Review of Sociology Special Issue (1995)

PREFACE The primary task of the Review of Sociology as the periodical of the Hungarian Sociological Association is naturally to serve the purposes of communication within Hungarian social science. As a consequence of the commonly known isolation of our language, regarded to be a difficult one (presumably affecting even the English translation) the international community of social scientists cannot easily hear about these publications. Although Hungarian sociologists'have a considerable number of contributions to the international periodicals of the profession, we believe that occasionally it is helpful to come forward with an English-language number edited by Hungarians to offer a cross-section of the issues preoccupying Hungarian social science. In 1994 our issue published on the occasion of the ISA congress held in Bielefeld presented some of our younger colleagues who have not yet made their international debut. The good reception of that issue encouraged us to address the public of the ESA congress of Budapest with an English-language issue as well. This issue differs from the previous one. The papers selected analyse transformation or crisis taking place in our country and region and affecting every segment of the society interpreted in a broad sense of the term. The reader will see that the authors figuring in the issue do not represent the same stand theoretically, methodologically, or in respect of their ethical and political values. We did not aim at projecting the processes from one aspect. We are of the view that at present no single approach can claim to offer a complete and comprehensive interpretation and explanation of this historic change. The individual papers speak for themselves - we do not wish to summarise their statements. Several of them are comparative analyses. We wish to call attention to the contribution of Hungarian sociologists working outside the country as members of a minority (Bíró et al.). A further merit of this issue is that two papers help the reader in understanding the special historical background of Hungarian social science (Tamás, Heller). We hope to contribute to the success of the ESA congress with this issue, and to its outcome, which should be. at least in a scientific sense, fusion and not fission.

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