This article outlines a theoretical framework for interpreting the meaning and function of political protest in modern democracies and develops normative criteria for assessing its democratic quality. To allow for a better understanding of how social structures, legal institutions, and political engagement interact in protest, I combine analytical perspectives from social theory and democratic theory. A useful first distinction, I argue, is between reformist and transformative forms of protest. While reformist protest does not challenge the given framework of the modern democratic order, transformative protest politicizes the basic principles of that order. Finally, I develop four criteria to identify emancipatory traits within protest movements: 1) expanding the circle of those who benefit from the fulfillment of democracy's promises; 2) the establishment of discursive democratic spaces; 3) a balance between dramatization and exchange; and 4) a willingness to become someone else.

Unlike theories in physics, social theories are usually tested by applying statistical hypothesis testing to observational data. This approach has more problems than commonly realised owing to false positives and model uncertainty, and it inhibits the development of social science. A better method to test a theory is by making definitive predictions that, if proved, strongly support the theory against alternative explanations.

This article builds on the Linguistic Society of America's Statement on Race to argue that linguistics urgently needs an interdisciplinarily informed theoretical engagement with race and racism. To be adequate, a linguistic theory of race must incorporate the perspectives of linguistic researchers of different methodological approaches and racial backgrounds and must also draw on theories of race in neighboring fields, including anthropology, sociology, and psychology, as well as speech and hearing sciences, composition and literacy studies, education, and critical interdisciplinary race studies. The lack of comprehensive and up-to-date theoretical, analytical, and political understandings of race within linguistics not only weakens research by erasing, marginalizing, and misrepresenting racially minoritized groups, but it also diminishes the impact of the entire field by devaluing and excluding the intellectual contributions of researchers of color, whose work on this topic is rarely welcome within linguistics departments. The article therefore argues for a rethinking of both linguistic scholarship and linguistics as a discipline in more racially inclusive and socially just terms.

Volunteering research focuses predominantly on predicting participation in volunteering, proceeding from the quasi-hegemonic foundation of resource theory and dominant-status theory. Empirical research in this tradition has provided extremely robust evidence that dominant groups in society are more likely to volunteer. At the same time, it has reinforced the status quo in the production of knowledge on volunteering, thereby neglecting the clear problematic of “inequality in volunteering.” Compared to the guiding question of “participation,” the concept of “inequality” can generate a more variegated, critical, and change-oriented research agenda. With this special issue, we aim to build a “new research front” in the field of volunteering. In this introduction, we advance a novel research agenda structured around a multidimensional understanding of inequality, concomitantly delineating four central research programs focusing on (a) resources, (b) interactions, (c) governmentalities, and (d) epistemologies. We discuss the focus of these lines of research in greater detail with respect to inequality in volunteering, their main critique of dominant research on participation in volunteering, and key elements of the new research agenda.

European studies have traditionally relied on the power of broad concepts to account for the experience of the European Union: be it integration, governance, market, or legal order. Many of these concepts originated in social sciences. Yet, one concept is conspicuously absent from this list: ‘society’ was seen as ill-suited for picturing European integration. This background makes the recent and pervasive return of the term ‘society’ in the EU institutional discourse even more apparent. The paper attempts to propose a framework within which to think of the EU and its law in terms of European society makes sense. First, it argues that this turn to society is a response to challenges posed to the core assumptions upon which EU law has been predicated. Secondly, it inquiries about the sort of society produced by the law of European society. Thirdly, it suggests a new development for EU law and EU legal studies, integrating in their technical and conceptual appartuses additional resources and critical knowledge drawon from social sciences and social theory.

Few social scientists expected another major inter-state war in Europe. The dominant positions either confine warfare to the dustbin of European history or downplay its significance in late modernity. Sociologists of war have been less surprised by recent developments, however. In a wider socio-historical context warfare remains a crucial catalyst of social change. No other social phenomenon has continuously influenced the social world to such an extent and this has been particularly the case in European history. In this article, I critically review recent developments in the sociology of war. I also look at the ways in which existing analytical tools can be deployed to explain the return of inter-state warfare in Europe. I argue that the integration of longue durée comparative historical sociology with micro-sociological scholarship on everyday behaviour in war is the best way forward to understanding the long-term dynamics of war and society.

The emergence of ‘compassionate cities’ and ‘compassionate communities’ (CCC) as social movements has become a pronounced development in public health approaches to the end-of-life. Drawing on the World Health Organisations’ Ottawa Charter, it contends that end-of-life care has become individualised and medicalised and promotes the ‘rediscovery’ of community approaches. Drawing on a range of sociological theory insights, it deploys a ‘critical interpretative’ analytic approach to literature identified in a narrative review. The paper aims to question the affirmative consensus that exists around CCC by building on the emergence of critical themes have recently emerged in various meta-reviews. This analysis identifies tensions and inconsistencies between the ideals of The Ottawa Charter, CCC practice and a relatively superficial and uncritical deployment of theory, particularly in relation to its status as a conservative or radical movement. The paper concludes by suggesting constructive ways forward.

This paper is interested in the spread of an autocratic ideology and the emergence of a societal belief. It is often assumed that the greater the capacities of an autocratic regime to inculcate an ideological belief into the minds and hearts of subordinate citizens, the more an autocratic ideology is shared in a given society. The extent of an ideological belief is explained by a direct and immediate function of its indoctrination capacities. The paper does not question this top–down, macro–micro approach, but argues that the spread of an ideology also depends on stabilizing micro–micro interactions and micro–macro linkages. In this light, the paper makes use of James Coleman’s famous explanatory model and theorizes the different partial mechanisms. It pays particular emphasis on the micro–macro mechanism. Borrowing insights from epidemiology, it argues that three classes of parameters should be taken into closer consideration: timing, contact structure, and the contagiousness of an ideology. In empirical terms, the paper illustrates its theoretical reasoning with the dissemination of the North Korean Juche ideology from the 1950s to the early 1970s, which represents an extreme case of a rapidly ideologizing autocracy. The paper relies on secondary sources as well as archival material retrieved from the former embassy of the German Democratic Republic in Pyongyang.

This paper aims at exploring the dynamic interplay between advanced technological developments in AI and Big Data and the sustained relevance of theoretical frameworks in scientific inquiry. It questions whether the abundance of data in the AI era reduces the necessity for theory or, conversely, enhances its importance. Arguing for a synergistic approach, the paper emphasizes the need for integrating computational capabilities with theoretical insight to uncover deeper truths within extensive datasets. The discussion extends into computational social science, where elements from sociology, psychology, and economics converge. The application of these interdisciplinary theories in the context of AI is critically examined, highlighting the need for methodological diversity and addressing the ethical implications of AI-driven research. The paper concludes by identifying future trends and challenges in AI and computational social science, offering a call to action for the scientific community, policymakers, and society. Being positioned at the intersection of AI, data science, and social theory, this paper illuminates the complexities of our digital era and inspires a re-evaluation of the methodologies and ethics guiding our pursuit of knowledge.