The Social Organization of the Kung (!UN) Bushmen of the North-Western Kalahari

Africa ◽  
1943 ◽  
Vol 14 (3) ◽  
pp. 124-129 ◽  
Author(s):  
Frank Brownlee

Opening ParagraphWith some previous knowledge of these people I had expected to ascertain on inquiry that they had a set if simple form of government and something more or less regular in their group and tribal organization, whereas I find that there is no cohesion or co-operation between groups or collections of groups, chieftainship hardly exists, and there is little or nothing in the way of a judicial system. What may have been custom seems to have been replaced to a great extent by habit and impulse, the interest of the individual is paramount to the exclusion of the good of the community—in short their mode of life, in spite of what may be said cf co-operative food quest, is the most complete expression of individualism, and any man who in astuteness and cunning, bravery and endurance, or in other similar qualities shows himself to be ahead of his fellows becomes their unacknowledged leader.

Author(s):  
Yuliya Novikova ◽  
Alexander Shakhmatov ◽  
Maria Salyah

The relevance of the study of individual psychological characteristics of employees of criminal investigation departments in transport in the North-Western Federal district of the Ministry of Internal Affairs of Russia (hereinafter referred to as the NWFD) in relation to indicators of professional deformation is due to the specific features of their official activities. Despite a significant amount of research on the phenomenon of professional deformity of police officers, there are few thoroughly developed and completed works on the prevention of professional deformities of police officers. The purpose of our research was to study the individual psychological characteristics of employees of criminal investigation departments in connection with the risk of professional deformation. The results of the empirical study were processed by correlation and factor analysis (49 parameters). The results of the initial analysis showed that the overall assessment of job satisfaction among employees of the studied departments is average with a downward trend. The results of the study on «professional burnout» revealed that a number of employees surveyed are close to emotional exhaustion. It is established that empathic abilities, social intelligence, and constructive coping strategies play an important role in the structure of individual psychological characteristics of police officers. Low ability of employees to learn behavior determines non-constructive strategies and models for coping with stressful situations, which leads to deformation of relationships with other people, i.e. to professional deformation. The obtained data can be used as the basis for the program of psychoprophylaxis of professional deformation of criminal investigation units in transport in the northwestern Federal district.


Africa ◽  
1965 ◽  
Vol 35 (2) ◽  
pp. 125-142 ◽  
Author(s):  
Claude Meillassoux

Opening ParagraphAccording to a partial census taken in 1960, Bamako city has about 130,000 inhabitants. Small by Western standards, it is still by far the largest city in Mali. At the time of the French conquest Bamako had only between 800 and 1,000 inhabitants; it was the capital of a Bambara chiefdom, grouping about thirty villages on the north bank of the Niger river, with a total of about 5,000 people. The ruling dynasty was that of the Niaré, who, according to their traditions, came from the Kingi eleven generations ago (between 1640 and 1700). For defence against the neighbours and armed slave-raiders fortifications were built around the town and a permanent army of so-fa (horsemen) was raised. Soon after its foundation Bamako attracted Moslem Moors from Twat who settled as marabouts and merchants under the protection of the Niaré's warriors. Among them, the Twati (later to be called Touré) and the Dravé became, alongside and sometimes in competition with the Niaré, the leading families.


2010 ◽  
Vol 10 (1) ◽  
pp. 109-119 ◽  
Author(s):  
M. del Carmen Llasat ◽  
F. Siccardi

Abstract. The right of a person to be protected from natural hazards is a characteristic of the social and economical development of the society. This paper is a contribution to the reflection about the role of Civil Protection organizations in a modern society. The paper is based in the inaugural conference made by the authors on the 9th Plinius Conference on Mediterranean Storms. Two major issues are considered. The first one is sociological; the Civil Protection organizations and the responsible administration of the land use planning should be perceived as reliable as possible, in order to get consensus on the restrictions they pose, temporary or definitely, on the individual free use of the territory as well as in the entire warning system. The second one is technological: in order to be reliable they have to issue timely alert and warning to the population at large, but such alarms should be as "true" as possible. With this aim, the paper summarizes the historical evolution of the risk assessment, starting from the original concept of "hazard", introducing the concepts of "scenario of event" and "scenario of risk" and ending with a discussion about the uncertainties and limits of the most advanced and efficient tools to predict, to forecast and to observe the ground effects affecting people and their properties. The discussion is centred in the case of heavy rains and flood events in the North-West of Mediterranean Region.


Urban History ◽  
2016 ◽  
Vol 43 (2) ◽  
pp. 306-335
Author(s):  
JELLE HAEMERS ◽  
GERRIT VERHOEVEN ◽  
JEROEN PUTTEVILS ◽  
PETER JONES

One of the key concepts of Max Weber's writings on cities was that in north-western Europe, the landed nobility and urban elites were clearly distinguished. For Weber, this was indeed a main reason to locate the occidental city in the north rather than in the Mediterranean. Christof Rolker tackles this question in his ‘Heraldische Orgien und Sozialer Aufstieg. Oder: Wo ist eigentlich “oben” in der spätmittelalterlichen Stadt?’, Zeitschrift für Historische Forschung, 52 (2015), 191–224. The in-depth analysis of one of the largest and at the same time most widespread armorials in the late medieval Holy Empire, namely that of Konrad Grünenberg (d. 1494), demonstrates that in Konstanz (where Grünenberg lived) guilds (and not the nobility) first insisted on patrilineal descent as a proof of status. Traditionally, Grünenberg is seen as a paradigmatic social climber, as he left his guild to join the society of the local nobility (called ‘Zur Katz’). Yet his sumptuous armorial, containing over 2,000 coat of arms mainly from the south-west of the Empire, does not mention any single member of this noble society. Instead, it praises the tournament societies of which Grünenberg was not a member, and highlights chivalric events in which he never participated. This, Rolker argues, indicates that armorials were not only about status already gained or to be gained, but also a manual for contemporaries to discuss the social order in a more abstract way. In his ‘Wappenbuch’, Grünenberg constantly explains why he could not join the noble societies he praised, while at the same time he ignored the ‘Zur Katz’ association of which he was a member. Therefore, Rolker concludes that it was not only members (or would-be members) of the respective social groups who knew and reproduced social codes. So the boundary between noble and urban elites was more blurred than Weber claimed – though Rolker is of course not the first to criticize Weber on this. Clearly, Grünenberg's armorial was part and parcel of a wider discussion of origins and kinship, namely patrilineal kinship that took place in several social milieux, rather than simply a book which displayed inherited status.


Africa ◽  
1939 ◽  
Vol 12 (3) ◽  
pp. 335-349 ◽  
Author(s):  
Johannes Lukas

Opening ParagraphIn the vast countries which stretch between Kordofan and the Bahr el Ghazal Province in the east, Tripolis in the north, Lake Chad and the north-western frontier of the Cameroons in the west, and a line in the south which is formed by the southern border of the colony Ubangui-Chari, linguistic research work is still only in its beginnings. The languages spoken in the above regions which comprise the highlands of Tibesti, Borku, Enedi, and the old kingdoms of Darfor, Dar Banda, Wadai, Bagirmi, Bornu, Adamawa, and their neighbouring countries, are still to-day the least known of all the languages of Africa. This part of Central Africa lies far from the animated coastal areas and was occupied by European Powers only in a comparatively recent period. But the study of languages of newly occupied countries is not the first object of a Native Administration, especially where Arabic is a first means of communication; and Arabic plays an important role indeed in some parts at least of Central Africa. Besides the use for purposes of administration, linguistic research work is linked to two undertakings: the missions and native education. Missionary work is especially important in pagan countries, but may have little or no influence in a large part of Muhammadan Central Africa.


Author(s):  
N.V. Parshina ◽  
A.A. Chuprova

The article is devoted to the legal review of the monument of law of the last quarter of the XVI century – the Sudebnik of 1589, namely, its norms on peasant land ownership and land use. The article analyzes the legislative regulation of land relations in the north-western lands of Russia with the help of historical-legal and comparative-legal methods. To summarize the results of the study, the authors also considered the norms of the Judicial Code of 1550, which regulate the above-mentioned circle of public relations, but are applied in the central regions of Russia, where serfdom existed and actively developed. The comparative characteristics of the legal regulation of land relations among the peasantry in these legal monuments allow us to assert the interdependence of the rights of the Russian landowner on the territorial factor. The authors come to the conclusion that the peculiarity of the legal regulation of land relations in the Judicial Code of 1589 was interconnected and mutually conditioned by the specifics of the social and social structure of Pomerania, on the territory of which its norms were distributed, and where, unlike the central regions of the Moscow Kingdom, the peasant population lived free from serfdom.


1977 ◽  
Vol 5 (2) ◽  
pp. 165-179
Author(s):  
Hildebert Kirchner

A Short Historical Review of the German Judicial SystemThe history of a unified German judiciary structure emphasizes two major characteristics. It tells a story of a judicial system which is as discontinuous as it is old. The first truly imperial court, known as the “Reichskammergericht”, was created in 1495. Its significant features were a permanent seat and an independence of the judges. Their decisions were final and conclusive, and were binding on the emperors. This court remained in existence until the demise of the old German Empire in 1806. Thereafter, due to a rapid political fragmentation of the territory formerly constituting the empire, the individual German states were bound together in a loose confederation only, known as the “Deutscher Bund”. Enjoying complete sovereignty, the states passed their own and widely differing laws. Endeavors to bring about some semblance of uniformity in such laws were doomed to failure, except in some areas of commercial law. Equally, in spite of repeated attempts, the formation of a unified appellate court of last resort encountered insurmountable difficulties. This state of affairs continued until cessation of the confederation when Austria was compelled to withdraw from it in 1866 and a new North German Confederation was formed under the leadership of Prussia. A few years later, in 1871, the North German Confederation was united with the southern German states and the new union became known as the German Empire.


1986 ◽  
Vol 16 (1) ◽  
pp. 87-104 ◽  
Author(s):  
Sylvia Tesh

Critics of health education policy in the United States fault it for ignoring the unequal ability of Americans to adopt more healthy behavior and for underestimating the social, economic, and political causes of disease. Many critics hypothesize that health education in a less bourgeois society would be more equitable and less individualistic. This article tests that hypothesis by analyzing the current Cuban health education program aimed at the reduction of chronic diseases. It argues that while the Cuban program appears to be every bit as individualistic as the North American program, theirs may not be comparable to ours because Cubans are less likely than Americans to reify the state. At least among supporters of the revolution, Cubans do not automatically make a conceptual distinction between the individual and the society. Discussions about responsibility for disease prevention take on new meaning in this light.


Africa ◽  
1938 ◽  
Vol 11 (1) ◽  
pp. 1-24 ◽  
Author(s):  
Margaret Read

Opening ParagraphModern anthropological research has shown that at every level of civilization there exists a moral code which is expressed in the ideal behaviour of individuals in the community, that is a behaviour which is ‘correct’ according to the people's ideas and praised by them in speech and story. Part of this moral code consists of regulations determining the mutual behaviour of the sexes, that is, of rules attempting to direct and control the physiological and emotional sexual impulses in individuals in the interest of the social well-being of the community or state. These physiological and emotional forces of sex are part of the biological equipment of human beings and hence common to all peoples. The anthropologist among so-called primitive people can approach the study of the moral code and its application from two angles: that of the individual, and that of the community. In all forms of society there is a supposition that individuals find control in sexual matters irksome, and only submit to restraint as a result of effective training allied to effective external pressure. A further universal supposition is that the community finds it necessary to demand a certain type of behaviour from individuals for the sake of its cohesion and stability. Both these suppositions are borne out by anthropological studies in primitive sociology. As soon, however, as we descend from general principles to a particular tribe, we begin to ask whether there is any connexion between the nature of the community and its demands on individuals as represented by the moral code and especially by the sexual regulations. Is there, for example, less need for stringent sexual regulations in a small isolated community than in a warlike tribe dependent for its existence on the strength of its arms? And if there is any such connexion what are the reasons for it?


2015 ◽  
Vol 3 (4) ◽  
pp. 11-19
Author(s):  
Tomasz Michalski

Abstract The aim of this study was to present the general situation of populations of European post-communist countries 25 years after the collapse of communism in Europe. The study consists of two parts. The first one briefly discusses the processes that led to a significant diversification in the social, economic and political situations of the populations of the studied countries. In the second part the diversity of this situation is shown (using: the Legatum Prosperity Index, the Social Progress Index, and the Human Development Index). It was found that the best situations exist in the countries which quickly and effectively implemented reforms, and whether they were independent states, or parts of larger states, under communism is of secondary importance. It is symptomatic that these are countries situated in the north-western part of the area under consideration, which corresponds to the current situation in the EU-15, where the countries located in the south (the so-called PIGS) have poor economic and partly social situations than those in the north. Furthermore, it was found that the situation with the population of Russia is worse than in many countries which were previously under the occupation of the USSR or were dependent on the authorities in Moscow.


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