Publication Type: Proceeding

Publication Type: Conference Paper/Unpublished Manuscript
Abstract: I examine recent protest activity of Polish farmers and offer an explanation for their mobilization capabilities based on organizational models of social movements. Protest event data from 1980-1995 shows that the intensity of protest activity among Polish farmers has increased over time. I argue that neither grievance nor political opportunity explanations can account for this. Rather, I contend that as international development agencies restructure Poland’s agricultural cooperative structure to match models from the West, they facilitate collective action in several ways. Firstly, the newly decentralized structure increases member’s social ties to each other and to the co-operative, thereby increasing group solidarity. Secondly, by promoting affiliation between local co-ops as well as between local co-ops and national trade unions, international agencies are creating avenues for the flow of information which aid the coordination of opposition. In essence, local cooperatives become co-optable networks for protests sponsored by national trade unions.
Somewhat ironically, international development agencies are interested in reorienting the co-operative structure in order to help Polish agriculture and adapt to the market economy; however, most farmers’ protests are aimed at unfavorable economic policies which are byproducts of a free market. Therefore, it appears that international agencies are succeeding in their short term aim, which is to re-structure agricultural co-operatives. However, this success is hindering their long term goal of agricultural modernization because the new co-operative structures foster protest against market forces.

Publication Type: Conference Paper/Unpublished Manuscript
Abstract: Polish farmers became politically contentious in the early 1990s, despite their minimal involvement in the Solidarity movement and other eras of protest during the communist regime. I examine protest data from 1980-1995 and show that farmers’ protests became increasingly intense in the years following transition to democracy. I find that programs implemented by international organizations are responsible for this trend. During democratization, international organizations restructured the Polish agricultural cooperative system to help farmers modernize and succeed in the market economy. The organizations transformed local co-ops into small groups of members with shared economic interests, and these small groups were linked to national trade unions. At the local level, this structure enabled groups to overcome collective action problems among members and led to high-cost protest events. At the national level, mobilizable local co-ops were networks of opposition deployed for union-sponsored campaigns, which led to widespread protest events. Ironically, most protest was in opposition to free market policies which the restructured cooperative system was intended to help farmers adjust to.

Publication Type: Conference Paper/Unpublished Manuscript
Abstract: This paper assess theoretical rational that explain public attitudes towards EU expansion based on existing literature. More specific, it assesses domestic determinants of Polish domestic political and public attitude towards the EU Constitution and more generally, the Polish integration with particular reference to its growing Euro-skeptic stances. After the “No” vote in the referenda in France and the Netherlands in June 2005, a period of reflection over the future of the EU was expected to launch a new phase in the construction of a common Europe. In most EU countries debates started on how to find a way out of the current constitutional stalemate. The discussions focused on what the 21st century Union is and what it should be. In Poland EU issues hardly played any role as measured by Polish’s continued “hold out” status on the Constitutional treaty (CT), and last year's electoral campaigns in which the CT was treated as unworthy of any deeper reflection. This article surmises that the current situation in Poland evinces a paradox. On one hand, a vast majority (80%) of Poles support EU integration and Poland’s membership in the Union with generally positive attitude towards polish accession to the Union. On the other hand, the same Poles have elected what is considered the most Euro-skeptic parliament since post 1989 Poland. We argue that this is perhaps due partly to deep rooted distrust for the EU and especially towards the biggest EU states - France and Germany. That the Polish coalition government is perceived as taking position that oppose a closer European integration explains Polish stagnation in ratifying the Constitutional treaty.

Publication Type: Conference Paper/Unpublished Manuscript
Abstract: This paper is part of a larger project studying representations of Jews and Jewishness in English case law, from the late Victorian period to the late 20th century. In this paper, I focus on early 20th century cases. I explore how English judges represented Jewish masculinity and how these representations were contingent upon English understandings of the relationship between class, nationality, and race, also considering how different areas of law reflected particular understandings of ‘the Jew’.