This cutting edge work offers an alternative perspective on existing paradigms of modernization and development that originated in the West from the vantage point of non-western, late-modernizing societies. It considers how East Asian philosophical ideas enrich the reformulation of the concept of development or societal development, and how influential principles of traditional culture such as yin-yang dialectic interact with modern ideas and technology. It addresses the significance of alternative discourses as culturally independent scholarship, and the problems of pervasive mechanisms of social, political, economic, and cultural dependence in the global academic world.

In this innovative book, Professor Alan France tells the story of what impact the 2007 global crisis and the great recession that followed has had on our understandings of youth. Drawing on eight countries as case studies, he maps the growing influence of neoliberalism as a political strategy in each, showing how it is accelerating the reconfiguration of institutions and practices that are central to the lives of the young.

This book looks at the role that civil society organizations play in dealing with conflict and violence. The authors argue that in most of the prevalent conceptualizations the conflict dimension of civil society is either downplayed or inadequately addressed. They contend that the ability to deal with conflict is at the heart of organized civil society; in the political process, one of civil society's key functions is to express and mediate between different interests, thus contributing to political decision-making. The chapters draw on detailed, empirical data from the CIVICUS Civil Society Index - a unique comparative data-set drawn from 25 countries, which has not previously been made publicly available. It examines the different ways violence has been manifested in civil societies, the meaning of violent protest and the impact of security legislation that might hinder the mediating efforts of civil society. The book offers a sophisticated comparison between conflict and post-conflict countries and an analysis of the role of civil society in conflict resolution, reconciliation and transitional justice.

Deeper Insight into Nigeria's Public Administration is a collection of a wider range of Public Administration topics to which scholars and authors have devoted attention in recent time. Here is a lucidly written and presented book, which selective scholars, researchers and readers would find indispensably useful to procure for personal and institutional librarians.

This book provides a historical-sociological analysis of the history of sociology in Belgium from the late-nineteenth until the early-twenty-first century. It sheds new light on the social structures that shaped and shape the orientations and work of sociologists in Belgium. The impact of three structural factors is discussed in more detail: religion, language and publication imperatives. Starting from analyses of these structural factors, this book presents a detailed analysis of the genesis and institutionalization of different sociologies in Belgium. It sheds light on the kinds of sociological knowledge that are or are not valued in Belgium. This book constitutes an important contribution to the sociological history of sociology and the development of a reflective historical sociology, and will appeal to students and scholars of social theory, as well as readers interested in the history of Contemporary Belgium.

From networks to fields to figurations to discourses, relational ideas have become common in social science, and a distinct relational sociology has emerged over the past decade and a half. But so far, this paradigm shift has raised as many questions as it answers. Just what are 'relations', precisely? How do we observe and measure them? How does relational thinking change what we already know about society? What new questions does it invite us to ask? This volume and its companion volume Conceptualizing Relational Sociology: Ontological and Theoretical Issues bring together, for the first time, the leading experts and up-and-coming scholars in the field to address fundamental questions about what relational sociology is and how it works.

The challenge is great. Despite all the talk about "family values," the family is besieged. The percentage of children living below the poverty line rose 49 percent from 1973 to 1992; American children are less likely to be immunized than those of any other developed nation; and many corporations still lag behind in areas such as maternity leave, while rewarding workers for long hours away from home. Moreover, the skyrocketing divorce rate and boom in the out-of-wedlock birth rate has relegated the "traditional family" to the realm of myth. Against this grim backdrop, Dr. Westheimer sees tremendous hope. She argues that the family is actually redefining itself in ways that will become more important - and more accepted - in the 21st Century. She points to changes in social attitudes and corporate and governmental policies that will allow for more unconventional but functioning family units, such as "step-" or "blended" families, and families headed by a gay single parent or couple. In addition, she sees generations pulling together for the sake of today's children, as more and more grandparents become active in their grandchildren's lives. In this book, help is available. Compiling an exhaustive list of family programs, resources, and self-help groups around the country and on the Internet, Dr. Westheimer tells parents how to get help for themselves and their children. And, sternly taking issue with new governmental legislation that claims to be "pro-family," she points our leaders in a bold new direction.

The diagnosis of 'Dyslexia' and the medical problematisation of reading difficulties were almost unknown one hundred years ago, yet today the British Dyslexia Association estimates that up to ten per cent of the UK population may have some form of dyslexia, with numbers in the United States estimated to be as high as twenty per cent. The Government of Reading investigates how this problematisation developed and how a diagnostic category was shaped in response to this.

The New Class Society introduces students to the sociology of class structure and inequalities as it asks whether or not the American dream has faded. The fourth edition of this powerful book demonstrates how and why class inequalities in the United States have been widened, hardened, and become more entrenched than ever. The fourth edition has been extensively revised and reorganized throughout, including a new introduction that offers an overview of key themes and shorter chapters that cover a wider range of topics. New material for the fourth edition includes a discussion of "The Great Recession" and its ongoing impact, the demise of the middle class, rising costs of college and increasing student debt, the role of electronic media in shaping people's perceptions of class, and more.

This book explores listening as a social and political practice, in contrast to the more common focus on voice and speaking. The author draws on cases from Canada, France and the United Kingdom, exploring: minority women and debates over culture and religion; riots and young men in France and England; citizen journalism and the creative use of different media; and solidarity between migrant justice and indigenous activists. Analysis across these diverse settings considers whether and how a politics of listening, which demands that the roles of speakers and listeners change, can be undertaken in adversarial and tense political moments. The Politics of Listening argues that such a practice has the potential to create new ways of being and acting together, as political equals who are heard on their own terms. The book will appeal to students and scholars across a range of disciplines, including sociology and political theory.

Social Policy, Welfare State, and Civil Society in Sweden I-II gives a comprehensive account of the global invention of the welfare state, from the far north of the West to the global East and Southeast, and from its social policy origins to the most recent challenges from civil society. This first volume includes four essays, by now minor classics in welfare state literature. "Before Social Democracy: The Early Formation of a Social Policy Discourse in Sweden" set the stage for a research current that shifted from state welfare to welfare mix and civil society. "Working Class Power and the 1946 Pension Reform in Sweden" examined a key thesis in Peter Baldwin's seminal work The Politics of Social Solidarity, and led to a lively polemic among social historians. The third text was first published (as "Sweden") in volume 1 of Peter Flora's magnum opus Growth to Limits: The Western European Welfare States Since World War II. The final essay, "The Dialectics of Decentralization and Privatization," is a path-breaking study of the Swedish welfare state's reconstruction in the 1980s. The second volume covers the period since 1988 - "the lost world of social democracy" - and recent changes in comparative welfare state research and the Nordic Model. This work is an updated and enlarged edition in two volumes of Sven Hort's well-known and wide-ranging dissertation Social Policy and Welfare State in Sweden, published under the author's birth name Sven E. Olsson in 1990. This first volume contains the original four essays of the first edition. In praise of the new edition: "This is an impressive, comprehensive and knowledgeable contribution to the analysis of the early history and long-term development of the Swedish welfare state. Through a prime focus on reform actors at various stages we are persuasively reminded that there was a history before the ascendance of Social Democracy from the early 1930s, that the Social Democrats played a crucial role in the expansionary phase, and that one must go beyond theories of class politics to get a proper understanding of the evolution and characteristics of the modern welfare state." - Stein Kuhnle, Professor in Comparative Politics, Hertie School of Governance and University of Bergen "The development of the Swedish welfare state is often sketched in fairly simplistic terms. Professor Hort's analysis remains the most penetrating of the complex and fascinating interplay between politics, social forces, and economic development that explains much of the intricacies of the system that eventually emerged." - Gunnar Wetterberg, The Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences Sven E. O. Hort is Professor in Social Welfare at the College of Social Sciences, Seoul National University, Korea. He is an alumnus of Lund University. In Sweden he taught sociology at Linneaus and Sodertorn universities. Currently he is the chief editor of the Swedish journal Arkiv. Tidskrift for samhallsanalys and a deputy editor of European Societies. With Stein Kuhnle he is the author of "The Coming of East and South-East Asian Welfare States," Journal of European Social Policy (2000).

From networks to fields to figurations to discourses, relational ideas have become common in social science, and a distinct relational sociology has emerged over the past decade and a half. But so far, this paradigm shift has raised as many questions as it answers. Just what are 'relations', precisely? How do we observe and measure them? How does relational thinking change what we already know about society? What new questions does it invite us to ask? This volume and its companion volume Applying Relational Sociology: Networks, Relations, and Society bring together, for the first time, the leading experts and up-and-coming scholars in the field to address fundamental questions about what relational sociology is and how it works.

This book explores the current status of primary schools in Rwanda and the history behind their development. It argues that current primary school leaders in the area encounter a wide range of problems relating to conflict prevention, teachers' and school leaders' professionalism, financial and resourcing constraints, student attrition, and parental disengagement, many of which can be attributed to the legacies of war and the genocide in 1994. The book also presents a range of strategies that are pursued by school leaders while dealing with these concerns, as the Rwandan government invests in reconstructing education following the country's turmoil. Through examining the issues of the past and the present, the book provides valuable insights for researchers of educational leadership, school leaders, education policy makers, and those in charge of preparing, developing, and implementing professional development programmes for school leaders and teachers in Rwanda, as well as in other post-war and developing countries.

This book explores local content policies and their role in natural resource management within the realm of energy justice. Based on several country case studies it discusses the role of regional integration for such policies in Sub-Saharan Africa. Energy justice has been widely applied across different aspects of development, but here the principles of justice are specifically integrated with the management and implementation of oil and gas projects. Such an analysis offers novel means of implementing policies in local regions, moving away from a one-size fits all approach that leads to the ineffective transplantation of policies from developed economies to developing Sub-Saharan economies. The book argues that with a regional approach, Sub-Saharan Africa can leverage natural resources, industrial parks, supplier clusters, regional financing mechanisms and regional training facilities which would drive down the costs of production, increase efficiency and integrate the local Sub-Saharan population into the oil and gas industry. This would result in the benefits as well as the environmental concerns and responsibilities intrinsic to these industries, being spread more equally amongst local and none local stakeholders. This book will be a valuable resource for scholars and students as well as policy makers and practitioners in the areas of extractive industry-related disciplines energy governance, and economic development in Africa.

This book provides a critical understanding of contemporary issues within global society and how these relate to six case study examples (UK, USA, China, India, South Africa, Bangladesh, and Japan). The authors draw on their diverse experience to explore four major themes of contemporary relevance: overall aging of societies; governance and institutions; emergency services and public health provisions; and community activism and involvement. The key issues within the book--sociability, social capital, and community development--are examined in the context of an ever increasing aging world. The authors' sense of optimism is linked to growing evidence that community activism is on the rise and can effectively plug the gap between public need and provision of service.

"Little did I know that my intimidation by senior officers in the UNDP had only just begun." Fouzia Saeed dreamed of bringing social change to the women of Pakistan and was thrilled to land her dream job at the world's ethical compass and institutional tour de force: The United Nations. As expected, the UN was a gathering place for passionate minds devoted to human rights and justice for all. Shockingly, at the UN mission in Pakistan it was also a breeding ground for powerful men who viewed women as sexual objects rather than professional equals. Refusing her boss's advances didn't stop the harassment. Reporting him to superiors didn't either. In her years-long struggle with torment and humiliation at the UN, Fouzia held strong, knowing her fight for women's rights was the only thing that could keep her going. But how do you fight for others' rights when you cannot even take hold of your own? Can you ever change a culture that views sexual harassment by a man as a woman's crime? Fouzia and a group of female colleagues, who similarly suffered in the workplace, gained the courage to risk their reputations. They filed a joint compliant and promptly found themselves under attack by their managers who aligned with the perpetrator in an effort to crush their case. Working with Sharks follows eleven indestructible women and the case that sparked a national movement and culminated in the passage of legislation that made sexual harassment a crime in Pakistan in 2010. Inspirational and poignant, Working with Sharks encourages women in any part of the world to find their voice and stand up to sexual harassment.

In America's much-touted classless society, the middle class--decried by some as a mythical construct and heralded by others as the embodiment of the American dream--has always occupied a central and controversial position. This book explores the origins of the new middle classes that emerged in the 20th century, revealing the relationship of these classes to capitalism, bureaucracy, and politics. The book is divided into four parts, addressing: the theoretical problems and historical changes brought on by the emergence of the new middle classes; status and the psychology of class; the middle class in America; and the lifestyles and political orientations of the middle classes in the United States.

This book places the topic of the state and society in the context of modern development in China over the past century, investigating the dynamic relation and internal tension between the state's power enhancement and society's vitality activation instead of simply regarding the country and society as two separate entities. Building a modern country and activating the people's vitality involves three closely linked and mutually supporting aspects: establishing the identity recognition of the people to unite the nation; adjusting the organizational system of the society to promote mobilization and institute a social incentive system; and determining dominant strategies and means for the interaction between the country and society to address social-governance issues. This book carefully sheds light on the logic behind China's roundabout strategy for building a modern country and motivating the vitality of its people.

In Liberal Barbarism, Erik Ringmar sets out to explain the 1860 destruction of Yuanmingyuan - the Chinese imperial palace north-west of Beijing - at the hands of British and French armies. Yuanmingyuan was the emperor's own theme-park, a perfect world, a vision of paradise, which housed one of the greatest collections of works of art ever assembled. The intellectual puzzle which the book addresses concerns why the Europeans, bent on "civilizing" the Chinese, engaged in this act of barbarism. The answer is provided through an analysis of the performative aspect of the confrontation between Europe and China, focusing on the differences in the way their respective international systems were conceptualized. Ringmar reveals that the destruction of Yuanmingyuan represented the Europeans' campaign to "shock and awe" the Chinese, thereby forcing them to give up their way of organizing international relations. The contradictions which the events of 1860 exemplify - the contradiction between civilization and barbarism - is a theme running through all European (and North American) relations with the rest of the world since, including, most recently, the US war in Iraq.

This volume introduces the notion of 'relational planning' through a collection of theoretical and empirical contributions that explore the making of heterogeneous associations in the planning practice. The analytical concept builds on recent approaches to complexity and materiality in planning theory by drawing on Science and Technology Studies (STS) of urban issues. It frames planning as a socio-material practice taking place within the multifaceted relations between artefacts, agency and practices. By way of this triad, spatial planning is not studied as a given, linear or technical process but rather problematized as a hybrid, distributed and situational practice. The inquiries in this collection thus describe how planning practices are negotiated and enacted in and beyond formal arenas and procedures of planning, and so make visible the many sites, actors and means of spatial planning. Addressing planning topics such as ecology, preservation, participation, rebuilding and zoning, this volume takes into account the uncertain world planning is embedded in. The implications of such a perspective are considered in light of how planning is performed and how it contributes to the emergence of specific socio-material forms and interactions. This is an invaluable read for all scholars of STS, Ecology, Architecture and Urban Planning.

This book explores how best to invest in and nurture teachers. It examines deprofessionalisation and reprofessionalisation in the recent developments in the understanding of teaching and learning, including the effects of standardizing teaching, education shaped by student satisfaction data and basic skills tests. The book focuses on Australian context and takes on an international perspective. It investigates fundamental issues affecting teacher quality, morale, attrition and retention, learner and teacher autonomy, and assessment and evaluation. It encourages teachers and teacher educators to assert centrality to teachers and question and challenge outside forces that suppress teacher autonomy and associated agency and creativity. It challenges administrators and educational jurisdictions to rethink their assumptions on their own capacities and limitations and teachers' capabilities to shape education in optimal ways and the impact of outcomes of the decisions they make.

This volume presents evidence-based research on citizens' experiences and reactions to the Great Recession in Europe. How did European citizen experience and react to the crisis? How are the experiences of crisis and political responses socially differentiated? Are some social classes and more deprived groups particularly hard hit? How did the crisis impact on political choices? What types of political action did citizens engage in and why? What were the drivers of populist attitudes and protest participation? This country-based book explores these important dynamics as expressed in diverse national contexts, namely France, Germany, Greece, Italy, Poland, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, and UK. Each chapter focuses on one of these countries and employs data from the same survey fielded in 2015. This volume is of particular relevance for scholars, students, and practitioners interested in political sociology, comparative politics and European politics.