Transforming Social Action Into Social Change PDF Download

Author: Shana Cohen
Publisher: Taylor & Francis
ISBN: 1351683519
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 152

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Book Description
Cohen offers a new framework for analyzing social projects and local social activism. Rather than look at how single projects are designed and managed to evaluate their impact, the approach calls for analyzing fields of social action: policy and politics, institutional behavior, social networks among policymakers and practitioners, and availability of funding and other resources. Combined, they affect the conceptualization of a social problem and the design and practice of social intervention. More broadly, through circumscribing the range of thinking about social problems, they delimit possibilities to generate social change. Analyzing fields also allows for linking macro-level trends in areas like policy to decision-making within individual organizations and the effectiveness of projects at instigating the desired transformation in individual and collective behavior. Working together, policymakers, individual activists, nonprofit organizations, and staff in public institutions like schools and hospitals can critique and alter fields to challenge more effectively social problems. This collaboration, in turn, affects how social policies are designed and, ultimately, the politics of social change.

Author: Francine T. Sherman
Publisher: Springer Science & Business Media
ISBN: 1461544033
Category : Psychology
Languages : en
Pages : 328

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Book Description
John F. Kerry United States Senator If we are to reinvigorate and reinforce civic participation in this country at a time when our society is increasingly fragmented and highly technologically based, we must find a way to unite distinct communities, such as universities, regional and non-profit organizations, and families. We must find ways to link academicians, students, teachers, and professionals with the reality of events and circumstances so that theories and ideas mightily pursued within the "ivory tower" are connected to social reality and useful. As the editors and contributors in this volume point out, the way to bridge theory/practice divide is not merely to interpret and report on circumstances of the real-world; but rather, to deconstruct the separate and distinct communities that exist within our society and actively engage other communities to realize a continuum of mutual understanding, collaboration, and action. It is crucial to include our nation's public schools in this new approach of social inquiry and social action. Improving and creating educational opportunity for all children in the United States has been an ongoing critical federal issue. We know that when children achieve in school they have a much greater chance of living healthy, productive adult lives that will benefit themselves and society, and we know that increasing the base of stakeholders in children's education yields those positive results.

Author: Piotr Sztompka
Publisher: University of Chicago Press
ISBN: 9780226788159
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 236

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Book Description
In Society in Action, Piotr Sztompka sets forth a highly topical contribution to central theoretical debates of contemporary sociology. Taking the idea and practice of collective mobilization as his theme, Sztompka argues that modern institutions, particularly of late, are characterized by an increasing awareness of collective empowerment. The most obvious concrete expression of this phenomenon, as Sztompka makes clear, is the rise of a diversity of active social movements such as those which dramatically transformed Europe in the 1980s, from the birth of Solidarity in 1980 to the 1989 "Autumn of Nations." Sztompka connects the interpretations of such collective activity to a wider grasp of the nature of social action. The result is a comprehensive and original theory of social change which focuses on the self-transforming influence on society of its members' striving for freedom, autonomy, and self-fulfillment. He develops his theory by means of a general concept of "social becoming," the roots of which he traces to the early romantic and humanist work of Karl Marx and his followers and to two influential sociological schools of today, the theory of agency and historical sociology. Sztompka situates his theory midway between the rigid determinism of social totalities and the unbridled voluntarism of free individuals. Social change, he demonstrates, can be understood neither as the outcome of individual actions taken alone nor as structurally determined actions. Instead, he confers upon social organizations and movements a "self-transcending" quality: they express human agency yet, by virtue of their active character, are quite often able to achieve unpredictable outcomes. Throughout his analysis of social movements and revolutions in history, Sztompka emphasizes the dynamics of spontaneous social change generated from below—a theoretical testimony to the rapid and fundamental social change in Eastern Europe in recent history. Against the fashions of postmodernist malaise, boredom, and disenchantment, his theory of social becoming expresses the possibility of emancipation, of change leading to positive gains. His work registers a belief in progress, not inevitably gained, but its attainment fully dependent upon the creativity and optimism of an active citizenry.

Author: Liddell Henry
Publisher: Scientific e-Resources
ISBN: 1839474300
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 304

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Book Description
Socialization is predominately an unconscious process by which a new born child learns the values, beliefs, rules and regulations of society or internalizes the culture in which it born. Social control is described in detail at the end of the book. It is intended as a book for undergraduate and postgraduate students of sociology and a reference tool to the researchers and academic professionals this comprehensive and well-structured book presents in a systematic way the Social Control and Social Change. The book is undoubtedly a valuable asset for the students, researchers as well as teachers of sociology. In addition, general readers concerned with social aspects and social progress will find it extremely informative.

Author: Brady Wagoner
Publisher: IAP
ISBN: 1617357596
Category : Psychology
Languages : en
Pages : 359

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Book Description
This book brings together social sciencists to create an interdisciplinary dialogue on the topic of social change as a cultural process. Culture is as much about novelty as it is about tradition, as much about change as it is about stability. This dynamic tension is analyzed in collective protests, intergroup dynamics, language, mass media, science, community participation, art, and social transitions to capitalism, among others contexts. These diverse cases illustrate a number of key factors that can propel, slow-down and retract social change. An emancipatory and integrative social science is developed in this book, which offers a new explanatory model of human behavior and thought under conditions of institutional and societal change.

Author: Etiony Aldarondo
Publisher: Psychology Press
ISBN: 0805855181
Category : Education
Languages : en
Pages : 522

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Book Description
Advancing Social Justice Through Clinical Practice is a comprehensive volume that bridges the gap between the psychosocial realities of clients and the dominant clinical practices. The book's contributors include social workers, family therapists, clinical psychologists, community psychologists, and counseling psychologists. Its accessible writing style makes it valuable to students studying the field.

Author: David Gershon
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 424

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Book Description
If "change" is the mantra of our moment in history, Social Change 2.0 may be poised to become its bible. Drawing on his three decades in the trenches of large-scale societal transformation, David Gershon--founder and president of Empowerment Institute, and described by the United Nations as a "graceful revolutionary"--offers an original and comprehensive roadmap to bring about fundamental change in our world. His goal is to empower change agents to tackle pressing social problems or unmet social needs by providing them with strategies and tools to effect transformative change at any level of scale.From his initiation as architect of the United Nations-sponsored First Earth Run--a mythic passing of fire around the world symbolizing humanity's quest for peace on earth that drew tens of millions of participants, the planet's political leaders and, through the media, over a billion people at the height of the cold war--to his recent climate-change work helping citizens, cities, and entire states measurably reduce their carbon footprint (using his book Low Carbon Diet), Gershon offers readers strategies to evolve an effective new model for social change. These include: The first comprehensive social-change model with proven, practical strategies and tools to either launch a social change initiative or improve the efficacy of any existing change program. A "Practitioner's Guide" accompanying each chapter, to help readers apply this social change framework to their initiative. The result is a riveting, enlightening, and inspiring book that will quickly find its way onto the desks--and into the hearts--of the tens of thousands of change agents engaged in the work of building a better world. Social Change 2.0 speaks to a wide range of practitioners across the spectrum of social change including social and environmental activists, social entrepreneurs, community organizers, and civic, government, and business leaders, as well as the vast number of baby boomers looking for a way to give back and the millennials just raring to go.

Author: Timo Harrikari
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 1317054075
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 222

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Book Description
Social Change and Social Work discusses and examines how social work is challenged by social, political and economic tendencies going on in current societies. The authors ask how social work as a discipline and practice is encountering global and local transformations. Divided into three parts, topics covered include the changing social work mandate throughout history; social work paradigms and theoretical considerations; phenomenological social work; practice research; and gender and generational research. Taken together, the chapters in this anthology provide an authoritative and up-to-date overview of current discussions within the European social work research community.

Author: Saundra M. Tomlinson-Clarke
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 1317577914
Category : Education
Languages : en
Pages : 185

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Book Description
The similarities between the United States and South Africa with respect to race, power, oppression and economic inequities are striking, and a better understanding of these parallels can provide educational gains for students and educators in both countries. Through shared experiences and perspectives, this volume presents scholarly work from U.S. and South African scholars that advance educational practice in support of social justice and transformative learning. It provides a comprehensive framework for developing transformational learning experiences that facilitates leadership for social justice, and a deeper understanding of the factors influencing personal, national and global identity.

Author: Antonio Sandu
Publisher: Cambridge Scholars Publishing
ISBN: 1443894265
Category : Philosophy
Languages : en
Pages : 185

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Book Description
The central focus of this volume is social constructionism in all its dimensions, including its sociological, ontological, epistemological, methodological, ethical, and pragmatic features. It pays particularly close attention to the social construction of reality as a communicative action, extending this area to include social pragmatics. It also interprets social action as a discursive-seductive strategy of exercising power in the public space, utilising a constructionist understanding, in which public space is represented by any part of the co-construction of reality through social or communicative action. In addition, at the methodological level, the book proposes a new semiotic strategy, called “fractal constructionism”, which analyses the interpretative drift of certain key concepts that are valued as social constructs.