Playing the scales: A strategy adopted by resistance coalitions for public value creation

Abstract

Local actors can defend public value by mobilizing resistance coalitions against threats from higher spatial scales. Drawing on existing scholarship on resistance movements and public value creation, this paper proposes a theoretical framework for understanding how local actors can protect public value from threats of rescaling driven solely by hegemonic discourses and presents a strategy that we call “playing the scales.” Our case study analyzes a Local Action Group’s resistance to a state-imposed and EU-framed regulation that threatened local forms of value creation on the Croatian peninsula of Pelješac. Employing a longitudinal participatory approach, our findings outline the strategy of playing the scales, which involved three key tactics: gathering relevant knowledge from various scales; crafting an alternative narrative; and leveraging this narrative across scales to reshape the dominant organizational logic. The study contributes to the understanding of public value creation by showing how it can be defended by resistance coalitions that are capable of playing the scales. It also sheds light on alternative dynamics of rescaling that, rather than oppositional resistance to higher scales or attempts to scale up micro-practices can also be driven by trans-scalar alliances that inscribe the interests of local communities into dominant discourses.