"Outlines in impressive detail the dimensions of women's powerlessness and shows the rich array of strategies women use to survive the oppression of their daily lives." Women's Review of Books "A fine collection. . . . This is a volume every person with interests in the social sciences or Latin America should read." American Anthropologist

Advances in Quality-of-Life Theory and Research is relevant to quality-of-life researchers working in the areas of Social Medicine, Sustainable Development, Social Indicators Research and Health Psychology/Behavioral Medicine.
This volume contains 14 chapters that represent a culmination of programmatic research in the science of quality of life (QOL). Each chapter offers interesting findings in different areas of QOL research and, together, the chapters reflect the very basic premise that QOL research is a broad interdisciplinary topic explored in a multidisciplinary manner. The research methods and conceptual models used by the different authors are exemplary and can induce QOL researchers to conduct future research in QOL in other cultures, geographic areas, and different socio-economic and demographic groups as well as in different QOL domains.

High quality interactions are recognised as fundamental to the achievement of outstanding teaching and learning in the early years. If you are working with children from six months to six years this authoritative new book from leading author Julie Fisher encourages you to reflect deeply on the quality and impact of interactions in your setting. Drawing on research undertaken in baby rooms, nurseries and classrooms over four years the book challenges prevailing orthodoxies and offers specific practical guidance on how to improve the quality of interactions on a day-to-day basis. With its illuminating examples, the book shows how you can best tune into and respond effectively to young children's conversations. It exemplifies how interactions are most effectively sustained and how developing high quality interactions can better scaffold and support children's learning and development. 'Interacting or Interfering?' * Identifies the key components of effective interactions and how implementing these can improve the quality of children's learning * Contains transcripts of interactions from baby rooms through to Year 2 classes which exemplify key messages * Provides prompts you can use to analyse and improve your own practice Written in the author's exceptionally clear and accessible style, this book is indispensable reading for all students and practitioners working and studying in the early years. "There is a tendency for adult talk to dominate nurseries and schools in an attempt to manage, organise and interrogate children's learning; this closes down children's own investigation and capacity for thought. Fisher points out how 'the very act of "being an educator" can sometimes distort the nature of an interaction so much that it inhibits the very learning it is trying to promote'. In this timely, thought-provoking and very readable book she prompts us to think more deeply about interactions and adapt new strategies to encourage all young children to engage in meaningful and enriching talk." TACTYC, March, 2016 "The prompts and points for reflection encourage practitioners to critically consider their role and function, noting where their work is affirmed and where there is scope for further development ... This book is both relevant, though provoking and extremely useful for all involved in early childhood - an excellent tool for professional development." Marion Dowling, Early Education Journal, No 79/ Summer 2016

Zygmunt Bauman is one of the most important contemporary social thinkers. He has changed the way we think about the Holocaust, postmodernity and globalisation. This is the first book to discuss all of Bauman's work, from the first essays in post Stalinist Poland, through to his participation in 1960s Marxist revisionism, and up to the work for which he is well known in the West. Bauman's work is put into its social and historical context, and it is shown why Bauman matters.

All former Soviet Union countries experience their past as a heavy burden. It led to the centralisation of scientific personnel, the separation of research from teaching at universities, and a concentration of certain branches of technology in different parts of the Union. This has given rise to a one-sided technology and science potential which frequently cannot be sufficiently supported due to a lack of adequate finance. Cooperation between the Baltic States themselves is often hampered by an exaggerated sense of national identity, and international cooperation can be made difficult by linguistic problems. A critical issue is finance. The Baltic States themselves are experiencing budgetary constraints, and the West is cutting back on funding. The analytical issues dealt with here include specific questions, such as in the sectors of energy policy, electrical equipment and electronics, and environmental considerations. The transfer of technology is also discussed, as is security: there is the possibility that science and scientific results can be obtained from the former Soviet Union at low cost by the criminal community.

This second edition of a classic text in the field has been revisited by its authors and extensively reworked. It incorporates new case studies based on the authors experiences as well as one completely new chapter. The first edition of Clinical Sociology was published in 1996. Its goal was to explore various approaches to problem-solving at the micro, meso, and macro levels of social complexity.

Understanding and responding to corruption is a worldwide challenge. This book offers a general overview of the nature, pattern, and differing perspectives on political and economic corruption. Providing detail and depth, the book examines and compares corruption in four countries: the United States, Israel, Russia, and India. Each country chapter explores how corruption is defined and understood in that country and provides case material illustrating corrupt practice and responses to it. The country chapters also cover whistleblowing activities, their prevalence, importance, and impact. A comparative analysis presents the most prominent factors contributing to a reduced level of corruption and the factors that lead to whistleblower success.

An accessible book covering the momentous changes that have occurred, and are still occurring, since the fall of the USSR in 1989. Contributions from an impressive collection of authors are drawn from the most recent and original research available and address political and social issues which impact on all levels of Russian society. The book consists of a selection of specially commissioned pieces which have evolved from the conference of the same name, held at Cambridge University in December 1994.

Nationalist movements in the South have been superseded by a plethora of different social movements. This book examines these new movements and considers emerging paradigms of organization and mobilization, which are related to the role movements play in economic and political development. The book analyzes a number of cases and their context and discusses the implications for social movement theory. The focus is on social movements among underprivileged and middle class groups, and the book is global in scope.

Praxiology deals with doing and working from the point of view of effectiveness. It has three components: analysis of concepts involving purposive actions; critique of models of action from the viewpoint of efficiency; and normative advisory aspects in recommendations for increasing human efficiency. This fourth volume of the Praxiology series is devoted to the very special topic of social agency. It focuses on two important praxiological concepts: rationality and preparation as preconditions for human action to be effective and efficient.

The question of efficiency was raised by Anatol Rapoport over three decades ago in his lecture to the audience at the Praxiological Seminar in Warsaw in 1961. Social Agency begins with an article written by this same famous scholar on the topic of decision theory, "Social Dilemmas: A Historical Overview." Social dilemmas is the subject of the first part of this volume, a question related to studies on human action guided by two types of rationality: individual and collective rationality. The intersection of the two, in which individuals meet collectives, creates the situation in which social agency emerges, generating dilemmatic circumstances for the actors involved.

The articles collected in the second part explore praxiological dimensions of education aimed toward the knowledge society, because of knowledge possessed and produced by educated persons. Chapters and contributors to volume 4 include: "Five Questions on the Research on Social Dilemmas" by Marek K. Mlicki; "Psychological Processes Underlying Cooperation in Social Dilemmas" by Paul A. M. Van Lange and David M. Messick; "Designing a System for Design Learning: Designers and/or Learners?" by Arne Collen; "Creating an Evolutionary Image of New Systems of Learning and Human Development" by Janet A. Khan; and "A Study Program Design in Retrospect" by Stig C. Holmberg. Social Agency continues the trend of original research done in a little-known, but important area. Social scientists, policymakers, and educators will benefit from this work.

Primary care, grounded in the provision of continuous comprehensive person-centred care, is of paramount importance in the delivery of accessible and effective health care around the world. The central notion of person-centred care, however, relies on often-unexamined concepts of self, or understandings of what it means to be a person and an agent. This cutting-edge book explores contemporary pressures on the sense of self for both patient and health professional within a consultation and argues that building new concepts of the self is essential if we are to reinvigorate the central tenets of person-centred primary care. Contemporary trends such as shared decision-making between health professionals and patients and promoting self-management assume those involved are able to make their own decisions and take action. In practice, however, medicine often opts for reductionist perspectives of patients as passive mechanical systems and diseases as puzzles. At the same time, huge political and organisational changes mean time and resources are scarce, putting further pressure on consultations. This book discusses how we can start to resolve these tensions. The first part considers problems posed by the increasing bureaucratisation of primary care, the impact of information technology in the consultation, the effects of chronic disease on our sense of self and how an emphasis on biology over biography leads to over-diagnosis. The second part proposes solutions based on a strong ontology of consciousness, concepts of creative capacity, coherence and engagement, and will show how these can enhance the self-esteem of patients and doctors and benefit their therapeutic dialogue. Combining theoretical perspectives from philosophy, sociology and healthcare research with insights drawn from clinical practice, this edited volume is suitable for those researching and studying primary healthcare, communication and relationships in healthcare and the medical humanities.

"The Open Covenant" examines two opposing trends in contemporary American culture: an adherence to traditional, rigid structures, institutions, and lifestyles; and a move toward a more flexible, tolerant society in which individuals and organizations work together on shared needs, interests, and goals. This volume presents a unique discussion of the distinctive new pattern in today's society--the increasing willingness of Americans to extend themselves beyond narrowly defined self-interests into more controversial and universal issues.

This book is a methodologically self-conscious and intellectually ambitious effort to advance the social science debate on postcommunist transformation beyond the limitations of its first decade. Offering theoretically innovative and empirically current analyses of fundamental economic, cultural, and political problems of systemic change and reform in central and Eastern Europe, the authors broaden and deepen the research agenda by developing a set of interrelated approaches that are cross-disciplinary, sociologically informed, historically comparative, and global. The book s major substantive themes revolve around problems of postcommunist socioeconomic transformations. Specifically, the book explores postcommunist systemic change, the role of religion and collective identity, the significance of trust and economic culture, patterns of state-economy interactions in enterprise restructuring, the context of EU expansion, the strengths and weaknesses of economic theory and neoliberal doctrine, and the history of ideas in the postcommunist transformation debate. Bringing together leading experts in the field to illustrate the fruitfulness of multidisciplinary analysis in understanding socioeconomic transitions, this work will be valuable for economists, sociologists, and political scientists alike."

Current environmental problems and technological risks are a challenge for a new institutional arrangement of the value spheres of Science, Politics and Morality. Distinguished authors from different European countries and America provide a cross-disciplinary perspective on the problems of political decision making under the conditions of scientific uncertainty. cases from biotechnology and the environmental sciences are discussed. The papers collected for this volume address the following themes: (i) controversies about risks and political decision making; (ii) concepts of science for policy; (iii) the use of social science in the policy making process; (iv) ethical problems with developments in science and technology; (v) public and state interests in the development and control of technology.

Bridging the gap between historical theory and the study of historical memory, this series crosses the boundaries between both academic disciplines and cultural, social, political and historical contexts. In an age of rapid globalization, which tends to manifest itself on an economic and political level, locating the cultural practices involved in generating its underlying historical sense is an increasingly urgent task. Identity has become a core concept of the social and cultural sciences. Bringing together perspectives from sociology, anthropology, psychology, history, and literary criticism, this book offers a comprehensive and critical overview on how this concept is currently used and how it relates to memory and constructions of historical theory."

This intriguing book's focus on post-material consciousness, a concept that has not been developed in American literature, offers a fresh perspective on the human condition and its social development as a vehicle of global welfare. Brij Mohan contends that post-modern societies, despite their affluence and the superpower thaw, remain in a state of flux, and that the traditional approaches on the Left and Right have failed to present a viable program for peace, development, and prosperity. Mohan's formulation is premised on three assumptions: existing ideologies, theories, and practices of national and international development are fraught with contradictions and anomalies; the world climate and its challenges call for a new thinking beyond bureaucratized disciplines; and post-material consciousness lends support to a bio-global strategy that is conceptually compatible with humankind's ultimate agenda for coexistence based on justice, equality, and peace.

Part One deals with theoretical considerations in light of contemporary social events, and Part Two offers comparative analyses of three different societies--the United States, Germany, and India--with a particular emphasis on social development issues. Concepts such as end of history, end of ideology, and even third world are called into question. Global Development, premised on the notion of humanity's one-ness, unravels the paradoxes of diversity and offers a rational, humane basis for a dignified existence of the human race beyond the ossified structures of conceptual boundaries and organizational morass.

This monograph presents the proceedings of the 2002 Spring Symposium sponsored by the Lake Champlain Research Consortium, hosted by the Missisquoi Bay Watershed Corporation. The book examines this common body of water shared by Canada and the US, and summarizes knowledge of the dynamics of this system with a primary focus on land use, water management, and bridging the gap between researchers and the public.

This is the sixth and latest addition to the European Union Studies Association's prestigious series, State of the European Union. The contributors of this volume take the dynamic interaction between law, politics and society as a starting point to think critically about key recent events in the European Union, while bringing to the forefront why these developments matter for ordinary citizens.

This collection examines ways in which modern literature responds to the body-at-war, examining the effects of violent conflict on the body in its literal and representative forms. Spanning literature from World War I to the present day, it includes essays on pacifist theatre, torture, fascist fantasies, and uniforms and masculinity.

Educationalists have long worked to democratise our school system and purge traces of its religious origins. Rethinking the School shows that these efforts have been in vain. The bureaucratic organisation of schooling is here to stay, and Christian moral discipline is an integral part of the school as we know it.Hunter argues that both liberal and Marxian theory ignore the historical reality of the school. He does not see the school as the failed attempt to realise principles of social equality, complete personal development and intellectual enlightenment. Rather, he sees the modern school as an improvised apparatus for the training of good citizens and the guidance of souls.Rethinking the School is one of the first major applications of Foucault's genealogical method to the school system, and will be widely debated by educationalists, policy-makers and those interested in the interaction of government and subjectivity.'This is a serious piece of scholarship which breaks with much orthodoxy in educational theory and research. It brings new insights to old dilemmas and as such is a major contribution to a field which has in some respects lost its nerve. This is a book that must be read.' - Professor Richard Smith, Australian Journal of Education'Hunter. offers a detailed and fascinating account of the popular school. in a manner which reinvigorates modern debates regarding the relations between government and education. He makes us look and see differently, the hallmark of a powerful and original thinker.' - Professor Tony Bennett, Institute for Cultural Policy Studies

Dementia is an urgent global concern, often termed a widespread 'problem', 'tragedy' or 'burden' and a subject best addressed by health and social policy and practice. However, creative writers can offer powerful and imaginative insights into the experience of dementia across cultures and over time. This cross-disciplinary volume explores how engaging with dementia through its myriad literary representations can help to deepen and humanise attitudes to people living with the condition. Offering and interrogating a wide array of perspectives about how dementia might be 'imagined', this book allows us to see how different ways of being can inflect one another. By drawing on the 'lived' experience of the individual unique person and their loved ones, literature can contribute to a deeper and more compassionate and more liberating attitude to a phenomenon that is both natural and unnatural. Novels, plays and stories reveal a rich panoply of responses ranging from the tragic to the comic, allowing us to understand that people with dementia often offer us models of humour, courage and resilience, and carers can also embody a range of responses from rigidity to compassion. Dementia and Literature problematises the subject of dementia, encouraging us all to question our own hegemonies critically and creatively. Drawing on literary studies, cultural studies, education, clinical psychology, psychiatry, nursing and gerontology, this book is a fascinating contribution to the emerging area of the medical and health humanities. The book will be of interest to those living with dementia and their caregivers as well as to the academic community and policy makers.

This book is an outstanding account of the current state of using writing in service of learning. It presents psychological and educational foundations of writing across the curriculum movement and describes writing-to-learn practices implemented at different levels of education. It provides concrete applications and ideas about how to enhance student learning by means of writing. It is useful for educators, curriculum developers, psychologists, cognitive scientists, writing researchers, and teachers.