A year ago Dr. Jacek Kurczewski asked me to take part in a symposium which he organized with the Polish Sociological Association, on the sociology of everyday life. The subject of my session was to be the sociology of the queue. As a psychologist I could, of course, interpret the phenomenon of the queue in terms of the interdependence of individual interests and social justice. Theses of social psychology, based on empirical grounds, provided some explanations of the mechanisms of behaviour in a queue. These explanations, however, led to trivial conclusions, though expressed in scientific terms. Therefore I decided to choose phenomenological analysis to deal with queue behaviour. This paper is a widened and more analytical version of my speech at the PSA seminar.

This essay analyzes the relationship between two ideas central to the social sciences and religion: charisma and objectivity. My goal is to interpret a longstanding theoretical dispute regarding objectivity in the social sciences by referring to sectarian charisma and its challenge to the legitimacy of ecclesiastical authority. In illuminating a religious pattern revealed in the confrontation between social science theory and political philosophy, I suggest that objectivity represents a form of ‘secular’ charisma. I describe the cross-cutting relationship between charisma and objectivity and examine both the religious implications of objectivity and the epistemological implications of charismatic phenomena.

There has of late been an increasing tendency to challenge the authority of ethnographic texts by criticizing the anthropologist's enterprise during the various stages of his performance—both the collection of data in the field, and the interpretation and presentation of his field notes at home. A better understanding of the process of gathering ethnographic data, and the characteristics of the participants in fieldwork may remove some of its mystique, and contribute to the credibility of the anthropological endeavor. It is often assumed that the anthropologist and in particular his informants are ‘marginal men’ in their respective societies. I intend to examine the applicability of this definition as regards both partners in the implementation of fieldwork, and suggest an alternative characterization.

Gegenläufig zum Bedeutungsverlust, den die Systemtheorie in den letzten Jahren in einer Reihe von Wissenschaftsdisziplinen erlebt hat und noch erlebt, ist es ihr in demselben Zeitraum in der Rechtssoziologie gelungen, eine Spitzenstellung zu erobern. Teubner/Willke, die man wohl zurecht zu den derzeit engagiertesten Verfechtern systemtheoretischer Vorstellungen zählen kann (Schmidt 1986), sind mit ihrem Theorem des »reflexiven Rechts« (Teubner 1982 und 1983; Teubner/Wilke 1984; Teubner 1985) unter den Rechtssoziologen auf eine ganz enorme Resonanz gestoßen (Ietswaart 1983, Falke 1984). Trotz vieler kritischer Einwände wird ihr von Luhmanns Autopoiesis-Begriff stark beeinflußter Ansatz im großen und ganzen als wichtig und fruchtbar eingestuft (Ietswaart 1983, 355 f).

Nous appellerons qualification, en un sens très large, la reconnaissance par l'employeur ou la revendication par le salarié de toutes les qualités de son travail qui importent pour la production: qu'il s'agisse du zèle avec lequel il l'accomplit (son effort, son attention, l'absence d'erreurs ou de fautes), de la compétence et de l'expérience qu'il mobilise et même du potentiel qu'il pourra montrer (sa capacité d'initiative et d'apprentissage). En ce sens — que nos développements justifieront, nous l'espérons — la qualification a toujours été négociée, ne serait-ce que par la signature d'accords de classification. Si développement il y a, il a été très progressif: l'accord interprofessionnel sur la formation continue date de 1970 (faut-il rappeler que l'intérêt de certaines entreprises pour la formation est bien antérieur ?), la préoccupation pour l'amélioration des conditions de travail s'est affirmée au début des années 70 et a abouti à un accord interprofessionnel en 1975. L'usage à des fins de conversion des institutions de formation s'est progressivement développé. La loi de 1971 sur la formation professionnelle et les accords qui l'ont prolongée ont confirmé le rôle des comités d'entreprise dans l'examen des plans de formation professionnelle. Et il est inutile de rappeler la part qui a été faite aux partenaires sociaux dans la définition des formations initiales.

Anthropology has become aware that its analysis of communities, no matter how small and isolated they might be, must reckon with the context of the nation-state. Many cultural phenomena that anthropologists confront on the local level thus are often seen as a reaction to and, to an extent, a consequence of the socioeconomic processes associated with the larger nation-state economy. In the Mediterranean region, patronage appears to be one of the most prominent features of any given community, because patronage resists changes engendered by the nation-state. It has been a constant target at which various anthropologists have expended their polemical ammunition. This essay examines the nature of the link between patronage and the nation-state.

We know much and understand little about the Italian mafia. The amount of factual information surrounding it—whatever that ‘it’ may be—is disproportionately and dramatically greater than our theoretical understanding of this elusive entity. We do not know everything it might be interesting to know, of course, yet in the monumental quantity of scholarly and judicial sources devoted to the mafia, we can find far more information than scholars have been able to make good, cogent sense of. Facts and anecdotes are not only numerous, but of the most diverse and seemingly irreconcilable kinds, and theoretical and analytical shortcomings have made it impossible to accomplish two fundamental and related operations: first, to discriminate between relevant information and contingent ethnographical detail, and between reliable and distorted evidence; second, to find a coherent thread linking whatever disparate pieces of information remain after the first screening operation.