Cosmopolitanism and Europe

Cosmopolitan perspectives on contemporary social and political issues have made inroads into EU studies, despite official EU discourse making no reference to Europeans as cosmopolitans. There are three main dimensions to the cosmopolitanization of the EU studies agenda: (i) a rethinking of transnationalism and globalization in relation to the EU; (ii) an increasing interest in the social dimensions of Europeanization; and (iii) a growing multi-disciplinarity in the study of contemporary Europe. There are several reasons for the increased interest in cosmopolitanism: a growing disenchantment with nationalism; recognition of the importance of global civil society; the ‘cosmopolitan democracy’ thesis advanced by Archibugi and Held; and the growing importance of human rights as a benchmark for democracy. Cosmopolitanism encourages a shift from a concern with the role of the nation-state in Europe to a broader sense of its role in the world, and relativizes Europe and the EU by placing them in a global context.     

A study of the correlation bias of unrecorded events by two independent enumeration systems

Summary In this paper the allegation that, when using the Chandrasekar-Deming technique with two independent enumeration systems to record the incidence of vital events and migrations, each individual system misses the same type of event is investigated. If this correlation bias were to occur frequently enough, it could result in a serious underestimation of a given type of event. Using vital events and migrations data derived from a longitudinal survey conducted in Liberia between 1969 and 1973, the estimated number of recorded events is tabulated into homogeneous groups that are demonstrated to affect omission rates. The proportion of missed eyents is computed separately for each enumeration system, and the presence or absence of a significant correlation mathematically determined. The results of this study suggest that no significant correlation could be demonstrated in the type of birth, death or infant death that was commonly missed by each individual enumeration system. This indicates that the omission of a birth, death or infant death was apparently a random occurrence as far as the individual casefinding systems were concerned. The authors conclude that any underestimation of vital events from this type of correlation bias may not be as serious as originally imagined. In contrast to this observation, the omission of particular types of migrations by each enumeration system was apparently not a random occurrence, but was associated with the direction of migration. This implies that selected migration rates in the liberian survey were probably understated and this could happen in other longitudinal surveys, unless specific precautions are taken to avoid it.     

Social Spaces beyond Civil Society: European Integration,Globalization and the Sociology of European Society

There has been a renewed interest in the idea of society of late. Sociological studies of globalization have posed the question of how to understand society without the nation-state, and studies of European Union (EU) integration have linked the non-emergence of a European society to the 'democratic deficit'. In both cases what is at issue is how to understand the social dynamics of transnational spaces. This paper advances three main arguments in relation to the idea of European society. First, despite its popularity, the concept of civil society is of limited use for understanding European society. Second, European society should not be seen as a unified and coherent whole but as a series of non-integrated, fragmented and autonomous public spheres. Third, European society cannot be understood in the singular. A plurality of European public and social spaces exist, often beyond the control of, or unrelated to, the EU or its member states. In short, European social spaces are not harmonious and cohesive, nor are they necessarily constituted by European integration.     

European Cohesion? Globalization,Autonomization, and the Dynamics of EU Integration

Globalization is frequently assumed to be responsible for creating the economic environment in which a much greater degree of European Union (EU) economic integration is deemed necessary. In contrast, this paper argues that globalization, in conjunction with neo-liberal growth, has led to autonomization as well as integration. The term autonomization designates both that economic governance is increasingly delegated to autonomous regions, and that neo-liberal economic policies tend to fragment and divide in their pursuit of growth. The paper investigates the tension between the role in which globalization has cast the region, and the region as a central player in the EU's cohesion strategy. Cohesion policy-measures to combat underdevelopment and backwardness-plays a key role in integration and growth strategies. It is argued that cohesion has become detached from its redistributive origins and incorporated in a discourse of competitiveness and growth. The region has emerged as both the site upon which the global acts upon the EU, and the level at which the EU has determined that the processes of globalization can best be accommodated. It is suggested that the tension between cohesion and autonomization introduced by globalization is a central dynamic at work in the contemporary EU.     

Social Policy beyond Fear: The Globalization of Strangeness,the ‘War on Terror’, and ‘Spaces of Wonder’

Fear has become central to social scientific understandings of contemporary insecurities. However, this article argues that a focus on fear is not sufficient, and that an exploration of ‘wonder’ is more productive, particularly when trying to understand modes of governance and policy regimes introduced as part of the ‘war on terror’. An appropriate starting point for such an exploration is the globalization of strangeness. The idea that globalization has undermined the familiar territoriality of a world of nation states has become accepted in the social science literature. However, the nature of the resulting unfamiliarity or strangeness of the world is rarely explored. This article focuses on the processes by means of which the world is rendered strange and examines the opportunities for new forms of governance opened up by a world designated as insecure, uncertain and unpredictable. The article pays particular attention to the ways in which this strangeness can generate ‘spaces of wonder’. Examples of such ‘spaces of wonder’ include ‘the world’, the UK's border, now offshore according to the Home Office, and ‘global borderlands’. The article advances a critical reading of contemporary political responses to ‘spaces of wonder’, particularly the ways in which the unknown and threatening are rendered in familiar and cosy terms.     

Placing democratization within the global frame: sociological approaches to universalism, and democratic contestation in contemporary Turkey

The process of democratization in Turkey is enhanced by both proximity to the European Union's enlargement process and universalistic discourses of personhood rights, and, at the same time, compromised by a nationalistic rejection of global human rights and democratic norms and state‐led resistance to political pluralism. One key feature of the democratization process is the way in which contending parties—the Kemalist elite, religious and ethnic minorities, the European Union—attempt to legitimise their claims by appeals to universal principles. The paper examines three sociological/social theory approaches to universalism (Beck, Laclau, Robertson) and demonstrates their usefulness for an understanding of political contestation in contemporary Turkey. It is argued that the work of these theorists allows us to move beyond a simplistic polarisation of the universal and the particular, where the state represents the universal and minorities the particular. The conceptualisation of universalism advanced by Beck, Laclau and Robertson points to the need to understand the processes of democratization within a sociologically informed globalization framework.     

Factors influencing the casefinding of migrations in the Liberian fertility survey

A study was made of the factors that affected the casefinding of internal migrations in Liberia using the Chandrasekar—Deming dual enumeration and tabulation methods. The results of this work suggest that the recording and not recording of a migration is not a random occurrence but is associated with a particular enumeration system, origin and destination of the migration, and the migrant’s age, sex, and location of current residence.