Social movement final Flashcards
What were the major features of the Civil Rights Movement? When did it occur?
From mid 1950 to early 1970
The movement was an early rise/initiator movement of the protest cycle of the 1960s. It triggered future movements and people got energized/activated during those years. Lots happened in the 1960s
Local initiatives happened all over the US, cross-pollination (early ones inspired others in other states/regions)
Lots of tactical innovations and skills, and diversity in tactics
-TV became more popular, so people could watch what was happening in real-time and become more invested.
Also the first mediatized movement
Framing: rights, freedom, justice
Influenced followers and spin-off movements and lots of counter-movement
True/False
The Civil Rights Movement influenced followers and spin-off movement?
True
For example, the BLM which is a newer movement that is concerned with racial disparities, rights, freedom, and justice
What are three words that could describe the framing of the Civil Rights movement?
Rights, freedom, and justice
Name one counter-movement of the Civil Rights Movement.
KluKluxKlan
What is the context of the Civil Rights Movement? International
Cold War had political, cultural and military effects. Also lot of fear towards communists which was fought by having racists ideas
-During WWII, there was a little segregation, but when soldiers came back to the US, they came back to a segregated society.
-In 1948, the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (US was in violation of those rights)
-From 1940 to 1960 decolonization of Africa and Asia (it was colonized by France, British, Belgian, Spain, Italy)
What is the context of the Civil Rights Movement? Old grievances
The persistence of segregation
-voting rights
-Jim Crow Laws (1876-1965)
-Brown vs. Board of Education (1954) Kansas, at the federal level segregation was deemed unconstitutional, but at the state level they maintained the system of segregation by race.
What is the context of the Civil Rights Movement? Economic
Cotton economy
-Northern textile industrialists depended on access to cheap cotton, which in turn depended on the captivity of cheap Balck workforce. With the mechanization of the cotton industry, the prices of cotton started to fall.
This contributed to a poor/unstable economy
What is the context of the Civil Rights Movement? Political
-End of Reconstruction period (1877)
-Late 1800s/early 1900: Electoral competition between populits movement and planter elite
-Electoral disenfranchisement of Black (ex. Poll Taxes): The Texas poll taxes required otherwise eligible to pay between 1.50$ and 1.75$ to register to vote which is a lot of money for that time and a big barrier for working class and poor.
What were the demographic and structural changes after WWI
WWI immigration strops, the solution was internal migration.
This created pull/push factors after there were 3 million South-North migrations between 1940 and 1960 and rural migration within the South.
A political Process Account
In spite of grievances, there was no mass movement, people decided to focus on organizational resources and Political Opportunity Structure.
-static dimension of POS
-dynamic dimension of POS: demographic and structural changes, and new influential allies (certain groups and politicians who were concerned about the systematic depression), and positive state behaviour at the federal level
What caused the shift in the POS?
-Elite division
-Development of Indigenous organizations
-Decrease of social and violence which made the cost of collective action went down eg. the number of lynchings went down from the 30s
-Federal Supreme Court became more favourable to Civil Rights claims
What were the characteristics of
the tactics used during the Civil Rights Movement and name a few
Characteristics:
-A lot of variety and adapted to the environment but they still had a sense of urgency
-Drawn upon the nonviolent repertoire of Thoreau, Gandhi, and Balck churches
-Not spontaneous: the activists considered what were the appropriate tactics and thoroughly thought about it
Examples: Bus Boycott, Sit-Ins, Freedom Rides
Explain the Bus Boycott tactic in the Civil Rights Movement
-Initial focus on transportation and public accommodation
-Montogomery, AL, 1955-56
-The movement did a great job at selecting the right person to represent the face of this tactic, which is Rosa Parks. However, they were many other Black Americans who refused to sit in the back of the bus. This tactic created major problems for the bus companies because dozens of people refused to sit in the back every day, this was interrupting transportation.
-Local NAACP chapter, the Women’s Political Council (WPC), and Montgomery Improvement Association (MIA)
What were the effects of Bus Boycotts in the Civil Rights Movement
Bus systems gradually allowed people to sit wherever and full victory in November 1956.
Media coverage and diffusion of tactics- the media became a mechanism of scope enlargement early on
It also created organizational spin-off- Black people would go to white-only restaurants and refuse to leave
Churches began to function as the institutional center of protest by telling people to pay attention and support the brave people who engage in activism
The emergence of a national leader: MLK
Backlash
Explain Sit-ins tactics
Oklahoma 1958
Critical difference in the leading role of Black churches (Greensboro, NC, Feb 1 1960; Nashville, TN, Feb 13 1960; Deep South, March 1960),
They were not spontaneous but planned and coordinated and in varying geography.
This tactic started a bit later than the bus boycott.
What were the effects of Sit-ins in the Civil Rights Movement?
The victory was not immediate but gradual; business owners didn’t want them disrupting business so they allowed non-white customers in illegally
Media coverage and diffusion of tactics
Organizational spin-fof- follow this pattern of nonviolent civil disobedience
Explain the freedom rides from the Civil Rights Movement
A direct challenge to Jim Crow laws, 1961
CORE & SNCC & SCLC
more than 400 freedom riders- people were now targeting interstate bus companies.
Violent response increased during journey- counter protestors- KKK members would attack them, a bus got bombed for it.
What were the effects of freedom rides for the Civil Rights Movement
Victory, they were able to desegregate transportation but at the same time they encountered anti-civil rights groups that would use violence.
Inspiration and emulsion: the idea was to desegregate inter-state transportation
Why would someone engage in the civil rights movement?
-high cost and high risk, need to focus on specific instances of activism, attributes and ideological orientation are not enough, biographical and structural availability (prior links to political or social activism, being available and near the site of the SM),
-history of prior activism, prior contacts with activists & membership in multiple political organizations (many Canadians joined and went to the South and Americans too because their family/friends told them to participate), personal ties to other participants, progressive process- people gradually start to engage in the movement- students by writing papers, joining student unions, going to nearby protests with friends, then starting to become freedom riders.
What was the general framing of the Civil Rights Movement?
-turn passivity into action;
-diagnosis, blame attribution, prognosis;
-actors within the movement compete to impose their respective collective action frame;
-civil rights/christian frame (MLK); -revolutionary/nationalist frame (Malcolm X)
What frame did Martin Luther King brought to the Civil Rights Movement
-Reconciliation, redemption, inclusion; nonviolence; but also frustration.
Explain MLK Frame
-broken promises of the Declaration of Independence, reference is democracy and American ideal-
Letter from Birmingham jail
- “Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere”,
-“There are two types of laws: just and unjust.
Explain Just and Unjust laws from Letter from Birmingham Jail MLK
Just laws: I would be the first to advocate obeying just laws. One has not only a legal but a moral responsibility to obey just laws. Any law that uplifts human personality is just.
Unjust laws: one has a moral responsibility to disobey unjust laws”. Any law that degrades human personality is unjust. All segregation statutes are unjust because segregation distorts the soul and damages the personality. It gives the segregator a false sense of superiority and the segregated a false sense of inferiority.
What happened during Brimingham AL campaign (spring 1963)
-the police used dogs to disperse protestors- hard policing style.
-Children and teenagers marched to protest segregation- using children was another tactic-, many were arrested for parading without a permit but the marchers came back the next day, they were viciously knocked down in the streets by torrents of water from fire hoses wielded by policemen, were hit with batons or set upon by police dogs.
-MLK Jr. was held for a week after being arrested, during this time he wrote his “Letter from Birmingham Jail” and referred to the children as “the disinherited children of God”. The marches became known as the Children’s Crusade.
True or False the Children’s Crusade was a walk for the disinherited children of god? Civil Rights Movement
True
What name was given to the marches done by children when MLK was in prison?
The Children’s Crusade
What paramilitary group also used the ideology of Malcolm X?
the Balck Panthers
What is the frame that Malcolm X brought to the Civil Rights Movement?
He brought a revolutionary frame
Explain the frame of Malcolm X during the Civil Rights Movement
-slavery= Blacks are not Americans,
-Nationalism= loyalty not to the United States but the Black community,
-African unity and third world liberation movements, real change and freedom necessarily imply violence- if you want to achieve freedom you may need to use violence,
-core issue is land ownership= solution is separation so as to own the land
- black people needed to have access to and own their own land, solution of separation such as what would be black owned states.
What was the usefulness of Radical Competitors to MLK?
-the spectre of violence to appear as moderate and foster negotiation and compromise (a radical flank mechanism).
“I am further convinced that if our white brothers dismiss as ‘rabble-rousers’ and ‘outside agitators’ those of us who employ nonviolent direct action, and if they refuse to support our nonviolent efforts, millions of Negroes will, out of frustration and despair, seek solace and security in black nationalist ideologies—a development that would inevitably lead to a frightening racial nightmare.”- MLK, “Letter from Birmingham Jail”, 1963.
Civil Rights Act of 1964
This Act states that “all persons shall be entitled to the full and equal enjoyment of the goods, services, facilities, privileges, advantages, and accommodations of any place of public accommodation, as defined in this section, without discrimination or segregation on the ground of race, color, religion, or national origin,”- this was in direct response to the civil rights movement from the federal level. It also said that any persons are entitled to be free from discrimination on those grounds anywhere, and that no one could deny or impede on those rights or threaten anyone for interfering with any, or punish anyone for exercising their rights.
What brought the Civil Rights Movement to decline?
There were disagreements on tactics and goals,
-a relative decline of leading national organizations primarily after 1968, geographical shift of the movement from the South to the North and the West, which affected coordination capacity,
-and critical resources were invested in intra-movement struggles at the expense of movement goals.
What shift did the Political opportunity Structure bring the Civil Rights Movement to its decline? and other shifts in POS
State Adaptation
Legal harassment, non-violent mass arrests- people got huge fines and criminal records, dual adaptation: inclusion and control.
Other shifts in POS:
reframing, negative media coverage, loss of influential allies, and the intensification of the Vietnam War
What were the impacts of the shift in POS on the Civil Rights Movement?
They needed to invest more resources, needed to use more radical means and rhetoric, so the cost of collective action increased, the effectiveness of collection action decreased, the innovation and diffusion of tactics decreased, and the pace of insurgency and mobilization declined.
What are the key characteristics of the women’s movement?
-it was/is collective, extra-institutional, used unconventional means, collective identity, common beliefs, and enduring.
-It is a beyond state-targeted protest: a collective challenge to authority.
-It challenges laws but also state and religious institutions, redefines cultural code, beliefs, and categories, provides services (helping people in need, wants to support people and empower them, ex. women’s centers), and cultural activities.
-Women were constituencies
-It was both universal and particular- there were/are specific frames that are supposed to unite all women, ideas that unite movements, and some particular ideas). eg. different conditions in Canada than in India
-Resources and opportunities were gendered (use all resources and opportunities that can empower women)
True or False
One of the key characteristics of Women’s movements is that they can not become feminists.
False
Women’s movements can become- but are not necessarily- feminist. Even if there is an overlap between feminist and women’s movements, some groups strictly reject the feminist label
True or False
One of the key characteristics of the Women’s movement is that some people are from conservative women’s organizations and movements.
True
What is feminism?
-a collection of movements and ideologies that share a common goal: to define, establish, and achieve equal political, economic, cultural, personal, and social rights for women. This includes seeking to establish equal opportunities for women in education and employment.
-There are many varieties of feminism
-Feminism challenges patriarchy as a type of gendered social and power structure.
Name three main varieties of feminism
radical feminism- the radical dismantling of all forms of patriarchy,
liberal feminists- create equal opportunities and equal standing for all people, third-world feminists
intersectional feminists- challenged the Western idea of feminism.
How does feminism challenge patriarchy?
It challenges the liberal/public divide (that men are in the front, men represent the household, etc.- women should be in the center of the public sphere).
What are “women’s interests”? Is it hard or easy to know?
-it’s hard to say because women have so many different identities so how can someone be chosen to represent them? Who should represent them? What are women interested in? They aren’t all interested in the same thing.
-Feminists often deduce women’s interests from theory.
-Formation of collective identities.
-Beyond gender: Intersectionality
-Feminist organizations can expand to other issues
-Three Waves of feminist mobilization
Explain what intersectionality means
we don’t experience gender in isolation from other parts of our lives, metaphor of a busy intersection, different parts of one’s identity overlap, need to account for race, ethnicity, sexuality, etc. It’s a more nuanced understanding of how people live their lives.
True of False
The waves of women mob are the same in every country
False
CONTEXT, VARIABILITY, AND APPLICABILITY are IMPORTANT- can’t apply to places outside the West because they have a different history
What are the characteristics of the first wave of women mobilization?
-The Women’s movement is not a “new” social movement- it started in the 19th century as a result of discontent with what was going on.
-Emphasis on women was a key category.
-Emergence was a partial product of exclusionary practices in existing movements (women were marginalized, excluded, “forgotten” in many movements at that time- they didn’t represent their interests)
-Late 19th/early 20th century campaigns- this first wave was a major period of mobilization. Majority of activists were white, came from upper social classes, were educated, people with power and social standing.
-Included Transnational organizing
True of false
Before the first wave the women did not participate in other movement
False
many women participated in movements (ex. Labour movement) and had many issues that united them.
Explain the transnational organizing of the first wave of women mob
women in France organized with women all over Europe, even to Canada, and women in the states and Canada made links together.
What were the years and the key goals of each wave of women’s mob
First wave: late 19th to early 20th century- it focused on attaining basic social and political rights (The Suffragettes).
Second wave: 1960s-70s- “the personal is political” was a key frame- Women’s liberation. It included body autonomy (access to contraceptives, abortion, sexual liberation), and equal rights and opportunities. It shares similarities with the civil rights movement.
Third wave: early 1990s- present. It focuses on gender, patriarchy, and reconceptualization of feminism. It’s a reconceptualization of gender and womanhood, includes transgender issues, alternative understandings of womanhood, and is an ongoing process.
Fourth Wave??: 2010s. Some people say we’re in a fourth wave
Explain the Women’s Social and Political Union from Great Britain (1903-1917)
-The Pankhurst Family.
It was a militant movement- they were engaging in what we call today high-risk activism.
They were mostly rich and white so they would get better sympathy as someone who “lost their way” and could hire better lawyers.
From what wave of women’s mob did the Women’s Social and Political Union from Great Britain is from? Was it high risk activism or low risk activism?
First wave
High-Risk activism
What repertoire of action did the Women’s social and Political union from Great Britain used?
from demonstrations, petitions, and pickets to hunger strikes, spitting at police and politicians, and night-time arson.
They believed in “Deeds not actions”- actions mattered more than words, they had had enough words and it was time for action.
The Suffragettes in prison went on hunger strikes (serious acts of defiance) and were force fed (police couldn’t risk getting in trouble from their families, were seen as women who needed protecting).
What are the characteristics of the second wave of women’s mobilization?
-Post WW11 (1950s-1970s): It was a time of big structural changes.
Shifts in the Political Opportunity Structure
Organizational Forms and goals: institutionalization of the women’s movement
Ambiguous legacy of previous movements: There was a rise of identity politics (political arguments that focus upon the interest and perspectives of groups with which people identify.
Explain what is the rise in identity politics during the second wave of women mob and how it affected the movement
Identity politics includes the ways in which people’s politics may be shaped by aspects of their identity through loosely correlated social organizations- ideas coming from one’s experiences and identity) sense of marginalization inside previous and existing movements (Civil Rights, New Left), internal debates about alliances with men, tensions between founding members/newcomers and insiders/outsiders-
we see this online today in a major way- there’s lots of passionate debates between groups and they try to cancel eachother, fighting one another instead of joining one another.
These organizations were often funded with public money which required accountability. There were also organizational changes and splits.
