Alex Law (Professor of Sociology at Abertay University) recently reviewed David McCrone’s (Emeritus Professor of Sociology at Edinburgh University) book Changing Scotland: Society, Politics and Identity for Bella Caledonia. In the book, McCrone discusses how Scotland has changed in the last three decades of the twentieth century and grounds his claim in what C. Wright Mills calls ‘the sociological imagination’–the idea that we can only fully understand an individual’s biography in relation to the wider historical changes in social structure. McCrone used this sociological framework to investigate the changing structure, politics and culture of Scotland. The book begins by outlining the patterns of social change in Scotland from 1945 to 1975 and then accounts for the social conditions that have shaped Scotland into what it is. McCrone argues that the meaning and institutions of Scotland were altered by civil society, state and nation and how that was transformed “practically and ideologically” by the 1970s caesura. The main thesis is: “socioeconomic and demographic changes since the 1970s have utterly transformed Scotland…All western societies passed through similar processes of deindustrialisation, the rise of services, demand for higher educational credentials, and the feminisation of the workforce, with populations reconfigured by smaller, privatised households living in new towns and peripheral suburbs.” Law describes the book as “eminently readable, intellectually engaging and instructive, replete with carefully marshalled facts in support of his overarching thesis about the post-war trajectory of Scottish society, culture and politics.”

Gadjah Mada University’s Donnie Trisfian released a news report on Indonesia’s democracy. In the report, UGM sociologist Dr. Arie Sujito explains how the current global instability is having an impact on national conditions such as “weakening of public ethics, rising pragmatism, and diminishing respect for humanitarian values.” Additionally he points out the two sides to the development of digital technology, one side advances in information expanding knowledge, communication and connectivity, while on the other side digital spaces have led to social fragmentation, political polarization, and the spread of unverified information. He argues that the challenge the younger generation faces is moving past mastering technology to cultivating it for “civic virtue.” Sujito argues Indonesia must shift from orientation around market demands to educational support as a way to develop ethical and social awareness: “A person’s intelligence is not measured merely by the numbers that appear, but by the character reflected behind them.”

The New York Times ran a story about how many couples are choosing legal  domestic partnership—celebrated with “domestic partnership parties”—over marriage and weddings. Pepper Schwartz (Professor of Sociology at the University of Washington) commented that domestic partnerships are “practical and private.” Schwartz describes that couples often “want security and something that differentiates them from living together or dating” but can be undone more easily than a divorce. She noted that Millennials, who witnessed a high divorce rate among their parents, may be cautious about marriage as an institution.