Democratisation and the Decline of Social Movements: The Effects of Regime Change on Collective Action in Eastern Europe, Southern Europe and Latin America

Sociology ◽  
1999 ◽  
Vol 33 (2) ◽  
pp. 353-372 ◽  
Author(s):  
Christopher G. Pickvance
2021 ◽  
Vol 26 (3) ◽  
pp. 359-379
Author(s):  
Konstantinos Roussos ◽  
Haris Malamidis

Both social movement research and the literature on the commons provide rich accounts of the anti-austerity mobilizations and uprisings in southern Europe. Movement studies offer important insights regarding the context of mobilization and collective claim making. The commons literature emphasizes bottom-up practices of shared ownership, self-management, and social co-production that move beyond institutional solutions. Although both literatures highlight similar phenomena, they remain relatively unconnected. Their distance precludes a full grasp of the implications regarding the dynamic and abundant to-and-fro movement between protest-based politics and everyday forms of collective action in this region, which is heavily affected by the crisis’ austerity management. Drawing on the South European context, this article rethinks key concepts addressed in both literatures (social movements-commons, activists-commoners, mobilization-commoning) and highlights how a conceptual synthesis can sharpen and (re)politicize the theorization of contemporary collective action in the everyday.


1991 ◽  
Vol 85 (4) ◽  
pp. 1283-1302 ◽  
Author(s):  
Josep M. Colomer

Several nonrevolutionary cases of transition to democracy are modeled. Different preferences and strategic choices between the alternatives of continuity, reform, and rupture of the authoritarian regime are used to define conventional distinctions between hard-liners, soft-liners, and opposition more precisely. Six groups of actors emerge. Using game theory, the interactions among these actors are formally analyzed. The possibility of political pact in the first phase of change is identified with the possibility of cooperation between players in games in which the equilibrium is a deficient outcome. Three models of transition by agreement are established: agreed reform within the ruling bloc, controlled opening to the opposition, and sudden collapse of the authoritarian regime. Each of these models entails differences in the pace of change and in the limits of the pact and can be associated with different cases of transition in Southern Europe, Latin America, and Eastern Europe.


Author(s):  
Benjamin W. Goossen

During the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, the global Mennonite church developed an uneasy relationship with Germany. Despite the religion's origins in the Swiss and Dutch Reformation, as well as its longstanding pacifism, tens of thousands of members embraced militarist German nationalism. This book is a sweeping history of this encounter and the debates it sparked among parliaments, dictatorships, and congregations across Eurasia and the Americas. Offering a multifaceted perspective on nationalism's emergence in Europe and around the world, the book demonstrates how Mennonites' nationalization reflected and reshaped their faith convictions. While some church leaders modified German identity along Mennonite lines, others appropriated nationalism wholesale, advocating a specifically Mennonite version of nationhood. Examining sources from Poland to Paraguay, the book shows how patriotic loyalties rose and fell with religious affiliation. Individuals might claim to be German at one moment but Mennonite the next. Some external parties encouraged separatism, as when the Weimar Republic helped establish an autonomous “Mennonite State” in Latin America. Still others treated Mennonites as quintessentially German; under Hitler's Third Reich, entire colonies benefited from racial warfare and genocide in Nazi-occupied Ukraine. Whether choosing Germany as a national homeland or identifying as a chosen people, called and elected by God, Mennonites committed to collective action in ways that were intricate, fluid, and always surprising.


Author(s):  
Paul D. Kenny

This chapter sets out the puzzle at the center of the book: what explains the success of populist campaigners in India, Asia, and beyond? It summarizes the existing literature on populist success both in Latin America and Western Europe and argues that these explanations do a poor job of explaining Indian and Asian cases in particular. Populists win elections when the institutionalized ties between non-populist parties and voters decay. However, because different kinds of party systems experience distinct stresses and strains, we need different models of populist success based on the prevailing party­–voter linkage system in place in any given country. The chapter then sets out the rationale for concentrating on explaining populist success in patronage-based party systems, which are common not only to Asia, but also to Latin America and Eastern Europe.


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