Portuguese Journal of Social Science - Volume 9, Issue 1, 2010

This article analyses the relationships between racial prejudice (flagrant and symbolic) and university students' membership of socio-political groups, their adhesion to political ideologies, and their attitudes related to the developed and developing worlds. A total of 418 students participated in the study. The results show a negative correlation between adhesion to left-wing ideology and social distance from black people. They also show that favourable attitudes to the developed world are positively correlated to the distance from black people. Finally, group memberships in social movements and in affective-religious communities inhibit the expression of symbolic racial prejudice.

This article discusses the role played by science museums in the public understanding of science in a semi-peripheral country, Portugal. It is based on the assumption that museums are at the intersection of science and society, being strongly influenced by what happens in the scientific field and in society at large, and that in a globalised world, they are susceptible to both international trends and national specificities. The article describes how in the last decade both the scientific system and the field of science museums have developed in Portugal, whereas visitor numbers and the connection to society have remained weak. The content analysis of a scientific exhibition on nuclear research and technology shows that the deficit mode of envisaging the relation between science and the public still persists.

Drawing on data from the International Social Survey Programme 2002 survey Family and changing gender roles, this article looks at the diversity in attitudes towards gender relations and family values in contemporary Europe from a gender perspective. Rather than the idea of a one-dimensional move from tradition to modernity that would gradually erase the attitudinal gender gap, the findings corroborate that gender differentiation plays a key role in attitudinal patterns. Furthermore, the attitudinal gender gap is path-specific and varies according to country-specific societal modernisation. Hence, I examine differences in the statements of men and women to portray attitudinal gender gaps on the national level. I follow the idea that wide gender gaps are associated either with women's financial autonomy or with greater societal equality in education and political participation, since they allow for greater female awareness of masculine domination. I also argue that family deinstitutionalisation also correlates with greater attitudinal gender gaps.

In this article we study typologies of partnership in three local projects for employment promotion, based on case study methodology. Partnership is the process by which two or more agents interact on the basis of key assumptions that are reflected in the project dynamic. For the three projects analysed Medida, Formart and Le Cheile the definition of participation through resource availability and actions constitutes the basis for coordination development by partner agents. Forms of coordination differentiate partnership dynamics, which are also based on different organisational impacts in projects and in the origin institutions of the partners.

The 2009 European Parliament elections were especially interesting for the Portuguese media, politicians and citizens because they took place shortly before the legislative and local elections of 27 September and 11 October 2009, respectively. Because of this proximity, the elections to the European Parliament were seen as a kind of primary for the forthcoming national elections. However, this also gave them special relevance in terms of electoral behaviour research concerning second-order elections. Here we reflect on these issues, not only by looking at the last European Parliament elections from a longitudinal perspective, but also by comparing the result with what happened in the following national elections. Since 1987 there have been major changes in the Portuguese party system, with the emergence of a majoritarian trend that was first visible in the legislative elections but which has since been replicated in European and local elections. However, the 2009 European elections showed a significant increase in party system fragmentation, indicating a possible return to the consensual period (197587). The questions are thus: to what extent may this be an indication of a major structural change; and is it simply a response to specific political circumstances?