2009 Presidential Address American Sociological Review 75(1) 7–30 The New Politics of Ó American Sociological Association 2010 DOI: 10.1177/0003122410363293 Community http://asr.sagepub.com

Patricia Hill Collinsa

Abstract Ideas about community are especially prominent in late-twentieth-century U.S. society. The term community resonates throughout social policy, scholarship, popular culture, and every- day social interactions. It holds significance for different populations with competing political agendas (e.g., political groups of the right and the left invoke ideas of community yet have very different ideas in mind). No longer seen as naturally occurring, apolitical spaces to which one retreats to escape the pressures of modern life, communities of all sorts now constitute sites of political engagement and contestation. The new politics of community reveals how the idea of community constitutes an elastic political construct that holds a variety of contradictory mean- ings and around which diverse social practices occur. In this address, I analyze how reframing the idea of community as a political construct might provide new avenues for investigating social inequalities. I first explore the utility of community as a political construct for rethinking both intersecting systems of power and activities that are routinely characterized as ‘‘political.’’ Next, by examining five contemporary sites where community is either visibly named as a polit- ical construct or implicated in significant political phenomena, I investigate how the construct of community operates within contemporary power relations of class, gender, ethnicity, sexu- ality, age, ability, nation, and race. Finally, I explore the potential intellectual and political sig- nificance of these developments.

Keywords sociology of knowledge, social inequality, intersectionality, political sociology

aUniversity of Maryland 8 American Sociological Review 75(1)

Barack Obama’s election in 2008 catalyzed patterns of social inequalities. Finally, I explore new questions concerning democracy’s the potential significance of the construct of capacity to grapple with social inequalities. community for contemporary power relations The election of the first African American of class, gender, ethnicity, sexuality, age, ability, president seemingly signaled a substantive nation, and race. change within social relations of inequality, one where marginalized peoples might use mechanisms of democracy for advancement. WHY COMMUNITY? At the same time, the Obama presidency Power relations are typically organized reignited deep-seated concerns that demo- around core ideas, namely, the cultural stock cratic institutions, no matter who runs that forms the bedrock of social relations, them, are not capable of dramatically alter- that shapes social structures, and that makes ing deeply-entrenched social inequalities. those structures comprehensible to people. Understanding social and political phenom- Important core ideas typically reflect a syn- ena such as the Obama election may require ergy between the taken-for-granted, com- a new language of politics that more effec- monsense, everyday knowledge that circu- tively addresses how social inequalities simul- lates throughout a social setting and the taneously change yet stay the same. Toward technical, formal knowledge of public tran- this end, redefining the construct of commu- scripts. While elites and ordinary people nity might be useful for grappling with the may agree that any given core idea is signif- ‘‘changing-same’’ patterns of social inequal- icant, they may disagree on the meaning of ities that characterize intersecting power rela- the idea. The most significant of these core tions of race, class, gender, ethnicity, sexual- ideas are sites of political contestation over 1 ity, age, ability, and nation. Because the the social practices and institutional forma- construct of community constitutes both a prin- tions that ensue. Typically, elite knowledge ciple of actual social organization and an idea permeates a society’s public transcripts—its that people use to make sense of and shape formal knowledge of theology, philosophy, their everyday lived realities, it may be central and science—and, as a result, is recognized to the workings of intersecting power relations as authoritative. By contrast, the everyday in heretofore unrecognized ways. Recasting knowledge of ordinary people, especially the notion of community as a political con- political knowledge, may operate through struct highlights how social inequalities are hidden transcripts. Elites may discredit these organized via structural principles of commu- hidden transcripts, but they can be important nity and are made comprehensible through sites of political contestation for ordinary a language of community. people (Scott 1990). In this address, I analyze how reframing the Core ideas constitute the contested terrain idea of community as a political construct might of symbolic and structural dimensions of provide new avenues for investigating the a society, regardless of whether an idea is 2 changing-same patterns of social inequalities. identified as political. Take, for example, I first explore the utility of community as a polit- the idea of ‘‘love’’ within American society. ical construct for rethinking both intersecting Despite its prominence within theology, systems of power and activities that are routinely music, literature, and everyday use, defining characterized as ‘‘political.’’ Next, by exa- love with any degree of precision or authority mining five contemporary sites where com- remains elusive, and building causal or munity is either visibly named as a political con- predictive models of love seems impractical. struct or implicated in significant political Instead, love circulates as an ambiguous, phenomena, I investigate how the construct of contradictory, and messy construct that community operates within changing-same people use in a variety of ways. When love Collins 9 becomes intertwined with sexuality and the contestation.3 Historically, the concept of erotic, it may constitute a site of political community occupies one side of Ferdinand contestation (Foucault 1980; Lorde 1984). To¨nnies’s ideal types of Gemeinschaft (com- When connected to projects of contentious munity) and Gesellschaft (civil society) politics, love becomes central to political (To¨nnies 2001). Conceptually, family, com- action (Emirbayer and Goldberg 2005). munity, and love are tightly bundled together Martin Luther King Jr. subscribed to a politi- within the idea of Gemeinschaft: the seem- cized version of love, noting in his ‘‘Where ingly natural and loving kinship relationships Do We Go From Here?’’ speech, that ‘‘one of mother and child or among siblings, and of the great problems of history is that the the biological relationship of a man and concepts of love and power have usually a woman (To¨nnies 2001). Claiming that been contrasted as opposites, polar opposites, ‘‘fatherhood is the clearest foundation for so that love is identified with a resignation of the concept of authority with community’’ power, and power with a denial of love. . . . (To¨nnies 2001:25), To¨nnies describes how What is needed is a realization that power structures of power within families form the without love is reckless and abusive, and bedrock of communities.4 that love without power is sentimental and Within sociology, To¨nnies’s conception of anemic’’ (Carson and Shepard 2002:186). community laid the foundation for subsequent Love illustrates a contested terrain of ideas, uncritical acceptance of the idea of commu- in this case, the power of an idea to mean nity as the marginalized, nonpolitical sphere many things and to move people to action. that frames more important debates about civil The construct of family constitutes another society, the true site of politics. These natural- core idea central to social relations of power ized and normalized views situate community whose meaning and valence varies dramati- as geographically specific, culturally homoge- cally. Simultaneously a principle of actual neous, and inherently apolitical entities— social organization as well as an idea people seemingly natural phenomena of families, vil- use to make sense of everyday lived realities, lages, neighborhoods, and ethnic and religious historically the construct of family was theo- groups. Moreover, To¨nnies’s endorsement of rized in apolitical terms, safely tucked away naturalized authority buttresses perceptions in the private sphere of household and neigh- of naturalized hierarchy within family line- borhood. This view advanced an uncritical ages and among races, ethnicities, and reli- binary idea of society, dividing social relations gious groups (Banton 1998). Whether by into the nonpolitical private sphere of family choice or by force, people belong to primary (where love and loved ones naturally reside) communities, and such communities are typi- and the public sphere of work and civil soci- cally ranked. Institutional practices concern- ety. Feminist theory challenges this view, ing families and communities, as well as elite pointing out its deeply gendered meanings. and everyday knowledge about family and In particular, scholars show how the construct community, form building blocks of social of family is not only a building block of patri- inequalities of class, gender, ethnicity, race, archy but also helps structure social inequal- age, sexuality, and religion. ities of sexuality, class, race, and age. In con- Despite its epistemological framing as an trast to earlier interpretations that naturalize, apolitical, natural concept, the construct of normalize, and idealize the family, the new community is central to multiple forms of politics of family conceptualizes family as power relations: for example, national projects a site of political contestation (Collins 2006). that construct racial, ethnic, and religious com- The construct of community might operate munities via inclusionary and exclusionary in a similar fashion as family, as an impor- polices (Balibar 1991); or subordinated groups tant, albeit unrecognized, site of political who frame political protest through the 10 American Sociological Review 75(1) specific language or cultural practices of com- interpretive shift. Because the term community munity (Santos, Nunes, and Meneses 2007). serves as a core construct for organizing a vari- Community, as refracted through the core ety of social groups for very different ends, it is idea of family, is the space to which women, central to the symbolic and organizational racial minorities, ethnic groups, the faithful, structures of intersecting systems of power. the dependent (young, old, and disabled), and The idea of community constitutes an elastic the overtly or differently sexual are assigned— social, political, and theoretic construct that in essence, the embodied, premodern, ‘‘dark’’ holds a variety of contradictory meanings side of society, ostensibly characterized by around which diverse social practices and its irrationality and emotionality.5 In this con- understandings occur. It stands to reason that text, the organizational principles and interpre- if this term garners such linguistic currency, tive meanings of community do the heavy lift- then it might be central to understanding the ing of shoring up multiple systems of social organization, dynamics, and social processes inequality. For example, protecting family, associated with contemporary social inequal- community, home, race, and nation merge ities. Moreover, because the construct of com- within ideologies of white supremacy, and munity has long been associated with women, from this fusion come social practices ethnic groups, non-Western peoples, poor designed to protect hearth and homeland. As people, religious minorities, and similarly evidenced by the legacy of the Ku Klux subordinated groups, it remains neglected as Klan, domestic violence, and gay-bashing, a core construct of political analysis for under- people do atrocious things to one another, all standing the workings of race, class, gender, in the name of protecting their loved ones sexuality, age, ability, and ethnicity as systems and communities from perceived threat. of power. Instead of being a natural, apolitical At the same time, social groups have used space, or even an empty category that can be the idea of community as a site of affirmation, used for political purposes, the construct of identification, and political expression. Eman- community may lie at the heart of politics cipatory social movements have invoked the itself. language of community as a powerful tool Several characteristics of the construct of to challenge social inequalities. For example, community make it a promising candidate the U.S. civil rights movement percolated in for examining the changing-same nature of the space of kitchens, Black churches, and social inequalities, and the intersecting freedom schools, building around Martin power relations that animate them, especially Luther King Jr.’s desire for a ‘‘beloved com- within the contemporary United States.6 munity’’ where power, love, and justice con- First, the United States is awash in the stituted synergistic ideas. The construct of language of community, making the community is not only an important principle construct of community ubiquitous in both organizing power differentials between com- everyday and elite knowledge. For example, munities, but it can also be used by ordinary community vocabulary permeates the elite people and elites to challenge these language of education, where the terms hierarchies. learning communities, community of learn- ers, and classroom community are prominent Community as a Political Construct (Pardales and Girod 2006). In everyday knowledge, people often use the term When feminists politicized the construct of community interchangeably with concepts family, they instituted a sea change in analyses of neighborhood. This points to the place- of work, religion, schooling, and numerous based underpinnings of the construct and other social institutions. The idea of commu- how community is central to group identifi- nity stands poised to undergo a similar cation. In some cases, these uses coalesce, Collins 11 with patterns of use varying from one setting of ‘‘black’’ and ‘‘community’’ remain far to another. For example, Latino communities more contentious. In the 1960s, the construct can be envisioned as constellations of geo- of community was largely taken for granted graphic neighborhoods, sets of face-to-face in ways that minimized differences of gender, relationships among ethnic groups, or imag- sexuality, ethnicity, age, and religion. Instead, ined transnational communities comprised people paid attention to the types of political of Cubans, Dominicans, Mexicans, and agendas that could be profitably pursued in Puerto Ricans who simultaneously negotiate representing the black community’s interests, shared interests and experiences and reject as well as who was qualified to speak for the classificatory efforts. community. By contrast, African Americans Second, the construct of community is and their allies who currently aspire to use versatile, malleable, and easy to use. Yet ‘‘black community’’ for political purposes these characteristics also make it unexam- must negotiate the contradictory meanings ined, taken-for-granted, and difficult to that accompany both ‘‘blackness’’ and ‘‘com- define (Cohen 1985). In everyday knowl- munity.’’ For example, the HIV/AIDS crisis edge, the term community is used descrip- challenged the seeming unity in African tively, so it seemingly needs little analysis American politics concerning use of the or explanation. Whether an imagined com- term ‘‘black community’’ by pointing out munity is a place-based neighborhood; how differences of sexuality, gender, and pov- a way of life associated with a group of peo- erty status affect health outcomes (Cohen ple; or a shared cultural ethos of a race, 1999). In essence, the construct of ‘‘black national or ethnic group, or religious collec- community’’ has survived, but the politics tivity; people routinely feel the need to cele- that surround it are quite different. brate, protect, defend, and replicate their own Fourth, the construct of community cata- communities and ignore, disregard, avoid, lyzes strong, deep feelings that can move and upon occasion, destroy those of others. people to action. Community is not simply Elite knowledge also demonstrates how the a cognitive construct; it is infused with emo- construct of community is easy to use yet dif- tions and value-laden meanings. People may ficult to define: one survey of academic liter- believe and support their political leaders, ature identifies 94 different uses of the term but their level of emotion and care about community, which in many cases have mini- their communities is central to their mal overlap (Hilary 1955).7 political behavior (Emirbayer and Goldberg Third, the construct of community holds 2005). Take, for example, the operation of varied and often contradictory meanings that two very different nationally-organized reflect diverse and conflicting social practi- groups: youth gangs housed in African ces. People can share the same cultural sym- American and Latino low-income neighbor- bols yet understand and deploy them differ- hoods and academic disciplines housed in ently, a situation that catalyzes varying diverse college and university departments. meanings and practices. In contexts of social For the former, initiated gang members often inequalities, malleable meanings of commu- describe their local gangs as surrogate fami- nity simultaneously catalyze contradictions lies, their territories as communities that and enable those contradictions to coexist. merit protection, and their national gang as For example, the concept of ‘‘black commu- an imagined community of men who under- nity’’ may appear relatively straightfor- stand and care about their everyday experien- ward—political polls routinely sample ces (Shakur 1993). For the latter, faculty African Americans to assess the ‘‘black members express allegiance to the broader vote,’’ which ostensibly represents the ‘‘black academic discipline that is their field, but community’s’’ perspective. Yet the symbols they also experience their departments as 12 American Sociological Review 75(1) places where space, resources, and people construct of community to make sense of matter greatly. Department infighting, which and organize all aspects of social structure, often ends with a truce to present a united including their political responses to their front to the university, makes sense not sim- situations. Similarly, social institutions use ply as a cognitive position, but through the symbols and organizational principles departments’ ability to garner strong feelings of community to organize social inequal- among faculty, staff, and students. The ities. Communities thus become major department is more than a place—it is a com- vehicles that link individuals to social munity. Despite their obvious differences, institutions. organized gangs and university departments Because the idea of community is ubiqui- do exhibit some commonalties: (1) tous, versatile, multifaceted, and able to mar- strongly-felt social ties that create surrogate shal emotions that move people to action, it families whose loyalty requires great per- is a potentially powerful idea for crafting sonal sacrifice; (2) pride in and defense of diverse political projects. Political leaders the ‘‘hood,’’ which faces internal (the police) know that when individuals cease seeing and external (rival gangs or other disciplines) themselves as part of a mass, a mob, a collec- threats; and (3) for historically established tivity, a population, or a public, and instead gangs and departments, a sense of connection claim a sense of belonging to a community, to carry on the name and the meaning of the they are primed for political analysis and group/community. Organized gangs and uni- action. The substance of the political identifi- versity departments are especially effective cations communities claim for themselves is when they find ways to marshal their certainly important—the Obama administra- members’ strong feelings for political tion’s democratic ideals differ markedly ends—noble ends in the case of departments, from nihilistic political agendas of youth or nihilistic ends in the context of many low- gangs. Yet it is equally important to point income urban neighborhoods. out that, while community may appear to Fifth, the construct of community is cen- be a benign, apolitical term, even avowedly tral to how people organize and experience nonpolitical communities participate in social inequalities. Because people exercise power relations. power in their everyday lives as individuals in multiple and crosscutting communities, it stands to reason that ordinary people will MAPPING THE NEW POLITICS use the construct of community to think OF COMMUNITY and do politics. Social structures such as neighborhoods, schools, jobs, religious Ideas about community may be undergoing institutions, recreational facilities, and malls a significant reconfiguration in the late- are the institutional expressions of social twentieth century. No longer seen as natu- inequalities of race, class, gender, age, eth- rally occurring, apolitical spaces to which nicity, religion, sexuality, and ability. one retreats to escape the pressures of modern These structures are typically hierarchical life, communities of all sorts now constitute and offer unequal opportunities and sites of political engagement and contestation. rewards. When people travel among neigh- In turn, these sites catalyze dynamic social and borhoods, they notice these structural political identities that actively engage con- inequalities. Increasingly, media enables temporary realities. In this context, the term people to see structural inequalities, both community resonates throughout social policy, locally and globally. Yet social structures scholarship, popular culture, and everyday do not exist independently of people. social interactions. It holds significance for Whether intentional or not, people use the different populations with competing political Collins 13 agendas (e.g., political groups of the right and techniques of surveillance are increasingly left invoke ideas of community yet have very called into service to maintain social inequal- different ideas in mind).8 ities that symbolic walls and gates of custom I identify five important contemporary and practices formerly provided (Low 2003). sites that rely on the construct of community Maintaining borders and policing who and where diverse political projects can be belongs within them is increasingly the cur- detected, whether they are overtly claimed rency of contemporary social relations, in as ‘‘political’’ or not. Because these five sites the United States and globally. fall within the general criteria of being ubiq- Building walls and gates around commu- uitous, versatile, holding contradictory mean- nities is not a new phenomenon. The period ings, and invoking strong feelings, they may of massive social change following the Civil shed light on communities as vehicles that War and Reconstruction was characterized people use to organize power relations. by the growth of racial segregation. Using These sites share several thematic elements. legal tactics to confine African Americans First, the sites are socially meaningful to peo- to inferior schools, jobs, and neighborhoods, ple: the language of community is present, formal social policies of racial segregation visible, and emotionally relevant. This focus disenfranchised African Americans by sepa- on agency enables me to examine community rating them. The post-1970s period also as a dynamic dimension of lived experience, brought racial change, this time by granting rather than as a simple taxonomic category. African Americans newfound citizenship Second, the term community is named across rights. Yet contemporary patterns of deseg- all five sites, illustrating the elasticity of the regation simultaneously catalyzed new strat- language of community and how such lang- egies for managing low-income African uage is part of the taken-for-granted lexicon American, Latino, and immigrant popula- of contemporary social relations. Third, by tions—strategies that rely on old methods illuminating how people use community as of confinement. The symbiotic relationship everyday knowledge to think and do politics, between inner-city schools, the dispropor- the sites illustrate one aspect of how contem- tionate number of young African American porary social inequalities are renegotiated. men in prison, and the ghetto as a subjugated The sites show elasticity in the term’s uses: gated community suggests that metaphors community as an organizing principle of and practices of incarceration and surveil- political behavior as well as a system lance continue to have a disproportionate of meaning for political understandings. impact on these populations (Wacxquant Finally, the sites point to how the construct 2001). of community is used to respond to specific Metaphors of gated communities reso- political challenges associated with intersect- nate with early twenty-first-century public ing power relations, especially where issues policies concerning immigration and citi- of social justice are part of the political zenship. Take, for example, how the empha- terrain.9 sis in the United States on homeland secu- rity engages policy debates about Gated Communities as Metaphor protecting the integrity of national borders. and Reality In the aftermath of September 11, concerns with sustaining the security of U.S. borders In many ways, the growth of gated communi- increased. Yet the increased attention to ties is a metaphor for preoccupation with risk immigration policy can also be seen as and security that characterizes societies as a contemporary expression of the swinging they undergo social change. In the United gate that adjusts population flows and States, physical walls, numerous gates, and access to citizenship to regulate the labor 14 American Sociological Review 75(1) supply (Glenn 2002). In the post-9/11 con- public space. Specifically, undesirables are text, the swinging gate not only reflects his- boxed into inferior and often dangerous pub- torical policies of differential treatment of lic schools, public transportation, crumbling immigrant groups based on race and ethnic- public infrastructures, underfunded public ity, but it is also intertwined with national hospitals, and subpar public housing. Elites security. One sees a parallel between symbi- retreat to private automobiles, send their chil- otic social institutions that incarcerate low- dren to private schools, enjoy private-option income African Americans, keeping them health insurance, and, when necessary, live within inner cities, and the Office of in gated communities. Homeland Security’s preoccupation with The elasticity of the idea of gated commu- protecting individuals within U.S. borders nities is not confined to elites. For people from foreigners and foreign terrorists. The who inhabit public space—for example, the shift toward local, rather than national, hospital worker who takes the bus after immigration policies is a Homeland working the night shift, or the ninth grader Security strategy to rid the country of who walks to public school through gang undocumented, illegal immigrants who territory—the threats are real. For popula- have become socially constructed as crimi- tions confined within public space, installing nals by recent immigration policies. These fences, gates, and sophisticated surveillance examples pivot on fear and risk catalyzed technologies in housing complexes, schools, by ideas about the ‘‘enemy without’’ as and the local corner store can provide protec- well as the ‘‘enemy within.’’ tion against risks and threats posed by drugs, In U.S. towns, suburbs, and urban neigh- crime, and similar social problems. For borhoods, gated communities signal a rever- example, Rouse’s (2004) ethnography of sal of the value attached to public and private how low-income African American women space and the seeming security attributed to built and maintained a Muslim community each. Historically, elites achieved security of faith in a dangerous urban environment by regulating the use of public space: they illustrates how community serves as a source locked up undesirables in prisons and mental of security and protection. These women hospitals and controlled everyone else used their community of faith as a political through laws and customs. Today, as response to threats posed to their children. African Americans, Latinos, women, immi- Growth of gated communities points to grants, religious minorities, and lesbian, a reversal of safety and danger: safety is gay, bisexual, transgendered, and queer now associated with life within private gated (LGBTQ) people have been granted more communities and danger spreads through the political protections with the loosening of uncertainty of public life. In the elusive restrictions on the use of public space, elites’ search for safety and security, far too many previous techniques are decreasingly effec- people retreat to the private space of self- tive. The public sphere has been redefined incarceration. in ways that formally protect individual Despite diverse political agendas, gated rights, despite differences of race, sexuality, communities all face the challenge of sus- ethnicity, class, gender, and ability. taining their borders: How should they man- Privatization has been the response to the age surveillance and security? Should they democratization of public space. With claims have a guard at the gate, or a video surveil- that fences are designed to protect their chil- lance system and card swipe system? How dren from undesirables, elites use the same often should private security patrol the techniques of security that they formerly neighborhood; who can get past the guard used to keep undesirables out of public space at the front door of the urban high school? to restrict these same populations within Metaphoric borders require comparable Collins 15 policing. For example, debates over gay areas rarely encounter these patterns of land marriage or whether LGBTQ people should use. This does not mean that individuals sit- be allowed to serve openly in the military uated within such communities all get along, may not be framed using the language of agree, or strive to articulate a group-based community, yet defending community is standpoint (Stoetzler and Yuval-Davis the ethos that makes these policies compre- 2002). Challenging the primacy of the indi- hensible. Gay marriages pose no substantive vidual as sacrosanct in politics becomes threat to the practice of heterosexual mar- more likely when individuals can see how riage—one can assume that heterosexual a chemical spill affects everyone in a neigh- people will continue to get married regard- borhood, not one by one, but as a community. less of what LGBTQ people do. Similarly, Politics may be refracted through a language debates about having out LGBTQ people of community, where community is not serve in the military speak to the need to a space to retreat and regroup but an impor- sustain a sense of military community that tant site of politics. sees a heterosexual homogeneity as part of The language of community reappears its imagined community. The small numbers in grassroots politics, not as a knee-jerk of LGBTQ people who wish to marry or to resistance to social change, but rather as serve openly in the military are not the issue a political tool for protecting families and here; rather, the challenges that these practi- neighborhoods. Policy debates regarding the ces make to the symbolic borders of mar- disposition of poor, African American com- riage and the military are at stake. munities in New Orleans after Hurricane Collectively, these examples suggest that Katrina illustrate this point. Intellectuals boundary work constitutes a significant and politicians who had long advocated dis- dimension of contemporary social relations. persing individuals as the solution to poverty Moreover, they suggest that maintaining saw Hurricane Katrina as a natural experi- community boundaries requires malleable ment to test their ideas. By contrast, poor gated communities. Such work is ongoing African Americans who were actually dis- and never-ending, primarily because a preoc- persed supported community development cupation with issues of safety, risk, and secu- strategies that would enable them to return rity in the context of changing patterns of home (Imbroscio 2008). This debate did not social inequalities is a threat to power. simply concern ideological positions; it pivoted on issues of political power and con- Grassroots Politics and the trol. Natural disasters not only illuminate Significance of Community contemporary social inequalities, they also reveal longstanding tensions between com- The construct of community has long perme- peting analyses of the causes of social ated the grassroots politics and political inequalities, different strategies for address- activity of less powerful groups. African ing them, and power differentials among Americans, Latinos, new immigrant groups, social actors (Coelho 2007). Academics’ Appalachians, and other groups with a dispro- and policymakers’ arguments about racism portionate population of poor people and poverty are well known, largely because approach politics through the specificity of these groups have greater capacity to use their everyday lived experience, and the elite knowledge to influence social policy. group-based ethos that this engenders. One By contrast, the everyday knowledge of can see the effects of differential zoning by poor people, racial and ethnic groups, new race, ethnicity, or class when chemical plants immigrant groups, women, and similar popu- or recycling facilities are routinely located in lations remains less known and less your neighborhood, whereas more affluent influential.10 16 American Sociological Review 75(1)

A constellation of terms related to com- degradation like dumping, deforestation, and munity development shows how the language strip mining. In this context, the grassroots of community reappears across many settings. politics of low-income African American, For example, terms such as community Latino, immigrant, indigenous, and poor white control, community action, and community communities are frontline sites where people building surface within grassroots political encounter harmful practices as threats to their projects. Black-American and Black-British communities, and they may invoke a language struggles for political power in the 1960s of community to resist them. Agency is key were often advanced within a framework of here, because market forces not only destroy community control, especially for neigh- local communities as physical entities—they borhoods within large cities. The community also can catalyze people to create new com- control movement used the term ‘‘commu- munities as political entities from the stuff of nity’’ to maintain that what happened to the prior social relations. Take, for example, group (often seen as family) affected all, polit- how transnational migration has catalyzed icizing individuals within the group, and to the growth of transnational communities that argue that control over group life lay else- transcend sending and receiving nations where. In schools, antipoverty programs, and (Portes 1997). Migrants join existing neighborhood agencies, demand for commu- immigrant communities, organize new ethnic nity control was a demand for power. communities in their new societies, and main- Women’s visibility as community workers tain ties with communities at home, thus form- within grassroots organizations illustrates ing new transnational communities. These how social justice initiatives invoke a language transnational communities might constitute of community. Here, traditions of African a new form of grassroots politics that empow- American women’s motherwork and care- ers individuals both in sending societies work exist in recursive relationships with (through receiving remittances) and within community work (Collins 2006). Similarly, the receiving society. this trajectory of framing grassroots political Grassroots politics might be infused with projects through the language of community a distinctive ethos that draws heavily on ideas spurs community action (Willie, Ridini, and about community. Under neoliberal policies, Willard 2008). The ethos lies in addressing individuals may have formal rights, yet these social problems that affect a group by seeing individual rights may be rendered meaning- the group as a community that, because it is less in the context of group subordination. harmed collectively, is best helped through Within disadvantaged groups, individuals collective response. In this sense, the language who lack material resources or the capacity of community retains its power as a vehicle for to exercise their formal rights often only grassroots political organization (Warren have each other. In such situations, a self- 2001). oriented political language of individual rights Hurricane Katrina and similar disasters may be far less useful than a language of com- provide a glimpse of more widespread prac- munity that potentially provides a functional tices that disproportionately damage com- statement of collective political demand. munities disadvantaged by race, ethnicity, or class. Disasters may appear to be exceptional Imagined Communities: Mediated events, but they represent the tip of the Communities iceberg. Low-income communities are far more likely to be harmed by the everyday Benedict Anderson’s influential volume practices of global capitalist development, Imagined Communities (1983) sparked new such as job export, mechanization, deindus- analyses of nationalism, nation-state policies, trialization, and practices of environmental and the centrality of imagined political Collins 17 identities to understandings of politics and changed. Sociology now extends across power. Noting the tenacity of nationalism regional and national borders and through as a political ideology, even when staunchly various organizations that knit together peo- critiqued, Anderson redefined the construct ple in an imagined interpretive community of nation as an ‘‘imagined’’ political commu- that is simultaneously local, global, multicul- nity, in the sense that members of even the tural, and aspirational. These mediated socio- smallest nations could never meet every indi- logical communities create new possibilities vidual within the nation. Yet, every commu- for the practice of sociology in multiple nity member could imagine terms of their social locations. New communications tech- inherent connectedness to others in the nologies enable sociologists to craft entirely group. Ideas of the nation or a national com- new mediated communities that build on, munity thus encourage members to be good transcend, and challenge existing socio- citizens by fostering feelings of connection logical power configurations. that lead people to serve and make sacrifices These new communications technologies for the good of others who belong to the raise at least two issues regarding the signifi- imagined nation. Anderson argues that all cance of mediated communities for community communities larger than those based on as a political construct. First, despite the exis- face-to-face contact are imagined and must tence of a very real digital divide that be ‘‘distinguished, not by their falsity/ disenfranchises those who lack access to the genuineness, but by the style in which they Internet, the emergence of user-generated are imagined’’ (p. 6 [italics added]). material via blogs, citizen journalists, New communications technologies have YouTube postings, and mass text messaging catalyzed new styles for imagining and orga- can shift the balance of power away from nizing communities of all sorts, including top-down control of information to a high- explicitly political communities.11 For exam- tech, bottom-up grassroots ethos. New technol- ple, young people’s use of convergent media ogies can encourage new forms of imagined forms—music, mobile phones, blogging, communities that express diverse political Web sites, the Internet, desktop publishing, agendas. The 2008 Obama campaign, for and digital cameras—has catalyzed new example, used cell phones to organize popula- forms of agency and social networking tions who had difficulty imagining themselves within mediated communities (Bloustien as being in one community—Latinos, young 2007). Youth may have led the way in using people, African Americans, and women—and media to imagine communities, yet the to link this national network to old- effects go much further than youth popula- fashioned, place- and issue-based community tions. Sociologists, for example, can no lon- organizing (Sampson et al. 2005). In essence, ger imagine the sociological community as new communications technologies unsettle a small group of faculty from elite notions of a top-down public sphere, where American, French, German, or British insti- elites control knowledge and public informa- tutions who speak for everyone. This style tion, the apparent hallmark of Western bour- of imagining a sociological community by geois society (Habermas 1989). Instead, placing an elite group at the center of power these changing patterns of the flow of infor- is becoming increasingly fractured within the mation may signal a fundamental shift from new global context. New communications a hierarchical, top-down organization of technologies enable individuals in the mar- power to a bottom-up, Web-based organiza- gins to speak directly with one another. tion of power grounded in potentially more With little need to consult the center on egalitarian social relations. Despite its short issues of what constitutes bona fide sociol- tenure, patterns of change in the overall orga- ogy, the entire sociological enterprise is nization of the Internet illustrate these 18 American Sociological Review 75(1) changes. The shift from a Web 1.0 perspec- community that served as a site of political tive, where Web users were primarily con- contestation for African American youth, yet sumers of information, to a Web 2.0 perspec- it has spread far beyond these origins. Hip tive, where each individual can become hop culture’s ability to attract youth from a creative producer of information, reflects diverse national groups, linguistic groups, how political communities might be imag- racial and ethnic groups, genders, sexualities, ined and organized. and abilities points to the political signifi- Second, technological tools might also cance of artistic mediated communities within enable people to imagine new social relations contemporary mass media venues. that transcend the limits of geography. At When reframed through power relations, their most basic level, social networking sites imagined communities can be marshaled for and similar Web-based meeting places oppressive or emancipatory political projects. provide powerful dissemination tools for In this sense, technologies that facilitate information. Enhanced access to information social networks move beyond their origins profoundly affects basic definitions of politi- as basic vehicles for companionship (e.g., cal communities, largely because informa- the social networking sites of adolescents) tion enables individuals to transcend, and or functional tools for business (e.g., virtual often erase, boundaries of the gated com- meetings, teleconferencing, and Skype). munities of actual social relations. It is now From sociology to hip hop, new communica- possible to see pictures of communities tions technologies enable people to create much like one’s own on the other side of social meanings through shifting patterns of the world, hear world music that expresses face-to-face and mediated interactions. In similar feelings and aspirations, see and try the context of globalization, these new tech- dance movements from unheard of places, nologies create organizational opportunities and communicate directly with actual people for new sorts of political communities. in different contexts. This expanded access to information cuts Citizenship and the Call to both ways. On the one hand, it can foster Community Service a voyeurism about the lives of others from the safety of one’s gated community; for The commitment to community service rou- example, new technologies enable black cul- tinely found within the United States may ture to be commodified and sold in the global reflect the peculiarities of American culture; marketplace (Collins 2009). On the other yet, the core idea of service to nation as hand, expanded access to information can imagined community has deep roots across unmask the power of gates by revealing the many social settings. With its expressed humanity of people who have been depicted commitment to community service, the in stereotypical fashion. Hip hop, an imagined Obama administration has refocused atten- community whose initial expression came tion on an important component of from black youth, illustrates this trajectory. American national identity. On January 19, In her study of the aesthetic and political 2009, the day before his inauguration, dimensions of hip hop, Perry (2004:44) notes Obama issued a call for a renewed commit- that ‘‘hip hop nourishes by offering commu- ment to community service in a speech deliv- nity membership that entails a body of cul- ered for the Martin Luther King Day of tural knowledge, yet it also nourished by Service at an inner-city high school: offering a counter-hegemonic authority and subjectivity to the force of white supremacy I am asking you to roll up your sleeves in American culture.’’ Hip hop may have and join in the work of remaking this begun as a cohort specific, mediated nation . . . don’t tell me that we can’t Collins 19

usher in a new spirit of service to this women of color provide low-paid care- country. I know we can do this. work that relieves middle-class and affluent America is a great nation precisely women of such duties (Hondagneu-Sotelo because Americans have been willing 2001). Within unpaid care-work, one sees to stand up when it was hard; to give a similar hierarchy in the value placed on when they have little left to give; to specific service activities. Although mid- rise above moments of great challenge dle-class women are far more likely to and terrible trial. And I know that I am work today than in the past, the service here today—as are so many of you— activities they pursue—and that they have because somebody, at some point, time to pursue because they can employ decided that loving their community low-paid domestic workers—are often and their country meant doing some- more valued. For example, stay-at-home thing to change it. (Obama 2009; moms’ service as organizers of school fund- italics added) raisers or troop leaders for the Girl Scouts, or professional women’s involvement in In this passage, Obama equates volunteerism philanthropic board and fundraising ser- with civic engagement, service with patriot- vice, is highly valued. By contrast, the ser- ism, and explains the notion of ideal citizen- vice of poor and working-class women who ship using the rhetoric of loving one’s com- take plates of food to elderly neighbors, run munity as one’s country. daycare centers in their homes for women Community service may seem to be a uni- who work the late shift, or perform volun- versal category that could be achieved by any- teer activities in their churches garners one, yet the construct of service is refracted less recognition. Thus, when it comes to through prevailing social inequalities. One’s military service and care-work, the value placement within social hierarchies of race, placed on volunteerism and sacrifice varies class, and gender may narrow or expand depending on individuals’ gender, race, and one’s access to service opportunities and the class. value placed on service itself. Moreover, the Poor and working-class populations not service individuals pursue is differentially val- only have different access to forms of com- ued by society. Compare, for example, mili- munity service, but the very meaning tary service and care-work as forms of com- attached to the notion of community service munity service. Military service is a highly may reflect lived experiences. Service can visible and valued form of community ser- mean very different things to middle-class vice, in part because the community served and working-class people. Many working- is the nation as community, and in part class people reject ideas of community ser- because military service has historically been vice altogether, viewing service work as the province of men (Yuval-Davis 1997). devalued, low-paid labor that is part of a his- Soldiers volunteer to serve the national com- tory of exploitation. Because women and munity, potentially sacrificing their lives. people of color have been forced to take ser- Yet within this service tradition, class, race, vice jobs, much of it dirty work, service sig- gender, and sexuality shape where men, nals submission and can be a reminder of women, Latinos, African Americans, whites, their placement within social hierarchies. middle-class, working-class, and poor people For many working-class people, community are situated and how their service is valued. service does not conjure up lofty ideals of Care-work constitutes an important form volunteerism and sacrifice as suggested by of women’s labor that draws on ideas about President Obama; instead, community ser- community service and women’s place. vice is something you get as an alternative Within paid care-work, poor women and to jail time. 20 American Sociological Review 75(1)

It would be a mistake, however, to assume Americans for voter registration drives and that poor and working-class communities similar forms of political action. Similarly, lack traditions of service. There are unrecog- the radical political agenda of the Black nized alternative traditions of civic participa- Panther Party for Self-Defense included tion and community service: helping out a breakfast program that, by feeding children neighbors, supporting churches, and running every morning, demonstrated the failures of neighborhood groups fall within the purview government institutions. of community service but are rarely In a context where community service is embraced as such. Community service tradi- closely linked to ideas of patriotism and cit- tions of care-work in African American com- izenship, as is the case in the United States, munities, much of it done by African calls for community service help manage American women, have been vital to the sur- the contradictions of competing political vival of families and neighborhoods. Retired, agendas. President Obama’s call to commu- professional African American women often nity service may be a sincere gesture, yet conceptualize their community service in community service is unlikely to fix the terms of intergenerational community range of deep-seated social problems that responsibility and race uplift. These women stem from multiple social inequalities. may engage in similar activities as middle- Agendas of community service are effective class white women but attach different social because the malleability of the term ‘‘ser- meanings to the work (Slevin 2005). Care- vice,’’ coupled with the similarly elastic work can be especially essential in poor com- notion of ‘‘community,’’ allows multiple munities that lack access to the benefits their social meanings to attach to this ostensibly more affluent counterparts routinely experi- universalistic political agenda. In this use ence, particularly if care-work is linked to of community as a political construct, atten- grassroots politics and the community ethos tion is diverted away from public policies this engenders. that might address root causes of social On the surface, the category of commu- problems and toward facile forms of amelio- nity service is a universal category open to ration. This construction suggests that paint- anyone, which will yield similar benefits to ing the school corridor is a valid substitute all who engage in it, and that is good for for providing skilled teachers for poor neighborhoods and the nation. However, dril- schools, or that working in a food pantry ling down into how social inequalities affect onedayayearisaviableresponsetohun- community service shows stratified patterns ger. Using the construct of community to of access to service, as well as inequalities invoke strong feelings—in this case, the in how service is valued, defined, and per- emotional satisfaction of helping the less ceived by different groups. Specifically, fortunate through community service— alternative community service traditions of feel-good experiences may mask equally subordinated populations might constitute important responsibilities of citizenship. political projects in their own right. Providing tutoring and free meals can be The Complexities of Community seen as benign volunteerism. Yet in the con- Organizing text of the political struggles of the 1960s, both of these community service activities President Barack Obama worked as a com- took on a different meaning. Specifically, munity organizer on the South Side of the freedom schools aimed to provide alter- Chicago, an experience that may have influ- natives to public education in Mississippi enced his campaign strategy and his style of and other Southern states, but the literacy governing. Whether accurate or not, training they provided equipped African Obama’s history highlights multiple and Collins 21 contradictory meanings that people attach to organizing under the rubric of identity poli- the term community organizer. Would tics might also involve politicizing a preexist- Obama’s perceptions of community organ- ing, visible social identity: for example, izers lead him to act as an advocate for spe- organizers might recruit workers at a factory cial interest groups—specifically, African into the labor movement using an identity as Americans—thus further balkanizing parti- ‘‘worker’’ that can be imagined to apply to san politics? Or would Obama be a commu- other workers in diverse work situations; nity organizer in the sense of organizing the feminists strive to organize women around American public into an imagined national a new social identity attached to the concept community dedicated to participatory of ‘‘women’’; and, in the 1980s and 1990s, democracy? In which direction might the the religious right tried to attach a political elasticity of the term community organizer agenda to the social identity of ‘‘Christian.’’ stretch in serving the political purposes of Community organizing might also bring the Obama administration? entirely new social identities into being; in These debates concerning President the 1960s, LGBTQ activists challenged the Obama’s loyalties reflect prevailing ideas social identity of ‘‘homosexual’’ advanced that view community organizing through the by the medical establishment. lens of either identity politics or affinity By contrast, forms of political behavior cat- politics. In effect, the curiosity of the egorized as affinity politics might emphasize American public as to whether Obama will organizing groups for political action, but be a ‘‘special-interest’’ president or one might not see their actions as organizing com- serving all of the people reflects widespread munities per se. The task for organizers under assumptions about the seeming contradictions an umbrella of affinity politics lies in politiciz- between identity and affinity politics that ing individuals by helping them develop an reflect To¨nnies’s binary of community and affiliation grounded in a commitment to civil society (To¨nnies 2001). a shared set of social interests; for example, Forms of political behavior categorized as working for or against climate change. The identity politics strive to craft political soli- goal is to craft a political organization of darity around social identity categories. For like-minded individuals who work on behalf this type of community organizer, the organi- of a social issue. Despite the crosscutting, zational task lies in politicizing a preexisting mutually-constructing nature of identity and shared social experience that might not be affinity politics, holding fast to this binary seen as a political identity. Community-orga- will limit community organizing. Not only is nizing traditions grounded in place-based, this framework of identity and affinity politics local, or seemingly homogeneous social not especially useful to actual community identities often constitute the benchmark of organizers and their projects, but it privileges identity politics. Neighborhood community one form of community organizing over development initiatives fall under this another. Specifically, this binary framework rubric—gated communities and neighbor- replicates longstanding dualistic thinking hood grassroots activism both reflect this that elevates political forms of civil society— place-based ethos of social identities at the the individualism of affinity politics—and core of community organizing.12 Because derogates the collective ethos most often asso- participants share a specific geographic ciated with forms of community organizing of focus, these initiatives build on shared social subordinated groups, namely, identity politics. networks and experiences to organize resi- Effective community organizing draws on dents in face-to-face settings of apartment multiple organizational forms. The identity/ buildings, neighborhoods, villages, churches, affinity binary may be useful as a starting workplaces, and clubs. Community point in that, initially, one form may be 22 American Sociological Review 75(1) more salient in a specific social context. Yet, Studies classrooms. Here they can form community organizing that works with peo- new communities based in affinities with ple where they actually are—in gated com- one another as individuals as well as with munities, low-income neighborhoods, the broader transnational women’s move- churches, national organizations, or the ment. Yet they also criticize the terms of mediated communities of professional organ- their new-found freedom, which can encour- izations and contemporary youth culture— age them to choose affinity politics over the and engages broader social issues that con- identity politics they left behind. Because cern them (e.g., the differential meaning of they are social mobiles, they see the false community service), suggests that political choice they must make between identity action always occurs at the intersection of and affinity politics (Hernandez and identity and affinity politics. For example, Rehman 2002). Transnational feminism a group of African American residents fight- expresses these same tensions. It sees ing a chemical plant being placed next to empowering women as its core political pro- their neighborhood school may appear to be ject, one that requires organizing a global an identity-based political project, yet this political community among women. Yet project is simultaneously part of a broader, how might this political solidarity be environmental justice initiative that cuts achieved? One approach is to organize across categories of race and class. women around identity categories such as Rather than classifying community orga- women, feminists, and sisters. Yet this nizing as being either identity or affinity approach has been criticized for flattening based, a more fruitful approach lies in identi- meaningful differences among women cre- fying issues that shape community organiz- ated by systems of race, class, sexuality, ing of all sorts. It is important to note that age, ethnicity, religion, and nation. Another ‘‘community organizing’’ refers to all types approach identifies a social justice agenda— of communities, not just explicitly political for example, reproductive rights, schooling ones associated with social movement poli- for girls, violence against women, or the tics. This broader conception of community globalization of women’s poverty—positing suggests that ideas about identity and affinity that commitment to these principles will might be better conceptualized as organiza- override differences among women. Yet tional tools, rather than as ostensibly opposi- this approach faces the challenge of specify- tional types of community organizing that ing how the core principles of transnational can be easily ranked. In this sense, all com- feminism apply to women from vastly differ- munities are inherently political: to exist, ent backgrounds. For young women of color they must organize across the differences in who claim feminism, as well as the transna- power among their members. They must tional feminist movement overall, identity also position themselves within a constella- and affinity politics constitute interrelated, tion of other communities engaged in similar essential components of community organizational projects. Communities must organizing. manage internal differences in power among Because the construct of community their members as well as negotiate differen- includes both a principle of actual social orga- ces in power among unequal communities. nization (from local to global settings) and an The global women’s movement illustrates elastic idea that people use in everyday life, the tensions community organizers must the theme of community organizing is central negotiate between internal and external dif- to oppressive and emancipatory projects ferences of power. Many young women of within intersecting power relations. In the color in the United States express excitement context of contemporary massive changes, when they discover feminism in Women’s refocusing attention on contested perspectives Collins 23 of community organizing sheds light on how relations. Whereas binary thinking is cen- people organize themselves and others for tral to systems of slavery, colonialism, diverse political ends. imperialism, and sexism that focus on sort- ing and ranking populations into non-over- lapping categories, relational thinking RETHINKING COMMUNITY: emphasizes connections among and across POWER, SOCIAL these categories. The shift from disciplinary INEQUALITIES, AND SOCIAL to interdisciplinary and transdisciplinary JUSTICE fields of inquiry, or from national to inter- national and transnational frames for global In the context of intersecting power relations politics, reflects this conceptual shift within that catalyze changing-same constellations of knowledge and power relations. Seeing new social inequalities, community has not disap- connections among and across individuals, peared from view. Instead, the new politics groups, categories, and theories is the of community detailed here suggests that com- hallmark of contemporary patterns of munity remains hidden in plain sight. interdependence. Practices such as retreating to gated communi- Because the construct of community is ties to protect loved ones from perceived inherently about interrelationships across threats, finding strength in community in differences in power—the aforementioned response to challenges of globalization, using power negotiations within identity communi- new technologies to imagine new mediated ties and across affinity communities—the communities, annexing the symbolic power relational thinking that accompanies multiple of community service to state agendas, and practices of community in actual social rela- organizing groups that accommodate seem- tions may be a useful entre´e into strategies ingly antithetical approaches to community, people deploy within an increasingly interde- are but a few examples of the pervasiveness pendent world.13 Because community of the community construct within contempo- embodies similarity and difference, both rary politics. within the internal politics of communities Several features of community as a political and across communities, the word community construct may make it especially salient for inherently expresses a relational idea (Cohen examining intersecting systems of power of 1985). Redefined notions of community might gender, ethnicity, sexuality, age, ability, be profitably incorporated into ongoing proj- nation, race, and class. First, the construct of ects to rethink social phenomena in relational community provides a template for both rela- terms. For example, broad projects of rethink- tional thinking, an increasingly necessary skill ing cultural interdependence that have cata- for navigating social relations of interdepen- lyzed contemporary patterns of multiplicity, dence, and social theories that strive to under- mixing, mestizaje, and hybridization stand these relations (Emirbayer 1997). (Canclini 1995) might be placed in dialogue Relational thinking need not be a cognitive with analyses of community as a political con- category; instead, the idea of community struct. This construct of community might also may provide a template for examining how resonate with broader intellectual frameworks relational thinking operates across a range of that draw on relational thinking. Take, for social venues, some explicitly political, others example, scholars’ use of intersectionality as less so. an emerging paradigm for analyzing race, From a blossoming world music scene to class, gender, sexuality, ability, and age as terrorism, growing recognition of multiple mutually constructing systems of power. forms of humanity’s interdependence Scholars of intersectionality have made rela- requires new ways of conceptualizing social tional thinking central to their analyses of 24 American Sociological Review 75(1) power and social inequalities (Knapp 2005; is similarly reconfigured, with people rub- Walby 2007), yet analytic treatments of com- bing elbows in schools and jobs while still munity as a political construct remain in their carrying the social distance provided by cat- infancy in this literature. egories of race, class, gender, and sexuality. Second, community’s proven track record Conceptual space follows a similar logic of as an adaptable, functional principle of social separation and ranking—interdisciplinary organization—recall that community is diffi- fields challenge the historical privileges cult to define yet easy to use—makes it use- enjoyed by established academic disciplines. ful for responding to changes associated with In this context, because boundaries signify the reconfiguration of systems of racism, sex- differences in power, boundary maintenance ism, class exploitation, and heterosexism. Do of physical, social, and conceptual space people living through massive changes draw becomes more intense (Pieterse 2004). on the familiar organizational principles and Because flexibility is both the hallmark interpretive frameworks of community to of contemporary social relations and a charac- respond to unfamiliar social relations? teristic of the construct of community, this Traditionally, the language of community construct may be especially suitable in help- mapped comfortably onto constellations of ing people manage ambiguities associated people who seemingly belonged together. with changing configurations of intersecting For example, ethnic constructions routinely power relations. Responses to the changing- separated Blacks, Irish, and Italians into hier- same patterns of social inequalities can vary archically ranked groups. The boundaries dramatically. Some groups advocate keeping between groups organized as communities communities the same or returning to former were clear. Under a logic of segregation or ways of being (e.g., gated communities); separate spaces, people belonged in specific others embrace changes and aspire to build places (e.g., neighborhoods, ethnic groups, new and better communities to address it nation-states, or occupational categories) (e.g., the aspirational content of conscious and all places were ranked. Social inequal- hip hop). ities of race, gender, sexuality, class, ethnic- A third dimension of community as a polit- ity, age, religion, and ability all drew on ical construct is that community is closely a shared logic of ranked social groups orga- associated with symbolic boundary construc- nized around varying configurations of core tion, and this process may often be drawn on social identities. in times of social change. Boundary mainte- In a situation of fluidity and seeming nance becomes more difficult in situations of interdependence, who knows who belongs interdependence—the prevailing ethos of con- where? As evidenced by the attention temporary globalization—hence the impetus devoted to themes of traveling, home, migra- to restore order via walls and gates. Because tion, exile, outsider-within existence, and it is impossible to return to the past, the func- categories of citizenship, questions of tionality of community in the symbolic con- belonging and border crossing preoccupy struction of boundaries helps explain why thinkers from diverse fields and walks of communities may be growing in significance life (Naples 2009). Transportation and com- at the same time that formal boundaries that munications technologies are rapidly regulate social inequalities are waning (e.g., destroying pristine neighborhoods and vil- declines in segregated housing for Latinos lages where one could easily spot a stranger. and African Americans or excluding women Physical places of housing, neighborhoods, from sports). In the aftermath of postcolonial schools, cities, religious institutions, and and civil rights movements’ activism, formal nations no longer provide the certainty of citizenship rights have been granted to many knowing which people belong. Social space historically subordinated groups. Yet, Collins 25 installing formal rights by eliminating visibly possibilities of assimilation, multiculturalism, exclusionary practices does not mean that and boundary-blurring forms of hybridity and social inequalities have disappeared. In the mestizaje (Collins 2009). United States, for example, the strict bound- Finally, the construct of community can aries of de jure racial segregation have largely serve as a template for aspirational political been replaced by a more nuanced, colorblind projects. Community can never be a finished racism that continues to produce racially dis- thing but is always in the making. In this parate outcomes through symbolic and coded sense, participating in building a community mechanisms (Guinier and Torres 2002). is simultaneously political (negotiating differ- Over the past several decades, many ences of power within a group); dynamic countries have seen growth in political action (negotiating practices that balance individual founded on ethnicity, race, religion, and sim- and collective aspirations); and aspirational ilar identities among groups who may have (a form of visionary pragmatism that places achieved formal rights but who encounter contemporary practices in service to broader symbolic and coded mechanisms that main- principles) (Collins 2000, 2009). The symbol- tain social inequalities. Where the old struc- ism associated with community is key, with tural bases of community boundaries are elasticity of the symbol serving as a measure blurred, groups respond by using the sym- of its effectiveness. Symbols are often most bolic dimensions of community to craft polit- useful when they are imprecise (Cohen ical solutions that either sustain existing 1985): the specific content of a given political social inequalities or challenge them. For project is less significant than how the con- example, regardless of ideological content, struct of community enables people to imag- the renaissance of community among subor- ine new forms of community, even as they dinated groups often takes shape through retrieve and rework symbols from the past.14 the aggressive assertion of ethnicity and the In the United States, community can be local neighborhood against the homo- a symbol for egalitarianism, the quest for genizing logic of the nation and international a place where every individual is recognized political economies (Cohen 1985). A similar as an equal member of the community with resurgence of ethnicity can be seen among entitlements and responsibilities commensu- whites and other dominant groups who rate with their ability to serve the greater perceive their power to be eroding within good. In this sense, ideas about community rapidly changing multicultural, multiethnic and participatory democracy remain bundled societies. The rise of far-right political together—democracy is not a thing that can projects within Western European societies be achieved but rather a relational process reflects this trend. honed in the crucible of lived experience The conception of community that is across differences in power. John Dewey, asserted by groups that are differentially posi- Jane Addams, W. E. B. Du Bois, and other tioned within power relations is vital. early-twentieth-century American pragma- Community can be based on solidarities that tists saw this connection between participa- draw on fundamentalist ideologies (e.g., tory democracy and community, viewing Christian, Islamic, and Zionist fundamentalist both as aspirational constructs that inform social movements), or political philosophies one another. The construct of community that suppress dissent. Purifying the commu- may be ideally suited for democratic aspira- nity of heretics, nonbelievers, and traitors is tional projects because its effectiveness lies one way of accomplishing political solidarity. in its ability to wed strong feelings to projects Alternative conceptions of community can that are designed to advance the greater good. catalyze more complex understandings of One reason that these four dimensions of community that grapple with the democratic the construct of community—its ability to 26 American Sociological Review 75(1) invoke relational thinking, help people deal social status of African Americans as a group. with change, negotiate boundaries, and har- Black people were not her mass, her mob, her ness political aspirations—are so effective public, her population, or a statistical collec- in grappling with the changing-same patterns tion of potential lynching victims—they were of social inequalities is that community is her community. Emboldened by community a holistic construct. Community is a ubiqui- commitment, Wells-Barnett dared to speak tous, versatile idea that can accommodate the forbidden and go where she was unwel- contradictory meanings and link thinking, come. In her work, we see the power of feeling, and action in ways that make it espe- deep feelings wedded to social justice agen- cially useful for contemporary social justice das, as well as a bona fide commitment to initiatives. Yet this construct links thinking- a widening of the civic space that might feeling-action less by integrating them one enable neighborhoods and nations to move into the other, and more by aggregating beyond coexistence to interdependent living. them such that they energize one another Let us hope that, as long as social inequalities (Cohen 1985). People do not aspire for a bet- persist, individuals like Wells-Barnett, with ter or different world for intellectual reasons a passion for social justice, will emerge only. They act because they care. Yet emo- who use community in innovative and imag- tion without reason is subject to manipula- inative ways. tion. A good deal of the power of community lies in its ability to wed strong feelings to Acknowledgments projects with diverse political agendas, espe- cially aspirational political agendas. People Because this project required many areas of expertise, who care about their communities, and proj- a variety of people were essential to its completion. Special thanks goes out to University of Maryland ects that harness emotions for political ends, graduate students Zeynep Atalay, Kendra Barber, possess a staying power. Community Valerie Chepp, Heather Marsh, Chang Won Lee, provides a window on a holistic politics, Nathan Jurgenson, and Kathryn Buford for research drawing on its proven track record and its assistance with various parts of this manuscript. relational cognitive frame, to provide the hope that is needed for politics. Notes Social justice initiatives require just this 1. I distinguish between intersecting systems of power sort of holistic commitment, one where, and specific social formations of social inequalities according to Martin Luther King Jr., ‘‘power that reflect these power relations from one setting to at its best is love implementing the demands the next. Intersecting systems of power may be per- of justice, and justice at its best is love cor- vasive, yet some intersections may be more salient recting everything that stands against love’’ than others. For analytic clarity, I refer to intersect- ing systems of power as the broader, analytic frame- (Carson and Shepard 2002:186). The con- work, and changing-same patterns of social inequal- struct of community can be a powerful orga- ities as the product of these broader systems (see nizing principle for social justice initiatives Collins [2000] for a discussion of the connections conceptualized within this framework. between intersectionality and the matrix of domina- Nineteenth-century African American jour- tion). For analytic approaches to social inequalities that influence this account, see Tilly’s (1998) anal- nalist Ida Wells-Barnett’s anti-lynching cru- ysis of the relational nature of durable inequalities; sade illustrates the effectiveness of joining Walby’s (2007) account of how complexity theory an unshakable commitment to community shapes institutional frames of inequality and social with a passion for social justice. Wells- relations of power; and Korzeniewicz and Moran’s Barnett was compelled to act when a friend (2009) use of world-systems theory to investigate the durable nature of social inequalities in the con- of hers was lynched. She realized that no text of globalization. individual could be safe from the threat of 2. Framing issues about democracy and social inequal- lynching without changing the legal and ities by juxtaposing change to stasis certainly Collins 27

permeates mass media depictions of politics —change ideas about gender, sexuality, age, race, religion, is defined as the opposite of stability, leaving stasis and ethnicity—as organized through prevailing schol- as the de facto enemy of change and vice versa. arship on family as influenced by To¨nnies—has The seemingly oxymoronic concept of the chang- shaped subsequent approaches to community. ing-same, however, might better describe democ- Unlike family, community has been relatively racy, social inequalities, and relations between neglected as a political construct within sociology. them. The notion of the changing-same encom- 5. The sustained attention within contemporary social passes contemporary social dynamics where the theory to examining the contours of ostensibly mod- global political economy has changed so dramati- ern and postmodern social formations constitutes an cally, ostensibly providing opportunities for iteration of this tendency to privilege civil society change while replicating old hierarchies. In this and the West as the site of significant action and global context of the changing-same, social to relegate the premodern to an ahistorical, natural, inequalities that accompany intersecting power and often unexamined site. Community constitutes relations of ethnicity, sexuality, age, ability, a construct associated with the premodern, the nation, race, class, and gender also simultaneously non-West, and a series of ideas that fall on the change and remain the same. negative side of Western binary thinking. 3. This project addresses Keller’s (1988:168) chal- 6. I hesitate to broaden this analysis of community lenge to sociology: ‘‘I seek for us to reclaim com- beyond the United States, primarily because cul- munity as a vital concept for sociological theory tural differences may mean that terms other than and empirical research, to ground our abstract and community may be more salient in other situations. over-generalized statistics, and to locate them in In the U.S. case, a constellation of practices has meaningful social space.’’ My approach draws fostered an emphasis on the term community (e.g., from the overall framework proposed by Barry the history of small towns that, for a large segment Wellman, yet it avoids both the structural determin- of the population, symbolize what it means to be ism among levels of society and identifying labor ‘‘American’’). Other core ideas may be equally if (class) relations as most fundamental. Wellman not more salient within other national or social (1979:1201) contends: ‘‘The Community Question settings. has set the agenda for much of sociology. It is the 7. Despite the term’s widespread use within sociology, question of how large-scale social systemic divi- after the 1970s, sociological theory largely sions of labor affect the organization and content neglected the construct of community. Yet there of primary ties. The Question has formed a crucial are signs that theoretical discussions of the concept sociological nexus between macroscopic and micro- are being revitalized (see Brint 2001; Etzioni 1996). scopic analysis. It has posed the problem of the Interestingly, rather than social theorists, it is structural integration of a social system and the sociologists who offer thorough and compelling interpersonal means by which its members have analyses of the concept in their empirical work access to scarce resources.’’ In this address, I (e.g., Liepins’s [2000] analysis of community for reframe the construct of community and explore contemporary rural studies). its political implications. Unlike family, community 8. Making a similar claim that ‘‘community is resur- is more visibly situated as a midrange, political con- ging as a force in its own right and not merely as struct, which I suggest has macroscopic dimensions a residue from the past as a way-station to gesell- of its own. We do not expect families to be political, schaft,’’ Keller (1988:173) identifies four main rea- yet we are not surprised when communities engage sons why this is so: (1) a disenchantment with in political behavior. modernity, (2) the search for roots in response to 4. The complete passage reads: ‘‘If a father’s love exists change, (3) new immigration and suburban in any strengths it resembles the love between bro- retrenchment, and (4) a longing for community thers and sisters because of its ‘mental’ [rather than catalyzed by increasing homelessness. I am less physical] character. But it clearly differs from that interested in explaining the resurgence of interest relationship because of the inequality of the parties in community than in specifying the conceptual involved, especially in age and intellectual powers. practices of community that articulate around power Thus fatherhood is the clearest foundation for the relations. concept of authority with community. This authority 9. This section is written as a linear argument, yet it is is not, however, to be used for the advantage of the important to note two additional characteristics of authority-holder, but to complete his part in pro- its overall organization. First, I am using a web- creation by seeing to his offspring’s training and edu- based format where the sites are conceptualized cation and sharing with them his own experience of within an interconnected network of practices and life’’ (To¨nnies 2001:24–25). My aim here is not to social meanings, rather than arrayed along a contin- discredit To¨nnies by selectively quoting him, but uum or within a hierarchy. The sites do not con- rather to illustrate how the synergistic relation of stitute a representative sample in the traditional 28 American Sociological Review 75(1)

sense, but instead should be viewed as intercon- and immigrant status, can be tracked through the nected windows through which we might observe changing composition of Chicago neighborhoods some common phenomenon; in this case, how com- and efforts by successive racial/ethnic groups to munity functions within power relations generally, develop their neighborhoods and gain equitable and in the context of contemporary social inequal- access to city services. A copious literature exam- ities in particular. Different windows would shift ines community organizing in Chicago among the perspective on what is seen and what we think a range of groups, most recently Puerto Ricans we know. Second, I am using a genealogical and Mexicans (Ramos-Zayas 2003). method, one where parts of a story are hidden and 13. Western paradigms tend to use linear frameworks and others come to the surface (Foucault 1980). I pre- attach prefixes such as ‘‘pre’’ and ‘‘post’’ to a host of sent what is currently visible; alternative uses of terms (e.g., post-modern, post-structuralism, and community may also be important but, because post-colonialism). By contrast, terms with the prefix they remain hidden-in-plain-sight—being too com- ‘‘inter’’ address the growing tendency to conceptual- mon, ordinary, or popular—remain unexamined. I ize social relations generally, and the centrality of use the term ‘‘mapping’’ to describe the landscape power within them, in relational fashion. Terms I can see here and now. The construct of community such as interdisciplinarity, international relations, suggests the particularities of place, a grounded and intersectionality illustrate this shift to relational concept that offers a particular standpoint. I am thinking. making an epistemological choice to work against 14. C. Wright Mills’s concept of the sociological imagi- the standard ‘‘view from nowhere’’ of seeming nation speaks to using community in this capacity. objectivity (Collins 1998) and instead use a ‘‘situ- Community can also serve as a powerful symbol for ated imagination’’ that emerges from a situated change through the use of imagination: ‘‘It permits standpoint (Stoetzler and Yuval-Davis 2002). deeply entrenched customary symbolic forms to be 10. The field of urban studies has shown sustained used in radically changed circumstances. It thereby interest in the concept and theory of community. manages change so that it limits the disruption of peo- Primary themes include the effects of urbanization ple’s orientations to their community, and enables on community, or communal solidarity through them to make sense of novel circumstances through three primary frameworks: the ‘‘community lost’’ the use of familiar idioms’’ (Cohen 1985:91–92). perspective, in which urbanization weakens com- For a provocative discussion of the potential use of munal solidarity; the ‘‘community saved’’ perspec- the concept of a situated imagination reminiscent of tive, which claims that primary ties continue to Mills, see Stoetzler and Yuval-Davis (2002). flourish in urban settings; and the ‘‘community lib- erated’’ perspective, in which city dwellers are no longer restricted to their immediate kinship groups References or neighborhoods and can form close relationships across an entire urban area (for a summary of these Anderson, Benedict. 1983. Imagined Communities: positions, see Wellman 1979). These three frame- Reflections on the Origin and Spread of works all rely on To¨nnies’s community/civil society Nationalism. London, UK: Verso. binary (To¨nnies 2001). Balibar, Etienne. 1991. ‘‘Racism and Nationalism.’’ 11. The debates that surround new communications Pp. 37–67 in Race, Nation, Class: Ambiguous technologies and the information society in general Identities, edited by E. Balibar and I. Wallerstein. are immense and I make no effort to summarize New York: Verso. them here. For discussions of how new technologies Banton, Michael. 1998. Racial Theories. London, UK: are changing social relations, especially the con- Cambridge University Press. struct of virtual communities, see Wellman and col- Bloustien, Gerry. 2007. ‘‘‘Wigging People Out’: Youth leagues (1996), Driskell and Lyon (2002), and Music Practice and Mediated Communities.’’ Calhoun (1998). The shift to the information society Journal of Community and Applied Social makes imagined communities even more signifi- Psychology 17:446–62. cant, in that new technologies make new sorts of Brint, Steven. 2001. ‘‘Gemeinschaft Revisited: mediated communities possible. A Critique and Reconstruction of the Community 12. Sociology has a storied tradition of researching Concept.’’ Sociological Theory 19:1–23. place-based community organizing, especially Calhoun, Craig. 1998. ‘‘Community without Propinquity through ethnographies. Chicago is a prime example Revisited: Communications Technology and the of the fusion of social identities of race, ethnicity, Transformation of the Urban Public Sphere.’’ immigrant status, and class via the changing config- Sociological Inquiry 68:378–97. uration of neighborhoods. Some of the more sophis- Canclini, Ne´stor G. 1995. Hybrid Cultures: Strategies ticated approaches to community organizing, which for Entering and Leaving Modernity. Minneapolis, drew on social identities of race, class, ethnicity, MN: University of Minnesota Press. Collins 29

Carson, Clayborne and Kris Shepard, eds. 2002. A Hondagneu-Sotelo, Pierrette. 2001. Domestica: Call to Conscience: The Landmark Speeches of Immigrant Workers Cleaning and Caring in the Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. New York: Warner Shadow of Affluence. Berkeley, CA: University of Books. California Press. Coelho, Joa˜o Paulo Borges. 2007. ‘‘The State, the Imbroscio, David. 2008. ‘‘‘[U]Nited and Actuated by Community, and Natural Calamities in Rural Some Common Impulse of Passion’: Challenging Mozambique.’’ Pp. 219–45 in Another Knowledge the Dispersal Consensus in American Housing Is Possible: Beyond Northern Epistemologies, edited Policy Research.’’ Journal of Urban Affairs by B. de S. Santos. New York: Verso. 30:111–30. Cohen, Anthony P. 1985. The Symbolic Construction of Keller, Suzanne. 1988. ‘‘The American Dream of Community. London, UK: Tavistock Publications. Community: An Unfinished Agenda.’’ Sociological Cohen, Cathy J. 1999. The Boundaries of Blackness: Forum 3:167–83. AIDS and the Breakdown of Black Politics. Knapp, Gudrun-Alexi. 2005. ‘‘Race, Class, Gender: Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press. Reclaiming Baggage in Fast Travelling Theories.’’ Collins, Patricia H. 1998. Fighting Words: Black Women European Journal of Women’s Studies 12:249–65. and the Search for Justice. Minneapolis, MN: Korzeniewicz, Roberto P. and Timothy Moran. 2009. University of Minnesota Press. Unveiling Inequality: A World-Historical ———. 2000. Black Feminist Thought: Knowledge, Perspective. New York: Russell Sage. Consciousness, and the Politics of Empowerment. Liepins, Ruth. 2000. ‘‘New Energies for an Old Idea: 2nd ed. New York: Routledge. Reworking Approaches to ‘Community’ in ———. 2006. From Black Power to Hip Hop: Essays on Contemporary Rural Studies.’’ Journal of Rural Racism, Nationalism and Feminism. Philadelphia, Studies 16:23–35. PA: Temple University Press. Lorde, Audre. 1984. Sister Outsider: Essays and ———. 2009. Another Kind of Public Education: Race, Speeches. Freedom, CA: Crossing Press. Schools, the Media, and Democratic Possibilities. Low, Setha. 2003. Behind the Gates: Life, Security, Boston, MA: Beacon Press. and the Pursuit of Happiness in Fortress America. Driskell, Robyn B. and Larry Lyon. 2002. ‘‘Are Virtual New York: Routledge. Communities True Communities? Examining the Naples, Nancy A. 2009. ‘‘Crossing Borders: Community Environments and Elements of Community.’’ City Activism, Globalization, and Social Justice.’’ Social and Community 1:373–90. Problems 56:2–20. Emirbayer, Mustafa. 1997. ‘‘Manifesto for a Relational Obama, Barack. 2009. ‘‘Remarks of President-Elect Sociology.’’ American Journal of Sociology Barack Obama.’’ Martin Luther King Day of 103:281–317. Service Luncheon, January 19, 2009. Retrieved Emirbayer, Mustifa and Chad A. Goldberg. 2005. December 17, 2009 (http://www.mlkday.gov/about/ ‘‘Pragmatism, Bourdieu, and Collective Emotions newsroom/releases_detail.asp?tbl_pr_id=1209). in Contentious Politics.’’ Theory and Society Pardales, Michael J. and Mark Girod. 2006. 34:469–518. ‘‘Community of Inquiry: Its Past and Present Etzioni, Amitai. 1996. ‘‘The Responsive Community: Future.’’ Educational Philosophy and Theory A Communitarian Perspective.’’ American 38:299–309. Sociological Review 61:1–11. Perry, Imani. 2004. Prophets of the Hood: Politics and Foucault, Michel. 1980. Power/Knowledge: Selected Poetics in Hip Hop. Durham, NC: Duke University Interviews and Other Writings, 1972–1977. Edited Press. by C. Gordon. New York: Pantheon. Pieterse, Jan N. 2004. ‘‘Ethnicities and Multicultural- Glenn, Evelyn Nakano. 2002. Unequal Freedom: How isms: Politics of Boundaries.’’ Pp. 27–49 in Race and Gender Shaped American Citizenship Nationalism, Ethnicity and Minority Rights, edited and Labor. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University by S. May, T. Madood, and J. Squires. London, Press. UK: Cambridge University Press. Guinier, Lani and Gerald Torres. 2002. The Miner’s Portes, Alejandro. 1997. ‘‘Immigration Theory for a New Canary: Enlisting Race, Resisting Power, Century: Some Problems and Opportunities.’’ Transforming Democracy. Cambridge, MA: International Migration Review 31:799–825. Harvard University Press. Ramos-Zayas, Ana Y. 2003. National Performances: The Habermas, Ju¨rgen. 1989. The Structural Transformation Politics of Race, Class and Space in Puerto Rican of the Public Sphere. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press. Chicago. Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press. Hernandez, Daisy and Bushra Rehman, eds. 2002. Rouse, Carolyn M. 2004. Engaged Surrender: African Colonize This! Young Women of Color on Today’s American Women and Islam. Berkeley, CA: Feminism. New York: Seal Press. University of California Press. Hilary, George. 1955. ‘‘Definitions of Community: Sampson, Robert, Doug McAdam, Heather MacIndoe, Areas of Agreement.’’ Rural Sociology 20:111–23. and Simon Weffer. 2005. ‘‘Civil Society 30 American Sociological Review 75(1)

Reconsidered: The Durable Nature and Community Warren, Mark R. 2001. Dry Bones Rattling: Community Structure of Collective Civic Action.’’ American Building to Revitalize American Democracy. Journal of Sociology 111:673–714. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press. Santos, Boaventura d. S., Joa˘o A. Nunes, and Maria P. Wellman, Barry. 1979. ‘‘The Community Question: The Meneses. 2007. ‘‘Opening Up the Canon of Intimate Networks of East Yorkers.’’ American Knowledge and Recognition of Difference.’’ Pp. Journal of Sociology 84:1201–1231. xvix–lxii in Another Knowledge Is Possible: Wellman, Barry, Janet Salaff, Dimitrina Dimitrova, Beyond Northern Epistemologies, edited by B. d. Laura Garton, Milena Gulia, and Caroline S. Santos. New York: Verso. Haythornthwaite. 1996. ‘‘Computer Networks As Scott, James C. 1990. Domination and the Arts of Social Networks: Collaborative Work, Telework, Resistance: The Hidden Transcripts. New Haven, and Virtual Community.’’ Annual Review of CT: Yale University Press. Sociology 22:213–38. Shakur, Sanyika. 1993. Monster: The Autobiography of Willie, Charles V., Steven P. Ridini, and David A. an L.A. Gang Member. New York: Atlantic Willard. 2008. Grassroots Social Action: Lessons Monthly Press. in People Power Movements. Lanham, MD: Slevin, Kathleen F. 2005. ‘‘Intergenerational and Rowman & Littlefield Publishers. Community Responsibility: Race Uplift Work in Yuval-Davis, Nira. 1997. Gender and Nation. Thousand the Retirement Activities of Professional African Oaks, CA: Sage. American Women.’’ Journal of Aging Studies 19:309–26. Stoetzler, Marcel and Nira Yuval-Davis. 2002. Patricia Hill Collins is Distinguished University ‘‘Standpoint Theory, Situated Knowledge and Professor of Sociology at the University of Maryland, the Situated Imagination.’’ Feminist Theory 3: College Park. Her books include Black Feminist 315–33. Thought: Knowledge, Consciousness, and the Politics Tilly, Charles. 1998. Durable Inequality. Berkeley, CA: of Empowerment (1990, 2000), winner of ASA’s Jessie University of California Press. Bernard Award and the SSSP’s C. Wright Mills To¨nnies, Ferdinand. 2001. Community and Civil Society. Award; a co-edited anthology, Race, Class, and Edited by J. Harris. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge Gender: An Anthology, 7th ed. (2009); and Black University Press. Sexual Politics: African Americans, Gender, and the Wacxquant, Loic. 2001. ‘‘Deadly Symbiosis: When New Racism (2004), recipient of ASA’s 2007 Ghetto and Prison Meet and Mesh.’’ Punishment Distinguished Publication Award. In 2008 to 2009 she and Society 3:95–134. served as the 100th President of the ASA, the first Walby, Sylvia. 2007. ‘‘Complexity Theory, Systems African American woman to hold this position in the Theory, and Multiple Intersecting Social Inequalities.’’ organization’s 104-year history. Philosophy of the Social Sciences 37:449–70.