Social Movement as Cognitive Praxis: The Case of the Student Movement and the Labor Movement in Hong Kong

Abstract

The study of social movements has until recently been concerned mainly with their causes, their course of development, and their demise. The major theoretical positions have been classified by Doug McAdam (1982) into three models: the classical model, the resource mobilization model, and the political process model. The theoretical advancement has proceeded from a focus on the social structural causes of social movements (classical model), to an emphasis on the resources and mobilization of challenger groups (resource mobilization model), culminating finally in an approach which perceives social movements as the end product of the confluence of political opportunities, the organizational strength of the challenger groups, and the cognitive liberation of the prospective movement participants (the political process model).