Political Altruism? deals with participation in political activities aimed at defending the rights of other individuals and groups, such as asylum seekers, immigrant workers, populations of Third World countries, and people whose fundamental human rights are being harmed. Solidarity movements have become an important collective actor in contemporary western societies, yet virtually no scholarly work up to now has addressed them theoretically and empirically. This volume shows why political altruism is better seen as the result of social interactions rather than of a supposedly altruistic outburst. Contributors address the theoretical questions at the core of social movement theory, using country-specific studies including France, Germany, Great Britain, Switzerland, and the US, while also examining the growing internationalization of solidarity movements, their outcomes and consequences.

This is an open access title available under the terms of a CC BY NC ND 4.0 International license. It is free to read at Oxford Scholarship Online and offered as a free PDF download from OUP and selected open access locations. Why does the mind matter for collective action? In Contentious Minds, Florence Passy and Gian-Andrea Monsch explain how cognitive and relational processes allow activists participate in and sustain their commitment to activism. Based on a wide array of survey and interview data with activists engaged in protest, volunteering and unions, they highlight how a commitment community develop shared values, identities, and meanings through interaction. The interplay of talk and ties enables stories and meanings to be constructed and exchanged, conveys worldviews and intentions that are modified through ongoing conversations, and reinforces and maintains commitment over time. Passy and Monsch's ambitious work brings the mind and culture back into the study of social movements and highlights the crucial role social networks play in constructing the communities and shared values that sustain commitment.

From international press coverage of the French government's attempt to prevent Muslims from wearing headscarves to terrorist attacks in Madrid and the United States, questions of cultural identity and pluralism are at the center of the world's most urgent events and debates. Presenting an unprecedented wealth of empirical research garnered during ten years of a cross-cultural project, "Contested Citizenship" addresses these fundamental issues by comparing collective actions by migrants, xenophobes, and antiracists in Germany, Britain, France, the Netherlands, and Switzerland.
Revealing striking cross-national differences in how immigration and diversity are contended by different national governments, these authors find that how citizenship is constructed is the key variable defining the experience of Europe's immigrant populations. "Contested Citizenship" provides nuanced policy recommendations and challenges the truism that multiculturalism is always good for immigrants. Even in an age of European integration and globalization, the state remains a critical actor in determining what points of view are sensible and realistic--and legitimate--in society.
Ruud Koopmans is professor of sociology at Free University, Amsterdam. Paul Statham is reader in political communications at the University of Leeds. Marco Giugni is a researcher and teacher of political science at the University of Geneva. Florence Passy is assistant professor of political science at the University of Lausanne, Switzerland.

Dialogues on Migration Policy brings together leading American and European scholars of immigration politics to address migration policy. Editors Marco Giugni and Florence Passy's aim to present a number of informed "dialogues" addressing three main theoretical concerns in this field: the role of the national state in a globalizing world, the determinants of policy change, and the role of collective interests in migration policy. Adopting an unconventional format, the novelty of Dialogues on Migration Policy lies in the fact that it is structured around a series of debates among authors. In each debate, expert contributors working in different theoretical traditions and with divergent views on the subject matter confront each other followed by a commentary from a leading scholar based on her/his reading of these authors' views. These lively debates are certain to engage scholars of migration, political science, and sociology.

Dialogues on Migration Policy brings together leading American and European scholars of immigration politics to address migration policy. Editors Marco Giugni and Florence Passy's aim to present a number of informed 'dialogues' addressing three main theoretical concerns in this field: the role of the national state in a globalizing world, the determinants of policy change, and the role of collective interests in migration policy. Adopting an unconventional format, the novelty of Dialogues on Migration Policy lies in the fact that it is structured around a series of debates among authors. In each debate, expert contributors working in different theoretical traditions and with divergent views on the subject matter confront each other followed by a commentary from a leading scholar based on her/his reading of these authors' views. These lively debates are certain to engage scholars of migration, political science, and sociology.

From Contention to Democracy addresses a crucial aspect of contemporary societies: the role of social movements for political and social change. The volume gathers together essays written by prominent social theorists who have been asked to reflect on the relationship between movements and processes of social, political and cultural change. Three broad types of movement-change nexus are distinguished and discussed: incorporation, transformation, and democratization. The chapters in this book all point to the place of social movements in relation to these three processes of change, while discussing the history and well-known events of social movements. Individual occurrences such as the protest of French students in 1968 or Chilean shantytown dwellers are examined. The final essay looks ahead, wondering: what is the future of social movements?