Suchergebnisse

Chinese local officials frequently employ relational repression to demobilize protesters. When popular action occurs, they investigate activists' social ties, locate individuals who might be willing to help stop the protest, assemble a work team and dispatch it to conduct thought work. Work team members are then expected to use their personal influence to persuade relatives, friends and fellow townspeople to stand down. Those who fail are subject to punishment, including suspension of salary, removal from office and prosecution. Relational repression sometimes works. When local authorities have considerable say over work team members and bonds with protesters are strong, relational repression can help demobilize protesters and halt popular action. Even if relational repression does not end a protest entirely, it can limit its length and scope by reducing tension at times of high strain and providing a channel for negotiation. Often, however, as in a 2005 environmental protest in Zhejiang, insufficiently tight ties and limited concern about consequences creates a commitment deficit, partly because thought workers recognize their ineffectiveness with many protesters and partly because they anticipate little or no punishment for failing to demobilize anyone other than a close relative. The practice and effectiveness of relational, "soft" repression in China casts light on how social ties can demobilize as well as mobilize contention and ways in which state and social power can be combined to serve state ends. (China Q/GIGA)

AbstractChinese local officials frequently employ relational repression to demobilize protesters. When popular action occurs, they investigate activists' social ties, locate individuals who might be willing to help stop the protest, assemble a work team and dispatch it to conduct thought work. Work team members are then expected to use their personal influence to persuade relatives, friends and fellow townspeople to stand down. Those who fail are subject to punishment, including suspension of salary, removal from office and prosecution. Relational repression sometimes works. When local authorities have considerable say over work team members and bonds with protesters are strong, relational repression can help demobilize protesters and halt popular action. Even if relational repression does not end a protest entirely, it can limit its length and scope by reducing tension at times of high strain and providing a channel for negotiation. Often, however, as in a 2005 environmental protest in Zhejiang, insufficiently tight ties and limited concern about consequences creates a commitment deficit, partly because thought workers recognize their ineffectiveness with many protesters and partly because they anticipate little or no punishment for failing to demobilize anyone other than a close relative. The practice and effectiveness of relational, "soft" repression in China casts light on how social ties can demobilize as well as mobilize contention and ways in which state and social power can be combined to serve state ends.

Some argue that use of the Internet tends to pull people's interests away from their local area and weaken community ties (e.g., Kraut et al., 1998). Others argue that the Internet is frequently used to strengthen local ties, and is becoming a tool for helping communities organize to achieve local interests (Hampton and Wellman, 2003). Our results from a 2005 random sample mail survey of 1,315 households in a rural region of the Western United States suggest that increased Internet usage is positively related to nominal and active levels of community participation while at the same time supporting affective networks outside the local area. The location of these communities in a rural region of the West and their substantial distance from a larger population concentration provide the opportunity to draw implications for community development in the Information age and address theoretical concerns about the effects of information technologies on communities of place and local social capital.

Diasporans as transnational brokers : a theory of homeland investment -- Research design and new firm-level data -- Measuring firms? : social connectedness -- How do diaspora-affiliated firms use social networks? -- The development impact of diaspora-affiliated firms

Sociological research has documented myriad associations between individuals' overall social connectedness and health but rarely considers the shorter-term dynamics of social life that may underlie these associations. The authors examine how being with others ("social accompaniment") is associated with momentary experiences of symptoms, drawing smartphone-based ecological momentary assessments ( n = 12,760) collected from 342 older adults from the Chicago Health and Activity Space in Real-Time study. The authors find that patterns of social accompaniment are distinct from global measures of social integration such as network size. Older adults who are in the company of friends or neighbors are significantly less likely to experience momentary fatigue and stress, even after accounting for global measures of social integration. These results suggest that social accompaniment has unique implications for short-term health outcomes. New theoretical perspectives and empirical analyses are needed to better understand the dynamic nature of everyday social accompaniment and its longer-term implications for well-being.