Volker Hermann Schmidt
Email Address
socvhs@nus.edu.sg
Organizational Units
26 results
Publication Search Results
Now showing 1 - 10 of 26
Publication Public health ethics. Problems and suggestions(Oxford University Press, 2015) Schmidt V.H; SOCIOLOGYPublication Multiple modernities or varieties of modernity?(2007) Schmidt, V.H.; SOCIOLOGYPublication Models of Health Care Rationing(2004-11) Schmidt, V.H.; SOCIOLOGYThe article discusses & exemplifies three models of health care rationing observed in affluent, economically advanced countries. Its underlying premise is that no welfare system in the world can be exempted from any rationing whatsoever. This raises the question as to how the problem ought best to be resolved. But before thinking about normatively appealing answers it might be helpful to study how the problem is actually dealt with in the real world. For such a study brings to light several advantages & drawbacks of various rationing schemes which it would be hard to consider (even conceive) in the abstract alone, but whose knowledge may be highly relevant, perhaps indispensable, for the designation of adequate solutions. References. [Reprinted by permission of Sage Publications Ltd., copyright 2004.].Publication Modernity and diversity: Reflections on the controversy between modernization theory and the theory of multiple modernities(2011-05) Schmidt, V.H.; SOCIOLOGYThe article revisits modernization theory's convergence claim, which has been strongly criticized by multiple modernists, who maintain that emerging realities have not borne out its underlying premises. Based on a thorough reading of classical texts, the article reconstructs the term's meaning within a modernization-theoretical frame of reference and then considers the evidence that multiple modernists hold against it. It finds that none of the observations cited by leading multiple modernists are able to challenge modernization theory, which can easily accommodate the kinds of difference invoked by its critics. East-Asian modernity in particular, to which both sides assign special weight for any test of modernization theory, appears remarkably similar to Western modernity when viewed through the lenses of this theory. At the same time, the literature on multiple modernities, despite pleading to take difference seriously, is silent about differences that large parts of the less-developed world exhibit vis-a-vis the West and East Asia in social-structural and cultural respects, indicating different degrees of modernization. The article concludes with a brief note on the differential weight of different kinds of diversity for different reference problems and a suggestion for a constructive resolution of the conflict between the two approaches.Publication Multiple modernities or varieties of modernity?(2007-06) Schmidt, V.H.; SOCIOLOGYThe article offers a critical appraisal of the concept of multiple modernities that has been gaining ground in sociology during the past decade. It rejects this concept as both conceptually flawed and empirically unfounded, and it proposes an alternative concept, that of varieties of modernity, which is believed to be better able to address the former's substantive concerns, while at the same time permitting us to speak of modernity in the singular. The main source of inspiration for such an alternative concept is the varieties of capitalism paradigm guiding the new political economy literature, and one of its advantages over the multiple modernities paradigm is its focus on institutions, rather than vague, barely explicated notions of culture and cultural difference. However, a varieties of modernity approach that followed its lead would have to be much broader and more comprehensive, and would therefore be more difficult to develop and to apply, than the varieties of capitalism paradigm. But even if it ultimately proved infeasible, the very consideration of its methodological prerequisites would still promise to yield valuable insights for students of modernity.Publication Sociological theory and social reality. Reply to the critics(2005-12) Schmidt, V.H.; SOCIOLOGYPublication Systems theory's systems: Strengths, weaknesses and a remedy(2005) Schmidt, V.H.; SOCIOLOGYPublication Systems theory's systems: Strengths, weaknesses and a remedy(2005-12) Schmidt, V.H.; SOCIOLOGYThe article concerns itself with Luhmann's concept of societal function systems and shows that Luhmann uses this concept with two fundamentally different meanings. Both versions cover important aspects of social reality and hence are indispensable for an adequate social theory. Yet, their respective definitions make them mutually incompatible, resulting not only in deep conceptual flaws and self-contradictions, but also giving rise to two conflicting social theories within the same body of work whose difference remains unacknowledged. Two proposals for solving the problem are discussed. The author suggests that Luhmann's concept of function systems be disaggregated in line with Weber's distinction between value spheres and life orders that, he claims, would permit us to retain key insights Luhmann offers about both aspects of reality without forcing us to give up central premises underlying his thought, which are contradictory only when applied to the same subject matter. © Lucius & Lucius Verlag Stuttgart.Publication Oversocialised epistemology: A critical appraisal of constructivism(2001-02) Schmidt, V.H.; SOCIOLOGYThe article looks at some strengths and weaknesses of attempts at socialising the concepts of knowledge and epistemology. Roughly speaking, such socialising is the result of considering these concepts from the sociological point of view. Four consequences of doing so are pointed out. This is followed by a discussion of a number of flaws identified in much of the constructivist literature on the issue. Constructivists have doubtless played an important role in demystifying the notions of knowledge and epistemology. Yet at times they have gone too far by drawing conclusions from their analyses which these analyses are incapable of supporting. At the end of the article, an alternative avoiding the difficulties posed by such conclusions is briefly sketched.Publication National Citizenship and Categorical Inequality(Duncker & Humblot GmbH, 2020-01-01) Schmidt, Volker H; Gutmann, Thomas; Prof Volker Hermann Schmidt; SOCIOLOGY
- «
- 1 (current)
- 2
- 3
- »