What are unintended and adverse consequences?

Kybernetes ◽  
2019 ◽  
Vol 48 (2) ◽  
pp. 226-237 ◽  
Author(s):  
Josué Antonio Nescolarde-Selva ◽  
Hugh Gash ◽  
Jose-Luis Usó-Domenech
Keyword(s):  
Social Change ◽  
Social Action ◽  
Social Reproduction ◽  
Sociological Theory ◽  
Life Forms ◽  
Unintended Consequences ◽  
Content Type ◽  
History Of ◽  
Methodological Status ◽  
Constituent Elements

Purpose The purpose of this study is to examine the unintended consequences of actions as one of the central and constituent elements of sociological theory and long debated in the history of sociology. This question has been treated under varying sociological terminologies, including, providence, social forces, social paradoxes, heterogeneity of ends, immanent causality and the principle of emergency. Design/methodology/approach This paper is concerned with “adverse effects”. The thematic contexts of “unintended consequences of social action” the authors wish to focus attention on are specific types of consequences which may merit the adjective “adverse”. Findings The analysis of the intentions of our actions and their unwanted or foreseen consequences allows us to understand how societies work. Many historical facts are probably “unintentional.” But, most continuous or changing life forms must be interpreted as a mixture of intentional (social reproduction) and unintentional consequences (social change). Originality/value This paper focuses on four points of view: the object of sociology, the problems of order and social change, the methodological status of the discipline and the nature of social explanation, and mathematical theory. Four classifications of unintended consequences are formulated from the works of Boudon, Baert and Ramos, as well as the authors.

Antecedents to the crisis: Mandeville, Smith, and Keynes

2019 ◽  
Vol 46 (8) ◽  
pp. 1018-1030
Author(s):  
Jonathan B. Wight
Keyword(s):  
Human Nature ◽  
Social Action ◽  
Global Financial Crisis ◽  
Economic Thought ◽  
Invisible Hand ◽  
History Of Economic Thought ◽  
Content Type ◽  
Government Interventions ◽  
History Of ◽  
The Global Financial Crisis

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to present the methods of teaching about the global financial crisis (GFC) from a social economic perspective. Using primary texts from the history of economic thought, the moral underpinnings for collective social action are examined in times of economic depression. The deregulation of financial markets raises two questions: to what extent is deregulation the result of a misunderstanding about human nature and the behavioral lessons of social economics; and to what extend does deregulation ignore the moral lessons of Adam Smith’s invisible hand? Design/methodology/approach By reading sources including Mandeville, Smith, Keynes, Hayek and others, students form conclusions about the strengths and weaknesses of government interventions, both to fix, and to prevent, major recessions and depressions. Findings Two fallacies relating to financial market deregulation are that “greed is good” and that rational actors in the market will self-regulate leading to widespread prosperity. These moral beliefs supported financial liberalization, and ultimately contributed to financial institutions taking on enormous risks and losses that are ultimately socialized. Originality/value This paper innovatively uses readings from the history of economic thought to spark pedagogical discussions and debates about human nature and policymaking relevant to the GFC.

scholarly journals A Review of Hope in the Dark: Untold Histories, Wild Possibilities by Rebecca Solnit.

2020 ◽  
Vol 29 (1) ◽  
pp. 67
Author(s):  
Julianne Burgess
Keyword(s):  
Social Change ◽  
Cultural History ◽  
Social Action ◽  
History Of

Rebecca Solnit's book makes the case for hope as a commitment to social action in an uncertain world. The author draws from her own history of activism and her study of environmental, political and cultural history, to shine a light on long forgotten transformative victories. Solnit argues that we are living in a time of exciting, unprecedented social change.

Sociology, theories of

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jeffrey C. Alexander
Keyword(s):  
Social Action ◽  
Social Life ◽  
Sociological Theory ◽  
Empirical Processes ◽  
Sociological Research ◽  
Fundamental Properties ◽  
History Of ◽  
1960S And 1970S ◽  
Post War ◽  
The 1960S

Throughout the history of sociology, three types of theorizing have co-existed, sometimes uneasily. ‘Theories of’ provide abstract models of empirical processes; they function both as guides for sociological research and as sources for covering laws whose falsification or validation is intended to provide the basis for a cumulative science. ‘Presuppositional studies’ abstract away from particular empirical processes, seeking instead to articulate the fundamental properties of social action and order; meta-methodological warrants for the scientific investigation of societies; and normative foundations for moral evaluations of contemporary social life. ‘Hermeneutical theory’ addresses these basic sociological questions more indirectly, by interpreting the meanings and intentions of classical texts. The relation between these three forms of theorizing varies historically. In the post-war period, under the institutional and intellectual influence of US sociologists like Parsons and Merton, presuppositional and hermeneutical issues seemed to be settled; ‘theories of’ proliferated and prospects seemed bright for a cumulative, theoretically-organized science of society. Subsequent social and intellectual developments undermined this brief period of relative consensus. In the midst of the crises of the 1960s and 1970s, presuppositional and hermeneutical studies gained much greater importance, and became increasingly disarticulated from empirical ‘theories of’. Confronting the prospect of growing fragmentation, in the late 1970s and early 1980s there appeared a series of ambitious, synthetical works that sought to reground the discipline by providing coherent examples of how the different forms of sociological theory could once again be intertwined. While widely read inside and outside the discipline, these efforts failed in their foundational ambitions. As a result of this failure, over the last decade sociological theory has had diminishing influence both inside the discipline and without. Inside social science, economic and anthropological theories have been much more influential. In the broader intellectual arena, the most important presuppositional and hermeneutical debates have occurred in philosophy and literary studies. Sociological theorists are now participating in these extra-disciplinary debates even as they have returned to the task of developing ‘theories of’ particular institutional domains. The future of specifically sociological theory depends on reviving coherent relationships between these different theoretical domains.

scholarly journals ‘Counterfinality’ in sociological theory: Reconceptualization of the concept

2021 ◽  
Vol 21 (4) ◽  
pp. 697-710
Author(s):  
I. A. Latypov
Keyword(s):  
Social Action ◽  
Sociological Theory ◽  
Unintended Consequences ◽  
Sociological Research ◽  
Sociological Analysis ◽  
Sociological Study ◽  
Distinctive Features ◽  
Intentional Actions ◽  
Main Ideas ◽  
Classic Papers

Counterfinality is defined as unintended consequences of the uncoordinated actions of rationally acting individuals. Even before the concept was introduced by Sartre and developed by Elster, counterfinality was considered by many scholars. Some defined counterfinality as a type of social paradoxes and dilemmas, others - as an outcome of social interaction. Description and analysis of such social contradictions and paradoxes can be found in the works of Hobbes, Mandeville, Smith, Marx and Hegel. In the 20th century, sociologists also considered the issue of unintended consequences. Many classic papers of Merton contributed to the sociological analysis of the unintended consequences of intentional actions. Subsequent works focused on their classifications, and the phenomenon of counterfinality was highlighted in almost every classification. The term counterfinality was introduced by Sartre as an appendage of history, an unforeseen consequence of many interactions. The sociological study of counterfinality was initiated by Elster. He analyzes counterfinality not within the functionalist paradigm, but in the methodological individualism perspective, and for him, counterfinality acts as a basis for social change. The authors analysis of the main ideas of Sartre, Elster and other authors on counterfinality reveals its distinctive features in general and in the sociological analysis of social action in particular. The author argues that today the counterfinality theory consists mainly of responses and criticism of the ideas of Sartre and Elster, and that further sociological research should focus on conditions, features and consequences of counterfinality, and on its empirical indicators.

scholarly journals ‘New People’ and ‘Old Structures’: Max Adler and Siegfried Bernfeld on Society, Education and Change

2005 ◽  
Vol 3 (2) ◽  
pp. 184-193
Author(s):  
Heinz Sünker
Keyword(s):  
Twentieth Century ◽  
Social Change ◽  
Social Inequality ◽  
Social Reproduction ◽  
History Of Education ◽  
Theory Of Education ◽  
History Of ◽  
Educational Theorist ◽  
Education And Social Change ◽  
Education And Society

This article deals with central issues in the field of theory of education and history of education. The examples of Max Adler and Siegfried Bernfeld show that contemporary debates on education and society, social reproduction of social inequality, and education and social change have been subjects of strong controversies in the first third of the twentieth century. Furthermore, the deepness of these approaches shows the contemporary relevance and the limits of these historical attempts to solve these controversies. The article aims to overcome some of these limits in proposing to deal with the approach of the central educational theorist in Germany in the twentieth century, Heinz-Joachim Heydorn.

The locality of Beijing historic areas from a dynamic perspective based on geo-tagged photos

2019 ◽  
Vol 5 (1) ◽  
pp. 75-89
Author(s):  
Fang Wang ◽  
Wenying Hu ◽  
Yicai Zhu ◽  
Chunyan Jiang
Keyword(s):  
Dynamic Balance ◽  
Rapid Development ◽  
Content Type ◽  
Constituent Element ◽  
Historic Areas ◽  
Dynamic Perspective ◽  
History Of ◽  
Constituent Elements ◽  
High Degree ◽  
Historic Area

Purpose Due to rapid development, historic city areas are faced with urbanization damage to their characteristic urban identity besides physical deterioration and economic decay. The purpose of this paper is to address the following questions: What are the constituent elements of locality for historic areas? How does one classify historic areas according to locality elements? What are the characteristics of each kind of historic area? How does one identify to-be-protected locality elements according to different historic areas to realize sustainable development? Design/methodology/approach As a historic cultural city with a building history of over 3,000 years, Beijing has a myriad of distinctive historic areas, of which 367 were selected as the research samples. This paper classifies historic areas into the following four categories: distinctive areas, permanent areas, adaptive areas and inherited areas by analyzing the locality elements of 8,905 geo-tagged photos related to Beijing historic areas. The correlation among locality elements – the basis for joint protection – is also examined by Pearson’s correlation analysis. Findings The results are as follows: the reaction degree of carrier elements is generally higher than that of information elements, of which the representative architecture is the main constituent element of locality; folk customs, traditional activities and other intangible cultural heritage in historic areas receive only slight attention and need to be further stressed; controlled by non-human factors, permanent elements bear a high degree of autocorrelation; and emerging tourism and business activities have, to some extent, grown into constituent parts of the locality elements in historic areas. Originality/value This paper seeks to strike a dynamic balance between city renewal and historic area protection, providing a reference for understanding the dynamics of locality.

Sociology and Idealism in Britain 1880–1920

1978 ◽  
Vol 19 (1) ◽  
pp. 3-50 ◽  
Author(s):  
Stefan Collini
Keyword(s):  
Social Action ◽  
Significant Contribution ◽  
Sociological Theory ◽  
The Social ◽  
Social Structural ◽  
History Of ◽  
The Subject ◽  
Metaphysical Tradition ◽  
Classical Sociology ◽  
Intellectual Climate

It is something of a commonplace in the history of sociological theory that during the classical period of the development of the subject, when Weber and Durkheim and others were formulating the stock of ideas upon which subsequent theory has so largely drawn, no significant contribution was forthcoming from Britain. Parsons' The Structure of Social Action was probably the most influential single source of this view, and it is one which was subsequently popularized by Hughes, Annan and others. It is now sufficiently well established to have been taken as the explanandum in several recent essays. Where the explanation has been looked for in intellectual terms, this has generally involved some variation on the theme of the ‘curious strength of positivism’ in British thought. The gist of this claim is that the intellectual climate in Britain was (and is) marked by a tradition of empiricism in philosophy and individualism in social thought which was unreceptive to the abstract theory and the social-structural concepts which are integral to classical sociology. The significance of the British empirical tradition in philosophy has been particularly insisted upon. This makes it all the more important to point out that it was precisely during this period that what is generally referred to as Idealism was the dominant philosophy in Britain, a philosophy characterized by its thoroughgoing rejection of nominalism and empiricism in favour of the metaphysical tradition derived mainly from Kant and Hegel, a philosophy, I shall argue, which was potentially a fruitful basis for the development of sociological theory.

Circumventing the predatory state

2017 ◽  
Vol 16 (3) ◽  
pp. 245-259
Author(s):  
Petra C. Besenhard ◽  
Nikolai G. Wenzel
Keyword(s):  
Development Economics ◽  
Unintended Consequences ◽  
Political Freedom ◽  
Good News ◽  
Spontaneous Order ◽  
Failed States ◽  
Content Type ◽  
Post Colonial ◽  
New Development ◽  
History Of

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to study the decline of the Tuareg, and explore the emergence of traditional elements of Tuareg culture to circumvent formal barriers to trade. Design/methodology/approach This paper examines the history of the Tuareg through the lens of the New Development Economics. Findings This paper examines three elements of past Tuareg wealth: the caravan trade as spontaneous order; the unintended consequences of forced modernization policies under colonization and post-colonial states; and contemporary problems from hindered freedom of trade. The bad news is that the Tuareg are facing impediments from failed states with low economic and political freedom. The good news is that traditional elements in the Tuareg’s entrepreneurial culture are re-emerging to circumvent formal barriers. Research limitations/implications The literature on the Tuareg is largely pessimistic, as the Tuareg’s traditions have largely been quashed by post-colonial boundaries and failed states. The New Development Economics offers a new perspective, with two implications. First, there is hope for the Tuareg, and a possible win-win, if the local states adopt a policy of laissez faire and international trade, rather than assimilation or repression. Second, this theoretical lens can be used in other cases throughout Africa (and the world) involving post-colonial borders. Originality/value There already exists a rich literature on the Tuareg. This paper uses the New Development Economics to examine the history of the Tuareg’s decline – and to find hope in traditional elements of Tuareg entrepreneurship emerging to circumvent local failed (and predatory) states.

scholarly journals THE CONFLICT OF SOCIAL LIFE AND CULTURAL FORMS: SIMMEL’S THEORY OF “QUALITATIVE SOCIETAL DIFFERENTIATION”

2017 ◽  
Vol 5 (7) ◽  
pp. 167
Author(s):  
Gregor Fitzi
Keyword(s):  
Social Action ◽  
Social Life ◽  
Sociological Theory ◽  
A Priori ◽  
Life Forms ◽  
Social Differentiation ◽  
Early Theory ◽  
Social Actors ◽  
The Social ◽  
Phases Of Development

Simmel’s work has often been interpreted as a succession of disparate phases of development following contradictory epistemological paradigms and intellectual stances, and a similar misunderstanding applies to his theory of societal differentiation. A completely different view emerges of Simmel’s contribution to sociological theory if his process of theory-building is placed at the forefront of analysis along with its specific continuities. The present paper provides a synthetic study of Simmel’s theory of societal differentiation by systematically reconstructing the different stages of its development. It starts with Simmel’s early theory of the parallel differentiation of the social group and the personality of the social actors, thus highlighting that social differentiation can be understood only as a process that takes place both on the level of social action and social structure. The focus then shifts to Simmel’s theory of culture and its relationship to the core of his sociological theory in the so-called a priori of sociation. Finally, the paper shows how Simmel’s late sociological anthropology links the different contributions on social differentiation, cultural sociology and the epistemological premises of sociation in a theory of life forms producing the structuration of “qualitative differentiated societies”.

Book Reviews: Faces of Feminism: A Study of Feminism as a Social Movement, The Entrepreneurial Middle Class, The Logic of Social Action. An Introduction to Sociological Analysis, The Unintended Consequences of Social Action, Thinking Photography, The Politics of Pop Festivals, One for the Money: Politics and Popular Song, Karl Marx's Theory of History: A Defence, Cooking, Cuisine and Class, The German Social Democratic Party, The Creation of World Poverty, An Alternative View to the Brandt Report, The Bureaucratic Leviathan—A Study in the Sociology of Communism, Culture and Society in Contemporary Europe: A Casebook, Advances in Social Theory and Methodology: Towards an Integration of Micro- and Macro-Sociologies, Johnsonville: Continuity and Change in a New Zealand Township, An Island Polity: The Archaeology of Exploitation in Melos, On Becoming a Rock Musician, The Population History of England 1541–1871: A Reconstruction, Policing the City, Frames of Meaning: The Social Construction of Extraordinary Science, Field Research: A Sourcebook and Field Manual, The History of Marxism: Vol. I, Marxism in Marx's Day, Modern Interpretations of Marx, Hooligans or Rebels? An Oral History of Working-Class Childhood and Youth 1889–1939, Housing and Identity — Cross-Cultural Perspectives

1983 ◽  
Vol 31 (1) ◽  
pp. 130-181
Author(s):  
Jeffrey Weeks ◽  
Michael Winter ◽  
Christopher Dandeker ◽  
Annette Kuhn ◽  
Bernice Martin ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Social Action ◽  
Democratic Party ◽  
Field Research ◽  
Unintended Consequences ◽  
Population History ◽  
Alternative View ◽  
Social Democratic Party ◽  
Science Field ◽  
Continuity And Change ◽  
History Of
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