Week 3: The Political Process Approach

Question 1

Who is the author of the ORIGINS of the political opportunity approach?

Answer 1

Tilly (1978)

Question 2

What are the origins of the political opportunity approach?

Answer 2

The polity model:
1. the polity consists of insiders and outsiders
2. coalitions form among insiders, among outsiders, and between insiders and outsiders
3. coalitions also form with forces entirely outside the boundaries of the polity
4. government action can sometimes facilitate protest, not just constrain it

Question 3

Who authored the political opportunity approach?

Answer 3

Tarrow (1998)

Question 4

Political opportunities vs. resources?

Answer 4

• opportunities are external to the movement – in the political environment
• resources are things that can be consumed and internalized by a movement
• opportunities might or might not be acted upon
• to act on them, they involve some element of perception

Question 5

How do opportunities work?

Answer 5

• opportunities have an effect because they change the likelihood of success
• they are not incentives but moments or sites that are propitious for action

Question 6

What is a political opportunity?

Answer 6

A condition that renders a target of mobilization more vulnerable and is therefore a propitious moment or venue for those excluded for mounting collective action. Renders a target more vulnerable to influence or weakens its ability to repress

Question 7

What are dynamic political opportunities?

Answer 7

The opening and closing of the system. Opening increases opportunities, closing decreases them.

Question 8

What are conditions that are considered dynamic political opportunities?

Answer 8

1. reforms that open access to participation by new actors (liberalization)
2. moments of leadership secession
3. the appearance of influential allies within the regime
4. visible conflict within the elite
5. elections
6. war
7. natural disaster

Question 9

What are static political opportunities?

Answer 9

Aspects of institutional design that affect the likelihood of success by challengers

Question 10

What has been the difference between open institutions & closed institutions?

Answer 10

Open institutions (like the US & Sweden) caused movements to work through established institutions, conducive to procedural changes

Closed institutions (like France & Germany) fostered more confrontational and disruptive strategies

More centralized systems (like France & Sweden) were more conducive to substantive policy gains by movements

Question 11

What are examples of institutional design and static political opportunity?

Answer 11

• federalism
• electoral rules
• forms of interest representation
• presidential system
• parliamentary system
• independent judiciary

Question 12

What are critiques of the political opportunity approach?

Answer 12

1. tendency for abuse - some define the concept so broadly that it becomes circular
2. how do we identify the presence of a political opportunity
3. some types of protest do not seem to be affected by political opportunities
4. critiques argue that opportunities are neither necessary nor sufficient for mobilization
5. the difficulties of engaging the perceptual dimension of opportunities
6. Can movements create their own opportunities? If so, does this invalidate the theory?

Question 13

Who authored the Critical Mass Approach ?

Answer 13

Marwell and Oliver (1993)

Question 14

What were the critiques of Olson from Marwell & Oliver? Aka – Critical mass approach

Answer 14

1. Olson fails to explain where the first movers come from (i.e. who provides selective incentives
2. Group size has a positive effect on the probability that a public good would be provided
3. Olson failed to take into consideration the ways in which people’s actions are interdependent (i.e. one person’s decision to participate affects another person’s decision to participate)

Question 15

Who defined the mobilization cycles?

Answer 15

Tarrow

Question 16

What is the mobilization cycles?

Answer 16

A phase of heightened conflict across the social system with a rapid diffusion of collective action from more mobilized to less mobilized sectors.

It involves a rapid pace of innovation in the forms of contention – the creation of new or transformed collective action frames; a combination of organized and unorganized participation; and sequences of intensified information flow and interaction between challengers

Question 17

What are the key features of mobilizational cycles?

Answer 17

1. An explosion in the number of protests and the number of participants in protests
2. diffusion of protest across multiple groups and sectors of society
3. protest as iterative and inter-related process - successful action incites further challenges and creates a sense of opportunity, both within and across groups; protest action can feed on itself, and prior actions alter the conditions under which subsequent actions can occur.

Question 18

What is the structure of mobilization cycles?

Answer 18

Early risers:
- role of opening political opportunities that sparks mobilization
- well-defined sense of identity and grievance
- may not be the most important movements within the cycle

Late risers:
- later timing within the cycle
- influenced more by the successful example of early risers and less influenced by the political opening

Diffusion processes
- central to mobilizational cycles
- action diffuses from structurally less advantaged groups through emulation
- not all groups mobilize; some remain quiescent or do not respond to efforts to mobilize
- is structured by the ability to draw analogies with prior successful mobilizers
- the critical role of media and communication channels

The master frame
- a general ensemble of concepts, slogans, and tactics that are shared across movements
- innovation in protest tactics associated with cycles

Violence within a mobilizational cycle increases over time

There are moments of madness – the symbolic height of the cycle, in which the dominant order appears come undone and everything seems possible

Heightened contingency within cycles and the critical role of momentum

Demobilization phase
- could accommodate and institutionalization of the challenges
- repression of challenges
- exhaustion