Die drei Welten der sozialen Ungleichheit: Belohnungen,Prestige und Citizenship

Talcott Parsons’s contribution to an analysis of social inequality seems to have had a strange destiny: it was either neglected as if Parsons had not contributed to the problem at all; or it was rejected as an allegedly useless kind of functional analysis of social stratification of modern societies. However, I argue, there is no single theory of functional stratification. Rather, there are at least three versions that have to be seen as separate approaches: First, the theory of rewards as it was developed by Parsons and, more important, by Kingsley Davis and Wilbert E. Moore; second, the theory of moral respect, that Parsons presented in two different versions; third, the theory of a balance of equality and inequality in modern societies that Parsons developed following T.H. Marshall’s theory of citizenship. The article presents a historic and systematic analysis of these three strands of Parsons’s contribution to the debate on social inequality. While the theory of functional stratification failed as a whole, I show that Parsons nevertheless anticipated crucial aspects of recent sociological debates, like the importance of the vagueness and fluidity of social stratification, or the crucial significance of education being the most important resource for a realization of individual life chances in modern societies.     

A comparison of rent-seeking models and economic models of conflict

This paper provides a comparative analysis of the basic rent-seeking model and a simple economic model of conflict. Each model is concerned with a game in which players invest resources in pursuit of a prize. The purpose of the analysis is to elucidate structural differences between the two models, and to analyse the consequent behavioral differences and equilibrium outcomes in the two cases. A key finding is that, where such comparisons are possible, the conflict model tends to involve greater relative expenditure on wealth-redistribution activities than does the rent-seeking model.     

Building majority coalitions for sub-majority benefit distributions

Public Choice - This paper poses a deceptively simple question. It asks, how can a program or group of programs that provides distributive benefits to recipients in a minority of legislative...     

The Medicaid Mandates of the 1980s: An Intergovernmental Perspective

Medicaid, the health care program for the poor, has undergone significant changes in the last fifteen years. Many of those changes relate to the intergovernmental nature of the program. Medicaid is jointly operated, with the federal and state governments sharing program costs. Despite a set of program guidelines dictated by the federal government, states have traditionally had substantial latitude in Medicaid decisions. However, a series of developments in the 1980s led to increasing constraints on state Medicaid discretion, including federal mandates to expand Medicaid coverage. This article examines the inception and effectiveness of the Medicaid mandates from the perspective of interstate equity of health care services for poor families.     

U.S. and Japan’s trends in attitudes toward the Korean peninsula

This article argues that Japan would not only be concerned about the creation of a united Korea, which could be a serious economic and political rival in her own backyard, but would actively fear the prospect of the extension of Chinese or Russian military influence to the Straits of Tsushima through a Korean regime that leaned towards either of these powers. For the U.S., too, while there might be political advantages in the appearance of a serious economic rival to Japan, these would be greatly outweighed by the possibility of the same extension of Chinese or Russian military influence feared by Japan. This is evident in the strategic, economic, and diplomatic objectives and interests of the powers in the peninsula. This article concludes that the coexistence of the two Koreas will be not only inevitable for the time being, but ultimately desirable for the external powers.     

Culture,self, and“URI”: Anti-Americanism in contemporary South Korea

As a much debated phenomenon in contemporary South Korea, anti-Americanism has been seen primarily as a response to the perceived political and economic domination of the United States in Korean affairs. This article suggests that such a view, however, is incomplete without consideration of the cultural and psychological context in which contemporary discourses of cultural nationalism have arisen: specifically, an indigenous cultural psychology characterized by an emphasis onuri (“we”)—a collective sense of socially diffuse yet unified and homogenous selfhood. As one variety of contemporary national cultural discourse, anti-Americanism is a response to certain to certain unwelcome trends in cultural development that have already begun to undermine the collective sense of Korean selfhood, as reflected in part in Korean concern over the Western “cultural invasion,” and Korean critiques of American bias and arrogance in dealings with Korea. However, far from being a static concept concerned only with defensive protection of Korean identity,uri also reflects Korean concern for re-formulating national cultural identity in terms more accommodating to the outside. Ultimately, anti-Americanism needs to be seen in the context of a Korean cultural psychology, which posits the enduring value of a collectively defined selfhood as an alternative to the prevailing individualist representations of the West. Diane M. Hoffman is an anthropologist and independent scholar with research interests in contemporary Korean culture and Korean-American intercultural relations.     

Images of the Future: The Basic Income Challenge

In this paper, the significance of basic income as an option in the future is investigated against the background of recent changes in society and social security systems, presented in four segments. First, the concept of basic income is presented in the context of existing social security systems. Basic income represents an elementary form of unconditional income in terms of labor and income. Second, arguments for and against basic income are studied; the social and political foundation is identified; and the relationship between the validity of the basic income as a future option and concrete socioeconomic conditions is discussed. Third, basic income is placed against the background of wider processes of social ordering—specifically, the relationship between state and society. Finally, arguments are made for reconsidering the present system of social security and its future transition.