Mobilization Without Organization: The Case of Unaffiliated Demonstrators

Abstract

Collective action literature tends to focus on how people are affiliated to mobilizing structures and on how being affiliated to these networks facilitates collective action participation. Much less attention is given to the fact that sometimes large proportions of the participants are not affiliated to the organizers’ networks. In this article, we discuss the dynamics of participation in street demonstrations for participants who are not affiliated to the organizers. How were they mobilized; what was their collective identity; and what was their motivation? Reporting data from a unique study of 69 street demonstrations in seven European countries, we compare the dynamics of participation by unaffiliated and affiliated demonstrators (n = 14,787). Fifty-one per cent of the demonstrators appeared to be unaffiliated to the organizers. The 69 demonstrations span the whole range from hardly anybody who is unaffiliated to the organizers to almost everybody. The article theorizes about why the proportion of unaffiliated demonstrators varies between demonstrations and how being unaffiliated impacts on the processes of mobilization, identification, and motivation. Our findings show that unaffiliated demonstrators are mobilized in different manners than affiliated demonstrators; moreover, patterns of identification differ, as do the strength and nature of their motivation.