Author Archives: David S. Meyer

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About David S. Meyer

Author and professor of Sociology and Political Science at the University of California, Irvine

Don’t stop with the flag. #blackvotesmatter

Politicians in the South, mostly Republicans (because it’s mostly Republicans in power in the South), have been rallying around the removal of the Confederate flag from government display.  South Carolina Governor Nikki Haley called her state legislature into a special … Continue reading

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Start with the flag

The tragic racist killing of nine people at Charleston’s African Methodist Episcopal Church, following a year of activism around #blacklivesmatter, drew unusual attention to a range of issues around political and economic inequality.  Striking the battle flag of the Army … Continue reading

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Climate activists: Habemus papem

Pope Francis’s encyclical on the moral necessity of protecting the earth is out.  You can read “On Care for Our Common Home” here (in English; translations in many other languages are readily available–but I couldn’t find the Latin version).  The … Continue reading

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Froze and reversed the arms race? Claiming credit on an anniversary.

Thirty(three) years ago today, one million people marched in the streets of New York City to protest the nuclear arms race in general and the policies of Ronald Reagan in particular.  Organized around a “nuclear freeze” proposal, the demonstration was … Continue reading

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Organizing (debt) forgiveness; Occupy continues

Occupy’s campaign against economic and political inequality continues, although you have to look a little bit below the headlines to see its efforts and influence. Secretary of Education Arne Duncan just announced that the Federal government would forgive student loans … Continue reading

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Activist social science

Like way too many social scientists, I’ve been overly obsessed with the LaCour/Green retraction. Partly, it’s the perverse attraction of watching the slow-motion crash of a career, but more substantially, it’s a chance to reflect on how social science is … Continue reading

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How do people change their minds? Others?

More from Columbia University: Donald Green, a professor of political science, has asked Science to retract an article he and a UCLA graduate student, Michael LaCour, published last year.  The paper demonstrated that an extended and open-ended conversation with a … Continue reading

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Take the degree, leave the mattress.

Emma Sulkowicz dragged her mattress across the Columbia University campus for the last time this week, when she participated in a Class Day graduation ceremony.  This day, several friends helped Sulkowicz carry the mattress across the stages, but mostly she’s … Continue reading

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Will the revolution be tweeted?

More than forty years ago, the talented and tragic poet/musician/activist Gil Scott-Heron rapped–before there was rap–that the Revolution would not be televised.  Television was controlled by big corporations and commercial interests, and social change would come from the streets.  But … Continue reading

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Justice, peace, and indictments in Baltimore #Ferguson

When Maryland State’s attorney Marilyn Mosby decided to indict six police officers for the death of Freddie Gray, she may have been responding only to the evidence of criminal conduct by law enforcement. Her office found that police lacked probable … Continue reading

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