bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025 huggingface dataset:
From social menace to unfulfilled promise: the evolution of policy and practice towards people with intellectual disabilities in the United States
Authors: Ferguson Philip M.
Published: January 2020

This chapter uses the stories of three families, the ‘Kallikaks’, the Kennedys and the Fergusons, to narrate the key stages of the history of intellectual disability in the twentieth century. The so-called‘Kallikaks’ were used as part of the vicious eugenic libel against the intellectually disabled population that stoked the cruel mass institutionalization programmes of the early century. This section tells the story of Emma Wolverton, one of those on whose life stories the mythical Kallikaks were based and created to spread fear and drive segregational policy. The story of the famous Kennedy family shows the post-war journey of the intellectually disabled person from a hidden site of shame to the policy reforms of the community return. Finally, the story of the author’s own family shows some of the great post-reform liberating shifts towards a life of choice and inclusion that have taken place, and alerts us to the brooding threats that still lurk.
State-sponsored amateurism: cultural intermediation, participation and non‑professional production
Authors: Long Paul
Published: January 2020

This chapter asks: what roles does participation as production have in cultural intermediation projects? How are individuals afforded agency in the making of cultural works and connected to the cultural ecology, between activities that are publicly funded, commercial and homemade? The chapter proceeds with an exploration of a contemporary injunction to be creative. It then deals with some of the prompts for thinking with the label of amateurism in relation to an understanding of participation and processes of intermediation. Drawing on indicative examples of activity in Balsall Heath is an exploration of a form of ‘sponsored amateurism’, a label describing every day creative work amongst non-professionals engendered by intermediaries and cultural policy. The chapter concludes with reflections on a field of production that falls outside of the obvious attention of policymakers and cultural intermediation objectives.
Intervention: Balsall Heath legends
Authors: Kiyani Saadia
Published: January 2020

This chapter reflects on a photographic commission that emerged from the participatory budgeting exercise examined in Chapter 9. The author wanted to build on her existing artistic skills to celebrate the contributions of local residents to helping the community in Balsall Heath. The artistic freedom given by the commissioning process was unusual, as was the level of support made available to help the author to realise her vision. The outputs were a successful exhibition as well as some of the work appearing on local buses, sharing the work with the wider community.
Intervention: street art, faith and cultural engagement
Authors: Ali Mohammed
Published: January 2020

This chapter presents the personal reflections of painter Mohammed Ali on his experience as a creative producer and in his intermediary role as the founder of Soul City Arts, a cultural organisation located in the Sparkbrook area of Birmingham that serves the locality and city while working with an international scope.
Conclusion: Where next for cultural intermediation?
Authors: Jones Phil , Long Paul , Perry Beth
Published: January 2020

The book concludes by arguing not about the need to increase funding for cultural intermediaries, but rather for a critical examination of the role of culture in tacking entrenched inequality. The cultural sector is largely a closed shop, dominated by the white middle classes in south east England. Realistically, only the very talented and very lucky can count on the creative sector as a route out of poverty, regardless of how many well-meaning cultural activities run in deprived neighbourhoods. The chapter calls for a clearer delineation of different types of intermediary function, noting that the excellent work done by intermediaries based in deprived communities tackling skills and confidence building should not be unreflexively conflated with the activities of large arts organisations engaging in wider practices of marketing cities to middle class consumers. The chapter concludes that cultural intermediation will continue to play a role in building confidence and skills among a relatively small number of people. Unfortunately, in the face of a right-wing agenda that seems determined to entrench inequality, the capacity of cultural activity to transform society remains highly limited.
The rise of a new urban technocracy
Authors: Savini Federico , Raco Mike
Published: January 2020

This chapter discusses the rise of a new technocracy in urban governance. It further argues that the shift to a new technocracy is leading to the re-fashioning of planning's core objectives and purpose from an earlier focus on the value of input-centred forms of deliberation, place-making, and social justice to an enhanced concern with output-centred agendas premised on expedited development and growth. The rolling out of entrepreneurial planning requires the employment of new governance technologies, such as quantitative systems of managerialism and the implementation of a multiplicity of codifications and models that are used to define urban problems and their solutions. The rise of a new technocracy is also reflected and reproduced by the expansion of increasingly complex landscapes of knowledge production. This co-evolution has been given additional impetus as the presence of more technocratic modes of governance carries advantages for policymakers and governments struggling to maintain their wider legitimacy in contexts of growing crisis.
Professional lobbying in urban planning: depoliticisation or REpoliticisation?
Authors: Hirvola Aino , Mäntysalo Raine
Published: January 2020

This chapter argues that professional lobbying is turning out to be an important factor in the de- and re-politicisation processes of urban development. It describes the phenomenon of professional lobbying in urban planning in general terms. The chapter then draws on public affairs studies, outlining the broad spectrum of tasks of the lobbyist and identifying certain strategies and tactics of lobbying. To question the technocratic logics of contemporary urban governance, the chapter asks what the professionalisation of lobbying means and how it affects the planning process and the related decision-making process. The focus is on the Finnish context and especially on Helsinki.
Conclusions: the technocratic logics of contemporary planning
Authors: Savini Federico , Raco Mike
Published: January 2020

This concluding chapter re-assesses the core propositions set out in the first chapter. Succeeding chapters have drawn on these core characteristics to examine and assess the emergence of technocratic logics in contemporary urban environments and the interweaving of new modes of technocracy with political projects and agendas following the financial crisis. While the term ‘technocracy’ is associated with particular, and very specific, historical conjunctures, this chapter argues that by focusing on technocratic logics and conceptions of technocracy it is possible to develop more powerful insights into contemporary planning processes and governance dynamics. At the heart of this discussion lies a dialectical tension between political projects that seek to implement technocratic modes of governance in the pursuit of broader aims, on the one hand, and the complexities of places and place-politics that often lie beyond the limits of technocratic calculation and control on the other. The tensions between these dialectical perspectives are on-going, subject to multiple influences, and prone to forms of incompleteness and contestation at various scales.
Housing’s economic context
Authors: Gallent Nick
Published: January 2020

Housing has long been implicated in the productive economy, providing a focus for manufacturing, construction and material consumption. The privatisation, assetisation and financialisation of housing in the twentieth century has broadened and deepened its economic function. This chapter examines the changing profile of the UK economy and the greater centrality today of services related to real estate and debt securitisation. It explores the idea of a ‘credit switch’ in the latter half of the twentieth century into the financialised built environment and the implications of that switch for both the wider economy and public revenues. The chapter explores the broadening role of housing in the UK economy and implications for productivity, workplace earnings and housing affordability (relative to those earnings). The tax treatment of housing – and various instruments of financialisation - are presented as critical scaffolding for this economic shift, which is theorised/explained using a range of key literature.
Local pathways to crisis
Authors: Gallent Nick
Published: January 2020

Returning to the idea of housing access/affordability as a wicked problem, this chapter explores 6 critical explanations of the housing cost crisis, showing how these explanations intersect to produce a broader narrative account of the political economy of housing outcomes. The chapter looks at impediments to increasing housing supply, the role of direct (overseas) investors in the London housing market, reliance on volume housebuilding (the lack of plurality in the UK model of housing production), the associated reliance on ‘build to sell’ (and the lack of space for alternative models), the impact that the tax treatment of housing has on consumption and housing supply, and the role that credit supply has on house prices and housing costs.
Methodological collectivism: social science and social policy
Authors: Spicker Paul
Published: January 2020

Methodological collectivism looks for explanations and patterns of behaviour not in the actions of individuals, but in the actions of groups - including classes, ethnic groups and societies taken as a whole. It extends beyond groups, however, to categories or blocs of people, treating them as if they can be understood in collective terms. This is the characteristic approach of sociology, but it also has an important pragmatic purpose in the development of public policy.
The individual and the collective
Authors: Spicker Paul
Published: January 2020

The main individualist objection to collectivism is that group interests, and group action, are incompatible with the recognition of individual interests. The interests of individuals will always diverge from the interests of the group, and consequently groups can only subsist by repressing individual interests. The formal 'proofs' of this are questionable; people's behaviour is socialised, and people can and do collaborate for mutual benefit. Cooperation is both a means to common ends and an end in itself. Asserting the rights of individuals may lead to circumstances where majorities have to accede to minorities, but the converse may also be true: sometimes minorities have to respect the rights of majorities.
So close, so far? Part-time employment and its effects on gender equality in Italy and Spain1
Authors: Maestripieri Margarita
Published: January 2020

This chapter analyses the cleavages among the insiders and outsiders of different groups of women in Italy and Spain with a particular focus on part-time employment. Given the prevalence of dualisation in Southern European labour markets, people employed in part-time work and non-standard employment are particularly vulnerable to precarious conditions. Only a minority of part-time contracts are voluntarily entered into by women. The authors argue that, in comparison with other European countries, part-time employment in Italy and Spain appears to be a form of implementing external labour market flexibility rather than an instrument created to ease work/family conflicts for women. Using an intersectional analytical approach, the authors show how the distribution of non-standard and involuntary part-time work is unequal among different groups of women, exposing young (in Italy) and low educated (in Spain) women in particular to deteriorated labour market conditions. The situation of disadvantage is magnified when there is a particular combination of lack of education, age and childcare requirements.
Part-time working women’s access to other types of flexible working-time arrangements across Europe
Authors: Chung Heejung
Published: January 2020

This chapter examines part-time working women's access to flexitime, that is the worker's control over their schedules such as starting and ending times, and time off work (a couple of hours during their working day) to tend to personal issues. It further examines whether this relative access varies across countries. The analysis of data from 30 European countries show that at the European average, part-time workers are more likely to get access to flexitime - showing evidence of a complimentary effect, and are as likely to get access to time off work for personal reasons as full time workers. There was a significant cross-national variance in part-time worker's relative access to flexitime compared to that of full-time workers. Countries where part-time work is more prevalent, where strong centralised unions exist, and family policies are generous were where women generally had better access to flexitime. However, this was especially the case for full-time working women, decreasing the gap between full-time and part-time working women
Part-time work in Danish private services: a (mis)match between wage flexibility and living hours
Authors: Larsen Trine P. , Ilsøe Anna , Felbo-Kolding Jonas
Published: January 2020

This chapter explores how the institutional framework for working time and wage regulation affects the prevalence of marginal part-time employment (less than 15 working hours per week) and its implications for men and women's hourly earnings within retail, industrial cleaning, hotels and restaurants. Analytically, we draw on the concept of living hours and find that the combined effects of wage and working time regulation influence the take-up of contracts of few hours and the workforce composition. We argue that the institutional framework of collective agreements, in some instances, facilitates a win-win situation for employers and employees alike and narrows the gender pay gap. In other instances, the very same agreements seemingly promote dualisation, especially for young people and migrants in terms of wage penalties and contracts of few hours, indicating the dual nature of the institutional framework.
Stepping in, stepping out or staying put? Part-time work and immigrant integration in Norway
Authors: Kavli Hanne Cecilie , Nielsen Roy A.
Published: January 2020

Migrants are often at a disadvantage in the labour market. Increased migration has therefore led to a strong focus in receiving countries on policy that can facilitate employment. Less attention is paid to working hours, contracts or type of work. The workplace is viewed as an arena where immigrants can improve language skills and establish contacts through which they can achieve upwards mobility in the labour market. We investigate transfers out of part-time work among immigrants and natives in Norway. By means of competing risk event history analyses, we compare transitions from part-time work to either full-time positions or exits from the labour market over five years among Norwegians and different groups of immigrants. Stable part-time is less common among immigrants than among natives, as immigrants have higher transfers to both full-time work and unemployment. Immigrants - men and women - have the same or higher likelihood of transitioning from part-time to full-time compared to natives. This suggest that immigrants are more often involuntarily in part-time and that they benefit from the opportunity to demonstrate their skills to employers. However, immigrants also have higher exit risk and this risk increases with short working hours, indicating a higher level of precariousness.
The interplay of welfare state policies with supply- and demand-side factors in the production of marginalised part-time employment among women in Germany
Authors: Pfau-Effinger Birgit , Reimer Thordis
Published: January 2020

In the early 2000s, Germany's Red-Green government introduced a new type of marginal employment in the form of 'Minijob' legislation. In the context of the dualisation strategy of the German welfare state, Minijob legislation has supported firms in extending the secondary segment of marginal jobs. However, Minijobs are associated with particularly low social security and high poverty risks, and these positions are primarily staffed by women. Therefore, the extension of the Minijob system has contributed to the persistence of traditional structures of gender inequality. This empirical study examines how demand and supply side factors interact with welfare state institutions and politics in the production of marginal employment of women in part-time jobs. Using data from the German Socio-Economic Panel, we used logistic regression to analyse women's risk of working in Minijobs based on family, educational, biographical and workplace characteristics. The research results identify both supply side and demand side factors as being significant in shaping a situation whereby married women with small children and lower levels of education who work in small, non-public firms are particularly exposed to the risks of marginal employment in Minijobs.
Fertility Biosensing
Authors: Roberts Celia , Mackenzie Adrian , Mort Maggie , Atkinson Theresa , Kragh-Furbo Mette , Wilkinson Joann
Published: January 2020

Fertility- and hormonal- biosensing are becoming increasingly widespread across the global North. Multiple devices and apps, and their associated platforms, are used to track menstruation and ovulation, to measure sperm count, and to monitor hormonal changes associated with pregnancy, menopause and gender transition. Such practices are, we argue, changing the way users - and arguably many non-users - experience their bodies, their sexualities and their sex/gender. The relevant platforms collect and collate data from millions of devices, producing, in some cases, very large data sets about particular bodily events across huge numbers of users. This data has commercial value and is of interest to a wide variety of researchers. Whilst the practices of fertility- and hormonal-biosensing may increase users’ understanding of their bodies and thus resonate with feminist discourses on the significance of self-knowledge, we show in this chapter that they do not typically effect (let alone contest) conventional biomedical or scientific knowledge or practices. Fertility and hormonal-biosensing practices, we argue, remain quite limited as vectors of social change because of their conventional understandings of bodies and their failure to engage with the politics of platformisation.
Biosensing Stress
Authors: Roberts Celia , Mackenzie Adrian , Mort Maggie , Atkinson Theresa , Kragh-Furbo Mette , Wilkinson Joann
Published: January 2020

Stress is a notoriously slippery concept and experience: something many of us talk a lot about, and have a strong physical sense of, but which is difficult to grasp scientifically or medically. Human stress responses are complex and can be traced in multiple physical processes and changes, as well as in mental and emotional life. Attempts to biosense the physical signs of stress are inevitably bound up with these complexities, and reflect the multiple uncertainties of contemporary science and clinical medicine on this issue. Despite this, devices to monitor stress are increasingly available and are being taken up in various contexts, including workplaces such as the military and financial trading. In this chapter we explore how biosensing platforms articulate ‘stress’ and suggest how these devices and platforms might be used to further a bio-psycho-social understanding of human and non-human life.
Biosensing in Old Age
Authors: Roberts Celia , Mackenzie Adrian , Mort Maggie , Atkinson Theresa , Kragh-Furbo Mette , Wilkinson Joann
Published: January 2020

How does biosensing reach into the lives of older people living at home? Here we examine care monitoring systems for older people, or telecare, as this has become known. We focus in particular on the wearable falls detector, an alarm device which triggers, it is claimed, when a person trips or falls. We explore findings from ethnographies of home telecare and from citizens’ panel debates on how individuals and families live with such systems, and how falls detectors are constructed as workable. Following individuals' interactions with telecare we question the notion of self-tracking, preferring the term dys-tracking as better reflecting their relationship with automated devices. Falls detectors are technically highly complex, collecting data difficult to interpret. Ageing bodies are invariably assessed as low functioning and intrinsically at risk. Views from our citizens’ panels however, show a more active and imaginative constituency where practices of self-care exist alongside remote-care systems.
Social work academia and social policy in Israel: on the role of social work academics in the policy process
Authors: Weiss-Gal Idit , Gal John
Published: January 2020

This study contributes to research on policy practice by enriching our knowledge about the forms that the policy engagement of social work academics takes, the dynamics of this engagement, and the factors associated with it. The study is based on structured interviews with 24 faculty members from schools of social work in Israel, all of whom are actively involved in policy formulation. The findings of the study reveal that participants are motivated by ideology and values to engage in policy and that they do so despite their perception that there is a lack of institutional support for this type of activity. The participants report that they successfully manage to combine their policy-related activities with teaching and research. The study also indicates that the social policy formulation process in Israel offers specific opportunities for the policy engagement of social work faculty.
‘A little more humanity’: placement officers in Germany between social work and social policy
Authors: Gottwald Markus , Sowa Frank
Published: January 2020

By definition, no social work is supposed to be carried out in the labour administration. However, what do German placement officers reveal about the implementation of social policy when they describe their activity as social work? Classical research studies on public employment service (PES) as well as our own empirical research reveal the following: while it emerged from earlier studies that placement officers described themselves as ‘social workers’ in order to lend greater meaning to their activities, interviews conducted with today's placement officers indicate their criticism as well: dysfunctional effects of an organisational means of achieving the social policy goals set by the Hartz labour-market reforms (2003-05) are specified – including the welfare-to-work principle being made unnecessarily stricter, thereby increasing the risk of the unemployed becoming ‘genuine’ social work cases.
What is it all about?
Authors: Greve Bent
Published: January 2020

It presents the key question the book will delve into: Key points and questions for the book to delve into are: Will populist erode or support welfare states development? Can populist and chauvinist stance explain specific traits in welfare states development? Is it possible that populist development will imply restructuring of the welfare state, also even if there is decreased trust in welfare state administration and politicians? Finally, it gives an overview of the book.
Basic concepts
Authors: Greve Bent
Published: January 2020

Voters and citizens perception of what would be the best way for a welfare state to develop are often analysed by a variety of concepts. They will, albeit shortly, be presented as this will help framing the presentation of the content of the book. The basic concept expected to be included is: welfare chauvinism, legitimacy, deserving/undeserving, populism and ideas. This also as several of these concepts are not always used consistently and/or having connotations that implicitly indicates a normative position. Still, these concepts are influential, and some has been for many years, in the understanding of why welfare states have developed as they have.
Why inequality matters
Authors: Greve Bent , Greve Bent
Published: January 2020

This chapter focuses on why inequality matters for welfare states, why we should have an interest in this topic, and how this is related to issues of populism and welfare chauvinism. This is done by trying to systematize the knowledge we have on why inequality matters for, and in relation to, economic growth, for health and for social cohesion. It also discusses why trickle-down economics do not work. The development in inequality is analysed by showing the development using traditional aspects such as the Gini coefficient, but also reflecting on, and showing, data on inequality in health and how this can be seen as connected to change in economic inequality.
Dualisation and the labour market
Authors: Greve Bent
Published: January 2020

The chapter depicts how and what the consequence for social cohesion of recent years development on the labour market has been. This includes a short description of possible future trends on labour market and how they can influence welfare state developments. It further includes reference to the Europeanization and globalisation discussion, as this also is an issue in relation to the labour market development, including how this might have an impact on preferences for state intervention.
Critical Dialogues
Authors: Clarke John
Published: January 2020

John Clarke is in conversation with 12 leading scholars about the dynamics of thinking critically in the social sciences. The conversations range across many fields and explore the problems and possibilities of doing critical intellectual work in ways that are responsive to changing conditions.By emphasising the many voices in play, in conversation with as well as against others, Clarke challenges the individualising myth of the heroic intellectual. He underlines the value of thinking critically, collaboratively and dialogically.The book also provides access to a sound archive of the original conversations.
Wendy Brown
Authors: Clarke John , Brown Wendy , Cochrane Allan , Cooper Davina , Grossberg Larry , Larner Wendy , Lewis Gail , Li Tania Murray , Maskovsky Jeff , Newman Janet , Sharma Anu (Aradhana) , Stubbs Paul , Williams Fiona
Published: January 2020

The chapter opens with a conversation about the demands and difficulties of theory, before turning to a reflection on the pleasures of seductions of discovering theory. We then reflect on the spaces between theory and politics before turning to issues of intellectual and political ambivalence.
Jeff Maskovsky
Authors: Clarke John , Brown Wendy , Cochrane Allan , Cooper Davina , Grossberg Larry , Larner Wendy , Lewis Gail , Li Tania Murray , Maskovsky Jeff , Newman Janet , Sharma Anu (Aradhana) , Stubbs Paul , Williams Fiona
Published: January 2020

The chapter opens with reflections on some of the paradoxes of popular politics. It moves to a discussion of our relative political trajectories. It ends by considering the relationship between certainty and ambivalence in political terms.
Fiona Williams
Authors: Clarke John , Brown Wendy , Cochrane Allan , Cooper Davina , Grossberg Larry , Larner Wendy , Lewis Gail , Li Tania Murray , Maskovsky Jeff , Newman Janet , Sharma Anu (Aradhana) , Stubbs Paul , Williams Fiona
Published: January 2020

The conversation begins from a focus on the field of social policy before exploring practices of resistance and refusal.Resistances and refusals. It goes on to examine the significance of ideas of contradiction and complexity in studying welfare changes. It ends by returning to social policy as a field of possibility.
Introduction: the new politics of home
Authors: Jupp Eleanor , Bowlby Sophie , Franklin Jane , Hall Sarah Marie
Published: January 2020

This chapter sets the following chapters within an overall landscape of social policy, governance and economic changes. It will assess the current political and economic moment in terms of austerity and welfare reform and set out some of the conceptual and theoretical resources, around care, crisis, and the home, as they are drawn on in the rest of the book. It also introduces the rest of the chapters.
Relational biographies in times of austerity: family, home and care
Authors: Hall Sarah Marie
Published: January 2020

Drawing on thinking across human geography and sociology, and engaging with key concepts of caringscapes, personal lives and the lifecourse, this chapter argues for greater consideration of the impact that austerity can have on both personal and relational biographies. Findings in the form of ethnographic accounts and vignettes from recent research with families and communities in Greater Manchester, UK, regarding everyday life in austerity, and particularly using findings from a biographical mapping tool developed by the author, are reported. Using these data, the chapter makes the case for developing both concepts and methods for understanding social and personal lives in times of austerity and crisis.
Spaces of care beyond the home: austerity and children’s services
Authors: Jupp Eleanor
Published: January 2020

This chapter examines a shift within UK social policy away from neighbourhood infrastructures of policy and services under conditions of austerity. The loss of these services are creating increasingly fragmented and unequal contexts in relation to local landscapes of care and support for families. The chapter draws on research about Sure Start Children’s Centres, which can be seen as crucial ‘in-between’ or ‘home-like’ spaces, linking care at home with wider networks and resources. The paper focuses on services, closures, activism and governance relating to the centres which were aimed at children under five and their families.
Introduction: the promotion of fundamental British values
Authors: Vincent Carol
Published: January 2020

This brief introduction introduces the research project, the Fundamental British values (FBV) requirement, and explains the government’s identification of the values as democracy, rule of law, individual liberty and mutual respect and tolerance of those of different faiths and beliefs. It also sets out the structure for the book.
The Occupational Relations of Domestic Cleaning as Work and Labour
Authors: Singha Lotika
Published: January 2020

This chapter shows how cultural injustices obstruct service-providers’efforts to do cleaning as work. When the work is done as labour, therelationship is substantially unequal because of some combination of class,class–caste, gender and socioeconomic (and racial) disparities, and becausethe work done is considered low status. That is, both the work and workerare stigmatised. The worker often harbours ‘ressentiment’When cleaning is done as work, there will be a friendly work relationshipthat can be located within wider work relationships, but participatoryparity between the service-user and service-provider can be hampered byservice-users’ classed actions that inadvertently or intentionally retrenchhousework as low-value ‘women’s work’. For instance, feeling guilty aboutoutsourcing housecleaning or assuming that the service-provider needshelp in recognising their rights as workers. Such injustices as practisedin relation to commodified ‘women’s work’ in the home are part of thewider cultural injustices that pervade paid work more generally.
Arriving in Morocco: Becoming Trapped in a Context of Uncertainty
Authors: Stock Inka
Published: January 2020

In this chapter, I describe how migrants actually arrive in Morocco. The data presented in the chapter situates their lives here in a context of extreme political, economic and social marginalization. I then analyse the migration policy context in Morocco and the increasing involvement of the European Union in this process. By doing this, I show how transit migrants’ rightlessness in Morocco has been constructed by states through the introduction of particular national and international migration policies which link mobility and rights in very specific ways.
Migrant Communities in Morocco
Authors: Stock Inka
Published: January 2020

This chapter shifts the view from how migrants see their own life to how they view each other. The chapter explores the contradictory community relations between migrants in Morocco by looking at moments of reciprocity and mutual help on the one hand, and exploitation on the other. I discuss how migrants’ relation to mobility, place and time conditions these dynamics. The data in the chapter shows that even though migrants are actually living in conditions very similar to what Agamben (1998) would term “the bare life”, it would be wrong to conclude that this prevents them from having any meaningful social and community life and therefore no basis for political agency. However, the analysis of the ethnographic material shows that migrants’ community life is characterized by activities which are mostly based on self-interest rather than on the desire to promote a common community goal.
Conclusion
Authors: Stock Inka
Published: January 2020

The conclusion wraps up the arguments made in the course of the book and attempts to give some tentative answers to the main question concerning the consequences of ‘stuckness’ on people’s lives in Morocco. In summary, the book shows how the current policy mechanisms which limit certain people’s mobility through border controls can have particularly negative effects on the life course of individuals. The discussion of migrants’ situation in Morocco shows how international migration control policies are actively hampering migrants’ and would-be migrants’ abilities to design a dignified, self-controlled life plan and to establish productive and mutually supporting relations with others. Such policies foster segregation, marginalisation and exploitation. As such, control policies are doing much more than simply inhibiting movement. They are also inhibiting people’s effective settlement and their development as persons.
Introduction: Can there be a ‘Criminology of War’?
Authors: McGarry Ross , Walklate Sandra
Published: January 2020

In chapter one, Introduction: Can there be a criminology of war?, we first outline the objectives of this book followed by establishing its central problematique: to question if a ‘criminology of war’ possible, and if so how this might be studied as a sociologically informed endeavour. Following this we go on to define at length the notion of “war” to be used throughout each forthcoming chapter. This is achieved by two means: first a Clausewitzean definition of ‘war’ is described to establish a baseline for our understanding, this is followed by a reinterpretation of the concept of ‘war’ as having both ‘old’ and ‘new’ forms. These definitions are used in the forthcoming chapters (2-8) for the purposes of framing our discussions and providing points of reference and departure. The outline, structure and intentions of the book are then provided.
Criminology’s ‘Fourth War’? Gendering War and Its Violence(s)
Authors: McGarry Ross , Walklate Sandra
Published: January 2020

In chapter seven, Criminology’s “fourth war”? Gendering war and its violence(s), a reanalysis of genocide is provided (as previously discussed in chapter four) via an analytic “prism” including: the sub discipline victimology, feminism (as broadly defined) and the study of gender (qua masculinity). The main intention of this chapter is to make clear that the study of war (and crime) within criminology (and sociology) has frequently overlooked its inherent gendered masculine nature. In so doing, this chapter provides a corrective to much of the literature presented throughout previous chapters of this book and gives affordance to critical ways of reflecting upon other conceptual frameworks and concepts used, and assumptions made, in our discussion to this point.
Robert Park in China
Authors: Ren Xuefei
Published: January 2020

The Chicago School of urban sociology was not only influential in the U.S., but also instrumental for introducing sociology to China in the early 20th century. Drawing upon archival materials from the University of Chicago’s special collection, this chapter examines Robert Park’s connections to China in the 1930s and highlights the pivotal role of the Chicago School in the education of the first generation of Chinese sociologists. The chapter argues that there is still much to be learned from the Chicago School, such as its effort to formulate a reflective research agenda in The City (1925), and Robert Park’s gesture of comparing cities across time and places. It suggests reviving Park’s comparative spirit and engaging comparison in the next course of urban China studies.
Beijing Ring Roads and the Poetics of Excess and Ordinariness
Authors: de Kloet Jeroen
Published: January 2020

“The city,” so does Park argue, “shows the good and evil in human nature in excess.” Which inspires him to read the city as a laboratory to study human behaviour. In my chapter I connect the notion of excess to the significance of the ring roads in Beijing. Beijing is an excessive city par excellence, too big, too polluted, too crowded, too ugly, and changing too fast, making one lose his way time and again. The ring roads function as a symbolic device to keep a sense of control over this excess; they help to locate people and places, they function as the highway in the centre, and they create the mental map of the city. How do Beijing citizens relate to the ring roads? And how do art and popular culture help reimagine the ringroads and contain or parody the excessiveness of Beijing?
Introduction
Authors: Dowding Keith
Published: January 2020

Chapter 1 introduces the subject matter of the book. It analyses the methodological issues that arise when conceptualizing power in society. It first looks at the definitional divisions that demarcate different approaches to power. The first division describes causal approaches to power and dispositional accounts of power. It argues that power is a disposition concept – power is best seen as a property of individuals that they can choose or not to wield. The second division concerns structural versus individualist accounts. The chapters argues we need to transcend this division. Whilst in this book power is seen as a dispositional property of agents, and can thus be seen as methodologically individualist, it is equally a structural account. A structure is the relationship between people which can be described in terms of their relative powers. We concentrate on actors for some questions and the structure for others.
Rational Choice and a Theory of Action
Authors: Dowding Keith
Published: January 2020

The chapter provides a simple introduction to rational choice theory as a method of analysis. It argues that the rationality assumptions provide consistency for agents, and then armed with that consistency the structural situations in which agents find themselves provides the explanation of their actions. Rational choice is thus a structural form of explanation. Many approaches to power are behaviorialist but behaviorialism is the comparison of human behaviour in different institutional or structural circumstances. It explains behaviorialism through a simple theory of action which proves important in the later analysis of why the collective action can answer many questions posed by power analysts. It examines the idea of non-decisions and explains how these arise in collective action through a simple Prisoners’ Dilemma game.
Political Power and Bargaining Theory
Authors: Dowding Keith
Published: January 2020

The chapter opens with some distinctions made in the study of power and semi-formally defines ‘outcome’ and ‘social’ or ‘power to’ and ‘power over’ showing the latter is a subset of the former. It argues both are legitimate ways of examining power. It argues that whilst ‘social power’ is often our concern, especially when discussing issues of freedom, domination and inequality we need to start by considering outcome power. Understanding why people can fail in their aims even when others are not acting against them – failure in their outcome power – is necessary for to understand the scope of social power. The chapter then examines the relationship between outcome power and freedom and discussesMorriss’s distinction between ability and ableness. Power is a dispositional concept and the ability that people have need to be distinguished from their exercise of their powers. It argues that if we only look at abilities we could eliminate the term power from our language since all we would need to is to look at their capacities or resources, but we also need to examine the way that agents change others incentives to act. The chapter introduces the formal aspects of the power index approach and through that discussion distinguishes power and luck. It then introduces bargaining power, formally distinguishes threats and offers and explains Harsanyi’s bargaining model of power and the extra element of reputation. It then discusses the relationship of luck and group power introducing the notion of systematic luck. It then concludes by discussing how we can study power in society.
Conclusions
Authors: Dowding Keith
Published: January 2020

The chapter explains that political power is fundamental to politics and thus of foremost interest to those interested in political science and political theory. Power is implicated in causation but is more problematic as it concerns the capacities of agents and how they choose to wield them. The chapter discusses the contestability of concepts and dismisses those who think that power cannot be analysed since it is essentially contested concept. It utilizes what has become known as the subscript gambit to overcome the contestability of concepts. It argues we need not think concepts are contested even though we acknowledge that there is social normative pluralism. It concludes by arguing that the lens of rational choice is the most useful tool for understanding the concept of power and providing tools for analysing it in concrete political situations
The Nature of the Exercise
Authors: Dowding Keith
Published: January 2020

Chapter 10 discusses conceptual analysis. It argues we should try to define terms in as non-normative a manner as possible. Whilst defining terms for specific purposes is justified we cannot expect to define important political concepts in a universal manner without acknowledging the research question that is being posed as part of that analysis. Whilst defining terms by necessary and sufficient conditions will always seem desirable, given that society changes and morality develops normative terms will evolve and change over time much like species. The chapter returns the essential contestability and suggests that some concepts are actually incoherent once we try to bring precision. This incoherence is hidden by their vagueness in application. It argues that power is not a vague term in the sense that freedom or democracy are. The analyses of power in this book is designed to give a scientific account of our folk understandings and enable a scientific description and analysis of the power and luck structure. It returns to the type-token distinction bringing out how important the distinction is to the analysis of power in the book, which is directed at type-level explanations. The analysis is comparative statics, but dynamic game theory can provide a way to examine token power struggles as they unfold. It shows how the analysis offered in the book is structural despite seeing power as measured by the resources of agents – their capacity is given by the power and luck structure. It acknowledges that deep structure goes right into the heart of the formation of human preferences.
Language, Labels and Lived Identity in Debates about Science, Religion and Belief
Authors: Kaden Tom , Jones Stephen H. , Catto Rebecca , Davie Grace
Published: January 2020

In public discussion and polling on the subject of science and belief people’s views are often subsumed under identity labels such as ‘Creationism’, ‘Darwinism’, ‘New Atheism’, ‘Intelligent Design’ and ‘Theistic Evolutionism’. Often, these labels are held to accurately represent people’s views both by public figures and by social scientific researchers. In this chapter, Kaden, Jones and Catto make the case for a reassessment of the role of labels and the knowledge connected to them in popular and social scientific treatment of the relationship between science and belief. They argue that there are considerable problems in identifying people’s views using the majority of commonly used analytic labels. Drawing on 123 semi-structured interviews with scientists and members of the public in the UK and Canada from a range of religious and non-religious positions, the authors then show that such categories of belief are creatively interpreted. The authors highlight the limited salience of popular concepts in science and religion debates, showing that such terms are frequently unfamiliar to British and Canadian publics. Based on their analysis, they argue that naive application of labels contributes to misperceptions and prejudices, especially relating to religious people’s beliefs about human origins. Finally, they conclude that to limit such misperceptions attention needs to be paid by scholars to whether, how and why individuals relate their fundamental beliefs to aspects of science.
Researching Clergy Attitudes towards Science: A Reflective Account of Key Methodological Challenges
Authors: Reid Lydia
Published: January 2020

“If I had realised you were interviewing me about science, I probably wouldn’t have agreed to do it” – this quote from an interviewee raises one of the key methodological issues facing researchers in the field of religion and science. The perception that one ought to be an ‘expert’ in science before one can be interviewed on the topic makes the recruitment of participants in qualitative and quantitative research particularly problematic. However, it does tell us something important about the way people understand ‘science’ and the increasing pressure on church leaders to be held accountable for anything they say in the public domain. In this chapter, Raid reflect on her experiences as a sociologist carrying out research on clergy attitudes towards science using both quantitative and qualitative research methods. She discusses the implications of having self-selecting interviewees as well as the challenges in creating a survey that accurately reflects the respondents’ views. Moreover, she outlines some of the key findings from the research and how some of these are intertwined with the aforementioned methodological issues.