2020, Vol.63, No.2

Studies in Humanities and Social Sciences 2023 KCI Impact Factor : 0.39

pISSN : 1598-4230 / eISSN : 2586-7601
https://journal.kci.go.kr/ihss

How do ordinary citizens assess threats posed by a rival state? International relations scholars, particularly realists, provide important insights into ordinary citizens’ threat assessment. Based on a survey experiment that utilizes a representative sample of U.S. citizens, this study examines how ordinary U.S. citizens assess a rival state’s threat. This study finds that instead of using all the information available, ordinary citizens utilize information about both state power and intentions heuristically for threat assessment. As a result, U.S. citizens respond as though they were offensive realists under certain conditions (when uncertainty about a strong state’s intentions is high), while they respond as though they were defensive (motivational) realists under some other conditions (when uncertainty about a strong state’s intentions is low). This study makes a theoretical contribution to the existing scholarship by empirically testing at the micro level the baseline assumption of realists of international relations over the role of a state’s intentions in threat assessment.

The germ theory of disease that had been developed in Europe was not only a theory for clinical treatment including antiseptic surgery but also an etiology for public health including vaccination and public hygiene. Furthermore, it was not confined to a medical setting, and expanded to cultural realms in many ways for the benefit of both. In particular, it began to collaborate with Christian concepts in America to promote a new idea for public health. As a result, it has influenced some religious concepts such as filth, sin, and repentance. This paper illustrates the way in which the collaboration between medical and religious concepts in America impacted the Protestant mission field in 19th century Korea. I will argue that in the process of introducing new Christian ideas to Korean people, the ontological aspect of sin was emphasized and simultaneously the sin became to be conceptualized as a material being that could be washed away by some rituals.

Architectural and urban design are now widely incorporating the method of what is called participatory design or citizen design and getting stakeholders involved in the very process previously left solely to experts. Based on anthropological qualitative research in Hawaiʻi, this paper discusses how a corporation seeking to represent corporate citizenship developed an affordable housing community while incorporating voices from the community. Using concepts and insights in anthropology and particularly that of semiotic mediation, this paper analyzes how certain design elements are selectively formed as signs capable of mediating future interpretations of and claims to citizenship. Through an analysis of interactions that took place using transcripts and observations at community-wide events and corporate meetings, what is revealed is that different groups including the corporation, local residents, and employees in search of homes nearby workplaces, differently contribute to the making of the design of the future community. Occupying different statuses and roles within a semiotic participation framework, they respectively contribute to the construction of the overall design as a composite sketch of signs indexically “pointing to” different ideas and preferences, which can be construed as meaningful by different participant groups. It is argued that these efforts are processes whereby design elements are made grounds for future claims to corporate citizenship and cultural citizenship.