Protest, social movements, and collective action: Conceptual clarifications and the subject of the book

2020 ◽  
pp. 136843022097475
Author(s):  
Samuel Hansen Freel ◽  
Rezarta Bilali ◽  
Erin Brooke Godfrey

In a three-wave longitudinal study conducted in the first 100 days of Trump’s presidency, this paper examines how people come to self-categorize into the emerging social movement “the Resistance,” and how self-categorization into this movement influences future participation in collective action and perceptions of the movement’s efficacy. Conventional collective action (e.g., protest, lobby legislators)—but not persuasive collective action (e.g., posting on social media)—and perceived identity consolidation efficacy of the movement at Wave 1 predicted a higher likelihood of self-categorization into the movement 1 month later (Wave 2) and 2 months later (Wave 3). Self-categorization into the Resistance predicted two types of higher subsequent movement efficacy perceptions, and helped sustain the effects of conventional collective action and movement efficacy beliefs at Wave 1 on efficacy beliefs at Wave 3. Implications for theory and future research on emerging social movements are discussed.


2021 ◽  
pp. 095679762097056
Author(s):  
Morgana Lizzio-Wilson ◽  
Emma F. Thomas ◽  
Winnifred R. Louis ◽  
Brittany Wilcockson ◽  
Catherine E. Amiot ◽  
...  

Extensive research has identified factors influencing collective-action participation. However, less is known about how collective-action outcomes (i.e., success and failure) shape engagement in social movements over time. Using data collected before and after the 2017 marriage-equality debate in Australia, we conducted a latent profile analysis that indicated that success unified supporters of change ( n = 420), whereas failure created subgroups among opponents ( n = 419), reflecting four divergent responses: disengagement (resigned acceptors), moderate disengagement and continued investment (moderates), and renewed commitment to the cause using similar strategies (stay-the-course opponents) or new strategies (innovators). Resigned acceptors were least inclined to act following failure, whereas innovators were generally more likely to engage in conventional action and justify using radical action relative to the other profiles. These divergent reactions were predicted by differing baseline levels of social identification, group efficacy, and anger. Collective-action outcomes dynamically shape participation in social movements; this is an important direction for future research.


Author(s):  
Paul Lichterman

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.


2016 ◽  
Vol 44 (1) ◽  
pp. 180-198 ◽  
Author(s):  
Luis F. Angosto-Ferrández

The unprecedented enfranchisement of Venezuela’s indigenous population is partly a result of the formation of a state-sponsored indigenous movement. This movement prioritizes access to social services, economic development, and political participation in state structures over certain goals of free determination. Other forms of collective action with different priorities are evidence of the existence of diverging interests and goals among indigenous people. These divergences are a reflection of the way in which the indigenous population partakes in the shaping of contemporary Venezuelan politics. La inclusión social de las comunidades indígenas de Venezuela no tiene precedentes y se debe, en parte, a la formación de movimientos indígenas auspiciados por el estado. Estos movimientos le dan prioridad al acceso a los servicios sociales, al desarrollo económico y a la participación política en las estructuras estatales por encima de ciertas metas de libre determinación. Otras formas de acción colectiva con prioridades diferentes revelan la presencia/existencia de intereses y objetivos divergentes entre las comunidades indígenas. Estas diferencias son un reflejo de la manera en que las poblaciones indígenas participan en la formación de la política venezolana contemporánea.


2019 ◽  
Vol 7 (17) ◽  
Author(s):  
Simone Gomes

O trabalho discute a organização prisional em facções a partir de paralelos com ações coletivas, com teorias dos movimentos sociais para lançar luz às práticas das facções prisionais. Dessa forma, baseado em um trabalho de inspiração etnográfica em prisões masculinas e femininas no Rio de Janeiro, Manaus e Fortaleza, abordaremos convergências e diferenças entre o modus operandi das facções prisionais do país, Primeiro Comando da Capital (PCC), Comando Vermelho (CV), Facção do Norte (FDN) e Guardiões do Estado (GDE) e movimentos sociais. Desde 2006, aumentaram significativamente as rebeliões, queima de veículos e transferência de presos, como instrumentos de barganha, aqui entendidas como repertórios. A pesquisa aponta para um funcionamento das facções que, por ser empiricamente orientado, traz elementos inovadores para pensar os limites e as possibilidades das teorias da ação coletiva.


Author(s):  
Paolo Gerbaudo

Digital communication technologies are modifying how social movements communicate internally and externally and the way participants are organized and mobilized. This transformation calls for a rethinking of how we conceive of and analyze them. Scholars cannot be content with studying the digital and the physical or the online and the offline separately, but must explore the imbrication between these aspects by studying how the elements of social movements combine in a political “ensemble,” an ecosystem, or an action texture, defining the possibilities and limits of collective action. This chapter proposes a qualitative methodology combining analysis of digital media with observations of events and interviews with participants to develop a holistic account of collective action. This methodology is best positioned to capture the changing nature and meaning of protest action in a digital era, producing a “thick account” of the relationship between digital politics and everyday life.


2020 ◽  
pp. 318-335
Author(s):  
Herbert Kitschelt ◽  
Philipp Rehm

This chapter examines four fundamental questions relating to political participation. First, it considers different modes of political participation such as social movements, interest groups, and political parties. Second, it analyses the determinants of political participation, focusing in particular on the paradox of collective action. Third, it explains political participation at the macro-level in order to identify which contextual conditions are conducive to participation and the role of economic affluence in political participation. Finally, the chapter discusses political participation at the micro-level. It shows that both formal associations and informal social networks, configured around family and friendship ties, supplement individual capacities to engage in political participation or compensate for weak capacities, so as to boost an individual’s probability to become politically active.


2002 ◽  
Vol 7 (3) ◽  
pp. 253-268 ◽  
Author(s):  
Rachel Einwohner

Most research on the role of identity in social movements treats identity as something that is constructed solely by movement participants themselves. However, participants are not the only actors involved in this identity construction. This article uses basic insights from symbolic interactionism to argue that external claims, or claims made about movement participants by those outside the movement, also shape activists' sense of identity. Using data collected during three years of fieldwork with members of a non-violent animal rights organization, I show how the activists made use of their opponents' depictions of them—in particular, charges that the activists were "overly emotional" and "irrational"—when describing themselves. Specifically, I illustrate two processes by which these external claims left their mark on the activists' identity: identity disconfirmation and identity recasting. More broadly, I suggest that "bringing the outsiders in" to examinations of identity and collective action provides a more complete picture not simply of identity construction but of movement dynamics as a whole.


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