Barbara Hicks

Barbara Hicks is an American political scientist with a focus on comparative politics. Her current research deals with contemporary politics in Russia, Central and Eastern Europe, and the European Union, as well as the transition from Communist rule in Eastern Europe. Hicks is currently a Professor of Political Science at New College of Florida.

Hicks has focused on transnational influences that affect the role of social movements as channels of citizen participation in the post-Communist regimes of Eastern Europe. The author of "Environmental Politics in Poland: A Social Movement Between Regime and Opposition" (1996), the first book to analyze the development of an environmental movement in Eastern Europe in both the final years of Communist rule and the contemporary post-Communist era, Hicks is one of the world's leading experts on Eastern European environmental movements. "Environmental Politics in Poland" related in rigorous empirical detail the history of the Polish environmental movement to recent theoretical debates in comparative politics on the interaction of social movements, democratization, and civil society. Hicks' book concluded that the Polish regime's failure to control social activism, such as activism by the environmental movement, ultimately led to the downfall of Polish Communism.

Publications

*Beckmann, A., Hicks, B., & Carmin, J. (2002). Catalysts for sustainability: NGOs and sustainable development initiatives in the Czech Republic. In W. L. Filho (Ed.), International experiences in sustainability (pp. 159-177). Bern: Peter Lang Scientific Publishing.

*Carmin, J., Hicks, B., & Beckmann, A. (2003). Leveraging local action: Grassroots initiatives and transboundary collaboration in the formation of the White Carpathian Euroregion. International Sociology, 18(4), 703-725.

*Hicks, B. (2004). Setting agendas and shaping activism: EU influence on Central and Eastern European environmental movements. Environmental Politics, 13(1), 216-233.

*Hicks, B. (2005). Setting agendas and shaping activism: EU influence on Central and Eastern European environmental movements. In J. Carmin, & S. D. VanDeveer (Eds.), EU Enlargement and the Environment: Institutional Change and Environmental Policy in Central and Eastern Europe. New York: Routledge.

*Hicks, B., & Carmin, J. (2002). International triggering events, transnational networks, and the development of the Czech and Polish environmental movements. Mobilization, 7(2), 304-324.

References