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We use social network analysis to test the hypothesis that group ideology affects information exchange among environmental groups. The analysis is based on interviews with leaders of 136 environmental groups in Alabama. This paper adds to the literature on resource mobilization among social movement organizations by exploring information exchange among a wide range of environmental groups across an entire state, and by incorporating ideology into our analysis. A typology of environmental groups was developed based on willingness to engage or not engage in political and legal activism to pursue their goals. We found a level of information exchange between activist groups twice that among all other groups. We also found that differing ideological profiles did not limit the flow of information between groups, taken as a whole. We conclude that the relatively high level of connectivity is attributable in part to the presence of paid staff among several key activist groups, making these groups important resources for technical and non-technical support for all groups across the state. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Analysis of social interactions has recently become an important area of economic research, and the focus of researchers in this area has increasingly shifted toward dynamic models. In one recent contribution, Brueckner and Smirnov (2007) analyze the evolution of population attributes in an exceedingly simple model, where an agent's attributes at time t are equal to the average attribute value among his acquaintances. The pattern of acquaintances in the population is determined by the social network, and Brueckner and Smirnov (BS) explore the effect of network characteristics on the convergence of population attributes over time. They show that some simple sufficient conditions on the network structure ensure convergence to a “melting-pot” equilibrium where attributes are uniform across agents. The present paper provides a generalization of BS's analysis, allowing for a more general form of the rule governing the evolution of population attributes. The analysis shows that BS's previous conclusions continue to hold under this generalization, while also providing a result that can be applied more generally to other models. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper examines the relative impact of two sources of sociocultural influence on racial identification. Using interviews with 225 African-American adults (Thompson Sanders, 1994), the relative influence of within-group vs. intergroup interaction variables was assessed. The data were collected using a structured interview protocol and a 30-item racial identification questionnaire. Information on the level and quality of intragroup interaction, experiences with race relations, political activism, age, gender, income, education, and orientation on four parameters of racial identification--psychological, physical, cultural, and sociopolitical--was collected. The results suggest that within-group contact variables have a strong association with the psychological and physical parameters of racial identification. The extent and quality of intergroup interaction with non-African Americans were associated with the sociopolitical parameter. Cultural racial identification was largely determined by demographic variables. These data suggest a model of racial identification based on a complex set of within-group, intergroup, and demographic variables. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]