|
Books,
E-Books Great Discounts
| |
OPPORTUNITY STRUCTURE
Sociologyindex, Sociology Books 2012
Opportunity structure refers to the notion that
opportunity, the chance to gain certain rewards or goals, is shaped by the way the society
or an institution is organized (or structured).
The opportunity for girls to succeed in mathematics may be
structured by the fact that all of the mathematics teachers are men, all teachers tend to
discourage such an endeavor or suggest that girls are not good at this subject.
There may be a sexist structure in the school which shapes
opportunity.
Opportunity structure can also be a framework of rules
people are encouraged to follow in order to achieve what their culture considers to be
success.
Political opportunity structure - Five key
dynamic components of the political opportunity structure: Tarrow
the relative openness or closure of the institutionalized political system;
the stability or instability of that broad set of elite alignments that typically
undergird a polity;
the divided elites;
the presence or absence of elite allies; and
the state’s capacity and propensity for repression.
Political opportunity structures can constrain or expand the field of collective action in
four ways:
A. they expand the group’s own opportunities;
B. they expand opportunities for others;
C. create opportunities for opponents
D. and create opportunities for elites
Theory of occupational allocation (Opportunity
structure)
Apart from a privileged minority of the population individuals are (more or less)
constrained in their choice of occupations by social variables that are outside their
control e.g. gender, ethnicity and social class.
The ‘opportunity structure’ model was first proposed
by Roberts (1968, p176) as an alternative to theories of career development advanced by
Ginzberg and Super. On the basis of a survey involving 196 young men aged between 14 and
23 selected by a random canvas of households in a part of London, Roberts (1968) suggested
that the:
'momentum and direction of school leavers' careers are derived from the way in which their
job opportunities become cumulatively structured and young people are placed in varying
degrees of social proximity, with different ease of access to different types of
employment' (p179)
Roberts (1968) did not suggest that his alternative theory is one of universal validity
(p179). Rather, he argued that entry to employment in different social contexts requires
different explanatory frameworks and that entry into employment does not take place in a
similar manner amongst all groups of young people, even in the same society. The
determinants of occupational choice identified are:
the home;
the environment;
the school;
peer groups;
job opportunities.
He challenged the relevance of the concept of choice embedded in psychological theories,
emphasising the structure of constraints:
'An adequate theory for understanding school-leavers' transition to employment in Britain
needs to be based around the concept not of `occupational choice', but of `opportunity
structure' (Roberts, 1977, p183)
Criminal Careers in Organized Crime and Social
Opportunity Structure
European Journal of Criminology, Vol. 5, No. 1, (2008), Edward R. Kleemans, Christianne J.
de Poot - Research and Documentation Centre, The Netherlands
This paper presents the main findings of quantitative and qualitative research into the
criminal careers of about 1000 offenders who were involved in 80 extensively analysed
cases of organized crime. The paper analyses how and when offenders become known to the
criminal justice authorities, studies in depth the criminal careers of `starters' and
analyses in detail the criminal careers of (ring)leaders and `nodal' offenders. Because
social ties play an important role in organized crime, the paper emphasizes that the
social opportunity structure, defined as social ties providing access to profitable
criminal opportunities, is extremely important for explaining involvement in organized
crime. It explains why certain offenders `progress' to certain types of organized crime
whereas others become involved only later on in life. Social opportunity structure may
also explain interesting phenomena such as `late starters' — people without any
appreciable criminal history — and people in conventional jobs who switch careers.
Upward mobility in organizations: the effects of hierarchy
and opportunity structure
JOSEF BRÜDERL, PETER PREISENDÖRFER and ROLF ZIEGLER
This article investigates hierarchical promotion processes. Following the ‘structural
approach’ in social mobility research and aiming at the organizational level, we
attempt to make this approach more ‘concrete’ than other studies in this
tradition. That is, we analyse the effects of both organizational opportunity structure
and hierarchical levels on upward mobility. By neglecting these structural factors,
studies of mobility processes not only distort the effects of individual factors
influencing mobility, but also preclude the analysis of the various ways in which
structural factors affect the mobility chances of different social groups. Our empirical
study of promotion processes in a large West German company, based on longitudinal data,
clearly demonstrates this. We conclude that mobility research should give more attention
to structural factors at the organizational level. -
esr.oxfordjournals.org/cgi/content/abstract/9/2/173
Between the State and the Market
Expanding the Concept of ‘Political Opportunity Structure’
Mattias Wahlström, Department of Sociology, University of Göteborg, Göteborg,
Sweden
Abby Peterson, Department of Sociology, University of Göteborg, Göteborg, Sweden
This article brings together two research traditions: social movement theory and theories
of corporate social responsibility. The study is an attempt to widen the perspective on
the relationship between a business/business sector and its external stakeholders in order
to include social movements. We depart from a three-part model of political opportunity
structures, including state, cultural and economic opportunity structures. In order to
illustrate our model, the article is centred on the case of the Swedish animal rights
movements’ political pressure on domestic fur-farming. The animal rights movement has
had considerable success by engaging with a relatively open cultural opportunity
structure, winning a framing war in regard to the moral issues raised. Despite the fur
industry’s attempts to counter-mobilize, the animal rights movement has found a
hearing in formal political channels and has achieved considerable success. However, since
the movement is faced with an economic opportunity structure that is not vulnerable to the
demands of stakeholders, and where there is great inconsistency between the interests of
the industry and the demands of the stakeholders, it is not surprising that the farmers
have been non-compliant. - asj.sagepub.com/cgi/content/abstract/49/4/363
Urban Field Education: An Opportunity Structure for Enhancing Students' Personal and
Social Efficacy
Judith Beinstein, Department of Communication Studies, Oberlin College, Oberlin, Ohio
44704.
Undergraduates' transitions to adult working roles can befacilitated by off-campus field
education programs. An evaluation study of one such program, a work internship program in
Philadelphia, indicated that student participants had experienced significant positive
changes in feelings of per-sonal and social efficacy. Participation in the program had
apparently in-creased their self-confidence and willingness to enter novel social
situations as well as decreased their tendencies to be self-abasing. -
hum.sagepub.com/cgi/content/abstract/29/7/677
Urban Black Youths' Educational and Occupational Goals
The Impact of America's Opportunity Structure
Elaine M. Walker, Newark Board of Education
Marcia E. Sutherland, State University of New York, Albany
An attitude formation model was developed to test the processes through which economically
disadvantaged Black students form their educational and occupational goals. The model
assumed that the development of aspirations among urban youths represents an interplay of
structural and subjective factors. The model predicted that urban Black youths' goals
would be influenced by their perceptions of the structural limitations of American
society. The model was tested on 175 African-American male and female 12th graders in an
urban school district. Results from regression equations revealed that the model accounted
for up to 51% of the variance in students' aspirations. Finings indicated that Black males
held more negative perceptions of the opportunity structure and had lower aspirations than
Black females. Indeed, Blacks males' perceptions of the opportunity structure carried the
same weight in influencing the type of educational plans that they established for
themselves as did how well they performed in school. The study's findings are discussed
within the context of the marginalization of urban Black males. Recommendations are
offered for enhancing the status aspirations of Black youths in general, and inner-city
Black males in particular. - uex.sagepub.com/cgi/content/abstract/28/2/200
Globalization, Environmental Movements, and International Political Opportunity
Structures - Hein-Anton Van Der Heijden, University of Amsterdam
Political opportunity structure refers to the specific features of a political system
(e.g., a country) that can explain the different action repertoires, organizational forms
and impacts of social movements, and social movement organizations in that specific
country. With the globalization of environmental problems and solution strategies,
important parts of the environmental movement have also become global. To what extent
could the concept of international political opportunity structure (IPOS) be useful for
analyzing transnational environmentalism in the 21st century? In this article, four of the
most important constituent parts of IPOS (United Nations [UN], European Union [EU], World
Bank, andWorld Trade Organization [WTO]) and their interactions with environmental
movements and environmental movement organizations are analyzed. Whereas the UN and EU
provoke the participation of a large number of transnational environmental lobby groups
whose impacts, however, remain limited, the World Bank and WTO provoke more unconventional
actions with potentially farther reaching impacts. -
oae.sagepub.com/cgi/content/abstract/19/1/28
Unequal Opportunity Structure and Labour Market
Segmentation
Reinhard Kreckel, University of Erlangen-Nuremberg
Sociology of social stratification and labour market economics have developed in isolation
from one another. The present paper attempts to bring these two traditions closer
together. The starting point is a critique of the very notion of social `stratification'.
A return to Max Weber's idea of `class situation as market situation' and to his concept
of `social closure' is advocated. On this basis, a conception of structured social
inequality in advanced capitalist societies is developed which is open for conceptual
innovations to be taken from labour market economics. A number of approaches to labour
market analysis are discussed, and the special significance of several recent
contributions related to the so-called `dual labour market theory' is emphasized. This
leads up to the construction of a typological model supposed to supersede the traditional
notion of social inequality as a system of hierarchically superposed strata. This model
comprises eight levels of labour market structuration characterizing structured social
inequality in advanced capitalist societies. -
soc.sagepub.com/cgi/content/abstract/14/4/525
On Social Structure and Science - by Robert King Merton, Piotr
Sztompka - 1996 - Page 153. Opportunity Structure (1995) Emergence of the Concept of
Opportunity Structure in the Columbia Micro-environment of the 1950s. Building on Robert
Merton's theory of delinquency, this term was developed by Richard A. Cloward and Lloyd B.
Ohlin in Delinquency and Opportunity (1960), to further elucidate the pathways to success
in American culture. When such pathways are blocked (for example through failed
schooling), other opportunity structures may be found, and these could lead to diverse
patterns of deviance. In this characterization, a combination of anomie theory and
cultural transmission theory, there were three major delinquent opportunity structures:
criminal, retreatist, and conflict.
Ounequal pportunity structure in Israel's education system
The opportunity structure in Israel's education system is unequal. At the
countrywide level there is inequality of opportunities between students in the Jewish
sector and their Arab counterparts. This inequality is also manifested at the local level;
inequality of opportunities is the rule within the Arab sector itself, i.e., between
private Arab schools and public schools, which include Arab state schools that belong to
municipal authorities and the Ministry of Education. Another manifestation of unequal
opportunity at the local level is the existence of two main scholastic "majors"
or specializations in Arab state schools: one that enrolls a small number of students and
leads to a good matriculation certificate.
The opportunity structure that the Arab student faces is also unequal. Only a small
proportion of students pursue a program of studies that leads to matriculation. Many drop
out along the way; many others stay in school, but not on a path that leads to
matriculation.
The Opportunity Structure: Implications for Career Counseling.
Authors: Miller, Vaughan Marshall, Journal of Employment Counseling, v36 n1 p2-12
Mar 1999
Abstract: A brief narrative description of the journal article, document, or resource.
Discusses traditional career counseling methods which are based on the assumption that
matching clients' interests, values, abilities, and aptitudes to a suitable occupation
will result in opportunities for self-actualization and personal expression. Contends that
vocational psychology has focused almost exclusively on individuals to the neglect of
social, economic, and political realities, as well as the opportunity structure.
| |
Books,
E-Books Great Discounts
|