Acta Sociologica

As European governments have embraced the credo of austerity, the perennial discussion whether welfare states erode the quality of social networks has taken on a more prominent position on political and social science research agendas. While non-believers of this so-called ‘crowding out’ thesis argue that social networks flourish well in welfare states, believers argue that welfare provisions render social networks irrelevant in mobilizing resources. Using the 2010 wave of the European Social Survey, we analyse the extent to which both the welfare state and social networks have prevented deprivation, as well as the extent to which the functional quality of social networks in inhibiting impoverishment differs as a function of welfare state generosity. Both the ‘crowding out’ and the ‘crowding in’ theses are supported: resources are less mobilized through networks in more generous welfare states precisely because encompassing welfare provisions reduce deprivation significantly, lowering the functional quality of social networks.

The article proposes a systems-theoretical approach to political clientelism. It places political clientelism in the theoretical framework of a democratic political system characterized by internal differentiation in government and bureaucracy, party politics and a politically relevant public. Against the background of existing research on the link between democracy and political clientelism, it uses Luhmann’s concept of power and more specifically his model of the formal and the informal power cycle to point out parallels and differences between a political system based on expectations with regard to policies and a political system in which clientelistic expectations prevail. Democratic political systems are based on formal, legally codified power and informal power. Clientelistic power is a special form of informal power affecting this interplay, as the example of democratization in Mexico shows. Political systems with clientelistic expectations differ from those with a policy orientation with regard to the complexity of policies, the generalization of political support, the bases for personalization, the pattern of interest articulation and the most prominent external influences on the system.

This article sets out the argument that ‘family’ relations constitute so many small-scale ‘fields’ in Pierre Bourdieu’s sense. It does so primarily to put on firmer conceptual ground a valuable means of making sense of how broader structures of social and cultural domination are lived, reproduced and transformed in everyday life, though in so doing it also intends to challenge those who believe Bourdieu has little to offer scholars of familial life. Using Bourdieu’s own brief reflections as a point of departure, it proceeds by putting substantive flesh on the foundational notion that ‘family’ constitutes a contested yet ‘realized’ category of thought before then sketching the constituent elements of family fields, namely internal doxa, struggles over capital, the existence of boundaries and embeddeness in broader ‘universes’ of family fields.

Although social movement organizations (SMOs) are often depicted as mobilizing intensive resources from their individual members, we lack a systematic assessment of this issue. Based on the notion of ‘modern social movements’ I argue that SMOs mobilize fewer human and monetary resources from their members than other voluntary organizations do. A regression model using a survey representative of American adults shows that, when compared to other organization members, SMO members generally contribute significantly lower amounts of money and time. They are also less likely to attend, plan or chair meetings, and give speeches on behalf of the organization. The only exception to this pattern is that SMO members are more likely to write letters for the organization than other members do.

In this article we study some of the overlooked mechanisms of how social origin affects an individual’s occupational success at labour market entry. The empirical analysis draws on four Dutch retrospective life-course surveys. The analytical sample consists of 6,416 respondents born in the period 1931–80. The results show intergenerational transmission of occupational status, but the effect of father’s occupation on his child’s first job has declined over time. Part of the decreased impact of social origin is related to the increased age at first job. Educational expansion prolonged the school career of individuals and increased the age at which they first enter the labour market, when parental control and influence matter less. The effect of level of education has decreased over time too, at an even faster rate. Because of that, a trend from ascription to achievement cannot be confirmed. Furthermore, we found evidence of a weaker impact of social origin on occupational status attainment for the higher educated. The labour market for higher levels of education is more meritocratic, as employers use the degree to which various educational programmes at these levels provide occupation-specific skills to evaluate the labour productivity of potential workers.