Employment, Individualization and Insecurity: Rethinking the Risk Society Perspective

2005 ◽  
Vol 53 (1) ◽  
pp. 129-149 ◽  
Author(s):  
Gabe Mythen
Keyword(s):  
Western Europe ◽  
Social Processes ◽  
Risk Society ◽  
Sweeping Process ◽  
Employment Relations ◽  
Environmental Transitions ◽  
German Sociologist ◽  
Social Distribution ◽  
Society Perspective ◽  
The Relationship

German sociologist Ulrich Beck maintains that economic, technological and environmental transitions have radically reshaped employment relations in Western Europe. Whilst theories of employment transformation are historically ubiquitous, Beck's contribution is rather unique. Utilising risk as a lens through which subterranean shifts in employment, the economy and society can be visualised, Beck's work has been heralded as a significant theoretical landmark. The risk society perspective emphasizes the diffusion of two interlinked macro-social processes. Firstly, Beck identifies a sweeping process of individualization which recursively generates personal insecurity and reflexive decision-making. Secondly, changes in the relationship between capital and labour are said to have facilitated an underlying shift in the pattern of social distribution. This paper scrutinises Beck's understanding of these two processes, as a means of developing a broader critique of the risk society perspective. Theoretically, it will be argued that Beck deploys unsophisticated and artificial categories, amalgamates disparate forms of risk and compacts together diverse employment experiences. Empirically, the paper demonstrates that – far from being directed by a universal axis of risk – labour market inequalities follow the grooves etched by traditional forms of stratification.

Sociolinguistics: Theory

1984 ◽  
Vol 5 ◽  
pp. 46-58 ◽  
Author(s):  
Monica Heller
Keyword(s):  
Language Use ◽  
Social Systems ◽  
Social Processes ◽  
Theoretical Issue ◽  
Social Meaning ◽  
Language Varieties ◽  
The Social ◽  
Variationist Sociolinguistics ◽  
Social Distribution ◽  
The Relationship

In 1980, in this journal, Joshua Fishman presented the major theoretical issue in sociolinguistics as being the link between microsociolinguistic and macrosociolinguistic processes. In 1984 that is still the case, although the issue is receiving more explicit attention than it did four years ago.There are two branches of sociolinguistics which approach this issue in different ways. These two branches are interactionist and variationist sociolinguistics. Interactionist sociolinguistics is principally interested in what language use can tell us about social processes, and therefore a central concern is the social meaning of language use. Variationist sociolinguistics is interested in accounting for linguistic variation and change, at least partly as a product of the social distribution of language varieties. It is, therefore, less concerned with meaning as process, and more concerned with the interaction of linguistic and social systems; in this view the significance of language is mainly symbolic. In this review, I will discuss the contributions of these branches to the problem of the relationship between microsociolinguistics and macrosociolinguistics, as well as the theoretical problems peculiar to each branch.

From ‘Goods’ to ‘Bads’? Revisiting the Political Economy of Risk

2005 ◽  
Vol 10 (3) ◽  
pp. 191-203 ◽  
Author(s):  
Gabe Mythen
Keyword(s):  
Social Reproduction ◽  
Narrow Range ◽  
Risk Society ◽  
Nuclear Accidents ◽  
Political Discourses ◽  
Social Theorist ◽  
Positive Logic ◽  
Industrial Modernity ◽  
Social Distribution ◽  
Society Perspective

German social theorist Ulrich Beck has consistently maintained that the logic of social distribution in western cultures has been reconfigured over the last three decades. Beck believes that, in the first industrial modernity, political and economic energies were directed toward the dissemination of ‘social goods’, such as healthcare, employment and wealth. By contrast, in the second modernity - or risk society - the positive logic of goods distribution is displaced by a negative logic of ‘social bads’, exemplified by environmental despoliation, terrorism and nuclear accidents. Critically, whilst the logic of goods is sectoral - some win and some lose, some are protected, some exposed - social bads follow a universalising logic which threatens rich and poor alike. This article interrogates and challenges these core claims by fusing together and developing empirical and theoretical criticisms of the theory of distributional logic. Empirically, it is demonstrated that Beck draws upon a narrow range of examples, is insensitive to continuities in social reproduction and glosses over the intensification of traditional inequalities. Theoretically, the paper asserts that the risk society perspective constructs an unsustainable divide between interconnected modes of distribution, neglects the way in which political discourses can be used to reinforce hegemonic interests and overlooks uneven patterns of risk distribution.

Fukushima Fixation – The Media Focus on Radiation Risk in Tsunami-Stricken Japan

2011 ◽  
Vol 2 (2) ◽  
pp. 209-212
Author(s):  
Adam Burgess
Keyword(s):  
Soviet Union ◽  
Former Soviet Union ◽  
Radiation Risk ◽  
Nuclear Accident ◽  
Risk Society ◽  
Nuclear Threat ◽  
New Era ◽  
The Media ◽  
German Sociologist ◽  
Society Perspective

Twenty five years on from Chernobyl, the tragic events in Japan of March 2011 seem to reaffirm the ‘risk society’ perspective which the 1986 nuclear accident in the former Soviet Union did so much to popularise. It was amidst widespread predictions of mass harm – projected both across Europe and into the future – that German sociologist Ulrich Beck’s book of the same name found such a receptive audience. Beck wrote of a new era defined by the greater risk posed by ‘manufactured’, technological risk than natural, ‘external’ ones. The way in which the possible, nuclear threat from the damaged Fukushima nuclear plant looms larger than the devastation and the thousands actually killed by the ‘natural’ earthquake and tsunami reminds us of Beck's distinction.

Rivers, Gatherings, and Infrastructures

2021 ◽  
pp. 56-61
Author(s):  
Straw Will
Keyword(s):  
Media Studies ◽  
Social Processes ◽  
The Past ◽  
The Social ◽  
Social Distribution ◽  
The Relationship

From an interdisciplinary communications studies perspective, this chapter triangulates the relationship between several ascendant approaches to music, media, and infrastructure. The author notes that infrastructure and affect have performed certain “gathering” functions within the past decades of media studies, albeit as distant poles of attraction. The chapter registers a similarly productive tension in the ways that infrastructural studies of music reassemble their object as the point of convergence of multiple histories of materials, movements, and social processes, while infrastructural media studies trace the ways in which materials, networks, and assemblages of various kinds carry out the social distribution of meaning, affect, and memory.

scholarly journals Cycles in Stone Mining and Copper Circulation in Europe 5500–2000 bc: A View from Space

2020 ◽  
pp. 1-22
Author(s):  
Peter Schauer ◽  
Stephen Shennan ◽  
Andrew Bevan ◽  
Sue College ◽  
Kevan Edinborough ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Western Europe ◽  
General Pattern ◽  
Exchange Networks ◽  
Broad Perspective ◽  
Radiocarbon Dates ◽  
Copper Mines ◽  
The One ◽  
Demographic Trajectories ◽  
Additional Reference ◽  
The Relationship

The authors of this article consider the relationship in European prehistory between the procurement of high-quality stones (for axeheads, daggers, and other tools) on the one hand, and the early mining, crafting, and deposition of copper on the other. The data consist of radiocarbon dates for the exploitation of stone quarries, flint mines, and copper mines, and of information regarding the frequency through time of jade axeheads and copper artefacts. By adopting a broad perspective, spanning much of central-western Europe from 5500 to 2000 bc, they identify a general pattern in which the circulation of the first copper artefacts was associated with a decline in specialized stone quarrying. The latter re-emerged in certain regions when copper use decreased, before declining more permanently in the Bell Beaker phase, once copper became more generally available. Regional variations reflect the degrees of connectivity among overlapping copper exchange networks. The patterns revealed are in keeping with previous understandings, refine them through quantification and demonstrate their cyclical nature, with additional reference to likely local demographic trajectories.

FEATURES OF PHYSICAL EDUCATION OF CHILDREN WITH DISABILITIES

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ekaterina Olegovna Tumanovskaya ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Physical Education ◽  
Children With Disabilities ◽  
Social Processes ◽  
Adaptive Physical Education ◽  
Relationship Of ◽  
The Relationship

The article considers the relationship of physical education of children with disabilities to the degree of socialization in social processes, describes the features of adaptive physical education, describes the game method as the most used in the physical education of children with disabilities

Jauna slota tīri slauka jeb muižnieka Bernharda Magnusa fon Vulfa tiesas prāva pret mācītāju Frīdrihu Danielu Vāru

2021 ◽  
pp. 122-136
Author(s):  
Ginta Pērle-Sīle
Keyword(s):  
Western Europe ◽  
18Th Century ◽  
Contextual Information ◽  
Social Groups ◽  
Literary Work ◽  
Court Case ◽  
Political Events ◽  
The One ◽  
The Relationship ◽  
Research Show

The subject of this article is a court case between Aumeisteri nobleman Berhard Magnus von Wulf (1732–1784) and the minister of Palsmane and Aumeisteri parishes Friedrich Daniel Wahr (1749–1827) about the suspension of the minister from his duties from 1775 to 1779. The aim of the research is to approach the court case as evidence of the different opinions of several social groups where extreme colonial ideas in Vidzeme meet Enlightenment ideas from Western Europe. At the same time, the court case is a source of contextual information for a better understanding of the development of Wahr’s literary and folkloristic heritage. The research is based on studies of documents found in the Latvian State History Archive that are approached using the culture-historical and comparative methods, thus trying to contextualize certain events in a specific place and time. The results of the research show the Palsmane and Aumeisteri society as typical of the second part of the 18th century. The existence of specific social groups, particularism, and the implementation of colonial attitudes by the local nobility are also evident. The attitude of Wahr towards Latvian peasants shows the influence of Enlightenment, especially his efforts in education. The relationship between the parish and its minister incorporates evidence of a syncretic praxis with pagan and Christian traditions. In the light of political events of that particular time, i. e. peasant rebels in Vidzeme, the court case allows Wulf’s accusations to be treated as an opportunity to decrease the implementation of Enlightenment ideas, thus safeguarding the local nobility’s power. At the same time, the court case is a source of biographic, private, and daily life details. The broad range of the parish territory which was often challenging to navigate, the modest means of the minister, and distancing of the local nobility on the one hand, along with the influence of enlightenment ideas, on the other hand, are the most probable grounding for Wahr’s folkloristic and literary work.

The relationship among freezing tolerance, vernalization requirement, Ppd alleles and winter hardiness in European wheat cultivars

2017 ◽  
Vol 155 (9) ◽  
pp. 1353-1370 ◽  
Author(s):  
A. GORASH ◽  
R. ARMONIENĖ ◽  
Ž. LIATUKAS ◽  
G. BRAZAUSKAS
Keyword(s):  
Molecular Markers ◽  
Western Europe ◽  
Complex Trait ◽  
Winter Hardiness ◽  
Photoperiod Sensitivity ◽  
The Other ◽  
Wheat Cultivars ◽  
Crucial Component ◽  
Per Se ◽  
The Relationship

SUMMARYWinter hardiness of wheat is a complex trait involving a system of structural, regulatory and developmental genes, which interact in a complex pathway. The objective of the present work was to study the relationship among the main traits determining the level of adaptation and the possibility for target manipulation of breeding material by using molecular markers and phenological parameters. Wheat cultivars from different ecoclimatic environments of Europe were included for analysis. Gene-specific assay showed that photoperiod sensitivity of the studied cultivars was determined by polymorphism in the Ppd-D1 allele. The study established the relationship among winter hardiness, LT50 (the temperature at which 50% of plants are killed), photoperiod sensitivity, vernalization duration and earliness per se genes in the environment of Lithuania. The cultivars from Northern and Western Europe exhibited stronger requirement for vernalization and photoperiod. Although the group of cultivars from the southern latitudes were characterized by earliness, they possessed a stronger level of LT50. The level of LT50 was found to be the most crucial component of winter hardiness, the other traits served as supplementary components.

Making Europe—Processes of Europe-Formation since 1945

2000 ◽  
Vol 48 (1_suppl) ◽  
pp. 235-256
Author(s):  
Dennis Smith
Keyword(s):  
European Union ◽  
Western Europe ◽  
State Level ◽  
The United States ◽  
Social Processes ◽  
National Society ◽  
The European Union ◽  
National State ◽  
Civilizing Process ◽  
Norbert Elias

Dennis Smith argues that the development of the European polity that has become the European Union has been shaped by social processes similar in many respects to those analysed by Norbert Elias in The Court Society and The Civilizing Process. However, these processes have occurred at the supra-state level whereas Elias described them as they occurred at the level of the developing national state, especially during the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. During the 1940s and 1950s the United States played a key role in pacifying the European nations and imposing a framework of rules for the conduct of their economic and diplomatic affairs. States in western Europe were increasingly locked into tight bonds of interdependence. This movement towards integration was complemented by the disembedding of regions and large businesses from their close ties to the national state; they became ‘Europeanised’. Brussels became Europe's Versailles, a place where the courtier's skills were employed by the lobbyist. It is suggested that just as France represented, in Elias's eyes, a vanguard society within Europe in respect of the civilising process at the level of the national society, the European Union may play such a role globally in respect of developments at the supra-state level.

scholarly journals Todor Pavlović's social ideas

2021 ◽  
Vol 55 (3) ◽  
pp. 908-929
Author(s):  
Ilija Kajtez ◽  
Srđan Starčević
Keyword(s):  
Content Analysis ◽  
Social Development ◽  
20Th Century ◽  
Dialectical Materialism ◽  
Social Processes ◽  
Comparative Methods ◽  
Synthetic Methods ◽  
Special Focus ◽  
Military Organization ◽  
The Relationship

The paper analyzes the sociological works of Todor Pavlović, with the aim of presenting his basic social ideas and checking the relevance of his conclusions about the relationship between social development and military organization. A special focus is placed on Pavlović's explanation of the development of military organization, within which the position of dialectical materialism about the influence of war technique on army organization and tactics is refuted. This sets Pavlović apart from other Serbian and Yugoslav sociologists of the 20th century who studied the army, and anticipates new sociological views on the relationship between technical achievements and the organization of social processes. Basic analytical and synthetic methods, content analysis as well as biographical and comparative methods were used.

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