Opportunity, Threat, and Dependency in the Social Infosphere

2021 ◽  
pp. 31-48
Author(s):  
Greg Austin
Keyword(s):  
Social Order ◽  
Information Age ◽  
Information Revolution ◽  
Human Welfare ◽  
Personal Lives ◽  
The Social ◽  
The Individual ◽  
Social Upheaval ◽  
Insight Into

The technological revolution outlined in the previous chapter has unleashed a social upheaval. If a suite of machines came to be so central in global and national social order, as well as in our personal lives, how does that affect our security? Bearing in mind that we are only at the dawn of the cyber age, what will the future hold? This chapter gives an overview of the profound impact of the information revolution on human welfare for better and for worse, from the individual and community levels to the national and international levels. The chapter begins with some insight into how philosophers have viewed these questions. It then looks at how leading actors have responded to the opportunities and threats. The chapter’s most important single theme is the issue of dependency, arguably the most ignored security aspect of the information age.

What Makes a Hero? Theorising the Social Structuring of Heroism

Sociology ◽  
2018 ◽  
Vol 53 (1) ◽  
pp. 87-103 ◽  
Author(s):  
Kristian Frisk
Keyword(s):  
Social Order ◽  
Sociological Research ◽  
Social Phenomenon ◽  
The Social ◽  
The Individual ◽  
Social Structuring ◽  
The Relationship

The article discusses four dominant perspectives in the sociology of heroism: the study of great men; hero stories; heroic actions; and hero institutions. The discussion ties together heroism and fundamental sociological debates about the relationship between the individual and the social order; it elucidates the socio-psychological, cultural/ideational and socio-political structuring of heroism, which challenges the tendency to understand people, actions and events as naturally, or intrinsically, heroic; and it points to a theoretical trajectory within the literature, which has moved from very exclusive to more inclusive conceptualisations of a hero. After this discussion, the article examines three problematic areas in the sociology of heroism: the underlying masculine character of heroism; the presumed disappearance of the hero with modernisation; and the principal idea of heroism as a pro-social phenomenon. The article calls for a more self-conscious engagement with this legacy, which could stimulate dialogue across different areas of sociological research.

Eunomia

1938 ◽  
Vol 32 (2) ◽  
pp. 89-102 ◽  
Author(s):  
A. Andrewes
Keyword(s):  
Social Order ◽  
Her Family ◽  
The Social ◽  
The Individual ◽  
The City

Eunomia was early personified. Already in Hesiod she is one of the three Horai, the child of Themis and the sister of Dike and Eirene, and from her family we may learn something of her nature. Both mother and sisters are concerned with the individual as the member of a community rather than as persomn in himself. Themis is a complicated character, whose implications cannot here be discussed, but we may without offence call her the mother of the social order and of the organized life of the community; Dike and Eirene are certainly social virtues which cannot usefully be practised by the individual in isolation, but if widespread make possible the collective life of the city. Eunomia too is one of the guardians of the social order, keeping the city from violence and lawlessness.

William Fremantle, Samuel Barnett and the Broad Church Origins of Toynbee Hall

1982 ◽  
Vol 33 (4) ◽  
pp. 564-579 ◽  
Author(s):  
L. E. Nettleship
Keyword(s):  
Political Economy ◽  
Social Justice ◽  
Middle Class ◽  
Economic System ◽  
Social Order ◽  
Economic Success ◽  
The Poor ◽  
New Concepts ◽  
The Social ◽  
The Individual

Contemporaries and historians alike have regarded the 1880s as a watershed in Victorian thought. They have argued that before the 1880s the well-to-do held firmly to a belief in Political Economy and attributed economic success to the high moral character and hard work of the individual. By the 1880s these beliefs had begun to waver, and many who had themselves prospered from the new economic system began to question its assumptions and develop a sense of responsibility toward those beneath them in the social order. One institution which seems to represent this change is Toynbee Hall, the first English settlement house, founded in 1884. Headed by a middle-class clergyman, Samuel Barnett, staffed by well-educated and well-to-do volunteers and dedicated to bringing education and culture to the poor, it seems to be an example, par excellence, of the newly heightened middle-class social conscience typical of the 1880s.2 But close examination reveals that the origins of Toynbee Hall date back to the 1870s, to the broad church orientation and parish practices of Samuel Barnett. Rooted in his modest day-to-day pastoral work rather than in new concepts of social justice, Toynbee Hall raises the question of whether in fact the 1880s constitute a great divide in Victorian thought or a period of continuation, expansion and institutionalisation of earlier ideas and practices.

scholarly journals The Impact of Interpersonal Trust on Group Cohesion: An empirical attestation among Scientists in R&D organizations

2016 ◽  
Vol 3 (2) ◽  
Author(s):  
Tessla Arakal ◽  
Dr.Sebastian Rupert Mampilly
Keyword(s):  
Social Order ◽  
Interpersonal Trust ◽  
Group Cohesion ◽  
Primary Data ◽  
Total Field ◽  
Development Organization ◽  
The Social ◽  
Degree Of Confidence ◽  
The Individual ◽  
The Impact

Trust is the degree of confidence the individual partners have in the reliability and integrity of each other and lack of it can undermine almost any other developmental effort .In today’s world of uncertainty , interpersonal trust is an imperative concept which has to be probed inorder to reap its benefits. Interpersonal trust implicitly means that the probability that one party will perform an action that is beneficial or atleast not detrimental to us is high enough for us to consider engaging in some form of cooperation with the party. Trust is both the specific expectation that another’s action will be beneficial rather than detrimental and the generalized ability to take for granted, to take under trust, a vast array of features of the social order. The second concept discussed in this paper is group cohesion. Group cohesion refers to the member’s attraction to the group. It is the total field of forces which act on members to remain in the group and my research on the concept illuminate this verity. This study is based on primary data collected from 172 scientists working in a nationalized Research and Development organization in central Kerala .The survey conducted during the last quarter of 2015, is expected to enlighten the linkage between interpersonal trust as the predictor and group cohesion as the outcome. The realistic and the pragmatic findings outlined in this paper can be guidelines to harness, employee’s trust in turn strengthening the group leading to better response, energy and enterprise.

Individuality and Achievement in South Indian Social History

1992 ◽  
Vol 26 (1) ◽  
pp. 129-156 ◽  
Author(s):  
Mattison Mines
Keyword(s):  
Social History ◽  
Social Order ◽  
Indian Society ◽  
Collective Identities ◽  
South Indian ◽  
The Social ◽  
History Of ◽  
The Individual ◽  
Social Importance

One of the unresolved issues of Indian anthorpology is how to characterize and weigh the social importance of individuality and achievement in Indian social history. Of course, the individual as ‘empirical agent’ exists in India as everywhere (Dumont 1970a:9), yet because Hindu culture stresses collective identities over those of the individual, individual achievement, which is a measure of individuality, has been overlooked and sometimes outrightly rejected as a cause of history and social order (Dumont 1970a:107; 1970b; cf. Silverberg 1968). In consequence, the motivations underlying achievement that might explain historic action have also been ignored. This undervaluing of individuality and achievement has given rise to a long debate among South Asianists about the role of the individual in Indian society (e.g., Marriott 1968, 1969; Tambiah 1972:835; Beteille 1986, 1987), a debate that raises questions in wider arenas about the nature of society and culture in relation to individuals (e.g. Brown 1988; Mines 1988).

Governing Sexual Health

2018 ◽  
pp. 21-50 ◽  
Author(s):  
Steven Epstein
Keyword(s):  
Sexual Health ◽  
Social Order ◽  
The United States ◽  
Health Work ◽  
Social Body ◽  
Diverse Range ◽  
The Social ◽  
Health Agencies ◽  
The Individual ◽  
Individual Body

This chapter describes how sexual health has become a touchstone in discussions about political belonging in the United States. By linking the management of the individual body to the governance of the social body, proponents of sexual health projects define healthy societies, responsible conduct, and “good” and “bad” sexual citizens. While the uptake of sexual health by federal health agencies suggests movement toward the centralized administration of the concept, other uses of the term escape the control of any central biomedical or state authority. This essay considers how projects of sexual health, some organized by the state and some the efforts of a politically diverse range of activists, circulate within worlds of politics and governance. It concludes that as proponents of sexual health work to establish the proper relations between bodily conduct and social order, they offer a range of templates for modern biocitizenship.

Introduction

2020 ◽  
pp. 1-15
Author(s):  
James Howard-Johnston
Keyword(s):  
Economic Growth ◽  
Social Order ◽  
Eleventh Century ◽  
Social Changes ◽  
The Third ◽  
Literature And Society ◽  
The Social ◽  
The Individual

The fundamental structures of Byzantium in the eleventh century have not been subjected to close and sustained scrutiny since the 1970s: it was during the eleventh century that Byzantium reached its apogee, in terms of power, prestige, and territorial extension, only to then plunge into steep political decline in the second half of the century. It is therefore well worth taking a thorough look at the social order in this age of change, to see how it was affected by economic growth and political expansion, and what were the consequences of the social changes which occurred. The Introduction sets out the origins of the volume in a workshop on the social order in eleventh-century Byzantium held in Oxford in May 2011, the third in a series of workshops funded by the British Academy on The Transformation of Byzantium: Law, Literature and Society in the Eleventh Century. It provides brief abstracts of the individual chapters, summarizing the approaches of their authors, in addition to a longer outline of the paper given by Mark Whittow on the Feudal Revolution at the workshop in 2011.

Modernity

2019 ◽  
pp. 219-236
Author(s):  
Nathan Spannaus
Keyword(s):  
Social Order ◽  
Social Structures ◽  
Personal Choice ◽  
Legal Norms ◽  
Muslim Society ◽  
Russian State ◽  
The Social ◽  
The Individual ◽  
Communal Institutions ◽  
Islamic Modernism

This chapter addresses the question of modernity, arguing that the changes to Volga-Ural Muslims’ relationship with the Russian state remade their society, dismantling the Islamic social order, based on sharia, that had historically predominated in the region. The result was the disembedding of Muslim society, the removal of overarching social structures with a religious basis; this broke the link between the individual and communal institutions, with the latter weakened by tsarist control. In effect, any adherence to Islamic legal norms was functionally rendered a personal choice. Addressing the social and religious impact of disembedding, this chapter connects it with secularity, itself a massive shift in the religious construction of society, and argues that such a transformation represents the beginning of modernity. Therefore, the elements of Qūrṣāwī’s thought that respond to these changes can be considered examples of Islamic modernism.

On the Dimension of Self-cultivation of Li in Xuncian Philosophy

KronoScope ◽  
2015 ◽  
Vol 15 (1) ◽  
pp. 93-117
Author(s):  
Kai Wang
Keyword(s):  
Social Stratification ◽  
Social Order ◽  
Moral Self ◽  
Individual Agent ◽  
The Social ◽  
Fundamental Process ◽  
Natural Emotion ◽  
The Individual ◽  
Individual Self ◽  
External Behavior

From the perspective of macro-politics, previous studies of Xunzi’s theory ofLi禮 (Rituals and Social Norms/Propriety/Rules of Proper Conduct) mainly concern the function and value ofLias a means of social control/governance that provides regulations and institutions (Dianzhang Zhidu典章制度). As a study of moral philosophy, this article adopts a micro-perspective to examine the individual agent [who practicesLi], and focuses on the dimension of individual self-cultivation throughLias discussed by Xunzi. This article argues that, based on the Confucian notion of moral community, even at the level of laws and institutions, the social stratification and social order established byLialso contain the value of “constructive morality.” The value foundation ofLilies not only in the propriety of external behavior but also in its performance of inner virtues. This article also points out thatLiis a notion of virtue precisely because it is the realization and expression ofYi. In addition,Li-performance is the cultivation and nourishing of the agents’ emotions and ethics in which natural emotion is elevated into moral sentiment. In short, according to Xunzi,Li-performance is a fundamental process and means of individual moral self-cultivation.

Sign in / Sign up

Export Citation Format

Share Document