Annual Review of Sociology - Volume 9, 1983

The history of the concept of values is reviewed from its beginnings in the 19th century to the present. Work on values rose to preeminence under Talcott Parsons and his associates during 1950-1965, Nevertheless, the theory they produced was flawed: It lacked sophisticated empirical support, imposed preordained categories on reality, and was formulated at an unresearchable level of abstraction. Alternative theories of values fared only somewhat better. More vibrant is the long tradition of (nonParsonian) empirical studies in various subject areas (e.g. achievement, religion). This body of work, however, is ad hoc in nature: The data produced are essentially noncomparable and do not advance the concerns of value theory. The recent work of Kohn (on class and values) and Rokeach (on general value systems) has begun to remedy the situation. It is suggested that value analysis of the future can only solve past ditficulties if (a) it develops grounded theory and research methods—i.e, hypotheses and techniques tied, from the outset, to the values of real populations; (b) it undertakes simultaneous multitechnique observations of the same population; and (c) it carefully tests some of the important hypotheses from value theory abandoned since the 1960s

This essay examines the recent historical research on the family with the objective of identifying useful lessons for students of the contemporary family. The following themes in the historical research are discussed: household and family structure, production and reproduction, life course transitions, the emotional content of family life, and the distinctiveness of the 1950s. The essay concludes with a discussion of theoretical and methodological issues in historical research on the family.

Rural sociology has recently developed a new research agenda focussing on the sociology of agriculture. This has led to a revitalization of a field of research that had lost its way since the decline of the rural-urban continuum in the 1960s. The crisis that occurred in rural sociology in the 1970s is discussed in relation both to this theoretical vacuum and to the failure to achieve a policy impact. It is argued that the sociology of agriculture offers a potentially successful means of overcoming this crisis, but some of the difficulties in utilizing this approach are also discussed. Observations are made on the institutional setting of rural sociology and on whether it is compatible with the development of a critical sociology of agriculture.

This review presents an analysis of current sociology and human ecology dealing with neighborhood change. The review is organized in four major sections. The first deals with the concept of neighborhood. The second discusses the classic models of neighborhood change—invasion-succession and life cycle. The third deals with the current perspectives on neighborhood change: demographic/ecological, sociocultural/organizational, political economy, and social movements. The final section focuses on urban revitalization and gentrification.

This review considers the problems and prospects associated with the development of Marxist perspectives in the sociology of law. Taking as its starting point the efforts to construct a Marxist understanding of law through the traditional approach of legal economism, a number of directions and themes in the development of a new Marxist vision of law are explored. Alternatives to “legal nihilism” are examined in conjunction with a survey of the movement of Marxist theory toward a “looser” and “flatter” conception of the relationship between law and society. The role of politics, ideology, and history in the reconstruction of Marxist legal theory are then considered with special attention to the virtues and limits of “imbricationist” and “constitutive” accounts. The analysis ends with a reexamination of the points of convergence and divergence among Marxism, sociology, law, and socialism.

Recent literature in military sociology is reviewed in the context of theories regarding increasing rationality on the part of societies, organizations, and individuals. Models that emphasize individualistic orientations to military service are compared with models that assume a more collectivistic orientation. Attention is paid to the shift from a mobilization-based armed force to a force in being, and to the convergence between military and civilian organizations. Several consequences of the rationalization of the military are considered, including potential changes in willingness to fight, military unionization, changes in professionalism, the substitution of management for leadership, increased utilization of women, and dependence on research, including social science research.

This article provides a comprehensive review of developments in transportation research relevant to sociological inquiry about urban transportation and its consequences for urban structure, both spatial and social. Recent research has gone beyond initial observations about the linkages between transportation use and the spatial form of cities to further detail its impacts upon residential segregation, decentralization, and inequalities in mobility access. Historical case studies of local transit firms and politics, industrial organization of the transportation industry and its impact upon transportation policy, and national and local studies of the political economy of urban transporation have advanced a comparative research framework for understanding the institutional forces that constrain transportation choices and technical development. Finally, social psychological research, through laboratory experimental studies, field studies, and time-budget analysis, has just begun to examine the impacts of transportation upon social interaction in the family and community. This literature review concludes with proposed research questions for future investigations.

This review takes off from the remarkable decline in mortality as one of the most striking features of the social history of the past century. Most deaths now occur not among the young but among the old. Death, thus postponed, is taking on new meanings for both the individual and society. Three lines of sociological inquiry over the past two decades, together with an extensive bibliography, are critically reviewed. First, the literature on dying and the self includes dying as a social process, dying trajectories, attitudes toward death, and the potentially mortal impact of such social stressors as retirement, residential relocation, and economic change. Second, a broad and often confusing literature deals with bereavement, grief, and the meaning of loss by death to surviving significant others, touching upon such topics as the “broken heart syndrome,” widowhood, types of death and bereavement, and anticipatory grief. Third, sociological inquiries examine the norms and social structures found in all societies for defining and managing dying and the consequences of death.

Although no satisfactory “sociology of death” has yet been written, four influential theories of death-in-society are noted: by Parsons, Blauner, Marshall, and Fox. On balance, the review sees a promising future for sociological inquiries on death and dying and concludes that the meanings of death are in a process of continuing transformation. Some of the key questions yet to be answered are: Will socialization for death become a recognized reality? Will dying persons seek to maintain an even greater sense of autonomy? Will passive euthanasia create fewer moral dilemmas? Will suicide continue as “the final alternative” for increasing numbers of older people? Will new patterns of bereavement emerge for the future population of widows? Will new caring environments for the terminally ill be institutionalized? Will the concept of a “good” death gain wider acceptance? An agenda for continued sociological inquiry appears to be in hand.

This chapter provides a general review of the research conducted over the past two decades on individuals’ conceptions of equity and distributive justice and their reactions to inequity. Various theoretical formulations are identified and important topics for further theoretical development and empirical investigation are discussed. In conclusion, the authors suggest that micro-level concepts of distributive justice have certain limitations. Consideration of more macrolevel concepts suggests possibilities for integrating equity and distributive justice theories with sociological theories of power, conflict, and collective action. This integration, if achieved, would bring notions of justice to the forefront in the analysis of social change.

This paper considers the present state of replication in the social sciences with special reference to a subtype of replication, longitudinal research as it applies to community research. Opportunities and pitfalls in replication are illustrated in the experience of the Middletown III Project, a 50-year follow-up of Robert and Helen Lynd's study of the same community in 1924-1925. Replication is defined as research undertaken with reference to a particular baseline study, and a replication may differ from the baseline study in any of its major features. A typology of replicative studies is offered based on four properties of research: time, location, subjects, and method. Longitudinal research is defined as a subtype of replication, and growing interest in and practice of longitudinal research are noted. Community research, which may involve mUltiple replications within a single local context, is contrasted with the usual longitudinal studies that trace specific individuals over time and through a variety of community contexts. Five guidelines for replications are offered: (a) clearly establish the baseline to be replicated; (b) resist the temptation to expand the replication to include topics absent in the baseline study; (c) where extensions are justified, try to include longitudinal linkages using techniques of retrospective or life-history reconstruction; (d) control the urge to update the datacollection instruments; and (e)pay close attention to the interplay between community-level variables and data on individual attitudes and experiences.

Before World War II the intellectual climate of American sociology was congenial to the growth of a sociology of knowledge akin to Mannheim's. Yet in the postwar period American sociologists committed themselves to ahistorical theory, positivist methodology, and team research; their “scientistic” sociology did not permit the historicism, relativism, and holism necessary to Mannheimian analysis. Currently, however, convergent trends in a number of disciplines—not only sociology but also philosophy, anthropology, literary criticism, and the histories of ideas, science, and art—favor a revival of the Mannheimian program. Analysts of culture now seek to integrate the sociological goals of “explanation” and “understanding”—the formulation of quasilaws of behavior, based on identification of the social structural elements of culture production, and the interpretation of the subjective meaning of culture, based on recovery of actors' intentions. Their research program requires investigation of the peculiar sociohistorical circumstances that condition actors' perceptions, necessitating attention to the cognitive content of culture. This article surveys both the theoretical justifications for such a research program and recent exemplifications of it, focusing on anlyses of what Mannheim termed “objective culture”—such symbolic vehicles for conceptions as religion, the arts, science, and political thought that acquire independent existence, becoming subject to diverse interpretations.

Contemporary research on emotions has been increasingly demarcated into four self-contained segments: the cultural, biological, inner, and outer aspects of emotional processes. A parallel trend is the increasing hegemony of the perspective of those who study only the cultural and outside segments. Research on cultural variation, the causation of emotional states, and cultural universals is reviewed and evaluated. This review suggests that the evidence does not support the exclusion of cultural universals from research designs. It is proposed that integration of these four approaches is urgently needed if we are to understand the interactions between culture and biology, between inner and outer, and therefore what is distinctively human about human beings. Some research that integrates these elements into single designs is described as pointing the way for future exploration.