Explaining The Outcomes of Antisuperstore Movements: A Comparative Analysis of Six Communities

2006 ◽  
Vol 11 (4) ◽  
pp. 443-460 ◽  
Author(s):  
Stephen Halebsky
Keyword(s):  
Social Movements ◽  
Comparative Analysis ◽  
Social Movement ◽  
Social Movement Organizations ◽  
Social Movement Organization ◽  
Qualitative Case Studies ◽  
Five Factors ◽  
Movement Organization ◽  
The Media ◽  
Movement Organizations

This research investigates the outcomes of local social movements through a comparative analysis of superstore siting controversies. Data were generated by qualitative case studies of six attempts by local social movement organizations to prevent the siting of a Wal-Mart superstore in their communities. A comparison of the cases reveals that the SMOs were most likely to succeed when they produced evidence of widespread opposition, framed the issue broadly, received backing from the media, did not have to contend with a counter social movement organization, and benefited from blunders by Wal-Mart. It is suggested that these five factors can be generalized to help explain the outcomes of other local social movements. It is suggested further that the first three of these factors combine in a mutually reinforcing fashion to enable a small SMO to expand its influence and thereby increase its ability to prevail against a more powerful target.

The Missionaries of Francis: The Theology of the People and the Unification of the Argentine Piquetero Movement (2014–2018)

2020 ◽  
Vol 47 (5) ◽  
pp. 35-48
Author(s):  
Pablo Forni
Keyword(s):  
Social Movement ◽  
Social Movement Organizations ◽  
Social Movement Organization ◽  
Informal Workers ◽  
The Poor ◽  
The People ◽  
Movement Organization ◽  
Movement Organizations ◽  
The Unemployed ◽  
Movimientos Sociales

Founded in 2014, the Missionaries of Francis is a small social movement organization made up of activists from several other social movement organizations representing informal workers and the unemployed. Its goal was to promote the message of the newly appointed Pope Francis among the poor and excluded. Drawing inspiration from the theology of the people, the movement is contributing new repertoires of contention based on popular religious images and icons to Argentine social movements. Starting in 2016, it has occupied a key role, bringing together ideologically and politically heterogeneous social movement organizations to resist the neoliberal social policies of President Mauricio Macri. Fundados en 2014, los Misioneros de Francisco son una pequeña organización formada por activistas de varios movimientos sociales que representan a los trabajadores informales y a los desempleados. Su objetivo fue promover el mensaje del recién nombrado Papa Francisco entre los pobres y excluidos. Inspirado en la teología del pueblo, el movimiento está aportando nuevos repertorios de protesta basados en imágenes e íconos de la religiosidad popular a los movimientos sociales argentinos. Ha jugado un papel clave a partir de 2016, reuniendo organizaciones de movimientos sociales ideológica y políticamente heterogéneos para resistir las políticas sociales neoliberales del presidente Mauricio Macri.

scholarly journals The Existence of Social Movement Organization(SMO) &Comparison of Collective and Connective Action in the Digital Era ---- an Analysis of 15-M Movement in Spain

2020 ◽  
Vol 2 (3) ◽  
Author(s):  
YuTong Sun
Keyword(s):  
Social Movements ◽  
Social Movement ◽  
Social Movement Organizations ◽  
Action Logic ◽  
Digital Era ◽  
Movement Organization ◽  
Brick And Mortar ◽  
Common Interests ◽  
Connective Action ◽  
Movement Organizations

Social movement organizations (SMOs) have been performing a significant role in terms of gathering like-minded civil individuals with common interests during social movements. Stepping into the digital era, the social media becomes prevailing in transforming people’s lifestyles. This essay will discuss the 15-M Movement in Spain to explore the transition of SMO’s position from conventional social movements to those in the digital era in the light of collective action logic and connective action logic. With the phenomenon that SMO itself sometimes is the original source of problems to trigger social movements, it is reasonable to see the decreasingly important SMO with the successful example of the 15-M Movement to engage over 60 cities in Spain and avoid the “free ride” problem via completely excluding brick and mortar organizations.

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.

scholarly journals THE RISE OF INEQUALITY: HOW SOCIAL MOVEMENTS SHAPE DISCURSIVE FIELDS*

2016 ◽  
Vol 21 (4) ◽  
pp. 413-429 ◽  
Author(s):  
Sarah Gaby ◽  
Neal Caren
Keyword(s):  
Social Movements ◽  
Social Movement ◽  
Media Coverage ◽  
Limited Attention ◽  
Social Movement Organizations ◽  
Wall Street ◽  
Term Outcome ◽  
Long Term Outcome ◽  
Occupy Movement ◽  
Movement Organizations

Social movement scholars have considered several political and cultural consequences of social movements, but have paid limited attention to whether and how social movements shape discourse. We develop a theory of discursive eruption, referring to the ability of radical movements to initially ignite media coverage but not control the content once other actors— particularly those that can take advantage of journalistic norms—enter the discourse. We hold that one long-term outcome of radical social movements is the ability to alter discursive fields through mechanisms such as increasing the salience and content of movement-based issues. We examine the way movements shape discourse by focusing on newspaper articles about inequality before, during, and after the Occupy Wall Street (OWS) movement. We analyze changes in the salience and content of coverage as well as shifts in actor standing and influence. Using 7,024 articles from eight newspapers, we find that the OWS movement increased media attention to inequality, shifting the focus of the discourse toward movement-based issue areas (e.g., the middle class and minimum wage). Further, we find that compared to the pre-OWS period, the influence of social movement organizations and think tanks rose in discourse on inequality. In addition, the discourse on inequality became more highly politicized as a result of the Occupy movement. These findings highlight the importance of social movements in shaping discourse and indicate that social movement scholars should further consider discursive changes as a consequence of social movements.

The Role of Spatial Organization in Resurrection City and Other Protest Camps

Contention ◽  
2020 ◽  
Vol 8 (1) ◽  
pp. 28-48
Author(s):  
Fabian Frenzel
Keyword(s):  
Social Movements ◽  
Social Movement ◽  
Spatial Organization ◽  
Hierarchical Structures ◽  
Spatial Dimension ◽  
Social Movement Organization ◽  
Organization Studies ◽  
Movement Organization ◽  
The Social ◽  
Mass Organization

Social and political organizing and organization has a spatial dimension, and there is increasing interest in academic studies of organization to understand better how space and organization relate, interact, and conflict. There is a range of studies that look at business and workplace organization, but little evidence from social movement organization or what is sometimes referred to as alternative organization studies. This article addresses this gap by observing and analyzing the effects of spatial organization in social movements. It focuses particularly on protest camps, a form of social movement organization in which spatial organization is particularly important. It looks at the Resurrection City protest camp of 1968 to identify the development of spatial organization practices. They are carried onwards across social movements, as they resolve organizational desires for the social movement organization, such as enabling mass organization without resorting to formal membership or hierarchical structures. In summary, the article provides insight into the relationship between spatial and social organization.

Joining the Cocktail Circuit: Social Movement Organizations at the European Union

2004 ◽  
Vol 9 (1) ◽  
pp. 55-71 ◽  
Author(s):  
Christian Lahusen
Keyword(s):  
European Union ◽  
Social Movements ◽  
Social Movement ◽  
Level Structure ◽  
Self Regulation ◽  
Social Movement Organizations ◽  
The European Union ◽  
Single European Act ◽  
Multi Level ◽  
Movement Organizations

Although social movement organizations have established themselves successfully on the European level, there is dispute whether the European Union is conducive or detrimental to movement politics. One view is that the EU's particular opportunity structures and styles of policy making subvert unconventional forms of action and participation, thus transforming social movements into a fragmented field of individual interest groups and lobbies. This article critically assesses this perspective. It traces these processes, showing that they were indeed part and parcel of the gradual Europeanization of social movements during the 1970s and 1980s. It then presents evidence that, in the aftermath of the Single European Act of 1986, the European movement sector began moving towards a more integrated multi-level structure. Data drawn from interviews with Euro-level movement activists and EU functionaries present a picture of this new interorganizational structure and multi-level action forms with reference to the European groups working on environmental protection, and human and social rights. It is argued that the present developments stress sectorial and cross-sectorial networking, self-regulation, and common policy deliberation.

Whose Memories? Whose Victimhood? Contests for the Holocaust Frame in Recent Social Movement Discourse

1998 ◽  
Vol 41 (3) ◽  
pp. 519-540 ◽  
Author(s):  
Arlene Stein
Keyword(s):  
Social Movements ◽  
World War Ii ◽  
Social Movement ◽  
Social Movement Organizations ◽  
World War ◽  
The Holocaust ◽  
Social Movement Framing ◽  
Symbolic Resource ◽  
Gay Movement ◽  
Movement Organizations

Fifty years after the end of World War II, the Holocaust is being utilized as a symbolic resource by US social movements. This article investigates social movement “framing” processes, looking at the use of Holocaust rhetoric and imagery by social movement organizations and actors. I explore how competing movements, the lesbian/gay movement and the Christian right, battle over the same symbolic territory, and how the Holocaust frame is deployed by each. Two forms of symbolic appropriation in relation to the Holocaust are documented: metaphor creation and revisionism.

scholarly journals Sowing seeds of hope in California's fields of resistance to Pharm rice and Frankenfish

2013 ◽  
Vol 20 (1) ◽  
pp. 159 ◽  
Author(s):  
Dustin Mulvaney ◽  
Anna Zivian
Keyword(s):  
Social Movements ◽  
Food Safety ◽  
Social Movement ◽  
Genetically Engineered ◽  
Social Movement Organizations ◽  
Wild Salmon ◽  
Safety Risks ◽  
Genetically Engineered Organisms ◽  
Movement Organizations ◽  
Important Site

California has been an important site of governance on risks from genetically engineered (GE) organisms. This paper reviews California's efforts to govern the ecological and food safety risks from GE salmon and GE pharmaceutical rice. We explain how a political constellation of actors emerged to pursue precautionary policies, and we discuss the prospects for similar policies elsewhere. We find that regulation of particularly risky objects is possible in some places, particularly where social movement organizations are mobilized and the possible consequences are severe, such as with impacts to wild salmon runs or pharmaceutically contaminated foods. But such regulations may only emerge when they are inconsequential to, or aligned with, the market concerns of dominant economic interests.Key Words: genetically engineered organisms, social movements, biosafety, California.

Social Movements in Late 20th-Century Ecuador and Bolivia

2016 ◽  
Author(s):  
Marc Becker
Keyword(s):  
Social Movements ◽  
Social Movement ◽  
Ethnic Groups ◽  
20Th Century ◽  
Farm Workers ◽  
Social Movement Organizations ◽  
Economic Interests ◽  
Late 20Th Century ◽  
Majority Population ◽  
Movement Organizations

Both Ecuador and Bolivia have gained a reputation for powerful social movements that have repeatedly challenged entrenched political and economic interests that have controlled the countries since their independence from Spain almost two hundred years ago. A wealthy and powerful minority of European descendant landowners ruled the countries to the exclusion of the majority population of impoverished Indigenous farm workers. Repeated well-organized challenges to exclusionary rule in the late 20th century shifted policies and opened political spaces for previously marginalized people. Social movement organizations also altered their language to meet new realities, including incorporating identities as ethnic groups and Indigenous nationalities to advance their agenda. Their efforts contributed to a significant leftward shift in political discourse that led to the election of presidents Evo Morales and Rafael Correa.

Coalitions and The Development of The Global Environmental Movement: A Double-Edged Sword

2005 ◽  
Vol 10 (2) ◽  
pp. 235-250 ◽  
Author(s):  
Gillian Murphy
Keyword(s):  
Social Movements ◽  
Social Movement ◽  
Empirical Evidence ◽  
Environmental Movement ◽  
Original Data ◽  
Social Movement Organizations ◽  
Transnational Social Movements ◽  
Global Environmental ◽  
Movement Organizations ◽  
Environmental Social Movement

Censuses reveal an increasing prominence of coalition organizations within transnational social movements. However, the causes and implications of this change are unclear. Using original data on a population of transnational environmental social movement organizations, this research shows that coalition presence is a double-edged sword. While greater numbers of coalitions suggest movement expansion, empirical evidence suggests that this rise makes foundings of new organizations less likely.

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