Reassessing the Insurance Effect: A Qualitative Analysis of Fertility Behavior in Senegal and Zimbabwe

A number of prominent demographers have recently reiterated the argument that a lasting mortality decline is a key determinant of the fertility transition. Of the main hypothesized pathways linking fertility to mortality, the one least studied is the insurance hypothesis: the notion that, in high‐mortality contexts, people decide to have more children in order to anticipate possible future child deaths and lessen the risks of having too few surviving offspring. In‐depth interviews and focus groups from Zimbabwe and Senegal are used to examine this hypothesis and to extend it into a broader theory of reproductive decision making under uncertainty. Whereas insurance strategies are frequent in Zimbabwe and occur in urban Senegal, in the higher‐mortality settings—the rural Senegalese site and the recent past described by respondents in Zimbabwe and urban Senegal—deliberate fertility‐limitation strategies are rare. The data depict fundamental changes in attitudes, strategies, and behaviors concerning family size over time and, in Senegal, over space. Important reproductive goals and risks extend far beyond numbers of children and mortality. Parents seek to have healthy, successful children for many reasons including companionship, descendants, and old‐age support. Diverse investments in child quality (their education, health, etc.) and quantity (numbers of births) are the main means to attain these goals and, less recognized by demographers, are also important ways for parents to manage uncertainty in family‐building outcomes; the “classic” insurance mechanism is only one, often minor, aspect of the quantity option.     

Reassessments of sociological history: The empirical validity of the conflict tradition

Conclusion The conflict tradition does not end with Max Weber, but there is room for only the barest sketch of subsequent or even contemporary developments. We have already covered many of the follow-ups of the Marx-Weber line of conflict sociology. Among these, there is the important line of influence inwhich Michels served as the link between Weber's historical theory of organizational politics and the organizational studies of the 1940–60's. Studies of stratification, although often pursued with naive theoretical categories, have gradually accumulated a great deal of evidence bolstering and refining the classical principles explained above; and some work, especially since the time of C. Wright Mills (but not necessarily influenced by him) has made a conscious effort to build on classical theory.Some other lines of conflict theory must at least be mentioned. The socialpsychological tradition of conflict theory originating with Schopenhauer and Nietzsche, of course, has Freud as its most famous representative. This level of analysis, despite various theoretical attempts, has not yet been convincingly related to the organizational/stratification level outlined above, nor has it had as much empirical support. But this social-psychological conflict tradition continues to have great potential importance. It holds out the promise of a model for the shaping of the individual psyche by the emotional and symbolic interchanges involved in struggles for interpersonal advantage to replace the artificially one-sided and relatively static models of psychological learning theory. Its premises move towards replacing adult-centered socialization theory with a two-sided view of age conflict under conditions of unequal resources. And when cast in an explicitly historical form, its insights into sexual repression become the basis of a comparative theory of sexual stratification. Many other interesting figures have been slighted in this brief history. Some, like Simmel and Pareto, appear isolated from the main stream, as they subordinated their insights about conflict to principles which led in quite different directions: neo-Kantian idealism and liberal positivism respectively. Others, like Sorel, came closer to the main line, above all, in Sorel's emphasis that conflict is the basis of moral solidarity, a point which resonates with Weber's understanding of group ceremony as the basis of legitimacy and solidarity precisely in situations of conflict and domination. From here, the possibility exists for appropriating the main achievements of the Durkheimian tradition - the understanding of the ceremonial bases of social realityconstructing - into a comprehensive conflict theory.For the arena encompassed by conflict theory is not only the moments of obvious strife in society, but the systematic explanation of the entire social structure. The central focus is on the organization of material arrangements into a system of power which divides society into interest groups struggling for control. Such material conditions operate not only through the sphere of economic production, but also directly condition the mobilization of interest groups for political action, as well as the production of ideas and of emotional ties. We need no longer rest with an abstract assertion of the determination of structure by contending interests with varying material resources; refined principles of conflict theory may explain specific outcomes in all areas of society.

---

     

Habitual and Occasional Lobbyers in the U.S. Steel Industry: An Em Algorithm Pooling Approach

Using U.S. steel firm data, we find that lobbying for import protection appears to be habit-forming. To identify heterogeneity in lobbying behavior among firms, we use an expectation-maximization algorithm to sort our firms into groups with different propensities to lobby and estimate the determinants of lobbying in each group. A two-pool model emerges: occasional lobbyers' lobbying depends on their market performance, and habitual lobbyers' lobbying only depends on past lobbying. The latter tends to be larger steel firms whose business is more focused in steel. Our evidence is consistent with dynamic economies of scale in protection seeking breeding protection-dependent firms.     

Child day care provision: Explaining local variation

Drawing on a combination of quantitative and qualitative data, this article seeks to account for variation in the amount and forms of child day care provision amongst British local authorities. Amongst relevant local factors it notes the legacy of earlier child care provision. It considers the association between provision and indicators of need on the one hand and political motivation on the other. Finally it looks at the process of policy making. The conclusion reflects on the implications of these findings for the government's new pledge to meet the child care challenge. Copyright © 2001 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

执行战略的最佳管理实践

引进新的部门,全力打造战略中心型组织的最佳实践 是什么使平衡计分卡的成功使用者 与众不同?这是人们经常问我们 的问题。平衡计分卡的成功是艺 术还是科学?是运气,抑或仅仅因为平衡 计分卡的使用者如此众多,必定会有一些 成功者?过去的一年里,我们一直致力于     

Self-managed Supervision

The growth of professional supervision in social work has been accompanied by complex attempts to theorise key elements of supervisory practice and highlight the need to further examine what constitutes supervisory support in current regulatory environments. Changes in human service organisations resulting from new public management generate a need to theorise broader patterns of support available to human service workers. This article draws on an electronic, mixed-method self-reporting study of advice and support-seeking behaviours of 193 human service professionals in 3 South Australian organisations. The findings indicate the fluidity of current professional supervision practice, with workers seeking professional wisdom, identifying practice direction, and debriefing with a range of colleagues within and outside their organisation. Accordingly, the article confirms that supervisors should no longer be thought of as the sole providers of professional advice and support for human service workers and conceptualises the workers as active agents shaping their own learning.