Suchergebnisse

Cover -- Title -- Copyright -- Original Title -- Original Copyright -- CONTENTS -- INTRODUCTION -- 1 LIBERTY AND EQUALITY -- 2 MARKET SOCIALISM A basis for socialist renewal? -- 3 MONETARY POLICY AND INTERNATIONAL FINANCE -- 4 THE REFORM OF SECONDARY EDUCATION -- 5 PRIVATISATION AND THE WELFARE STATE -- 6 RACISM AND THE RIGHT -- 7 DEMOCRACY Socialism's best reply to the right -- References -- Index

1. Liberty and equality / Barry Hindess -- 2. Market socialism : a basis for socialist renewal? / Jim Tomlinson -- 3. Monetary policy and international finance / Grahame Thompson -- 4. The reform of secondary education / Jack Demaine -- 5. Privatisation and the welfare state / Elim Papadakis -- 6. Racism and the right / Juliet Cook and Julian Clarke -- 7. Democracy : socialism's best reply to the right / Paul Hirst.

Choice, Rationality and Social Theory is a powerful rebuttal of the remarkably influential theories underlying ''rational choice analysis''. Rational choice analysis maintains that social life is principally to be explained as the outcome of rational choices on the part of individual actors. Adherents of this view include not only philosophers, political scientists and sociologists, but also prominent politicians in Western governments - notably of the United Kingdom and the United States. Rational choice analysis is said to be rigorous, capable of great technical sophistication, and able to g

This new textbook for students of social theory considers the role of public intervention in social and economic processes. It is a clear, critical discussion of different theoretical and political perspectives on social policy. Barry Hindess begins with the 'consensus' view, shared by senior politicians, civil servants, and academics throughout much of the postwar period. This view depends on two beliefs: in the capacity of government to manage the economy; and in the development of a qualitatively new relationship between the state and the population. The first is discussed in relation to Crosland's The Future of Socialism, and the second in relation to Marshall's conception of citizenship and Titmuss's account of social policy. The consensus view generated serious objections, and Hindess examines two in particular. One is the argument that the view itself causes a destructive, competitive struggle between sectional interests for state intervention in their favour. The other, from the left, is that what Tawney called 'the strategy of equality' has failed, and that a more radical attack on inequality is required. The remaining section looks at the Marxist and liberal alternatives to the consensus view. In conclusion, the author discusses firstly the essentialism of the market both in consensus and (in very different ways) in liberal and Marxist thought; and secondly the place of principles such as freedom and equality in political discussion and the analysis of social conditions. He shows that market and plan are not necessarily incompatible. Freedom, Equality, and the Market, with its careful assessment of the key texts, will be important reading for undergraduate students of sociology and social policy.

The core of Paul Muldoon's "Contesting Australian Asylum Policy" is a subtle and sophisticated reading of Plato's tale of the last days of Socrates which he uses it to throw light on the dilemma facing Australians who despair of their government's asylum-seeker policy. While I do not dispute his commentary on Socrates, its bearing on the position of those who reject Australia's asylum-seeker policies is less straightforward than Muldoon suggests. I argue firstly, that the parallel he draws between the situations of the latter and Plato's Socrates is too big a stretch, and secondly, more specifically that, while both the Athens of Plato's Socrates and contemporary Australia present their citizens with dilemmas of democratic citizenship, the two dilemmas are so radically distinct as to render problematic any attempt to draw lessons for one from the other.