different manifestations of capitalist production in these historical societies, it is stressed that such transitions to capitalism possess commonalties, eg, birth & mortality rates of the laborers & comparative advantages provided by different actors. Aspects of ancient Roman, colonial Southern US, & colonial African society that obstructed or completely prevented the establishment of wage-labor systems, & thus capitalist modes of production, in those historical societies are highlighted; in addition, conditions that facilitated the growth of capitalist production in the colonial Northern US region are highlighted. Despite the overthrow of socialist in the former USSR, it is stressed that Russia's industrial history is resistant to the full implementation of free market wage-labor, thereby challenging the position that post-Soviet Russia will adopt a capitalist mode of production. It is concluded that capitalism does not necessarily have to triumph as the favored mode of production in all societies. J. W. Parker

The statistics of union density in Britain are throughly documented and there is little disagreement about the overall pattern across British industry between the turn of the century and the present day. However, discussion of their significance has largely been dominated by the two apparently incompatible approaches of the `Marxian' and `Industrial Relations' schools. In this article, it is argued that an interpretation derived from the theory of social selection can reconcile what is valid in these two approaches and thereby suggest a more satisfactory explanation than either of the reported pattern of variation, both over time and across different sectors of the economy. In conclusion, some wider implications are discussed which bear on recent debates over the class position of white-collar employees.

If `class' is defined in terms of the economic power (or lack of it) attaching to different roles through their relation to the processes of production, distribution and exchange, then the number of classes in a society is a function of the number of dividing-lines in its social space which can be so drawn as to mark qualitative differences between sets of similarly positioned roles. These differences are defined neither by income nor by employment status as such, but by one or more of the three functionally equivalent criteria of ownership, control and marketability. From this approach, it follows that the number of classes in contemporary British society is seven; and although this schema poses (like any other) a number of practical difficulties in assigning the incumbents of particular roles to their appropriate classes, it can help to clarify, and perhaps to resolve, several problems in current stratification research.

The plurals in my title carry two implications, neither of which I take to be controversial, if they ever were: first, that there is more than one kind of "original" state; second, that there is more than one way in which states originate. There is, admittedly, continuing controversy over the definition of "state." But for the purposes of this article, I assume that there are four necessary and jointly sufficient conditions for the emergence of a state from nonstate or stateless forms of social organization: specialization of governmental roles; centralization of enforceable authority; permanence, or at least more than ephemeral stability, of structure; and emancipation from real or fictive kinship as the basis of relations between the occupants of governmental roles and those whom they govern. All four admit of differences of degree. But they furnish an adequate framework within which the different processes by which different states have come into being can be analyzed and compared.

The concern is with the relations between ethnic & racial groups to classes on the one hand, & deference groups & pol'al groups on the other. 4 aspects are considered important: (1) the connection between soc prestige & pol'al power; (2) the nature of membership group consciousness & the kind of sense of relative deprivation to which restricted mobility gives rise; (3) the visibility of ethnic diff's & the consequent practicability of 'passing' if so desired; (4) the "standards of purity & pollution in terms of which deference groups may be ranked" (ie, the 'religious value-ordering of status in society'). While these aspects, as other concepts used in the study of race & soc stratification, have limits, they do bring out how the processes whereby ethnic group membership either becomes, or ceases to become, signif for class, deference group, & pol'al group membership, can best be identified. 3 examples are used to illustrate this: (a) Hispanic Amer slavery; (b) the Jews in England from the 1870's to 1914; & (c) the French Canadians. They show the wide range of situations in which stratification is to a greater or lesser degree a function of race relations. Adequate explanations of any particular case must be an interdisciplinary exercise based on a particular context. M. Maxfield.

In this volume, Mr Runciman has selected extracts, from Max Weber's writings which reflect the full range of his major concerns: the nature of domination in human society, the role of ideas in history, the social determinants of religion, the origin and impact of industrial capitalism and the scope and limits of social science itself. He has also included some shorter extracts from Weber's less familiar writings on such diverse topics as the stock exchange and the history of the piano.