The Political Opportunity Structure of Chinese Villages: A Case Study of Rightful Resistance in Northwest China

2021 ◽  
Vol 45 (3) ◽  
pp. 645-670
Author(s):  
Guo Pengpeng ◽  
René Trappel ◽  
Han Guoming
Contention ◽  
2020 ◽  
Vol 8 (2) ◽  
pp. 21-52
Author(s):  
Matthew S. Williams

Political opportunity structure (POS) refers to how the larger social context, such as repression, shapes a social movement’s chances of success. Most work on POS looks at how movements deal with the political opportunities enabling and/or constraining them. This article looks at how one group of social movement actors operating in a more open POS alters the POS for a different group of actors in a more repressive environment through a chain of indirect leverage—how United Students Against Sweatshops (USAS) uses the more open POS on college campuses to create new opportunities for workers in sweatshop factories. USAS exerts direct leverage over college administrators through protests, pushing them to exert leverage over major apparel companies through the licensing agreements schools have with these companies.


Author(s):  
Diana Fu ◽  
Greg Distelhorst

How does China manage political participation? This chapter analyzes changing opportunities for participation in the leadership transition from Hu Jintao to Xi Jinping. Contentious political participation—where individuals and independent organizations engage in protest and other disruptive behavior—has been further curtailed under Xi’s leadership. Yet institutional participation by ordinary citizens through quasi-democratic institutions appears unaffected and is even trending up in certain sectors. Manipulation of the political opportunity structure is likely strategic behavior on the part of authoritarian rulers, as they seek to incorporate or appease the discontented. The political opportunity structure in non-democracies is therefore multifaceted: one channel of participation can close as others expand.


2019 ◽  
Vol 113 (2) ◽  
pp. 569-583 ◽  
Author(s):  
ARTURAS ROZENAS ◽  
YURI M. ZHUKOV

States use repression to enforce obedience, but repression—especially if it is violent, massive, and indiscriminate—often incites opposition. Why does repression have such disparate effects? We address this question by studying the political legacy of Stalin’s coercive agricultural policy and collective punishment campaign in Ukraine, which led to the death by starvation of over three million people in 1932–34. Using rich micro-level data on eight decades of local political behavior, we find that communities exposed to Stalin’s “terror by hunger” behaved more loyally toward Moscow when the regime could credibly threaten retribution in response to opposition. In times when this threat of retribution abated, the famine-ridden communities showed more opposition to Moscow, both short- and long-term. Thus, repression can both deter and inflame opposition, depending on the political opportunity structure in which post-repression behavior unfolds.


2019 ◽  
Vol 45 (9-10) ◽  
pp. 1084-1105
Author(s):  
Jean L. Cohen

This article focuses on the relationship between social movements and political parties in the context of populist challenges to constitutional democracy. There are many reasons for the current plight of democracy but I focus here on one aspect: the decline of mainstream political parties, the emergence of new forms of populist movement parties and the general crisis of political representation in long consolidated Western democracies. This article analyses the specific political logic and dynamics of social movements – the logic of influence, and distinguishes it from that of political parties – the logic of power. It addresses transformations in movements, parties and their relationships. It looks at the shifts in movement and party types that constitute the political opportunity structure for the emergence of new populist movement party forms and relationships, focusing on the hollowing out and movement-ization of political parties. Contemporary populist movement parties are not the cause of the hollowing out or movement-ization of political parties. Rather they are a response to the crisis of political representation exemplified by hollow parties and cartel parties. But it is my thesis that thanks to its specific logic, populism fosters the worst version of movement party relationships, undermining the democratic functions of both.


2011 ◽  
Vol 55 (9) ◽  
pp. 1235-1266 ◽  
Author(s):  
Patricia Landolt ◽  
Luin Goldring ◽  
Judith K. Bernhard

The authors identify and analyze patterns of community organizing among Latin Americans in Toronto for the period from the 1970s to the 2000s as part of a broader analysis of Latin American immigrant politics. They draw on the concept of social fields to map Latin American community politics and to capture a wide range of relevant organizations, events, and strategic moments that feed into the constitution of more visible and formal organizations. Five distinct waves of Latin American migration to Toronto produce three types of community organizations: ethno-national, intersectional panethnic, and mainstream panethnic groupings. This migration pattern also leads to a layering process as established organizations evolve and new migrant groups with specific priorities and ways of organizing emerge. The authors present a case study of the development and agenda-setting process of the Centre for Spanish Speaking People, a mainstream, multiservice, panethnic organization. Agenda setting is defined as the process of defining the vision and mission of an organization or cluster of organizations. The case study captures how a mainstream panethnic organization mediates between diverse in-group agendas of Latin American immigrants and out-group, specifically, state-generated, agendas, and how this agenda-setting process changes over time in tune with shifts in the political opportunity structure. The authors propose, however, that agenda setting is a dialogic social process that involves more than navigating the existing political opportunity structure. Agenda setting involves in-group and out-group dialogues embedded within a complex organizational field. It is an instance of political learning. The analysis of these dialogues over time for a specific group and organization captures immigrant politics in practice.


2020 ◽  
pp. 002190962095488
Author(s):  
Abi Chamlagai

The purpose of this article is to compare Nepal’s two Tarai/Madhesh Movements using the political opportunity structure theory of social movements. Tarai/Madhesh Movement I launched by the Forum for Madheshi People’s Rights in 2007 became successful as Nepal became a federal state. Tarai/Madhesh Movement II launched by the United Democratic Madheshi Front of the Tarai/Madheshi parties and the Tharuhat Joint Struggle Committee of the Tharu organizations failed as political elites disagreed about the need to create two provinces in the Tarai/Madhesh. While Tarai/Madhesh Movement II confirms that a social movement is more likely to fail when political elites align against it, Tarai/Madhesh Movement II refutes the theoretical proposition. Tarai/Madhesh Movement I suggests that the sucess of a social movement is more likely despite the alignment of political elites against it if its central demand consistently sustains the support of its constituents.


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