Co-Opting Social Ties: How the Taiwanese Petrochemical Industry Neutralized Environmental Opposition

2010 ◽  
Vol 15 (4) ◽  
pp. 447-463
Author(s):  
Ming-sho Ho

This article seeks to understand how social ties can be manipulated by industrial producers in such a way that local opposition to pollution is neutralized. Social movement researchers argue that mobilization cannot proceed without pre-existing social ties, and further reflection suggests the nature of social ties is tremendously consequential. Clientelist ties are characterized by mass dependence and cooperation as beneficiaries expect favors from above. Thus, when clientelist leaders are politically excluded, a strong community-based protest is likely to take place under their leadership. However, if clientelist leaders are incorporated to share the benefits of industrial development, the result is likely to be community acquiescence even though popular grievances are endemic. This paper analyzes Taiwan's environmental politics since the late-1980s by focusing on how material compensations incorporated the previously excluded politicians. Elites thus played the role of redistributors and brokers, rather than protest leaders, and consequently, popular discontent over pollution was contained.

2017 ◽  
Vol 5 (1) ◽  
pp. 67-85 ◽  
Author(s):  
John E. Balzarini ◽  
Anne B. Shlay

Widespread gentrification has increasingly been accompanied by community-based conflicts between newer and long-established residents. These conflicts raise questions about the strategies long-time residents can use to resist displacement and neighborhood change. This article examines a conflict in Fishtown, a gentrifying Philadelphia neighborhood, over plans to build a casino in the community. It looks at the role of strong community ties based on shared place-based identities and experiences as a resource to galvanize community power for long-time residents. The findings show that strong ties can be a source of power used to challenge the interests of newer residents disputing the idea that the market power of incoming gentrifiers always overshadows and displaces the original community. Newer residents with their weaker but more widespread connections did not acquire the leverage to prevail over the strong relationships that long-time residents had with each other. Long-established residents supported the casino as a form of community investment somewhat akin to investments made by manufacturing establishments of yesteryear. Their belief in the concrete monetary benefits that the casino would accrue to their community propelled the organizational activities that the strong ties facilitated, making long-time residents partners in bringing a casino to their neighborhood.


2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Robert Riggs

Abstract Research shows that social ties and social support are central to former prisoners’ social integration; however, most scholarship focuses on family ties. Beyond family ties, we know little about the composition of former prisoners’ personal networks or how non-family ties may form and influence social integration. This article investigates in detail the personal networks of a group of male former prisoners and documents how they use their social ties during the transition into the community. In addition to family, many men were networked with others with whom they had formed relationships in prison. In contrast to criminological research on criminal peers, this study finds that networks formed through participation in prison programs operated by community-based organizations were prosocial and endured into the men’s release into the community. These organizationally embedded prison-forged networks gave transitioning men access to and impelled activation of forms of social capital in free society. These findings suggest scholars and policymakers should use care in defining what a criminal peer is and that parole policies forbidding parolees from associating with others who have criminal records may in some cases do more harm than good.


Author(s):  
Aswathy S. ◽  
Lakshmi M. K.

The study was aimed to assess the breastfeeding practices among mothers of infants in Peringara Gramapanchayat in Kerala. Study was a community based cross-sectional study among mothers of infants in Peringara gramapanchayat using a pretested questionnaire. 142 breastfeeding mothers of infants in Peringara gramapanchayat were studied and mothers who were not present at home during the study were excluded from the study. Study period consisted of 18 days between December 2015 and January 2016. Study variables includes type of delivery, initiation of breastfeeding, breastfeeding practices and role of ASHAs in promoting good breastfeeding practices. Statistical analysis was done using Pearson’s Chi-square test and T test. The study found that exclusive breastfeeding has been done by 68.3% of mothers. There is no practice of giving pre-lacteal feed, 95.8% of mothers have given colostrum to the new born. Statistically significant association was found between the type of delivery and time of initiation of breastfeeding (p less than 0.05). Time of initiation of breastfeeding was prolonged in case of Caesarean section. 49.3% of mothers have breastfed the baby within one hour. 55.6% of mothers were informed about importance of breastfeeding by ASHAs and only 20.4% of mothers were informed about period of exclusive breastfeeding and period of complimentary feeding by ASHAs.


Author(s):  
Francis L. F Lee ◽  
Joseph M Chan

Chapter 1 introduces the background of the Umbrella Movement, a protest movement that took hold in Hong Kong in 2014, and outlines the theoretical principles underlying the analysis of the role of media and communication in the occupation campaign. It explicates how the Umbrella Movement is similar to but also different from the ideal-typical networked social movement and crowd-enabled connective action. It explains why the Umbrella Movement should be seen as a case in which the logic of connective action intervenes into a planned collective action. It also introduces the notion of conditioned contingencies and the conceptualization of an integrated media system.


Author(s):  
Donatella della Porta ◽  
Massimiliano Andretta ◽  
Tiago Fernandes ◽  
Eduardo Romanos ◽  
Markos Vogiatzoglou

The second chapter covers the main characteristics of transition time in the four countries: Italy, Greece, Spain, and Portugal. After developing the theoretical model on paths of transition, with a focus on social movement participation, the chapter looks at social movements and protest events as turning points during transition, covering in particular the specific movement actors, their organizational models, and their repertoires of action and frames. The chapter focuses on two dimensions: the role of mobilization in the transition period, which implies the analysis of how elites and masses interact, ally, or fight with each other in the process, and the outcome of transitions as continuity versus rupture of the democratic regime vis-à-vis the old one. It concludes by elaborating some hypotheses on how different modes of transition may produce different types and uses of (transition) memories.


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