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Bringing the State Back In: A Report on Current Comparative Research on the Relationship between States and Social Structures

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In the early 1980s historical and comparative studies began reassessing the importance of “the state.” This 1982 article by Theda Skocpol examines the trajectory of “the state” in social scientific analysis, documenting the shift from society-centered approaches to politics and government research to a focus on the state as both actor and organizational structure. This report would lay the groundwork for the SSRC’s Committee on States and Social Structures (1983–1990), which would further explore the role of the state in different settings and across a range of social, cultural, political, and economic processes.

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September 22, 2020

“The Big Clean Up”: The 2020 Pandemic as a Representational Crisis

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We learn of many crises only from the media—from far-way earthquakes to spectacular child abductions to life-changing national election results. But the Covid-19 crisis is so close — in our bodies, homes, communities, and schools—and yet we cannot see it. The pandemic poses profound representational challenges, writes Julia Sonnevend, confounding our collective ability to relate to it, to see the suffering, and to act.

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September 17, 2020

Who Produces Science During Crisis?

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With research on the social impacts of the Covid-19 pandemic now underway, Courtney Cogburn argues for examining who receives funding and conducts research, in particular with regard to the investigation of the racial dimensions of the crisis. Cogburn suggests that now is especially the moment for highlighting and supporting the work of scholars who have deep knowledge of and expertise on the racial inequalities embedded in the United States, as well as the inequities present in academic research.

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September 17, 2020

The Social Science Research Council Announces the Recipients of the Social Data Research and Dissertation Fellowships

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·September 11, 2020
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September 11, 2020

Not All Disasters Are Disasters: Pandemic Categorization and Its Consequences

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In their essay for “Covid-19 and the Social Sciences,” Samantha Montano and Amanda Savitt break down the importance of event categorization for applied disaster response, and the need for researchers and science communicators to use these concepts consistently. Hearkening back to E. L. Quarantelli’s seminal work on the subject, Montano and Savitt revisit previous events that have helped define conceptual scales for catastrophic events and ask whether and how we should describe the Covid-19 pandemic as such. Considering the unique harms produced in the pandemic context (including widespread economic impacts, and the limits on resource-sharing that can respond in geographically limited disasters), the authors show how the framing of our research has long-reaching potential effects on policy and practice.

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September 10, 2020

Inequality in the Digital Pandemic

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As the Covid-19 pandemic has forced millions to remain in their homes and restricted the capacity of public spaces, people have turned to online spaces to continue all forms of social interactions. However, despite being heralded as a means to overcome social inequalities, the new “digital public spaces” have continued these inequalities. In this essay, Mona Sloane draws attention to how prepandemic inequalities, created by social, political, and economic dynamics, prevail in social isolation. These are exemplified, for example, through who has efficient internet access and who owns the websites and apps facilitating online social interaction. Sloane asks us to consider not just how prepandemic conditions shape digital spaces but also how they influence our understanding of these spaces and the meanings we ascribe to them.

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September 3, 2020

Gentrifying the City: From Racialized Neglect to Racialized Reinvestment

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The intertwined dynamics of urban “revitalization” and the displacement and destabilization of African Americans in US cities is not a phenomenon new to twenty-first century New York City. Amanda Boston’s examination of the “redevelopment” of Downtown Brooklyn exposes the changing roles of government and the market in the erasure and destabilization of long-standing communities of color. As municipal government has moved from market regulator to market facilitator—inviting the influx of global capital and gentrification into majority-minority neighborhoods—the impact on the space has benefited the affluent (often white) residents and consumers of the city to the detriment of minority communities. A consideration of the construction of the Barclay’s Center in Brooklyn provides a close-to-home lens on the role of race and profit in the organization of urban space.

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September 1, 2020

New York City as a Research Site

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Adapted from the introduction to Power, Culture, and Place, this article published in 1988 examines the importance of New York City as a site of social science research. John H. Mollenkopf, a member of the Council’s Committee on New York City (1985–1991), explains how, at the time, social science research despatialized its investigations with the aim of obtaining generalizable results; however, the interactions of power, culture, and economics do not happen in a vacuum. To better understand these and other social dynamics and relations, Mollenkopf argues for centering urban spaces, in particular New York City which has a rich social history and remains a key point in the flows of people, trade, and culture.

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September 1, 2020

Reflections on Assessment Models

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Testing and models, medical and educational, have come under scrutiny during the Covid-19 pandemic. In particular, the coronavirus crisis has accelerated the conversation on the challenges of educational testing. Here, William Dardick looks at the reliability, validity, and fairness of educational assessments, and how these varied characteristics all factor into how policymakers employ testing and their results.

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August 27, 2020

Too Sad to Vote? Mental Health’s Impact on Political Participation during the Covid-19 Crisis

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Claudia Landwehr, Christopher Ojeda, and Oliver Tüscher ask how the effects on mental health from the Covid-19 crisis might be related to political participation. Drawing on recent studies, they find a strong relationship between the Covid-19 crisis and depressive symptoms. Holding this evidence up against US and European surveys demonstrating lower probability of voter turnout with increasing depressive symptoms, they suggest that Covid-19 may decrease political participation via declining mental health. They call for new strategies for mitigating depression’s impact on political participation and to reinvigorate participation in its aftermath.

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August 27, 2020
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