Through community eyes: the transition of international organizations from community aid to development in postconflict Sierra Leone

Sierra Leone experienced an 11-year civil war, brutalizing its people and destroying its communities. With the cessation of violence, international organizations helped to secure peace, deliver aid and supplies, and, after, assist with development projects. This grounded theory study, which aims to understand the role these organizations played from the viewpoint of community members in 2 communities, posits that community members’ regard of international organizations lessened as their efforts transitioned from securing the peace and relief efforts to aid for development. Highlighted are the successes and challenges of this work and a broad discussion of implications and recommendations.     

滕尼斯与齐美尔:社会伦理同文化伦理的分流

作为德国社会学的两位奠基人,滕尼斯和齐美尔奠定了截然相反的两种现代伦理生活格局。伦理世界观的分流源于他们各自对时代处境的体验以及对思想史的独特解释。从近代自然法的角度出发,滕尼斯的社会伦理的核心是重建政治社会的秩序与风尚,一切价值最终都要融入社会;与此相反,齐美尔的社会学思考从一开始就以对社会伦理的批评作为前提,他将超越社会的个体生命视作伦理的目的,对他来说,生命不仅意味着身处社会之中的个体具有饱满个性,而且从自身孕育出客观的、适用于他自己的伦理责任。从帝制时期到魏玛时期,德国社会伦理同文化伦理的分流、交织与合流为我们提供了一条理解德国社会学史的清晰主线。     

“Come for the period comics. Stay for the cultural awareness”: reclaiming the troll identity through feminist humor on Reddit’s /r/TrollXChromosomes

/r/TrollXChromosomes is a women-focused humor subreddit on the community site Reddit.com. This essay presents the findings of a thematic content analysis of TrollX’s top-ranked postings. Several themes emerge: that TrollX is a space for networked affective content, that postings often concern women’s embodiment and sexuality, and that they suggest feminist perspectives. These themes are all linked by the image of the troll: a remixed version of the negative, antisocial identity that disrupts and often harasses communities. The TrollX troll invokes a spirit of self-deprecation to revel in the absurdities of life and collectively celebrate women’s everyday experiences. However, this research also argues that the TrollX version of the feminist troll is only partially realized, as it tends to express ambivalence in regards to systemic, intersectional oppression.     

Building Virtual Age-Friendly Communities in Minecraft

A key theme of Age-Friendly Honolulu’s initiative is intergenerational exchange. The initiative believes that youth need to be aware of aging issues, demographic change, and think critically about the potential impact on their lives. The goal of the Age-Friendly Honolulu Youth Engagement Initiative is to teach youth about the role of the built environment and community features in promoting active aging and engagement among older adults. This article describes a new program in the field that teaches youth and older adults to assess the built environment and then use design thinking and Minecraft (a popular video game in which players use 3-D blocks to create virtual lands) to develop and envision ideas to improve the livability of their neighborhood.     

Quality of Life Enhancement Research Program: Lessons Learned

The attempted Quality of Life Enhancement program appeared to be a novel method for creating a symbiotic and sustainable relationship between a large Southeastern university and local nursing home and assisted living facilities (ALF), through which ALF residents would attend university arts and sporting events. During implementation, it was discovered that this project was unsustainable, undesired, unneeded by many care centers, difficult to implement, and required a dedicated and specialized staff. After attempting to enroll 14 local care facilities, only 2 were interested in becoming involved and produced 5 eligible participants. During the program itself, coordination with facilities and residents was difficult to maintain and unique transportation and accommodation needs were challenging to overcome. Finally, data collection was time consuming and generally unfruitful. Ultimately the project was discontinued after a year of attempted recruitment and implementation of inclusive changes to protocol. While creating an ongoing relationship with local care facilities and local universities may enhance opportunities for residents and research into important areas, such relationships take time, effort, and specialized staff to maintain.     

Participatory shaping of community futures in e‐waste processing hubs: Complexity,conflict and stewarded convergence in a Palestinian context

This article describes an unconventional participatory development approach carried out in an informal e‐waste hub in South‐West Hebron, an area that has collected and processed the bulk of Israeli e‐waste for over a decade. Our approach contributes to the critique and recovery of community representation in participatory development and the search for ways to facilitate representative community engagement. Specifically, we describe our use of a novel Delphi‐like method that allowed us to facilitate a broadly endorsed development trajectory within a heterogeneous and conflicted community. We show how the results yielded by this approach diverged from those that were likely to emerge from more facile forms of participation in ways that are important for other similar e‐waste hubs internationally, which face a destructive status quo on the one hand, or the economically ruinous international policies that ban e‐waste trade from “developed” to “developing” countries on the other. Despite real tensions and cleavages within the affected communities, the process described facilitated a shift from deadlocked environmental versus livelihood positions towards building capacity and regulating existing informal e‐waste trades to preserve livelihoods dependent on these.     

从“群众参与”到“公民参与”——转型期我国城市社区参与模式的“革命性”转变

＂群众参与＂模式是建立在国家与社会高度统一、国家对资源的高度控制和垄断基础上。＂群众参与＂往往是出于国家政权建设的需要或者更准确地说是社会整合和社会控制的需要。而在社会转型期,国家与社会逐步分离、市场经济唤醒了民众的利益意识和权利意识、＂单位人＂开始向＂社区人＂转化。在实行社区自治,建设基层民主的背景下,政治、社会、经济的诸多变化要求社区参与模式的＂革命性＂变革,即从＂群众参与＂走向＂公民参与＂。     

农村高等教育创新与教育公平的诗性进路

教育公平是世界变平的基础,在中国这样一个发展中国家,面向农村的高等教育是相当薄弱的,广播电视大学面向基层和农村,实践平民高等教育,在新形势下电大教育因异化而面临挑战。借鉴国外社区大学的经验,结合中国的现实,实现电大教育向社区教育的转变,是新时期平民高等教育创新的进路,也是教育公平和教育民主化的具体实践。     

居住分异与社会距离

通过对一个新建社区的形成过程和居住现状的考察,分析了国内"居住分异"的社会分化现象。通过数据分析发现,居住分异以后,群体分化程度被强化了,它使居民之间的社会距离扩大、疏离感增强。这种状况不利于社会团结与和谐社会的建设。我国正处在城市化高速发展的进程中,如果没有明确的政策干预,任由房地产市场按照这样的情况发展下去,居住分异与社会距离问题会变得更加严重。     

社区矫正对象之选择初探

通过对中外社区矫正制度的对比,指出解决问题的基础在于确定社区矫正之对象选择方法;通过对社区矫正与其他刑罚方式的比较,指出确定社区矫正对象需要在犯罪人格视角下进行;通过对犯罪人格的剖析,最终提出了社区矫正对象选择的路径,即以犯罪人格的区分来选取社区矫正的对象。矫正当局应当通过一系列法律制度、人员配置、经费划拨、机构设立,来保障社区矫正对象的正确选取,以实现社区矫正的目标和任务,体现人本主义关怀,使得犯罪人能够得到适宜其改造的矫治方法。