The Global Sociology Blog

A few days ago, I made a point I have made before: that local governance is not inherently more democratic than of other levels (national, regional or global). This point was discussed over at Corrente where some were unconvinced and Lambert noted that, in the context of inaccessible national politics, there is a greater chance [...]

Wendy Wolford and Angus Lindsay Wright’s To Inherit The Earth: The Landless Movement and the Struggle for a New Brazil is the perfect introduction to the Movimento dos Trabalhadores Rurais Sem Terra (MST). The book is roughly divided into four main sections. The first goes through a general political history of Brazil along with its [...]

Well, my favorites didn’t win and there were too many crappy ballads. Anyways, here are my favorites: Romania Turkey Iceland And Denmark

It seems like Todd Krohn and I are from the same ancient generation: we both grew up with Asia (does that correlate with turning into a cranky sociologist??)… heck, I can remember them when they were Emerson, Lake and Palmer… and King Crimson… and Uriah Heep. Asia had catchy tunes, solid rock… and oh, these [...]

Via the Center for Economic and Policy Research: Full report below: No-Vacation Nation As the original article above notes, “But it’s not just vacation. CEPR research shows that the United States comes in last when when it comes to paid sick days and paid parental leave as well. And while some argue that paid leave [...]

Let’s start with Amartya Sen’s insight on entitlements: “Economist Amartya Sen (1990:374) suggested that people command food through entitlements – that is, their socially defined rights to food resources. Entitlement might consist of the inheritance or purchase of land on which to grow food, employment to obtain wages with which to buy food, sociopolitical rights [...]

It is a topic I have touched upon before but it does not seem to matter how much information is made available publicly regarding the overall positive impact of immigration. Once the media has a set script (teachers unions = bad, for instance), it is really hard to change. Nevertheless, Robert Shapiro tackles the data [...]

This British documentary, airing on HBO in the US, is a horrific account of the plight of children designated as witches in parts of Nigeria, thanks to the rise of fundamentalist pentecostal churches. The pastors in these churches get wealthy by promising parents that they will deliver their children from possession. In these rural communities, [...]

In an article in Le Monde, Edgar Morin outlines why the Left is necessary in current times, why it has failed so far and the challenges it needs to tackle to begin solving the problems of what he calls the age of barbarity. Morin starts from the idea that there may be a unity of [...]

If you missed this short documentary on HBO, you missed something important. This film is about more than just distributing ARVs to HIV-positive people in Zambia and the challenges of public health on the African continent. It also touches upon the devastation on the social structure when mortality is so high, the stigma attached to [...]

Daniel Little, over at Understanding Society, has a very interesting post that analyzes the Thai Red Shirt movement as social movement. Before getting into his post, you can refresh your memory with a short primer on social movements by your truly here. Also, Little has linked to an interview he conducted with Doug McAdam on [...]

A while back, Italian sociologist and fellow socblogger Agnese Vardanega sent me the link to this article by Guido Martinotti on the sad state of Italian sociology (although she is obviously a powerful counter-example of that). The article questions whether the death of Italian sociology is a murder or a suicide. My Italian is not [...]

Hey kids, remember the IMF riots that occurred in poor countries as a result of IMF-imposed neo-liberalization of their economies and the havoc it wreaked on their societies? Let’s have Greg Palast refresh our memories, as he wrote about Joseph Stiglitz getting the economic Nobel Prize: “Each nation’s economy is individually analyzed, then, says Stiglitz, [...]

Via Pierre Maura, click on the link to enjoy the animation, 1274372604_cac40_3.swf (application/x-shockwave-flash Object) via kwout This diagram reveals the extent of interlocking directorates between CAC40 firms, despite voluntary codes of conduct and pleas to good corporate governance (do these ever work?). The links between firms are quite extensive and dense.

A binge drinking death at an “apéros Facebook”, that is, a drinking event organized via Facebook, where thousands of people congregate, and out of the woodworks come the moral entrepreneurs, sounding the alarm as to what is happening to our kids these days and what should be done about these apéros géants. There is nothing [...]