Exam 13: Technology, the Environment, and Social Movements

Which of the following nations is most likely to be responsible for global environmental damage?

Most technological innovations did not become engines of economic growth until social conditions allowed them to do so.

Which of the following best describes changes in research and development spending that took place during the last 40 years of the twentieth century?

Rock, punk, and reggae bands are sometimes invited to play at demonstrations such as nuclear disarmament rallies and gay liberation festivals because they keep crowds in control by keeping them entertained and involved in the celebratory aspects of social action.

What term is used by sociologists for widely valued goods such as money, education, prestige, and security?

Provide examples of how market pressures have encouraged new technologies that conserve resources, and resolved some environmental degradation issues.

Solidarity theorists argue for the importance of which of the following in the emergence of social movements?

What term is sometimes used in breakdown theory for the violation of norms in response to a perceived gap between expected social rewards and actual social rewards?

Define environmental racism and describe a Canadian example.

Breakdown theory falls within the functionalist perspective.

As described in the textbook, in 1991 the B.C. Forest Alliance tried to counter the growing appeal of the province's environmental movement. Which of the following describes how the strategies they used can be seen as frame alignment?

A social movement is a formal government-sponsored group that precipitates change.

Which of the following best explains the fact that public belief that global warming posed a real threat faltered, despite evidence of global warming in droughts, crop failures, the collapse of fish stocks, and violent storms during the 1990s?

Which of the following theories states that social movements emerge from collective action when discontented people succeed in building a stable membership and organizational base?

Which of the following conditions decreases the opportunities for collective action?

On the basis of which of the following has it been optimistically argued that various forms of environmental degradation will be resolved?

Which of the following best characterizes the world's richest countries?

In a classroom discussion, Connor challenges his professor's claim that class struggle is the motor of human history and the determining factor in history. Connor believes that, of all the different factors that have an impact on human life and society, none have had more influence than technology. What do sociologists call Connor's view?

Adopt solidarity theory as a research framework. Research the competition between proponents of wind energy and those who promote nuclear energy. Draw conclusions about which side has the greatest public support and explain how the support is the outcome of resource mobilization, political opportunities, and social control mechanisms.

Sociologists reserve the use of the expression normal accident for errors arising from the unpredicted but inevitable failure of highly complex technologies.