scholarly journals Robert Michels — zapoznany klasyk socjologii

2017 ◽  
Vol 61 (4) ◽  
pp. 169-188
Author(s):  
Radomir Miński

Robert Michels (1876–1936) considered himself to be a disillusioned socialist, who, under the influence of elitism, rejected democracy and moved into the fascist camp. As a figure in sociology he is associated solely with the “iron law of oligarchy.” In Poland, it is a little-known fact that in Western social thought he is viewed as a socially engaged sociologist—a “genuine” researcher gifted with sociological imagination and a passion for scholarship. The aim of the author is to present Michels as a scholar in many areas: feminist issues, local patriotism in the context of national citizenship, phenomena of a general sociological nature, the history of Italy, and social movements. Furthermore, the author illustrates the German writer Timm Genett’s thesis that Michels should also be valued as a pioneer in the study of social movements, which he consistently examined in his analyses of organizations, systematically investigating the degeneration of social movements and the shifting of organizational aims.

Author(s):  
Sara Awartani

In late September 2018, multiple generations of Chicago’s storied social movements marched through Chicago’s Lincoln Park neighborhood as part of the sold-out, three-day Young Lords Fiftieth Anniversary Symposium hosted by DePaul University—an institution that, alongside Mayor Richard J. Daley’s administration, had played a sizeable role in transforming Lincoln Park into a neighborhood “primed for development.” Students, activists, and community members—from throughout Chicago, the Midwest, the East Coast, and even as far as Texas—converged to celebrate the history of Puerto Ricans in Chicago, the legacies of the Young Lords, and the promises and possibilities of resistance. As Elaine Brown, former chairwoman and minister of information for the Black Panther Party, told participants in the second day’s opening plenary, the struggle against racism, poverty, and gentrification and for self-determination and the general empowerment of marginalized people is a protracted one. “You have living legends among you,” Brown insisted, inviting us to associate as equals with the Young Lords members in our midst. Her plea encapsulated the ethos of that weekend’s celebrations: “If we want to be free, let us live the light of the Lords.”


Author(s):  
Durba Mitra

During the colonial period in India, European scholars, British officials, and elite Indian intellectuals—philologists, administrators, doctors, ethnologists, sociologists, and social critics—deployed ideas about sexuality to understand modern Indian society. This book shows how deviant female sexuality, particularly the concept of the prostitute, became foundational to this knowledge project and became the primary way to think and write about Indian society. The book reveals that deviant female sexuality was critical to debates about social progress and exclusion, caste domination, marriage, widowhood and inheritance, women's performance, the trafficking of girls, abortion and infanticide, industrial and domestic labor, indentured servitude, and ideologies about the dangers of Muslim sexuality. British authorities and Indian intellectuals used the concept of the prostitute to argue for the dramatic reorganization of modern Indian society around Hindu monogamy. The book demonstrates how the intellectual history of modern social thought is based in a dangerous civilizational logic built on the control and erasure of women's sexuality. This logic continues to hold sway in present-day South Asia and the postcolonial world. Reframing the prostitute as a concept, the book overturns long-established notions of how to write the history of modern social thought in colonial India, and opens up new approaches for the global history of sexuality.


2021 ◽  
pp. 026858092110053
Author(s):  
Naoto Higuchi

Between the decline of mass protests in the 1970s and the Great East Japan Earthquake and Fukushima nuclear meltdown in the 2010s, which resulted in the resurgence of mass demonstrations, social movements were widely regarded as uncommon in Japan. In this essay, the author reviews Japan’s social movement studies in the last decade, focusing on the influence of the lack of mass protest since the 1970s on scholarly interests. The essay examines the following four topics: (1) slow responses to the resurgence of mass demonstrations in post-3.11 Japan, (2) quick responses to the rise of the radical right movement, (3) the emergence of cynical approaches to studying social movements, and (4) the redemption of the history of Japan’s postwar social movements. Despite some twists and turns, we can see how social protests are a perpetual element of Japanese society that sociologists study as a common phenomenon.


2005 ◽  
Vol 67 ◽  
pp. 54-63 ◽  
Author(s):  
Dorothy Sue Cobble

Verity Burgmann's call for a reinvigorated class politics and language is timely. This essay shares her goal of strengthening social movements in which class is taken seriously. It argues, however, that her efforts to resuscitate an antiquated class politics dressed up in identity clothes will not further that goal. This response offers an alternative reading of the nature and history of the “new” and the “old” social movements, of what can be learned about class and class-conscious movements from “identity politics” and from cultural theorists, and of what is needed to encourage future movements for social and economic justice. It calls for a class politics that recognizes the diversity of the working classes, embraces multiple class identities, reflects the fluid and multitiered class structures in which we live, and honors the aspirations of working people for inclusion, equity, and justice.


1986 ◽  
Vol 34 (2) ◽  
pp. 262-284 ◽  
Author(s):  
Wolfgang Rüdig ◽  
Philip D. Lowe

Britain appears to be largely removed from the new political tide of ‘green’ parties that is currently sweeping other West European countries. This article will put forward some explanations for this ‘stillborn’ character of ‘green’ party politics in Britain. A detailed scrutiny of the history of the Ecology Party will be provided. It will be argued that the relative weakness of the Party is mainly due to its'failure to attract the support of ‘new social movements’. Particular attention will be paid to the British political system's ability to deal with middle-class protest movements by a mixture of issue suppression and group integration.


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