Statistics In Sociology, 1950–2000: A Selective Review

Statistical methods have had a successful half-century in sociology, contributing to a greatly improved standard of scientific rigor in the discipline. I identify three overlapping postwar generations of statistical methods in sociology, based on the kinds of data they address. The first generation, which started in the late 1940s, deals with cross-tabulations and focuses on measures of association and log-linear models, perhaps the area of statistics to which sociology has contributed the most. The second generation, which began in the 1960s, deals with unit-level survey data and focuses on LISREL-type causal models and event-history analysis. The third generation, starting to emerge in the late 1980s, deals with data that do not fall easily into either of these categories, either because they have a different form, such as texts or narratives, or because dependence is a crucial aspect, as with spatial or social network data. There are many new challenges, and the area is ripe for statistical research; several major institutions have recently launched new initiatives in statistics and the social sciences.     

Forging Diaspora: Afro-Cubans and African Americans in a World of Empire and Jim Crow

ABSTRACT

Drawing on social histories of rumour, this article challenges notions of white and Afrikaner homogeneity which persist in the scholarship on late and post-apartheid South Africa. In so doing, it demonstrates the revisionist potential of rumour as a historical source, while reinserting class in a scholarship which privileges race as salient historical feature. The article focuses on Arrie Paulus, apartheid South Africa’s most prominent white trade unionist, infamous as the personification of working-class racism. Yet this defender of race-based privilege and staunch Afrikaner nationalist was haunted by a rumour: Paulus, it was whispered, was not actually white. The rumour circulated in reform-era South Africa and persists in the post-apartheid present. By examining the rumour surrounding Paulus’s racial and ethnic origins in terms of the functions it fulfilled within the particular contexts in which it appeared, this article exposes longstanding tensions around the politics of class characterizing Afrikaner society since the 1970s.     

The meaning of empowerment: the interdisciplinary etymology of a new management concept

Empowerment has become a widely used management term in the last decade or so, though, in practical terms, it shares the ambiguity of its predecessors in the HRM tradition. This paper sets out to unravel the web of meaning surrounding empowerment to show what a contested concept it is, and hence why its application in organizational settings is fraught with misunderstanding and tension. It does so by taking an approach that contributes to the examination of HRM discourse and management rhetoric. To demonstrate the ambiguity of empowerment as a concept, the paper reviews the various ways in which the term has been used across non-management disciplines (women, minority groups, education, community care, politics), culminating with a review of the use of empowerment in contemporary management theory. The paper concludes that organizations and managers have chosen to coin a phrase which is open to different, sometimes contradictory, meanings and which, when applied, evokes both subjective attitudes and objective behaviour, means different things in varying contexts, and is affected fundamentally by individual differences in perception and experience. Unless organizations offer clear operational definitions when using empowerment, instead of purely acquiescing to a vague and seductive version of the concept, they are abdicating responsibility for the unpredictable consequences that result.     

Inference in model-based cluster analysis

A new approach to cluster analysis has been introduced based on parsimonious geometric modelling of the within-group covariance matrices in a mixture of multivariate normal distributions, using hierarchical agglomeration and iterative relocation. It works well and is widely used via the MCLUST software available in S-PLUS and StatLib. However, it has several limitations: there is no assessment of the uncertainty about the classification, the partition can be suboptimal, parameter estimates are biased, the shape matrix has to be specified by the user, prior group probabilities are assumed to be equal, the method for choosing the number of groups is based on a crude approximation, and no formal way of choosing between the various possible models is included. Here, we propose a new approach which overcomes all these difficulties. It consists of exact Bayesian inference via Gibbs sampling, and the calculation of Bayes factors (for choosing the model and the number of groups) from the output using the Laplace–Metropolis estimator. It works well in several real and simulated examples.     

Bayesian Analysis of DNA Profiling Data in Forensic Identification Applications

The utilization of DNA evidence in cases of forensic identification has become widespread over the last few years. The strength of this evidence against an individual standing trial is typically presented in court in the form of a likelihood ratio (LR) or its reciprocal (the profile match probability). The value of this LR will vary according to the nature of the genetic relationship between the accused and other possible perpetrators of the crime in the population. This paper develops ideas and methods for analysing data and evaluating LRs when the evidence is based on short tandem repeat profiles, with special emphasis placed on a Bayesian approach. These are then applied in the context of a particular quadruplex profiling system used for routine case-work by the UK Forensic Science Service.     

The protestant work ethic,human values and attitudes towards taxation

The literature on demographic determinants of attitudes towards taxation was briefly reviewed. Whereas most previous concerned the relationship between such things as income, vote etc. and tax attitudes, this study examined the relationship between Protestant Work Ethic beliefs, social value systems and attitudes toward taxation. It was demonstrated that subjects who strongly endorsed the Protestant Work Ethic were more opposed to taxation than those who did not strongly endorse these beliefs. Further many of the instrumental and terminal value systems of subjects who were pro-taxation were significantly different from those who were anti-taxation. The results are discussed in terms of the psychology of lay-economic beliefs and implications for social change were noted.     

A Semi-formal Explication of Talcott Parsons's Theory of Action*

Operations of thought are like cavalry charges in a battle–they are strictly limited in number, they require fresh horses, and must only be made at decisive moments.