The central sociological issue in Weber's studies on charisma is to account for the emergence, the reproduction, and the eventual disappearance of reference systems. Such a preoccupation is in general keeping with a comprehensive sociology. Beyond that, these studies also aim to clarify the internal mutations of this type of legirimity, its possible conditions, notably in a religious form, relative to specifically modern notions of modernisation, secularisation and disenchantment.

Urban ethnographers can explore spaces forgotten or given up for lost, replacing illusions with maps of social reality. The city is filled with milieux that remain scarcely known to the inhabitants of other spaces. Paradoxically, as the rationalization of urban life continues, boundaries enclose some lives more tightly, isolating and making them more vulnerable. By re-discovering the lives of people in those spaces, by replacing stereotypes about them with descriptions that convey their vitality, dignity and humanity, ethnographers may restore some lost relationships in urban milieux, and in a modest way reduce the isolation.

This paper seeks to assess the validity, in a particular historical case, of two ways of thinking in functionalist literature about the role of human intentionality in social change. It does so by means of an analysis of the contribution of French provincial intendants of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries to the differentiation of state and society. It is argued that if functionalists are to build a theory of social change it is necessary that they deal more directly with the question of human intentionality. Four historical views, each positing a different relationship between intentionality and the evolution of the state in Early Modern France, are outlined as different approaches to understanding the establishment of the institution of intendants and the part they played in state-society differentiation. The historical evolution of French intendants is traced and 1066 actions by intendants and the French crown during the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries are analysed to determine the extent to which intendants contributed to state-society differentiation and whether they and the crown did so intentionally.

This article examines the well known practice in pre-colonial Africa of the pawning of humans. This practice, also found in Asia, should be distinguished from slavery, despite its similar characteristics. The author enumerates relevant principles and establishes concrete boundaries. A number of misunderstandings are thus elucidated and the concept is clearly explained.

Despite Durkheim's powerful argument that suicide is caused by social forces only (Durkheim 1966), recent studies have viewed suicide as resulting from a combination of psychological and environmental factors, as springing from the suicide's personality conjoined with his immediate social setting. ‘Suicide is both a personal and a social act’ (Reynolds and Farberow 1976: 33). Social forces alone cannot explain why only a few people commit suicide nor can psychological factors by themselves provide the necessary set of conditions for individual suicides. Certain syndromes are widespread: illness, loneliness, bereavement, shame lead to suicide in many parts of the world. But each society's structure and institutions determine the environmental setting and constellations involved in suicide. How does the society regard illness? Who will be lonely? In what relationships is loss most sharply felt? What constitutes shame? Social forces define the various trouble spots and categories and groups of people most at risk in the society. Their interplay with psychological factors outlines who will commit suicide.

Current interpretations of James Frazer's work overestimate the importance of the three stages theory (Magic-Religion-Science) and of individual reflection in the philosopbes sauvages. The Golden Bough is more about the idea of a universal and spontaneous psychological atmosphere, beyond the distinction between Religion and Magic. Frazer prefers to characterise this atmosphere through the explicit content of rites and beliefs, often neglected by twentieth century religious anthropology.

This research aims to describe the process of integration of Luxembourg’s Portuguese. To achieve this, we first conduct a summary review of the sociological literature about integration. Once the conceptual framework established, we measure and link the two essential aspects of integration: the socio-economic integration and the acculturation. To complete, we confront the Portuguese population resident of Luxembourg to those residing in Portugal in order to highlight the degree of acculturation of Portuguese immigrants and their descendants with the Luxembourg society. This research has required the use of data from the Luxembourg European Values Study (EVS) of 2008 as we measure acculturation from questions about the values of individuals. We prove that compared with their parents, the descendants of Portuguese immigrants, regarding their native social environment, are experiencing upward social mobility associated with the development of an “hybrid” cultural identity, composed of values both of the country of birth of their parents and of Luxembourg.

Ever since Durkheim, the relationship between ritual and sociability has been a primary theme of theoretical reflection in sociology. The article highlights a number of aspects relating to that theme and explores the question of whether ritual change – posited by the author as an historical evidence – can be adequately understood in this way, notably in terms of its societal implications. In the second half, the author presents a detailed analysis of a number of issues that emerge when ritualisation is considered as a continuous historical process. The prerequisites and mechanisms of ritualisation are at the core of this reflection, in particular in exploring how routine action, ritual experience and symbolic auto-declaration can be deployed in the context of the creation of social ties.

This essay analyzes the relationship between two ideas central to the social sciences and religion: charisma and objectivity. My goal is to interpret a longstanding theoretical dispute regarding objectivity in the social sciences by referring to sectarian charisma and its challenge to the legitimacy of ecclesiastical authority. In illuminating a religious pattern revealed in the confrontation between social science theory and political philosophy, I suggest that objectivity represents a form of ‘secular’ charisma. I describe the cross-cutting relationship between charisma and objectivity and examine both the religious implications of objectivity and the epistemological implications of charismatic phenomena.

Nul ne saurait prétendre qu'il a pris connaissance de toute la litterature publiée aux États-Unis depuis 1945 sur les problèmes stratégiques, encore moins de la littérature mondiale qui, presque toujours dépendante de la littérature américaine, n'en présente pas moins, dans plusieurs pays, une certaine originalité (1). En lisant la littérature américaine, je me suis toujours préoccupé du contenu, des analyses et des conclusions, jamais de Phistoire proprement dite, c'est-à-dire de l'origine de chaque idée, de l'ordre dans lequel les théories ou doctrines ont été élaborées, de l'influence exercée par tel des analystes sur ses collégues ou sur les hommes d'État.

Changes in labour market conditions over the last ten years have led to renewed speculation about the future of collectivist attitudes. In Britain, the most striking change has been the sharp rise in the level of unemployment which doubled between 1979 and 1981. However, many commentators have also suggested that profound changes are occurring in the character of employment, in particular through the rise of more precarious types of work. On one estimate, fully a third of British employees could now be considered part of the ‘flexible’ workforce (Hakim 1987). Overall, there has been an increase in the level of insecurity and a marked accentuation of financial inequality.

In this analysis of elements which break the continuity of natural spaces (gullies, forests, rivers, hills) or constructed spaces (bridges, paths, crossroads, borders, milestones) we see that they are primarily considered as crossover places between different worlds. Places where spirits and ‘experts in exstasy’ circulate. Among these are the Calusari, esoteric groups whose practices recall those of shamanism. The analysis of their rituals reveals the importance for traditional societies of the notion of ‘limits’.