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Spring/Summer 1999: The Unknown Of Globalisation
Globalised Multiculturalism: the Challenge of Heterogeneity (PDF, 18 pages, 56.1 KB) , by Jocelyne Cesari
The author suggests analysing the cultural dimensions of globalisation and replacing the cultural question, and more precisely the link between culture and social structure, in the centre of sociological theory. Jocelyne Cesari shows that the cultural aspect of globalisation cannot be stopped at what one calls "macdonaldisation", i.e. the homogenisation aspects. The dynamic is indeed more complex and recalls to a necessary analysis of the global differentiation, relativisation and socialisation processes and dynamics. Is the diffusion of cultural norms at a global scale sufficient to edify a transnational civility?
The English version of this contribution has been published in Alternatives Vol. 27, Supplement, February 2002 Available at http://www.rienner.com/altrec.htm
Marseilles: Networks of Trans-Border Migrants, Market Place and Bazaar Economy (PDF, 17 pages, 54.3 KB) , by Michel Peraldi
How are migrants integrated into the western market place? The author studies with an ethnographical precision the network of companies and migrants in the French harbour city of Marseille. He analyses the new dynamics participating in the constitution of companies and networks overcoming the usual frames of the fair and ethnic economy leading to more and more transnational companies. The author invites us to reconsider the articulation between a local commercial area and a far-off and global market.
The Migrant Entrepreneurs of Europe (PDF, 18 pages, 56.7 KB) , by Hassen Boubakri
This article deals with the organisational dimensions of the work of various migrant groups to Europe, mostly originating from Third countries (Tunisian and North African, Turks, Asians...). These groups have proved very active and enterprising in the field of private initiative and in the participation to economic exchanges and transfers on a transnational scale. This economic dimension (entrepreneurial and independent activities, multipolarised circulation and mobility...) has in fact been carried-out and promoted by very effective modes of communal organisation on the scale of social advancement and control of the territories, and spaces of mobility.
Dispersion as a Resource (PDF, 15 pages, 46.7 KB) , by Emmanuel Ma Mung
How can the geographical dispersion of a social body transform into a "spatial resource"? The Chinese Diaspora provides an answer. Several tightly imprecated processes enable this transformation. Their origin come from the special relation the Diaspora maintains with the territory and from the effort made to think the unity of a dispersed body. One of these processes has been that of the making of a genealogical continuity through the creation of a specific memory/history. Another process is related to the way this genealogical continuity has been transformed into a geographical contiguity. A third consists of the way in which the relation to the territory – in its classical sense of a determined space circumscribed by its permanent occupation by a population – is replaced by a feeling of extra-territoriality. After having described these processes the author tries to analyse the way in which the spatial resources may be mobilised
Metropolis: Strategic Site and New Frontier (PDF, 21 pages, 69.6 KB) , by Saskia Sassen
The classical representations of the globalisation of the economy put the light on the ideas of hyper mobility, global communication, and the loss of sense of notions such as place and distance. The author reintroduces the notion of place and production process by underscoring how the global and the local space do not exclude one another. Saskia Sassen reconstitutes the geography of all these various places that participate to the globalisation process and produce new power stakes.
Review Essay: Questioning the Object 'Diaspora', by (PDF, 16 pages, 53 KB) , by Stéphane Dufoix
As the word "diaspora" has been more and more commonly used in the field of social sciences, its meaning and the heuristic scope of its use are still very blurred. It is possible to highlight the epistemological and theoretical problems characterising the common use of the word "diaspora" through a critical reading of three recent and important books on this topic. Considered as a given and not as a social product it misses all the fluctuations of State that may shape the structuring of collective experiences abroad.
Review Essay: Perspectives on the Middle East (PDF, 4 pages, 17.2 KB) , by Rémy Leveau
What is the future for Middle East? This question finds an answer in the works of Louis-Jean Duclos and Bernard Botiveau, respectively on Jordan and Palestine. The author of this bibliographical comparison details the interests of these two books and spots the light on the necessity to consider the political news from Middle East through a long term field-work and perspective.