The doors that culture opened: Parallels between social movement studies and social psychology

Abstract

During the last 30 years the study of social movements has changed dramatically, under the recognition of how important cultural meanings are to collective action and outcomes. Social movement studies has rediscovered a number of microlevel cultural mechanisms that have enriched our understanding of protest and social movements, bringing some subjective elements to a field that for a generation had been highly structural. These include the collective identities of political players, the dynamics of gender, the role of emotions, strategic choices, and the influence of leaders. In much of this work, sociologists and political scientists in social movement studies have worked in parallel to social psychologists, and there has been insufficient dialogue between the two traditions.