Rationality and Bureaucracy: Maoist Contributions to a Marxist Theory of Bureaucracy*

The assessments of the role of bureaucracy in socialism offered by Weber and Lenin are seriously weakened by their reliance on an inadequately developed category of rationality. A genuinely Marxist theory of bureaucracy presupposes a clarification of the category of rationality, and such is presented in accordance with the communicative model recently formulated by Habermas and Gouldner. Premised on several important features of this model, the Maoist ideal type of bureaucracy provides Marxist social theory with a solid basis for advancing a theory of bureaucracy and, at the same time, seriously challenges the Weberian claim that socialism can be either a modern society or revolutionary society, but not both.     

政治社会化理论视阈下高校学生政治冷漠现象管控研究

青年时期是大学生政治意识形成的关键时期,是其政治心态与政治行为确立的重要阶段。当前,大学生政治参与得到较大程度的提升,但部分学生仍存在政治冷漠现象,具体表现为政治活动缺位、政治信仰缺失、政治效能低下、政治关注失衡等,这些都对国家的政治现代化进程造成了阻碍。究其原因,主要受思想分歧与群体差异、传统限制与体制缺陷、信息缺失与地位失调、网络虚拟与渠道不畅等因素的限制。为此,可从环境与制度、渠道与途径、内容与方向、评估与创新等方面进行改进:通过优化成长环境,完善参与制度;健全参与渠道,提升参与能力;改革教育内容,培育政治意识;加强评估预警,完善网络参与等方式构建相应的引导管控机制,改善大学生政治冷漠现象。     

Northern Theory: The Political Geography of General Social Theory

The relationship between geopolitical position and general social theory is examined by a detailed reading of three important texts, Coleman’s Foundations of Social Theory, Bourdieu’s Logic of Practice, and Giddens’s Constitution of Society. Effects of metropolitan position are traced in theoretical strategies, conceptions of time and history, models of agency, ideas of modernity, and other central features of their theorizing. Four textual moves are identified that together constitute the northernness of general social theory: claiming universality, reading from the center, gestures of exclusion, and grand erasure. Some alternative paths for theory, embodying different relations with the global South, are briefly indicated. Raewyn Connell is University Professor at the University of Sydney, and author, co-author, or editor of nineteen books, including Ruling Class Ruling Culture (1977), Making the Difference (1982), Gender and Power (1987), Schools and Social Justice (1992), Masculinities (1995), The Men and the Boys (2000), and Gender (2002). Connell is an Editor of Theory and Society. A contributor to research journals in sociology, education, political science, gender studies, and related fields, her current research concerns social theory, neo-liberalism, corporate masculinities, gender practices, and intellectual labor.     

The Influence of Gender Roles on Political Socialization:

This paper reports on an experimental study investigating the relationship between gender role stereotyping and political learning among Mexican-American children. In addition to the pre-test and post-test administered to the entire sample, 15 of the children were exposed to a treatment emphasizing a flexible definition of the female role. The children did stereotype behavior assigning some activities to men and others to women. Further, this stereotyping affected their attitudes toward female political participation. Comparison of pre-test and post-test suggests that the treatment had some effect on gender role attitudes, particularly concerning the female role. In addition, on several questions there appeared to be an interaction between gender and the experimental treatment, sugguesting possible differences between the political socialization of boys and girls.     

Procedural Control of the Bureaucracy, Peer Review, and Epistemic Drift

Regulatory peer review—in which independent scientistscomment on the technical underpinnings of proposed regulations—isa recently pursued form of political control of the bureaucracy.This article situates regulatory peer review in the contextof both the history of technical advice to government and theprincipal-agent perspective often used to explain the presenceof administrative procedures. Much of the academic discussionof attempts to influence bureaucratic decision making has utilizedprincipal-agent theory. We introduce two novel concepts to accommodateregulatory peer review into the principal-agent framework. Thefirst is "technocracy" where the preferences of technical expertsdisplace public preferences. The second is "epistemic drift,"a change in embodied knowledge that contributes to departuresfrom the policy intentions of an enacting coalition of policymakers. In addition to introducing these concepts, we arguethat regulatory peer review is more complex than other administrativeprocedures and that its efficacy critically depends on the detailsof its implementation. We hypothesize that regulatory peer reviewwill cause nongovernmental participants in regulatory conflictsto devote more effort to creating research and other epistemicresources. But we also hypothesize that, just as courts havebecome more politicized with their role in regulatory policy,peer review and regulatory science will become increasinglypoliticized as well.     

The Control of Sociological Theory: In Praise of the Interregnum*

The argument advanced here contends that integrative efforts within sociology exacerbate, rather than mitigate, theoretical and organizational fragmentation. Viewing epistemologically driven movements towards theoretical control as counter- productive, this study contains a proposal for a greater analytical focus on ontology as a better way to promote and preserve the sociological enterprise. Such a move would reflect a return to the ethos of sociology's classical project and encourage embracing theoretical diversity as a desirable condition.     

Venues and Filters in Managed Migration Policy: The Case of the United Kingdom

The United Kingdom, like many developed world economies, has witnessed unprecedented immigration since the early 1990s. Also in line with other developed world economies, the United Kingdom has adopted a “managed migration” policy paradigm. The paper argues that the operation of this paradigm is best understood with reference to two key concepts: migration policy “venues” and migration policy “filters.” In terms of the former, the paper argues that managed migration policy is associated with outward, upward, and downward rescaling and commensurate venue growth and diversification. In terms of the latter, the paper argues that six policy filters (legal, geographical, credential, transfer‐based, monetary, and humanitarian) are commonly used to determine legitimate forms of migration but that one (the geographical filter) has been particularly prominent within the United Kingdom's managed migration policy paradigm.     

Political Polling and the New Media Culture: A Case of More Being Less

Changes in journalism—including newsroom cutbacks, anemphasis on repackaging secondhand material, and the demandsof 24-hour news—have expanded the reliance on polls asnews, including polls of a sort once considered not reliablefor publication, and led to a more superficial understandingof the 2004 presidential race. The proliferation of outletsoffering news, which has resulted in greater competition foraudience, has also intensified the motivation of using pollsin part for their marketing value rather than purely their probativejournalistic value. The more "synthetic" style of contemporaryjournalism has increased the tendency to allow polls to createa context for journalists to explain and organize other news—becomingthe lens through which reporters see and order a more interpretativenews environment. A greater dependence on horse race trackingpolls by the media has reinforced these tendencies and furtherthinned the public’s understanding toward who won andaway from why. Growing audience skepticism and political polarizationhave created an environment of distrust about the methodologyand integrity of polling. All of these factors, in turn, arefrustrating the efforts of academic and commercial pollstersto maintain standards and deepen understanding among journalistsabout public opinion research and how to use it as journalism.     

The Political Influence of Return: From Diaspora to Libyan Transit Returnees

In December 2016, Gambian dictator Jammeh was surprisingly ousted through the ballot box by a democratically motivated opposition. With this remarkable change, tables also turned for Gambian migrants. Gambians abroad were called upon to return and help rebuild the nation, while political interests in host states increased to return “irregular” migrants. In what ways can migrant return be politically influential, especially after a critical juncture as in the Gambia? Current studies fail to consider different types of returnees, including those perceived as highly skilled compared to those seen as low‐skilled. We found that in post‐dictatorial Gambia, both types of returnees have political influence on the new regime. Highly skilled diaspora returnees were explicitly invited as contributors to political developments in the country and thus have a direct political influence. In contrast, low‐skilled returned migrants from Libya are considered as receivers of public goods; yet through claims to political representation they managed to carve out political influence, albeit indirectly.     

Bureaucracy Redux: Management Reformism and the Welfare State

Bureaucratic discretion is a fundamental feature of social provision,one that presents enduring difficulties for management. In general,management reform has taken two, divergent paths. One, utilizingthe familiar public bureaucratic model, seeks to control discretionthrough hierarchical command structures and standardization.The other, utilizing decentralization and privatization, regulatesand relocates discretion, using incentive structures associatedwith market or quasi-market institutions. However, it may bethat discretion will prove to be as problematic for the newpublic management (NPM) as it was for the old. This articleoffers a critical political history of management reformism,reviewing efforts to reorganize the public welfare provisionby applying new public management models to old public bureaucracyproblems. It considers the dynamics of bureaucratic discretionand reform not only as a problem of public management but aspart of the contested politics of social policymaking.     

Bureaucracy and place: expertise in the European Quarter

Bureaucratic structures and procedures are an integral part of the production of political space today. Analyses of geopolitical practices must therefore unpack the bureaucratic context in which these practices unfold on a daily basis. This is particularly important if we wish to understand transnational processes that operate at scales and in contexts other than the familiar contours of the nation‐state. In this article, I focus on one bureaucratic centre of geopolitics – the European Quarter in Brussels, Belgium, the institutional centre of the European Union. Drawing from scholarship on geopolitics and policy‐making, as well as primary interview material from field research in Brussels, I make two related points – (1) that we need detailed close‐up studies of the bureaucratic settings of contemporary geopolitics, and (2) that we must carefully situate such settings in their place‐specific contexts to reveal dynamics that remain unnoticed from afar. Empirically, the article contributes to the interdisciplinary scholarship on the EU as a transnational power centre of global importance. Theoretically, it seeks to improve our understanding of geopolitics as a bureaucratic and material practice.