Abstract

Now more than ever, “recognition” represents a critical concept for social movements, both as a strategic tool and an important policy aim. While the subject’s theoretical and empirical dimensions have usually been studied separately, this interdisciplinary collection focuses on both  to examine the pursuit of recognition against a transnational backdrop. With a special  emphasis on the efforts of women’s and Jewish organizations in 20th-century Europe, the studies collected here show how recognition can be meaningfully understood in historical-analytical terms, while demonstrating the extent to which transnationalization determines a movement’s reach and effectiveness.

“The collaboration between scholars from social science and history here has produced the most comprehensive book available on the topic. With its diverse conceptual and methodological approaches, it offers brilliant insights into theories as well as specific case studies.” · Brigitte Geissel, Goethe University Frankfurt

Dieter Gosewinkel is a professor of history at the Freie Universität Berlin and co-director of the Center for Global Constitutionalism at the WZB Berlin Social Science Center. He has published widely in the field of modern history, legal history, and history of civil society and citizenship, including Zivilgesellschaft – national und transnational with Dieter Rucht, Wolfgang van den Daele and Jürgen Kocka (Edition Sigma, 2004).

Dieter Rucht is a professor of sociology at the Freie Universität Berlin. Before his retirement he was co-director of a research group on civil society and political mobilization at the WZB Berlin Social Science Center. Among his best-known works on the sociology of the public sphere and social movements is Modernisierung und neue soziale Bewegungen. Deutschland, Frankreich und USA im Vergleich (Campus 1994).