Levelling up Group

• Levelling Up Statistics
• Basic Economics
• New Social Developments
• Concepts of Social Policy
• Labour Market Policy
• Analytical Demography

Socio Economic Policy Group

• Social Problems and Reforms Seminar
• Social Policy
• Comparative and International Socio-economic Policy

Policy Evaluation Group

• The Policy Cycle
• Evaluation Techniques and Tools

Statistics & Research Group

• Statistics & Research Methods part 1
• Statistics & Research Methods part 2

Master Dissertation

• Master Dissertation

0ptional courses

• Applied Methodology
• Performance audit in social policy

Courses: New Social Developments

Teaching Staff

Prof. Frans Lammertyn (University of Leuven, Belgium)

Objectives

This course aims at giving students a view on the specificity of sociology. More particularly, in the context of this course a (short) overview is given of what this discipline has to say about the social changes that take place in current societies.

Contents

The conceptualisation of these developments is based on the work of sociologists like Bauman, Beck, Castel, Castells, Giddens, Wagner, and many others. Trying to express what is happening in (western) societies at this very moment, some of them are talking about a transition from a 'simple' modernity to a 'reflexive' modernity. Through its inherent dynamics, modern society is undermining its formation of class, status, profession, gender roles, production, politics, etc., replacing them by a new kind of modernity. To people in general, this means they are being placed in a different world, a world that is characterised by terms such as 'manufactured uncertainty' (Giddens) and 'Risikogesellschaft' (Beck).

The literature mentionned above, points at different entangled radical changes people are confronted with. A first series of changes concerns the 'economic bonds'. Central are the processes concerning the labour market, the organisation of work and the collective and individual labour relationships. Of special importance here - but also in other contexts - is the process of globalization. The second part of the course is about the 'affective bonds' between people. Which developments can be detected in the field of marriage and the family, in the relationships between men and women, between different ethnic groups, between the young and the old ... ? A third set of changes is labeled 'cultural bonds' and concerns the process of individualisation and its impact on the (social) life of people. Within the same framework, attention is given to the risks that accompany the development of science and technology. Among other themes, the environmental issue is addressed here. The fourth and last part deals with the political and subpolitical steering of society, with the reactions these changes bring forth and with the demands that are imposed on the structure and the activities of the welfare state.