Comparison of the characteristics of homes for older people in Slovenia with Goffman's concept of the total institution

The past concepts of life and work in homes for older people in Slovenia are no longer adequate to meet the needs, wishes and requirements of their current users. One of the basic premises, relying on Goffman's concept of the total institution, is that the first and foremost characteristic of homes for older people is that they are institutions. The theoretical starting point, namely that Goffman's concept of the total institution is ideal-typical, was corroborated by an investigation of the presence of elements of the total institution in Slovenian homes for older people, proving that not all features of the total institution can be found in any chosen empirical selection of institutions, with the data showing that those characteristics which are present do not exist in the ideal, that is in the most pronounced form. The homes’ users are given consideration, their personnel are adapting to their needs and requirements, even though this occurs within the functioning of an institution whose aims, i.e. to care for a large number of people living in one place, make life in such an institution subordinated to rules, along with the bureaucratisation and routinisation of services.     

Deinstitutionalisation: the management of rights

This article is based on an ethnographic study of the closure of a large institution for people with intellectual disabilities in Australia. The research involved 20 months of field work including participant observation in a locked unit at the institution, 120 interviews with those closing the institution, staff and families involved with people living there. The researcher was also involved as a participant observer in the closure of the institution. The paper argues that deinstitutionalisation is a problematic process because it necessarily involves a tension between two incompatible discourses: one concerned with the 'rights' of people with intellectual disabilities and the other with their 'management'. This tension leads inevitably to compromises in the practice of deinstitutionalisation. The paper concludes by exploring the implications of this argument for future institutional closures.     

Living apart together

Traditionally, marriage has been the social institution for couples that have been together for a long period. Some decades ago a new social institution appeared in the Western world: non-marital cohabitation, although this was slower to be accepted in some countries than in others. Living Apart Together (LAT) relationships, are a new phenomenon which seems to have the potential of becoming the third stage in the process of social change. In contrast to couples in commuting marriages which have one household in common, couples living in LAT relationships have one household each. We discuss some data on the frequency of LAT relationships in Sweden and Norway as well as some varieties of the phenomenon. Our analysis suggests that the existence of cohabitation as a social institution, alongside marriage, is a necessary precondition for LATs to be recognised as a social institution. LAT relationships could not exist unless a preceding social institution of cohabitation also exists.     

Changing informal institutions via mimesis: Gender equality in marriage proposals

Marriage equality has exposed how the institution of marriage is changing, but less attention has been given to how informal institutions around heterosexual marriage rituals are affected by a growing demand for gender equality. By applying institutional theory and feminist institutionalism to the context of women proposing to their male partners, this paper observes how shifts in gender norms change heteronormative institutions. Drawing from interviews with women who proposed to men and a virtual ethnography, we describe how reverse proposals can set precedence for emulation of practices or mimetic isomorphism. We therewith contribute to institutional theory in threefold ways. First, we describe how mimetic isomorphism introduces new standards and norms into a highly traditional institution. Second, we show how this integration of new standards and norms serves this patriarchal institution to remain relevant and appear progressive. Finally, we contend that this tension of joining a patriarchal institution but doing so in a subversive manner represents a double bind for women who are encouraged by society to formalize their heteronormative relationships through marriage and yet chastised for initiating this themselves.     

Institutional crisis assessment and mission-driven response in practice: One religious-affiliated university’s response to the Catholic priest sexual abuse and cover up crisis

An institutional crisis occurs when individuals and organizations fail to perform the routines and roles that produce the collective interests and social order of the institution. The institution of the Catholic Church continues to endure a crisis of priest sexual abuse and those in positions of leadership covering up these incidents. The crisis reached another eruption point in 2018 when a Pennsylvania grand jury produced a report that documented these crimes. Any organization within the institution could proactively decide that it must respond to maintain its credibility, while also helping repair the reputation of the institution. A response to an institutional crisis should be driven by an organization’s assessment of events as well as its mission, values, and sense of responsibility to its stakeholders. The response should also use the unique skill and resource capabilities of the organization. This case study focuses on the response of one religious-affiliated university that was prompted by the Pennsylvania grand jury report. The appeal of studying a religious-affiliated university is that it serves dual missions: that as part of the larger religious institution and that of a higher education institution. In response to this institutional crisis, the university has a focus on victims’ concerns from the religious mission perspective and is using its capabilities of amassing and disseminating knowledge from the higher education mission perspective.     

Two decades of serving children with autism in the People’s Republic of China: achievements and challenges of a state‐run mental health center

This article presents the results of research conducted at the first place where autism was diagnosed in China, the Nanjing Child Mental Health Research Center. The purpose was to examine the development of service provision for children with autism in this state‐run medical institution. Specifically, the specific intervention model for autism, factors influencing the development of this model and how structural and organizational features of the institution impact on the implementation of that model are examined. Results indicate: (1) the importance of family involvement in intervention due to limited services in China; (2) the challenges of providing educational services at a medical institution during the reform period. The implications of these services in contemporary China are significant to consider as an important way to address the rights of individuals with disabilities to have equal opportunities in society, beginning with early education.     

Women Working in a Greedy Institution: Commitment and Emotional Labour in the Union Movement

This paper seeks to move beyond the restrictions of limited representations of women's participation in the union movement. Through a focus on the union movement as a ‘greedy institution’, it is argued that women's union involvement requires complex and dynamic negotiations with its gendered discourses and practices. As a greedy institution, the union movement demands considerable depth of commitment and loyalty, as well as high levels of work and emotional labour. Based on a study of a network of women union officials, this paper discusses the ways women interpret three main aspects of trade union work: commitment, workload and emotional labour. I argue that the strategies the women officials employ do not remain static within a limited frame of gender difference from men. Rather, they must engage with the effects of male dominance of the union movement as well as the difficulties associated with union activism, family, service to members, leadership, and care in order to take up the political opportunities available in this greedy institution.     

Why Social Capital Subverts Institution Building in Risky Settings

This article considers the problem of fostering confidence in institutions in a post-war context. Situated in post-war Bosnia, this article examines interactions between citizens and representatives of municipal governments on newly established local planning committees to demonstrate that an individual's confidence in an institution and his/her trust in a social intimate who works in that institution are sociologically different phenomena with correspondingly different outcomes for institution building. Contrary to the assumption that increased social capital and interpersonal trust positively affect democratic institutions, this article shows that interpersonal trust may actually undermine the development of institutional confidence.

The media and the formation of the public sphere in the new Independent States

This paper analyses the development of the media in the successor states of the USSR from a public sphere perspective. This approach allows the post‐communist media to be placed within the context of the process of democratization that these societies are currently experiencing by postulating that the role of the media in this process should be to provide a symbolic space where the economic and political dimensions of the process of transition offer themselves to the comprehension of citizens, and where those who hold representative opinions on this process are able to express themselves. This article argues that two main obstacles exist to the development of East European media as a public sphere institution. These are the various means of control East European governments employ to check the freedom of the press, and some of the profit‐oriented journalistic practices market‐driven media entrepreneurs are introducing in the East European media field. In its conclusion, this article argues that media policies in the New Independent States should specifically aim at developing the media as a public sphere institution rather than simply an industry.     

Contested memories: efforts of the powerful to silence former inmates' histories of life in an institution for 'mental defectives'

This paper discusses the barriers encountered in undertaking an oral history project with survivors of a total institution for 'mental defectives' in the province of Alberta, Canada. Powerful social actors were able to bar access to survivors through legal guardianship orders, and to make access to the institution and its grounds and to publicly archived materials quite prohibitive to the researcher. In addition to overt efforts on the part of powerful social actors to block the project, concerns about the potential to discredit survivor narratives led to changes in the research design. Specifically, research and literature about the 'acquiescence' of intellectuals with intellectual impairments led the researcher to broaden the sources for this history as a preemptive strategy. Despite these barriers, survivors of the institution provided a rich and powerful testimony to the brutality of institutionalization, and provide us with an emancipatory history from the perspectives of those most oppressed by disability policies and practices.     

RUNNING OFF-TACKLE THROUGH THE LAST BASTION: WOMEN,RESISTANCE, AND PROFESSIONAL FOOTBALL

This article discusses the mechanisms that must be in place in order for women to successfully resist institutionalized gender norms. This research draws on over 200 hours of observations of and 20 in-depth interviews with women playing full contact football, a sport traditionally dominated by men and firmly planted in the culture of the U.S. as synonymous with masculinity. Following the work of recent calls by gender scholars to treat gender as a social institution, this research shows that at least four components must be in place for sustained, successful resistance to a social institution. First, resistance must be a conscious activity. Second, any resistance must involve engaging in an abnormal activity. Third, any deviant or abnormal activity must take place in an otherwise legitimate social context. Finally, as the creation and maintenance of a social institution is an inherently social enterprise, so, too, is institutional resistance. This research contributes to scholarship on gender and social institutions by showing some strategies for increasing possibilities for personal expression.     

Judicial Conceptions of Tradition in Canadian Aboriginal Rights Law

The concept of tradition has, historically, played a significant role in the anthropological understanding of indigenous peoples. Since the 1970s, it has also played a fundamental role in the judicial determination of aboriginal rights claims in Canada and other Anglophonic common law countries, such as Australia and the United States. In order for indigenous practices to be recognised and protected by these legal systems, those practices must be proved to be traditional. This paper offers a lawyer's analysis of the ways in which Canadian judges have interpreted and used the concept of tradition in aboriginal rights claims. It is hoped that this analysis will provide anthropologists with a greater insight into the thought and practice of an institution with which they are increasingly in contact, and stimulate them to engage critically with that institution in relation to the interpretation and use of such concepts as tradition.     

Willingness and availability: Explaining new attitudes toward institutional elder care among Chinese elderly parents and their adult children

This paper studies the attitudes of Chinese elderly parents and their family members toward institutional elder care. Based on a sample survey of 265 elderly residents in 67 elder home institutions and 114 family members, this study finds that elders and family members generally had high evaluations of institutions' quality in terms of facility, medical, and direct care conditions. Elders who reported improved health and emotional well-being after entering institutions gave higher ratings to those institutions' quality. Among adult children, those who had more siblings tended to rate institutions higher than those who had fewer siblings. Factors that influenced elders' willingness to stay in an institution included marital status and financial ability. Widowed elders were more willing to stay in institutions compared with married counterparts. Elders who rated service charge very high preferred to stay at home due to the high cost of institutional care. In the family relatives' sample, gender was found to be related to willingness to place elderly parents in an institution; female children were less willing to place elderly parents in the institution.     

Social reward,conflict, and commitment: A theoretical model of gambling behavior

A theoretical model of gambling behavior is introduced which examines the linkage between regular gamblers, the gambling institution, and outside society. This model is based on participant observation in an urban casino and a review of the related literature. The intention is to explore the structural and cultural factors operating both in society at large and in a gambling institution and to connect them with the personal characteristics of avid regular gamblers to explain their gambling behavior and its consequences. The main conclusion is that the gambling institution with its social rewards and the perceived threatening nature of the wider social structure are the dominant forces in attracting gamblers and in shaping their subsequent gambling entanglement.     

Mechanisms of Organizational Commitment: Adding Frames to Greedy Institution Theory

How do organizations that make significant physical, emotional, and intellectual demands foster commitment and loyalty from voluntary participants? Greedy institution theory (Coser 1974 ) answers this question by identifying structural elements that foster participants' undivided commitment to “greedy” groups, those in which participants' involvement interferes with and takes precedence over their involvement in other social spheres. In this article, I argue for the expansion of greedy institution theory to include frames and framing processes as “greedy” organizational tools that work on the microinteractional level. Using data from an ethnographic study of an intensive program that prepares low‐income students of color to attend elite boarding high schools, I show how the organization's “family” frame mobilized participants and encouraged interpretations and interactions that helped students persist in the program and remain committed to the organization. I argue that turning our attention to frames and framing processes will increase our understanding of the tools organizations use on a microinteractional level to build and repair participants' loyalty and commitment.     

加强社会体制建设的思路与对策研究

社会体制建设是我国社会建设和整个现代化进程中面临的一个重大问题,也是上海当前经济社会建设面临的一个重大问题。加强社会体制建设、进行社会体制建设重大战略决策,首先必须明确＂社会体制建设＂的主要内涵及其具体内容,还应掌握社会体制建设中诸多有待解决的体制性矛盾和问题所在,在此基础上,提出完善社会体制建设的整体思路、总体框架和阶段性目标,并提出进一步推进和完善社会体制建设的有关对策建议。     

On the ruins of the historical avant‐garde: The institution of art and its contemporary exigencies

The focus of this theoretical paper is the analysis of the European historical avant‐garde as an excess of modernism. As such, its goal was two‐fold. First, it tried to transcend the institution of autonomous art and second, it attempted to integrate art into everyday life. In this light, the paper presents the contingencies of the genesis and main features of the historical avant‐garde's doctrine and practice. It further argues that the historical avant‐garde ended in a collapse of the aesthetic and practical dimension without corresponding emancipation. This failure, in turn, laid down the groundwork for the post‐modern art which appropriated the stylistic and formal innovations of historical avant‐garde while comfortably remaining within the institution of art. Thus, the post‐modern betrayal of the values embedded in avant‐garde and modernist works of art appears to be a necessity.     

京津冀协同发展现状、问题与对策——基于区域协调机制的视角

京津冀协同发展是我国区域协调发展的一个重要组成部分,京津冀都市圈区域规划早在2004年就已经启动,2007年已正式上报国务院,但迟迟没有批复的消息。京津冀都市圈区域规划推进不力有众多原因,其中市场经济发展不成熟、政治因素介入过多、合作的制度供给不足、合作的制度实施不力等是几个主要原因。那么,接下来就要从发挥市场的激励机制、保障制度供给充足、保障制度实施到位等几个方面做出努力。     

Family is NOT an institution: distinguishing institutions from organisations in social science and social theory

This paper addresses the use, and potential misuse, of the ‘institution’ as a key concept in sociology. The concept of the ‘institution’ is interrogated using ‘family’ as an example and new institutional economics (NIE) as a crucible. The sociological understanding of family as an ‘institution’ is challenged by the distinction between ‘institutions’ and ‘organisations’ in NIE. The blurring of generic non-sociological terms with critical sociological concepts causes confusion between institutions and organisations. This is highly problematic for understanding social change in increasingly complex systems. I conclude that the contextual embedding of sociological concepts remains important to the appropriate use of the term ‘institution’ in the social sciences.