Societal Interaction Research Articles

Tracking Nile Delta Vulnerability to Holocene Change

Understanding deltaic resilience in the face of Holocene climate change and human impacts is an important challenge for the earth sciences in characterizing the full range of present and future wetland responses to global warming. Here, we report an 8000-year mass balance record from the Nile Delta to reconstruct when and how this sedimentary basin has responded to past hydrological shifts. In a global Holocene context, the long-term decrease in Nile Delta accretion rates is consistent with insolation-driven changes in the ‘monsoon pacemaker’, attested throughout the mid-latitude tropics. Following the early to mid-Holocene growth of the Nile’s deltaic plain, sediment losses and pronounced erosion are first recorded after ~4000 years ago, the corollaries of falling sediment supply and an intensification of anthropogenic impacts from the Pharaonic period onwards. Against the backcloth of the Saharan ‘depeopling’, reduced river flow underpinned by a weakening of monsoonal precipitation appears to have been particularly conducive to the expansion of human activities on the delta by exposing productive floodplain lands for occupation and irrigation agriculture. The reconstruction suggests that the Nile Delta has a particularly long history of vulnerability to extreme events (e.g. floods and storms) and sea-level rise, although the present sediment-starved system does not have a direct Holocene analogue. This study highlights the importance of the world’s deltas as sensitive archives to investigate Holocene geosystem responses to climate change, risks and hazards, and societal interaction.

Urban characteristics attributable to density-driven tie formation

Motivated by empirical evidence on the interplay between geography, population density and societal interaction, we propose a generative process for the evolution of social structure in cities. Our analytical and simulation results predict both super-linear scaling of social-tie density and information contagion as a function of the population. Here we demonstrate that our model provides a robust and accurate fit for the dependency of city characteristics with city-size, ranging from individual-level dyadic interactions (number of acquaintances, volume of communication) to population level variables (contagious disease rates, patenting activity, economic productivity and crime) without the need to appeal to heterogeneity, modularity, specialization or hierarchy.

Ethnic identity and immigrants’ wages in Greece

This study investigates the impact of ethnic identity on Albanian, Bulgarian, Romanian, Georgian, and Russian wages in Greece. Treating ethnic identity as a composite of language, cultural habits, ethnic-self identification, societal interaction, and future citizenship plans, the estimations suggest that assimilation and integration are positively associated with immigrant wages, while separation and marginalisation are negatively associated with immigrant wages, after considering various demographic and pre- and post-immigration characteristics. In addition, dramatic wage growth for fully assimilated and integrated immigrants, and vast wage losses for totally separated and marginalised immigrants are estimated. A healthy Greek – as well as a European – immigration system should recognise labour immigration flows and the potential of repeat immigration and evaluate the cornerstone features of ethnic identity.

Trustworthy Nanotechnology: Risk, Engagement and Responsibility

The papers in this special edition are based on contributions to the symposium “Trustworthy nanotechnology” in Trondheim, Norway in June 2010. This symposium was initiated by the research project NANOTRUST,1 funded by the Research Council of Norway’s Programme for nanotechnology and new materials. The motivation for the project was a realization that the question of trust in nanotechnology has been raised at a stage when the material, conceptual and social body of nanotechnology has been in its infancy. As trust or distrust in social and technological systems generally is based in previous experiences with these systems, nanotechnology raises new conceptual and social challenges. A number of public engagement exercises and research projects on the societal aspects of nanotechnology have, due to the relative novelty of the nano field, been fairly general in their involvement with the technology. One of the potential strengths of this project was its collaboration with a project investigating the use of polymeric micro- or nanoparticles to enhance vaccine formulations for farmed salmon. Thus we raised the question of trust in relation to a concrete case of nanotechnology development, integrating ELSA research with the technology research. Reflecting on trust in collaboration with technologists at this early stage has both advantages and drawbacks. It provides a unique opportunity in creating a forum for ethical reflection, opening the possibility for making a positive impact on technology development. By engaging technology researchers at this stage one can avoid the historical role of ELSA research as an exercise in negative ethics, i.e. ethics as border guard against real and perceived risks and harm to environment and society. On the other hand, being too far upstream may imply that the engagement is reduced to hypothetical discussions or conceptual clarifications. Engaging with nanotechnology at this stage means that attempts to foster public trust would need to focus less on technological products and more on the complex process of science. While a products focus draws attention to the public’s choices, understanding, knowledge and acceptability of the product, a process focus draws attention to the visions and goals as well as organization and governance of nanotechnology. Thus the focus of the project and the symposium shifted from the conditions for public trust in general, to the body of scientific practitioners and practices that is to be trusted. This shift implies a corresponding shift from the concept of trust to the concept of trustworthiness and from what conditions trust to what conditions trustworthiness. With this focus, we aim at addressing to what extent nanotechnology is providing a sound basis for fostering public trust. One important feature of recent approaches to technology studies is that they draw attention to extraordinary cases where there is much at stake, values are disputed and high risks are involved. These cases are often accompanied with high degree of controversy, either scientifically or publically, calling attention to post-normal strategies that widens the circles of engaged stakeholders. Controversies function as a mobilizing factor. The normal case however is not the one of controversies, but more like the case of exploring PLGA particles for delivery of vaccines in aquaculture. Projects like this one, that run under the heading of nanotechnology display low degree of substantial controversy. When the mechanisms of society “talking back” to science [3] are staged through initiatives like the NANOTRUST project there is little visible and unusual scientific or public questioning—neither of individual projects of nanotechnology nor of nanoscience initiatives in general. Nanoscience and -technology differs from genomics in this respect: the “talking back” is staged in ways that may suppress internal scientific conflicts, conflicts on specific products, engage NGOs or media coverage in the ways that we have witnessed in connection with genomics. Therefore the symposium sought to explore how the challenges related to trustworthiness can be raised in projects where there are few or no controversies to spark increased scrutiny and scientific self-reflection. What do such normal cases require from the working scientist in terms of their responsibility to display and be able to normatively account for co-produced societal changes? How can and should nanotechnologists meet the challenge of societal interaction under such presumably low risk circumstances? In this issue, three of the papers are products of the reflections of the NANOTRUST research group on the trustworthiness of a technology application subject to uncertainty and ignorance regarding potential harms to health and environment. In addition, we include papers related to two of the invited presentations that contextualized the issue of trustworthiness based on other nanotechnology governance research projects.

Changed planning for planned and unplanned change

Change, planned and unplanned, can be the product of events (change by chance), new language (change from societal interaction), and practices (track-bound change), and can involve many different societal actors. To position planning as an activity within this broader context, we present a model that captures the interplay between these three sources of change, leading to a typology of change-inducing phenomena. Change, consequently, can be managed in an active and effective way rather than being viewed as an environment of fuzzy conditions and unpredictable dynamics. Our model may be helpful to planners, as an analytic tool, usable in educational curricula as well as in the practice of planning.

Orientalism Beyond the Orient

Edward Said’s Orientalism, is one of the seminal sociological studies of the 20th century. Written in 1978, Said’s book makes an extremely convincing argument about how Western societies (the “Occident”) have viewed the Orient over the centuries. The purpose of this paper is to further understand the cause and scope of this phenomenon. Said’s basic underlying thesis is this: the West’s view of the orient is and has been clouded by a set of misconceptions, prejudices and stereotypes that occur in western art, literature, discourse, culture and academic study. In essence, “orientalism, [is] a way of coming to terms with the Orient that is based on the Orient’s special place in European Western experience.” Said goes on to say that this clouded view has had a derogatory effect on the relationship between the two cultures, and continues to negatively impact the relationship to this day. Said’s focus is on the Arab middle East, however his broader implication is that this was a common theme within the Occident-Orient relationship.It would be quite difficult to argue against Said’s thesis. His use of primary sources in Art, literature and scholarship make the argument somewhat impervious to attack. However, that is not the goal here. This paper looks, instead, at the scope of the argument. In particular, it will explore how the phenomenon that Said describes as orientalism, actually goes far beyond the relationship between the west and the east. Instead, it is common to all societal interaction. This paper will first discuss what I will call “supra-orientalism.” This is essentially Said’s thesis expanded, exploring the lens through which the western world views other societies outside the orient (in particular, Africa and the Americas). Next, we will explore what is commonly referred to as “occidentalism.” This section will essentially stand Said’s thesis on its head and explore the view of the west through the eyes of other cultures. Finally, this paper will discuss various conclusions that come out of this study. In particular, the fact that this phenomenon is not limited to Occident-Orient relations, but instead is present in all sociological interactions and relationships. Furthermore, it is not only damaging when done in a dominant-subservient relationship (as in Orientalism) but effects all relationships, from all levels, and has a drastic negative effect to all sides.

He Obligations on Government and Society in our Constitutional State to Respect and Support Independent Constitutional Structures

he Obligations on Government and Society in our Constitutional State to Respect and Support Independent Constitutional Structures

New openings in university–industry cooperation: Aalto University as the forerunner of European University Reform†

The Innovation University (IU)—to be called the Aalto University after Alvav Aalto, a famous Finnish architect and MIT professor—is a new university which will be created through a merger of three existing universities: the Helsinki University of Technology (TKK), the Helsinki School of Economics (HSE) and the University of Art and Design Helsinki (TAIK). The commitment to this reform can be summed with one figure: start-up funding is 700 MEUR coming from the government and industry. The objectives set for the IU require long-term development of operations in a way that makes societal interaction and in particular, effectiveness serving working life an integral part of all the operations. This cannot be achieved without education and development services essential to working life competencies, meeting also short-term competency challenges and representing international top level. Themes, research topics and ways of working crossing boundaries will be nurtured within the focus areas of the new university. These facilitate comprehension of how knowledge and skills acquired through various disciplines are to be integrated into the teaching and learning practices. The IU is the developer of new learning environments and a determined promoter of lifelong learning. The new university will position itself within the core of global competition, as an active interaction node and meeting forum for the international academic community and the most noteworthy networks formed by global companies. In selected key areas, the new university will volunteer to act and take a role as the network orchestrator. †This article was written in the planning phase of the new university in May 2008. Aalto University will officially launch its operations in January 2010.

Work and Money: Payoffs by Ethnic Identity and Gender

Upon arrival in the host country, immigrants undergo a fundamental identity crisis. Their ethnic identity being questioned, they can be classified into four states - assimilation, integration, separation and marginalization. This is suggested by the ethnosizer, a newly established measure to parameterize a person's ethnic identity, using individual information on language, culture, societal interaction, history of migration, and ethnic self-identification. In what state individuals end up varies among immigrants even from the same country. Moreover, the quest for ethnic identity affects women and men differentially. This paper contends that ethnic identity can significantly affect the attachment to and performance of immigrants in the host country labor market, beyond human capital and ethnic origin characteristics. Empirical estimates for immigrants in Germany show that ethnic identity is important for the decision to work and significantly and differentially affects the labor force participation of men and women. Women who exhibit the integrated identity are more likely to work than women who are German assimilated; this does not hold for men. However, once we control for selection in the labor market and a slew of individual and labor market characteristics, ethnic identity does not significantly affect the earnings of men or women immigrant workers.

Accommodating “Jezebel” and Withdrawing John: Negotiating Empire in Revelation Then and Now

Revelation addresses a struggle over how followers of Jesus might negotiate the complex imperial realities of Roman rule. The call for societal distance and disengagement resists and seeks to conceal other voices that urge greater levels of societal interaction. Revelation also raises the urgent issue of how contemporary followers of Jesus might negotiate the world's most powerful empire—the one we in the United States inhabit.

Race in the Ontology of International Order

The current world order is characterised by profound global inequality, depicted through reference to the developed and developing world. The racialised character of global inequalities in power is rarely acknowledged, however. Explicit racial discourse has been removed from the institutional form of the modern world order, and this apparent transcendence of race is mirrored in the lack of attention to race within mainstream scholarship in International Relations (IR). This is in part because of the empiricist assumptions underlying much IR scholarship, which reflect the non-racialised appearance of the modern world order. While the question of race has been exposed by critical strands of IR scholarship, such critiques have focused largely on discursive dimensions of race. This article argues that critical analysis of global racism and racial oppression must go beyond the limits of discursive critique. It is necessary to grasp the non-discursive dimensions of racial power, in order to explain the reproduction of racial inequality by an international order formally committed to racial equality. This, in turn, requires an expanded theory of social ontology. Critical realism develops a theory of social ontology which provides a basis for differentiating between various dimensions of racial oppression. The critical realist theory of social ontology highlights the significance of the relations structuring societal interaction with nature, which are fundamental in determining distributions of social power within society. A survey of the long global history of colonialism reveals that the relations structuring societal interaction with nature on a global scale have been built upon a basis of racialised dispossession. The article argues that the racialised structures of social power produced through centuries of colonial dispossession remain entrenched, despite the formal transcendence of racism in modern institutions of international order. Thus a realist ontology provides the basis for revealing the endurance of race in the structures of international order.

Ethnosizing immigrants

The ethnosizer, a new measure of the intensity of a person's ethnic identity, is proposed using information on language, culture, societal interaction, history of migration, and ethnic self-identification. A two-dimensional version classifies immigrants into four states: integration, assimilation, separation and marginalization. Results based on the German Socio-economic Panel for 2001 are as follows. Young migrants are assimilated or integrated the most. While Muslims and Christians do not integrate, both assimilate the best. Immigrants with college in the home country separate less. Having some schooling is worse than no schooling for integration and assimilation. While ex-Yugoslavs assimilate more, Greeks, Italians and Spaniards are no different than Turks.

Measuring Ethnic Identity and its Impact on Economic Behavior

The paper advocates for a new measure of the ethnic identity of migrants, models its determinants and explores its explanatory power for various types of their economic performance. The ethnosizer, a measure of the intensity of a person's ethnic identity, is constructed from information on the following elements: language, culture, societal interaction, history of migration, and ethnic self-identification. A two-dimensional concept of the ethnosizer classifies migrants into four states: integration, assimilation, separation and marginalization. The ethnosizer largely depends on pre-migration characteristics. Empirical evidence studying economic behavior like work participation, earnings and housing decisions demonstrates the significant relevance of ethnic identity for economic outcomes.

An analysis of service studies toward sustainable value creation

It is difficult to establish a new scientific methodology for studies of service because the value of a service should become apparent through societal interaction and created value is needed to be sustainable in society and environment. This paper provides an overview of previous studies of services using an academic database to clarify the underlying problems related to this subject. It introduces our study example on lifestyle including daily behaviour, personality, and attitudes about information technologies. Finally, a new classification of service models is introduced, considering the relationships among service providers, service receivers, and service environments.

Agency in Adaptation

Agency in Adaptation

Measuring Ethnic Identity and its Impact on Economic Behavior

The paper advocates for a new measure of the ethnic identity of migrants, models its determinants and explores its explanatory power for various types of their economic performance. The ethnosizer, a measure of the intensity of a person's ethnic identity, is constructed from information on the following elements: language, culture, societal interaction, history of migration, and ethnic self-identification. A two-dimensional concept of the ethnosizer classifies migrants into four states: integration, assimilation, separation and marginalization. The ethnosizer largely depends on pre-migration characteristics. Empirical evidence studying economic behavior like work participation, earnings and housing decisions demonstrates the significant relevance of ethnic identity for economic outcomes.

Sense and sensitivity: the roles of organisation and stakeholders in managing corporate social responsibility

While companies are increasingly convinced of the relevance of CSR, many are still struggling to define their responsibility. Part of the answer to this question can be found in the dual approach towards CSR. The authors unravel the concept of CSR into two components: responsibility and responsiveness. Regarding the firm's responsiveness towards society, companies can adopt two positions. They might adopt an inside‐out approach towards CSR and emphasise their own ambitions. Alternatively, they can approach stakeholders from an outside‐in perspective, wherein stakeholder claims dominate. The authors argue that both perspectives are inadequate with regard to complex societal issues. Therefore, a third approach towards societal interaction is proposed. This is characterised by a process of collective sensemaking, aimed at understanding the issue and defining responsibilities.

Why we do it: rethinking sex and the selfish gene

Why do people have sex? Is it solely for the purpose of passing on genetic information, or are there other reasons? A candid, no-punches-pulled interpreter of the core ideas of evolutionary biology (Science News), author Niles Eldredge unravels the origins of our coital instincts. Whereas other scientists dismiss human sexuality as a helpless response to the same deep-set biological imperatives that govern the behavior of lesser animals, Eldredge points to various examples of customs, taboos, laws, and other cultural forces that run counter to our most primal desires. Directly assaulting the reductionist selfish gene theory, whereby sex is reduced to a purely procreative act, Eldredge draws on Darwin's ideas about evolution as well as modern economic theory to describe the delicate cultural and societal interaction that exists between survival, sex, and procreation in the human species.

Ceramic petrography and cultural interaction in Palau, Micronesia

Because of their durability and widespread use, ceramics in the Pacific are important artifacts for examining patterns of prehistoric subsistence, settlement, and societal interaction. Numerous studies demonstrate that petrographic analysis of prehistoric pottery in western Oceania can differentiate temper sands and other mineral constituents unique to geotectonically different islands. However, a detailed study of tempering agents has not been attempted for ceramic assemblages in Palau, Western Caroline Islands, Micronesia. We present the first major synthesis of Palauan ceramic petrography and petrological classification. The analysis of several sherd suites recovered from both the volcanic and limestone islands in the archipelago and other nearby western Micronesian atolls suggest that pottery was locally made, manufactured using primarily grog or composite (mixed-grog sand) tempers, and transported to smaller islands within and outside of the Palauan archipelago. The research has implications for determining raw material acquisition by ancient Palauan potters and is a critical step for developing regional models of intra- and inter-island exchange and interaction.

Folkelige og sociale bevægelser. Nyere forskningsretninger og kvalitative forståelser

Folkelige og sociale bevægelser. Nyere forskningsretninger og kvalitative forståelser