Movement Culture as Habit(us): Resistance to Change in the Routinized Practices of Resistance

Abstract

In this chapter I want to draw on the theoretical understanding of culture as implicit, routinized, taken-for-granted symbolic systems of meanings that individuals from shared locations (e.g. local, national, class, and social) have in common and that shape their interactions. This understanding of culture has a rich and diverse theoretical trajectory that is under-utilized in analysis of social movements,1 yet yields significant insight into the internal dynamics of social movement interaction. As such it provides a very fruitful conceptual tool for research into culture and movement, as I hope to illustrate. My aim here is not prescriptive - other understandings of culture capture important aspects of social movement dynamics. Rather, I want to show how this conception of culture, broadly defined, can illuminate internal movement dynamics, using the specific example of how it can hinder a sense of collective belonging or cohesion in movement groups, within the context of deliberative and coordinating practices. This forms part of a larger agenda to show how social theory, broadly defined, rather than social movement theory, narrowly conceived as a self-contained and self- referential subfield, can serve as a rich source of insights into social movement dynamics (Flesher Fominaya 2014). At the same time, I hope to show that the study of collective action provides fertile terrain for the advancement of social theory.KeywordsSocial MovementCollective IdentityMovement GroupTransnational NetworkSocial Movement DynamicThese keywords were added by machine and not by the authors. This process is experimental and the keywords may be updated as the learning algorithm improves.