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This article comments on the position papers in the June 1967 issue of Rural Sociology. The author asserts that the papers are a mark of growing maturity of the rural sociology profession. It took years before the state universities and colleges assumed the dominant role of that they have achieved in the development of rural sociology. Contributions of the early sociologists to the applied field are presented to emphasize their historical value.

Rural sociologists are concerned about the present status, the crucial issues, and the future of their group. In 1963, the Committee on the Development of Rural Sociology developed a preliminary list of major issues facing rural sociologists. With the approval of the Council, the members of the committee decided to prepare a set of working papers on some of these major issue areas. These papers would attempt to define more clearly the assumptions, dimensions, and issues, to present different points of view, and to suggest alternative definitions or positions and their probable consequences. Thus, it was hoped that the working papers would provide a structure from which more effective discussion would develop.

The article presents the author's comments on the works of sociologist Robert F. Winch regarding permanence and change in the American family. The author suggests that there may be two significant aspects of a network of extended kin in a nuclear family. One is the literality of kin contacts and other is the presence or absence of formal kin groupings.

The article presents discussion by various sociologists during the fourth working session of the First World Congress for Rural Sociology held in Dijon, France. Sociologist Antonio M. Arce from Costa Rica briefly commented on Pakistani sociologist A.M. Khan's paper entitled "Impact of changes in agriculture on political life in Asia". These comments refer to three different aspects of the paper and are expected to stimulate discussions from the audience. The paper tries to analyse the dynamic relationship between agricultural development efforts and political ferment in Asia and how this interdependence relates to the residues of Western colonialism and the emergence of Russian and Chinese communism. Another sociologist R. Bičanič from Yugoslavia discussed about the interference of politics in sociology. He also discussed the point dealing with the revival of rural sociology in socialist countries, particularly Poland, Czechoslovakia and Yugoslavia. The rural exodus linked with accelerated industrialization has become so intense that agriculture is threatened with a depleted labour force, and this leads to a policy of income parity with industrial workers for agricultural producers also which may have wider political implications.

This article reports on the Fifth World Congress of Sociology organised by the International Sociological Association (ISA), at the Shoreham Hotel, Washington D.C., during 2-8 September, 1962, under the auspices of UNESCO and in collaboration with the American Sociological Association. The meetings brought together 1,030 participants from fifty one countries. Three main themes dealt with were, sociologists, policy-makers and the public, the sociology of development, the nature and problems of sociological theory. Many of the 240 invited contributions and the main papers presented to the plenary sessions are being published in the periodical "Transactions," volumes I and II of which have already appeared. Volumes III and IV will be published during the spring of 1963 and will contain reports on the discussions, a representative selection of the shorter papers and a list of the participants. Grants from the American Council of Learned Societies, the National Science Foundation and the Social Science Research Council enabled the ISA to pay the travel expenses of most of the principal contributors and to offer free charter flight tickets to 80 young research workers from twenty countries.

Information about the Fifth Symposium of the International Association of French-speaking Sociologists held in Quebec, Canada from September 29 to October 4, 1964 is presented. The symposium, chaired by Georges Gurvitch, initially tackled the social classes in Africa and the inequalities that the people in the region experienced. Another paper discussed about the social categories in Arab countries before the popularization of Marxist ideas.

Research on communities often fails to meet two important criteria which permit valid generalizations from the findings. First, studies generally fail to apply the scientific comparative approach and the techniques of multivariate analysis in their design and execution. Second, theory fails to distinguish between properties of communities and properties which are properly classified in other systems. Sociologists who study communities do not share a precise definition of community, nor do they agree how observations about community phenomena are to be incorporated into sociological theory. The discussion that follows will be facilitated, however, if one can make reasonably clear the sense in which this paper deals with the sociological study of community. Community is viewed in this paper as a territorial system. The more comprehensive territorial definitions of community view it as a form of social or ecological organization arising from the fact that people share a common area for their daily activities.

Rural sociologists, for a long time now, have doubted whether their discipline really existed. In the developed countries, the agricultural population has shrunk, so that nowadays it may account for as little as 4 percent of the total gainfully employed population; it has also gradually become more difficult, and even impossible, to put one's finger on the differences between rural and urban. These changes have affected rural sociologists in various ways. Some have left the field altogether. Others have turned their attention to new problems that occur in the countryside, problems that are mostly related to the uses made of open space and natural resources. They have specialized in the sociology of recreation, the sociology of environmental problems, or in regional planning. According to the author, the discipline has not only lost the wholeness it may once have had, but also that the specializations themselves are often marked by the lack of a holistic outlook. It is as if rural sociologists have lost sight of the fact that, whatever phenomenon they study, it is embedded in a context as wide as a total society, and even wider.

The article focuses on the author's comment on sociologists Kingsley Davis and Wilbert E. Moore's paper "Some Principles of Stratification." According to the author, the paper offers some important point but that the argument they advance is contradictory in certain of its implications and therefore defective. The source of the difficulty is to be found in one of the premises of their argument. To state it most simply, the premise asserts, "people desire rewards." This assertion is incontestable, but it is not adequately qualified in their argument. The author shows in the first part of this article how their argument, containing this premise, leads to contradictory implications. Then, in the second part of this article, the author attempts to provide qualifications which he believes will allow Davis and Moore's argument to avoid contradictions and thus give it greater force.

The article focuses on the sociology in and of China. In the general history of social sciences it is assumed that the marriage between sociology and anthropology comes late, having been preceded by a long courtship. China does not fit this pattern. Almost as soon as social sciences were established there anthropology and sociology were intertwined, to be disentangled in a strange way when Communists arrived. To avoid a tedious recitation of evidence just one witness is called upon, a scholar whose later career in the U.S. makes his testimony underline the Chinese paradox. Writing in China in 1944 Francis L.K. Hsu has said in this paper that the word sociology is used synonymously with the term social anthropology. It is customary to date the beginning of sociology in China by the publication of Yen Fu's translation of two chapters of "The Study of Sociology" in 1898. Later a few original works were produced in Chinese and courses of instruction were introduced in universities, it was not until about the 1920s that sociological investigations of any great weight began to be made.

The article presents the autobiography of the sociologist Jan Szczepanski on the tribulations of a Polish sociologist. He started to study philosophy and sociology in 1932 at the University of Poznan, Poland, under Florian Znaniecki. He received the M.A. degree on the basis of a paper on the semantics of Husserl, and the Ph.D. degree on the basis of a dissertation entitled "The Idea of the Milieu in Rural Sociology," written under the direction of Professor Znaniecki in 1939. Both these works, prepared for printing in 1939, were lost during the war and have never been published, only several articles appearing at that time. He brought with him from his home an interest in rural sociology. His father possessed a small farm in the mountain locality of Ustron in Silesia. Work on this farm was therefore his first experience of any social importance. Sociology in Poland was quickly reconstructed. During the first post-war years the author wrote two textbooks, "Development of the Methods of Sociology" and "History of Social Thought in the Nineteenth Century." However, after the turn towards Stalinism, the publication of the manuscripts proved impossible. Instead he published many papers, and wrote in the weeklies, taking part directly in political discussions and polemics.

The article reports on news related to the field of sociology. Dean Hoge has accepted an appointment as Associate Professor in the Sociology Department of Catholic University. Information on recent publications in this field have been presented. Theology and Depth-Theology: a Heschel Distinction by S. Daniel Breslauer, An Interview With Karl Menninger: Pastoral Psychiatrist by David M. Moss. The annual meeting International Society for the Comparative Study of Civilizations to be held at the Center for International Studies, University of Pittsburgh. The topics of sessions planned include analytical problems in the study of civilizations, Islam in civilizational perspective and others. Interested scholars have been invited to submit papers on these and allied topics for presentation at sessions reserved for such contributions. There will be a special session on history and sociology of religion at the Society for the Scientific Study of Religion meetings in Milwaukee, Wiconsin.

This paper constitutes an attempt to extend a style of theoretical activity in sociology which is quite new to their domain. It is theory which rests upon the central postulate of economic theory that of rational man attempting to pursue his selfish interests. Perhaps the central problem in sociological theory is that posed most succinctly by Thomas Hobbes. Why is there not a war of all against all? Hobbes took as problematic what most contemporary sociologists take as given: That a society can exist at all, despite the fact that individuals are born into it wholly self-concerned, and in fact remain largely self-concerned throughout their existence. Conflict within a communal group, which can occur in the process of collective decision-making, illustrates well the dilemma in which sociologists find themselves. Seeing conflict as a massive element in the functioning of society, but unable to say anything about it as social theorists, they split themselves as individuals off from themselves as sociologists: they form "Journals of Conflict Resolution," join disarmament and peace committees, yet continue to purvey sociological theory which has nothing to say about conflict.

This paper tells the story of how and why five rural sociologists were invited to spend a year attached to an American embassy "to study the rural life" in five different Latin-American countries. This paper attempts to report what the sociologists planned to do, to what extent they were able to carry out their plans, and why they could not always do so. The value of such broad types of studies is appraised by the rural sociologists who participated in this enterprise, and their knowledge of the sociologically significant carryovers resulting from their work is reported. The author conferred or corresponded with all who participated in the studies and feels confident that he has faithfully reflected or reported all of the ideas which space has permitted him to present. For the appraisal of limitations of the methods used and the special emphasis given by the different analysts, he accepts sole responsibility. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The purpose of the article is to afford an additional medium of expression for scholars in the field of Rural Sociology. Rural Sociology has always been the joint responsibility of the professional organization of rural sociologists and a sponsoring university. Its history is intimately intertwined with the history of the Rural Sociological Society and its predecessor, the Rural Sociology Section of the American Sociological Society. The history of the journal may be summarized in four periods: (1) the prepublication period when decisions and plans were made; (2) the first five years (1936-40), at Louisiana State University; (3) the next eleven years (1941-51), under the sponsorship of North Carolina State College; and (4) the years at the University of Kentucky (1952-57), four of which fall in the 20-year period covered by this index. Moreover, it will be the policy to solicit manuscripts from workers in foreign countries, although it is intended that all such papers shall deal with some phase of rural social life.

The article presents a comment on a previous paper Some Critical Observations on the Church-Sect Dimension, by Erich Goode, that appeared in the April 1967 issue of the Journal for the Scientific Study of Religion. According to the author of this article, Erich Goode's paper has a double purpose in criticizing the wider legacy of the church-sect distinction. By and large, the author of this article concurs in his evaluation of the former, but perhaps understandably, the author has reservations about his appraisal of the latter. At the risk of overpersonizing the matter, the author wants to defend his own work, his book Social Class in American Protestantism, first before turning to the broader issue. The author appreciates the opportunity to speak offensively about the church-sect distinction in general and defensively about his own work in particular. Somehow the author had never expected more than cursory reviews of his book. In many respects, the analysis was an abortive attempt to turn a sow's ear into a silk purse.

Émile Durkheim's writings on the sociology of the family have generally been neglected by American sociologists. Only in the last few years has there been an increased interest in his contribution to this field. This paper presents some of Durkheim's ideas on the family: his methodological approach to the study of the family and his views on the dysfunctions of divorce. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article presents authors personal thoughts on the pursuit of sociological problems. The author intends to retrace his steps along one path of his intellectual career--the path that links two books, titled, "Social Change in the Industrial Revolution," and "Theory of Collective Behavior," and a number of recent articles and papers on sociological theory and psychological theory. The main emphasis in the article was on the need for a determinate synthesis of the several classes of variables that are essential for the explanation of collective behavior such as cultural, social, psychological, ecological and other variables. In attempting to sort out the major influences on his choice of sociological problems, he resorts to a device that he find congenial and helpful: to arrange these influences in a series extending from very general, predisposing influences which have steered his intellectual interests to the very specific, immediate influences that have determined a particular strategy of analysis in working on a sociological problem.

The article reports on the eighteenth biennial congress of the Institut International de Sociologie (IIS), held in Nürnberg, Germany from September 10 to 18, 1958. The congress was attended by 295 participants including 221 from 31 countries. Several hundred papers were discussed during the first four days. After these sessions, the members traveled for five days to see postwar Germany. They viewed the reconstruction of Kassel, East Germany and West and East Berlin. The receiving station at Marienfeld in the West Berlin was also inspected. It is the place where peoples who flee from East Germany are held until their placement in West German industries and occupations. IIS is the oldest sociological organization, founded by René Worms at Paris in 1893. Scientific papers may be written in English, French, Spanish, Italian, or German. They are printed in bound volumes for distribution to the members. Membership is elective but national quotas are limited to prevent one country's domination. Eminent sociologist, Professor Hans Freyer, was president of this congress. Professor K. Valentin, general secretary of the U.S., was host this year.

In his challenging paper, in June 1972 sociologist Joseph Fichter asks social scientists to redefine man as an "authentic human being" and to put this human being "in the center of social studies." As a proponent of Weberian sociology, the author agrees with these objectives and endorses the critique of the physicalist determinism of behaviorist psychologists and positivist sociologists. Neither the thesis of the emergence of "human nature" nor the theory of the development of the conception of "self" in an individual have to be subjected to determinist interpretations. Man is not merely but also an organism and social scientists concerned with `human nature,' have to take account of this basic fact. Attempting this, in itself, does not deny Man's fundamental humanity which is embedded in his original potentialities. But it takes not simply physical care but love, attention, and "training" by others to bring these potentialities to their realization. Fichter argues that "a human baby, raised in a family of monkeys," would not "become nonhuman."

This article focuses on the research papers published in this issue of the journal "Marriage and Family Living." The research paper "Research in family dynamics: A criticism and a proposal," focuses on the extensive use of questionnaires in the study of interpersonal family relations. The study suggests the clinical approach by family sociologists who have been trained in psychodynamics as a more appropriate technique which is also capable of progressive refinement. The research paper "Family-oriented treatment of marital problems," highlights the special aspects of family-oriented treatment of marital problems in a family agency focus attention on the interaction between husband and wife. A sound clinical understanding of each partner is essential, but it is equally important that the relationship between the partners be understood. Another research paper "Are educators afraid of sex?" attempts to show that there is a trend toward emotional withdrawal from sex instruction in family life education today.

The article presents information on family as a small group association. Sociologist Reuben Hill's review of family studies includes, as one approach, the conceptualization of the family as a small group association. Sociologist George Homans is mentioned in this connection, though, perhaps naturally, few words are devoted to his actual contribution. His contribution has been both direct in terms of writings on role-relations within the family and indirect in terms of generalizations about small groups which prove to be useful in its study. The present paper follows this indirect route. Interaction frequency and intensity of liking have proven to be two of the more useful variables in small group research. Homans' proposition that "persons who interact frequently with one another tend to like one another" is taken as the starting point for a discussion of some aspects of role-relationships in the English family, mainly that of the traditional working-class. Interaction normally varies with liking only if the interaction is freely chosen and can he broken off when desired. If a member of a group is forced to interact with someone he does not like, the chances are at least as great that he will dislike the other more, as that he will come to like him after all. It seems fair to take length of courtship as a measure of the variables with which people are here concerned and to predict a correlation between interaction, affection and understanding.

The fact is that the lower classes are not more likely than the middle class to have a disease or condition but they do react more violently to it and are more concerned about it. Nonetheless, neither sociologists nor public health researchers have for the most part taken proper note of the split between getting sick and reacting to it. For example in a recent general review of chronic illness the author does not even mentions his own study which shows no relationship between class and the prevalence of illness. Rather, he shows that some few chronic illnesses diagnosed in hospitals are related to living in lower class neighborhoods. Yet, he avoids making an overall statement about chronic illness and social class. There are obviously sonic problems here in the sociology of Sociology. First, there is a serious problem in the interpretation of tables which is caused by a lack of satisfactory non-parametric measures of association and analyses of variance. Second, there is a fallacy of forgetting why it is thought that social class was related to illness in the first place. The present paper concludes that social factors are important in the experience of ill health, although not in the gross fashion that had been imagined.

Processes of perception and thought are such that anyone who reads a book is necessarily selective in absorbing the author's meaning. What one reader thinks the author was saying may not coincide with what the author intended to say nor with another reader's perception of what the author meant. The first time the author read Robert M. Maclver's book "Social Causation" the parts which most caught his attention made the book seem at best a weak defense of the Verstehende approach in sociology or at worst a thoroughly animistic and anti-scientific treatise. This article, demonstrates the MacIver's book, like some of the works of other sociologists, explains a need of innovation in the basic concepts of sociology. Although Maclver will be cited more often than any other author. This paper is not intended as mere exegesis of one man's thoughts. Maclver is taken as a specimen, more or less representative of others. The interpretations offered in this article are intended to apply to sociology rather than to just this particular sociologist.

The article presents announcements and news notes regarding the call for papers for 1970 annual meeting. Plans for the 1970 Rural Sociological Society meetings to be held in the Sheraton Park Hotel in Washington D.C. in August are progressing. Some guidelines have been established for the submission of papers for the 1970 program. Completed papers and an abstract of each paper must be submitted to the Program Committee no later than April 1, 1970. The theme for the 1970 annual meeting of the Rural Sociological Society is "Societal Change". Rural Sociological Society policy on participation will apply to all sessions other than general sessions; each author is limited to a single paper on the program unless he is a joint author of two papers; a sole author of one paper may also serve as chairman, discussant, or panel member of the same or one other session on the program; a person not listed as author or co-author of a paper may serve as a chairman, a discussant, or a panel member of two sessions or any combination thereof.

A unique feature of rural sociology as a discipline is the number of professionally trained staff members who are primarily engaged in applying sociological knowledge and skills to social problems. The purpose of this paper is to analyze this practitioner role. Particular attention will be directed to understanding certain conditions long associated with the role of the sociologists in Extension, i.e., low prestige compared to that of research staff, lack of relevant knowledge to approach some situations, barriers to communication between the researcher and the practitioner, and inappropriate graduate training for those who take on the applied role.

The article presents a restudy of Tepoztlán culture and criticizes the folk-urban hypothesis. Certainly there are phenomena that represent social disorganization; but the term has been used so commonly for social reorganization that perhaps it should be abolished. The study of man has demonstrated few things more clearly than the universality of socio-cultural change. Change need not be confused with the idea of progress, but neither should it always be labeled "disorganization." Both in this paper and in his major work, Sociologist Lewis Writh has presented us with many provocative ideas. Although one cannot concede that he has given final answers on all points, he has made constructive suggestions which represent important contributions to anthropology and, in at least some degree, to sociology. Lewis suggests that Robert Redfield's earlier study of Tepoztlán was directed primarily toward testing the folk concept rather than at producing a reasonably complete ethnography. This seems a legitimate comment; but Lewis's assertion, at least by implication, that his book is an attempt at a complete ethnography approaches correctness only if his work is read in connection with Redfield's. Even so, a complete study of Tepoztlán material culture has yet to be published.

The article presents a response of the author on comments made by sociologists N.J. Demerath and A.W. Eister on the church-sect dimension. I am provoked much more to agreement than to debate. There are, nonetheless, points which call for clarification and further conceptualization. We will begin with Eister's sweeping statements since his critique and my own are more complementary than contradictory. It is wrong, however, to infer that I am attempting to salvage the church-sect typology, to criticize only a part of it and to replace that part with an improved part, so that the basic edifice of church-sect will be retained. I must assert that the basic intention of my paper was to show how and why the church-sect dimension was faulty and to show this empirically. In order to offer an adequate critique of any theoretical tool, it has to be taken apart piece by piece, if nearly all the pieces are faulty as I would assert is true of church-sect then we are left with an unusable tool, one which must be either entirely remade, or discarded altogether. Eister suggests that this is too trivial and partial, that the tool ought to be smashed without reference to its component parts.

This paper reports findings of a study dealing with some factors associated with religious and political affiliation in a college population. Specifically, relationships between religious affiliation, belief and participation, political orientation and socio-economic status are examined. The influence of religion on secular activity has long been of interest to sociologists. The classical works of sociologist Emile Durkheim and Max Weber. Among college populations, the study provides the most comprehensive body of empirical data on students' religious values and their correlates. The article reports that religious belief is widespread but that commitment is rare. Substantial differences are found among major religious groups. Catholic students score highest on a scale of religiousness and Jewish students score lowest with Protestants falling in between. This article also deals with the relationship between parents' religious orientation and the students' religious beliefs.

According to the author, it is appropriate, after concluding the book A Decade of Development, to take stock of where the study of development has taken sociologists and where it has gone wrong. That it has gone wrong is painfully obvious given the meager results of efforts to improve the quality of life in most third world countries as well as the attempts on the part of advanced capitalistic countries to enhance the life chances of their less-advantaged sectors. A portion of these mistakes may be attributed to methodological errors on the part of those engaged in the study of development. The present paper attempts to review some recent approaches to the study of development and suggest what future steps are needed to develop a clearer understanding of the issues and approaches to developmental concerns. The major approaches to the sociological study of development may be divided into two broad camps that roughly conform to the unit-ideas that form the foundations of sociology. These unit-ideas range from conservative to radical philosophical assumptions. In everyday terms these two broad camps are usually referred to as equilibrium models or conflict models.

The theme for this Third World Congress for Rural Sociology was selected by a working group, which met in Rome, Italy at FAO headquarters in the summer of 1969. This group included eminent scholars with diverse national and cultural backgrounds. It, therefore, must be considered a commentary on the appropriateness of the theme selected that a consensus was achieved in a relatively short period of time. This theme, Development Policies and Rural Life, was considered in keeping with research and action programs, which were being implemented by rural sociologists and other social scientists in almost all nations of the world. In light of the serious nature of the deliberation with regards to the theme and program of the Congress and in view of the objective which inspired the decisions, it occurred to the author that it would be appropriate to attempt a paper which was keynoted on ways to lessen the degree of incoherence and incongruity which characterizes the arena within which sociologists contemplate the field of rural development. According to the author, his tact has been to scrutinize as objectively as possible the two separate but inextricably related issues over which controversy is centered.

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The article discusses the governmental farm policies as a zero-sum game in which one segment, commercial farmers, gains while another segment, farm labor and rural people, lose. Evaluation research is a neglected area of sociology. Methodology and skills in conducting evaluative research need improvement. Sociologists can make contributions to measuring goal accomplishments and explaining the process by which the program objectives are established and the program is implemented. Sociological knowledge should have utility in goal formation. Sociologists have envied the money measure used by economists. They are only now seriously searching for indicators or standards by which to compare returns or payoffs to various segments of society. They usually arrive at "quality of social relationships" or "improved life's chances" but these are multi-dimensional and not easy to quantify. Rural sociologists have been oriented primarily to build a body of knowledge and to discipline problems, rather than to undertake research on the problems of the rural society. Analysis of farm policies would require a focus on current rural societal problems.

The article presents discussion by various sociologists during the closing session of the First World Congress for Rural Sociology held in Dijon, France. According to sociologist Orlando Fals Borda, The nature of the problems of development experienced today in Latin America and the paucity of basic arid responsible general materials of the type useful for research, makes it almost mandatory that the social scientist be not too specialized. Specifically this means that there should not be rural sociologists. According to sociologist P. von Blanckenburg, if one characterises the special patterns of the American rural sociology as a sharp limitation to the social process in its narrow sense, a strong predominance of empirical research and an outstanding carefulness in interpretation and generalisation of research findings one must admit, that a similar rural sociology was developed in Europe only after the war. Another sociologist Z. Mlinar from Yugoslavia told that in the past, sociologists have not paid enough attention to central sociological concepts, neither have determined what these concepts were. This is because a great number of rural sociologists are not yet professionally skilled in sociology and even less in rural sociology and expectation is that in the future this situation will be improved.

Educators, psychologists and sociologists have generally agreed upon the importance of early childhood in the formation of personality and character. No doubt this emphasis is well placed. However, there is still much to be found out about the conditions or kinds of experiences which make for significant differences in subsequent development. It is the major purpose of this paper to present a report of some efforts to evaluate the extent to which nursery school and kindergarten experiences can be shown to make a difference in classroom social adjustments in subsequent elementary school grades.

Over recent years, sociologists have devoted considerable attention to the comparative analysis of industrialized societies. Perhaps the major impetus for such interest has been the discussion the so-called "thesis of convergence" has generated. Although this thesis tends to focus upon "structural" features of societies, there have been other arguments which have suggested that such developments are related to changes of a more "cultural" kind. Researcher A. Inkeles has put forward the view that industrial modes of production particularly of the large-scale bureaucratic kind, generate structural environments and institutional features which lead to relatively consistent patterns of attitudinal responses. This paper is an attempt to re-examine Inkeles' thesis in the light of empirical data for two industrial societies, namely England and Sweden. More particularly, the emphasis is upon the perceptions of various aspects of social stratification. In order to test Inkeles' thesis, the findings of a number of empirical studies have been synthesized. But it is important to stress the problems of comparability. The studies have been conducted at various points of time; different research designs have been utilized; and the objectives of the studies have often been quite different.

This article discusses the book "Readings in the Philosophy of the Social Sciences," edited by May Brodbeck. The author gives attention to three topics discussed in this anthology. The first is the controversy over whether the account of explanation given by sociologist Hempel is applicable in the human as well as in the natural sciences. The second theme in the anthology obviously relevant to sociologist is that of methodological individualism versus holism. Many of the papers in this anthology characterize at one level the alternatives confronting a scientist whose theorizing confronts either empirical or conceptual difficulties. Just because actions are informed by intentions and purposes, and intentions and purposes presuppose beliefs, so a social role-which specifies and prescribes or permits certain courses of action for certain types of person presupposes certain beliefs. The matter of the philosophy of science may not only be regulative as regards the form of our theories and the lessons to be learnt here may well be one that the sociologist now feels have been conveyed to him almost too often-but suggestive as to their content.

The argument of this paper is firstly, that public opinion is a complex process that cannot properly be measured by an arbitrary cross-section of opinions. Secondly, that pollsters adopt a different definition of public opinion that makes certain value assumptions and thirdly, that-even on the pollsters own definition, measures of opinion on controversial issues offered by commercial polls cannot readily be validated and are as practical guides to public opinion of doubtful value. The practice of public opinion polling implicitly treats public opinion as opinions of all members of a defined universe, such as the electorate, as measured by means of standard questions presented to an appropriate sample. It is a sign of the influence of the polls that current discussion of public opinion tends to take this definition for granted. Criticism there certainly is, on both technical and constitutional grounds. But few people challenge the implied definition of public opinion. Political scientists and sociologists have given systematic expression to the view that public opinion derives from activities of restricted numbers of people, typically organized in groups.

The purpose of this short paper is to review the present the position of industrial sociology as an academic discipline as of September 1959. It will focus therefore on its approach, its field of inquiry, the selection of problems for study, methods used and the present provision for its pursuit. The treatment given to the article is analytical rather than descriptive, since it can be assumed that most sociologists will have some knowledge of particular developments and various researches in this field, and only passing reference will therefore be made to them. There is still a tendency to use the term industrial sociology compendiously, to refer to all developments in the study of social relations in industry, in a manner which is reminiscent of the way in which the role of sociology itself was seen at one time simply as synoptic. This tendency of course is indicative of the developmental stage of the subject, but is quite illegitimate and emphasizes the need for clarification of the special position of industrial sociology.

Five phases of sociologists' approaches to education in society are identified. A discussion of the analysis of internal problems of education systems is followed by a more detailed consideration of education and the values-consensus of social classes as it arises particularly in the work of French, Eastern European and Latin American sociologists. In conclusion, the sociological approach to education is set in historical perspective. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Before discussing the main theme of this paper, namely, the research being conducted by Soviet sociologists in their study of the family, it seems necessary to say a few words about what is, in the final analysis, the most important thing, that is the moral views of Soviet people and the standards of behavior they strive for. Communist morality, as can be seen from this brief list of the standards of behavior of Soviet citizens, includes the basic rules common to all mankind. At the same time, as the building of the new society progresses, communist morality becomes enriched with new principles and contents. This is not a matter of one day or even a year. This process of the formation of new qualities in man who has been freed from exploitation and has become the master of his own fate is going on in the Soviet Union and will continue to go on even more intensively. All of this gives the Soviet sociologists extremely rich material for their study of the family as a historical phenomenon connected with the development of society as a whole.

To begin with one should note that any study of change in the Japanese family must go back over three periods-the pre-Meiji period, the Meiji and post-Meiji period and the post-second world war period. And, in fact, recent sociological studies in Japanese family cover not only the latter stage but the others as well. It would hardly be possible to attempt a complete survey of the trends of these studies in this paper, since considerable background knowledge is needed of the peculiar characteristics of the Japanese family system and of the special concepts employed. Nevertheless, some of the more important aspects can be discussed here. As is well known, the family and the village are the two fields of Japanese sociology in which sociological research had already made a great deal of progress, even before the war. These two fields overlap to a large extent. With the possible exception of the first family sociologist, T. Toda, family sociologists who have made the most important contributions, such as K. Ariga and K. Kitano, are also the rural sociologists. Their studies of the Japanese family have been carried out in relation to the village, and particularly in relation to the "ie," or traditional family system, and the dozoku, which is a sort of special institutional group composed of several it.

The article focuses on sociologist Peter L. Berger's definition of religion. In his stimulating article in the June 1974 issue of Journal for the Scientific Study of Religion, Berger presents an argument for reconsidering the kind of definition employed in the scientific study of religion. The major thread of his argument runs as follows. Concepts and definitions are tools fitted to the purposes of the investigator, like substantive or functional definitions of religion. Some use functional definitions for ideological purposes, that is to avoid specifically religious experience or to deny the transcendent. The scientific study of religion needs a reinvigorated substantive definition of religion from the phenomenological approaches of analysis of the numinous as religious experience and of model of multiple realities. The author agrees with Berger's approach while disagreeing with the impact of the total argument. The author holds that there are issues in the formation of concepts and definitions which are logically prior to the purposes of investigators.

The article explores the nature of the "rural-urban fringe" in the light of what is known, and to suggest, if possible, plausible hypotheses for investigation. The rural-urban fringe is currently a subject of rowing interest to sociologists. In the United States today, the "fringe" not only includes a substantial portion of the total population; it is also the most rapidly growing element in the population. Sociologists have customarily subdivided the total population into two parts: rural and urban. By doing so they have conceptually created two "worlds," presumed to differ from each other in culture and in mode of life. But there are some indications that the growing rural-urban fringe fits neither of these classifications. Furthermore, there are those who regard "rural" and "urban" as simply two aspects of a single continuum. It would appear that at this stage three hypotheses are possible: (1) The rural-urban fringe represents a position on a continuum within a single rural-urban distribution. (2) The rural-urban fringe represents an overlapping of two distinct distributions-the rural and the urban-providing a scrambled confusion within the area of overlap. (3) The rural-urban fringe represents a third distribution with some characteristics of both the rural and the urban, but with some new ones found only in the "fringe."

The article presents information and announcements related to the field of rural sociology. The Social Research Center of the American University in Cairo announces openings for sociologists, anthropologists, and economists on its research staff. Research will include problems of social and economic developments social aspects of physical planning of the city of Aswan, labor problems the High Dam, Nubian resettlement, demography and family planning, settlement of nomads, and marketing. The article presents announcement about the fiftieth anniversary of the beginning of rural sociology at Cornell University, which will be observed with a dinner program in April 1965. The Council of the Southern Mountains is seeking a research director for a project under a Ford Foundation grant. The article reports on new projects as like the Farm Population Branch of the U.S. Department of Agriculture is cooperating with the University of Kentucky in the preparation of a monograph on the rural aged in the United States. The article also reports that sociologist Ismail Ajami has returned to Iran after completing his Ph.D. work at Cornell and Fuad C. Baali has been appointed Assistant Professor of Sociology at the University of Florida.

This article discusses several developments related to academic activities and appointments in field of sociology, from various universities and colleges in the U.S. Howard W. Been, the University of Kentucky's head of the Departments of Sociology and Rural Sociology, is in New Delhi, India, serving as a community development adviser to the Indian government. He is employed by the Ford Foundation. He is expected to return in July, 1959. John H. Mabry has been appointed associate medical sociologist in the University Medical Center and associate professor of sociology. He was formerly on the staff of the Upstate Medical Center in Syracuse, New York. In Mississippi State University, at the invitation of the Department of Sociology and Rural Life, a review panel visited in October to discuss and make recommendations about the research program. In Ohio State University, Robert M. Dimit, associate professor, has been promoted to the position of extension leader in research. He replaces Harold R. Capener, who is in India for two years as part of the Ohio State-India team. Dimit has recently completed a study of membership relations in the Ohio Farm Bureau Federation.

This article presents news related to rural sociology as of March 1, 1936. The annual business meeting of the Section on Rural Sociology, American Sociological Society, was held at the Commodore Hotel, New York City on December 29, 1935. The meeting was called to order by the Chairman of the Section, B.L. Hummel, at 9:45 a.m. Minutes of the 1934 meeting were read and approved. Several members of the section suggested the need for improved publication facilities for rural sociologists and for an improved and enlarged annual program to include material of interest to teachers of rural sociology as well as the research and extension personnel.

The article presents views of authors on the article "On Freedom and Organization," by Stephen W. Forbes. According to authors, professor Forbes's excursion into the realm of human freedom is a timely investigation of a subject, which many social scientists, particularly those professionally concerned with business behavior, have often, been content to leave well alone. For example, Peter Berger states that "freedom is not empirically available" to social researchers while to many other sociologists, eager to earn the title "scientist," man's social life is "determined," i.e. subject to invariant laws. There is a sense in which it is possible to produce evidence for whatever view of mankind one holds and it has not been difficult for social scientists to "prove" the capacity of man to inflict pain, to be highly aggressive, to conform blindly and to cheat. Although Forbes employs several useful quotations from writers such as Dewey, Tillich and Hayek on the nature and limits of human freedom, he fails to draw upon the work of others in this field.

The article focuses on sociologist Pierre-Joseph Proudhon's sociology of war. Estimation of the central role of military conflict in history and the life of society has been a traditional one, reaching back in western civilization at least as far as classical Greece. It is not surprising that war has been continuously subject to study by sociologists and other students of social phenomena. The 19th century was particularly rich in such studies. Among those who made contributions were socialists of differing hues and schools, such as the Saint-Simonians and Marxists. Although the theories of war of some of these socialists have been subject to scholarly study, the important writings on war of the father of modern anarcho-socialism and the rival of Karl Marx, Proudhon, has received relatively little serious attention. The purpose of this paper is to present succinctly Proudhon's sociology of war in order that his contribution may receive recognition. At the outset Proudhon's distinctive approach to the study of war can be brought sharply into focus by contrasting it with the writings on the subject by some of the leading French socialist theoreticians of his own day like Louis Blanc, Victor Considérant, and Constantin Pecqueur.

Three basic problems with the church-sect dimension are raised: its definition, empirical correlates, and the association of its defining elements. The last question is examined in detail. Several elements presumed to be essential to a definition of church-sect are demonstrated to have no basis in fact. A re-examination of the concept is called for. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]