Roland Robertson

The Third World and International Stratification: Theoretical Considerations and Research Findings

In recent years the rank-dimensional approach to the analysis of social stratification has become increasingly prominent. One of its advocates, Johan Galtung, has made relations between nations his major point of empirical reference. The present paper applies rank-dimensional analysis to the deprived nations of Africa and Asia (or the so-called Third World) in an attempt to grasp the degree of rank homogeneity within the group and to relate its rank characteristics to the more privileged nations in the global system. This exercise demonstrates that there is a linear relationship between total rank and rank disequilibrium in the Afro-Asian group; a finding which has a number of significant theoretical ramifications. The major theoretical innovation in this connexion is the concept of rank divergence—defined as the degree to which a unit in a system of stratification diverges from the typical relational pattern holding between the units total rank and rank disequilibrium scores.

Strategic relations between national societies: a sociological analysis

In recent years sociologists have begun to pay systematic attention to relations between national societies. Inevitably, problems arise as to the relationship between sociological and other kinds of analytic treatment of international phenomena, while the appropriateness of prevalent systems of sociological analysis and theory is also necessarily questioned. In probing the basic relations between national societies in sociological terms, the present paper revolves around these issues at various

Societies, Individuals and Sociology: lntra-Civilisational Themes

On the Scope of Western Sociology and Its Internal Structure With the deaths of Durkheim, Simmel and Weber during the years 1917-1920 a perspective passed from the arena of sociologically-informed analysis which was not to be fully glimpsed again until the 1970s. Each of those three Intellectuals, as well as some of their sociologically Inclined predecessors and contemporaries, had interested themselves in and had written at length about much broader issues than those which were to dominate sociology from the early 1920s until recent years. Those intervening decades were marked by a strong tendency to regard the sociological enterprise as being confined: (1) to the study of lntra-societal phenomena; (2) to the study of strictly Inter-actional and/or lnstitutional-s~stemic issues; (3) to the study of the present and/or to the study of the past in purely synchronic terms; (4) to the study of the objective but

Book Reviews: Sociological Impressionism: a Reassessment of Georg Simmel's Social Theory by David Frisby, London: Heinemann, 1981,pp xi 190

David Frisby attempts to reconstruct and assess &dquo;some of the central themes&dquo; (p viii) of Simmel’s approach to sociological theory &dquo;within the context of his contemporary milieux and the light of contemporary responses to his work&dquo; (p 165). The rationale for the task is &dquo;to confront the paradox of Simmel’s work, namely the enthusiasm with which it was greeted by many of his contemporaries and its relative neglect today&dquo; (p viii). Frisby seeks in that regard &dquo;to rescue Simmel from the time warp within which he seems to be trapped&dquo; but at the same time &dquo;question the tradition within which Simmel’s work is located&dquo; (p viii).