What kind of system is the one that accumulates colossal fortunes by the mass-scale closure of workplaces while forcing millions of people to ghettos, unhealthy living conditions, wretched housing estates, schools operating in car parks, stand-courses, hopeless little jobs and racial police harassment?

The article reviews the sociological theories of postindustrial societies, and attempts to find the categories that describe and reproduce the new inequalities. It tries to explain why and how the conditions of socialization, the integration into the professional world and the individual trajectories have changed in the new structure. The prolonged period of adolescence brings about not only a re-evaluation of the role of family, family education and disciplining but also other forms of the reproduction of social inequalities. Academic titles and degrees are becoming more and more important that give an advantage in the flexible labor market besides the academic-cultural prestige.

Lenin's article of 1917 has become a major paradigm of the historiography of the revolution of 1905 although this relationship received relatively little interest. It is therefore very actual and illuminating to re-discover this forgotten document on the centenary of the revolution.

What is the economic-social context of the advance of the Latin American left since the past few years? What is new about these "new social movements" and how original are their demands, values, organizational forms, actions, and proclaimed identities?

In Latin America the political significance of peasant movements have increased in the past 25 years – in spite of the decrease of the number of peasantry. Toady these movements are more successful in mobilizing the society against the neo-liberal elite and they are often capable of more organized actions and deeper solidarity than the weakened working-class movement. One of the reasons of this phenomenon is that the countryside suffers more from the impacts of neo-liberalism than the towns. The alliance with the local parliamentary central-leftist political parties was therefore almost always detrimental for the peasant movements. However, they are not ready to seize power on their own and there are severe obstacles to an alliance with the working-class.