Society Building

Society Building
Author: Xiangqun Chang
Publisher: Cambridge Scholars Publishing
Total Pages: 210
Release: 2014-04-23
Genre: Social Science
ISBN: 1443859567

In China’s future social development, there is likely to be an interest in “society building” with interactions between top-down and bottom-up approaches, along with a deepened level of social reform and the construction of a harmonious or “symbiotic” society. This represents one of China’s social development models, and is reflected in the Communist Party of China (CPC) and state policy. The term “society building” was proposed by Chinese thinkers nearly one century ago, and has been used by Chinese sociologists to study Chinese society since the 1930s. In the 21st century, “society building” has been approached as an interdisciplinary concept by Chinese social scientists. The main concern of China for its future social development is to enhance its people’s wellbeing and encourage them to build Chinese society in innovative and creative ways. This volume showcases the latest research of non-Chinese scholars relating to this indigenous concept and to China’s social development in the global context. It tackles the following topics: the assessment of the social impact of infrastructure projects; China’s reforms and its changing political system; whether or not the Singapore model is suitable for China to follow; soft power through education; and boundaries, cosmopolitanisms and spaces in Chinese and international cities. The book will be of interest to academics, professionals, practitioners, university students and the general public seeking a comprehensive understanding of China.

Building the Great Society

Building the Great Society
Author: Joshua Zeitz
Publisher: Penguin
Total Pages: 401
Release: 2019-01-29
Genre: History
ISBN: 0143111434

The author of Lincoln's Boys takes us inside Lyndon Johnson's White House to show how the legendary Great Society programs were actually put into practice: Team of Rivals for LBJ. The personalities behind every burst of 1960s liberal reform - from civil rights and immigration reform, to Medicare and Head Start. "Absorbing, and astoundingly well-researched -- all good historians do their homework, but Zeitz goes above and beyond. It's a more than worthwhile addition to the canon of books about Johnson."--NPR "Beautifully written...a riveting portrait of LBJ... Every officeholder in Washington would profit from reading this book." --Robert Dallek, Author of An Unfinished Life: John F. Kennedy, 1917-1963 and Franklin D. Roosevelt: A Political Life LBJ's towering political skills and his ambitious slate of liberal legislation are the stuff of legend: the Civil Rights Act of 1964, the Voting Rights Act of 1965, Medicare, Medicaid, Head Start, and environmental reform. But what happened after the bills passed? One man could not and did not go it alone. Joshua Zeitz reanimates the creative and contentious atmosphere inside Johnson's White House as a talented and energetic group of advisers made LBJ's vision a reality. They desegregated public and private institutions throughout one third of the United States; built Medicare and Medicaid from the ground up in one year; launched federal funding for public education; provided food support for millions of poor children and adults; and launched public television and radio, all in the space of five years, even as Vietnam strained the administration's credibility and budget. Bill Moyers, Jack Valenti, Joe Califano, Harry McPherson and the other staff members who comprised LBJ's inner circle were men as pragmatic and ambitious as Johnson, equally skilled in the art of accumulating power or throwing a sharp elbow. Building the Great Society is the story of how one of the most competent White House staffs in American history - serving one of the most complicated presidents ever to occupy the Oval Office - fundamentally changed everyday life for millions of citizens and forged a legacy of compassionate and interventionist government.

Technology and Society

Technology and Society
Author: Deborah G. Johnson
Publisher: MIT Press
Total Pages: 853
Release: 2008-10-17
Genre: Technology & Engineering
ISBN: 0262303388

An anthology of writings by thinkers ranging from Freeman Dyson to Bruno Latour that focuses on the interconnections of technology, society, and values and how these may affect the future. Technological change does not happen in a vacuum; decisions about which technologies to develop, fund, market, and use engage ideas about values as well as calculations of costs and benefits. This anthology focuses on the interconnections of technology, society, and values. It offers writings by authorities as varied as Freeman Dyson, Laurence Lessig, Bruno Latour, and Judy Wajcman that will introduce readers to recent thinking about technology and provide them with conceptual tools, a theoretical framework, and knowledge to help understand how technology shapes society and how society shapes technology. It offers readers a new perspective on such current issues as globalization, the balance between security and privacy, environmental justice, and poverty in the developing world. The careful ordering of the selections and the editors' introductions give Technology and Society a coherence and flow that is unusual in anthologies. The book is suitable for use in undergraduate courses in STS and other disciplines. The selections begin with predictions of the future that range from forecasts of technological utopia to cautionary tales. These are followed by writings that explore the complexity of sociotechnical systems, presenting a picture of how technology and society work in step, shaping and being shaped by one another. Finally, the book goes back to considerations of the future, discussing twenty-first-century challenges that include nanotechnology, the role of citizens in technological decisions, and the technologies of human enhancement.

Building Blocs

Building Blocs
Author: Cedric de Leon
Publisher: Stanford University Press
Total Pages: 255
Release: 2015-05-27
Genre: Social Science
ISBN: 0804794987

Do political parties merely represent divisions in society? Until now, scholars and other observers have generally agreed that they do. But Building Blocs argues the reverse: that some political parties in fact shape divisions as they struggle to remake the social order. Drawing on the contributors' expertise in Indonesia, India, the United States, Canada, Egypt, and Turkey, this volume demonstrates further that the success and failure of parties to politicize social differences has dramatic consequences for democratic change, economic development, and other large-scale transformations. This politicization of divisions, or "political articulation," is neither the product of a single charismatic leader nor the machinations of state power, but is instead a constant call and response between parties and would-be constituents. When articulation becomes inconsistent, as it has in Indonesia, partisan calls grow faint and the resulting vacuum creates the possibility for other forms of political expression. However, when political parties exercise their power of interpellation efficiently, they are able to silence certain interests such as those of secular constituents in Turkey. Building Blocs exposes political parties as the most influential agencies that structure social cleavages and invites further critical investigation of the related consequences.

Building Systems

Building Systems
Author: Kiel Moe
Publisher:
Total Pages: 0
Release: 2012
Genre: Architectural design
ISBN: 9780415617932

We can no longer view building components as artifacts (a brick or a boiler) or as autonomous systems (air conditioning or prefabrication). Rather these components and systems are part of much larger systems of which architects are one agent. This book will help architects more broadly envision these networks including : canonical texts as well as contemporary thinking from well known theorists and practitioners, each contribution frames a specific range of technology in relation to society such as building process, products, economies and ecologies clearly structured, the book is divided into three parts; each accompanied by a comprehensive introduction by the editors an annotated bibliography provides a glossary of further reading illustrated throughout with over 100 illustrations. The book calls for integration, a convergence and confluence of social and technical factors, discovering the capability and culpability of such; for architects to finally realize that the term building systems is best grasped as a verb, not a set of nouns. This reader presents students, faculty and practicing architects with an expanded view of technology in architecture that transcends naive determinisms and technocratic applications; forming a more pithy intellectual context for the complex and contingent roles of technology in twenty-first century architecture.

Building a Civil Society

Building a Civil Society
Author: Steven C. Soper
Publisher: University of Toronto Press
Total Pages: 321
Release: 2013-01-01
Genre: History
ISBN: 1442645032

The most passionate advocates of Italy's unification in the nineteenth century possessed an almost limitless faith in the benefits of civic association. They also shared a common concern: once Italian unification was achieved and various freedoms were established, would ordinary Italians naturally become responsible, progressive citizens – especially after centuries of foreign rule, regional division, and economic decline? Most unification advocates doubted that their fellow citizens could form a modern, progressive civil society on their own, or that a vibrant association life would develop from the ground up. Building a Civil Society is the first book-length English-language study of associational life in nineteenth-century Italy. Drawing on extensive research in published and unpublished documents – including associational records, newspapers, periodicals, government documents, guidebooks, exhibition catalogues, memoirs, and private letters – Steven C. Soper provides a complex account of Italian liberalism during Europe's age of association. His study also raises important questions about the role that associations play in emerging democracies.

Transforming Government and Building the Information Society

Transforming Government and Building the Information Society
Author: Nagy K. Hanna
Publisher: Springer Science & Business Media
Total Pages: 345
Release: 2010-03-20
Genre: Business & Economics
ISBN: 1441915060

Information and communication technology (ICT) is central to reforming governance, innovating public services, and building inclusive information societies. Countries are learning to weave ICT into their strategies for transforming government as enterprises have learned to use ICT to innovate and transform their processes and competitive strategies. ICT-enabled transformation offers a new path to digital-era government that is responsive to the challenges of our time. It facilitates innovation, partnering, knowledge sharing, community organizing, local monitoring, accelerated learning, and participatory development. In Transforming Government and Building the Information Society, Nagy Hanna draws on multi-disciplinary research on ICT in the public sector, and on his rich experience of over 35 years at the World Bank and other aid agencies, to identify the key ingredients for the strategic integration of ICT into governance and poverty reduction strategies. The author showcases promising practices from around the world to outline the strategic options involved in using ICT to maximize developmental impact—transforming government institutions and public services, and empowering communities for inclusion and grassroots innovation. Despite the ICT promise, Hanna acknowledges that reforming governance and empowering poor communities are difficult long-term undertakings. Hanna moves beyond the imperatives and visions of e-transformation to strategic design and implementation options, and draws practical lessons for policymakers, reformers, innovators, community leaders, ICT specialists and development experts.

Building the Good Society

Building the Good Society
Author: Lloyd J. Dumas
Publisher: Emerald Group Publishing
Total Pages: 197
Release: 2019-11-15
Genre: Political Science
ISBN: 1838676317

In six interconnected essays, leading political economist Lloyd J. Dumas presents a pragmatic alternative view of a society that is capable of maximizing individual freedoms and producing sustained prosperity while preserving socially responsible behavior.

Building the E-Service Society

Building the E-Service Society
Author: Winfried Lamersdorf
Publisher: Springer
Total Pages: 482
Release: 2006-05-08
Genre: Computers
ISBN: 1402081553

Building the E-Service Society is a state-of-the-art book which deals with innovative trends in communication systems, information processing, and security and trust in electronic commerce, electronic business, and electronic government. It comprises the proceedings of I3E2004, the Fourth International Conference on E-Commerce, E-Business, and E-Government, which was held in August 2004 as a co-located conference of the 18th IFIP World Computer Congress in Toulouse, France, and sponsored by the International Federation for Information Processing (IFIP). The book contains recent results and developments in the following areas: E-Government: E-Government Models and Processes, E-Governance, Service Provisioning. E-Business: Infrastructures and Marketplaces, M-Commerce, Purchase and Payment. E-Commerce: Value Chain Management, E-Business Architectures and Processes, E-Business Models.

Building a Better Society

Building a Better Society
Author: Colum Giles
Publisher: Historic England
Total Pages: 108
Release: 2015-04-01
Genre: Architecture
ISBN: 1848023111

Liverpool's landscape, both in the city centre and throughout its historic suburbs, is studded with institutional buildings, some - like the great hospitals - very prominent, others - like Sunday Schools and chapels - punctuating ordinary street scenes. All, however, tell the story of how charity and public authorities responded to the desperate need of the poor and vulnerable in the 19th century. Attractively illustrated by photographs and drawings, this book emphasises the importance of institutional buildings to our understanding of Liverpool's character and demonstrates how new uses can be found to ensure that they continue to form part of the city's historic environment.