Critical theory meets America: Riesman, Fromm, and the lonely crowd

A reading of David Riesman’s classic The Lonely Crowd is presented that emphasizes its links with the critical theory of German psychoanalyst and social critic Erich Fromm. The intellectual and personal relationship between Riesman and Fromm brings into focus Riesman’s adaptation of the insights of European critical theory as well as the strengths of American social science and social criticism. Riesman’s relatively neglected theoretical approach has much to offer a sociology concerned with retaining its links to public debate and empirical evidence. Thanks to Robert Alford, Linda Boos, Steven Brint, Scott Davies, Cynthia Fuchs Epstein, Louis Greenspan, Rhoda Howard-Hassmann, Lisa Kowalchuk, Bonnie Oglensky, Rolf Meyersohn, Stephen Steinberg, Alan Wolfe and Dennis Wrong for comments on earlier versions of this paper. A McMaster University ARB grant provided funds for a trip to German where I read the extensive correspondence between Riesman and Fromm housed in the Erich Fromm archives maintained by Rainer Funk. The paper was first presented at the American Sociological Association annual meetings in Chicago in 1999.     

A theory of scandal: Victorians, homosexuality, and the fall of Oscar Wilde

Oscar Wilde is considered to be the iconic victim of 19th-century English puritanism. Yet the Victorian authorities rarely and only reluctantly enforced homosexuality laws. Moreover, Wilde's sexual predilections had long been common knowledge in London before his trial without affecting the dramatist's wide popularity. Focusing on the seemingly inconsistent Victorian attitudes toward homosexuality and the dynamics of the Oscar Wilde affair, this article develops a general theory of scandal as the disruptive publicity of transgression. The study of scandal reveals the effects of publicity on norm enforcement and throws into full relief the dramaturgical nature of the public sphere and norm work in society.     

Performative family: homosexuality,marriage and intergenerational dynamics in China

Using in‐depth interview data on nominal marriages – legal marriages between a gay man and a lesbian to give the appearance of heterosexuality – this paper develops the concept of performative family to explain the processes through which parents and their adult children negotiate and resolve disagreements in relation to marriage decisions in post‐socialist China. We identify three mechanisms – network pressure, a revised discourse of filial piety and resource leverage – through which parents influence their gay offspring's decision to turn to nominal marriage. We also delineate six strategies, namely minimizing network participation, changing expectations, making partial concessions, drawing the line, delaying decisions and ending the marriage, by which gay people in nominal marriages attempt to meet parental expectations while simultaneously retaining a degree of autonomy. Through these interactions, we argue that Chinese parents and their gay adult children implicitly and explicitly collaborate to perform family, emphasizing the importance of formally meeting society's expectations about marriage rather than substantively yielding to its demands. We also argue that the performative family is a pragmatic response to the tension between the persistent centrality of family and marriage and the rising tide of individualism in post‐socialist China. We believe that our findings highlight the specific predicament of homosexual people. They also shed light on the more general dynamics of intergenerational negotiation because there is evidence that the mechanisms used by parents to exert influence may well be similar between gay and non‐gay people.     

The global clothing production system: commodity chains and business networks

The global organization of the clothing industry has been the prime example of buyer‐driven commodity chains. However, previous empirical studies to substantiate Gereffi's assertion have been highly Western centric and predominantly based on the empirical evidence of American retailers and brand name companies. In this article I demonstrate that any clothing commodity chain has various influential factors, such as the national and global regulatory framework, the societal context of the leading firm, the fashion context of the products, as well as the actual brand ownership. Thus, the organization of clothing firms in the global economy can develop diverse intra‐sectoral commodity chain coordinations. Using a hypothetical clothing commodity chain as an example, I attempt to identify the individual commodity chains within which Indonesian clothing firms are embedded. Furthermore, I outline the ways in which Indonesian clothing firms were affected by the economic crisis of the late 1990s.     

Why reputation is not always beneficial: Tolerance and opportunism in business networks

Many researchers in economics as well as sociology have stressed the important role of business networks for cooperation, trust, and performance. This claim is based on solid theoretical arguments as well as empirical findings. However, neither theory nor the selective empirical results support the view that networks are always beneficial for economic transactions. This paper begins with an observation that for the purchase of IT products, network embeddedness leads to even more problems for the customer. In order to explain this effect, possible reasons for this phenomenon are discussed using theory as well as empirics. The most promising explanation for this special case is the effect of uncertainty and incomplete information ex post. In order to reduce this uncertainty, the buyer forms beliefs on the basis of the opinions existing in a shared network or group. However, if the network members have the same problem of uncertainty, suppliers have an incentive to reduce their performance because such behavior will not be detected and sanctioned. An analysis of the customer's tolerance to a supplier's behavior in business transactions yields support for this argument. Even if problems in a transaction are kept constant, customers give suppliers more reputational credit if they share a common network.     

Prison sexology: Two personal accounts of masturbation,homosexuality, and rape

As revealed in two unrelated reports from prison inmates, the sexology of all‐male incarceration subdivides into masturbation, wet dreams, and partner contacts in association with heterosexual imagery; consenting homosexual pairing with one partner exclusively androphilic and the other bisexual; coercive partnerships with one partner dominating but not injuring the other and neither being permanently and exclusively androphilic; and violent homosexual rape. The long‐term outcomes of prison celibacy and homosexuality are not presently known. These outcomes need to be studied systematically and prospectively. It is suggested that it is illogical to punish sex offenders by incarcerating them in an environment that breeds sex offending. A system of conjugal visitation, and possibly of family living in prison, is a more logical, and probably the only alternative to institutionalized sexual brutality and homosexuality that is situationally evoked.     

From social control to financial economics: the linked ecologies of economics and business in twentieth century America

This article draws on historical material to examine the co-evolution of economic science and business education over the course of the twentieth century, showing that fields evolve not only through internal struggles but also through struggles taking place in adjacent fields. More specifically, we argue that the scientific strategies of business schools played an essential—if largely invisible and poorly understood—role in major transformations in the organization and substantive direction of social-scientific knowledge, and specifically economic knowledge, in twentieth century America. We use the Wharton School as an illustration of the earliest trends and dilemmas (ca. 1900–1930), when business schools found themselves caught between their business connections and their striving for moral legitimacy in higher education. Next, we look at the creation of the Carnegie Tech Graduate School of Industrial Administration after World War II. This episode illustrates the increasingly successful claims of social scientists, backed by philanthropic foundations, on business education and the growing appeal of “scientific” approaches to decision-making and management. Finally, we argue that the rise of the Graduate School of Business at the University of Chicago from the 1960s onwards (and its closely related cousin at the University of Rochester) marks the decisive ascendancy of economics, and particularly financial economics, in business education over the other behavioral disciplines. We document the key role of these institutions in diffusing “Chicago-style” economic approaches—offering support for deregulatory policies and popularizing narrowly financial understandings of the firm—that sociologists have described as characteristic of the modern neo liberal regime.     

A preliminary analysis of emigration determinants in Mexico,Central America,northern South America and the Caribbean

The author examines migratory movements and their causes in Mexico, Central and South America, and the Caribbean. Sections are included on migration trends, theoretical approaches, and methodological tools before the 1970s; the shift in migratory patterns after the 1980s; macrosocial variables as a general background of current international flows; and migration policies.     

From city club to nation state: business networks in American political development

Although cities were given no role in the constitutional order of the United States, the new nation posed the same potential threats to the accumulation of capital and wealth as European monarchs posed to long-powerful urban centers. In mobilizing for self-protection and advancement, American business developed new practices and discourses of citizenship that sustained a central role for the community as the locus of social provision. The strategy combined opportunity-hoarding through restricted membership in civic groups and obligation-hoarding through the alignment of diverse networks of voluntarism with this civic core. The linkage of business interests to this hybrid charitable-civic configuration constituted a source of resistance to nationalizing tendencies driven by demands for social protection. This alternative model of social provision and civic organization sustained a distinctive pattern of political membership and state development. By fiercely defending the capacity of privately governed civic networks to provide substantial social support, this history of business influence through community organizations lives on in the partial and fragmented character of the American welfare state.     

Race,Ethnicity, and Deviance: A Study of Asian and Non-Asian Adolescents in America

This study shows that Asian American adolescents commit less deviance in the form of school misbehavior than white, black, Hispanic, or Native American adolescents. Social control and social learning theories receive support as the observed differences are explained primarily by race/ethnic differences in family backgrounds and school bonding. These variables' explanatory ability tends to be invariant across four regional groups of Asian Americans. This study applies OLS regression to self-reported data from a nationally representative sample.     

Suicidality and Sexual Orientation in Five Continents: Asia, Australia, Europe, North America, and South America

This study examined the relation between suicidality and sexual orientation in an intercontinental sample (Asia, Australia, Europe, North America, and South America). Participants responded to a survey hosted on the Internet Website of an international news organization. Categorical analyses compared homosexual and bisexual respondents' history of suicide attempts and suicide ideations to those of heterosexual respondents, by total sample, males only, and females only. A relation between male sexual orientation and suicide attempts was found for every continent except Europe (odds ratio [OR] 1.5; 95% confidence interval [CI] = 0.3, 6.9). A relation between female sexual orientation and suicide attempts was not found in any continent except North America (OR = 2.1; 95% CI % 1.7, 2.5). These data provide preliminary evidence of intercontinental variation in the relation between suicidality and sexual orientation.     

Family and sexual orientation: the family-demographic correlates of homosexuality in men and women

Using a nationally representative sample of young adults, I identify the family-demographic correlates of sexual orientation in men and women. Hence, I test the maternal immune hypothesis, which posits that the only biodemographic correlate of male homosexuality is the number of older brothers, and there are no biodemographic correlates of female homosexuality. For men, I find that having one older brother does not raise the likelihood of homosexuality. Although having multiple older brothers has a positive coefficient, it is not significant. Moreover, having any older sisters lowers the likelihood of homosexual or bisexual identity. For women, I find that having an older brother or having any sisters decreases the likelihood of homosexuality. Family structure, ethnicity, and education are also significantly correlated with male and female sexual orientation. Therefore, the maternal immune hypothesis cannot explain the entire pattern of family-demographic correlates. The findings are consistent with either biological or social theories of sexual orientation.     

Discourse, interaction, and testimony: The making of selves in the U.S. Protestant dispute over homosexuality

Ethnography helps to elaborate Foucault's conception of power at work to produce subjects through micro-level interactions. I examine interactions among Protestants as they discuss homosexuality in two sites, an ex-gay movement seminar and a pro-gay liberal congregation. In two opposed groups, the genre of testimony produced an authentic-seeming truth, working performatively to produce group boundaries, to legitimate authority and hierarchies in the group, and to tacitly define certain categories as abject, unlivable. That groups can produce this effect in spite of their intentions illustrates how certain forms of social power inhere in language and work through everyday talk.     

Homeless in America: A children's story

Each night across America more than one million children are homeless. They and their parents now account for 38% of America's homeless. They are also the fastest growing segment of the homeless population. The demand for emergency shelter by families with children has increased 50% since 1995 and 15% in the last year alone. Despite the lowest unemployment rate in 30 years and a booming stock market, the number of homeless children today is higher than at any other time since the Great Depression. Throughout the early part of 1999, the Institute for Children and Poverty surveyed almost 2,000 families with more than 4,000 children in 24 locations to assess the state of homeless children across America. This report is their story—a story of constant upheaval, educational struggles, declining health, and violence. It is also a story of opportunity for those with the will and the power to influence policy and create change.