The Diffusion of Cricket to America: A Figurational Sociological Examination

Abstract  This paper examines the historical development of cricket in America and seeks to explain why, despite having a significant initial impact, the game ultimately became culturally marginal. It is argued that class and cricketing relations in England in the mid-nineteenth century had a significant and hitherto unacknowledged impact on the diffusion of the game to America, and that this unplanned social process can only be understood in the light of the specific interdependencies between the British and Anglo-Americans, between upper and lower class English immigrants, and between English immigrants and "Native White Americans". Correlatively, this analysis spreads new light on the establishment of baseball as America's national game, illustrating a greater level of dependence on the English and English sport than is traditionally attributed.     

Perceptions of Stigma and User Involvement in Child Welfare Services

Correspondence to Dr E. M. Scholte, Department of Social and Behavioural Sciences/Centre for Research on Youth Welfare, University of Leiden, PO Box 9555, 2300 RB Leiden, The Netherlands. Summary This paper explores the perceptions of social disqualificationor ‘stigma’ that service users attributed to publicchild welfare services in random samples of service users takenfrom the Netherlands, a part of Spain (Catalonia) and a partof the United Kingdom (Wales). It was found that, in all threesamples, foster and residential care invoked the greatest senseof stigma, while the health related and the preventive familyservices were perceived as the least stigmatizing types of publicwelfare services. Comparative analysis further revealed thata positive attitude towards the use of public welfare services,a perception of supportive or non-stigmatizing social normsregarding the use of such services, and a perception of publicwelfare services as helpful correlated in all three sampleswith higher levels of user satisfaction and involvement in theservices. It was further found that, in the British and Spanishsamples, a positive attitude towards public welfare services,as well as a perception of public welfare services as helpfulfor their recipients, were the predominating factors promotinghigher levels of satisfactory user involvement in the services,while, in the Dutch sample, a perception of supportive socialnorms was the factor that most promoted satisfactory user involvement.     

International labour migration and tacit knowledge transactions: a multi‐level perspective

Abstract There has been limited research on the role of international migration in the transfer of tacit knowledge, as opposed to skills and capital. In part, this results from lack of engagement between research on migration and that on knowledge and learning, even in debates concerning the relative importance of distanciated versus localized knowledge transfers. However, positioning international migration in relation to the literature on knowledge management opens up new perspectives on its role in the overall transfer of knowledge in the economy. Starting from the premise that all tacit knowledge transactions are socially situated, in this article I set out a multi‐level approach to understanding the role of migrants in knowledge exchanges. The national, the urban and the firm constitute key levels in this study, although these are understood as interfolded rather than as discrete sites of analysis.     

Property, the Formation of the Pioneer State and the Working of Power in Rural Australia

Abstract  This paper is concerned with the role of property ownership and the importance of male patriarchy on family farms. I critique here the role of property and family and its role in State formation. I am interested in local and regional sites where I argue that identity and conduct was determined. This approach indicates how the cultural values of farming were reflected in the culture of the State through its administrative apparatuses of power. Through an explanation of the role of 'family' and 'property', I show how different discourse and techniques involved with rural life received endorsement and support, within legal and non-legal forms of power. I outline the direction my argument will take. Firstly, I show the importance of the family in State policy and how the family was imbedded in ideas of property. Secondly, I show the role of economics as a form of governance. Economics, I argue formed a discipline of productivity through which the family governed the individual and the State governed the family. Thirdly, I show how property, the family and economics were linked within other administrative agencies involved in the 'governmentalisation of society'.     

Family trends,insecurities and social policy

If a decent childhood, and a good start to adulthood, depend on a secure — and financially sound — family life, then very many children in Britain are in serious difficulties. This major theme is presented in the context of a review of social and economic developments affecting all families with children. The paper also briefly discusses issues concerning the rights and responsibilities of families, at a time when these issues are coming to the fore in British politics, with interest in the concept of ‘active citizenship’ and the responsible community.     

Why is there no agrarian capitalism in Nigeria?

Abstract It is widely assumed that the development of commodity production in agriculture will necessarily lead to the displacement of peasant producers by more strictly capitalist forms of production. I argue that no such transition can be assumed in general, nor can it be shown to be occurring in Nigeria. The first section identifies the various ways in which the peasantry are said to be transformed along capitalist lines. The second section examines conditions under which agrarian capitalism has been established, both in Europe and in Africa. It discusses attempts by governments and capitalists to subordinate peasant producers in Africa to their direction. The third section examines attempts to establish plantations, capitalist farms and state farms in Nigeria and considers what light evidence of inequalities among peasant households sheds on the possible emergence of capitalist producers from among the peasantry. It discusses whether rural development projects are likely to transform peasant production along capitalist lines and/or subordinate peasants to the requirements of capital and the state. I conclude that state support has provided niches for capitalist farming, but that Nigerian agriculture is not being transformed along capitalist lines and that both capital and the state have found it difficult to subordinate peasant producers to their direction     

DOES SEX STILL MATTER? NEW EVIDENCE FROM THE 1980s

Recent analyses of gender based salary differentials among University faculty have focused on colleges and universities which are quite different from those used in earlier (pre-1975) studies. To facilitate comparisons with previous studies we examine gender earnings differentials during the 1983–84 academic year at Kent State University, a school similar to those studied in the pre-1975 period. Our results suggest that after controlling for differentials in productivity-related characteristics and market influences, there is little evidence of gender based salary discrimination at Kent State during 1983–84.     

Children in Need: Definition, Identification and Support

Correspondence to Dr Matthew Colton, Department of Social Policy and Applied Social Studies, University of Wales, Swansea, Singleton Park, Swansea SA2 8PP. Summary This paper examines the way in which local authorities operationalizethe concept of need contained in Part III of the Children Act1989. Findings from an empirical study conducted by the authorssuggest that difficulties are being encountered in operationalizingneed, and that these difficulties stem from an inherent contradictionbetween the all-embracing spirit of the Act and current politicaland social realities. The paper identifies key dilemmas in theimplementation of Part III of the Children Act and highlightsconflicts facing social services departments.     

Introduction to special section on blockchains and financial globalization

This special section shifts analytical attention onto efforts undertaken by dispersed sets of actors operating in online communities to mobilize a novel internet‐based technology that mysteriously appeared at the height of market volatility in 2008. Applications of blockchain technologies and the challenges presented to longstanding patterns of financial globalization are analysed by a group of scholars with backgrounds in anthropology, political science and sociology. This introductory article first elaborates what blockchain technologies consist of before foreshadowing the insights that the following interdisciplinary investigations yield for comprehending the implications that technological changes pose for global finance specifically and globalization more generally.