Paradoxes of American Individualism1

I point to contradictions in American individualism not unlike those suggested by Robin M. Williams Jr. I go on to suggest how twenty‐first‐century sociologists might better understand this aspect of American exceptionalism: not as an egoistic, asocial individualism, but as a covenantal, social voluntarism.     

Do females necessarily have the same occupational status scores as males? A conceptual and empirical examination of the Duncan Socioeconomic Status Index and Nam-Powers Occupational Status Scores

Social Science researchers have advanced important yet somewhat contradictory conclusions regarding the different economic and occupational reward structures faced by men and women. Income and wage differences between men and women have been shown to be sizable and persistent throughout the occupational hierarchy. Conversely, gender differences in occupational status, commonly scaled by the Duncan Socioeconomic Index, have been shown to be small or nonexistent in most studies. In an attempt to investigate this incongruity, the present study undertakes a comparison of the Duncan SEI and the Nam-Powers Occupational Status Scores in an empirical study of the occupational position of white men and women in 65 large standard metropolitan statistical areas (SMSAs) in 1970. While the findings of earlier studies showing no gender differences in occupational status are for the most part replicated using the Duncan SEI, use of the Nam-Powers scores prompts a much different conclusion. Large status differences between men and women are indicated using this latter scale, differences which are very much in line with income differences commonly cited. We suggest that the Nam-Powers metric should be used instead of the Duncan SEI in studies of occupational status of women and men.     

“文化冷战斗士”——历史学家小施莱辛格的“第二种身份”

历史学家小阿瑟·施莱辛格在冷战期间的重要身份是“文化冷战斗士”。这主要体现在他对“反共自由主义”意识形态共识的塑造和同新“左派”史学家威廉·A·威廉斯的论战上。这种政治活动分子的身份及其强烈的意识形态取向,一定程度上削弱了小施莱辛格史学的客观超然性。     

小约瑟夫·奈、罗伯特·基欧汉与跨国关系研究

随着跨国交往和相互依赖的加深,非国家行为体的作用日益突出。奈和基欧汉通过对跨国关系的研究阐述了国家间互动、跨国互动、跨政府间互动对世界政治产生的影响,这从理论上冲击着传统的“国家中心”范式,促使国际政治研究向世界政治研究的“多中心”范式转变,因而奈和基欧汉的跨国关系研究具有里程碑式的意义。     

Four Months to System Change

Abstract

This paper discusses the process through which students in a Community Intervention class brought about change in university policy to recognize Martin Luther King, Jr.'s birthday as a university holiday. It includes tactics and strategies used to influence decision makers, to educate the community, and to empower the minority community on the campus. It discusses important lessons for students including the political nature of system change, issues of power and stratification, and the impact of successful tactics on the opposition. This project was able to bring about change in a system that was unwilling to change. In today's social climate, that is often what social workers must do. Experiencing the process of system change during the educational process allows for the lessons of one class to be applied to larger systems of service delivery in professional practice.     

“I Just Want to Do God's Will:” Teaching Martin Luther King,Jr. as a Religious Leader

Teachers often respond to the perils of teaching about religion by simply avoiding the subject. An investigation of secondary lesson plans on three prominent Martin Luther King, Jr. websites reveals little attention to the ideology of the civil rights movement, especially those touching on religious ideas. Ignoring King's religious views risks fundamentally misrepresenting his identity, his ideology, and his motivation for nonviolence. Stride Toward Freedom: The Montgomery Story, King's 1958 account of the Montgomery Bus Boycott articulates three key features of the theological framework that inspired his activism: the spiritual motivation for his leadership, the ethical basis for his strategy of nonviolent direct action, and the theological understanding of human nature that undergirded his leadership and strategy. These points provide a useful model for introducing King's ideas in the classroom. The effort to intentionally and thoughtfully teach religion could contribute one step toward inculcating genuine tolerance among students. Civil discourse is not fostered simply by identifying core principles everyone shares but also through thoughtful, critical engagement with disparate ideas, including what are, for many people, the most heavily freighted ideas.     

在反思与批判中彰显史学理性之光——小阿瑟·施莱辛格史学观述评

美国当代著名史学家小阿瑟·施莱辛格对政治的积极参与常使他遭学界指责,认为他有将史学研究政治化、简单化的倾向.本文通过追溯其学术取向的形成过程及对其史学思想的解剖指出,施莱辛格深知参与政治实践可能影响学术研究立场,并在长期的学术生涯中不断自觉地加以反思,形成了强调历史的学术功能,追求客观主义理想的史学观,对历史与政治的关系亦有独到见解.这使他较好地处理了治学与从政的关系.     

Social Relations, Core Values, and the Polyphony of the American Experience

This essay examines social relations and cultural values in the United States, paying special attention to recent characterizations of Americans as increasingly isolated, disconnected, and dangerously individualistic. In this essay, I refute such claims. And building on earlier work ( Cerulo, 2002 ), I show that U.S. social relations and cultural values are more multifaceted than such "new individualism" arguments suggest. Indeed, as Robin M. Williams Jr. discovered 50 years ago, when studied in a systematic way, U.S. values and beliefs present us with a multiplex system—a system in which individualism plays only a supporting role. This is true, I suggest, because Americans'"value focus"—that is, the prioritization of one value over another—shifts in concert with certain social events and structural conditions. In this way, we can think of U.S. values as part of a "cultural toolkit," with actors selecting or foregrounding the values needed to support certain strategies of action.     

Therapeutic Ambition,Uncertainty, and Psychotherapy with Heterosexually Married Gay Men: A Short Commentary

A Short Commentary on the article 'Staying Put in the Closet: Examining Clinical Practice and Countertransference Issues in Work with Gay Men Married to Straight Women' by Edward Alessi. The focus is upon countertransference issues, especially therapeutic ambition, in working clinically with heterosexually married gay men. The work of the interpersonal school is emphasized as providing a creative approach to therapeutic ambition with Otto Allen Will's concept of the governing principle of uncertainty.

An analysis of nonpartisan election media expenditure decisions using limited dependent variable methods

In order to maximize the information disseminating function of campaigning, candidates for political office must make numerous decisions regarding the allocation of resources for various campaign activities. One of the most important financial decisions a candidate must make occurs in determining the extent and character of mass media expenditures. To determine mass media budget allocations, two decisions are required. First, the type(s) of mass media to employ in the campaign, and second, the amount of the budget to allocate to each media selected. These two decisions are not necessarily independent since high fixed costs are associated with employing electronic media.In this paper, we examine one particular form of mass media, television, and its use in nonpartisan elections. Because of the nature of the decision process in using television advertising an estimation technique for limited dependent variables is employed to predict first, the probability that a candidate will use television advertising in a campaign, and second, the amount spent on such advertising. The occurrence of these outcomes is considered to be a function of both the total financial resources available to the candidate and the type (importance) of the political office sought.