Traveling through Latin America, one quickly discovers its diversity. In this issue Juliana Franzoni and Diego Sánchez-Ancochea point to a broad continental turn against inequality. Nevertheless, even in this realm, differences are stark. Thus, Chile and Uruguay lie at the opposite ends of the spectrum between neoliberalism and social democracy. When it comes to social […]

An Interview with Manuel Antonio Garretón. Part I: Sociology under the Dictatorship Manuel Antonio Garretón is one of the most well-known social scientists in Latin America. He graduated from the Catholic University of Chile and received his PhD from École des Hautes Études en Sciences Sociales in Paris. He has been the director of many […]

by Elizabeth Jelin, IDES (Instituto de Desarrollo Económico y Social), Argentina and Member of the ISA Executive Committee, 1986-1990 Elizabeth Jelin is an Argentinian sociologist, widely known for her work in the fields of human rights, the memory of political repression, citizenship, social movements, gender, and the family. Her many books include Los trabajos de […]

by Immanuel Wallerstein, Yale University, USA and former President of the ISA, 1994-1998 Immanuel Wallerstein’s contributions to social science are marked by a half-century of award-winning books and articles, starting with his study of colonialism and national liberation struggles in Africa in the 1960s. From there he moved to detailed historical scholarship of the emergence […]

by Ruy Braga, University of São Paulo, Brazil and Board Member of Research Committee on Labor Movements (RC44) and Ricardo Antunes, State University of Campinas, Brazil June 2013 will go down in the history of social uprisings in Brazil. Beginning on June 6 with a march in São Paulo, which attracted about 2,000 people in […]

by Asef Bayat, University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign The release of ex-president Hosni Mubarak from prison on August 22, 2013 represents a turning point; it marks a counter-revolutionary restitution that had begun probably the day after Mubarak’s resignation on February 11, 2011, but culminated on July 3, 2013 when General el-Sisi forcefully ousted the elected President […]

by Mohammed A. Bamyeh, University of Pittsburgh, USA, and Editor of the ISA’s International Sociology Reviews The first grand phase of the Egyptian Revolution is over: the period between February 11, 2011 and August 14, 2013 signals a clearly defined period. It begins with the apparent collapse of the old regime. It ends with its […]

by Polat Alpman, Ankara University, Turkey Islamic Conservatism has now come to power in Turkey, not once but three times, each time increasing its support. It has taken a political route that extends from political power to social and even cultural domination. It tries to remove the tutelage of the Turkish army, and, through economic […]

by Zeynep Baykal, Middle East Technical University,Turkey and ISA Member of Research Committee on Racism, Nationalism and Ethnic Relations (RC05) and Nezihe Başak Ergin, Middle East Technical University, Turkey and ISA Member of Research Committees on Regional and Urban Development (RC21) and Social Classes and Social Movements (RC47) “To live like a tree single and […]

by Guy Standing, School of Oriental and African Studies, UK Globalization has brought not just greater inequalities but also chronic economic uncertainty to the world’s population. Governments have failed to effectively develop or adapt social protection systems to reduce economic insecurity. They have turned to means-testing, behavior-testing, selectivity, targeting, conditionality, and workfare. Emancipatory universalism has […]

by Juliana Martínez Franzoni, University of Costa Rica, ISA Member of Research Committee on Poverty, Social Welfare and Social Policy (RC19), and Diego Sánchez-Ancochea, University of Oxford, UK Latin America has traditionally been the most unequal region of the world and has suffered from the negative consequences of inequality: dysfunctional politics, powerful elites, social tensions […]

by Ching Kwan Lee, University of California, Los Angeles, USA Dear Michael, Greetings from Kitwe! Yes, here I am doing ethnographic fieldwork in your old stomping ground – the Zambian Copperbelt. This month, I am based at the Nkana mine, which local residents assure me was once upon a time called “Rhokana” – the mine […]

by Helen Sampson, Cardiff University, UK and Board member of the ISA Research Committee on Sociology of Work (RC30) A seafarer is perched on a rail at the back of the ship. The hot Mexico sun beats down on him. It is so fierce that the air seems to crackle. The seafarer is at his […]

by Jorge L. Giovannetti, University of Puerto Rico, San Juan, Puerto Rico There were ten massacres in Puerto Rico in 2012. As of May 2013, the massacre-counting news media has reported a total of six massacres in this US Caribbean possession of 3.7 million inhabitants. While in 2011 Puerto Rico obtained an unflattering position in […]

by Eliana Kaimowitz, The Center for the Study of Law, Justice and Society (Dejusticia), Bogotá, Colombia Imagine you are a human rights activist from a small town in South America who is trying to stop a European mining company from continuing to pollute your community’s drinking water. You recently heard that a human rights activist […]

by Lekë Sokoli, Albanian Institute of Sociology, Tirana, Albania and ISA Member of Research Committees on Comparative Sociology (RC20) and Sociology of Migration (RC31) During the last two decades there have been extreme and multidimensional transformations in Albania. Economically, we have moved from a centralized economy, where the state was the only owner and the […]

by Ayse Idil Aybars, Middle East Technical University, Turkey The Third ISA Conference of the Council of National Associations was held at the Middle East Technical University (METU) in Ankara, Turkey on May 12-17, 2013. The conference was jointly organized by the ISA with the Department of Sociology of METU, the Turkish Social Sciences Association […]

by Mari Shiba, Nagoya University and ISA Member of Research Committee on Sociology of Migration (RC31), Kyoko Tominaga, University of Tokyo, Keisuke Mori, Hitotsubashi University, and Norie Fukui, Kyushu University, Japan Professors Koichi Hasegawa, Shujiro Yazawa, Yoshimichi Sato, and Sawaka Shirihase – key members of the Local Organizing Committee for next year’s World Congress of […]

María José Álvarez Rivadulla, ISA Member of Research Committee on Regional and Urban Development (RC21) Majo is an Associate Professor of Sociology at the Rosario University, Colombia. Originally from Montevideo, Uruguay, she has a PhD in Sociology from the University of Pittsburgh and has lived in Colombia for the last five years. She is interested […]