<abstract xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml">I am proposing to use the term <italic>EUfication</italic> to define the process of creating the EU as territory out of the geographical disparities (re)produced across the core and periphery of Europe. The article contends that <italic>EUfication</italic> is a manifestation of the phenomenon of spatial fix. In a first step, it describes the dynamics of territorial unevenness within the EU: on the one hand, by some relevant socio-economic cohesion data compiled from Eurostat indicators, and – on the other hand – through the diagnosis on spatial injustice in different Member States, as it was revealed by a comparative research conducted between 2017-2019. Furthermore, my analysis explains territorial unevenness by reconstructing the well-known historical formation of the union through a less acknowledged perspective, i.e., in the context of the changing regimes of capital accumulation. The article concludes that the theory of spatial fix allows us recognizing: the position and timing, from which and when different countries took part in the process of <italic>EUfication</italic> is a factor leading to the persistence of uneven territorial development among the European core and periphery. My contribution to theorizing on this process consists in bringing together the perspective of the spatial fix with the critical analysis of how is the social dimension paradigm overshadowed by the economic concern of capital accumulation in the socio-economic governance of the European Single Market, including the politics of territorial cohesion.</abstract>

Uneven <italic>Eufication</italic>, The Spatial Fix and the Dominance of Economic Over Social Policies

<abstract xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml">This article aims to conduct a case study on urban planning models drawn by social scientists in 1970s Romania. It looks at the trans-national channels of knowledge circulation and reconstructs specialists’ role in creating new bridges of cooperation between the first and second world. It also analyzes the gradual re-signification of these ideas locally as part of the socialist state development project. More precisely, it wants to answer three intertwined questions: To what extent did the trans-nationalization of knowledge in the late 1960s determine a particular approach to urban planning in Romania? What does this tell us about local professional practices’ autonomy? Which was the international relevance of Romanian social sciences’ practice? The article contributes to an emerging scholarship on the genealogy of these ideas by placing the transnational debates of the late 1960s and early 1970s consumed under the umbrella of various international organizations, such as the ISA and the UN, in conversation with an intellectual tradition dating back to the interwar period.</abstract>

Epistemic Encounters: Social Sciences and the Rethinking of Urban Planning Policies in the Early 1970s Romania

<abstract xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml">Our main aim is to unpack the notion of employability as a narrative and as a strategy by contextualising it in an Eastern European setting and by scrutinizing how it is defined and experienced by two different categories of employees: high-skilled and skilled workers. We look at the case of Cluj, a mid-size Romanian town fast developing into an IT hub and a centre of reindustrialization. Drawing on qualitative interviews with employees in the IT and HR sectors, and in medium-sized factories, we argue that personal development and gaining expertise are a successful employability strategy for the highskilled, but make the skilled workers more vulnerable and at risk of becoming redundant. We argue that the employability discourse draws new lines of divisions between employees. By shifting the lens away from the organization and towards the individual worker’s responsibility, the employability discourse depoliticizes the relationship between the employee and the employer.</abstract>

Department of Sociology, Faculty of Sociology and Social Work

Depoliticizing the Firm: Revisiting Employability as a Strategy and a Narrative for High-Skilled and Skilled Workers in an Eastern European City

<abstract xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml">The idea of being active, healthy, happy and independent as long as is possible is strongly promoted in public discourse and in aging policies. Starting from the idea of investigating the serious leisure practices of the elderly, I sought to develop a qualitative research that captures perceptions and normative attitudes regarding the perceived and lived experience of aging. The study offers insights into the socially constructed nature of successful aging, by critically exploring the relation between the practice of Tai-Chi, considered a serious leisure activity among older adults, and the neoliberal ideology. During my fieldwork I conducted 14 in-depth semi-structured interviews and I have analyzed a specific typology of subjects - ‘healthy and somewhat wealthy’ as one of the respondents described himself - motivated by the fact that this category of the elderly is much more likely to internalize and promote neoliberal ideology. The goal of my fieldwork research was to determine how seniors operationalize the concept of successful aging and what strategies they use in order to ensure their experience matches their expectations. I also chose to focus on the way elders embrace a serious leisure perspective, which promises to give them a sense of purpose and progress. As shown by the accounts of the participants in the study, the need to be active, independent, healthy, and cheerful determine individuals to work with their own self and seek to engage in serious leisure activities.</abstract>

Healthy and Somewhat Wealthy: The Lived Experience of Successful Aging

<abstract xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml">This paper retraces the historical, structural, socioeconomic and political conditions of the Italian land reform, from the 1950’s, with a particular interest in the dynamic of class formation and property relations reconfiguration before and in the aftermath of the agrarian reform. We particularly discuss the class reconfiguration processes that ensued after the reform, displaying a particular interest in analysing the transformation of the class of absentee lords (latifundists) into a capitalist proprietary or entrepreneurial class, while rural landless or poor laborers - the new small owners - suffered further deterioration of their socioeconomic condition under the generalization of capitalist property forms, dissemination of market constraints and imperatives into Southern agriculture and the reconfiguration of social relations within the capitalist mode of production.</abstract>

Land Reform and Social Structure. A Sociohistorical Survey of the Impact of 1950’s Italian Land Reform on Property Relations and Class Formation in the <italic>Mezzogiorno</italic>

Book Review: <italic>Noile subiectivități ale capitalismului global. Spiritualitate, dezvoltare personală și transformări neoliberale în România (The New Subjectivities of Global capitalism. Spirituality, Personal Development and Neoliberal Transformations in Romania)</italic>, Sorin Gog and Anca Simionca (eds.), Cluj-Napoca: Tact, 2020, 206 pages.

Book Review: <italic>Red Globalization: The Political Economy of the Soviet Cold War from Stalin to Khrushchev,</italic> by Oscar Sanchez-Sibony, New York: Cambridge University Press, 2014, 293 pages.

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Studia Universitatis Babes-Bolyai Sociologia

The journal welcomes multidisciplinary and comparative approaches in the fields of sociology, social work, social policies, anthropology, urban and rural studies. Articles that address social issues from Central and Eastern Europe from a global perspective, develop historical comparisons or critical reflections, are particularly appreciated. The core of each thematic issue is composed of research articles with empirical grounding. Methodological discussion papers and book reviews compose distinct sections. A special section entitled Romanian Sociology Today publishes recent research papers relevant for the state-of-art of sociology in Romania.   Why subscribe and read  Studia UBB Sociologia was one of the first Sociology journals in Romania, fully published in English since 2008. The majority of articles are authored by Eastern European scholars who embrace a theoretically informed, empirically grounded, comparative and critical perspective on social changes in the region.  Archiving  Sciendo archives the contents of this journal in Portico - digital long-term preservation service of scholarly books, journals and collections.  Plagiarism Policy  The editorial board is participating in a growing community of Similarity Check System's users in order to ensure that the content published is original and trustworthy. Similarity Check is a medium that allows for comprehensive manuscripts screening, aimed to eliminate plagiarism and provide a high standard and quality peer-review process. 

Studia Universitatis Babes-Bolyai Sociologia

Volume 65 (2020): Issue 2 (December 2020)

Uneven Eufication, The Spatial Fix and the Dominance of Economic Over Social Policies

Epistemic Encounters: Social Sciences and the Rethinking of Urban Planning Policies in the Early 1970s Romania

Depoliticizing the Firm: Revisiting Employability as a Strategy and a Narrative for High-Skilled and Skilled Workers in an Eastern European City

Healthy and Somewhat Wealthy: The Lived Experience of Successful Aging

Land Reform and Social Structure. A Sociohistorical Survey of the Impact of 1950’s Italian Land Reform on Property Relations and Class Formation in the Mezzogiorno

Book Review: Red Globalization: The Political Economy of the Soviet Cold War from Stalin to Khrushchev, by Oscar Sanchez-Sibony, New York: Cambridge University Press, 2014, 293 pages.

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