Russian Journal of Sociology

38-43

Authors: А.P. Abramov

The article discusses evolution of conceptual socio-economic approachesfor various forms of economic behavior.The economic motivation is expressed by such formsof coercion asexternal economic, economic, technological and ideological coercion.The social norm is determined as the main source of motivation. The new social reality presented by the non-institutional structures gives rise to the introduction of irrational motivational variablesin terms of global economy and transition of cultures, where affective economic action becomes dominant, and value-oriented, based on cultural scrapie, religious faith and aesthetic taste is the least important. It is concluded that the socio-cultural approach is fundamental in the study of socio-economic systems, since it allows the systematically and holistically imagine a new model of "economic man".

52-61

Authors: Georg W. Oesterdiekhoff

The incidents in Cologne at the New Year´s Eve with sexual attacks against young women performed by some hundreds of Arabian refugees and migrants have originated a debate both about the causes to such strange forms of behavior and about migration policy. Most experts earmark either the specific social situation of migrants or their traditional values regarding gender relations as causers to these forms of delinquency. The article shows that explanations of this type are not sufficient to explain such extreme forms of behavior unknown in the crime history of Germany. It is evidenced that instead only developmental psychology is able to explain these crude and brutal patterns of behavior. Different nations stay on different stages of psychological development, as Piagetian cross-cultural psychology found out. Therefore, it will need generations to raise in the new migrants those higher stages that carry a civilized conduct peoples of the most advanced nations of today usually exhibit. The incidents of Cologne shed a light on the modifications of culture modern societies have to face when they follow the migration policy Germany currently practices for whichever reasons. The new approach shows a fundamental theoretical alternative both to social psychological and racial-biological theories regarding the scrutiny of the psychology of different nations and of the problems of migration policy.

4-9

Authors: Alexander Fedorov

The author uses the hermeneutic analysis– a study of the process of interpretation of media texts, cultural and historical factors influencing the views of the agency / author on the media text. This analysis suggests media text comprehension through comparison with historical, cultural tradition and reality; penetration of its logic; through comparison of media images in historical and cultural context by combininganalysis of the structural, plot, ethical, ideological, iconographic / visual, media stereotypes and analysis of media texts’ characters. As a result, the author concluded that the era of the Cold War, which spawned mutual ideological confrontation of the communist and capitalist countries, covering all categories of media texts, including animation / cartoon. Cartoons were used as levers of power required reports confrontational ideas in attractive folklore, fairy package in order to influence not only adults but also on children's audience.

20-34

Authors: Georg W. Oesterdiekhoff

The realistic school of political sciences explains politics and wars by reference to “rationality” and “material interests”. However, a look at the political world of the first half of the 20th century shows forms of mind, culture, worldview, and behavior that are predominantly submerged in today´s most advanced nations. Racism, antisemitism, aggressive nationalism, imperialism, colonialism, and warfare for conquest targets shaped the political life. Cross-cultural psychology has evidenced that the generations born around 1870 or 1900 stood on intermediary psychological stages between those of humans from folk societies (R. Redfield) and from today´s most advanced nations. The rise of the adolescent stage of formal operations stepwise unfolded during the whole 20th century, while the earlier generations stood on lower stages. Accordingly, the intelligence of the peoples increased especially between 1950 and 1990 in consequence of school and job enrichments, a phenomenon the psychometric intelligence research calls Flynn effect. This article demonstrates that only the new developmental approach has the means available to disclose the psychological structures behind the former political life and the two world wars. The psychological advancement after 1950 is the main motor behind the humanitarian revolution (S. Pinker) that caused the changes and ameliorations of the moral and political life observable both on the national and international level. The considerate analysis of the causes to the world wars reveals that the instability of the international system originated in forms of mind and reason that are vanished nowadays not only in the Western world but partially beyond. The former instability of the international system, which led to the wars, has not institutional causes but mental ones describable by modern psychological approaches. On the whole, the 20th century catastrophe does not originate in the eternal structure of the human psyche but in a certain developmental stage modern humans occupied at that time.