Views schools as social organizations and, using the associated body of theory, tests hypotheses on interpersonal relations with regard to position or role. (LN)

The basic dynamic core of social change, the adoption and diffusion processes, evolves around an innovation. The tendency to adopt an innovation related to communicability of the innovation, its compatibility with other practices, its publicness, and the reversibility of its effects. (Author)

If people and organizations do not change, it must be because the natural drives toward innovation are being stifled or held in check by countervailing forces. Factors within personality and social systems which resist change are examined and recommendations for neutralizing or transforming these factors are summanized. (Author/MB)

Evaluation as a meta-activity is a process which assumes that the definition of problems is itself problematic. In evaluation as a technical activity, agreed criteria are applied to agreed policy problems. This distinction has important implications for the role of universities and research funding. (Author/CM)

Innovation processes in the Swedish Higher Education System are described and related to a general theory of innovation. Using the theories of Kurt Lewin, characteristics of higher education as a social system and factors which determine the nature of the forces towards a certain type of change are defined. (JMF)

This game focuses on techniques for identifying coalitions or subgroups within larger social systems; and generates a wealth of data that not only serve to dramatize social dynamics, but also can be used to identify the structure of coalitions and the degree to which particular individuals exert interpersonal influence. (Author/CMV)

Presents a framework for the study of Science-Technology-Society (STS) interactions and some uses of the framework. States six tenets of the STS interaction. (YP)

Illustrated is the importance of several sociological concepts in understanding families of young children with disabilities. These concepts include the social system, cultural and subcultural values, status and role, definition of the situation and role-taking ability, presentation of self, and social process. (Author/JDD)

This commentary on the study reported in this monograph focuses on three topics raised by the study: (1) social systems, or individuals in the context of institutions; (2) the study of development through the use of disabled populations as experiments in human growth; and (3) the ability of intervention programs to manipulate development. (BC)

Describes an online self-organizing social system (OSOSS) which allows large numbers of individuals to self-organize in a highly decentralized manner to solve problems and accomplish other goals. Topics include scalability and bandwidth in online learning; self-organization; learning objects; instructional design underlying OSOSS, including…

Historically, the cold war was a watershed that separated two epochs: the time of abnormal, although compelled, partnership of two political systems and the period of peaceful coexistence with barely hidden hostility. The peacefulness of the latter, however elusive and vulnerable it was from time to time, has to be credited to the cold war, a…

This article uses the lens of education to elucidate multidimensional transformations affecting gender equity in the process of democratization in CEE, SEE, and FSU countries. First, the article suggests that postsocialist transformations in these areas have not automatically resulted in greater gender equity across the region but rather have led…

This article discusses moral education in contemporary Belarus. It offers an insight into the problem of educational change in post-Soviet societies in general and investigates the need for moral education reform in Belarus in particular. It provides a brief description of the situation with respect to moral education in some former Soviet…

In this concluding article we discuss how the different contributors of this special issue deal with the methodological challenges in special needs education research. The shift from an individual perspective towards an interactional and systemic point of view in special educational needs research has introduced research methods that are able to…

This paper examines the patterns of entry into self-employment in urban and rural China and across different reform stages, focusing on how communist cadres have responded to new market opportunities. Analysis of data from a national representative survey shows that both education and cadre status deter people from entry into self-employment in…