Natural hazard events and social capital: the social impact of natural disasters

This study investigates if and to what extent natural disasters affect social capital. Twelve different events in Europe are examined in a quantitative analysis, using data derived from the European Social Survey and the EM‐DAT International Disaster Database. The study uses social trust as an indicator of social capital and offers evidence that a change in social trust is a possible occurrence during or after a disaster, but that it is not an inevitable consequence of it. The results reveal that social trust decreases after a disaster with a death toll of at least nine. Changes in social capital, therefore, are found to be more probable as the severity of the event increases. National, rather than regional, disasters lead more frequently to significant shifts in social trust. This evaluation of 12 separate cases pinpoints several disasters that have had an effect on social trust, but it does not identify any general patterns, underlining the significance of contextual dependency.     

排污权交易市场中具有激励相容性的双边拍卖机制

针对排污权交易市场的交易机制设计问题,描述了多个排污权出售方和购买方治污量和产量的最优决策问题,基于单边拍卖的缺点,设计出了一个激励相容的双边拍卖机制.结果表明,此机制在描述排污权交易市场竞价规则的基础上,设计出了符合排污权市场特点的出清和交易规则,不仅能保证排污权交易市场实时出清,使理性的企业披露自己真实的治污成本,而且能够使污染物平均处理成本低的企业承担更多的处理量,达到了社会治污成本最小化.最后通过算例验证了该机制的有效性和实用性.     

The Moderating Role of Hardiness and Social Support in the Relation Between Job Stressors and Well-Being. A Lesson From a Clerical Women Sample

The study concerns the moderating role of two variables—hardiness and social support—in the relation between job stressors and well-being. It was checked if there is a connection between hardiness and social support, and if these variables are directly related to the level of well-being. It was also hypothesized that hardiness and social support buffer the negative influence of stressors on well-being. The fact that social support and well-being are multidimensional variables was taken into account.

The cross-sectional study was conducted on a group of 200 women employed as office workers. The results showed that hardiness correlates with the indexes of emotional support as well as practical support coming from supervisors. The connection, however, was not strong. Hardiness and social support were directly connected with the level of well-being. Interaction of these two independent variables played a marginal role. As far as the buffering role of these variables was concerned, the results have shown that hardiness did not play a buffering role and social support did to a limited degree only.

The results of the study proved that it is justifiable to treat social support and well-being as multidimensional variables.     

Occupational Health and Social Resources

There is a relationship between the changes in work-related diseases and the following factors: the transformation of the organization of work, organizational development, as well as human and social changes in the work environment. These factors also influence the maintenance of industrial health and safety standards at work. Safety technology will continue to be important, but will be reduced in significance compared to the so-called soft factors, that is, all dimensions and parameters affecting people’s health and social environment at the work place.

It seems that in the future the relationship between the social resource development and work protection will become more relevant. Social resource development influences the quality of work performance and motivation, the quality of work and work protection, the likelihood of accidents and breakdowns, and the level of self-control and capacity of change.

The consequences of work protection research will be discussed in this article with a focus on the contribution of social sciences.     

When does centrality matter? Scientific productivity and the moderating role of research specialization and cross‐community ties

The present study addresses the ongoing debate concerning academic scientific productivity. Specifically, given the increasing number of collaborations in academia and the crucial role networks play in knowledge creation, we investigate the extent to which building social capital within the academic community represents a valuable resource for a scientist's knowledge‐creation process. We measure the social capital in terms of structural position within the academic collaborative network. Furthermore, we analyse the extent to which an academic scientist's research specialization and ties that cross‐community boundaries act as moderators of the aforementioned relationship. Empirical results derived from an analysis of an Italian academic community from 2001 to 2008 suggest academic scientists that build social capital by occupying central positions in the community outperform their more isolated colleagues. However, scientific productivity declines beyond a certain threshold value of centrality, hence revealing the existence of an inverted U‐shaped relationship. This relationship is negatively moderated by the extent to which an academic focuses research activities in few scientific knowledge domains, whereas it is positively moderated by the number of cross‐community ties established. Copyright © 2012 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Asian Americans and workplace discrimination: The interplay between sex of evaluators and the perception of social skills

In two role‐playing scenarios, we investigate how White male and female evaluators perceive an Asian American versus White job candidate on the dimensions of competence and social skills and how these perceptions affect evaluators' decisions in hiring and promotion. Specifically, Study 1 examines how the perceptions of competence and social skills affect Asian (versus White) college graduates' chance of obtaining a non‐technical (versus technical) position, and Study 2 tests how these perceptions affect Asians' probability of promotion relative to Whites'. Our findings suggest that female evaluators were less likely to select Asian than White candidates into positions involving social skills and were less likely to promote Asian than White candidates into these types of positions. Furthermore, female evaluators' perception that Asians were less socially skilled than Whites mediated both of these decisions. This paper contributes to the understanding of workplace discrimination of Asian Americans. Copyright © 2012 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Exploring the lay/expert divide: the attribution of responsibilities for coal ash pollution in Tuzla,Bosnia and Herzegovina

Invoking expert knowledge is a common strategy in attempts to settle environmental disputes. However, the validity of expertise is contingent upon the context in which an actor is recognised as an expert. In complex environmental conflicts the distinction between lay and expert knowledge is not always fixed a priori. However, as conflicts unfold, intervening parties tend to present their cases in ways that reinforce this distinction. This is apparent in the attribution of environmental responsibilities. This paper presents an empirical case of an environmental conflict related to land contamination due to coal ash disposal in Bosnia and Herzegovina. The analysis revealed two polar positions in the conflict: the first one, mainly held by scientists and industry representatives, invoked expert knowledge and presented a distributed approach to the attribution of responsibilities; the second one, mainly held by local residents and municipal officials, presented an experiential understanding of pollution, as lay knowledge, and attributed direct responsibilities to the local energy industry. The paper concludes that the persistence of the distinction between expert and lay knowledge is a manifestation of the social structures that underlie the conflict.     

Social capital networks for achieving sustainable development

There have been few empirical studies investigating whether and how social capital (SC) relates to better achievement of sustainability goals and, if so, how. This research investigates the roles three types of SC, namely, bonding, bridging, and bracing SC, play in achieving sustainable development (SD), using a case study of the Japanese region to explore the process of SC accumulation leading to collective action. The research question as to whether SC accumulation makes a difference in the progress towards sustainability is addressed qualitatively and quantitatively using a case study, and network and regression analysis; in particular the impact and functions of bracing SC are closely investigated. The study concludes that SC accumulation can indeed make a difference in achieving sustainability and that bracing SC plays an essential role in expediting the processes of goal sharing and resource flow by connecting various networks across sectors and scales, thereby making collective action possible. These findings suggest that creating an environment in which the generation of all three types of SC is encouraged may help local governments to achieve their desired policy goals for SD.     

Made in conflict. Local residents' construction of a local environmental problem

The aim of this paper is to understand how local residents participate in the construction of local environmental problems and to evaluate a particular analytical approach in environmental sociology to study this phenomenon. The paper is based on an interview study with a sample of local residents. The analysis demonstrates how the local residents attempt to construct a local environmental problem. In particular, the study focuses on how involved actors are positioned, how different sorts of knowledge claims are used, and how the neglect the residents perceive from the authorities affects the attempt to construct a local environmental problem. The study shows that the local residents play a central role in the construction of the situation and that the evaluated model could be very helpful as an analytical tool in the investigation of local residents' participation in the construction of environmental problems.     

Sustainability and social inclusion? Examining the frames of Canadian English-speaking environmental movement organisations

Some scholars and activists have suggested that discourses of environmental sustainability do not include sufficient attention to social issues or environmental justice. Since social inclusion is a prevalent masterframe among activists and in social policy circles in Canada and elsewhere, our research explored the extent that English-speaking Canadian environmental non-governmental organisations (ENGOs) incorporate discursive aspects of social inclusion into their website communication. Social inclusion includes such issues as multiculturalism, gender inequality, low income and racialisation. We analysed mission statements, programmes and policy analysis presented by a sample of ENGOs drawn from the membership of the Canadian Environmental Network for evidence of a variety of indicators of attention to social inclusion. We conclude that environmental groups remain locked into an “environmentalist” frame that often ignores such issues. This has major implications for partnerships with other Canadian social movements.