While We Were Sleeping: From Dystopia to Global Awakening

2013 ◽  
Vol 12 (1-2) ◽  
pp. 80-97
Author(s):  
Karen Abney-Korn ◽  
Shawn Cassiman ◽  
Dana Fleetham

Abstract Activists and academics have been sounding the alarms for years: climate change, globalization, capitalism, human rights abuses, and more. The alarms appeared to fall upon the deaf ears of the slumbering “multitude.” The Arab Spring, European movements, global and local attacks upon labor, and the Occupy Wall Street movement have awakened us from a slumber reliant upon vacuous media, consumption, alienation and isolationism. In shattering this spell, Occupy Wall Street has called us into the streets in record numbers, opening space for a new opportunity to imagine. Some scholars argue, “. . . we need Marxism to understand the structure of society and anarchism to prefigure or anticipate a new society” (Lynd and Grubacic 2008:xiii). We agree. In this article, we employ a local Occupy case study to briefly discuss 1) the historical contributions to Occupy Wall Street, 2) and to argue that it is precisely the opportunity to imagine, to anticipate, to challenge the “real” that holds the most promise for the development, and future, of the Occupy Wall Street movement.

Author(s):  
Jonas Tallberg ◽  
Karin Bäckstrand ◽  
Jan Aart Scholte

Legitimacy is central for the capacity of global governance institutions to address problems such as climate change, trade protectionism, and human rights abuses. However, despite legitimacy’s importance for global governance, its workings remain poorly understood. That is the core concern of this volume, which engages with the overarching question: whether, why, how, and with what consequences global governance institutions gain, sustain, and lose legitimacy. This introductory chapter explains the rationale of the book, introduces its conceptual framework, reviews existing literature, and presents the key themes of the volume. It emphasizes in particular the volume’s sociological approach to legitimacy in global governance, its comparative scope, and its comprehensive treatment of the topic. Moreover, a specific effort is made to explain how each chapter moves beyond existing research in exploring the book’s three themes: (1) sources of legitimacy, (2) processes of legitimation and delegitimation, and (3) consequences of legitimacy.


2018 ◽  
pp. 64-78
Author(s):  
Stephanie Vie ◽  
Daniel Carter ◽  
Jessica Meyr

By examining three major digital activist events—the Arab Spring, the indignados movement, and Occupy Wall Street—the authors illustrate that digital activism motivates and facilitates real offline behaviors beyond slacktivism by reviewing successful strategies and outcomes that were part of each movement. Moreover, in examining the issue of slacktivism, the authors demonstrate that slacktivism is not always digital, and that the power of weak ties has demonstrable effects in protester behavior and coordination. Finally, the rhetorical situations and exigencies of these major digital activist events are examined; this is an area ripe for more direct analysis and commentary. Understanding the rhetorical situations and exigencies involved in successful digital activist events allows researchers and practitioners a better understanding of integrated approaches to public involvement using social media.


Author(s):  
Paul Havemann

This chapter examines issues surrounding the human rights of Indigenous peoples. The conceptual framework for this chapter is informed by three broad, interrelated, and interdependent types of human rights: the right to existence, the right to self-determination, and individual human rights. After describing who Indigenous peoples are according to international law, the chapter considers the centuries of ambivalence about the recognition of Indigenous peoples. It then discusses the United Nations's establishment of a regime for Indigenous group rights and presents a case study of the impact of climate change on Indigenous peoples. It concludes with a reflection on the possibility of accommodating Indigenous peoples' self-determination with state sovereignty.


2018 ◽  
Vol 44 (4) ◽  
pp. 478-490 ◽  
Author(s):  
Lisa Anderson

Although they produced vastly more turmoil, the uprisings in the Arab world shared many characteristics with other early 21st-century popular protests on both the left and the right, from Spain’s Indignados and Occupy Wall Street to the anti-elite votes for Brexit and Trump. The conviction that political elites and the states they rule, which were once responsible for welfare and development, now ignore and demean the interests and concerns of ordinary citizens takes many forms, but is virtually universal. The Arab world was only one site of this discontent, but the story of the Arab Spring insurrections provides a cautionary illustration of the perils in abdication of political authority and accountability and provokes questions about how we understand historical moments when passions outstrip interests.


Author(s):  
Susan Waltz

Chapter 3, by Susan Waltz, addresses several of these challenges as well as other themes in a distinct way, drawing upon experiences before and after the Arab Spring from several countries in the region including Egypt, Morocco, and Tunisia. She first draws attention to the apparent gaps between a set of universal human rights standards enshrined in international treaties, the practice of transitional justice with its focus on gross human rights abuses, and the expectations which have been raised of transitional justice, including of addressing questions of economic injustice. She then interrogates different facets of the problem of “impact” of transitional justice.


2020 ◽  
Vol 8 (1) ◽  
pp. 456-463
Author(s):  
Dakheelallah Alharbi ◽  
Zarina Othman ◽  
Sity Daud

Purpose: The purpose of the study is to give an analysis of the humanitarian situation and the case of human rights in Syria after the events of the Arab spring. Methodology: This is analytical-descriptive research that has been done through literature review, content analysis, and documentary and case study research. Result: our results suggest that the Syrian government made false concessions designed to end the revolts. The occurrence led to the formation of a rebel group, the Free Syrian Army whose main objective was to oust the authoritarian regime and stop the killing of civilians. This marked the beginning of the blatant violation of human rights as well as the civil war in Syria. The government not only ignited but also took the war to its own people killing, injuring and imprisoning thousands of people. Worse still, thousands of women and young girls still suffer sexual violence during the nightly raids conducted frequently on either opposing camps. Following the massive violations of human rights, almost all economic sectors of Syria have met rock-bottom. Applications: This research can be used for policymakers and the international community to take a further step to aid the Syrian civilians. Novelty/Originality: In our research, we try to target a very much debated topic in the Middle East. Although several articles written about the humanitarian and human rights situation in Syria studies on human rights after the Arab spring is still lacking.


2014 ◽  
Vol 8 (2) ◽  
pp. 165-179
Author(s):  
Keith Mann

Largely due to its conservative profile at the time, the U.S. labour movement was largely absent from modern social movement literature as it developed in response to the new social movements of the 1960s and 1970s. Recent labour mobilizations such as the Wisconsin uprising and the Chicago Teachers’ strike have been part of the current international cycle of protest that includes the Arab Spring, the antiausterity movements in Greece and Spain, and Occupy Wall Street. These struggles suggest that a new labour movement is emerging that shares many common features with new social movements. This article offers a general analysis of these and other contemporary labour struggles in light of contemporary modern social movement literature. It also critically reviews assumptions about the labour movement of the 1960s and 1970s and reexamines several social movement concepts.


Author(s):  
Stephanie Vie ◽  
Daniel Carter ◽  
Jessica Meyr

By examining three major digital activist events—the Arab Spring, the indignados movement, and Occupy Wall Street—the authors illustrate that digital activism motivates and facilitates real offline behaviors beyond slacktivism by reviewing successful strategies and outcomes that were part of each movement. Moreover, in examining the issue of slacktivism, the authors demonstrate that slacktivism is not always digital, and that the power of weak ties has demonstrable effects in protester behavior and coordination. Finally, the rhetorical situations and exigencies of these major digital activist events are examined; this is an area ripe for more direct analysis and commentary. Understanding the rhetorical situations and exigencies involved in successful digital activist events allows researchers and practitioners a better understanding of integrated approaches to public involvement using social media.


2015 ◽  
pp. 1743-1759
Author(s):  
Adam Gismondi

The Occupy Wall Street (OWS) movement, when viewed within proper historical context, can be considered part of an American tradition of higher education activism. The movement's pioneering use of social media, which was in part inspired by activists within the Arab Spring, allowed OWS to organize and disseminate information with efficiency. Social media also helped to build the connections that were made between OWS activists and those within higher education, while subsequently providing documentation of these same connections in online forums. This chapter's analysis of OWS tactics provides evidence that social media will be integral to the organization and promotion of future activist movements within higher education and beyond.


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