The Global Sociology Blog

This is the third video in Al Jazeera’s series, Slavery: A 21st Century Evil:

Via Alex Trillo, here: “”If all that happens is those groups continue to try to occupy public space to express outrage, this dissipates relatively quickly,” said Doug McAdam, a professor of sociology at Stanford and an expert on social movements. “Lots of movements start out as more expressions of outrage or frustration, but that does [...]

See here.

So, of course, everyone and their brothers is talking about this article by Joe Nocera: “On Friday, the law firm of Steven J. Baum threw a Halloween party. The firm, which is located near Buffalo, is what is commonly referred to as a “foreclosure mill” firm, meaning it represents banks and mortgage servicers as they [...]

Latest installment on Al-Jazeera series on modern slavery:

Nothing random or “just happened because of [robotization / technology / globalization]“, this was accomplished through policy over decades, Structure / History / Power, people, never forget the SHiP! Back to the good ol’ days, again: And one more time: And with a touch more details; At least, now, it seems a few people are [...]

We white people love to rescue poor, yet hard-working, and therefore deserving (by our own criteria) black people. And we love to have these stories to us in movies, like Blood Diamond, The Blind Side or The Help. We love these movies because they are conveniently guilt-free: the poor, deserving blacks, victims of their own [...]

As I recommended they do during the British riots… let’s go to the data: “The Ministry of Justice’s statistical report published yesterday into the riots must bring misery to the ears of those like Michael Gove who wished to argue that the root causes of the riots was a lack of morals and values and [...]

Here: “The news of capitalism’s demise is (to borrow from Mark Twain) somewhat exaggerated. Capitalism has an inbuilt wondrous capacity of resurrection and regeneration; though this is capacity of a kind shared with parasites – organisms that feed on other organisms, belonging to other species. After a complete or near-complete exhaustion of one host organism, [...]

This is interesting (H/T DC Blogger over at Corrente): “A 21-year-old Occupy Wall Street demonstrator caused quite the ruckus early this morning, when he scaled a 70-foot sculpture in New York’s Zuccotti Park, refusing to come down until Mayor Michael Bloomberg resigned. Dylan Spoelstra of Canada climbed the park’s signature red sculpture around 6 a.m. [...]

Hurray! We’re back to Depression-era stratification levels… Neoliberal mission accomplished: As the article notes; “As you’ll notice, from the 1950s onwards, income distribution in the US remained broadly stable until the Thatcher-Reagan revolution. The neoliberal policies pursued by the Reagan administration – tax cuts for the wealthy (the top rate of tax was reduced from [...]

By now, this video has made the rounds. Don’t watch if you don’t have a strong stomach. What is in there is a 2-year-old getting run over by a truck. The driver stops, then starts again and drives away, running her over a second time with the rear wheels. Then, a whole bunch of people [...]

Based on the GINI coefficient, gotta scroll down:

It is quite interesting that, no the heels of my post on the selection of Francois Dubet as my sociologist of the semester, I have just received my copy of Raewyn Connell’s latest book, Confronting Equality: Gender, Knowledge and Global Change, which deals with exactly the topic of my Dubet post: why we need the social [...]

Via, click on the link or the image for humongous view,