{"title":"SOCIAL MOVEMENTS AND “SOCIAL SECURITY”: POLICY IDEAS, DISCURSIVE RATIFICATION, AND THE U.S. OLD-AGE PENSION MOVEMENT","authors":"Edwin Amenta, Qindian Chen","doi":"10.17813/1086-671x-27-4-445","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.17813/1086-671x-27-4-445","url":null,"abstract":"Under which conditions can social movements influence discursive struggles over public policies? Policy ideas are embedded in any new movement-relevant legislation, including categories, frames, justifications, and narratives. Moreover, when legislation passes, it receives a “discursive ratification” in the news media, which interprets its meaning. These cultural aspects of legislation define the constituencies of social movements and influence future political group formation and policy development but are not much analyzed by scholars. We argue that it is more difficult for mass movement organizations to influence policy ideas than to influence the political agenda, votes for programs, or monetary upgrades in them because doing so requires different capacities and favorable political contexts. Also, influencing the discursive ratification of policy is more difficult than placing quotes or demands in the news. To illustrate and appraise these arguments, we examine the policy ideas behind and the national news coverage of U.S. old-age legislation during its formative years in the 1930s and 1940s. Specifically, we examine six key episodes in which the old-age pension movement had broad influence over legislative developments. However, only in some instances did the movement influence ideas in old-age policy or its discursive ratification, and sometimes its actions backfired. These analyses show that movements’ favorable influence over the benefits in policy may not translate into cultural influence.","PeriodicalId":151940,"journal":{"name":"Mobilization: An International Quarterly","volume":"100 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2022-12-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"126620178","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"PROTEST EVENT ANALYSIS MEETS AUTOCRACY: COMPARING THE COVERAGE OF CHINESE PROTESTS ON SOCIAL MEDIA, DISSIDENT WEBSITES, AND IN THE NEWS","authors":"Christian Göbel, H. Steinhardt","doi":"10.17813/1086-671x-27-3-277","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.17813/1086-671x-27-3-277","url":null,"abstract":"How accurate is media-elicited protest event data from autocracies where the state censors the media? Based on a source-specific model of event selection and a multisource dataset of over 3,100 protests from three Chinese megacities, we demonstrate the substantial advantages of using social media data, capturing 115 times more protests than English-language international news, 74 times more than domestic news, and 10 times more than dissident websites. Social media are most likely to cover small and nonviolent events that other sources often ignore. Aside from antiregime protests, they are less affected by censorship than often assumed. A validity test against public holidays and daily rainfall shows that social media data outperform dissident websites and traditional news. Social media, and to a lesser extent dissident media, are promising new sources for protest event analysis in autocracies. Scholars should treat news media-based event data from heavily censoring regimes with caution.","PeriodicalId":151940,"journal":{"name":"Mobilization: An International Quarterly","volume":"2 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2022-09-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"126191868","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"AN INTERSITUATIONAL ANALYSIS OF IDENTITY WORK: THE CASE OF THE SEXUAL TRAUMA SURVIVOR","authors":"Yael Findler","doi":"10.17813/1086-671x-27-3-335","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.17813/1086-671x-27-3-335","url":null,"abstract":"Existing social movement research acknowledges the situated, interactional nature of internal identity-work processes but lacks a framework for studying their intersituational dynamics. I argue that some identity-related tensions require multiple forms of identity work. Integrating social movements research with studies on meaning making in interaction, I further argue that members need shared, if implicit, patterns of switching among them to navigate these processes successfully. I use the case of the trauma survivor—a nonascribed, invisible, private identity. Twenty months of participant observation and fifteen interviews with an antisexual violence student organization show how members nimbly switched among facilitating survivors’ coming out, constructing survivors as a social identity, and constructing a group identity of survivors and allies. Each form of identity work entailed different interaction styles, went with varying perspectives on the survivor as a shared identity and allowed for various purposes and events in the organization.","PeriodicalId":151940,"journal":{"name":"Mobilization: An International Quarterly","volume":"15 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2022-09-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"132783969","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"PANTIES FOR PEACE: REFLEXIVITY IN THE DEPLOYMENT OF A HYPERLOCAL CAMPAIGN TROPE FROM MYANMAR","authors":"M. Ford, Thushara Dibley","doi":"10.17813/1086-671x-27-3-319","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.17813/1086-671x-27-3-319","url":null,"abstract":"Scholars of internet activism have comprehensively analyzed techniques for ensuring the success of online campaigns, but few have examined whether and how campaigns built around culturally specific tropes drawn from non-Western contexts can achieve traction with global audiences. This article addresses this question by tracking the use of a hyperlocal cultural trope relating to the impact of women’s sarongs (htamein) on men’s power in an awareness-raising campaign sparked by a violent crackdown against tens of thousands of protesters in Myanmar. We draw on in-depth interviews with the campaign’s originators and a content analysis of its online component to document how this trope transformed through three iterations over several years. In doing so, we examine the impact of processes of appropriative mediation and digital reflexivity, and the extent to which available technology shapes online campaigns.","PeriodicalId":151940,"journal":{"name":"Mobilization: An International Quarterly","volume":"77 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2022-09-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"127394345","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"MIXING WITH THE CROWD: HOW MOBILIZATION AFFECTS DIVERSITY IN DEMONSTRATIONS","authors":"J. de Moor, R. Wouters","doi":"10.17813/1086-671x-27-3-257","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.17813/1086-671x-27-3-257","url":null,"abstract":"The internal diversity of demonstrations speaks to fundamental debates about voice and equality, solidarity, social capital, and social movement success—yet is rarely empirically investigated. We study how mobilization distinguishes between internally diverse and homogenous demonstrations in terms of education and class. We use unique protest survey data from 16,134 participants in 76 demonstrations in nine European countries. We find that mobilization processes explain variation in internal diversity for education but hardly for class. Whereas informal mobilization decreases internal diversity, organizations’ involvement increases diversity. Diversity is also negatively affected by the presence of transmitters—protesters who are both asked to participate and who ask others. This homogenizing impact of transmitters is more pronounced in demonstrations more strongly dominated by informal mobilization processes. Our findings support recent arguments against the association between informal mobilization and demonstration diversity and stress the enduring relevance of formal organizing.","PeriodicalId":151940,"journal":{"name":"Mobilization: An International Quarterly","volume":"46 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2022-09-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"132300314","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"RESHAPING ALLIANCES AND REDRAWING BOUNDARIES: HOW INTERNATIONAL MIGRATION AFFECTED ITALIAN CIVIL SOCIETY","authors":"Cecilia Santilli, Roberto Scaramuzzino","doi":"10.17813/1086-671x-27-3-353","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.17813/1086-671x-27-3-353","url":null,"abstract":"Many conflicts in Italian politics have focused on migration policy. After the national elections in 2018, this conflict cut across all societal spheres and levels of governance and administration. On the one hand, tightening migration policies and criminalizing pro-migrant civil-society actors created a conflict between the government and many civil-society actors. On the other hand, civil-society and public-sector actors formed new alliances and lines of conflict at the local and national levels. This article analyzes the development of Italian civil society around the migration issue from the 1970s to 2019 from a relational perspective using the strategic action field approach. This approach offers a conceptual framework and an analytical model for studying behaviors and relations among different types of collective actors, including civil-society actors and public authorities.","PeriodicalId":151940,"journal":{"name":"Mobilization: An International Quarterly","volume":"42 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2022-09-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"124034531","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"VIOLENT REPRESSION, RELATIONAL POSITIONS, AND EMOTIONAL MECHANISMS IN HONG KONG’S ANTI-EXTRADITION MOVEMENT","authors":"Chit Wai John Mok","doi":"10.17813/1086-671x-27-3-297","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.17813/1086-671x-27-3-297","url":null,"abstract":"Emotions are essential for mobilization. In the face of violent repression, individual participants evaluate their relational positions in the interaction order within relation to other participants and compare their contributions. This evaluation leads to the arousal of emotions that help sustain mobilization. Using Hong Kong’s anti-extradition movement as a case and based on thirty-two in-depth interviews of participants, this article proposes two emotional mechanisms of sustained mobilization. Through the guilt mechanism, interviewees believed that some others were making more contributions, and felt sorry for failing to do more. Interviewees mobilized by the mechanism of moral pleasure and solidarity, on the other hand, argued that participants contributed equally. They took part in the movement out of the desire to fulfill their moral obligations, and they felt good to be part of the movement. The key factor distinguishing the mechanisms was how participants evaluated their positions and contributions compared to other participants.","PeriodicalId":151940,"journal":{"name":"Mobilization: An International Quarterly","volume":"34 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2022-09-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"115497016","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"LIFE-COURSE EFFECTS OF WOMEN’S POLITICAL ACTIVISM: PUBLIC AND PRIVATE TRAJECTORIES FROM ANTI-FRANCOISM TO THE 15-M IN SPAIN","authors":"Eva Espinar-Ruiz, Mónica Moreno‐Seco","doi":"10.17813/1086-671x-27-2-211","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.17813/1086-671x-27-2-211","url":null,"abstract":"Using life stories, this article analyzes the effects that youthful political participation during the final years of Spain’s Francoist dictatorship had on the public and private life-course trajectories for a group of activist women. Noteworthy among our conclusions is the fundamental role that political engagement plays, becoming a key element of the interviewed women’s identities. They associated political activity with mainly positive emotions, learnings, and empowerment, as well as with the creation of social networks that became especially relevant when reengaging in activism later in their lives. Similarly, their political activism favored the development of heterodox attitudes and behaviors. In general, their personal trajectories were marked by political and social commitments, regardless of the differences in relation to formal participation in political parties and other organizations.","PeriodicalId":151940,"journal":{"name":"Mobilization: An International Quarterly","volume":"4 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2022-06-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"128646855","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"FETAL ASPIRATIONS: THE HUMOROUS MEME AS A MOBILIZING TACTIC","authors":"Julia Mcreynolds-Pérez","doi":"10.17813/1086-671x-27-2-193","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.17813/1086-671x-27-2-193","url":null,"abstract":"This article analyzes the use of humor as a strategy for claims making and activist identity construction through visual production at face-to-face protests and Internet memes. Humorous visual images can serve multiple social movement purposes, including ridiculing and delegitimizing the opposition, neutralizing opponents’ claims, creating a fun and irreverent group identity, and fostering group cohesion through shared enjoyment. This article explores these issues through a content analysis of visual repertoires of contention in the mobilizations around the proposed legalization of abortion in Argentina in 2018, with a focus on the use of images of fetuses. This case is useful for theorizing the specific uses of humor as a social movement strategy, especially the role it plays in the relationship between two oppositional movements.","PeriodicalId":151940,"journal":{"name":"Mobilization: An International Quarterly","volume":"22 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2022-06-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"128861007","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"INDIGNATION AS AFFECTIVE TRANSFORMATION: AN AFFECT-THEORETICAL APPROACH TO THE BELGIAN YELLOW VEST MOVEMENT","authors":"Louise Knops, G. Petit","doi":"10.17813/1086-671x-27-2-169","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.17813/1086-671x-27-2-169","url":null,"abstract":"In social movement research, indignation features prominently as an affect that triggers protest and mobilization. Yet, scholarly accounts rarely unpack the precise ways in which indignation performs these roles, and how it transforms individuals who join mobilization. This article conceptualizes indignation as a moment of affective transformation, based on affect-theoretical insights and drawing on the empirical analysis of the Belgian yellow vest movement (BYV). Building on focus groups, participant observations, and interviews, we unpack the complex affectivity of indignation and the dynamics that underlie indignation in the context of protest and mobilization. We find that indignation enables three affective transformations: (1) it acts as a tipping point that follows from individual feelings of resentment; (2) it is a moment of affective resonance that binds individuals in affective communities, (3) it acts as affective bifurcation from the disempowered state of fear and towards the reclaiming of political power.","PeriodicalId":151940,"journal":{"name":"Mobilization: An International Quarterly","volume":"1 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2022-06-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"127949749","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}