The sounds of silence: American history textbook representations of non-violence and the Abolition Movement

In this paper we examine how the Abolition Movement’s approach to non-violent resistance has been silenced in four American history textbooks. Despite extensive research that reveals an extensive network of groups dedicated to the peaceful abolishment of slavery little of this historical record is included in the textbooks. Instead, a skewed representation of the movement is conveyed to the reader, one that conveys an image of a movement that contributes to a climate of social violence. Through a critical discourse analytical approach to the data we carefully deconstruct how this process of misrepresentation occurs. By employing the discursive tools of narrative framing, positioning, and stance we lift up what is often hidden from the reader and demonstrate how language use communicates powerful social messaging to the reader. We argue that student readers are left with an impoverished sense of how non-violent democratic change has occurred when presented with a limited portrayal of the Abolition Movement. We therefore emphasize the importance of equipping students with the skills needed to critically interrogate both historical and contemporary sources that purports to convey the inevitability of war to resolve complex social problems; we maintain this is both an educational imperative and a civic obligation.     

From race to citizenship: The indigenization debate in post-socialist Tanzania

Neoliberal economic reforms in post-socialist Tanzania heightened racial as well as anti-foreign hostilities, while liberal political reforms made possible the expression of these antagonisms in electoral politics. Newly formed opposition parties mobilized popular support by advocating anti-Asian indigenization of minority rights. This prompted the ruling party, which had initially denounced advocates of indigenization as racist, to alter its position. In doing so, ruling party leaders redefined the meaning of indigenization, shifting the focus of the debate away from racial issues and Asian control of the economy toward issues of free trade, foreign investment, and foreign economic domination. By implementing indigenization measures targeting non-citizens and featuring anti-liberal economic policies, including tariff barriers, local content laws, and restrictions on property ownership, the government faced the danger of losing international support from foreign donors and international financial institutions. The trajectory of the indigenization debate reveals the role of electoral competition and party formation in shaping race relations and national identity in post-socialist Tanzania. It suggests the need for event-centered studies of the way in which political identities are constructed in processes of conflict within the institutional arenas created by liberal political reforms. Ronald Aminzade is professor of sociology at the University of Minnesota-Twin Cities. His publications concerning the social and political consequences of capitalist development includeBallots and Barricade: Class Formation and Republican Politics in France, 1830–1871 (Princeton University Press, 1993) andClass, Politics, and Early Industrial Capitalism: A Study of Mid-Nineteenth Century Toulouse, France (State University of New York Press, 1981). He is also co-editor ofSilence and Voice in the Study of Contentious Politics (Cambridge University Press, 2001) andThe Social Worlds of Higher Education (Pine Forge Press, 1999). For making this research possible I would like to thank the University of Minnesota and the Center for Advanced Study in the Behavioral Sciences, which provided support through National Science Foundation Grant #SBR-9601236. I am grateful to James Brennan, Susan Geiger, Erik Larson, Mary Jo Maynes, Marjorie Mbilinyi, Jamie Monson, Richa Nagar, Anne Pitcher, Eric Sheppard, Thomas Spear, Charles Tilly, Eric Weitz, Erik Olin Wright, and several anonymous reviewers for helpful comments on an earlier draft.     

The Strategy of Exclusion in American Counterterrorism

ABSTRACT

While garnering heightened attention following the Trump administration's travel restrictions, exclusionary tactics in counterterrorism have a much lengthier history. Given that some terrorism studies scholars identify social and political exclusion as an explanation for the resort to terrorist violence, the selection of a strategy of exclusion is significant. In this article, I identify the elements of a strategy of exclusion and the logic behind this strategy. In particular, I examine the origins and persistence of this strategy in the U.S. context. Rather than a contemporary anomaly, exclusion was among the first strategies the United States added to its counterterrorist tool-kit, and has remained among the most consistent strategies relied on. I trace the history of this strategy from its origins in immigration restrictions passed following the assassination of President McKinley by an anarchist through the contemporary War on Terror. Controversy surrounding this strategy, its negative effects on nonviolent immigrant populations, and its failure to prevent further acts of terrorism suggest it was historically ineffective and may also be so today.