Conflict in the World Polity - Neo-Institutional Perspectives
co-authored with Matthias König, published in "Acta Sociologica" 54 (1): 5-25, 2011.
This article assesses the potential contribution of neo-institutional world polity theory to the study of global... more
This article assesses the potential contribution of neo-institutional world polity theory to the study of global conflict dynamics. Prevalent conflict theories explain the emergence and resolution of conflicts by resorting to actors’ mutually incompatible preferences and differential access to economic, social or symbolic sources of power. World polity theory challenges fundamental assumptions of such theories by conceptualizing action as highly scripted and actors as culturally constituted. By focusing on the cultural rules of modern actorhood, world polity theory accounts for the emergence of new motives of conflict no less than for the diffusion of ‘rational’ methods of conflict resolution. It concludes by arguing that theoretical explication and empirical analysis of the hitherto neglected conflictive dimensions of the world polity approach is a fruitful agenda for conflict research and neo-
institutional scholars alike.
Documenting the Immigrant and Ethnic Experience in American Archives
Published in The American Archivist 73:1 (Spring 2010) 84-102
This paper examines the development of ethnic and immigrant archives in the United States since the 1960s. It focuses... more This paper examines the development of ethnic and immigrant archives in the United States since the 1960s. It focuses on the dramatic evolution of “ethnic archiving”―the processes and objectives involved in documenting the immigrant and ethnic experience―and shows how cultural minorities evolved from an object or theme of archival collections to active participants in the creation, appraisal, description, and use of their own archives. A number of factors made this evolution possible: a new political context increasingly responsive to minority rights and cultural diversity, rising interest in social history, and the influence of postmodernist thought on archival theory. New digital technologies have also facilitated the expression and archiving of ethnic voices.