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(Re)framing identity claims: E uropean and state institutions as opportunity windows for group reinforcement
Author(s) -
Dembinska Magdalena
Publication year - 2012
Publication title -
nations and nationalism
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.655
H-Index - 44
eISSN - 1469-8129
pISSN - 1354-5078
DOI - 10.1111/j.1469-8129.2011.00540.x
Subject(s) - cognitive reframing , framing (construction) , ethnic group , politics , collective identity , identity (music) , sociology , state (computer science) , political economy , political science , gender studies , law , social psychology , engineering , psychology , aesthetics , computer science , philosophy , structural engineering , algorithm
How do we account for the reinforcement of identity particularisms despite transnational integration? This paper addresses the question by comparing two ethnolinguistic groups, S ilesians and K ashubs in P oland. It is argued that in order to obtain state protection and tools to develop and survive, ethnic entrepreneurs adjust to institutions and discourses. Census politics, state laws' elaboration, transnational institutions represent openings to which groups adjust by reframing identity claims. In doing so, they re‐imagine and reinforce their communities. Following R ogers B rubaker, group‐making is presented as an eventful process where ethnic elites invest identity categories with groupness by taking advantage of opportunity windows at hand. Further, tracing changing political opportunities, strategic adjustments and groups' boomerang effect bid, the paper embeds identity groups within the social movement literature.