Elizabeth Sowers

Associate Professor, Sociology

Education

Ph.D. Sociology, UC Irvine
M.A. Social Science, UC Irvine
M.Phil Sociology, University of Cambridge, UK
B.A. Global Studies, UC Santa Barbara

Biography

Elizabeth Sowers is an Associate Professor in the Sociology Program at CSU Channel Islands. Elizabeth's research interests are in the areas of work, globalization, and economic sociology, with a specific focus on investigating working conditions within the logistics, or goods movement, industry.

Generous support for Elizabeth's research has been provided by the John Randolph Haynes Foundation and the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation. Recently, Elizabeth published articles and book chapters on critical nodes in capitalist commodity chains, intimacy & economy, globalization & development, global economic networks, and work & neoliberal globalization, as well as a book, Economy and State: A Sociological Perspective (with Nina Bandelj).

Elizabeth teaches a range of courses across the Sociology curriculum, including core classes (Introduction to Sociology, Social Stratification, Capstone) as well as classes in her areas of specialty. Elizabeth is also the Co-Editor-In-Chief of the Sociological Perspectives research journal, the official journal of the Pacific Sociological Association.

Representative Courses Taught

  • SOC 100 Introduction to Sociology
  • SOC 300: Social Stratification
  • SOC 416 Money, Work, and Social Life: The Economy
  • SOC 448 Globalization & Development
  • SOC 499 Capstone

Select Publications

Books:

Articles:

  • Sowers, Elizabeth, Paul S. Ciccantell, and David A. Smith. 2018. “Labor and Social Movements’ Strategic Use of the Global Commodity Chain Structure.” Pp. 19-34 in Choke Points: Logistics Works and Solidarity Movements Disrupting the Global Capitalist Supply Chain, edited by Jake Alimahomed-Wilson & Immanuel Ness. London, UK: Pluto Press. https://www.plutobooks.com/9781786802347/choke-points/
  • Sowers, Elizabeth, Paul S. Ciccantell, and David A. Smith. 2018. “Labor and Social Movements’ Strategic Use of the Global Commodity Chain Structure.” Pp. 19-34 in Choke Points: Logistics Works and Solidarity Movements Disrupting the Global Capitalist Supply Chain, edited by Jake Alimahomed-Wilson & Immanuel Ness. London, UK: Pluto Press. https://www.plutobooks.com/9781786802347/choke-points/
  • Bandelj, Nina and Elizabeth Sowers. Forthcoming, 2016. "Globalization and Development." Pp. 553-76 in Sociology of Development Handbook, edited by Gregory Hooks. Berkeley and Los Angeles, CA: University of California Press. - Link Coming Soon
  • Sowers, Elizabeth, Paul S. Ciccantell, and David A. Smith. 2017. “Are Transport and Raw Materials Nodes in Global Commodity Chains Potential Places for Worker/Movement Organization?” Journal of Labor & Society 20:185-205. https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1111/wusa.12288
  • Sowers, Elizabeth. 2017. “Logistics Labor: Insights from the Sociologies of Globalization, the Economy, and Work.” Sociology Compass 11(3):12459. doi:10.1111/soc4.12459. https://compass.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/soc4.12459
  • Bandelj, Nina and Elizabeth Sowers. 2016. "Globalization and Development." Pp. 553-76 in Sociology of Development Handbook, edited by Gregory Hooks. Berkeley and Los Angeles, CA: University of California Press. https://www.ucpress.edu/book/9780520277786/the-sociology-of-development-handbook
  • Bandelj, Nina, Paul Morgan, and Elizabeth Sowers. 2015. “Hostile Worlds or Connected Lives? Research on the Interplay Between Intimacy and the Economy.” Sociology Compass 9(2): 115-127. http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/soc4.12242/abstract
  • Bandelj, Nina, Kristen Shorette, and Elizabeth Sowers. 2015. “Global Economic Networks.” Emerging Trends in the Social and Behavioral Sciences, edited by Robert Scott and Stephen Kosslyn. Hoboken, NJ: John Wiley & Sons. http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/9781118900772.etrds0148/abstract
  • Elizabeth Sowers, Paul S. Ciccantell, and David A. Smith. 2014. “Comparing Critical Capitalist Commodity Chains in the Early Twenty-first Century: Opportunities for and Constraints on Labor and Political Movements.” Journal of World-Systems Research 20(1): 112-139. http://jwsr.pitt.edu/ojs/index.php/jwsr/article/view/575
  • Bandelj, Nina, Kristen Shorette, and Elizabeth Sowers. 2011. “Work and Neoliberal Globalization: A Polanyian Synthesis.”Sociology Compass 5(9): 807-823.2) http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/j.1751-9020.2011.00408.x/abstract

Keywords

Globalization, Economic Sociology, Work, Labor Movements, Social Inequality, Logistics Industry.

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