Week 4: Identity, Culture, and Emotion Flashcards
New social movement theory
- was aimed at explaining the broader question of movement emergence
- theories focus on culture-change and identity as a key explanatory variables, but linking these with broader processes of social change
social change -> cultural change -> movement
How did new social movements differ from old social movements?
- Different social bases – workers vs. middle class
- focused not on economic gains per se but on lifestyle issues
What are the 2 versions of new social movement approach?
- post-Marxist (Offe) – reflection of the emergence of post-industrial society
- cultural (values) perspective (Ingelhart) – rise of post-materialist values
What is the post-Marxist approach
new social movements were movements of resistance against the bureaucratization and rationalization of social life characteristic of modern capitalism
- against manipulation, control, dependence, bureaucratization, and regulation
- for self-autonomy and identity
- rejection of the state as a source of social support
- reconstitution of civil society
- focus on lifestyle issues – create an autonomous space
- the expression of personal identities is part of the purposes of the movement itself
What is the cultural (values) perspective?
- Inglehart demonstrated the presence of a values shift from materialist to post-materialist that is generationally based
- presence of post-materialist values was the strongest predictor of whether an individual participated in environmental or peace movements
- new social movements arose because of the emergence of new post-materialist values that emphasized identity, respect, and self-fulfillment
- this, combined with cognitive mobilization (the skills and awareness needed for political participation) explained individual-level participation in new social movements.
What were the important contributions of the new social movements approach?
- provided a coherent theory of social change and connected it with the emergence of certain types of movements
- pointed to the central role of identity within social movements (the expressive dimension of movement participation)
What are the critiques of new social movement approach?
- seriously overstated the novelty of the movements that it analyzed (these movements were not entirely new)
- the theory could not explain the fate of new social movements since the 1960s, or the unexpected apperance of ‘new’ social movements in the 3rd world
- limits as a general theory of social movements
What is identity?
A categorization of individuals who are posited to share a common set of characteristics, affinities, or sense of group-ness
- are simultaneously individual and collective
- draw boundaries between individuals (a sense of otherness)
- are learned (sometimes assigned) through participation in social relationships
- are imbued with cultural meaning to varying degrees
- all individuals have multiple identities; the degrees to which each is salient varies over time
Why are identities important for mobilizational processes?
- a strong sense group-ness is one of the solutions to the collective action problem (strong identities can generate a normative obligation to provide public goods for the group)
- identities usually contain networks and institutions that can act as a structural basis for mobilization
- since identities are always created in reference to something else (an ‘other’) they often contain a built-in sense of conflict that establishes targets against which to mobilize
- since identities can be thick with meaning, they ca imbue mobilization with the power of symbols and emotions, increasing the level of commitment of individuals to collective action and reducing the costs of coordinating mobilization
- fostering a strong sense of identity itself can sometimes be a goal of movements – what is often referred to in social movement theory as ‘identity work’
What can happen as a result of culture in mobilization?
- there can be certain advantages in terms of networks and resources for mobilization, as well as a sense of solidarity
- opportunities for mobilization may revolve around the religious calendar rather than a secular calendar
- the symbolic capital shared by religious groups imbues a sense of emotion into mobilization, helps to sustain commitment, and lowers the costs of communication and the need for organization by functioning as a coordinating device
- the other-worldly nature of religious belief can alter significantly the cost-benefit calculations of protestors and sustain high-risk activism
Ways of thinking about culture in mobilization processes?
- as webs of meaning
- as a toolkit
- as a mechanism of control
- as a performance
What are the role of symbols in mobilizational processes?
- symbols are useful for challenging superior forces by allowing for a coded and indirect interaction
- symbols are widely understood and contain emotional power
What is the ‘narratives of spontaneity’?
- used to explain the origin of movements
- protest understood not as an act of agency, but as an unstoppable moral force over which participants themselves had no control
- make it appear as if mobilization was instinctual, necessary, inevitable, powerful, and emotional
Who authored the transcripts of resistance?
Scott
What is the hidden transcript of resistance?
- occurs behind the back of power
- transcript = roles that are acted out, often fro audiences (private and public)
- exists within a context of domination, as a substitute for voice or protest
- very rarely seen by the dominant or by outsiders
