Suchergebnisse

Thinking about social change in America -- Political participation -- Civic participation -- Religious participation -- Connections in the workplace -- Informal social connections -- Altruism, volunteering, and philanthropy -- Reciprocity, honesty, and trust -- Against the tide? : small groups, social movements, and the Net -- Pressures of time and money -- Mobility and sprawl -- Technology and mass media -- From generation to generation -- What killed civic engagement? : summing up -- Education and children's welfare -- Safe and productive neighborhoods -- Economic prosperity -- Health and happiness -- Democracy -- The dark side of social capital -- Lessons of history : the Gilded Age and the Progressive Era -- Toward an agenda for social capitalists.

"A groundbreaking examination of the growing inequality gap from the bestselling author of Bowling Alone: why fewer Americans today have the opportunity for upward mobility. It's the American dream: get a good education, work hard, buy a house, and achieve prosperity and success. This is the America we believe in--a nation of opportunity, constrained only by ability and effort. But during the last twenty-five years we have seen a disturbing "opportunity gap" emerge. Americans have always believed in equality of opportunity, the idea that all kids, regardless of their family background, should have a decent chance to improve their lot in life. Now, this central tenet of the American dream seems no longer true or at the least, much less true than it was. Robert Putnam--about whom The Economist said, "his scholarship is wide-ranging, his intelligence luminous, his tone modest, his prose unpretentious and frequently funny"--offers a personal but also authoritative look at this new American crisis. Putnam begins with his high school class of 1959 in Port Clinton, Ohio. By and large the vast majority of those students--"our kids"--went on to lives better than those of their parents. But their children and grandchildren have had harder lives amid diminishing prospects. Putnam tells the tale of lessening opportunity through poignant life stories of rich and poor kids from cities and suburbs across the country, drawing on a formidable body of research done especially for this book. Our Kids is a rare combination of individual testimony and rigorous evidence. Putnam provides a disturbing account of the American dream that should initiate a deep examination of the future of our country"--

Introduction Robert D. Putnam and Kristin A. Goss -- Great Britain: the role of government and the distribution of social capital Peter A. Hall -- United States: bridging the privileged and the marginalized? Robert Wuthnow -- United States: from membership to advocacy Theda Skocpol -- France: old and new civic and social ties in France Jean-Pierre Worms -- Decline of social capital?: the German case Claus Offe and Susanne Fuchs -- From civil war to civil society: social capital in Spain from the 1930s to the 1990s Victor Pérez-Díaz -- Sweden: social capital in the social democratic state Bo Rothstein -- Australia: making the lucky country Eva Cox -- Broadening the basis of social capital in Japan Takashi Inoguchi -- Conclusion Robert D. Putnam

Robert Putnam hatte 1995 mit seinem Aufsatz "Bowling Alone" und seiner umfassenden Studie gleichen Titels im Sommer 2000 für Furore gesorgt, in denen er einen Verlust der gesellschaftlichen Bindekräfte und den Niedergang des bürgerschaftlichen Engagements, kurz: ein Schwinden des Sozialkapitals in den USA konstatierte. Ein alarmierender Befund, denn Amerika hatte sich stets viel auf seine Zivilgesellschaft eingebildet: "The best government is the one that governs less." Sowohl Bill Clinton als auch George W. Bush erkannten die Tragweite von Putnams Arbeit und eilten sich, ihn zu ihrem Berater zu machen. In dem Maße, wie die Bedeutung der Zivilgesellschaft auch für Deutschland erkannt wird, rücken Putnams Thesen und Erkenntnisse hierzulande in den Blick der Öffentlichkeit. Der Bundestag lud Putnam ein, über die Zukunft des bürgerschaftlichen Engagements zu referieren; Frankfurter Allgemeine, Süddeutsche Zeitung und Financial Times Deutschland veröffentlichten längere Portraits. Mit "Gesellschaft und Gemeinsinn" blickt Putnam über den Tellerrand der USA hinaus: Das Buch untersucht Möglichkeiten und Grenzen der Zivilgesellschaft in acht Ländern, darunter auch der Bundesrepublik.

Ethnic diversity is increasing in most advanced countries, driven mostly by sharp increases in immigration. In the long run immigration and diversity are likely to have important cultural, economic, fiscal, and developmental benefits. In the short run, however, immigration and ethnic diversity tend to reduce social solidarity and social capital. New evidence from the US suggests that in ethnically diverse neighbourhoods residents of all races tend to 'hunker down'. Trust (even of one's own race) is lower, altruism and community cooperation rarer, friends fewer. In the long run, however, successful immigrant societies have overcome such fragmentation by creating new, cross‐cutting forms of social solidarity and more encompassing identities. Illustrations of becoming comfortable with diversity are drawn from the US military, religious institutions, and earlier waves of American immigration.

Contends that political science must have a greater public presence, arguing that this has been a long-standing goal of the discipline, but one that has lost salience. It is noted that those who advocate most strongly the public responsibilities of political science have been the most vociferous critics of the discipline's scientific aspirations -- & vice versa. In addition, skeptical attitudes among leading scholars have inhibited political science's contributions to public life. How to foster a more engaged political science is considered. 21 References. J. Zendejas