From Organizational-Centric Engagement to Network-Centric Engagement: The Role of Autonomous Public Communities in a Mediated Public Policy Advocacy Network

In this study, we explore how a social movement organization ( Sunrise.org ) and its autonomous public community advocated for the Green New Deal on social media. An autonomous public community is a group of publics that initially connect with each other through their engagement with a focal organization. Then, they go on to develop ties among themselves that go beyond simply responding to organizations’ messages. Autonomous public communities are ubiquitous on social media. Our research identifies unique patterns of interactions in an autonomous public community and finds that the Tertius Iungens orientation brings the network together. We also find that while the focal organization is not centralized in an autonomous public community, it still significantly affects tie formation and discourse as the networks evolve. Our study reveals a nuanced understanding of networked organization–public engagement where network structure and discourse are co-created by the organizations and the communities that they engage.

Flexland in wording.

Internationally, the 1980s marked a shift in economic policy. In the Netherlands, it was the decade of the supposedly moderate neoliberal turn and of the first round of flexibilization. Nowadays, the degree of flexibility of the Dutch labour market is exceptionally high compared to neighbouring countries. This article examines how the trade union movement in the 1980s responded to increasing flexibilization, which strategy was used, and how this contributed to early Dutch flexibilization. In contrast to the literature with an institutional perspective, this article analyzes the trade union movement from a social-historical perspective and as a social movement organization. As a result, it argues that the effects of rising flexibilization were signalled very early on within the trade unions. Be that as it may, both the priorities that followed from the agreements with employer organizations and the internal dynamics, were decisive for the trade union movement’s relatively late and unassertive responses towards the flexibilization of labour in the 1980s.

Die rechtspopulistische PEGIDA in der COVID-19-Pandemie

Zusammenfassung Dieser Beitrag thematisiert die Reaktionen der Dresdner rechtspopulistischen Protestbewegung „Patriotische Europäer gegen die Islamisierung des Abendlandes“ (PEGIDA) auf die COVID-19-Pandemie in Deutschland. Er beschäftigt sich mit Kontinuitäten und Brüchen in PEGIDAs Aktivismus während der ersten Pandemie-Welle und „Lockdown“, insbesondere im Hinblick auf Aktionsformen, Netzwerke und diskursive Deutungsrahmen. Auf Grundlage des Verständnisses von PEGIDA als einer social movement organization (SMO), die sich in und durch öffentlichen Protest konstituiert, analysiert der Artikel zum einen Kontinuitäten in PEGIDAs Kooperation mit etablierten Figuren aus der Rechtsaußen-Szene sowie in bekannten rechtspopulistischen Artikulationsmustern. Zum anderen verweist die Analyse auf neuartige, virtuelle Aktionsformen sowie auf veränderte, der regierungskritischen „Querdenken“-Bewegung angepasste Deutungsrahmen. Abschließend argumentiert der Beitrag, dass PEGIDA während der ersten Welle der COVID-19-Pandemie weder eindeutige Mobilisierungserfolge noch -misserfolge verbuchen konnte. Der Analyse liegt eine „virtuelle Ethnographie“ zugrunde.

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

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.

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

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.

What do we want? Examining the motivating role of goals in social movement mobilization

The main purpose of any social movement organization is to achieve the goals of its followers. Little is known, however, about what type of goals disadvantaged group members strive to reach and which of those may motivate them to join a social movement organization. Using a door-to-door survey (N = 351), we investigated the mobilizing effects of goals among inhabitants of the North of the Netherlands that are adversely affected by gas-extraction induced earthquakes. We distinguished between collective (e.g., reduce gas extraction) versus individual goals (e.g., financial compensation), and outcome versus means goals (e.g., influence policy-makers). Moreover, we examined how perceptions of shared opinions with other affected citizens versus with people who are not negatively affected by gas extraction motivate the inhabitants to join a movement and attach importance to different goals. Our results indicate the existence of two pathways for potential mobilization: the first one through the perceptions of shared grievances, which can motivate people to join the movement and pursue collective solutions; and a second one through the perceptions of deprivation, which can motivate people to exert influence on power holders by joining a movement. Individual outcome goals were important but did not motivate disadvantaged citizens to join a social movement organization. We discuss the role of goals as a link between individual level and meso level factors for movement mobilization and collective action.

Activism before EU Leverage

This is the first of three chapters that process trace the development of LGBT activism in Poland and the Czech Republic through the different stages of exposure to and integration into the EU. It sets a baseline for assessing how hard-right backlash impacted the organization of activism by showing what fledgling activist networks in both countries looked like before the application of EU leverage, a comparison that proves to be a study in contrasts. By 1997, Czech activists had moved from informal organization to the consolidation of a politically oriented social movement organization that aggregated a broad network of local groups into a national-level structure. By contrast, the Polish movement had failed to move from local to national organization; informal affiliations still formed the basis of organization; and, motivated by concerns regarding funding and safety, activists were avowedly apolitical in orientation.

STRATEGIC TRADEOFFS: MOVEMENT-GOVERNMENT INTERACTIONS AND DUTCH GAY AND LESBIAN POLICY, 1986–1994*

Interactions between social movements and government actors have been conceptualized as either combative and exclusionary or institutionalized and coopted. This article transcends that dichotomy by tracing one social movement organization's tactical pursuit of institutionalization, examining the process through which institutionalization occurred, and evaluating its effects. This case study, based on qualitative, archival data, traces the institutionalization of the gay and lesbian social movement organization, the Dutch Association for the Integration of Homosexuality, COC, between 1986 and 1994. The analysis offers three findings: First, institutionalization is a process built through sustained exchange relations over time. Second, institutionalization does not necessarily result in cooptation but does involve tradeoffs. Third, both SMO and governmental actors are affected, albeit differently, by the process of institutionalization. While the COC was primarily affected organizationally, the Dutch government became more activist by attempting to influence the social institution of sexuality to accommodate homosexuality.