World War II and the development of global indigenous identities

The indigenous rights movement emerged in the last quarter of the twentieth century, establishing a newly conceptualized identity claimed not on the grounds of shared culture, language or ancestry but on shared experience as native peoples marginalized by colonial expansion. This article examines how the Second World War created conditions favouring the emergence of indigenous identity as a global concept. Using a comparative perspective, this paper considers two ways in which war conditions affected indigenous peoples: by highlighting issues of citizenship, loyalty and military service; and by altering how combatant powers evaluated indigenous cultures. While the experiences of particular groups varied widely, the wartime era focused attention on both policies of assimilation and assertions of distinctiveness, creating a fluid context for change. A global, comparative perspective offers insight into the role of the war era in understanding the relationship between indigenous activism and the international order.     

Origins and destinies: Immigration to the United States since World War II

Contemporary immigration to the United States and the formation of new ethnic groups are the complex and unintended social consequences of the expansion of the nation to its post-World War II position of global hegemony. Immigrant communities in the United States today are related to a history of American military, political, economic, and cultural involvement and intervention in the sending countries, especially in Asia and the Caribbean Basin, and to the linkages that are formed in the process that open a variety of legal and illegal migration pathways. The 19.8 million foreign-born persons counted in the 1990 U.S. census formed the largest immigrant population in the world, though in relative terms, only 7.9% of the U.S. population was foreign-born, a lower proportion than earlier in this century. Today's immigrants are extraordinarily diverse, a reflection of polar-opposite types of migrations embedded in very different historical and structural contexts. Also, unlike the expanding economy that absorbed earlier flows from Europe, since the 1970s new immigrants have entered an hourglass economy with reduced opportunities for social mobility, particularly among the less educated, and new waves of refugees have entered a welfare state with expanded opportunities for public assistance. This paper seeks to make sense of the new diversity. A typology of contemporary immigrants is presented, and their patterns of settlement, their distinctive social and economic characteristics compared to major native-born racial-ethnic groups, and their different modes of incorporation in—and consequences for—American society are considered.     

Going Back to Civvy Street: a historical account of the impact of the Everest and Jennings wheelchair for Canadian World War II veterans with spinal cord injury

In February 1945, the Canadian government agreed to provide the Everest and Jennings folding, self-propelled wheelchair to all World War II veterans with spinal cord injury. These wheelchairs replaced wooden and wicker invalid wheelchairs that were usually assigned to hospital wards rather than to individuals. Veterans with spinal cord injury were among the first group of Canadians to use these wheelchairs to participate in community life. By 1947, Canadian veterans had demonstrated that it was possible to return to education, employment and leisure activities using a wheelchair. Drawing on oral history interviews and archival research, this paper provides an account of the introduction of folding, self-propelled wheelchairs into Canada following World War II. It discusses the impact of these wheelchairs on the life experiences of veterans, and outlines the strategies used by these early pioneers to live and work in communities that had neither expected nor planned for individuals using wheelchairs.     

LANGUAGE, experience and history: 'What happened' in World War II

Sociolinguistics can contribute to our understanding of history by showing how language helps to develop and maintain a sense of a communal past. This paper focuses on the referring terms for the World War II experiences of European Jews and of Japanese Americans, as evinced through various sources of public discourse (newspapers, library cataloguing systems, book titles). The analysis of linguistic form and function combines with discussion of the social and cultural history of Holocaust awareness in the U.S. to show how the word Holocaust (as a referring term for the experience of European Jews) became part of an American lexicon. A comparison of this stable term with the variety of nouns and verbal expressions used to index the Japanese American experience allows us to more fully consider how language helps to create and preserve collective memory.     

Unionization Matters: An Analysis of Post–World War II Strikes

Recent macroeconomic analyses of post–World War II US strikes conclude that union density during a given year does not affect the occurrence of strike activity during that same year, a finding attributed to the institutionalization of collective bargaining after WWII. However, this argument does not take into account two processes that may render new bargaining units more radical than established bargaining units and, hence, more likely to use strikes as a weapon against capitalists. Because macrolevel changes in union density are reflective of the organization or lack of organization of new bargaining units (Freeman and Medoff 1984), the effect of union density on strikes should still be present. However, given the average contract length of two years during this time period (Cecchetti 1987; Vroman 1989), this effect should be delayed by about two years by the presence of total no-strike pledges in most contracts (Perusek and Worcester 1995). An ARIMA time-series analysis confirms that union density has a two-year lagged effect on strike activity in the post–WWII time period, 1947–1977.     

Refugee children in Europe on the eve of World War II

In the summer of 1939, on the eve of World War II, Children’s Bureau social workers Elsa Castendyck visited four European countries to investigate the care of refugee children. Her report was published in the Social Service Review in December, after the German invasion of Poland and the declaration of war by France and Great Britain, and is reprinted here.     

Explaining life course and cohort variation in the relationship between education and health: the role of income

Researchers have attempted to explain the relationship between education and health by incorporating mediators-such as income--through which schooling affects health. Research has also shown that the education-health relationship varies across age and cohort. This article integrates these themes in an investigation of the role income plays in the changing relationship between education and health. Using data from the 1972-2001 National Health Interview Surveys, I find that the direct relationship between education and health is weakening across cohorts, while the indirect effect of education through income is strengthening across cohorts. Cohort change in this indirect effect is equally attributable to change in the relationships between education and income and between income and health. Life course differences in direct and indirect relationships vary in shape, suggesting that a substantive explanation---one that does not rely solely on selective mortality--is warranted. The results suggest that future research should continue to employ a life course framework.     

Off the record: Margaret van Kleffens and the gendered history of Dutch World War II diplomacy

This article makes the case for recovering women’s roles from the forgotten corners of diplomatic history, and for considering the consequences of the gap between feminist and non-feminist research. It shows how ignorance of the gendered nature of diplomatic norms and practices impacts our understanding of diplomatic history, and how specific biographies are hampered by gender blindness in particular. Using the history of Margaret van Kleffens and Dutch World War II diplomacy as an example, the article demonstrates how historians’ continued neglect of the role of women and gender norms has influenced representations of twentieth-century diplomacy. To dismiss the history of gender and of women as by definition irrelevant to the actions of states and of male statespersons is not simply part of a self-appointed focus on the political at the expense of the personal; rather, it omits much of the political history too, reproducing stereotypes and resulting in a skewed understanding of diplomatic history and foreign policy decisions. The article argues that both historians and feminist scholars need to historicize gender in order to recognize women’s roles in diplomacy, and so gain a better understanding of the history of international politics as a whole.     

Childhood exposure to the Second World War and financial risk taking in adult life

Adverse childhood experiences might have long-lasting effects on decisions under uncertainty in adult life. Merging the European Survey on Health, Ageing and Retirement with data on conflict events during the Second World War, and relying on region-by-cohort variation in war exposure, we show that warfare exposure during childhood is associated with lower financial risk taking in later life. Individuals who experienced war episodes as children hold less – and are less likely to hold – stocks, but are more likely to hold life insurance, compared to non-exposed individuals. Effects are robust to the inclusion of potential mediating factors, and are tested for nonlinearity and heterogeneity. Moreover, we provide evidence of hedonic adaptation to war, as high and low intensity of war exposure have comparable long-term effects. We also document that war exposure in childhood increases sensitivity to financial uncertainty since exposed-to-war individuals are less likely to hold stocks after periods of high volatility. Finally, we shed light on the most likely mechanism in the relationship between war exposure and financial risk taking – i.e., enhanced sensitivity to uncertainty – and we show that preferences, and not beliefs, channel this relationship.     

Involuntary celibacy: A life course analysis

Using a life course perspective, we explored the development and maintenance of involuntary celibacy for 82 respondents recruited over the I'nternet. Data were collected using an open‐ended electronic questionnaire. Modified grounded theory analysis yielded three groups of involuntary celibates, persons desiring to have sex but unable to find partners. Virgins were those who had never had sex, singles had sex in the past but were unable to establish current sexual relationships, and part‐nereds were currently in sexless relationships. These groups differed on dating experiences, the circumstances surrounding their celibacy, barriers to sexual activity, and the perceived likelihood of becoming sexually active. They were similar, however, in their negative reactions to celibacy. Pervasive in our respondents’ accounts was the theme of becoming and remaining off time in making normative sexual transitions, which in turn perpetuated a celibate life course or trajectory.     

Examining Variance in Presidential Approval: The Case of FDR in World War II

Despite the substantive growth and increasing methodologicalsophistication of the presidential approval literature overthe last four decades, almost all analyses continue to focusexclusively on the mean of the approval distribution—thepercentage of Americans who approve of the president at a givenmoment. However, changes in the variance of popular supportfor the president may be as politically and substantively importantas shifts in the mean. To illustrate how a focus on variancecan enrich our understanding of changes in the president’spublic standing, this analysis examines the effects of the economyand World War II on the variance in popular support for FranklinD. Roosevelt. At the aggregate level, the study shows that highpeacetime unemployment and mounting casualties increased thevolatility of FDR’s standing among federal relief recipients,erstwhile his most consistent base of support. At the individuallevel, the analysis demonstrates that individuals with conflictingpartisan, economic, and war-related considerations for evaluatingthe president were more variable in their approval of Rooseveltthan were other respondents. Exporting a similar focus on varianceto other lines of research across the public opinion subfieldcould produce a richer understanding of the complex processesdriving opinion change over time.     

论二战后土耳其中东政策的演变

二战结束以来,中东局势多变且冲突频仍,在综合考量国内外影响因素与制约力的基础上,土耳其政府在力所能及的范围内,对其中东政策不断进行调整,并形成了“追随美国”、“亲阿疏以”、“阿以平衡”三个演变阶段,最大限度地维护和实现了国家核心利益。土耳其政府执行的灵活中东政策,为处在大国夹缝中的中小国家如何执行国家利益最大化的外交政策提供了有益借鉴。