Afterword: Transnational Activisms in Social Movement Studies

Abstract

The research collected in this volume not only takes up concepts from social movement studies, but also enriches them by providing knowledge about various types of transnational activists. It also encourages the dialogue, as yet only sporadic, between historians and social scientists and enriches the understanding of transnational activism, showing interesting precedents for cosmopolitan activities and helping to dispel the view that cosmopolitanism is only a recent phenomenon. Finally, it points to the unresolved question addressing the very meaning of transnationalism by examining many different types of activists, showing how different contexts brought about different types, a point which this chapter aims to further stress by comparing the Global Justice Movement at the turn of the millennium with the anti-austerity protests about a decade later. This collection therefore offers a very important contribution for the development of social movement studies, which in the future we hope will encourage further research considering other geographic areas and historical periods, as well as further interdisciplinary and cross-time comparisons.