Readers will follow an intense period of social change in Quebec, during which there was a remarkable increase in the level of modernization. They will note a massive entry of women into the labour force and a growing service sector that now constitutes seventy percent of all economic activity. They will observe also that the Québécois have dramatically increased their television viewing and that, while they express a generally high level of satisfaction with life, the Québécois must contend with escalating crime and suicide rates.

Readers will follow an intense period of social change in Quebec, during which there was a remarkable increase in the level of modernization. They will note a massive entry of women into the labour force and a growing service sector that now constitutes seventy percent of all economic activity. They will observe also that the Québécois have dramatically increased their television viewing and that, while they express a generally high level of satisfaction with life, the Québécois must contend with escalating crime and suicide rates.

The introduction summarizes and locates the major waves of change. The authors then document each trend in relation to eighteen thematic groups that include age, community, women, labour, management, stratification, social relations, the state, mobilizing institutions, social forces, ideologies, households, lifestyle, leisure, education, integration, and attitudes and values.

On Rachel Carson and her work and on current environmental challenges. The four authors present information on various American trends: demographic, macroeconomic, and macro-technological. Descriptions, tables, and graphs trace the dynamics of population, specifically in relation to the expansion which followed the 1982-83 recession, and analyze achievements in intelligence, genetic engineering, and space travel. Annotation copyrighted by Book News, Inc., Portland, OR

Over the three decades from 1960 to 1990, French society underwent a spectacular transformation due to the baby boom, which was particularly broad-based and prolonged in France and caused the population to climb by a full one-third. At the same time, the French economy expanded and the pace of modernization picked up, with the result that the wealth of the French quadrupled in a single generation. The turning point between the reconstruction and development period and the period of profound social change appears to have been 1965. The baby boom was over by then, and the production system was shifting in orientation. No longer dominated by the growth of basic industries, production was now starting to focus on consumer goods and services.

Italy remains an enigma for many observers. Recent Social Trends in Italy, 1960-1995, the sixth volume from the international Comparative Charting of Social Change program, provides a new and convincing schema for its comprehension. It shows that three essential institutions have structured and unified Italian society: the family, the church, and political parties. While the state remains a weak institution, it is important as a regulator of the economy and of society through the welfare state. The book, which contains a long introduction by Alberto Martinelli on the uneven modernization of Italy, shows the usefulness of analysing social change through study of a series of macro-social trends. These trends range from life-style structures to fertility, leisure, consumption, inequality, religion, and family, among others. This sixth national profile provides more arguements in favour of a hypothesis of diversification, rather than convergence, of modern societies. As Henri Mendras writes in the preface of the book, "The more we change, the more we remain ourselves: that is the conclusion of our comparative research, and the Italian study provides further ample proof of it."