CCJ Journal Introduction Cosmopolitan Civil Societies Journal, Vol.1, No.1, 2009 i Editorial Welcome Cosmopolitan Civil Societies : an Interdisciplinary Journal We are pleased to publish the first issue of our new e-journal, Cosmopolitan Civil Societies: an Interdisciplinary Journal. This new journal initiative comes out of the establishment of the UTS Cosmopolitan Civil Societies Research Centre (CCS) in late 2007. CCS has an inter-disciplinary research focus, for we argue that the traditional disciplinary boundaries constrain, rather than enable, innovative approaches to the study of contemporary societies. Members of CCS come from the Faculties of Business, Arts and Social Sciences and Law. CCS is interested to develop and pursue interdisciplinary research opportunities related to cosmopolitanism and civil societies under four themes: migration and ethnic diversity; civil societies; learning and activism, and human rights. The plural of Societies is intentional: we are interested in comparative studies of issues related to the four research themes in western and non- western societies today. Cosmopolitan Civil Societies: an Interdisciplinary Journal will be published at least twice annually. All articles submitted to the journal will be double-blind reviewed. Some issues of the journal will be linked to a specific theme, with guest editors and a call for papers. Other issues will be comprised of a broader range of submitted articles. We invite submissions to this journal (URL http://epress.lib.uts.edu.au/journals/ index.php/mcs). In this first issue we present a range of articles that indicate the breadth of our inter- disciplinary research interests and the diversity of quantitative and qualitative research methodologies that are employed. The articles span continents and oceans, looking at the UK, New Zealand, Australia and the Coral Sea Islands. They also explore a range of themes from racism to ethnic precincts to civil societies to communities and identities. The first articles explore contemporary spatial dimensions of racism in Australia (Dunn et al) and the UK (McEvoy). Kevin Dunn and his colleagues present the results of the latest stage of their long-running project to map Australian racism. Utilising telephone survey data collected in 2006 from informants in Sydney, Perth and Melbourne, the authors explore dimensions of ‘everyday racism’. They demonstrate that between 10 per cent to one third of respondents experiences some form of everyday racism. The authors also explore anti-racism responses that take into account local differences. Using more quantitative methodologies, David McEvoy looks at Bradford (UK) the site of riots in the summer of 2001 with an eye on the explanatory power of the spatial patterns of settlement of the different ethnic/racial groups in understanding the dynamics of the riots. Analysing 2001 census data, collected at ward level, the main contribution of the paper is a quantitative analyses of ii Cosmopolitan Civil Societies Journal, Vol.1, No.1, 2009 the exposure index to explore the ethnic mix at a neighbourhood level in Bradford and how that changes with age. Collins and Kunz also investigate spatial aspects of immigrant settlement through their study of ethnic precincts in the Australia context. Drawing on fieldwork conducted in Sydney’s Chinatown, Little Italy, Cabramatta and Auburn with immigrant entrepreneurs, customers and local government and ethnic community informants, they explore aspects of the authenticity of the ‘ethnic experience’ of customers (tourists, locals). One innovative aspect of this paper is the different subjective takes on authenticity by the three groups of customers in the ethnic precinct: co-ethnic, co-cultural and others. These articles are followed by explorations of community and civil society in Australia. Mark Lyons explores the meaning of the concept civil society before arguing that if it is to be of any use analytically civil society needs to be able to be measured in ways that will permit cross national comparisons. This article is part of an important dialogue and debate about operationalising the concept of civil society with quantitative as well as qualitative methodologies. The article by Hilary Yerbury presents the findings of an ethnographic study of members of Generations X and Y. Analysing the comments and stories of informants from Generations X and Y, Yerbury is interested to explore their perceptions and experiences as part of On-line communities while, at the same time, both reinforcing and shifting definitions and understandings of what it means to be part of a community. The article by Maydell and Wilson explores issues of identity construction among Russian-speaking immigrants in New Zealand. Drawing on 23 in-depth interviews they find evidence of identity loss among these Russian-speaking immigrant informants, partly because of the lack of familiar cultural resources available to them in New Zealand. Some responded by attempting to reconstruct their old identities in the New Zealand context, while others shifted to embracing a cosmopolitan identity that was not limited to a particular culture or geographical space. Finally, the article by Judy Lattas takes a cultural studies approach to an investigation about the relationship between gay nationalism and cosmopolitanism in the Gay and Lesbian Kingdom of the Coral Sea. Drawing on qualitative interview correspondence and other ethnographic material, Lattas explores the relationship between secession, micronationalist queering and the development of a new cosmopolitics. Jock Collins Editor