Acta Sociologica

The quarantine hotel is one of several political instruments used to control the spread of Covid-19 in diverse countries, from Norway to China. I apply discourse analysis to map the discursive struggle to define the quarantine hotel in Norway. The government and other key political actors channel a biopolitical discourse constituting the quarantine hotel as necessary to protect the Norwegian population from imported contagion. This discourse's meaning is contested by a juridical counter-discourse articulated by lawyers and travellers, which constitutes the quarantine hotel as imprisonment/internment and a breach of rights. Travellers tend to combine this with a biopolitical counter-discourse, dismissing the quarantine hotel's biopolitical properties, strengthening the juridical critique. These discourses are important resources in a transnational, ongoing struggle, where the prize is the legitimacy of the politics of Covid-19, and the very ordering of the post-pandemic world.

The notion that mobility weakens collective norms and increases tolerance has a long pedigree in sociology. In this article, we examine the association of migration with partisan identification as British Unionists or Irish Nationalists in Northern Ireland, a region where the overlap of opposing religious and national identities is reflected in the residential segregation of its population. In representative samples of the population, we find that Irish Nationalist identification among Catholics and British Unionist identification among Protestants was lower among people not born in Northern Ireland and return migrants from beyond the British Isles. Having lived in the Republic was associated with more Nationalist identification among Catholics but less Unionist identification among Protestants and others. Moreover, having lapsed from the family religion is associated with decreased partisan identification. While international migration has in many countries led to increased tensions, conflict and the ascendance of exclusionary national populist movements, our results thus suggest that mobility beyond the British Isles has contributed to less nation–state conflict in Northern Ireland.

Scholars have unpacked the rhetorically nuanced ways political actors alter state narratives in resisting pressure to comply with international norms. But many of these rhetorical strategies apply in other contexts, where there exists sufficient norm ambiguity, too. For example, in response to Turkey's long-standing denialism, many governments have been asked to recognise the Armenian Genocide (or 1915 Genocide of Christians in the Ottoman Empire). But, because there exists no clear international norm about recognising genocides perpetuated by other states, even some of the most unlikely government officials adapt their rhetoric to resist recognition and pursue ulterior foreign policy objectives. Building on Dixon's rhetorical adaptation framework, this article argues that, between 1999 and 2021, Swedish political actors often adapted their rhetoric in ways similar to Turkish officials as a result of the normative ambiguity of states recognising the Armenian Genocide. In explaining why Sweden consistently resisted Genocide recognition efforts, this analysis focuses on its larger foreign policy commitments of spreading democracy in Turkey and managing the Syrian refugee crisis.

This is the first study to use longitudinal population register data to illustrate that marital stability may relate to the adoption of the spouse's language. The paper draws on theories of boundary shifting and boundary crossing to examine two main ancestral groups in Finland, Finnish speakers and Swedish speakers, between whom intermarriage is common. Administrative changes in how the question about language/ethnicity was registered between the censuses of 1975 and 1980 make it possible to distinguish between persons who are concordant or discordant on the main language used and ethnic affiliation. Using data on the entire married population, and adjusting for several individuals and couple characteristics, we estimate the couples’ divorce risk as a function of language convergence with Cox regressions. Discordance in terms of adopting the Finnish language used by the partner is associated with a higher divorce risk, as compared with couples who are exogamous in terms of both language use and ethnic affiliation. Adopting the Swedish language, on the other hand, is associated with a slightly reduced divorce risk. Thus, these data provide some evidence that marital stability may relate to language convergence.

Young adults who are not in education or work are often depicted as deviating from the norm of gainful employment that is still widely shared across the Nordic countries. While it has been argued that young adults feel that they are being blamed for their NEET situation, this article seeks to identify the variety of interpretations they have of their situation and what kind of explanations can be proposed for the differences. Theoretically, perspectives from Axel Honneth's recognition theory are combined with Thomas Scheff's sociological work on shame to discuss the variations in the sentiments of young adults. Based on this framework, the article illuminates how young adults use the shared semantics available within their immediate circles to enable them to feel worthy of recognition despite their depicted deviation from the norm of gainful employment. Additionally, the article contributes to sociological debates on Honneth's recognition theory – especially its ambiguous concept of shared semantics – by making sense of the role of communities and institutions as providers of shared semantics. The findings are based on an abductive analysis of 35 in-depth interviews with young Finnish adults aged 18–29 who have been or are currently outside of education or employment.

Methodological nationalism as a critique of container-based and nation-state-focused theory and empirical research is currently strongly anchored within migration studies, where it was initially developed. While this has led to extensive literature and critical engagement with methodological nationalism, and ways to circumvent the national trap in many (sub-)disciplines, it has not much penetrated theories of social stratification. This conceptual paper will address this gap by discussing the social positioning of high-skilled migrants in contemporary stratified societies. This exemplary discussion will bring together a critical perspective of methodological nationalism on class and milieu theory. It will also confront the critique of methodological nationalism with the question of the origin of social power and dominance, which are the foundation of stratification theories. This article will specifically draw on Pierre Bourdieu's concept of social space and its derivative. Emphasis will also be given to Michael Vester's development of social milieu to highlight blind spots according to the critique of methodological nationalism. This paper shows that these theories have not grasped high-skilled migration thoroughly. It also outlines that migrant theories and their critique of methodological nationalism inadequately address the source of symbolic hierarchy and the formation of social stratification. Thus, both theoretical strands would benefit from a deeper conversation with each other.

While many studies document the ambitious educational choices of immigrants across Europe, researchers have only recently begun to investigate the consequences of these ambitious choices. Our article extends this emerging literature by focusing on immigrants’ success throughout tertiary education in Germany. We argue that after the transition into tertiary education, immigrants lose their advantages over native students regarding higher aspirations while retaining or even increasing their disadvantages regarding academic achievements, which ultimately results in a higher risk of dropping out. Analyses based on data from the German National Educational Panel Study (NEPS) confirm our hypotheses. Net of socioeconomic background and prior academic achievements, immigrants enter tertiary education with similar aspirations as their native peers. At the same time, immigrants, especially those of Turkish origins, have lower grades and competency levels. Furthermore, immigrants continue to receive lower grades during tertiary education and have a considerably higher risk of dropping out. We conclude that immigrants’ high aspirations enable them to enroll in tertiary education at comparably low levels of academic achievement but ultimately increase the risk of academic failure. We discuss possible policy measures to improve the situation of immigrants.