Spatial Politics and American Religious Pluralism

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Bret E. Carroll
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Dynamic Process ◽  
Religious Pluralism ◽  
The United States ◽  
Religious Groups ◽  
Spatial Politics ◽  
Virtual Communication ◽  
American Life ◽  
The 1960S

American religious pluralism is not simply diversity but a dynamic process of interaction and exchange. Its core is a spatial politics in which religious groups create meaningful spaces and interact with other groups similarly engaged, sometimes cooperatively and sometimes apprehensively and even violently. This dynamic is configured by a longstanding pattern of Anglo-Protestant dominance coupled with a widespread though tension-filled acceptance of religious pluralism. This dynamic has been particularly dramatic and intense since the 1960s because of an increase in the numbers of adherents of non-Protestant and non-Western religions in the United States and an increase in the degree to which religious groups have sought a more active and visible involvement in American life. One can observe the American pluralist dynamic functioning spatially at three interlocking levels—regional, local, and national—with spatial politics playing out differently in different locations depending on a variety of factors. As the new century opens, new factors such as globalization, virtual communication, and heterolocalism come increasingly into play.

Having Their Say, Leaving Their Mark

2020 ◽  
Vol 1 (1) ◽  
pp. 141-153
Author(s):  
Adolphus G. Belk ◽  
Robert C. Smith ◽  
Sherri L. Wallace
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Civic Engagement ◽  
Political Science ◽  
Black People ◽  
The United States ◽  
The Political ◽  
Historical Documents ◽  
Adverse Conditions ◽  
The 1960S ◽  
Independent Organization

In general, the founders of the National Conference of Black Political Scientists were “movement people.” Powerful agents of socialization such as the uprisings of the 1960s molded them into scholars with tremendous resolve to tackle systemic inequalities in the political science discipline. In forming NCOBPS as an independent organization, many sought to develop a Black perspective in political science to push the boundaries of knowledge and to use that scholarship to ameliorate the adverse conditions confronting Black people in the United States and around the globe. This paper utilizes historical documents, speeches, interviews, and other scholarly works to detail the lasting contributions of the founders and Black political scientists to the discipline, paying particular attention to their scholarship, teaching, mentoring, and civic engagement. It finds that while political science is much improved as a result of their efforts, there is still work to do if their goals are to be achieved.

The Insidious Momentum of American Mass Incarceration

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Franklin E. Zimring
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Public Policy ◽  
Twentieth Century ◽  
Mass Incarceration ◽  
The United States ◽  
Next Generation ◽  
Single Generation ◽  
American Life ◽  
Peak Rate ◽  
Or Practice

The phenomenal growth of penal confinement in the United States in the last quarter of the twentieth century is still a public policy mystery. Why did it happen when it happened? What explains the unprecedented magnitude of prison and jail expansion? Why are the current levels of penal confinement so very close to the all-time peak rate reached in 2007? What is the likely course of levels of penal confinement in the next generation of American life? Are there changes in government or policy that can avoid the prospect of mass incarceration as a chronic element of governance in the United States? This study is organized around four major concerns: What happened in the 33 years after 1973? Why did these extraordinary changes happen in that single generation? What is likely to happen to levels of penal confinement in the next three decades? What changes in law or practice might reduce this likely penal future?

Equal Opportunity in a Pluralistic Society

1987 ◽  
Vol 5 (1) ◽  
pp. 104-119 ◽  
Author(s):  
James W. Nickel
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Religious Pluralism ◽  
Equal Opportunity ◽  
Religious Diversity ◽  
The United States ◽  
Pluralistic Society ◽  
Self Image ◽  
The Difference ◽  
The U.S

The United States has never been culturally or religiously homogeneous, but its diversity has greatly increased over the last century. Although the U.S. was first a multicultural nation through conquest and enslavement, its present diversity is due equally to immigration. In this paper I try to explain the difference it makes for one area of thought and policy – equal opportunity – if we incorporate cultural and religious pluralism into our national self-image. Formulating and implementing a policy of equal opportunity is more difficult in diverse, pluralistic countries than it is in homogeneous ones. My focus is cultural and religious diversity in the United States, but my conclusions will apply to many other countries – including ones whose pluralism is found more in religion than in culture.

John Courtney Murray

2021 ◽  
pp. 180-198
Author(s):  
Francesca Cadeddu
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Social Relations ◽  
American History ◽  
Religious Pluralism ◽  
The United States ◽  
Catholic Theology ◽  
Reinhold Niebuhr ◽  
Archival Documents ◽  
Religious Landscape ◽  
John Courtney Murray

This chapter offers an insight on the intellectual relationship between Reinhold Niebuhr and John Courtney Murray, SJ. Newly discovered archival documents highlight their roles as consultants to the Basic Issues Program of the Center for the Study of Democratic Institutions (CSDI), established in 1957. The activities of the programme were based on debates pertaining to topics including religious pluralism, civic unity, and natural law. Niebuhr and Murray had the opportunity to present their perspectives on the United States religious landscape and the issues raised by ecumenical and social relations between the Protestant majority and the Catholic minority. What emerges from their confrontation is not a search for conciliation, but rather a representation of Reinhold Niebuhr’s understanding of pre-conciliar Catholic theology and John Courtney Murray’s effort to contribute to the acknowledgement of Catholics within American history and society.

The Measure of All Things

2018 ◽  
Vol 48 (4) ◽  
pp. 403-440 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jérôme Lamy
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Global Warming ◽  
Large Range ◽  
The United States ◽  
Significant Rise ◽  
The Other ◽  
Satellite Mission ◽  
Sea Levels ◽  
Joint Mission ◽  
The 1960S

The TOPEX/POSEIDON satellite mission to observe the oceans triggered the formation of the new specialty of space oceanography from the 1970s to 1990s. Previously, in the 1960s in the United States, traditional oceanographers had shown little interest in the possibilities of space and thus space engineers and physicists worked on the first missions (Seasat in particular). TOPEX/POSEIDON brought together two projects, one American (TOPEX) and the other French (POSEIDON). The gradual crystallization of the disciplinary specialty of space oceanography occurred by making available a platform of instruments able to meet an ensemble of varied needs. Battery failures just before the launch of the joint mission meant that the mission had to focus on the essentials (notably El Niño effects). Subsequently, the discovery of a significant rise in sea levels due to global warming resulted in space oceanography becoming a recognized specialty. The case of TOPEX/POSEIDON shows the original ways in which instruments gained a place in the very large range of oceanographic techniques.

scholarly journals Crop Insurance and the New Deal Roots of Agricultural Financialization in the United States

2020 ◽  
Vol 21 (3) ◽  
pp. 648-680
Author(s):  
SHANE HAMILTON
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Risk Management ◽  
Social Insurance ◽  
Crop Insurance ◽  
The United States ◽  
The Great Depression ◽  
Before And After ◽  
Private And Public ◽  
The 1960S ◽  
American Agriculture

A range of private and public institutions emerged in the United States in the years before and after the Great Depression to help farmers confront the inherent uncertainty of agricultural production and marketing. This included a government-owned and operated insurance enterprise offering “all-risk” coverage to American farmers beginning in 1938. Crop insurance, initially developed as a social insurance program, was beset by pervasive problems of adverse selection and moral hazard. As managers and policy makers responded to those problems from the 1940s on, they reshaped federal crop insurance in ways that increasingly made the scheme a lever of financialization, a means of disciplining individual farmers to think of farming in abstract terms of risk management. Crop insurance became intertwined with important changes in the economic context of agriculture by the 1960s, including the emergence of the “technological treadmill,” permanently embedding financialized risk management into the political economy of American agriculture.

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