This carefully selected and integrated series of discourses on the central issues of political life presents Robert M. MacIver's views on ethics and politics, society and the state, government and political change, war and peace, and the conditions of a viable international order. It is both a key to the astonishing scope and versatility of MacIver's mind and a major contribution to political thought. Politics and Society elucidates some of the major themes and essential problems of political theory. Here are incisive essays on the nature of understanding in social and political science; on the discontinuities between ethics and politics that render difficult, yet imperative, the ordering of a multigroup society; and on the ever-present tensions between liberty and authority, private interests and the common good. Here too are MacIver's assessments of the forces that make for social change and the transformations requisite to the establishment of a viable international order. And here, with sensitivity and wisdom, are MacIver's articulations of relevant ends and their realization through appropriate means. David Spitz provided a lengthy introduction to this volume on its first publication in 1969 assessing the importance of MacIver's teachings as well as relating these essays within the broader context of MacIver's political and social thought. The republication of this collection now attests to Spitz's conclusion: "The rewards that await the reader of these essays support my conviction that MacIver's eminent achievements, in both method and vision, stamp him as the most distinguished of our social and political theorists."Robert M. MacIver (1882-1970) was Lieber Professor of Political Philosophy and Sociology at Columbia University (1929-1950) and held many other academic posts, directorships and honorary degrees, and in 1962 came out of retirement to be chancellor of the New School for Social Research. Among his most important books were Social Causation and Community, a Sociological Study. David Spitz was professor of political science at Columbia University. He was the author among other books of The Liberal Idea of Freedom. The David and Elaine Spitz Prize is awarded every year for the best book in liberal and/or democratic theory by the International Conference for the Study of Political Thought in his honor.
In this important classic work, one of America's foremost social scientists introduces a significant approach to the causation of delinquency and advances an all-inclusive strategy for coping with a national problem of continuing concern. MacIver shows that delinquency is caused by a complex and bewildering interplay of many factors and is not susceptible to simplistic explanations and solutions. He advances reasoned critiques of various theories regarding the causation of delinquency, while suggesting that the two combined factors most closely associated with delinquency--despite its increase among middle class youth--are urbanized poverty and ethnic or racial discrimination. Citing the encouraging results obtained by the establishment of "predelinquent gangs" by various organizations, he demonstrates that prevention of delinquency is far more successful than rehabilitation. MacIver emphasizes the need for a strategy consisting of closer coordination of programs, in nation as well as city, a sustained system of group after-care, and special training for law enforcement officers and judges to enable them to deal more competently with delinquents. In particular, he calls for better educational services, increased employment opportunities, and higher qualifications and salaries for counselors. The Prevention and Control of Delinquency, exploring an important aspect of urbanized life in instructive and absorbing detail, points the way for effective action in the various areas of delinquent behavior. It provides a concrete description of the more important devices and experiments that are now being developed and practiced. Written by an outstanding authority, this major work on the theoretical understanding, control, and cure of one of the crucial problems of our urban civilization is addressed to social scientists, organizational leaders and workers, and educators and planners in the field.
First published in 1917, this work seeks to be an introduction to the concept of community, the term which best expresses the object which social science as such endeavours to study; it is in community, the common life, that the interests represented by the specific social sciences are bound together, made integral, and thus amenable to a more comprehensive science. Community, A Sociological Study, includes an examination on the false perspectives of community, the elements of community, the structure of community and institutions.
First published in 1917, this work seeks to be an introduction to the concept of community, the term which best expresses the object which social science as such endeavours to study; it is in community, the common life, that the interests represented by the specific social sciences are bound together, made integral, and thus amenable to a more comprehensive science. Community, A Sociological Study, includes an examination on the false perspectives of community, the elements of community, the structure of community and institutions.
Alternate Civilities is an anthropologist's answer to the argument that China's cultural tradition renders it incapable of achieving an open political system. Robert Weller draws on his knowledge of both China and Taiwan to show how such sweeping claims fail to take account of potential democratic stimuli among local-level associations such as business organizations, religious groups, environmental movements, and women's networks. These groups were pivotal in Taiwan's democratic transition, and they are thriving in the new free space that has opened up in China. They do not promise a clone of Western civil society, but they do show the possibility of an alternate civility.
Why Men Rebel was first published in 1970 after a decade of political violence across the world. Forty years later, serious conflicts continue in Africa, Asia and the Middle East. Ted Robert Gurr reintroduces us to his landmark work, putting it in context with the research it influenced as well as world events. Why Men Rebel remains highly relevant to today's violent and unstable world with its holistic, people-based understanding of the causes of political protest and rebellion. With its close eye on the politics of group identity, this book provides new insight into contemporary security challenges.
One of the leading thinkers to emerge in the postwar conservative intellectual revival was the sociologist Robert Nisbet. His book The Quest for Community, published in 1953, stands as one of the most persuasive accounts of the dilemmas confronting modern society. Nearly a half century before Robert Putnam documented the atomization of society in Bowling Alone, Nisbet argued that the rise of the powerful modern state had eroded the sources of community—the family, the neighborhood, the church, the guild. Alienation and loneliness inevitably resulted. But as the traditional ties that bind fell away, the human impulse toward community led people to turn even more to the government itself, allowing statism—even totalitarianism—to flourish. This edition of Nisbet’s magnum opus features a brilliant introduction by New York Times columnist Ross Douthat and three critical essays. Published at a time when our communal life has only grown weaker and when many Americans display cultish enthusiasm for a charismatic president, this new edition of The Quest for Community shows that Nisbet’s insights are as relevant today as ever.
Written by Derek Black, one of the nation’s foremost experts in education law and policy, and Education Law Association’s 2015 Goldberg Award for Most Significant Publication in Education Law recipient, this third edition casebook develops Education Law through the themes of equality, fairness, and reform. The book focuses on the laws of equal educational opportunity for various disadvantaged student populations, recent reform movements designed to improve education, and the general constitutional rights that extend to all students. New to the Third Edition: Updates on litigation regarding the fundamental right to education, school funding, and their intersection with COVID-19 issues New cases and analysis on the rights of LGBTQ youth, including Bostock v. Clayton County Department of Education’s new regulatory structure for investigating and resolving sexual harassment claims Two new U.S. Supreme Court special education cases defining the meaning of “free and appropriation public education” and the intersection of Rehabilitation Act with the Individuals with Disabilities in Education Act New cases on student walkouts and protests New U.S. Supreme Court case, Espinoza v. Montana, on vouchers and the free exercise of religion New analysis and updates on the Every Student Succeeds Act New materials on the U.S. Supreme Court’s decision striking down mandatory teacher union fees Professors and student will benefit from: Efficient presentation of cases—to permit more comprehensive inclusion of case law and issues Problems—which can be modified for group exercises, in-class discussion, or out-of-class writing assignments Contextualization and situation of case law in the broader education world—by including edited versions of federal policy guidelines, seminal law review articles, social science studies, and organization reports and studies Careful editing of cases and secondary sources—for ease of reading and comprehension Narrative introductions to every chapter, major section, and case—synthesize and foreshadow the material to improve student comprehension and retention Teaching materials Include: Teacher’s Manual
This book is a stimulating contribution to the new literature. It is not intended as a comprehensive review of the full range of topics nor is it solely a summary of research findings. It consists, in essence, of an open-ended debate on a limited series of related issues in which the reader is invited to participate. Who might profit by an examination of these topics? What can a reader expect to learn through perusing this particular account and even vicariously joining in the discussion of the social structure of power, the role of bureaucracy in American life today, and what is meant by a democratic society? In addition, the book offers the perceptive reader an illuminating example of a much neglected topic in that segment of the new literature which stems from the social sciences, namely, the role of the observer in relationship to what is observed. The editors should be commended for bringing together not a bland series of polite statements but a stimulating discussion which raises more questions than it answers. More important, it raises questions that have to be posed in any significant appraisal of America today.—John Useem, Head Sociology and Anthropology, Michigan State University
This carefully selected and integrated series of discourses on the central issues of political life presents Robert M. MacIver's views on ethics and politics, society and the state, government and political change, war and peace, and the conditions of a viable international order. It is both a key to the astonishing scope and versatility of MacIver's mind and a major contribution to political thought. Politics and Society elucidates some of the major themes and essential problems of political theory. Here are incisive essays on the nature of understanding in social and political science; on the discontinuities between ethics and politics that render difficult, yet imperative, the ordering of a multigroup society; and on the ever-present tensions between liberty and authority, private interests and the common good. Here too are MacIver's assessments of the forces that make for social change and the transformations requisite to the establishment of a viable international order. And here, with sensitivity and wisdom, are MacIver's articulations of relevant ends and their realization through appropriate means. David Spitz provided a lengthy introduction to this volume on its first publication in 1969 assessing the importance of MacIver's teachings as well as relating these essays within the broader context of MacIver's political and social thought. The republication of this collection now attests to Spitz's conclusion: "The rewards that await the reader of these essays support my conviction that MacIver's eminent achievements, in both method and vision, stamp him as the most distinguished of our social and political theorists."Robert M. MacIver (1882-1970) was Lieber Professor of Political Philosophy and Sociology at Columbia University (1929-1950) and held many other academic posts, directorships and honorary degrees, and in 1962 came out of retirement to be chancellor of the New School for Social Research. Among his most important books were Social Causation and Community, a Sociological Study. David Spitz was professor of political science at Columbia University. He was the author among other books of The Liberal Idea of Freedom. The David and Elaine Spitz Prize is awarded every year for the best book in liberal and/or democratic theory by the International Conference for the Study of Political Thought in his honor.
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