When Do Papers Matter? An Institutional Analysis of Undocumented Life in the United States

This article assesses how two key institutions differentially shape immigrants’ relationship to their rights in American society. We draw on over 200 in‐depth interviews to argue that there is a stark difference between how schools encourage undocumented youth to view themselves as equal members of US society and how undocumented workers are marginalized in the workplace. We find that even as schools track and stratify students, they also foster a culture of meritocracy between documented and undocumented youth. Schools ultimately render immigration status irrelevant as undocumented youth learn to navigate the primary institution of this stage of their lives. Conversely, immigration status is central to the experience of undocumented workers, who develop a particular set of survival skills that help them live and work successfully in the United States without being detected while also erecting a barrier between themselves and any additional rights they may be afforded.     

The Development of Peer Interaction in Infancy: Exploring the Dyadic Processes

Peer interaction is an important component of children's social repertoires that is associated with a variety of developmental outcomes and life skills. The present study provides an in‐depth study of early dyadic peer behaviors during the infancy period, during which social competence with peers is first being developed. Results from variable‐centered analyses highlight the effectiveness of behaviors, such as offering objects to peers, and point to the importance of the social context set by a peer's prior social behavior and processes for eliciting peer responses. Findings from person‐centered analyses reveal marked individual differences in the processes through which infants are successful in eliciting responses from their peers, illustrating the presence of multiple pathways to achieving social competence with peers.     

New Organizational Forms for Competing in Highly Dynamic Environments: the Network Paradigm

Turbulence and rapid change in the business environment have been associated for some time with the development of new network organizational forms which put various types of strategic alliance and other inter-organizational collaborations into effect. This paper traces the rationale for the formation of such networks and the associated vertical disaggregation of functions and implications for internal organizational design. This leads to the proposal of a classification framework for network forms. Using the dimensions of volatility of environmental change on the one hand, and the type of inter-organizational relationship involved (collaborative or transactional) on the other hand, network forms are classified as: hollow networks, flexible networks, value-added networks and virtual networks. In each case it is possible to identify the environmental and organizational contingencies most likely to be associated with the emergence and adoption of a particular type of network arrangement. This argument leads to the identification of a new research agenda which has the goals of developing more robust conceptualizations of network characteristics; better understanding the contingencies surrounding the emergence of network forms and their relative efficiencies and specifying some of the major implications of network formation for internal organizational design. In parallel the paper identifies a number of managerial implications for setting strategic priorities and developing appropriate management systems in these new organizational contexts.     

Courage in the Telling: The Critical Rise and Fall of David Leavitt

Openly gay American fiction writer David Leavitt, who had received positive reviews for his previous novels and short story collections, was sued in 1993 over his novel While England Sleeps by English poet Stephen Spender, who claimed that Leavitt plagiarized an episode from his own 1951 memoir World Within World, and grafted pornographic fantasies onto his biography. The accusations created a homophobic backlash against Leavitt, whose career has yet to recover fully. The result is that Leavitt, who had once been viewed as the one gay writer to find a footing in the mainstream literary community, is now firmly positioned in the gay literary subgenre and his work categorized as such. This essay examines book reviews in order to illustrate the difficulties that a writer who deals with gay life frankly and unapologetically finds in being accepted by the mainstream literary establishment, no matter how normal or assimilationist he or others might perceive his work to be.     

Social Equality and the Mobilization of the Law

Sociolegal scholars refer to the invocation of law or rules during a dispute as the mobilization of law. Most studies of the mobilization of law focus on the mobilization of law by people in non‐official capacities, particularly by persons of relatively low social status or in positions of social disadvantage. Early studies debated the effectiveness of court‐centered strategies for social justice, examining whether real social change could be achieved through formal judicial means. Scholars now largely agree that law can be effectively mobilized for social change through both direct formal legal action and the indirect radiating effects of legal mobilization. This is because the influence of law goes beyond the courtroom; rights consciousness and legal mobilization help to transform culture and understandings of social status and power. Currently scholars are turning their attention to the mobilization of law within organizations such as schools and workplaces and the mobilization of rights talk and justice talk in unofficial arenas domestically and internationally.