The Goals of History Teaching

Abstract

The following article is an excerpt of a speech given by Larry Diamond to those participating in the 1996 Civitas Panamericano Conference in Buenos Aires, Argentina. In his speech, Dr. Diamond included a comprehensive survey of the state of stable, liberal democratic government in the Americas. He outlined the multiple levels of development required to achieve stable, liberal democratic institutions, but he focused the major portion of his address on that one level “indispensable for a stable, liberal, and effective democracy”—the individual citizen. At that level, civic education, both formal and informal, is required. The editors of The Social Studies offer readers Dr. Diamond's concept of educating for democracy, hoping that the excerpts will result in our readers' critical reflection on the revival of civic education in the United States and in other parts of the Americas.     

THE COLLAPSE AND RECOVERY OF THE CAPITAL SHARE IN EAST GERMANY AFTER 1989

After the 1990 unification, East Germany's capital income share plunged to 15.2% in 1991, then increased to 37.4% by 2015. To account for these large changes in the capital share, I model an economy that gains access to a higher productivity technology embodied in new plants. As existing low productivity plants decrease production, the capital share varies due to the nonconvex production technology: plants require a minimum amount of labor to produce output. Two policies—transfers and government‐mandated wage increases—have opposite effects on output growth, but contribute to lowering the capital share early in the transition. (JEL E20, E25, O11)     

BROADBAND INTERNET,FIRM PERFORMANCE,AND WORKER WELFARE: EVIDENCE AND MECHANISM

This paper examines the effect of high-speed internet on firm's productivity and worker's wage in China. We exploit a national policy reform and devise a difference-in-difference strategy to address the endogeneity. We find that high-speed internet significantly increases firm's productivity and worker's wage, and the estimate is larger for firms in industries with high skill intensity and for more educated workers. We provide suggestive evidence that the mechanism is likely from firm's increased use of skill-biased technology and the flattened management organization. (JEL O2, O3, J3)     

GROWTH AND CONVERGENCE WHEN TECHNOLOGY AND HUMAN CAPITAL ARE COMPLEMENTS

This article presents a model of endogenous growth, in which a firm's technology and a country's human capital stock are complementary in the production of output. Production technologies are created by costly research and development (R&D) and are owned by firms that can freely choose where in the world to produce. Both production and R&D have a positive effect on a country's human capital stock. While all countries typically grow at the same rate in the long run, they differ in their levels of human capital, per capita output, and the quality of the technologies that are used in production. A country's relative position in terms of productivity is history dependent. Countries that start out with a lower human capital stock or industrialize later end up with a lower per capita GDP in long‐term equilibrium. (JEL O4, O33, O47)     

Coming Back Across the Fence: Masculinity and the Transition to Sustainable Agriculture*

Abstract In this paper we explore the social construction of agricultural masculinity and its role in the transition to sustainable agriculture. We draw our evidence from a participatory qualitative study comparing members of the sustainable agriculture group Practical Farmers of Iowa (PFI) with their non‐PFI neighbors. On the non‐PFI farms, men more often represented what we call monologic masculinity, a conventional masculinity with rigid and polarized gender expectations and strictly negotiated performances that make a clear distinction between men's and women's activities. The male farmers belonging to PFI, on the other hand, more often represented what we call dialogic masculinity, characterized by different measures for work and success than in monologic masculinity, less need for control over nature, and greater social openness. Although both are present to some extent in all male participants, we argue that acceptance of a more dialogic masculinity helps promote the transition to sustainable agriculture.     

Bourdieu,Technique And Technology

This paper examines the place of technology in Pierre Bourdieu's social theory, and argues for the relevance of Bourdieu's thought to the study of technology. In moving from an examination of the status of technology in Bourdieu's work through to his broad approach to social practice and his widely cited concept of habitus, it is argued that technologies are crystalliz­ations of socially organized action. As such, they should be considered not as exceptional or special phenomena in a social theory, but rather as very much like other kinds of social practices that recur over time. Ultimately, through the use of Bourdieu's concepts of habitus, field, and capital, we are able to overcome the binary divisions such as technology/society and subject/object that have plagued technology studies.     

WHY CHINA INDUSTRIALIZED AFTER ENGLAND

Although industrialization first occurred in England, it is thought that China, not England, may have been the world leader in technology at the time. Yet, China did not industrialize until 150 yr after England and nearly a century after less advanced European countries. This represents a puzzle because two‐sector neoclassical growth models, such as Hansen and Prescott (2002) , that accurately match industrialization, require that more technologically advanced countries industrialize at an earlier date. I find that a model that accounts for cross‐country heterogeneities in population density accurately predicts the timing of industrialization in China. (JEL F43, N10, N30, O11, O14, O41)     

DEMOCRACY AND GROWTH: A PERSPECTIVE FROM DEMOCRATIC EXPERIENCE

This article investigates the impact of democracy on growth by simultaneously considering a country's secular‐historical experience of democracy and current political regime. The results obtained show that the effect of democracy on growth exhibits an asymmetrical pattern depending on the country's democracy stock. Only in “democratic countries” with “prolonged experiences of democratic rule” can democracy promote growth. This claim stands in contrast to the earlier literature in which there is either no consistent relationship between growth and democracy or perhaps a nonlinear relationship. This conclusion provides circumstantial support for the claim of the “democracy promotes growth” hypothesis. (JEL O43)     

Adolescent Transitions to Young Adulthood: Antecedents,Correlates, and Consequences of Adolescent Employment

The antecedents, correlates, and consequences of adolescent employment were investigated in a sample of 251 low‐income, African American youth that were followed since birth. The youth (age: M at preschool = 4.89, SD= .70; M at adolescence = 16.44, SD= .66; M at transition to adulthood = 19.36, SD= .76; and M at early adulthood = 27.67, SD= .75) were the firstborn children of African American teenage mothers who gave birth in Baltimore in the 1960s. Analyses examined the antecedents and correlates of age of entry into employment and stability of employment during adolescence. The associations of adolescent work experiences with subsequent adult education and employment outcomes also were considered. Findings indicate that among this sample of low‐income, African American youth, those who repeated a grade in school during middle childhood were more likely to enter the workforce at later ages than their peers who did not repeat a grade. The small subset of adolescents who never worked (n= 12) appear to be markedly more disadvantaged than their peers who worked. At the transition to adulthood, adolescents who entered the workforce earlier were more likely to complete high school than their peers. In addition, stable employment during the adolescent years had more beneficial effects on young men's chances of attending college than young women's postsecondary education. This pattern of findings is consistent with ethnographic accounts of adolescent employment among poor, minority, urban youth.     

Improving alcohol screening for college students: Screening for alcohol misuse amongst college students with a simple modification to the CAGE questionnaire

ABSTRACT

Objective: To improve the CAGE (Cut down, Annoyed, Guilty, Eye opener) questionnaire's predictive accuracy in screening college students. Participants: The sample consisted of 219 midwestern university students who self-administered a confidential survey. Methods: Exploratory factor analysis, confirmatory factor analysis, receiver operating characteristics (ROC), and Cronbach's alpha were used to analyze factor structure, validity, and reliability. Results: The modified CAGE correctly classified students with alcohol abuse (“AA students”; area under the curve [AUC] = 0.7765) and students with alcohol dependency (“AD students”; AUC = 0.8392) more often than CAGE (AA students: AUC = 0.6977; AD students: AUC = 0.7437), and these differences are statistically significant (AA students: χ²(1) = 14.72, p < .001; AD students: χ²(1) = 7.71, p < .01). Using 2-point cut scores, CAGE correctly identified 59.38% of AD students as AD, whereas the modified CAGE correctly identified 87% of AD students as AD. Using 1-point cut scores, CAGE correctly identified 65% AA students, whereas the modified CAGE identified 85.29%. Conclusions: The modified CAGE has better accuracy than CAGE in predicting AA and AD among college populations.     

IS PHYSICAL INVESTMENT THE KEY TO CHINA'S GROWTH MIRACLE?

This paper applies Jones' test for the empirical validity of AK‐type models to the Chinese economy over the period 1952–2006 (Jones C. I., Quarterly Journal of Economics, 110, 1995a, 495–525). We aim to establish whether large permanent movements in the physical investment rate cause permanent movements in output growth. The evidence indicates that the one‐sector AK model cannot be rejected. We also find that augmenting the model to allow for transitional dynamics—via imbalances in factor endowments, structural transformation, and R&D‐based technology transfer—does a better job in describing China's growth dynamics than the basic AK model. (JEL C22, O41, O47)     

Social welfare functions and fairness

A definition of a social state is proposed that incorporates the notion of procedural fairness into Harsanyi's (1955) analytical framework. We show that, within the new framework, a Harsanyi-type social welfare function is immune to Diamond's (1967) criticism. Moreover, the resulting social welfare function embodies the notion of procedural fairness held by individual members of the society.     

ANTIDUMPING ECHOING

This article documents that antidumping (AD) “echoing” (i.e., different countries sequentially imposing AD measures on the same product from the same exporter) is common practice among users of AD. We develop a dynamic game where two competing importers can impose AD measures on a third exporting country in one of two periods, if at all. Assuming that governments are politically motivated (favoring their import‐competing industry), AD echoing occurs only for intermediate values of a country's political‐economy parameter. This result is confirmed by our econometric analysis, demonstrating that countries' political‐economy‐driven AD actions are interdependent and should not be analyzed in isolation. (JEL F12, F13, F14)     

In their voices: Identity preservation and experiences of Alzheimer's disease

Although much research pertaining to Alzheimer's disease (AD) explores the impact on caregivers, there is a general paucity of data on experiences of living with the condition. Contemporary medical initiatives to diagnose people earlier in the illness trajectory make it increasingly possible to hear the voice of people with memory loss, which can improve both public perception and policy. This study examined the impact of being diagnosed with early AD on identity construction. Respondents highlighted aspects of being diagnosed that were instrumental in making sense of changes in their lives and identities, including defining moments, to tell or not to tell, and preservation. Findings suggest that understanding how to identify memory deficits, the context of diagnosis, and the techniques employed for managing illness are crucial to subjective experiences. Despite normative expectations and the rhetoric of loss, respondents deliberately manage their interactions to make sense of their lives and preserve themselves.     

THE QUANTITATIVE IMPORTANCE OF OPENNESS IN DEVELOPMENT

This paper deals with a classic development question: how can the process of economic development—transition from stagnation in a traditional technology to industrialization and prosperity with a modern technology—be accelerated? Lewis (1954) and Rostow (1956) argue that the pace of industrialization is limited by the rate of capital formation which in turn is limited by the savings rate of workers close to subsistence. We argue that access to capital goods in the world market can be quantitatively important in speeding up the transition. We develop a parsimonious open‐economy model where traditional and modern technologies coexist (a dual economy in the sense of Lewis 1954). We show that a decline in the world price of capital goods in an open economy increases the rate of capital formation and speeds up the pace of industrialization relative to a closed economy that lacks access to cheaper capital goods. In the long run, the investment rate in the open economy is twice as high as in the closed economy and the per capita income is 23% higher. (JEL O11, F43, O14)     

Becoming a Parent and Relationship Satisfaction: A Longitudinal Dyadic Perspective

This study investigated the extent to which women's and men's relationship satisfaction within couples is similarly or differently affected by becoming a parent and the extent to which changes in work hours and hours spent on household labor affect a person's own and his or her spouse's relationship satisfaction across the transition to parenthood. The authors conducted longitudinal dyadic analyses, based on 12 waves of the British Household Panel Study (BHPS). They selected 689 couples who remained together during the period of observation and who were employed, childless, and living with their partner (of which 28% married) at the first moment of observation. The results revealed that relationship satisfaction of both members in a couple changed in tandem. Although work hours and household labor had some effect on people's own and their spouse's relationship satisfaction, these factors did not account for the U‐shaped relationship satisfaction pattern associated with the transition to parenthood.     

Backing Australia's Future: Teaching and Learning in Social Work

Abstract

It is universally expected that universities will strive for quality in teaching and learning. Over the past 25 years, massive changes to higher education have impacted on these institutions. We now have a mass higher education system, a knowledge-based economy, increased technology, and the internationalization of education accompanied by increased student enrolments and political expectations of enhanced graduate outcome measures. These changes pose challenges to developing, updating, and improving the quality of teaching and learning. This new policy environment confronts social work educators as they determine how best to deliver quality professional education. The present paper discusses the concepts underpinning the Australian government's paper Our Universities: Backing Australia's Future as a background to exploring the tensions arising in current professional expectations and criteria for social work programs as they make the transition from old to new paradigms in classroom teaching and field education.     

Women's Work? The Relationship between Farmwork and Gender Self‐Perception

Women have long been involved in agricultural production, yet farming and ranching have been associated with masculinity and men. In recent years women have become more involved and more likely to take active and equal roles on farms and ranches and thus increasingly are doing tasks that have been associated with masculinity. Prior work indicates that women are perceived by others as more masculine when they do these tasks, but less work has focused on the association between women's involvement in farming and women's own perceptions of their gender (i.e., how masculine or feminine they feel). Using 2006 survey data from a random sample of women in livestock and grain operations in Washington State, we find that women's involvement in farm and ranch tasks is associated with their gender self‐perception, with more involvement being associated with a more masculine self‐perception. Women who view their primary role as independent agricultural producers or full partners also perceive themselves as more masculine than women who view their primary role as homemaker. We discuss the implications of these findings for women's experiences in agriculture.     

WHY CANNOT POOR COUNTRIES UTILIZE EXISTING KNOWLEDGE? EXPANSION OF FIRMS AND HUMAN CAPITAL ACCUMULATION BY TRAINING

Current growth literature does not explain the inability of poor countries to utilize existing knowledge. This study presents a stylized development model based on firms' expansion through on‐the‐job training. Since trained workers can supervise and train more workers, a development process in which output and productivity increase up to a full utilization of existing technology is generated. Unlike schooling‐based models, which require an assumption regarding a smaller local stock of knowledge, this study relies on the size of the industrial sector and the limited supply of training opportunities, therefore highlights barriers to development, even when technology and capital are available. (JEL O1, O4, J2)     

Father's Migration and Leaving the Parental Home in Rural Mozambique

Migration is an increasingly common global phenomenon and has important implications for the well‐being of family members left behind. Although extensive research has examined the impact of parental labor migration on school‐age children, less is known about its effect on adolescents. In this study, the authors used longitudinal survey data collected in rural Mozambique (N = 515) to assess the association between father's migration and adolescent children's leaving the parental home, an important component of the transition to adulthood. The results showed that father's migration delays home‐leaving for adolescent girls and that these effects are not mediated by school enrollment. The results for boys were inconclusive. The authors also found that remittances and longer durations of paternal migration were negatively associated with the transition out of the home. On the basis of the findings, they argue that father's migration delays girls' marriage.