An Insider's Critique of the Social Movement Framing Perspective.

This article addresses the concerns related to the issue of framing perspective and the increasing popularity it has gained among social movement researchers and theorists. In general the framing perspective has made significant contributions to the social movements field. It has infused new enthusiasm for the analysis of ideational, interpretive, constructivist, and cultural dimensions of collective action. It has moved the field beyond the structural determinism of resource mobilization and political opportunity models and away from the dubious psychology of rational choice approaches. Whether its impact will continue, and to what extent, remains to be seen. The prospect that the framing approach will produce an enduring legacy could be enhanced by addressing several noteworthy shortcomings prevalent in the current literature. One or more of these weaknesses characterize most social movement analyses. But these foibles seem particularly acute in the case of the framing perspective. Underlying the descriptive bias in the movement framing literature is the tendency to focus on frames as "things" rather than on the dynamic processes associated with their social construction, negotiation, contestation, and transformation. Movement scholars have been more inclined to attend to frames rather than to framing.