The rational kernel within Samir Amin’s mythological shell: the idea of a democratic and pluralist world political party

ABSTRACT

Amin’s Leninist-Maoist vision is unlikely to be persuasive to twenty-first century citizens. Nonetheless, there is a rational kernel in Amin’s call for a new worldwide political organization. Some structures, mechanisms and tendencies of the capitalist world economy are relatively enduring and some patterns recurrent, although the world economy is also fluid, constantly changing and evolving. Although waves of globalization have radically transformed human societies and their economic activities during the past 500 years also in many positive ways, the expansion of the international society and world economy has often been characterized by violence, imperial subjection and colonial expropriation and exclusion. There is a rational kernel also within Amin’s analysis of the current world-political situation. Command over space and time by investors and megacorporations is power. Emancipation aims at freedom from domination. The decline of the World Social Forum indicates that progressive politics must move ‘beyond the concept of a discussion forum’. My argument is that emancipation from unnecessary, unneeded and unwanted sources of determination requires global transformative agency and planetary visions about alternatives.     

Third party buying: the trend and the consequences

The trend toward more buying of health insurance, life insurance, and pension or annuity plans through employers brings up problems of consumer sovereignty , problems of the incentives of service providers, and problems of availability of the services of insurance which are only available through group buying. In order to specify what social indicators would be useful in this area, this paper analyzes the incentive systems for consumers, for service providers, and for employers as they are affected by the trend toward third party buying. It assesses the indicators that are available on the trend, and the literature in health economics which tried to analyze the impact of the trend on the provision of health services and health costs. On this basis, needed social indicators for policy assessment in the area of third party buying are suggested.     

Towards a multicultural democracy: some thoughts on the recent Indian elections

Abstract The surprising defeat of the BJP in May's elections is evidence of longterm trends in India's politics. Welcomed by the diaspora with mixed feelings, the results inspire confidence in India's progress towards a mature multicultural democracy. The elections demonstrate that India is a far more diverse and pluralistic country than previous elections might have suggested and that Indian democracy successfully mirrors the country's ideological spectrum. In place of Hindu nationalism and the religious card, one finds a unique political leadership drawn from the country's minorities and shaped by India's synthetic culture.     

Representation elections in higher education: Occurrence and outcomes

This study examines factors related to the occurrence of union representation elections in four-year universities and colleges and the outcomes of those elections (i.e., whether or not faculty opt for collective bargaining). In general, the results indicate that the probability of union victory in an election depends on economic conditions, the structural characteristics of the institution, and union density in higher education. For the most part, however, such indicators of institutional vulnerability are not found to be significant determinants of election occurrences. A major implication of this study is that there is a need to investigate more thoroughly the intraorganizational processes of faculty unions with regard to the allocation of organizing resources in order to understand the spread of faculty unionism. It is also suggested that the findings of this study may cast light on the growth of unionism in other white-collar and professional sectors. The authors are grateful to James L. Perry, Jeffrey Pfeffer, Claudia Bird Schoonhoven, and an anonymous reviewer for comments on an earlier version. The research assistance of Ken Bergstrom is also acknowledged.     

The Tenant Labor Market and Lynching in the South: A Test of Split Labor Market Theory*

Split labor market theory was originally advanced as a general approach explaining ethnic antagonism as the result of class-based interests. In this investigation, the threat to “high-priced” (white) labor from “cheap” (black) labor within the farm tenancy system of the postbellum South is examined as an underlying cause of the lynching of blacks by whites. Supporting this interpretation, the ratio of black to white tenants in southern counties, a measure of the level of economic threat to high-priced labor, is shown to be a strong predictor of lynching rates in the Cotton South. Findings for the Non-Cotton South, however, are inconsistent with theoretical expectations. We conclude that racial violence linked to economic competition between working-class whites and blacks was limited to that part of the South dominated by the plantation system.     

Determinants of the decertification process: Evidence from employer-initiated elections

There have been relatively few studies on why workers choose to decertify a union as their bargaining unit and virtually no empirical studies on the outcomes of employer-initiated representation elections. Using data from the NLRB monthly election reports (1977–1981), we attempt to analyze the factors that seem to influence the outcomes of employer-initiated representation elections with an incumbent union. Variables in our analysis include size of the election unit, region, industrial classification, type of incumbent union, and the state of the local economy. While the data show a concentration of elections on the West Coast, there is no significant difference in the ability of unions there to “win” decertification elections.     

青年就业者劳动合同签订状况及意愿调查

劳动合同的签订情况是反映青年劳动者就业现状的重要指标。对十个城市1795名青年的调查显示,目前青年劳动者仍在一定范围内面临着劳动合同签订率不高、签约意愿不足等问题。定序Logistic回归模型的结果表明,性别、受教育程度、劳动纠纷经历、劳动合同认知、行业类别、企业规模与青年劳动者的劳动合同签订意愿存在显著相关。其中,受教育程度和合同认知具有显著的正向相关,受教育程度越高,对劳动合同的认知越积极,青年劳动者的劳动合同签订意愿也越强烈。     

Labor Economics Mincer-Style: A Personal Reflection

Between 1957 and 1974 Jacob Mincer pioneered important new approaches to labor economics. In the years since these seminal discoveries, he, as well as generations of his students and colleagues at Columbia University and elsewhere, adopted these innovations to reach important conclusions about human well-being. In 1967 I was lucky enough to arrive as a graduate student at Columbia University, just at the peak of this research revolution. In this paper, I detail some of my recollections concerning Jacob Mincer and the hospitable research atmosphere at Columbia University that sparked so much of this path-breaking research.     

Social media and elections in Singapore: comparing 2011 and 2015

This article applies a theoretical approach that focuses on the interaction between media, politicians, activists, and citizens to investigate the influence of social media during two recent general elections in Singapore. Taking into account the combination of authoritarian governance and popular elections in this city-state, this article utilizes a mixed methods approach (i.e., a combination of statistics and virtual ethnography) to analyze four aspects of this influence. First, social media are used by the opposition parties because they are the only alternative to use in disseminating information and fostering dialogue. However, the ruling authorities use the same social media to counter the opposition. Second, social media empower the opposition by serving as efficient tools to mobilize, organize, and engage active citizens. However, compared to the traditional grassroots approach, online mobilization is not as effective as expected. Third, social media are able to change the perceptions of ordinary citizens regarding the opinion climate, which could be to either the advantage or the disadvantage of the opposition. Finally, the youngest age group (i.e., 21–30 years) was surveyed in both 2011 and 2015 to investigate their responses to these changes. Because of the complex influence of social media in Singapore, the citizens in this age group are particularly prone to being swing voters.     

The Google voter: search engines and elections in the new media ecology

This paper explores key Internet search trends for electoral information vis-à-vis the broader media ecology in the UK and the US. An innovative methodology is introduced that maps the informational trajectories of key election events by combining Google Trends data linked to significant news events during the campaigns. While the research found spikes of search that suggested a seemingly trivial event in the US could drive voters to search out deeper information on related policy issues, the study did not find the same phenomenon in the UK. This invites a reflection on the opportunities available to Internet users/voters in the changing informational landscape and how scholars can leverage Google Trends records to better understand how voters seek information in new and evolving media ecologies.     

我国城市社区民主治理的困境与出路

积极推进城市社区民主治理对我国民主政治建设和法治进程具有重要而深远的影响,但宥于我国历史传统和民主法治国情,城市社区民主治理仍存在民主权利与民主需求、民主需求与民主实践、民主实践与民主权利之间不相协调一致的问题,使得社区民主治理陷入“权利-需求-实践”的困境,这严重阻碍着中国城市社区建设及基层民主政治的健康发展。当务之急是结合我国实际,完善民主权利,满足民主需求,深化民主实践,积极探索具有我国特色的城市社区民主治理之路。     

Worker Behavior on the Job: A Multi-Methods Study of Labor Cooperation with Management

In the 2000s, the leadership of the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers (IBEW) called for labor-management cooperation from its rank and file members in response to concerns about increasing competition from the nonunionized electrical contracting sector. The IBEW??s leadership implored members to cooperate by altering their behavior on the job, thereby modifying the effort bargain between workers and management. To date, this type of cooperation with management has been little studied. Using qualitative and quantitative data collected from one Local of the IBEW, this study analyzes how workers responded to the leadership??s call and the factors guiding this behavior. Among the findings, cooperative behavior on the job is found to be strongly associated with workers?? attitudes, as measured by their commitments to their occupation and to their union.     

Community struggles and the shaping of democratic consciousness

Grass-roots protest activities against economic growth have often been viewed as particularistic, random, self-interested actions that have little significant impact on the larger political economy or movements for social change. This article, however, provides an alternative framework for understanding these community conflicts by examining the structural contradictions of political life that frame such conflicts and by showing, through a case study of a toxic waste protest, the ways in which these structural contradictions are subjectively experienced in the process of political protest. This integrated analysis thus shows how ordinary citizens may develop a more active, participatory concept of democracy.