Extension And Refinement Of Network Exchange Theory

This text, first published in 2006, presents the most important and influential social psychological theories and research programs in contemporary sociology. Original chapters by the scholars who initiated and developed these theoretical perspectives provide full descriptions of each theory and its background, development, and future. This second edition has been revised and updated to reflect developments within each theory, and in the field of social psychology more broadly. The opening chapters of Contemporary Social Psychological Theories cover general approaches, organized around fundamental principles and issues: symbolic interaction, social exchange, and distributive justice. Following chapters focus on specific research programs and theories, examining identity, affect, comparison processes, power and dependence, status construction, and legitimacy. A new, original piece examines the state and trajectory of social network theory. A mainstay in teaching social psychology, this revised and updated edition offers a valuable survey of the field.

The field of network exchange has grown over the last 20 years from a few scattered studies to substantial publications in leading journals. Today network exchange is as advanced as any area of sociology. Willer and his contributors present its most advanced theory, Network Exchange Theory, and, by assembling and supplementing formulations now spread across leading journals, provide scholars with a unique collection. Contributors examine basic issues in theory as well as research. The end product is a well-tested theory which relates social structure to social action under a wide range of conditions, and is proven to be a useful tool for structural analysis at both the micro and macro levels. An important text and guide for researchers and students of social theory, structure, and social psychology.

Status, Power, and Legitimacy presents methodological, theoretical, and empirical essays by Joseph Berger and Morris Zelditch, Jr.—two of the leading contributors to the Stanford tradition in the study of micropro-cesses. This three-part volume brings together major contributions to the development of this tradition, in addition to a number of newly written essays published here for the first time. Berger and Zelditch integrate the essays and relate them to a larger body of theory and research as they explore the importance of a generalizing orientation in sociology. Their view of theory as flux and process, the blending of social process with theory-building, produces a picture of the social world in line with the great tradition of George Herbert Mead, Max Weber, and Georg Simmel. Status, Power, and Legitimacy explores the relation between the scope of a theory and testing, applying, and developing it; the relation between abstract, general theories and empirical generalizations; and how to use an understanding of this relation to construct theories that are neither historically nor culturally bound. In the first part, Berger and Zelditch discuss strategies of theory construction, the development of abstract, general theories of social processes, and the different ways in which theories grow. Status processes are the focus of the second part, which includes: the formation of reward expectations; the role of status cues in interaction; the evolution of status expectations; and the application of status characteristics theory to male-female interaction. Lastly, the authors dissect power and legitimacy: the effect of expectations on power; the legitimation of power and its effect on the stability of authority; and legitimation under conditions of dissensus. This volume is a fine theoretical effort of great depth and breadth. Berger and Zelditch review the background of each paper, place the new concepts and principles introduced by each paper in context and examine subsequent research generated by the paper. They carve out new research areas in the social world of class, status, power, and authority. This volume will be of interest to those in the fields of sociology and, in particular, social theory.

Despite a shared interest in the analysis of complex organizations operating in complex environments, macro-organization theory and research on the multinational corporation have developed quite independently of each other. This book, the product of a collaborative endeavour by scholars from both fields, represents the first systematic effort to build a broad bridge between these two areas of research.

Includes sections "Book reviews" and "Periodical literature."

This comprehensive four volume set includes all major contributions to the field of international business. It also includes key writings in the areas of international political economy and on regional and national issues.