This article discusses recurrent themes in the literature about teaching in developed countries: the intensification of work, increased central control, diminished professional autonomy, and fears about the deskilling of teachers. Labour Process theory is used to consider how we might understand the ways in which teachers' work and professionalism…

The role of improved schooling, a central part of most development strategies, has become controversial because expansion of school attainment has not guaranteed improved economic conditions. This paper reviews the role of education in promoting economic wellbeing, with a particular focus on the role of educational quality. It concludes that there…

Exchanges of population between supposedly "urban" and "rural" spaces have occurred throughout history as people migrate between areas with relatively, densely and sparsely settled populations. However, comparatively little is known about whether the same small areas persistently contribute to the flow and what types of…

Global university rankings have cemented the notion of a world university market arranged in a single "league table" for comparative purposes and have given a powerful impetus to intranational and international competitive pressures in the sector. Both the research rankings by Shanghai Jiao Tong University and the composite rankings by…

This study evaluated the precipitating and debilitating factors that occurred in the emergence and growth of the private university system in Nigeria. Three research questions guided the analysis and examined enrolment patterns in seven pre-2003 private universities, students' preferences for enrolment and the factors that encouraged and…

Sociological analyses of suicide have often neglected female suicide rates. Three competing explanations are tested to determine why the suicide rates of married women are, typically, lower than the suicide rates of women who are not married: (1) marital status integration, (2) societal integration, and (3) a nation's normative order about…

Using pooled, time-series data for a sample of 15 developed nations, we assess the effect of divorce rates on gender-specific suicide rates for youths aged 15-19 with models of relative cohort size, lagged nonmarital fertility, and an interaction term for divorce rates and nonmarital fertility. The results reveal that, for young men, relative…

Political-economic sociologists have long investigated the dynamics and consequences of international trade. With few exceptions, this area of inquiry ignores the possible connections between trade and environmental degradation. In contrast, environmental sociologists have made several assumptions about the environmental impacts of international…

A look at a unique case applying the rules of freedom of expression for mass media in Sweden. (HB)

A discussion of how developments in psychotechnology, information and communications technology, organizational technology and systems technology promise new opportunities for personal and cultural development. (Author)

Multinational corporations operating mostly in northern Canada export natural resources thus creating jobs and money for foreign shareholders. Similarly, businesses based in southern Canada reap benefits from northern resources. Environmentalists and churches can ally north-south interests to protect northern resources and people from corporate…

A look at how a media mobile unit was able to help teachers in the field, not presently in training, to learn to use instructional media effectively in Tasmania, Australia. (HB)

World food production reached a record high in 1986, exceeding 1985's record by about 1 percent, despite declining food output in Latin America, the United States, Western Europe, and Oceania. World food production generally increased faster than population from 1977 to 1986. Production of agricultural commodities increased at an annual compound…

Although there are a number of complex political, economic, and ecological issues at the root of world hunger, a number of myths have been perpetuated to explain why hunger exists. One myth says that people are hungry because of scarcity; in fact, hunger exists in the face of plenty. The earth is producing more than enough to nourish every human…