A stem-family society without the stem-family ideology? The case of eighteenth-century Poland1

This paper mobilizes historical census microdata and quantitative methods to answer a seemingly qualitative question of whether the stem-family organization, profoundly described in sociological and anthropological literature, existed in historical western Poland. The paper’s narrative takes a threefold argumentation format, each step relying on different methodologies. First, using household registers data and basic tools of historical demography we come to the point where a conjectural hypothesis of stem-family prevalence in the territories in question seems to be necessarily rejected. However, the vivid prevalence of the stem family is brought back to the fore in the second step, when empirical data are combined with more sophisticated statistical tools (computer microsimulation of kin sets). Finally, the latter observation is problematized in light of the historical contextual information, which altogether makes the incidence of stem-family organization in the region unthinkable given the existing socio-cultural and political-economic framework. We close with a contemplation of the limits of quantitative approaches to concerns over historical family systems, and with a discussion of the extent to which – given this apparent conundrum – our findings may illuminate existing models of historical family systems.     

福泽谕吉“脱亚入欧”的思想轨迹

＂脱亚入欧＂是被称为日本近代之父的福泽谕吉为近代日本设计的国家道路。明治维新后的日本正是在这条道路的指引下,快速成为发达的资本主义国家,但这条道路同时也给亚洲人民带来不可磨灭的伤痛。文章通过福泽谕吉早年的经历和各个时期的相关作品及言论,解读其当时的亚洲观和西洋观以及两者的内在逻辑关系,并结合当时日本国内外形势分析福泽谕吉＂脱亚入欧＂思想的形成轨迹。     

欧美志愿服务与现代公民教育

在很多欧美国家,伴随着个人主义在20世纪带来的许许多多社会问题,越来越重视公民教育。志愿服务是实现公民教育的一个重要渠道.志愿服务的本质是一种公民精神,具有普遍的社会意义,是人类精神文明的一个重要内容。志愿服务可以提高公民意识,帮助公民实现人生价值;同时它还可以激发公民的爱国热情,提高公民参与社会的能力,为公民教育提供了一个很好的实践机会。     

External debt of post-communist countries

On the background of continuous global economic instability and debt problems in the Eurozone, the significance of post-communist external debt goes without saying. The article will explore the scope and dynamics of external indebtedness in the post-communist world in a comparative and historical framework. Particular attention will be paid to a likelihood of a debt crisis in the region similar to the one in the developing world in the early 1980s. The debt crisis will be an ultimate price for reform mistakes and may have serious political economy implications by hampering or even reversing the process of the post-communist transformation.     

过渡司法及其在原苏联、东欧国家的实践

过渡司法（transitional justice）是指对系统性或者大规模人权侵犯的回应,包括起诉、赔偿、真相调查、机构改革和人事清查等多种机制。过渡司法并不存在＂一刀切＂的模式,由于特殊的历史经历,原苏联、东欧有关国家主要采取了清洗和开放档案等做法。这些国家过渡司法实践留给我们的经验和教训是：不可盲目追随某些人提出的正义口号,每一位公民都应当参与到过渡司法的思考和辩论中来,进而在其目标和手段方面达成共识。     

State as Transgressor: Šilingas versus the State—A Case Study

In a recent reflective essay written on his dual role as a scholar and public advocate, Paul Robert Magocsi with self-deprecation described himself as a loser on the margins. The sentiment of loss came with his emotional attachment to the wrong baseball team (the Dodgers rather than the Yankees) (“The Scholar as Nation-Builder”). What is clear, however, is that Magocsi is no loser in academia. My esteemed colleagues in this symposium are echoing what has become incontrovertible: Magocsi is a towering figure in Ukrainian Studies.     

European Professors as Public Intellectuals

Historically, European economists, compared to their American counterpart, were more involved in public discussions of policy. In this paper it is argued that this has likely changed. The chief reasons seem to involve the European imitation of the academic ethos that is more prevalent in America. Features of this academic ethos include a more formalist orientation in graduate programs and an academic incentive system wherein professional journal publication is paramount and public discourse is relatively devalued. I suggest there is an inescapable ideological dilemma in addressing the costs and benefits of professors’ neglect of public discourse. The ideological character of academics compared with our own political sensibilities affect whether we want academics to influence public discourse or not. I use the history of academics as public intellectuals in Sweden to substantiate the change, and I use new data on Swedish social science academics to see whether those who participate in public discourse tend to have certain political and social views.

On the Other Side of the Curtain: A Reassessment of Non-Elite Human Rights Experiences and Values in Poland

In this paper, I explore the formation of human rights attitudes among what I call the “silent majority” in the post-communist countries of Central Europe and the former Soviet Union. This is the large, diverse group of people never directly confronted with harsh methods of repression under communism. I argue here that the foundations for conceptualizing human rights are based on the degree and saliency of exposure to rights violations and that, for many citizens of Central and Eastern Europe, life behind the “iron curtain” is associated with relatively fewer rights violations than life after the iron curtain’s fall. Comparative personal experiences will play a key role in explaining how these citizens conceptualize human rights. I test this argument by applying it to the cases of Poland, where I conducted a total of 68 randomly selected non-elite interviews in an effort to probe for key factors defining individuals’ conceptions of human rights.

Veto player theory and reform making in Western Europe

Veto player theory generates predictions about governments’ capacity for policy change. Due to the difficulty of identifying significant laws needed to change the policy status quo, evidence about governments’ ability to change policy has been mostly provided for a limited number of reforms and single‐country studies. To evaluate the predictive power of veto player theory for policy making across time, policy areas and countries, a dataset was gathered that incorporates about 5,600 important government reform measures in the areas of social, labour, economic and taxation policy undertaken in 13 Western European countries from the mid‐1980s until the mid‐2000s. Veto player theory is applied in a combined model with other central theoretical expectations on policy change derived from political economy (crisis‐driven policy change) and partisan theory (ideology‐driven policy change). Robust support is found that governments introduce more reform measures when economic conditions are poor and when the government is positioned further away from the policy status quo. No empirical support is found for predictions of veto player theory in its pure form, where no differentiation between government types is made. However, the findings provide support for the veto player theory in the special case of minimal winning cabinets, where the support of all government parties is sufficient (in contrast to minority cabinets) and necessary (in contrast to oversized cabinets) for policy change. In particular, it is found that in minimal winning cabinets the ideological distance between the extreme government parties significantly decreases the government's ability to introduce reforms. These findings improve our understanding of reform making in parliamentary democracies and highlight important issues and open questions for future applications and tests of the veto player theory.     

Freedom,faith, and humanitarian governance: the spatial politics of church asylum in Europe

In the context of increasing numbers of vulnerable migrants in Europe, many churches and other faith-based organizations have provided sanctuary to those at risk of deportation. This paper sheds light on the rationalities and practices of actors such as these, and in what ways their beliefs may be different from liberal norms. Investigating both liberal and faith-based understandings of space, time, and freedom I look at the ways that multiple webs of belief intersect to form new constellations of power in humanitarian governance.