Bulletin 73-74
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, bulletin 73-74 International Sociological Association Association Internationale de Sociologie Asociación Internacional de Sociología Faculty of Political Sciences and Sociology University Complutense 28223 Madrid, Spain. Tel: (34-1)3527650 Fax: (34-1)3524945. Email: [email protected] http://www.ucm.es/info/isa o Letter from the President, No. 7 "Differentiation 1 and Reconstruction in the Social Sciences" by Immanuel Wallerstein o ISA XIV World Congress of Sociology July 26 - August 1, 1998, Montréal, Canada o How to present a paper 7 o Deadlines 7 o Financial Support 8 o Editorship of the ISA Journals: Intenational Sociologyand Current Sociology 10 o In Memoriam: Rudolf Andorka 10 o Reports on Activities 1995-1997 from the Research Committees, Working and Thematic Groups 11 o New ISA Membership Dues Structure 28 o Call for Participation and Papers 29 o Calendar of Future Events 30 o Election of ISA Officers 1998-2002 30 o Publications of the ISA 33 FaII-Winter 1997 Published by the Intemational Sociological Association ISSN 0383-8501 Editor: lzabela Barlinska. Lay-out: José l. Reguera. Printed by Fotocopias Universidad S.A. EXECUTIVE COMMITTEE 1994-1998 President: Layi Erinosho Research Coordinating Immanuel Wallerstein Ogun State University Committee Binghamton University Ijeby-Ode, Nigeria Chair: Stella R. Quah, Members: Binghamton, NY, USA Linda Christiansen-Ruffman, Vincenzo Ferrari Vincenzo Ferrari, Jan Marie Fritz Vice-President, Program University of Milano Jorge A. González, Christine Inglis Alberto Martinelli Milano, Italy Jennifer Platt, Arnaud Sales, Piotr University of Milano Sztompka Milano, Italy Jan Marie Fritz University of Cincinnati Publications Committee Vice-President, Research Cincinnati,OH, USA Chair: James Beckford Stella R. Quah Member: Karl van Meter, France National University of Singapore Jorge González EC representatives: Layi Singapore Universidad Colima Erinosho, Nigeria, Bernadette Colima, Mexico Bawin-Legros, Belgium Vice-President, Publications RCC representative: Jorge A. James A. Beckford Christine Inglis González, Mexico University of Warwick University of Sydney Current Sociology. Robert Brym, Coventry, United Kingdom Sydney, Australia Editor, Nikolai Genov, Bulgaria, Gy6rgy Széll, Germany Vice-President, Membership & Jennifer Platt International Sociology. Roberto Finance University of Sussex Cipriani, Editor, Orlando Fals Jürgen Hartmann Brighton, United Kingdom Borda, Colombia, Ina Wagner, University Dalarna Austria Borlánqe, Sweden Arnaud Sales Sage Studies in International Université de Montréal Sociology. Neil Guppy, Editor Past President 1990-1994 Montréal, Canada Sociological Abstrscts; Miriam T.K.Oommen Chall, Editor Jawaharlal Nehru University Piotr Sztompka International Review of Sociology. New Delhi, India Jagiellonian University Mino Vianello, Editor Cracow, Poland SAGE Publications: Stephen Barr, Chris Rojek, UK G6ran Therborn MEMBERS University of G6teborg Representatives to ISSC G6teborg, Sweden UNESCO Bernadette Bawin-Legros Delegate: Daniel Bertaux, France Université de Liege Peter Weingart Alternate: Karl van Meter, France Liege, Belgium University of Bielefeld Bielefeld, Germany Representatives to ICSSID Roberto Briceño-Leon UNESCO LACSO, Universidad Central Shujiro Yazawa Richard Grathoff, Germany Caracas, Venezuela Hitotsubashi University Tokyo, Japan Representatives to United Maria Carrilho Nations ISCTE Executive Secretary: Vienna: Jürgen Hartmann, Lisbon, Portugal Izabela Barlinska Sweden, Piotr Sztompka, Poland Geneva: t.b.a. Linda Christiansen-Ruffman New York: Linda Christiansen- Saint Mary's University SUB-COMMITIEES Ruffman, Canada, Vera Zolberq, Halifax, NS, Canada USA Juan Díez-Nicolás Membership & Finance Representative to WHO Universidad Complutense Committee Eugene B. Gallagher, RC15 Madrid, Spain Chair: Jürgen Hartmann, Members: Juan Díez-Nicolás, Representative to "SL Oñati Arnaud Sales, Christine Inglis Vincenzo Ferrari, Italy Letter from the President, No.7, October 1997 by Immanuel Wallerstein Differentiation and Reconstruction in the Social Sciences [This letter is an abbreviated version of my presentation at ISA Committees, and many other applicants knocking at the doors. The Research Council, Montreal, Aug. 6, 1997. The fuller version is story is replicated within most of our national associations, at least available, in English only, on the ISA website: the larger ones. There is every reason to believe that the pressure http://www.ucm.es/info/isa] for creating these specialized structures will continue and may even accelerate. And I should not at all be surprised to see these Differentiation is one of the basic concepts in the sociological research committee structures, or specialized groupings, armory. It refers to a presumed process whereby tasks that were at themselves fractionate in turno Is this evidence of healthy division one point seen as singular or to be done by a single person and/or of labor or of cancerous growth? We know from biology that the line group are divided such that they are seen as multiple and done by between the two models is thin, and the medical researchers for more than one actor.It is a morphological concept and thus can be their part are not yet able to explain exactly what turns one into the plied to any field of activity. It is the process that results in a other. Can we? division of labor. There is a further problem. If, as we subdivided, the subgroupings It has been argued that one of the marked features of the modern were all, so to speak, isolationist, keeping to themselves, we might world has been the extent of its differentiation. (...) When we turn to have an atmosphere that could be accused of being intellectually the analysis of the structures of knowledge, we find a situation that stunting, but it would atleast be organizationally quite viable. But is not too different from the analysis of the political economy of the this is not at all the case. The more divided we become, the more world-system. We have assertions of greater heterogeneity. Today, imperialist each sub-unit seems to become. Once upon a time, knowledge is divided into a multiplicity of disciplines, and each economists were in one corner, sociologists another, and historians discipline has an ever-Iengthening list of fields of interest, so-called a third. They saw themselves as constituting separate, quite specializations. Yet our knowledge structures seem to transcend different, disciplines, with clearly defined and distinctive objects of many differences of space and time, and a defining characteristic study, and indeed of modes of studying them. But today economists of modern structures of knowledge has been the prominence, in seek to explain how families function, sociologists explain historical fact the dominance, of the claim to the existence of universal transformations, and historians explain entrepreneurial strategies. knowledge, a claim that admits of no possible theoretical variation I offer a simple test. Take the titles of papers listed in the programs in what constitutes truth. Here too, we find no real consensus about of a half-dozen international social science congresses of different whether homogeneity or heterogeneity is the preferred outcome. organizations. Shuffle the titles, and ask a group of social scientists Indeed, the intensity of the contemporary so-called science wars to identify at which congress these papers were offered. I haven't and culture wars are clear testimony to the depth of division within done this, but my guess is that a 50% correct response would be the scholarly world on this valuation. very high. So we have incredible so-called overlap, which is sometimes dressed up as the spread of "interdisciplinarity." Is this et us look at the International Sociological Association. It itself is an instance of efficiency or of inefficiency? (...) the product of a several-century long process of differentiation. When Machiavelli or Spinoza or even Montesquieu wrote their What is the source of this homogeneity amidst heterogeneity? One books, they did not call themselves sociologists; indeed, there was simple, structural answer is size. The number of researchers in the no such concept as "sociologist." More, there was not even yet a world today has grown enormously in the last 500 years, and clear distinction between such broader categories as "philosopher" geometrically in the last 50 years. This has in turn two and "scientist." This latter distinction, fundamental to the university organizational expressions. First, each individual researcher is still system we have created in the last 200 years, was initially an required to prove his or her originality. Each must therefore -ñnd a invention based on the Cartesian antinomy of humans and nature, niche, or an approach, or a reserved corner, or something. And one that became fully crystallized only in the late eighteenth there just do not seem to be enough of these to go around. So century. The additional conceptual category of social science, as a poaching has become a widespread strategy of survival. However, third scholarly domain in-between science and philosophy, or in one can never admit that one is poaching, beca use that would university jargon between the faculty of natural sciences and what prove lack of originality. So everyone insists that his or her is some languages is called the faculty of humanities, emerged only particular variant is significantly different from everyone else's in the nineteenth century. And separate university departments