Social Thought and Research, Volume 22, Number 1&2 (1999)

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  • Publication
    Perceived Parent-Child Interaction and Boys' Self-Esteem in Nigeria
    (Department of Sociology, University of Kansas, 1999-04-01) Sijuwade, Philip O.
    The problem under consideration in the present paper deals with the relationship between parent-child interaction patterns and the child self-esteem in a private high school in the city of Lagos, Nigeria. The relationship between these variables is examined. It is hoped that a cross-cultural investigation of the effects of parent-child interaction on the child's self-esteem will enable us to make a more precise statement about the nature of this relationship. The hypotheses dealing with parental support and child's self-esteem was strongly supported by the data.
  • Publication
    Social Thought and Research, Volume 22, Number 1&2 (1999): Book Review
    (Department of Sociology, University of Kansas, 1999-04-01) Horowitz, Mark
  • Publication
    Social Thought and Research, Volume 22, Number 1&2 (1999): Front Matter
    (Department of Sociology, University of Kansas, 1999-04-01)
  • Publication
    Social Thought and Research, Volume 22, Number 1&2 (1999): Book Review
    (Department of Sociology, University of Kansas, 1999-04-01) Rhoads, John K.
  • Publication
    Marcuse and the Quest for Radical Subjectivity
    (Department of Sociology, University of Kansas, 1999-04-01) Kellner, Douglas
  • Publication
    Klara Hitler's Son: Reading the Langer Report on Hitler's Mind
    (Department of Sociology, University of Kansas, 1999-04-01) Spark, Clare L.
    This essay is a spin-off from my book on psychological warfare in the Melville Revival, 1919-1999. Unbelievably, leading scholars in the twentieth-century "revival" of Herman Melville (1819-1891) read their subject as a bad Jew; bad because, like the abolitionists and other radical puritans, he thought Judeo-Christian morality ought to be lived out in everyday lift and could not be compromised in the interests of "expediency." Such rigorous and consistent moralism was viewed as wild-eyed zealotry or monomania by the pragmatic moderate men who intervened between readers and Melville's texts, annexing Melville's art and the lessons of his bumpy career to their own corporatist agendas. The same scholars (Dr. HenryA. Murray, Charles Olson, and Jay Leyda) who frowned upon Melville/ Ahab the Hebraic moralist were simultaneously involved in the creation of propaganda during the Roosevelt administration. Neither antisemitism in the Melville Revival nor Murray's Jungian reading of Hitler's soma and psyche can be understood without reference to theTory response to Hebraic radical puritanism as it surfaced in the English Civil War. With Herman Melville and Captain Ahab on his mind, Dr.Henry A. Murray and his Harvard colleague Walter Langer suggested to FDR that Nazi evil was drawn from Jewish blood, applying racial theory to the long-distance psychoanalysis of Hitler. Of course, Murray and Langer did not profess antisemitism; quite the contrary. Such a deficit in self-understanding was the inevitable outcome of conservative Enlightenment.
  • Publication
    Constructing the 'Self' of Self-Determination: Liberal and Anti-Liberal Tensions in Modern Irish Nationalism
    (Department of Sociology, University of Kansas, 1999-04-01) Swart, William J.
    This paper explores the relationship of modern nationalism to the philosophical dictates of eighteenth century liberalism. It argues that although the ethos of modern nationalism developed out of the liberal ideal of popular sovereignty, the process of constructing a national "self" as the legitimate benefactor of that sovereignty often embraces very anti-liberal ideas. This paper explores this tension through a case study modern Irish nationalism. Although born out of the dictates of British liberalism, Irish nationalism also drew upon the anti-liberal objectives of European Romanticism and Socialism in order to create a unique national "self." By combining these liberal and anti-liberal ideals, Irish nationalist leaders articulated a political culture which claimed the right of self-determination for a community symbolically separated from the British Empire.
  • Publication
    The Global Economy and Changes in the Determinants of Cross-National Income Inequality
    (Department of Sociology, University of Kansas, 1999-04-01) Morris, Theresa M.
    This study examines the capacity of modernization theory, dependency theory, world-system analysis, and political democracy theory to explain the determinants of income inequality in less-developed countries before and after major structural economic changes,stemming from the collapse of the Bretton Woods system in 1971 and the OPEC oil crisis in 1973 and 1974, occurred in the global economy. Data from two cohorts of countries are used to test these theories. The first cohort contains thirty-three countries with data on income inequality between 1968 and 1973, and the second cohort contains thirty-one countries with data on income inequality between 1985 and 1992. The results suggest that world-system analysis and some aspects of dependency theory are relevant to explaining income inequality both before and after the global changes.. However, modernization theory and political democracy theory are only predictive of levels of income inequality before changes in the global economy occurred. Overall, the results of this research highlight the importance of integrating historical shifts in the global economy into theories of income inequality.
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    Helmut Schelsky's "German" Hobbes Interpretation
    (Department of Sociology, University of Kansas, 1999-04-01) Heidegren, Carl-Goran
    Helmut Schelsky (1912-1914) is certainly one of the most important and influential German sociologists of the post war period. He held professorial chairs in sociology in the Federal Republic for thirty tears (1948-1978): in Hamburg, Munster, Bielefeld and, again, Munster. Owing to the lack of translations Schelsky is, however, not very well known in the English-speaking world. It's also difficult to point out one or two principal writings from his hand; rather we have to do with a continuous stream of publications on a wide range of topics. In this article, however, I'll focus on Schelsky's controversial postdoctoral thesis on Thomas Hobbes, which he presented on the eve of the Second World War. My discussion is furthermore intended as a contribution to the much wider theme: German intellectuals and National Socialism.
  • Publication
    Authoritarianism in the Netherlands: Mission Completed? Downward Trends in Authoritarianism in the Netherlands 1970-1992 with an International Comparison of World Data
    (Department of Sociology, University of Kansas, 1999-04-01) Meloen, Jos D.
    Three basic hypotheses on authoritarianism in The Netherlands areproposed. A composite Middendorp dataset was used, that included five national random samples in The Netherlands: 1970, 1975, 1980, 1985and 1992. The first hypothesis maintains that the authoritarianism syndrome will not disintegrate in time. This stability-hypothesis was strongly supported in the 1970-1992 period. Thes econd hypothesis suggestes that the levels of authoritarianism have steadily decreased in time. This decreasing-levels hypothesis also received consistent support Nonauthoritarian attitudes are now supported among a majority of the population. It is argued that the decrease of authoritarianism levels cannot be attributed to disintegration of the authoritarianism syndrome proper. Hypothesis three stated that The Netherlands is among the lowest in levels of authoritarianism and state authoritarianism in the world. This lowest level-hypothesis was explored using cross national data of authoritarian attitudes and state authoritarianism. The indicators indeed suggest that The Netherlands rank among the lowest in authoritarian attitudes as well as in state authoritarianism, together with Scandinavia, Iceland, Canada and New Zealand. The results suggest that the quest of Adorno et al. may have been completed, at least for countries like The Netherlands in the 1990s.
  • Publication
    Border States and Civil Rights: Activism Prior to 1955
    (Department of Sociology, University of Kansas, 1999-04-01) Delinder, Jean Van
    Early civil rights activism prior to 1954 Brown case is marked by the absence of an intervening agency ororganization associated with the type of mass mobilization found in the Montgomery Bus Boycott and other events in the later civil rights movement. The community action in Topeka, Kansas before Brown illustrates that civil rights actions have always been around, but only recent scholarship of the civil rights movement has brought these seemingly less significant campaigns to the fore ground. The activism in Topeka, Kansas, characterized as indirect action tactics, was organized around primarily local level issues. These local level issues were also historically situated prior to the national push to desegregation which occurred after the 1954 Brown decision.
  • Publication
    Authoritarian Aggression and Social Stratification: A Research Note
    (Department of Sociology, University of Kansas, 1999-04-01) Smith, David N.; Gunn, Christopher
    Ever since Seymour Martin Lipset's famous paper on authoritarianism and the left(1959), it has been widely assumed that blue collar workers are uniquely susceptible to the temptations of hate. Thisassumption was tested and (itseemed) confirmed by Melvin Kahn & Carmi Schooler (1983), among others. Yet in our recent research we have found contrary evidence - evidence suggesting, in fact, that comparatively high status professionals are significantly more authoritarian than other strata of the workforce. The starting point for this research was our hypothesis that the attitude questions in Erik Olin Wright's 15-nation study of Class Structure and Class Consciousness might correlate with Bob Altemeyer's time-tested "Rigbt Wing Authoritarianism" scale. Early tests of this thesis indicate that this seems to be true,at the .70 level;and subsequent analysis of Wright's first United States survey (1980) reveals a number of further correlations. Most notably, and contrary to the oft -reported findings ofKahn & Schooler, we found that white collar "experts" in Wright's study appear to have significantly more aggressive and authoritarian attitudes than lower status workers. (Their mean authoritarianism scores, respectively, are 2.85 and 2.31) These are preliminary findings, to be sure, and we are certainly not trying to vindicate the old chestnut that classical working-class status guarantees virtue - but if in fact this finding is borne out in further studies, it may prove important.
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    Testing a Model of American Elite Generational Continuity with Cross National Data
    (Department of Sociology, University of Kansas, 1999-04-01) Kurtz, Donn M., II
    A cross national data set consisting of 122 national chief executives who were in office in 1990 is used to test the validity of a model of American elite generational continuity. The hypothesis is that the model will be as useful in explaining the kinship dimensions of elite continuity in other political systems as it is in the study of American political leadership. In broad terms the findings with respect to national chief executives correspond closely to the expectations of the model. Most of the differences between the expected and the discovered kinship patterns may be accounted for by the fact that descendants of at least some of the leaders still have time to enter the political arena.