American Journal of Sociology 117(4)

American Journal of Sociology, January 2012: Volume 117, Issue 4

Gender Deviance and Household Work: The Role of Occupation
Daniel Schneider

This article takes a new approach to gender and housework by identifying a new measure of gender deviance—work in gender-atypical occupations—and by arguing that men who do “women’s work” and women who do “men’s work” in the labor market may seek to neutralize their gender deviance by doing male- and female-typed work at home. Analysis of data from the National Survey of Families and Households and the 2003–7 waves of the American Time Use Survey shows that men who do “women’s work” in the market spend more time on male-typed housework relative to men in gender-balanced occupations and their wives spend more time on female-typed housework. Women in gender-atypical occupations also do more female-typed housework than women in gender-balanced occupations. The article provides clearer evidence about the important ways in which cultural conceptions of gender shape and are shaped by economic processes.

Settler Colonial Power and the American Indian Sovereignty Movement: Forms of Domination, Strategies of Transformation
Erich Steinman

The article extends the multi-institutional model of power and change through an analysis of the American Indian Sovereignty Movement. Drawing upon cultural models of the state, and articulating institutionalist conceptions of political opportunities and resources, the analysis demonstrates that this framework can be applied to challenges addressing the state as well as nonstate fields. The rational-legal diminishment of tribal rights, bureaucratic paternalism, commonsense views of tribes as racial/ethnic minorities, and the binary construction of American and Indian as oppositional identities diminished the appeal of “contentious” political action. Instead, to establish tribes’ status as sovereign nations, tribal leaders aggressively enacted infrastructural power, transposed favorable legal rulings across social fields to legitimize sovereignty discourses, and promoted a pragmatic coexistence with state and local governments. Identifying the United States as a settler colonial society, the study suggests that a decolonizing framework is more apt than racial/ethnicity approaches in conceptualizing the struggle of American Indians.

Human Rights as Myth and Ceremony? Reevaluating the Effectiveness of Human Rights Treaties, 1981–2007
Wade M. Cole

Much research has shown human rights treaties to be ineffective or even counterproductive, often contributing to greater levels of abuse among countries that ratify them. This article reevaluates the effect of four core human rights treaties on a variety of human rights outcomes. Unlike previous studies, it disaggregates treaty membership to examine the effect of relatively “stronger” and “weaker” commitments. Two-stage regression analyses that control for the endogeneity of treaty membership show that stronger commitments in the form of optional provisions that allow states and individuals to complain about human rights abuses are often associated with improved practices. The article discusses the scholarly and practical implications of these findings.

Lustration Systems and Trust: Evidence from Survey Experiments in the Czech Republic, Hungary, and Poland
Susanne Y. P. Choi, Roman David

Dealing with personnel inherited from prior regimes in the administration of transitional states is critical for democratic consolidation, a problem traditionally addressed by the dichotomy of continuation or dismissal. However, major organizational innovations to deal with tainted officials appear in postcommunist Central Europe. Using the concept of lustration systems, this study differentiates three archetypes: dismissal, exposure, and confession. The authors propose that each system carries different symbolic meanings, which produce different outcomes for citizens’ trust in government and in tainted officials. The hypothesized effects of different lustration systems on trust are tested by an experiment embedded in nationwide representative surveys conducted in the Czech Republic, Hungary, and Poland. The results show that dismissal and confession increase citizens’ trust in government and trust in tainted officials. However, exposure reduces citizens’ trust in tainted officials.

Citizenship Rights for Immigrants: National Political Processes and Cross-National Convergence in Western Europe, 1980–2008
Ruud Koopmans, Ines Michalowski, Stine Waibel

Immigrant citizenship rights in the nation-state reference both theories of cross-national convergence and the resilience of national political processes. This article investigates European countries’ attribution of rights to immigrants: Have these rights become more inclusive and more similar across countries? Are they affected by EU membership, the role of the judiciary, the party in power, the size of the immigrant electorate, or pressure exerted by anti-immigrant parties? Original data on 10 European countries, 1980–2008, reveal no evidence for cross-national convergence. Rights tended to become more inclusive until 2002, but stagnated afterward. Electoral changes drive these trends: growth of the immigrant electorate led to expansion, but countermobilization by right-wing parties slowed or reversed liberalizations. These electoral mechanisms are in turn shaped by long-standing policy traditions, leading to strong path dependence and the reproduction of preexisting cross-national differences.