Communities, Identities and Social Movements

Abstract

The previous chapter questioned the binary approach — the view that culture, cultural strategies and cultural struggles were either top of the social transformation agenda, on the one hand, or a potentially harmful diversion, on the other hand. In place of such over-simplified polarities, it was suggested, the question was not so much whether, but how culture and cultural struggles were relevant, depending upon which definitions and which perspectives were being applied. This chapter raises a similar set of questions in relation to the analysis of Communities, Identities and Social Movements. The chapter starts by exploring the varying and contested meanings of the notion of ‘community’, whether ‘community’ has been defined in terms of geography or in terms of common interests and identities. This leads into some discussion of the concept of ‘identity’ itself, a concept which turns out to be no less problematic. The concluding sections of the chapter move on to explore varying perspectives on the New (and not-so-new) Social Movements in principle, and differing approaches to the role of social movements and community politics in practice.