Conceptualisations of the state as a reified entity fall short in the case of socialist Laos. Foreign commentators often imagine Lao political life through a discourse of state governance, yet the Lao themselves, in popular narratives, tend to emphasise their day to day interactions with state officials. In their everyday lives, the latter are treated as individuals with which it is possible to interact. This article explores the relations between the Lao people and their government officials, and how those relations have changed in recent history (mainly since 1975). Wedding receptions – vital events in Lao social life, where power is invoked through performance and representation – are taken as case studies for the analysis of authority and legitimacy in a socialist state context.

Standard versions of the sociology of rational practice assume justificationist theories of rationality: all rational beliefs are justified and rational individuals do not believe any non-justified statements. This theory appears to some to offer the possiblity of finding “deeper” insights into social behavior: some actions presented by actors as “rational” can, in fact, be explained as non-justified and, therefore, as mere consequences of prestige and/or power conflicts. When, however, it turns out that no theories can be justified, then all theories are irrational. This leads to relativism. The possibility, that we may profitably construct alternative theories of rationality is, in contrast, raised nearly uniquely by fallibilist theories of rationality. In order to take advantage of this, an alternative to the dominant methodological individualist theory of rational action is needed and possible. According to this alternative, rational action consists of problem-solving within institutional contexts without justification. Such a non-relativist sociology of rational practice can be enlightening and useful. Differing institutional contexts offer differing standards of rationality.

‘Religion is no longer important in Belgium!’, they declared. Wherever I travelled in Belgium over the course of 1976–1977, the year of my sabbatical leave from an American university, and my eighteenth consecutive year of fieldwork in Belgian society, friends, colleagues, and informants announced this.

I was particularly puzzled by this statement because I had always considered Belgium to be a society deeply imprinted by religion: by its diffuse Catholicism, and its complex reactions to it. Belgians from the whole range of philosophical, political, linguistic, regional, and social-class milieux in which I had worked knew that this was my considered judgment. Yet, on this visit, they seemed intent on showing me that religion was less important to them, and in their society, than I had supposed. The picture that many Belgians painted was of a society where religion had not merely waned, but spontaneously, and with great rapidity, had virtually disappeared. However much this image intrigued me, neither sociological theory, nor my own first-hand observations on previous trips to Belgium made it seem credible.

LeMalheur corporel et la mort obsèdent les esprits de la fin du Moyen Âge; se dressent les squelettes ricanants de la Danse Macabre, entraînant les uns aprés les autres tous les membres de la société, du roi jusqu'au paysan, sans oublier le médecin, impuissant, malgré tout son savoir, devant la mort. Dans quelle mesure celle-ci fut-elle, dans la seconde moitié du Moyen Âge, l'affaire du corps médical (2)?

A new and curious species of public figure emerged on the international scene after the Second World War, gaining in prominence and conspicuousness in the years that followed. His daily experience is often a trying one, marked by recurrent tension between conflicting commitments. Enjoying from bhth the comforts of the advanced industrial world, he seeks to speak onbehalf of the hungry and impoverished. Educated in the best universities, he lives among countrymen who are predominantly illiterate. He is regarded as an impertinent upstart by the diplomats of wealthier and more powerful nations. At the same time, he is suspected by his own people of compromising himself with the reigning powers of the international arena. He is well-versed and highly articulate in the political vocabulary of the West. Yet he is acutely sensitive to perceived slights against the political traditions of his native land. He is bitter about what the Western presence did to his native society. But the very categories in which he couches his criticisms of that presence—the rights to sovereignty, distributive justice, and national self-determination —are themselves the inheritance of the West. He follows with enthusiasm the latest currents of intellectual life in Europe and America. Yet he is deeply committed, simultaneously, to defending the dignity of his own people's cultural achievements. As a result of his modern education, he cannot help but feel somewhat estranged from the traditional beliefs and practices of his fellow citizens. Yet neither can he feel very comfortable as the mere bearer to them of the colonizer's culture, a culture he rarely regards entirely as his own. Such is the predicament of that loquacious and troublesome child of the post-colonial age, the Third World intellectual.

Sociologists have noted that the ideological inclusiveness of nationalism varies. By comparing the Bolshevik and Chinese communist revolutionary elites, this article explains that such variation depends on the social strength of nationalism. A strong nationalism is (a) undergirded by a widely diffused national culture that can socialize most radical elites into the nation; (b) kept institutionally open to broad social strata so that lower classes can form a nationalist identity through participation; and (c) universally believed to be a geopolitically feasible anti-colonial revolution so that radical elites can think of engagement as worthwhile and necessary. Using a comparative biographical method probing both nationalists and communists, this article demonstrates that nationalism in Tsarist Russia was far weaker than in post-imperial China. In the former, the nationalist movement excluded communists while, in the latter, communists were incorporated. Therefore, the two communist parties had different understandings of Marxism.

Für den politischen Soziologen, der sich seiner Zeit ver-pflichtet weiß, gibt es heute vor allem zwei Probleme, und beide sind Probleme der Demokratie: das Problem der deutschen Demokratie und das Problem der Demokratie in den Entwicklungslandern. Die meisten anderen Gegenstande der Reflektion und Forschung sind nur Facetten und Aspekte der beiden Fragenkomplexe: Wie konnte die Demokratie in einem industrialisierten, »west-lichen«, »zivilisierten« Land im Nationalsozialismus enden? Welche Elemente sozialer Strukturen werden also vom freundlich verall-gemeinernden Modell der »industriellen Gesellschaft« nicht erfaßt? Und: Kann die Demokratie in Indien, in Ghana, in China funktionieren? Welche Widerstände setzen die Sozialstrukturen industrialisierender Länder der Ausbildung einer wirksamen Demokratie entgegen? Die beiden Fragen scheinen auf den ersten Blick sehr verschiedene Antworten zu verlangen. In beiden Fällen geht es zwar um das Verhältnis von Demokratie und Sozialstruktur. Während aber das Nichtfunktionieren der Demokratie in Entwicklungsländern eher unsere ohnehin zögernden Wünsche als unsere Erwartungen enttäuscht, rührt das Versagen der deutschen Demokratie an die Grundlagen des Selbstverständnisses der westlichen Welt. Um in der handfest ideologischen Sprache der älteren deutschen Ethnologie zu sprechen: Was bei »primitiven Naturvölkern« nicht überrascht, ist bei einem »hochentwickelten Kulturvolk« ein bedrängendes Problem. Es wird noch zu zeigen sein, daB die »Natur-« und die »Kulturvölker«, die beiden Probleme der deutschen und, sagen wir, der chinesischen Demokratie einander so ganz unähnlich nicht sind. Die Formen der Industrialisierung in beiden Ländern haben manches miteinander gemeinsam; in der Tat stellt die deutsche industrielle Revolution von oben so etwas wie einen Modellfall der »verspäteten Industrialisierung« — gemessen am klassischen Beispiel Englands — dar. Doch sind solche Gemeinsamkeiten erst das Ergebnis einer Untersuchung, die sich auf eines der beiden Probleme konzentriert: das Verhältnis von Demokratie und Sozialstruktur in Deutschland.

Common fears about immigration have little basis, such as the fear of being displaced by alien labour or invaded by fundamentalist mobs. Others have some basis, such as those concerning illegal behaviour or the magnitude of inflows, at least in some countries. However the profile of our European democracies may, unless certain policies are pursued, be doomed to change for the worse, not because of these commonly feared dangers but in consequence of the increasing number of workers who do not enjoy basic political, civil and social rights.

In a previous edition of the Archives, Vladimir Shlapentokh proposed an explanation of the surprising patience of the Russian people in the face of a drop in the standard of living of a majority of the population. Obervations made in the Altaï territory confirm Shlapentokh's explication. Using individual adaptation categories as formulated by Merton, it is shown how the different adaptation strategies cancelled each other out and impeded the emergence of an opposition movement.

Bauman's Schumpeter-like forecast concerning the prospects of revolution in socialist societies calls for a reply which takes issue not only with the details of his analysis of the tensions within these societies, but also with some semantic aspects of his conceptual framework: the very concept of revolution and of political legitimacy as applied to these systems.

Ilsuffit d'une réflexion rapide pour constater que l'expression, «les origines de la Reévolution», comporte toute une seérie d'obscuriteés et d'ambiguïtés, qui s'attachent aussi bien aux origines qu'à ce qu'il convient d'entendre par Révolution française.

This article argues that Shmuel N. Eisenstadt’s theoretical framework contains some elements of modernization theory threatening to neglect the contingencies of social processes and the possible breaks within historical trajectories. This is demonstrated via an analysis of the history of the US-American South that cannot be interpreted with an Eisenstadtian framework without seriously misrepresenting this particular region. It is argued that the development of “Dixie” was not a predetermined process which led to a smooth integration into US-society, but a path which was decisively influenced by many unforeseen factors and events in various periods of its history.

This article examines the relationship between the structure of politico-military movements and effective insurgent engagement in peace processes. Drawing on the experiences of Irish republicans and Basque separatists, I argue that centralized movement structures in which politicos wield influence over armed groups allow for effective coordination between movement wings in peace efforts while providing political leaders with credibility as interlocutors. In the Irish case, centralization enabled Sinn Fein leaders to ensure Provisional ira commitment to peace and to contain schism within the republican movement throughout the peace process. In the Basque case, movement decentralization created persistent coordination problems between wings during peace efforts, while eta’s unilateral reneging prevented political allies from establishing credibility as peacemakers. These cases show that while movement leaders untainted by direct association with armed groups may be more politically palatable than those with ties to “terrorists”, tainted leaders may make more credible partners for peace.

L'origine sociale des deputes des débutés de la IIIe á ceux de la Ve République traduit, de façon frappante, l'incidence des mutations de la société française sur la composition de l'éiite politique: les fils de la bourgeoisie moyenne, un siécle aprés la Révolution de 1789, ravissent le pouvoir á ceux de la noblesse et de la haute bourgeoisie et assoient leur emprise á la faveur de deux guerres mondiales; les fils d'ouvriers et de petite bourgeoisie, dans le même temps, apparaissent comme des forces montantes dont le développement, cependant, semble s'arrêter en 1945. Le tableau 1 ci-aprés, extrait d'une étude de Mattei Dogan, où l'originé sociale est définie par la profession du pére de chaque député, atteste aisément ce double phénoméne — prise du pouvoir par les couches moyennes et blocage de l'ascension politique des couches populaires — qui éclaire la fonction des élites dans un systéme politique complexe et pluraliste comme celui de la France.