Putting Peace to the Vote: Displaced Persons and a Future Referendum on Nagorno-Karabakh

Fifteen years after the war over Nagorno-Karabakh, the conflictremains unresolved, and Azerbaijan remains host to one of theworld's largest per capita populations of internally displacedpersons (IDPs). Current plans for a settlement of the conflictenvision a crucial role for these IDPs, by proposing their returnand participation in a referendum to decide the future statusof the disputed territory. This article outlines several issuesthat need to be considered when arranging for such a referendum:what territory will the referendum concern, who will be eligibleto vote, what options will voters choose among, and how willthe results be determined? These issues arise from previousexperiences of peace processes that provided for referenda.In conclusion, the article argues that the referendum be arrangedin such a way as to increase uncertainty about the outcome,rather than gearing it towards one that seeks to confirm andlegitimize a solution negotiated by governments.     

The wide-meshed safety net. Decision-making on social assistance eligibility in Sweden

This article explores and analyses, with the help of both client and social worker data on 423 applications for social assistance in Sweden, (i) the extent to which social assistance benefits and labour market strengthening measures are granted and (ii) factors concerning clients as well as social workers that are associated with the granting of benefits. Considering (i), the results show that social assistance is granted in about 74% of cases while only 6% of applicants are granted additional labour market strengthening measures. With regard to (ii), the results indicate that the granting of benefits seems to depend on a broad spectrum of factors at both the client and the social worker levels. For example, more experienced social workers are less willing to grant social assistance while chances increase when an applicant is already registered at the local public employment service and/or social insurance office. Moreover, the granting of benefits also co-varies with more or less invariable factors at the client level: social workers are in general more generous towards women and people born outside Sweden, but rather less generous vis-à-vis single parents. The findings are discussed in terms of workfare and professionalization among social workers.     

What is Qualitative in Research

Qualitative Sociology - In this text we respond and elaborate on the four comments addressing our original article. In that piece we define qualitative research as an “iterative process in...     

What is Qualitative in Qualitative Research

Qualitative Sociology - What is qualitative research? If we look for a precise definition of qualitative research, and specifically for one that addresses its distinctive feature of being...     

Knowledge and valuation in markets

The purpose of this theoretical article is to contribute to the analysis of knowledge and valuation in markets. In every market actors must know how to value its products. The analytical point of departure is the distinction between two ideal types of markets that are mutually exclusive, status and standard. In a status market, valuation is a function of the status rank orders or identities of the actors on both sides of the market, which is more entrenched than the value of what is traded in the market. In a market characterized by a standard, the situation is reversed; the scale of value is more entrenched than the rankings of actors in the market. In a status market actors need to know about the other actors involved as there is no scale of value for evaluating the items traded in the market independently of its buyers and sellers. In a standard market it is more important to know how to meet the standard in relation to which all items traded are valued. The article includes empirical examples and four testable hypotheses.

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Market Fashioning

Theory and Society - How do markets come about? This article offers a first systematic analysis of three different ideal types of market fashioning: mutual adjustment, organization, and fields....     

The Mirror to Our Soul? Comparisons of Spontaneous and Posed Vocal Expression of Emotion

It has been the subject of much debate in the study of vocal expression of emotions whether posed expressions (e.g., actor portrayals) are different from spontaneous expressions. In the present investigation, we assembled a new database consisting of 1877 voice clips from 23 datasets, and used it to systematically compare spontaneous and posed expressions across 3 experiments. Results showed that (a) spontaneous expressions were generally rated as more genuinely emotional than were posed expressions, even when controlling for differences in emotion intensity, (b) there were differences between the two stimulus types with regard to their acoustic characteristics, and (c) spontaneous expressions with a high emotion intensity conveyed discrete emotions to listeners to a similar degree as has previously been found for posed expressions, supporting a dose–response relationship between intensity of expression and discreteness in perceived emotions. Our conclusion is that there are reliable differences between spontaneous and posed expressions, though not necessarily in the ways commonly assumed. Implications for emotion theories and the use of emotion portrayals in studies of vocal expression are discussed.