The Successes of Political Consumerism as a Social Movement

2018 ◽  
pp. 772-792
Author(s):  
Lara Monticelli ◽  
Donatella della Porta
Keyword(s):  
Social Movements ◽  
Collective Action ◽  
Social Movement ◽  
Ecological Communities ◽  
Political Consumerism ◽  
Cultural Contexts ◽  
Consumer Activism ◽  
Individual Citizen ◽  
The Individual ◽  
Interpretive Frameworks

The chapter aims at providing a set of interpretive tools to analyze the outcomes of consumer activism when performed through collective action. In the last years, there has been a shift from political consumerism understood as a practice of the individual citizen-consumer to political consumerism performed by a growing number of organized collectives like solidarity purchasing groups, consumer-producer cooperatives, ecological communities, etc. This implies that a reconceptualization of political consumerism should be accompanied by renewed interpretive frameworks and methodologies. Drawing from the literature on social movements and their outcomes, the chapter proposes an interpretive compass composed of six main features (type, domain, nature, target, timing, duration) that help in understanding the effectiveness of consumer activism. The authors then underline the importance of taking into account factors like resources, media outreach, and alliances as well as political, socioeconomic, and cultural contexts.

Modes of Coordination in Political Consumerism

2018 ◽  
pp. 88-110
Author(s):  
Mario Diani
Keyword(s):  
Social Movements ◽  
Social Movement ◽  
Purchasing Decisions ◽  
Political Consumerism ◽  
Consumer Activism ◽  
Multiple Networks ◽  
Multiple Groups ◽  
Consumer Movements ◽  
Mode Of Coordination

This chapter uses the concept of modes of coordination to differentiate between various forms of political consumerism, often generically treated as consumer movements. When consumer activism consists primarily of individual purchasing decisions, it is difficult to speak of social movements, although consumption takes place in the context of retail/production organizations embedded in a specific consumerist subculture and not purely oriented to the market. In other cases, organizations creating opportunities for critical consumers may develop cooperative ties and engage in substantial and formal collaboration with other similar organizations; individual members may act primarily as individual consumers. In other instances, individuals may be involved in multiple interpersonal connections as members of multiple groups while organizations may not collaborate with each other in significant ways. Finally, both conditions may occur simultaneously, with multiple networks linking individual consumers and service-providing organizations. Such cases are close to a social movement mode of coordination.

We are “the Resistance”: Predictors and consequences of self-categorization into the emerging movement to oppose Trump

2020 ◽  
pp. 136843022097475
Author(s):  
Samuel Hansen Freel ◽  
Rezarta Bilali ◽  
Erin Brooke Godfrey
Keyword(s):  
Social Media ◽  
Social Movements ◽  
Longitudinal Study ◽  
Collective Action ◽  
Social Movement ◽  
Efficacy Beliefs ◽  
Future Research ◽  
Identity Consolidation

In a three-wave longitudinal study conducted in the first 100 days of Trump’s presidency, this paper examines how people come to self-categorize into the emerging social movement “the Resistance,” and how self-categorization into this movement influences future participation in collective action and perceptions of the movement’s efficacy. Conventional collective action (e.g., protest, lobby legislators)—but not persuasive collective action (e.g., posting on social media)—and perceived identity consolidation efficacy of the movement at Wave 1 predicted a higher likelihood of self-categorization into the movement 1 month later (Wave 2) and 2 months later (Wave 3). Self-categorization into the Resistance predicted two types of higher subsequent movement efficacy perceptions, and helped sustain the effects of conventional collective action and movement efficacy beliefs at Wave 1 on efficacy beliefs at Wave 3. Implications for theory and future research on emerging social movements are discussed.

Reinventing the Concept of Civic Culture

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Paul Lichterman
Keyword(s):  
Social Movements ◽  
Collective Action ◽  
Social Movement ◽  
Voluntary Associations ◽  
Civic Culture ◽  
Social Movement Organizations ◽  
Alternative Approach ◽  
Religious Associations ◽  
Movement Organizations

This article proposes a new and better concept of civic culture and shows how it can benefit sociology. It argues that a better concept of civic culture gives us a stronger, comparative, and contextual perspective on voluntary associations—the conventional American empirical referent for “civic”—while also improving our sociologies of religion and social movements. The article first considers the classic perspective on civic culture and its current incarnations in order to show why we need better conceptual groundwork than they have offered. It then introduces the alternative approach, which is rooted in a pragmatist understanding of collective action and both builds on and departs in some ways from newly prominent understandings of culture in sociology. This approach’s virtues are illustrated with ethnographic examples from a variety of volunteer groups, social movement organizations, and religious associations.

Social Conflict in Argentina (1989–2017): Democracy in Dispute

2020 ◽  
Vol 47 (4) ◽  
pp. 96-111
Author(s):  
Leandro Gamallo
Keyword(s):  
Social Movements ◽  
Collective Action ◽  
Social Movement ◽  
Social Conflict ◽  
The State ◽  
Right Wing ◽  
Social Conflicts ◽  
The Right ◽  
Movement Participation ◽  
Multiple Actors

An analysis of the evolution of social conflicts in Argentina between 1989 and 2017 in terms of three aspects of collective action—the actors in contention, their main demands, and their chosen forms of struggle—reveals important changes since the country’s return to democracy. Collective action has extended to multiple actors, channeled weightier demands, and expanded its forms. With the emergence of progovernment and conservative social movements, it has become apparent that not all movement participation in the state implies weakness, subordination, or co-optation and that social movement action does not necessarily mean democratization or expansion of rights. The right-wing government of 2015 opened up a new field of confrontation in which old divisions and alliances are being reconfigured. Un análisis de la evolución de los conflictos sociales en Argentina entre 1989 y 2017 realizado a partir de tres grandes dimensiones de la acción colectiva (los actores contenciosos, las demandas principales que enuncian y las formas de lucha que emplean) revela cambios importantes. La acción colectiva se ha extendido a más actores, ha canalizado demandas más amplias y se ha expresado de maneras más heterogéneas. Con el surgimiento de movimientos sociales oficialistas y opositores de índole conservador, se ha hecho evidente que la participación de las organizaciones sociales en el estado no siempre significa debilidad, subordinación o cooptación por parte del estado y que la movilización social no necesariamente implica procesos de democratización o expansión de derechos. La llegada de una alianza de derecha en 2015 abrió un nuevo campo de confrontaciones que redefinió antiguas alianzas y divisiones.

Exploring the Crisis of the Reform Movement in Iran (1997–2005)

2016 ◽  
Vol 17 (3) ◽  
pp. 386-409
Author(s):  
SEYED AMIR NIAKOOEE
Keyword(s):  
Social Movements ◽  
Collective Action ◽  
Social Movement ◽  
Process Model ◽  
Political Process ◽  
Reform Movement ◽  
The Political ◽  
Political Opportunity ◽  
Framing Processes ◽  
Comprehensive Framework

AbstractThe Second Khordad Movement was a democratic social movement in contemporary Iran. Investigation of this movement revealed two images, of flourish and of decline, as the movement was first generally successful until early 2000 and thereafter began to regress from the spring of that year onwards. The purpose of this article is to provide a comprehensive framework in which to examine the reasons behind the movement's failure and regression. To this end, the study utilizes the literature on social movements, especially the political process model, and attempts to explain the initial success and subsequent decline of the movement based on elements such as political opportunity, framing processes, mobilizing structures, and the repertoire of collective action.

Sustainable community movement organisations

2014 ◽  
Vol 14 (2) ◽  
pp. 139-157 ◽  
Author(s):  
Francesca Forno ◽  
Paolo R Graziano
Keyword(s):  
Social Movements ◽  
Collective Action ◽  
Social Relations ◽  
Local Level ◽  
Analytical Framework ◽  
Political Consumerism ◽  
The Past ◽  
Sustainable Community ◽  
Current Economic Crisis ◽  
Community Movement

In the current economic crisis, social movements are simultaneously facing two types of challenges: first, they are confronting institutions which are less able (or willing) to mediate new demands for social justice and equity emerging from various sectors of society, and second, given the highly individualised structure of contemporary society, they are also experiencing difficulties in building bonds of solidarity and cooperation among people, bonds which are a fundamental resource for collective action. It is in this context that protests waves, which may be very relevant, are in fact often short-lived, and it is in this context that we detect the rise and consolidation of new mutualistic and cooperative experiences within which (similarly to the past) new ties and frames for collective action are created. This article discusses and analyses social movement organisations which focus on both the intensification of economic problems and the difficulties of rebuilding social bonds and solidarity within society, emphasising solidarity and the use of ‘alternative’ forms of consumption as means to re-embed the economic system within social relations, starting from the local level. While discussing what is new and/or what has been renewed in new Sustainable Community Movement Organisations, the article will develop an analytical framework which will combine social movements and political consumerism theories by focusing on two basic dimensions: consumer culture and identity and organisational resources and repertoire of action.

scholarly journals Genocide as Contentious Politics

2016 ◽  
Author(s):  
Aliza Luft
Keyword(s):  
Social Movements ◽  
Collective Action ◽  
Social Movement ◽  
Political Violence ◽  
Contentious Politics ◽  
Social Movement Theory ◽  
Final Version ◽  
Movement Theory ◽  
History Of ◽  
Convergence And Divergence

Preprint, final version in Sociology Compass available at: http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/soc4.12304/fullDespite a recent turn towards the study of political violence within the field of contentious politics, scholars have yet to focus their lens on genocide. This is puzzling, as the field of collective action and social movements was originally developed in reaction to fascism (Nazism in particular), while research on collective action and research on genocide has long shown parallel findings and shared insights. This paper reviews the history of this scholarly convergence and divergence, and suggests that recent findings of research on genocide can be improved by the consideration of concepts from social movements and collective action. It then details three theories of the micro-mechanisms that mobilize individuals for contention – framing, diffusion, and networks – and specifies how they refine existing explanations of civilian participation in genocide. In the conclusion, I suggest that a contentious politics approach to genocide would consider it one form of collective action among others, analyzable within the existing framework of collective action and social movement theory.

Lifestyle Movements as Social Networks: The Connections between Everyday Politics and Larger Collective Action in an Indian Feminist Movement

2018 ◽  
Vol 61 (6) ◽  
pp. 894-910 ◽  
Author(s):  
Todd Nicholas Fuist ◽  
Elizabeth Mogford ◽  
Abhijit Das
Keyword(s):  
Social Networks ◽  
Social Movements ◽  
Qualitative Study ◽  
Collective Action ◽  
Social Movement ◽  
Violence Against Women ◽  
Local Knowledge ◽  
Cognitive Maps ◽  
Feminist Movement ◽  
Fine Line

The sociology of social movements has often drawn a fine line between individualistic “lifestyle movements” and more politically oriented collective action. Yet, this distinction belies the fact that seemingly individualistic movements can generate cognitive maps and associational ties necessary for wider mobilization. Drawing on a qualitative study of the Indian men’s feminist movement Men’s Action to Stop Violence against Women (MASVAW), we examine how an ostensibly individualistically oriented lifestyle movement can create the potential for collective action through forging social networks of like-minded individuals who can draw on local knowledge of specific situations to quickly mobilize their peers. Through this, we contribute to the literature on social movement networks by synthesizing theorizing on lifestyle movements with theorizing on activist social networks, demonstrating how networks can shift movements between different modes of coordination, from individualistic and everyday to collective and activist.

Social Movements

2020 ◽  
pp. 464-478
Author(s):  
Eduardo Romanos
Keyword(s):  
Social Movements ◽  
Collective Action ◽  
Social Movement ◽  
Great Recession ◽  
Model Building ◽  
Long Term Effects ◽  
National Surveys ◽  
The Great Recession ◽  
Cross National

According to cross-national surveys, Spaniards are among the Europeans who participate the most in street protests. At the same time, Spanish social movements have been generally understood as deploying a less radical protest repertoire and a relatively weak organizational model. Building upon central concepts in social movement studies, this chapter analyses these and other features of the Spanish activist tradition as compared to other Western countries. An especial attention is paid to the strongest protest cycles in Spanish recent history: the years of the democratic transition and the Great Recession. In doing so, this chapter aims to address the long-term effects of regime transition on domestic collective action and organized protest.

When a Social Movement Quarantines: The Power of Urban Memory in the 2019 Chilean Anti-neoliberal Uprising

2020 ◽  
Vol 23 (3) ◽  
pp. 286-292
Author(s):  
Manuela Badilla Rajevic
Keyword(s):  
Social Movements ◽  
Collective Action ◽  
Social Movement ◽  
Social Interactions ◽  
Spatial Dimension ◽  
Hygienic Measures ◽  
Alternative Spaces ◽  
The City

This article reflects on the connections between space, social movements, and urban memory by analyzing the effects of quarantine on the massive Chilean anti-neoliberal movement. It explores two aspects of the quarantine that have unsettled and challenged the spatial dimension of collective action: restrictions on transit through the city and the imposition of hygienic measures on infrastructure and social interactions. The article suggests that these aspects represent a concrete threat to social movements, while at the same time push to strengthen alternative spaces and repertoires of action. It concludes by illustrating the role of urban memories on the potential continuity of the mobilizations and their demands.

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