Long-Term Social Change and the Territorial Power of States

1981 ◽  
pp. 71-106 ◽  
Author(s):  
Randall Collins
Keyword(s):  
Social Change

scholarly journals Reframing Aging in Contemporary Politics: Building Momentum

2020 ◽  
Vol 4 (Supplement_1) ◽  
pp. 681-681
Author(s):  
Patricia D'Antonio
Keyword(s):  
Social Change ◽  
Older People ◽  
Evidence Based ◽  
Negative Attitudes ◽  
Attitudes And Behaviors ◽  
Contemporary Politics ◽  
Perceptions Of Aging ◽  
The Many ◽  
Changing Attitudes

Abstract Changing American culture is challenging and changing attitudes and behaviors around the universal experience of aging especially so. Unless the field of advocates who care about aging issues cultivates a more visible, more informed conversation on older people, it will remain difficult to advance the systemic changes needed to adjust to a society with increased and increasing longevity. Advocates will need to be vigilant to avoid cueing negative attitudes towards aging and aging policies. The Reframing Aging Initiative is a long-term, social change endeavor designed to improve the public’s understanding of what aging means and the many contributions older people bring to society. Using evidence-based research, the initiative seeks to teach advocates how to tell an effective story about aging that will promote positive perceptions of aging and reduce ageism. The time to change the conversation is now.

scholarly journals Theorizing media, communication and social change: towards a processual approach

2018 ◽  
Vol 41 (4) ◽  
pp. 482-501 ◽  
Author(s):  
Sabina Mihelj ◽  
James Stanyer
Keyword(s):  
Social Change ◽  
Social Order ◽  
Media Communication ◽  
Shared Language ◽  
Agent Of Change ◽  
Media And Communication ◽  
Conceptual Language ◽  
Processual Approach

Debates about the role of media and communication in social change are central to our discipline, yet advances in this field are hampered by disciplinary fragmentation, a lack of shared conceptual language and limited understanding of long-term shifts in the field. To address this, we first develop a typology that distinguishes between approaches that foreground the role of media and communication as an agent of change, and approaches that treat media and communication as an environment for change. We then use this typology to identify key trends in the field since 1951, including the sharp downturn in work focusing on economic aspects of change after 1985, the decline of grand narratives of social change since 2000 and the parallel return to media effects. We conclude by outlining the key traits of a processual approach to social change, which has the capacity to offer the basis for shared language in the field. This language can enable us to think of media, communication and social change across its varied temporal and social planes, and link together the processes involved in the reproduction of status quo with fundamental changes to social order.

Afterword

2021 ◽  
pp. 244-248
Author(s):  
Michael J. Rosenfeld
Keyword(s):  
Social Change ◽  
Gay Rights ◽  
Marriage Equality ◽  
Short Term ◽  
The Past ◽  
The Many ◽  
The U.S ◽  
The Way

Gay rights and marriage equality have advanced so far in the U.S. in the past decade that it would be all too easy to assume that the struggle is over. The opponents of gay rights, however, remain powerful. Readers can take inspiration from how dramatically attitudes toward gay rights have liberalized in the past two decades and how transformative the liberalization of attitudes has been. We live in a world where political lies often seem to have the upper hand. It is worth remembering that despite the many short term advantages that lies can yield in politics, the truth has some long term advantages as well. The way the marriage equality movement prevailed should be a lesson to anyone who wants to make progressive social change.

Hunter-Gatherer Mobility and Versatility: A Consideration of Long-Term Lithic Supply in the Midwest

2019 ◽  
Vol 85 (1) ◽  
pp. 113-131
Author(s):  
Mark F. Seeman ◽  
Amanda N. Colucci ◽  
Charles Fulk
Keyword(s):  
Social Change ◽  
North America ◽  
Behavioral Changes ◽  
Size And Shape ◽  
Historical Sequences

Hunter-gatherer societies held sway in midwestern North America for at least 11,000 years. Those at the end of this period were more complex and less mobile, and they supported larger populations than those at the beginning, but there are relatively few general conceptions as to when and how this took place. Here we examine the fit of gradual, one-way social change as it relates to the size and shape of lithic supply zones for Upper Mercer and Flint Ridge flint as well as the inflow of exotic materials. Our results show no singular cline either in the size of successive lithic supply zones or in the inflow of exotic materials. Hunter-gatherer societies can make remarkable behavioral changes through time and not necessarily in any consistent (unilineal) direction. Such differences impose more contingency—and less directionality—into particular historical sequences.

Perception, Psychedelics, and Social Change

1973 ◽  
Vol 3 (2) ◽  
pp. 141-151
Author(s):  
Charles Kaiser ◽  
Robert Gold
Keyword(s):  
Social Change ◽  
Social Institutions ◽  
Social Consequences ◽  
Altered States Of Consciousness ◽  
Altered States ◽  
States Of Consciousness ◽  
Widespread Availability ◽  
Long Term Consequences

If it is true that experiences involving altered states of consciousness have historically been confined to a minute segment of the population (such as shamans, prophets, and even self-actualizers within Maslow's [1] context), and if the psychedelics act as a catalyst for such experiences, then their widespread availability portends significant social consequences. The most profound long term consequences of the increasingly widespread use of psychedelics may not be medical or even psychological in nature, but rather socio-logical. Altered states of consciousness create nothing less than new perceptual configurations which may well spell the end of social institutions based upon modes of perception which are incongruent with new perceptions being attained by increasing numbers of people via the psychedelic experience.

Cultural and Identity Transmission in Mixed Couples in Quebec, Canada

2015 ◽  
Vol 662 (1) ◽  
pp. 112-128 ◽  
Author(s):  
Josiane Le Gall ◽  
Deirdre Meintel
Keyword(s):  
Social Change ◽  
Cultural Differences ◽  
Cultural Transmission ◽  
Ethnic Identities ◽  
Cultural Resources ◽  
Multiple Meanings ◽  
The Creation

Drawing on eighty interviews with mixed couples in Quebec, this article discusses how parents in such unions negotiate strategies of cultural transmission and develop “identity projects” for their children, that is, blueprints for the children’s ethnic identities. Our data show that instead of one person having to take on the other’s culture, and the children adopting that culture, both partners usually embrace cultural differences as enriching for themselves, their children, and the society in which they live. It is not so much a question of transmitting a “heritage” but rather making available a set of virtual cultural resources to the child that he or she will activate (or not) later in life. We argue that through the choices they make, mixed couples contribute to shaping a society where plural identities are normalized. In so doing, they become important agents of social change and participate in the creation of an enduring diversity, a long-term transformation of Quebec society, and even contribute to the multiple meanings of “Quebecois.”

scholarly journals Why durability matters? Towards a Comparative Economic Sociology of Market Organization

2020 ◽  
Vol 61 (1) ◽  
pp. 33-64 ◽  
Author(s):  
Alexander Dobeson ◽  
Sebastian Kohl
Keyword(s):  
Social Change ◽  
Insurance Markets ◽  
Household Economy ◽  
New Production ◽  
Fresh Fish ◽  
Comparative Sociology ◽  
Market Organization ◽  
Basic Infrastructure ◽  
Opening Up

AbstractWhat can a good’s durability tell us about its market organization? This paper argues that the socially expected durability of goods is one of their most important features. It illuminates temporal and material aspects of market organization and social change across different markets. While recent literature in the sociology of markets tends to emphasize financial goods, intangible assets, and the service economy, markets for material durable and nondurable consumer goods are still surprisingly pervasive in everyday life and in the household economy, as well as in modern economies’ basic infrastructure. Based on a comparison of the extreme cases of durable housing and fresh fish markets, we come to the general finding that the higher a good’s expected durability, the smaller the share of its new production will be and the larger its aftermarkets. Furthermore, it will be more tightly linked to credit and insurance markets, and its market will be more volatile in the short-term, but more inert in the long-term. Beyond this static distinction, we show how socio-technical mechanisms can “durabilize” or “dedurabilize” goods and hence change their market form. By comparing markets along the durability dimension, this paper contributes to a comparative sociology of market organization that goes beyond single-market studies, while at the same time opening up space for a more dynamic understanding of social change and market segmentation over time.

A Brief Cosmogeny of the West German Green Party

2015 ◽  
Vol 33 (4) ◽  
pp. 53-65 ◽  
Author(s):  
Belinda Davis
Keyword(s):  
Social Change ◽  
Political Thought ◽  
The West ◽  
Green Party ◽  
Political Thinking ◽  
Current Form ◽  
Political Experience

Today's German Green Party looks much like its parliamentary counterparts. However, the long-term political experience of activists who founded the party informed flexible and open political thinking and structure, and raised questions about the nature of deep social change that are worth returning to. The Green Party in its current form is not the only possible relevant and practical manifestation of this thinking. This piece briefly traces an evolution of political thought before the emergence of the Green Party through the case of one former activist.

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