GLOBAL DIVISION
The Global Division of the Society for the Study of Social Problems seeks to promote interdisciplinary empirical and theoretical understandings of the ways in which global and transnational processes both intensify and mitigate existing social problems, as well as contribute to the generation and prevention of new ones. We include a strong emphasis on globalization, by which we mean more than simply the institutional expansion of markets around the world, past and present, but also include a focus on social, cultural, legal, political, environmental, and moral aspects of an increasingly interconnected shared planet.
A central aim of the Global Division is to promote scholarship on globalization that squarely situates analyses of social problems within a broader global or transnational context of understanding. We strive to make the Global Division a vibrant resource for scholars and activists seeking to identify visions and practices that are successfully shaping “alternative”, social justice oriented, globalizations.
Reflecting the broader ideals of the Society for the Study of Social Problems, members of the Global Division should be committed to producing scholarship, educational materials, and other forms of knowledge and activist resources that promote principles of equity, social justice, sustainability, and cultural recognition that foster human agency. Many of us also devote ourselves to the practical challenges of “public scholarship” -- that is, producing and presenting research that deliberately engages audiences beyond the boundaries of our respective disciplines and aims to reach a wider public. We believe that knowledge should be a shared resource.
Toward these ends, our Division is engaged in six broad areas of activity within the Society for the Study of Social Problems:
(1) We organize thematic sessions and co-sponsor annual conference sessions within our professional association that promote global and transnational perspectives and inquiry and encourage scholars to transcend methodological nationalism across the various divisions of the Society for the Study of Social Problems.
(2) We provide an ongoing institutional forum and professional network of exchange among scholars and activists who are working to understand globalization and create identities, relationships, practices, and institutional mechanisms that are contributing to currents of global development that are democratic, just, secure, and sustainable.
(3) We work to further the global impact of the SSSP by deliberately recruiting new members who live, work, and research social problems in different parts of the globe with the particular intent to help democratize the production of activist-scholarship within transnational networks of research on social problems.
(4) Since 2006, we have sponsored the Graduate Student Paper Award to help support and uplift the critical work of our emerging scholars.
(5) Since 2026, we have sponsored the Global Division Outstanding Scholarship Award to help recognize the outstanding contributions to scholarship of global concern made by our Division members.
(6) Since 2026, we have sponsored the Outstanding Non-English Language Scholarship Award to help recognize the outstanding contributions to scholarship of global concern made by our Division members who publish in a language other than English.
Division mission statement edited in November 2026 by J. Michael Ryan, Pontificia Universidad Católica del Perú, Global Division Chair, 2026-2028. Division mission statement edited in November 2025 by Beatriz Padilla, University of South Florida, Global Division Chair, 2025-2026.