Community Storytelling Network,Neighborhood Context,and Civic Engagement: A Multilevel Approach

From a communication infrastructure theory perspective, the current study examined individuals’ civic engagement (neighborhood belonging, collective efficacy, and civic participation) as influenced by 2 multilevel components of the communication infrastructure—an integrated connectedness to a storytelling network (ICSN) and the residential context—focusing on ethnic heterogeneity and residential stability. Our multilevel analyses show that ICSN is the most important individual‐level factor in civic engagement—neighborhood belonging, collective efficacy, and civic participation—after controlling for other individual‐level and neighborhood‐level factors. In both ethnically homogeneous and heterogeneous areas and in both stable and unstable areas, ICSN is an important factor in civic engagement. As contextual factors, residential stability positively affects neighborhood belonging and collective efficacy, and ethnic heterogeneity is negatively related to collective efficacy. Our data do not show any direct contextual effects of residential stability or ethnic heterogeneity on civic participation. However, our HLM analysis showed that the relative importance of ICSN for the likelihood of participation in civic activities is significantly higher in unstable or ethnically heterogeneous areas than in stable or ethnically homogeneous areas.     

The effect of essentialism in settings of historic intergroup atrocities

Three studies tested the effects of essentialist beliefs regarding the national ingroup in situations where a perpetrator group has inflicted harm on a victim group. For members of the perpetrator group, it was hypothesised that ‘essentialism’ has a direct positive association with ‘collective guilt’ felt as a result of misdeeds conducted by other ingroup members in the past. Simultaneously, it was hypothesised to have an indirect negative association with collective guilt, mediated by perceived threat to the ingroup. Considering these indirect and direct effects jointly, it was hypothesised that the negative indirect effect suppresses the direct positive effect, and that the latter would only emerge if perceived ‘ingroup threat’ was controlled for. This was tested in a survey conducted in Latvia among Russians (N = 70) and their feelings toward how Russians had treated ethnic Latvians during the Soviet occupation; and in a survey in Germany among Germans (N = 84), focussing on their feelings toward the Holocaust. For members of the victim group, it was hypothesised that essentialism would be associated with more anger and reluctance to forgive past events inflicted on other ingroup members. It was proposed that this effect would be mediated by feeling connected to the ingroup victims. This was tested in a survey conducted among Hong Kong Chinese and their feelings toward the Japanese and the Nanjing massacre (N = 56). Results from all three studies supported the hypotheses. Copyright © 2009 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

民间寺庙与中国宗教经济——对宗教经济理论的探讨

国外宗教经济理论能否适用于中国宗教研究备受关注。香港城市大学梁景文教授及罗斯教授等对此问题也做出了回应。从1980年代后期到2004年,他们对广东和浙江八座黄大仙庙进行了研究,并得出结论:中国的寺庙在吸引信众方面存在竞争,并在宗教经济中扮演积极的角色。在最成功的新寺庙中,管理者制定了选址、推销、推广、革新和公共活动等一系列战略决策,以增加他们寺庙的吸引力。宗教经济模型能够有效地用来研究中国社会中的民间寺庙。