Search

Municipal bureaucrats in the United States—mostly on the social side of the state (e.g. public health, welfare, educators, housing, and sometimes urban planners) but not exclusively so (e.g. district attorney offices)—have shown growing willingness to engage in political battles within the bureaucracy, connect with social movements, and construct oppositional identities centred on social and racial justice. Critical urban theories of the state highlight important constraints that shape state strategies, functions, and policies but tell us little about the contradictions propelling some bureaucrats into political contests over power and legitimacy. Consequently, we turn to theorists who conceive of the bureaucratic state as a contradictory and relatively autonomous field where conflicts between dominated and dominant bureaucrats overlap and converge with conflicts between dominated and dominant class forces (Bourdieu, Gramsci, Hall, and Poulantzas). Their observations are used to formulate the three propositions that underpin our theoretical framework. These propositions draw attention to the structural, relational, and conjunctural processes involved in forming individual bureaucrats into an insurgent political subject. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Although mutual aid organizing is a social movement practice long sustained by queer/trans people, immigrants, people of color, and disability communities, among other communities pushed to the margins of society, with the emergence of the COVID‐19 pandemic, and subsequent government failures in addressing unmet needs, mutual aid proliferated into new (and more socially privileged) communities in the United States and across the world. Amidst this landscape of extraordinary and unique crises, our study sought to understand the benefits experienced by those engaged in mutual aid in the early months of the COVID‐19 pandemic in the state of Colorado, United States. Our team conducted semistructured individual interviews with 25 individuals participating in mutual aid through groups organized on social media or through intentional communities. We found that participants, who engaged in mutual aid in the early months of the COVID‐19 pandemic, built empathy, a sense of nonjudgement, and critical consciousness as they created common ground as humans. Participants also found mutual aid engagement to provide nourishing support, to hold pain among more people, and, simply to "feel good." We discuss the potential implications of these benefits for sustaining mutual aid movements through the ongoing COVID‐19 pandemic in the United States and beyond. Key Points/Highlights: Mutual aid organizers during COVID‐19 experienced benefits to individual and collective well‐being.Mutual aid built a sense of empathy, nonjudgement, and critical consciousness among participants.Mutual aid provided nourishing support, an ability to hold pain among more people, and "felt good."Horizontal interdependent care models have benefits as we face complex crises of the future. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study explored Black and Latinx youth organizers' experiences of racism within national gun violence prevention organizing spaces. Interview data were analyzed from 17 Black and/or Latinx youth (Mage = 20.17, 47% women) across the United States who organized against gun violence. The findings identified three forms of racism that Black and Latinx organizers experienced in national organizations: (1) being tokenized for their racial identities and experiences without having real decision making power; (2) feeling a burden to educate their white peers about the structural causes of gun violence and how to improve organizing spaces for other youth of color; and (3) being silenced in their racially conscious organizing efforts to address the structural causes of gun violence in their communities. This research highlights how Black and Latinx youth gun violence prevention organizers contend both with structural racism in their everyday lives and racism in organizing spaces. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

An essay is presented which explores the opposition of White conservative evangelicals to environmental protection efforts in the U.S. Topics discussed include the way the late evangelical leader Jerry Falwell portrayed environmentalists as competitors, the possible reasons behind the anti-environmental stance of the Religious Right movement, and the views of the White conservative evangelical community on climate change and other environmental issues.

For over a century, abortion has been politically and socially contested, affecting people's lives through personal experience and/or public discourse. In the United States (US), abortion is sometimes exceptional—treated differently from other procedures, professions, and political issues—and sometimes an exemplar—an accessible example of a commonly occurring social, political, or personal phenomenon. It is, in other words, an excellent sociological case study. Yet the sociological literature on abortion is relatively thin. In this essay, we review research on abortion and opportunities for future sociological work in eight areas: gender; race; the body and embodiment; political economy; organizations, occupations, and work; medical sociology; law and society; and social movements. Sociologists have much to contribute to characterizing and understanding abortion, particularly following the 2022 US Supreme Court decision overturning the constitutional right to abortion. The discipline also has much to learn from studying abortion as a case. With its multifaceted social and political status and intersections with key areas of sociological interest, abortion offers a generative case for advancing sociological concepts, subfields, and constructs. While not exhaustive, our review aims to spark interest and inquiry, showcasing how a topic that spurs strong opinions can also catalyze sociological insights. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Social movements must find ways to intensify their efforts to maintain political relevance—and potential influence. But escalation comes with risks in the potential reactions from authorities, supporters, potential supporters, and opponents. I argue that recognizing two elements of escalation can help. First, we need to acknowledge that movements are not unitary actors and that a large movement cannot always stop putative allies from escalating in risky ways. Second, I argue that scholars and activists can do better in making sense of the dynamics of escalation by disaggregating three dimensions of aggression by tactics, claims, and venues, assessing the range of responses to escalation on each of these dimensions. Social movement organizers face continual pressure to find ways to escalate, but responses from authorities and allies can provide a brake on escalation. I illustrate my arguments with reference to contemporary movements of the left and right in the United States and conclude by discussing the importance (and danger) of certain government responses. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

An organized response to sexual harassment (SH) in K‐12 schools in the US traces its development as a social movement to the larger women's rights movement in the late 1970s. It was an outgrowth of the social movement of feminist activists who protested and filed lawsuits to draw attention to SH in the workplace to gain recognition for the problem as one of equity for working women. The focus on SH in K‐12 schools did not begin as an academic pursuit or with an emphasis on research – rather shares its origins as an activist movement to rectify injustices. Authors document the unwritten history of this social movement, by examining the early roots to address and prevent SH in K‐12 schools. The authors review survey and intervention research from the initial movement through the past couple of decades, noting limitations and challenges for future efforts to prevent and eliminate SH in K‐12 schools. The role of youth activism in advancing the movement against SH in schools represents hope of a renewal of activism with a robust gendered perspective. Authors provide next steps for research and action. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Social movements must find ways to intensify their efforts to maintain political relevance—and potential influence. But escalation comes with risks in the potential reactions from authorities, supporters, potential supporters, and opponents. I argue that recognizing two elements of escalation can help. First, we need to acknowledge that movements are not unitary actors and that a large movement cannot always stop putative allies from escalating in risky ways. Second, I argue that scholars and activists can do better in making sense of the dynamics of escalation by disaggregating three dimensions of aggression by tactics, claims, and venues, assessing the range of responses to escalation on each of these dimensions. Social movement organizers face continual pressure to find ways to escalate, but responses from authorities and allies can provide a brake on escalation. I illustrate my arguments with reference to contemporary movements of the left and right in the United States and conclude by discussing the importance (and danger) of certain government responses. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Academic and activist conversations about the position of men in feminism often operate under the assumption that women are the movement's key beneficiaries and men are privileged outsiders lending their support. I use 59 interviews from a broader project on feminist and LGBTQ+ activism in the United States to illustrate how men's orientation to feminism is shaped by whether social movement organizations adopt what I call woman‐centered or identity‐fluid politics. While woman‐centered politics treat men as allies whose intentions must be vetted by women, identity‐fluid feminism imagines men as insiders with their own independent investment in the movement. I argue that the tension between these two models of identity politics gives men a liminal "insider‐ally" position within feminism. Although feminist men are given a tentative authority to speak for the movement, the persistence of woman‐centered understandings of feminism means men's insider status is contested, especially when they dominate feminist spaces, compromise women's sense of safety, and seek leadership. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

There is a long history of small groups of white activists engaging in social movements for racial justice led by Black Indigenous and People of Color in the United States. Yet organized white antiracism has received much less study than white racism. From forging antiracist identities to crafting racial justice organizing strategies, white people's involvement in BIPOC‐led liberation struggles has proven both promising and problematic. This article explores what scholars know about white people's involvement in US‐ based racial justice efforts in order to pose central questions and quandaries for future study. It focuses on white antiracist activism in the United States beginning in the Civil Rights era. During the late 20th century, US‐based racial justice campaigns became fragmented across diverse networks and issue areas making it harder to locate groups of white people collectively aligning with a visible and unified social movement for racial justice. This appears to be shifting. Racial logics and racist regimes have proven themselves eminently flexible, and investigating how white people have tried to join social movements for racial justice illuminates important areas for future study. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The present research examined the perspectives of both White and Black racial justice activists on the roles of White allies in the struggle for justice for Black people in the United States. Study 1 used Q methodology, a mixed‐methods approach, which identified four distinct perspectives about the role of White allies from a sample of activists (33 White and 22 Black Americans): (1) mobilize to support Black leadership, (2) interpersonal activism, (3) avoid dominating Black people's efforts, and (4) lifelong learning. In Study 2, we interviewed activists (22 White and 12 Black Americans) to understand their evaluation of, and preference for, each of perspective identified in Study 1. Thematic analyses showed that each perspective had its pros and cons regarding considerations of how to best use ingroup advantages without dominating the movement. Our findings contribute to our understanding of potential tensions in solidarity‐based social movements. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The climate change countermovement (CCCM) in the United States has exerted an important influence on delaying efforts to address climate change. Analyses of this countermovement have primarily focused on the role of conservative think tanks. Expanding this research, this article initiates an examination of the structure of key political coalitions that worked to oppose climate action. In conjunction with their allied trade associations, these coalitions have served as a central coordination mechanism in efforts opposed to mandatory limits on carbon emissions. These coalitions pool resources from a large number of corporations and execute sophisticated political and cultural campaigns designed to oppose efforts to address climate change. Through an analysis of twelve prominent CCCM coalitions from 1989 to 2015, I show that over 2,000 organizations were members of these coalitions and that a core of 179 organizations belonged to multiple coalitions. Organizations from the coal and electrical utility sectors were the most numerous and influential organizations in these coalitions. The article concludes with suggestions for further research to expand understanding of complex social movements and countermovements. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Social movements pushing for social change are often met with reactionary counter‐movements that defend the status quo. The present research examined this interplay by focusing on the role of racial majority group members claiming collective psychological ownership. We examined collective ownership that stems from being native to the land and from being founders of the nation. Study 1 found that in Malaysia, the Malay majority group endorsed more native ownership than Chinese and Indian minorities, which in turn predicted greater threat in response to protests demanding electoral reforms and subsequently greater support for a reactionary pro‐government movement. Situated in the United States, Study 2 found that the more that White Americans endorsed founder ownership beliefs, the more they reported negative attitudes towards the Black Lives Matter protests, which in turn predicted more support for White nationalistic counter‐protests. This effect was stronger among White people compared to people of colour. Study 3 examined both founder and native ownership in Australia. Founder (but not native) ownership beliefs predicted more negative attitudes towards Invasion Day protests, which subsequently predicted more support for counter‐protests defending Australia Day celebrations. Implications of culture‐specific beliefs about collective ownership for social movement research are discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The family is often described as the foundation of Latino immigrant communities. Scholars interested in the political activism of Latino immigrants in the United States have consequently sought to examine the relationship between the family and recruitment to social movement participation. Overall, this research focuses on how the family can promote Latinos' political activism. However, less is known about the conditions under which the family may hinder activism. Family dynamics may be particularly demobilizing for certain segments of the Latino population with liminal or undocumented status. This article reviews two groups of the recent literature on Latino political mobilization: (a) social networks; and (b) collective action frames. By drawing on insights from social movement theory, the article concludes by arguing for more research that theorizes on the family as a group identity, powerfully enabling, and constraining Latino movement participation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this essay, I argue that sociology programs should offer curricular opportunities for undergraduate students to study the actual mechanics of social change in the form of explicit training in the philosophies and practices of community organizing and direct action. That training, I assert, is separate from a content‐driven approach to the study of social movements, or the inclusion of community‐based research courses. Grounded in an analysis of the roots of the discipline of U.S. sociology as situated in the practice of empirically informed democratic engagement, I shift the focus away from a debate over whether or not critical pedagogy is, or should include, activism. Instead, I focus on the extent to which our students are, in practice, learning concrete organizing skills to change power relations, regardless of the content area or pedagogical style. In doing so, I bring back into the conversation a tradition that the profession seems to have forgotten, and think of ways in which contemporary sociology programs in the United States can better contribute to the advancement of a grassroots, or a humanistic public sociology. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Interactive cultural practices such as songs and storytelling are key to contemporary social movement organizing because they can attenuate the challenges of social difference by expanding participants' understandings of self and community. Yet the precise cultural dynamics through which such practices become effective are not well understood. Using the case of a large faith‐based community organizing coalition, I show that practices focused on personal moral authenticity are especially effective in fostering alignment between social movement goals and individuals' pre‐existing moral commitments. I define personal moral authenticity as the ambition to develop, enact, and perform a moral identity that is "true" to an enduring internal self, and validate that identity through interactions with others. This is an effective basis for organizing practices because it spans the various cultures of commitment that prevail in different racial and religious subgroups and gives individuals a personal stake in social change projects. In highlighting how it animates practices in faith‐based community organizing, one of the most robust fields of grassroots civic activity in the United States, this article illuminates an important part of the cultural dynamics underlying much contemporary social change work, and specifies how religion contributes to progressive social change efforts amid ongoing religious disaffiliation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In the early 21st century, teachers' union mobilization was widespread throughout the United States. Decrying low salaries, restrictions on labor rights, and more, teachers' unions engaged in large‐scale tactics such as massive strikes, public protests, and successful ballot campaigns. In this article, I demonstrate that by sharing characteristics of both social movement organizations and interest groups, teachers' unions are well suited to respond to political threats. Teachers' unions are large, longstanding organizations with the resources necessary to use a wide variety of tactics. Teachers' relationships with parents and the local community provide strong potential for alliances, and teachers can leverage their professional identity and expertise to help establish legitimacy in educational policy conversations. Ultimately, however, the future of teachers' unions depends upon sustained worker and ally activism beyond the current wave of mobilization. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article builds on and contributes to the scholarship on social movements and the law by revealing the critical function of nongovernmental organizations (NGOs) in law and policy in neoliberal times. Building on frame theories in social movement literature, this essay uses the lens of NGO‐produced advocacy for binational same‐sex couples to consider more broadly the relationship between individual experience, subjectivity, and the discourses and practices employed by NGO actors. It offers an analysis of both how NGOs developed and utilized particular messaging strategies and rhetorical frames to discursively produce a normative image of their constituency, and how constituents navigated and made use of the framing strategies developed by NGOs in their own claims to state rights and recognition. This discussion thus highlights the potentials and the problematics of the NGO model in social movements' efforts toward legal and political change. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A growing body of research demonstrates that U.S. politics has become increasingly polarized over the past few decades. In these polarized times, what potential roles might social movements play in bridging divides between, or perhaps further dividing, people across a variety of political and social groups? In this article, we propose a research agenda for social movement studies focused on the prosocial and antisocial outcomes of social movements. Although scholars commonly frame their work on the consequences of social movements in terms of social movements' political, economic, cultural, and biographical outcomes, we suggest a focus on two categories of social movement outcomes (prosocial and antisocial outcomes) that cut across prior theoretical categories, and we show how an emerging body of scholarship has documented such outcomes at micro, meso, and macro levels of analysis. We also consider how emerging scholarship has addressed the sociological question about the conditions under which social movements produce prosocial versus antisocial outcomes. As we argue, attention to prosocial and antisocial outcomes of social movements holds both theoretical implications for social movement research and practical implications for social movements navigating the United States' political and social divides. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article focuses on the American Ethnologist forum that discusses the 2014 Ferguson Protest that occurred after the police shooting of an unarmed African American teenager Michael Brown in St. Louis, Missouri. It mentions other various African American protests that occurred in the U.S. It explores the Ferguson protest, which became the template for 21st-century Black liberation. Topics discussed include social movement, race, protest art and necropolitics.

The article focuses on Black death and liberation in the U.S. and discusses Mirror Casket, which was created by St. Louis artists to mark the fatal police shooting of African American unarmed teenager Michael Brown Jr. on August 9, 2014, in Ferguson, Missouri. It is noted that the 2020 Black Lives Matter protests for many activists was the resurgence of the 2014 Ferguson uprising. The authors' mention their participation in the Ferguson protests and the younger generation's fight for justice.

How do social movements gain concessions from large corporations? The ability of protests to attain leverage by imposing disruption costs on their targets is widely assumed but less often tested. In this article, we assess the ability of protests to attain concessions by disrupting three broad sources of interest to firm officials: maximizing shareholder value, gaining positive media, and fostering a well‐reputed image. In contrast to the body of research on the benefits to movements from shaping media discourses and damaging the reputations of their targets, we find that only market disruption provides protests with leverage. We show this through statistical analyses of an original database of protests against large corporations in the United States over five years, 2005–2009. This study advances social movement and organizational research by demonstrating the ways in which the interests of large corporations provide insurgents with means of attaining leverage over their targets. It also speaks to the broad debate over the importance of disrupting the material versus symbolic interests of movement targets. Our results suggest that when it comes to obtaining concessions from large corporations, it is material disruption and not symbolic disruption that provides movements with leverage. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The January 2017 Women's March was an example of the paradigmatic March on Washington, part of the repertoire of collective action used by social movements in the United States for decades. Similar marches were held on its first and second anniversary, in January 2018 and January 2019, respectively. One did not need to travel to the nation's capital to participate in these marches, however; activists also organized hundreds of "sister marches" across the United States and internationally. Yet, a sole focus on these one‐day, physical events misses a great deal of activity. In this article, we examine social media activity related to the Women's March on the platform Instagram that was posted well after the 2017 march was over but before the 2018 march was fully planned. We do so to gain purchase on how individuals and organizations use social media to maintain movements between large events. We analyze a systematic sample of Instagram posts from two sources: (1) individual Instagram users' public posts with the hashtag #womensmarch and (2) posts from the official Instagram account of the Women's March. Conceptualizing these posts as political performances, we use our findings to draw implications for the study of contemporary protest. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The mid‐twentieth century "collective behavior" school asserted that (1) collective behavior—the actions of crowds, movements, and other gatherings—had distinct dynamics; (2) such action was often "nonrational," or not governed by cost‐benefit calculation; and (3) collective behavior could pose a threat to liberal democracy because of these features. While this tradition fell out of scholarly favor, the 2016 election has given us empirical reasons to revisit some elements of collective behavior approaches. We argue for three key orienting concerns, drawn from this tradition, to understand the current political era. First is a focus on authoritarianism and populism, particularly among those who feel disaffected and isolated from political institutions, pared of psychologistic determinism and geared more sensitively to their manifestations as a political style. Second is a focus on racialized resentment, strain, and perceptions of status decline, especially in how such feelings are activated when people are confronted with disruptions to their lives. Third is an analysis of "emergent norms" and the extent to which political actors produce normative understandings of contextually appropriate action that are distinct from traditional political behavior. We elaborate on these themes, apply them to examples from current politics, and suggest ways to incorporate them into contemporary sociological research. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

When and how do social movements form to mobilize action across national boundaries? In the context of the 2015 movement to support Syrian refugees, we develop an integrative model of transnational social movement formation shaped by pre‐existing world‐views (social dominance orientation and right‐wing authoritarianism) and social media exposure to iconic events, resulting in an emergent group consciousness ("we are", "we believe", "we feel"). Group consciousness is, in turn, the proximal predictor of solidarity with refugees. Participants were from six countries: Hungary (N = 267), Romania (N = 163), Germany (N = 190), the United Kingdom (N = 159), the United States (N = 244) and Australia (N = 344). Multi‐group structural equation models confirmed that group consciousness, shaped by individual differences and exposure to events through social media, was the proximal predictor of solidarity. The subjective meaning of group consciousness varied across samples, reflecting national differences. Results support the importance of considering individual and national differences, and group processes in understanding emergent social movements. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We examine efforts of feminist institutional activists in the 1960s and 1970s as they worked to gain U.S. federal policy to combat workplace pregnancy discrimination. The success of these activists in winning policy change provides a case that allows us to develop a theoretical understanding of how feminist institutional activists can succeed in winning policy change. We find that when institutional activists strategically shifted governmental arenas and adapted their mobilization and discursive strategies to these arenas, they were able to dismantle policy‐specific barriers that impeded their goals. In taking these steps, feminist institutional activists were successful in opening up both contingent and structural opportunities, which ultimately allowed them to gain the policy change they sought. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article offers information on the works of sociologist Manuel Castells. Topics discusses include his participation in social movements, use of Internet between 1996-1998, political history of the U.S., administration of U.S. President Donald Trump, data analysis of elections and digitization in Trump's administration.

How do advocacy organizations make tactical choices? This paper contributes to theory building in advocacy studies by examining how the decision‐making processes of advocacy organizations are affected by the choices of their peers. Drawing on qualitative interviews with practitioners in two contexts—the European Union and the United States—I document that organizations face pressures toward cohesion and differentiation with the tactical choices of other organizations. Other important processes—such as rational evaluation of political opportunities, resource dependence, and ideological constraint—are also reported to be influential, although these processes are sometimes influenced by relational dynamics. These findings suggest new variables and relationships of interest for future quantitative research and provide insight into the growing complexity of climate politics. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In her recent piece, MacKendrick (2017) asks whether we are experiencing a “new wave of science activism” and outlines various visible and vocal forms of political action taken by scientists in recent months. Coming from a slightly different perspective, this piece looks at scientists as part of the broader Resistance—people working individually and in collectivities to challenge the Trump agenda. Building on analysis of data collected from a random sample of participants from the Washington, DC, March for Science, which took place in April 2017, I explore how participants at the March for Science compare to a broader sample of participants in the Resistance. Although they have some unique characteristics, my findings show that there are few statistically significant differences between participants in the March for Science and others participating in the Resistance. I conclude this piece by discussing the implications of these findings on scientists in the Resistance and science activism more generally. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This essay raises several issues triggered by Norah Mackendrick's (2017) piece “Out of the Labs and into the Streets,” which appeared in “The Forum.” Using that essay as a springboard, I reflect on the complicated relationship between science and politics. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This analysis explores men's role exit process from being married to divorced in the context of the alimony reform movement in the United States. Those considering potential role exit may face governmental policies that either support or oppose them in making these personal changes. In this case, mostly men want to leave their husband roles behind but legally imposed alimony, in their view, unfairly binds them to their former spouses. This analysis uses 182 narratives to map out how major collective action frames—based upon the highly valued, masculine concept of autonomy—are generated in this social movement. Overall, this research demonstrates the importance of both considering the operation of governmental policies in producing successful or incomplete role exit for individuals, and how these same individuals can respond using collective action frames drawn from privileged notions of masculinity as they aim for significant life change. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We introduce the concept of embedded legal activity to capture the ways in which lawyers and legal organizations can become intertwined in the ongoing activities of social movements. Embedded legal activity is characterized by diverse issues and venues and comprises legal activities that help support movement infrastructure, close coordination between movement lawyers and other activists, and responsiveness to constituent needs. Investigating a comprehensive data set on legal activity during the southern civil rights movement, we identify forms of legal activity beyond the typical focus of legal mobilization, including defense for movement participants charged with misdemeanors and other crimes, movement assistance on organization‐level legal matters, and general legal aid to movement constituents. These were by far the more common types of legal activity and emerged from the embeddedness of lawyers in a mass movement. We argue that embedded legal activity is likely where movements prioritize grassroots leadership and community organizing and face significant countermobilization, hostile legal and political opportunity structures, and substantial social and economic inequality. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Contemporary radical right-wing populism is generally associated with nativism, usually defined as an intense hostility to anything deemed alien and threatening to national cohesion. This article explores the origins and evolution of nativism in three major nineteenth-century populist movements - antebellum Know Nothingism and post-civil-war agrarian populism in the United States and late nineteenth-century Boulangism in France. All of them advanced nativist propositions to bolster their populist agenda, yet not of the same nature and to the same extent. These differences can largely be explained by the targets of populist mobilization and the constituency at which it was aimed. The cases suggest that nativism plays an important role in populist mobilization, not least because it allows populist movements to transcend differences between social groups and gives them an opportunity to promote themselves as the champions of collective identity - a concern central to the contemporary radical populist right. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Social movements rely on coalitions to help mobilize the mass numbers of people necessary for success. In this article, we review the literature on social movement coalition formation, longevity, and success. We identify five factors critical to coalition formation: (a) social ties; (b) conducive organizational structures; (c) ideology, culture, and identity; (d) the institutional environment; and (e) resources. Next, we explore the extent to which coalition survival is influenced by these same factors and argue that emergent properties of the coalition, such as commitment and trust, also facilitate longevity. Our review of the literature reveals that two factors specific to coalitions influence their success: coalition form and the nature of institutional targets. Interaction, communication technology, and the availability of physical and virtual spaces that facilitate communication are themes that run throughout our discussion, as they undergird many of the elements that shape coalition formation and survival. We conclude by evaluating the state of the research area and suggesting directions for further research. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article discusses the writings of the late American author Myrtle Mae Borsodi in relation to what the author refers to as feminist empowerment and back-to-the-land housewifery in the early twentieth century. Back-to-the-land social movements and political projects are addressed, along with American myths regarding individualist autonomy and independence. Self-sufficiency and Borsodi's husband Ralph Borsodi are examined, along with domesticity and household work.

Social movements struggle to gain acceptance as legitimate actors so that they can raise money, recruit members, and convince politicians to meet their demands. We know little, however, about how this legitimacy is granted by various political authorities, in part because legitimacy is often poorly operationalized. To operationalize legitimacy, I revise Charles Tilly's () classic concept of WUNC displays (i.e., public presentations of worthiness, unity, numbers, commitment) to assess how political authorities legitimize social movements. I analyze original data on the coverage the Tea Party and Occupy Wall Street received from 20 elite political blogs during a critical event early in each movement's development. I find that liberal and conservative blogs both use the same aspects of worthiness (and not unity, numbers, or commitment) to endorse their preferred movement but different aspects of unworthiness to denounce the movement they opposed. Conservative outlets were more partisan on both accounts. This suggests that these blogs' shared status as distinctly partisan political outsiders produces a similar, but not identical, relationship with social movements. While both sets of blogs legitimize and delegitimize a movement based on its specific strengths and weaknesses, conservative blogs act more as a partisan bullhorn and liberal blogs act more as a forum for debate. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Objective. How can social movements increase their presence in the news? We argue that press releases can do so via social movement framing. Press releases from, and news coverage of, social movement organizations (SMOs) in the gun control debate serve as our case. Methods. A qualitative framing analysis is conducted to identify frames in press releases from the National Rifle Association and the Brady Campaign. Logistic regressions assess the effect of frames in press releases on New York Times coverage of the gun control debate. Results. We find that both organizations use systematic framing strategies in their press releases. Only the Brady Campaign has a significant association between specific frames in its press releases and coverage in the New York Times. Conclusions. Press releases are viable tactics for SMOs, but biases in news media have implications for how effective press releases might be for an SMO. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Policies governing the sale of raw milk-making the sales of raw milk more permissive-are gaining traction on the legislative agendas of dozens of states. This paper examines one contributor to this movement on the policy agenda: the role of competitive framing. By combining theoretical approaches from policy studies and political psychology theories of competitive framing, we offer evidence supporting the recent relative success of raw milk activists in several state legislatures. Using an Internet survey-based experiment with a sample size of 1,630 respondents from seven Midwestern states, we show that a frame emphasizing consumer choice and food freedom is more effective than the frame that dominates among the policy establishment, that emphasizing public health risks. This is true in both one-sided and competitive framing contexts. We further show that those previously aware of this issue were less influenced by the public health frame than those naïve to the issue. Our results suggest that the pro-raw milk movement may be making strides on the state policy agenda because their frames are more resonant among the public. We also highlight the advantages gained from considering psychological and policy processes simultaneously to understand policy change. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Institutional scholars have argued that in the absence of legislation on the issue of climate change, nongovernmental organizations ( NGOs) can help reduce the amount of anthropogenic greenhouse gases being emitted to the environment by disseminating environmental norms. Consistent with this reasoning, they have shown that from the middle of the last century up through the mid-1990s, nations with more memberships in NGOs have tended to have lower carbon dioxide ( CO2) emissions in the aggregate. Doubts remain, however, about whether NGOs have reduced emissions in the time since and at the level of individual power plants where the lion's share of carbon pollution is emitted. Using plant-specific information on CO2 emissions recently collected by the Environmental Protection Agency ( EPA) under its Greenhouse Gas Reporting Program, we investigate the effects of local environmental NGOs ( ENGOs) on plants' environmental performance. Consistent with our expectations, we find that local ENGOs not only directly reduce plants' emissions but indirectly do so by enhancing the effectiveness of subnational climate policies that encourage energy efficiency. We discuss the implications of our findings for research on the decoupling of normative systems, social movements, environmental sociology, and the EPA's proposed Clean Power Plan. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Several scholars have pointed to a gap between the social movement and policy literatures, and argue that the failure of each field to incorporate the other creates a missing link in our understanding of how social movements and policy shape each other. This study provides an opportunity to make these links by applying John Kingdon’s multiple streams framework of agenda setting to the marijuana movement in Texas. Texas, an unlikely candidate for marijuana reform, was the site of sustained efforts to change marijuana laws during the 2015 legislative session. This research offers evidence about the ways in which social movements influence the policy process, and how the policy process responds to activist efforts. We find that despite well-organized movement efforts, political influence was limited. We argue that the reform movement’s inability to control activist participation presents additional challenges in a nonballot initiative state such as Texas. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The U.S. Constitution includes civil and political rights-as individual rights-but does not include what is internationally understood to be 'human rights,' namely rights we enjoy as equals, including economic, social, and cultural rights, and protections for vulnerable persons, such as children, minorities, mothers, and refugees. The United States has not ratified any international (United Nations) or regional (Organization of American States) human rights treaty, is not a party to the Rome Statute that established the International Criminal Court, and is no longer a member of the United Nations Educational, Scientific, and Cultural Organization. It might be concluded that Americans do not know what human rights are. It is more complicated than that. While opinion polls show that Americans often endorse individual rights-e. g., the rights of women-they do not frame them as being interdependent or being within the purview of government. Can we conclude that human rights have no place in the United States? Not at all. This article concludes by showing that many U.S. institutions of higher learning have programs in human rights and that some academic associations, including the American Sociological Association, recognize human rights. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The Tea Party Movement (TPM) is often discussed in terms of Americans for Prosperity, the Republican Party, and other well-funded, national groups. Yet, grounded ethnographic research reveals vibrant, independent, local organizations, which, while they do draw on nationally disseminated cultural images and discourses, are far from simple agents of the larger organizations and media. Relying on eighteen months of fieldwork among eight local Tea Party groups in central North Carolina, I argue that these small, locally situated groups are crucial components in the TPM and its effects. Using theoretical concepts from social movement studies and social practice theory, I analyze the ways personal and Internet-based social networks, media, and elite organizations are cocreating new political subjects, and demonstrate the importance of local, face-to-face political organizations in cultivating and animating these subjects. I suggest that localized political groups are important for long-lasting political transformations. [social movements, right wing movements, identity and agency, United States, American South] [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Racial conflict has been at the center of US society since its inception. Various theories have tried to explain why racial conflict arises and what the motivating factors are. The aim of this article is to examine one of these theories--ethnic competition--by reviewing the sociological literature from the 1970s to present that focuses on racial interest, ethnic competition, and racial threat. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In October of 2012, youth organizers from the immigrant justice and climate change resistance movements in the southeastern US metropolitan region of Atlanta, Georgia, coordinated a direct action tactic framed by a unified narrative justifying collaboration between immigrant and climate justice activists on equal terms. In a continuing collaborative relationship, these organizers embraced mutually strategic narratives rooted in local civil rights history, but rejected common 'global climate justice' narratives used to frame social and environmental collaborative organizing. We examine the departure from 'global climate justice' narratives, which was exemplified by coalition building in Georgia, to argue that scholarship articulating 'global climate justice' as a new context for integrating social and environmental movements must anticipate barriers to these solidarities, especially historical, regional and racialized dynamics of power among organizations engaged in these developing alliances. Based on an investigation of strategic alliances between anti-racist, immigrant justice organizers and climate change activists in the metropolitan areas of Atlanta and Athens, Georgia, we argue that climate justice narratives in both activism and scholarship would benefit from more attention to the particular political and cultural geographies in which diverse forms of climate justice organizing can take hold. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article is founded upon research that was inspired by the lovely community of the Northern Rivers Region and their passionate, artistic, and nonviolent way to protest against coal seam gas mining in the area. It was completed during the course of the Masters of Integrated Water Management which was instructed by the International Water Centre at the University of Queensland premises. Residents of the NRR claim that CSG Industry may pollute shared water resources, destroy the land, and ruin the scenery for them and future generations. Having little political, legislative or National Government support, the community organized and educated themselves in order to create a national grassroots organization called "Lock the Gate Alliance" that fosters policy changes to stop CSG activities unless it is proven safe for the environment, natural water resources, land, and health. The Alliance's activities follow principles of nonviolence and community participation, which have inspired creative and artistic ways to create awareness about current CSG processes, to educate people, to raise funds, and more. The inclusion of art expressions in the Alliance's social movements have encouraged resident participation, leading to increased social capital. As a result, the Alliance has progressed in the social movement lifecycle following a path to success. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

US academic Daniel Schlozman traces the difficult history of American radicalism, where social movements and mainstream politics come together. The rules of engagement are neither clear nor fair, he argues, but each side needs the other in order to build support and drive change. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Research has explored the ways in which communities respond to local polluting facilities. In some cases, residents mobilize to confront corporate and state polluters, whereas in other cases residents remain quiescent in the wake of documented environmental threats. The variation in community response is often linked to demographic variables, including age, gender, education, and length of residence; yet cultural factors remain largely unexamined. We examine how cultural factors such as community identity and memory mitigate the relationship between community residents and polluting facilities. We present a comparative study of two heavily polluted communities- Blackwell, Oklahoma, and Cañon City, Colorado-that had divergent responses to contamination. The data for these cases come from in-depth interviews with community residents and various officials ( N = 105), content analyses of newspaper coverage and relevant organization documents, and direct observation of meetings and organizing activities. Our findings indicate that cultural factors play a critical role in understanding the relationship between local residents and polluting facilities. We conclude by discussing the implications of our findings for future research on rural communities and environmental contamination. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Civil rights activists in 1968 hoped that the passage of the Fair Housing Act would lead to the residential desegregation of American society. In this article, I assess the degree to which this hope has been fulfilled. I begin by reviewing how the black ghetto came to be a universal feature of American cities during the twentieth century and the means by which high levels of black segregation were achieved. I then describe the legislative maneuvers required to pass the Fair Housing Act and review its enforcement provisions to assess its potential for achieving desegregation. After examining trends in residential segregation since 1970, I conclude with an appraisal of the prospects for integration as we move toward the fiftieth anniversary of the Act's passage. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Was the modern civil rights movement successful? I depart from traditional approaches that judge success in terms of political inclusion and policy response and instead ask 'ordinary' blacks what they thought. Using 1968 survey data, I find that while a slight majority (58%) believed that the movement successfully reduced racial discrimination, a sizable share (42%) saw failure. It seems most accurate to conclude that both perspectives resonated with large segments of the black population. I next examine who thought the movement a success and uncover that blacks of higher economic standing had the most faith in the movement's achievements. This result supports critics who thought that the poor were left behind by the movement's gains. Finally, while there was overall stability from 1968 to 2000 in opinion, the mid-1980s represented the nadir in thinking the movement successful. This development appears to have been a reaction to the racially hostile Reagan administration and the worsening economic position of blacks in the 1980s. Views on the civil rights movement, thus, are a living memory that can be altered by contemporary deleterious developments. I conclude by arguing that conceptualizations of success should be grounded in how movements impact the everyday lives of their constituency. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Consumer food cooperatives constitute a vital part of the alternative food movement in the United States, alongside farmers' markets, community-supported agriculture, community gardens and other initiatives. Like these efforts, food co-ops seek to counter the dominance of industrial agriculture and the decimation of local economies. Yet food co-ops wrestle with a paradox of exclusivity, whereby some practices and people are inadvertently left out in order to create conditions for a strong identification among others with particular ways of being and doing. This article explores the paradox of exclusivity through an in-depth study of two food co-ops in Philadelphia, PA. Exclusivity manifests itself in what the co-ops sell, their business practices, and how they market themselves to potential members. Overcoming the paradox of exclusivity requires efforts towards affordability, accessibility and reflective practice in order for co-ops to realize their transformative social and economic potential. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]