[EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote:
>
> It puzzles me that with respect to this discussion on Asian cronyism, >there has
>been no mention of "Family Circles." Family circles have a >long history among the
>more successful ethnic groups in the U.S. They >are very visible in Asian ethnic
>neighborhoods in New York City and San >Francisco and Los Agneles. Large family
>circles can have thousands of >members and are managed by a very formal
>administrative structure.
(snip)
>
> If the U.S. is successful in reducing social relations throughout the >world to
>complete isolation, I fear the violence and the almosat >psychotic disconnection that
>that will produce among people who lose >their former kinship bonds with the
>community.
>
> The Protestant Reformation, while it may have accelerated the >economics of
>capitalism, also destroyed the social safety net that had >been informally built
>throughout the Middle Ages.
The church began much earlier than the protestant reformation to destroy
family relations within Europe. There is an article about this subject
(in Norwegian) on the web at
URL::http://www.aftenposten.no/bakgr/980606/kronikk.htm written by
professor Jan Broegger at the university of Trondheim.
He writes that few centuries after csar Constantine the church was the
largest owner of land in Europe. It is estimated that in the seventh
century the church owned a third of all cultivated land in France.
To get this land the church declared lots of family relations to be sin
and illegal. People were not allowed to marry anyone they had any kind
of family relations with. By breaking down family relations this way the
church became able to take over large parts of the cultivated land of
Europe. In the kingdom of Naples (Souther Italy + Sicily) the catolic
church owned something like 70% of all land 200 years ago. The church
controlled almost everthing in the countryside, and that part of Europe
was the most backward part of Europe, only comparable to Russia.
Research about the church's destruction of traditional famlily relations
within Europe is to be found in the book "The development of the family
and marriage in Europe" written by Professor Jack Goody at Cambridge,
published by Cambridge University press 1983, according to professor Jan
Broegger. This destruction started as soon as the christian church
became the dominant religion within Europe.
But when the power of the church was weakened it was possible to build
other structures of solidarity which was not controlled by the church.
--
All the best
Tor Førde
visit our homepage: URL::http://home.sol.no/~toforde/
email:
[EMAIL PROTECTED]
