The African Development Bank and women’s health: A cross-national analysis of structural adjustment and maternal mortality

We conduct a cross-national analysis to test the hypothesis that African Development Bank (AfDB) structural adjustment lending adversely impacts maternal mortality in Sub-Saharan Africa. We analyze data for thirty-five Sub-Saharan African nations with up to four time points (1990, 1995, 2000, and 2005) with generalized least squares random effects regression models and modified two-step Heckman models that correct for potential endogeneity regarding whether or not a Sub-Saharan African nations receives an AfDB structural adjustment loan. We find support for our hypothesis that indicates that Sub-Saharan African nations that receive an AfDB structural adjustment loan tend to have higher levels of maternal mortality than Sub-Saharan African nations that do not receive such a loan. This finding remains stable even when controlling for endogeneity. We conclude by talking about the theoretical and methodological implications along with possible directions for future research.     

Life satisfaction,ethnicity and neighbourhoods: Is there an effect of neighbourhood ethnic composition on life satisfaction?

Immigrants and ethnic minorities tend to have lower life satisfaction than majority populations. However, current understanding of the drivers of these gaps is limited. Using a rich, nationally representative data set with a large sample of ethnic minorities and matched neighbourhood characteristics, we test whether first and second generation minorities experience lower life satisfaction once accounting for compositional differences and whether, specifically, neighbourhood deprivation impacts their wellbeing. We further investigate whether a larger proportion of own ethnic group in the neighbourhood improves satisfaction. We find life satisfaction is lower among ethnic minorities, and especially for the second generation, even controlling for individual and area characteristics. Neighbourhood concentration of own ethnic group is, however, associated with higher life satisfaction for Black Africans and UK born Indians and Pakistanis. The effect for Black Africans may stem from selection into areas, but findings for Indians and Pakistanis are robust to sensitivity tests.     

Diversity begets diversity? The effects of board composition on the appointment and success of women CEOs

Previous research on the effects of leadership diversity on firm outcomes has produced inconsistent and inconclusive findings. While some scholars argue that diversity increases organizational equity and enhances performance, others argue that diversity increases conflict, reduces cooperation and harms performance. This study tests the impact of a variety of compositional factors on firm outcomes. Specifically, we analyze whether and how board composition affects the advancement and mobility of women CEOs and firm performance. Our analysis relies on a unique data set of all Chief Executive Officers (CEOs) and Board of Directors (BODs) in Fortune 500 companies over a ten-year period. We find a marginally significant positive relationship between board diversity and the likelihood of a woman being appointed CEO. We further find that board diversity significantly and positively influences the post-promotion success of women CEOs. Our findings suggest that board composition is critical for the appointment and success of women CEOs, and increasing board diversity should be central to any organizational diversity efforts.     

Variation in trajectories of women’s marital quality

I examine variation in trajectories of women’s marital quality across the life course. The analysis improves upon earlier research in three ways: (1) the analysis uses a sequential cohort design and data from the first 35 years of marriage; (2) I analyze rich data from a national sample; (3) I examine multiple dimensions of marital quality. Latent class growth analyses estimated on data from women in the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth-1979 (N = 2604) suggest multiple trajectories for each of three dimensions of marital quality, including two trajectories of marital happiness, two trajectories of marital communication, and three trajectories of marital conflict. Socioeconomic and demographic covariates are then used to illustrate how factors such as income, cohabitation, and race-ethnicity set individuals at risk of poor marital quality throughout the life course by differentiating between high and low trajectories of marital quality. Women on low marital quality trajectories are, as expected, at much greater risk of divorce. Taken together, these findings show how fundamental socioeconomic and demographic characteristics contribute to subsequent marital outcomes via their influence on trajectories of marital quality as well as providing a better picture of the complexity in contemporary patterns of marital quality.     

Homophily in the career mobility of China’s political elite

We argue that leadership promotion in China’s political elite relies on homophily for signals of trustworthiness and future cooperative behavior more than on economic performance. We first point to the limitation of the economic performance argument from within the framework of China’s specific M-form state structure, and then we proffer a sociological explanation for why higher-level elites in China rely on homophilous associations in recruiting middle-level elites to the top positions of state. Using a unique dataset covering China’s provincial leaders from 1979 to 2011, we develop a homophily index focusing on joint origin, joint education and joint work experience. We trace personal similarities in these respects between provincial leaders and members of China’s supreme decision-making body, the Politbureau’s Standing Committee. We then provide robust evidence confirming the persisting impact of homophilous associations on promotion patterns in post-reform China.     

A Path to Freedom——Life of black women in The Color Purple

Alice Walker sThe Color Purple,published in 1982,tells the story of Celie,ablack woman in the South.Celie was a blackwoman growing up in the South.She mustovercome masogeny,racism and poverty toestablish herself as an independent person.Thenovel also follows the maturation of her sisterNettie and the lives of Shug,Albert,and muchof his extended family.Celie writes letters toGodin which she tells about her life-her roles asdaughter,wife,sister,and mother.In thecourse of her story,Celie me…     

Feminists wrestle with testosterone: Hormones,socialization and cultural interactionism as predictors of women’s gendered selves

Sociology of gender has developed beyond a personality-centered idea of “sex-roles” to an approach that stresses interaction and social structure. At the same time, there has been a concurrent development in the psychological sex-differences and medical literatures toward including the biological bases of sex-typed behavior and gender identities. In this paper, while we conceptualize gender as a social structure, we focus only on the individual level of analysis: testing the relative strength of (maternal circulating) prenatal hormones, childhood socialization, and the power of expectations attached to adult social roles (cultural interactionist) as explanations for women’s self-reported feminine and masculine selves. Our findings are complex, and support some importance of each theory. Prenatal hormones, childhood socialization, and cultural interactionism were all influential factors for gendered selves. While cultural expectations predicted only feminine selves, prenatal hormones were more robust predictors of masculine sense of self. While personality may be a relatively stable characteristic influenced by the body and childhood socialization, our results reinforce the importance of studying how the social world responds to and reinforces gendered personality.     

‘It's The Sun Wot Won It’: Evidence of media influence on political attitudes and voting from a UK quasi-natural experiment

Do print media significantly impact political attitudes and party identification? To examine this question, we draw on a rare quasi-natural experiment that occurred when The Sun, a right-leaning UK tabloid, shifted its support to the Labour party in 1997 and back to the Conservative party in 2010. We compared changes in party identification and political attitudes among Sun readers with non-readers and other newspaper readerships. We find that The Sun's endorsements were associated with a significant increase in readers' support for Labour in 1997, approximately 525,000 votes, and its switch back was associated with about 550,000 extra votes for the Conservatives in 2010. Although we observed changes in readers' party preference, there was no effect on underlying political preferences. The magnitude of these changes, about 2% of the popular vote, would have been unable to alter the outcome of the 1997 General Election, but may have affected the 2010 Election.     

The Shanghai World EXPO’s Chinese Elements and Their Country Imagination Building of China

上海世博会的重要功能之一是通过对中国元素的遴选/组合、编码/解码,实现中国国家形象的建构。从上海世博的宣传片到世博会的选址和规划,从中国国家馆到省市区联合联合馆的主题确立、标志设计、场馆外形到内部的展示内容,从以中国元素活动周为代表的各种演艺活动到外国场馆中对中国文化的借鉴,中国元素可谓渗透在上海世博的方方面面。上海世博的中国元素展示了中华民族的灿烂文明和改革开放以来的巨大成就,通过中国元素及其组合,传达出了中国古代文化中的城市智慧、生存智慧以及对和谐共生、天人合一的理想与追求,这些都成为构建中国国家形象的精神内核。但是,上海世博通过中国元素来建构中国国家形象会否实现设计者的编码与参观者的解码之间的无缝对接而不致于遭遇对抗式解读?本文提出‘元素主义’的思维陷阱、中国形象给谁看?——‘他者眼光的想象’与‘中国文化的自省’和‘一体与多元’:文化的地方性与中国国家形象问题等三个问题并进行了初步思考。     

Exchange and cohesion in dyads and triads: A test of Simmel’s hypothesis

This paper uses social exchange theory to address a classic question posed by Simmel (1964) regarding dyads and triads. The question is whether exchanges in a triad will generate more cohesion at the group level than exchanges in an isolated dyad. The main hypotheses, integrating several ideas from Simmel and social exchange theories, are as follows. First, triads generate less variability of behavior than dyads; that is, there is more uniformity or convergence in triads. Second, in the context of repeated exchange, we predict higher levels of cohesion in triads than in dyads. Third, positive emotion or affect has a stronger impact on cohesion in dyads than in triads, whereas uncertainty reduction has a stronger impact on cohesion in triads. To test these hypotheses, an experiment compared isolated dyads to dyads nested in a triadic exchange network. Subjects engaged in exchanges across a series of distinct episodes, using standard experimental procedures from research on relational cohesion (Lawler and Yoon, 1996) and exchange networks (Molm and Cook, 1995, Willer, 1999). Consistent with the hypotheses, the results reveal more convergence of behavior and higher cohesion in triads than in dyads; moreover, uncertainty reduction is the primary basis for cohesion in the triad, whereas positive affect was the primary basis for cohesion in the dyad. These results are discussed in relation to Simmelian dyad–triad dynamics and the theory of relational cohesion.     

Impact of the spread of mass education on married women’s experience with domestic violence

This paper investigates the association between mass education and married women’s experience with domestic violence in rural Nepal. Previous research on domestic violence in South Asian societies emphasizes patriarchal ideology and the widespread subordinate status of women within their communities and families. The recent spread of mass education is likely to shift these gendered dynamics, thereby lowering women’s likelihood of experiencing domestic violence. Using data from 1775 currently married women from the Chitwan Valley Family Study in Nepal, we provide a thorough analysis of how the spread of mass education is associated with domestic violence among married women. The results show that women’s childhood access to school, their parents’ schooling, their own schooling, and their husbands’ schooling are each associated with their lower likelihood of experiencing domestic violence. Indeed, husbands’ education has a particularly strong, inverse association with women’s likelihood of experiencing domestic violence. These associations suggest that the proliferation of mass education will lead to a marked decline in women’s experience with domestic violence in Nepal.     

The Influence of Confucianism on the World’s Diverse Culture

Confucianism plays an important role in the w orld’s diverse culture.Since C onfucianism w as spread from Asia to Europe,it has communicated,integrated and innovated w ith W estern culture,and even had a major impact on the European Enlightenment M ovement of ideas.T here is no doubt that it is important to interpret the cross-cultural values of C onfucianism and to explore its influence on the development of contemporary society.C onfucianism is an open ideological system,w hich needs us to treat it w ith an open mind.O nly by constantly absorbing the essence of the cultures from all over the w orld,enhancing civilization and exchanges betw een countries,seeking common ground w hile reserving differences,can w e uphold C hinese culture and make great contribution to the progress and development of the w hole human civilization.     

Men’s mobility into management from blue collar and white collar jobs: Race differences across the early work-career

Within the context of the “particularistic mobility thesis” we examine racial differences in the incidence, and determinants of, as well as timing to, mobility into management across the critical early career years at a refined level, namely, when groups share similar white collar and blue collar jobs. Findings from a Panel Study of Income Dynamics sample of men support theory and indicate that from both job levels a racial hierarchy exists: African Americans have the lowest rate of mobility, reach management through a route that is relatively formal and structured by a traditional range of stratification-based causal factors and take longest to reach management. Whites, in contrast, have the highest mobility rate, reach management through a relatively informal path that is less structured by traditional stratification-based factors, and reach management the quickest, and, across all three issues Latinos occupy an intermediate ground between African Americans and Latinos. Further, as predicted by theory, racial differences, particularly, relative to whites, are greater among those tracked from blue collar jobs than white collar jobs. Discussed are implications of the findings for understanding racial disadvantage in the American labor market across the work-career and on an inter-generational basis.     

Life-course changes in the mediation of cognitive and non-cognitive skills for parental effects on children’s academic achievement

We assess life-course changes in how cognitive and noncognitive skills mediate the effect of parental SES on children's academic achievement using data from the Early Childhood Longitudinal Study-Kindergarten Cohort. Our results show: (1) the direct effect of parental SES declines while the mediating effect of skills increases over time; (2) cognitive and non-cognitive skills differ in their temporal sensitivities to parental origin; and (3) in contrast to the effect of cognitive skills, the mediating effect of non-cognitive skills increases over time because non-cognitive skills are more sensitive to changes in parental SES. Our results offer insights into the dynamic role skill formation play in status attainment.     

Asian children’s verbal development: A comparison of the United States and Australia

Using longitudinal cohort studies from Australia and the United States, we assess the pervasiveness of the Asian academic advantage by documenting White-Asian differences in verbal development from early to middle childhood. In the United States, Asian children begin school with higher verbal scores than Whites, but their advantage erodes over time. The initial verbal advantage of Asian American children is partly due to their parent’s socioeconomic advantage and would have been larger had it not been for their mother’s English deficiency. In Australia, Asian children have lower verbal scores than Whites at age 4, but their scores grow a faster rate and converge towards those of Whites by age 8. The initial verbal disadvantage of Asian Australian children is partly due to their mother’s English deficiency and would have been larger had it not been for their Asian parent’s educational advantage. Asian Australian children’s verbal scores grow at a faster pace, in part, because of their parent’s educational advantage.     

Chips off the old blocks? The political participation patterns of parents and children in Italy

This article studies the relationship between the political participation of parents and children in Italy, a country for which no empirical evidence on the topic is available and that has particular characteristics in terms of household dynamics and patterns of political participation. The analyses are based on a sample of 12,802 children from 14 to 19 years old and their parents, drawn from the “Multipurpose survey – Aspects of daily life”, collected by the Italian National Institute of Statistics. The results show that the political participation of children is strongly associated with that of their parents; that maternal participation is of somewhat greater relevance to the participation of both sons and daughters compared to that of fathers; and that the parents’ level of education is not associated with the likelihood of the child participating, net of parental participation.     

Explaining attitudes about homosexuality in Confucian and non-Confucian nations: Is there a ‘cultural’ influence?

The majority of research on attitudes about homosexuality has concentrated on the global North and on Christian and Muslim majority nations. Little research attention has been given to the factors that shape tolerance in societies with a Confucian heritage. Residents of Confucian counties are less tolerant than Europeans and Americans. One reason given for this difference is the emphasis on Confucian values in many Asian societies. Using data from the World Values Survey, we examine whether values that could be described as Confucian influence attitudes in Confucian and non-Confucian nations. We find a unique Confucian cultural effect, which can partially be explained with concerns about keeping the family intact. Conversely, in Confucian societies values related to obedience, conformity, and filial piety are unrelated to attitudes. There is also a small Buddhist contextual effect, resulting in more tolerant attitudes, and the Confucian influence cannot be reduced to an Asian regional effect.     

Hegel’s Speculative Reflection——The Dream in Mind of Metaphysics

没有反思便没有哲学,没有思辨的反思便不能进入黑格尔思辨形上学的体系。思辨体系建构了一个理念论的理想主义,它以现实性与合理性的辩证矛盾的推移与发展,走向绝对真理,达到心灵自由,实现精神的理想。     

Value-oriented citizenship index: New extensions of Kelman and Hamilton’s theory to prevent autocracy

In Crimes of obedience, Kelman and Hamilton argue that societies can be protected by the degeneration of authority only when citizenship is based on a strong values orientation. This reference to values may be the weakest point in their theory because they do not explicitly define these values. Nevertheless, their empirical findings suggest that the authors are referring to specific democratic principles and universal values (e.g., equality, fairness, harmlessness). In this article, a composite index known as the value-oriented citizenship (VOC) index is introduced and empirically analysed. The results confirm that the VOC index discriminates between people who relate to authority based on values rather than based on their role or on rules in general. The article discusses the utility of the VOC index to develop Kelman and Hamilton’s framework further empirically as well as its implications for the analysis of the relationship between individuals and authority.     

In-services and empty threats: The roles of organizational practices and workplace experiences in shaping U.S. educators’ understandings of students’ rights

This paper applies theoretical frameworks from organizational sociology and sociolegal studies to examine factors associated with educators’ conceptions of students’ rights to due process in disciplinary actions. We analyze a unique representative data set of 402 teachers and 200 administrators in U.S. high schools to investigate how educators understand the rights to due process articulated in the Supreme Court case of Goss v. Lopez (1975). We then examine whether individual characteristics and participation in organizational processes are associated with educators’ understandings of students’ due process rights. Findings suggest that educators’ understandings of students’ entitlements to due process vary with educators’ level of education, experience of school-related legal threats, and participation in district or diocese in-service training programs on students’ rights. Results point to organizational climate as a key factor in shaping educators’ rights conceptions and the role of law in American schools.