Macrostructural analyses have long dominated the field of social theories of modernity, with the work of Habermas, Giddens, and Beck providing influential cases in point. Empirical studies, however, ...have raised questions about the applicability and empirical soundness of macrostructural approaches to risks, technology, and nature, and U.S.‐based sociologists have offered alternative theories that have been identified in some studies as providing better predictions and explanations than the macrostructural analyses. Informed by all of the above theories, this article examines the “Atoms for Peace” program, which established the civilian uses of nuclear energy, providing one of the central scientific and technological achievements of modernity. Given the mixed results of nuclear technology development, the mid‐range, structurally informed perspectives of Short and other U.S.‐based sociologists do appear to provide the best interpretations, both for the “Atoms for Peace” program and for the broader legacy of the technological and environmental risks of modernity.
Scientists have made remarkable progress in dealing with technical challenges but not in dealing with society. Given that public concerns have grown, in the face of declining "real" risks, the common ...if simplistic tendency has been to blame public ignorance or irrationality and to argue that policy decisions should be based on quantitative risk estimates, effectively ignoring public concerns. Such assertions are superficially plausible, but they reflect fundamental misunderstandings of the nature of technological societies, as well as of the reasons behind declining scientific credibility and of actual strengths and weaknesses of risk assessment. Scientific credibility has been undermined not so much by shadowy enemies as by actions of self-proclaimed friends, and there are inherent limitations to the practical usefulness of risk assessment in policy disputes. If proposals for risk-based decision making were actually implemented, they could well lead not to increased credibility for specific technologies but to self-reinforcing losses of credibility for science and technology as a whole.
Examines myths about media coverage of hazard events (HEs) through content analysis of the reportage of 128 HEs indexed in the New York Times. Four notions about media coverage of HE were explored: ...(1) tendency toward sensationalist &/or antitechnology coverage, (2) coverage as tool of the technological establishment, (3) coverage as subtly antitechnology, & (4) coverage as susceptible to framing & spin control. Analysis revealed that media coverage was predicted not by sensationalism or antitechnology bias, but only by the objective characteristics of the HE. Even for extreme HEs, eg, nuclear or toxic hazards, the net effect of full media stories was to lessen emotionalism. "Keynoting" by the media gave the impression that the authorities were acting more responsibly than might be assumed on the basis of factual summaries of HEs alone. 4 Tables, 45 References. Adapted from the source document.
The review by Humphrey et al. (1993) is arguably the most important effort to date to advance our understanding of poverty in resource-dependent communities-one that is likely to be remembered as ...pivotal, not just because it brings together four highly diverse theoretical perspectives, but because its clarity will facilitate the recognition of important gaps and of the need for empirical testing. All four of the perspectives appear to have important weaknesses, although the weaknesses appear not to be due so much to the efforts of Humphrey et al. as to the fact that social scientists have often overlooked biophysical variables in the past. For the future, there is a need for more systematic empirical analysis, including a more explicit focus on the characteristics of natural resource activities. In particular, attention needs to be devoted to (1) long-term declines in both extractive and "linked"; employment; (2) the high levels of volatility that characterize world commodity markets; and (3) the tendency for social science expectations about natural resources, like many other forms of "social construction,"; to be based on untested assumptions that may have grown out of past experiences, but that are not based on careful analysis of long-term trends, and that may prove inadequate as a guide to the future.
Traditional focus on social impact assessment has been on the impacts taking place during the most intensive phases of developmental activity. A conceptual framework that deals with impacts across ...potentially affected systems of the human environment is discussed.
The nature of ecological research can mean that ecological scientists will come into far more contact than will other scientists with the one species seldom studied systematically in ecology classes. ...A look at what ecologists can learn from nuclear scientists is offered.
Although sociologists have made advances in understanding the community-level impacts of technological and environmental change, attention to date has focused almost exclusively on the relatively ...brief development stage of construction and rapid expansion. Significant social changes can also take place both before and after the phases of the most intense physical activities (construction, production, expansion), and pathways of influence can be social as well as physical. At the outset, during the “opportunity-threat” stage, most social and economic impacts are associated with opportunities and/or threats to biophysical, economic, social, cultural, and psychological systems of the human environment. If development proceeds, the opportunities and threats are joined by the impacts of visible, physical perturbations that have received most of the attention to date. Over time, both of these sets of impacts are increasingly joined by the accumulation of experience. While human systems do adapt to changes or impacts, even apparently functional short-term responses can lead over the longer term to overadaptation.
The protection of habitat for an officially designated "threatened" species, the Northern Spotted Owl, is widely seen as having endangered the survival of a very different "species," namely the rural ...American logger. In spite of the widespread agreement on this point, however, it is not clear just how many jobs have been endangered, over just how long a period, due to the protection of spotted-owl habitat and of the environment more broadly. In the present paper, we analyze longer term employment trends in logging and milling, both nationally and in the two states of the Pacific Northwest where the spotted-owl debate has been most intense, to determine the length of time over which such environmental protection efforts have been creating the loss of logging and milling jobs. There are three potential key "turning points" since the start of high-quality employment data in 1947 -- the 1989 controversy over the federal "listing" of the Northern Spotted Owl under the Endangered Species Act, the earlier increase in environmental regulations accompanying the first Earth Day in 1970, and the still-earlier "locking up" of timber after the passage of the Wilderness Protection Act in 1964. We also examine the effects of two other variables that have received considerable attention in the ongoing debates--levels of U.S. Forest Service timber harvests and the exporting of raw logs. We find that the 1989 listing of the spotted owl has no significant effect on employment--not even in the two states where the debate has been most intense. Instead, the only statistically significant turning point came with the passage of the Wilderness Act in 1964. The direction of the change, however, was precisely the opposite of what is generally expected. Both nationally and in the Pacific Northwest, the greatest decline in timber employment occurred from 1947 until 1964--a time of great economic growth, a general absence of "unreasonable environmental regulations," and growing timber harvests. The period since the passage of the Wilderness Act has been one of increased complaints about environmental constraints, but much less decline in U.S. logging employment. If logging jobs have indeed been endangered by efforts to protect the environment in general and spotted-owl habitat in particular, what is needed is a plausible explanation of how the influence of the owls could have begun more than forty years before the species came under the protection of the Endangered Species Act. /// Spanish La protección oficial designada al habitat para las especies en extinción del Búho Moteado del Norte, ha sido ampliamente conocida por poner en peligro la sobrevivencia de una "especie" Ilamada el talador Americano. A pesar de que este acuerdo ha sido ampliamente difundido; sin embargo, se desconoce con exactitud el número de empleos que se han puesto en peligro, en un período determinado, debido a la protección del habitat de los búhos moteados y del medio ambiente. En este trabajo analizamos las tendencias de empleo a largo plazo en la industria maderera y en la industria de su trituración, tanto a nivel nacional como en los dos estados del noroeste del pacífico en donde el debate sobre el búho moteado a sido más intenso, para determinar el tiempo requerido en que los esfuerzos de dicha protección ambiental han estado creando la pérdida de empleos en la industria maderera y en la industria de trituración. Han existido tres puntos centrales y decisivos desde el inicio del banco de información de alta calidad de 1947 y de la controversia acerca de la "Lista de Inscripción" Federal del Búho Moteado del Noroeste bajo el Acta de Especies en Extinción, el incremento de la reglamentación inicial sobre el medio ambiente que se adherió al primer Día Mundial en 1970, y al contínuo "bloqueo" de la industria maderera después de la aprobación del Acta de Protección de regiones Desérticas de 1964. Además, examinamos los efectos de otras dos variables que han recibido una atención considerable en el contínuo debate --niveles de tala de madera y la exportación de troncos en bruto del Servicio Forestal de EE. UU. Encontramos que en la inscripción de la lista del búho moteado no tiene ningún efecto significativo sobre el empleo--ni siquiera en los dos estados en donde el debate se ha Ilevado con mayor intensidad. En su lugar, se dio un viraje estadístico muy decisivo con la aprobación del Acta de Areas Desérticas de 1964. La dirección del cambio fue completamente opuesta de lo que se esperaba. Tanto nacionalmente como en el noroeste del pacífico, ocurrió la disminución más alta en el empleo de la industria maderera a partir de 1947 hasta 1964--un momento de alto crecimiento ecónomico, una ausencia general de "reglamentos inmoderados ambientales," y el incremento en la tala maderera. El período desde la aprobación del Acta de Areas Desérticas se ha caracterizado por sus incesantes quejas acerca de la coacción ambiental, pero mucho menos en la disminución de empleos de la industria maderera de EE. UU. Si en realidad los empleos de la industria maderera se han puesto en peligro por los esfuerzos para proteger el medioambiente en general, y en particular el habitat del búho moteado, lo que en realidad se necesita es una explicación convincente de cómo la influencia de los búhos pudo haberse iniciado hace más de cuarenta años antes de que estas especies quedaran protegidas por el Acta de Especies en Extinción. /// Chinese (Unicode for Chinese abstract). /// Japanese (Unicode for Japanese abstract).
Most discussions of legitimation focus on factors that are expected to contribute to it, such as tradition, expertise, or prosperity. Less attention has been paid to “the dark side” of legitimation, ...which depends heavily on evading attention. A potentially informative approach is to learn from professionals with special expertise in evading attention while making things “disappear”—magicians. Rather than seeking overt control over the audience, they perform in plain view, largely by using well‐timed distractions, or “misdirection.” Preliminary evidence suggests that similar techniques may be widely used in political contexts, with some of the most effective forms of misdirection involving diversionary reframing—diverting attention away from any questions about existing distributions of privilege, not by brute force, but by changing the subject, especially by raising questions about the legitimacy of critics. These and related techniques clearly deserve to be the focus of additional research.
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