Grassroots Mobilization Research Articles

Review: Promoting Democracy: The Force of Political Settlements in Uncertain Times, by Manal A. Jamal

Review: <i>Promoting Democracy: The Force of Political Settlements in Uncertain Times</i>, by Manal A. Jamal

From the Streets to the Voting Booth: the Electoral Effect of Grassroots Mobilization Against the Far-Right

Far-right scholars have focused extensively on the causes and consequences of far-right success, while not much attention has been directed towards what citizens and the civil society can do to tackle this phenomenon. Focusing on the surge of an anti-far-right social movement -the Sardine- during the 2020 Italian regional elections, we test whether grassroots mobilization is an effective tool to curb far-right parties’ electoral performance. Employing municipality-level data on electoral results, Sardine rallies and far-right events, we exploit a difference-in-differences design to identify the effect of local exposure to Sardine mobilization on the municipal electoral performance of far-right parties. The results suggest that local exposure to a Sardine event has a strong negative effect on far-right electoral results.

THE LEBANESE STUDY COMMITTEE: A CHRISTIAN THINK TANK IN WARTIME LEBANON (1975–1982)

AbstractThis article seeks to shed light on the Lebanese Study Committee, an overlooked centre of intellectual production and political activity during the Lebanese Civil War. It was comprised of legal experts and Maronite monks of the Lebanese Maronite Order, and emerged at the Holy Spirit University of Kaslik in 1975. The committee was created at the initiative of the Catholic clergy in order to endow the Christian war effort with an ‘intellectual pole’ capable of studying recent developments and provide solutions aimed at defending the interests of the Christian society. By making use of hitherto inaccessible primary sources, its internal and external publications, the article elucidates the activities and ideas of the committee, which worked to counteract leftist discourse and propaganda. By paying attention to the context of the Lebanese Study Committee's emergence, the article also brings to light a history of interaction between lay, clerical, state, and para-military institutions. It concludes that its creation is the direct consequence of the grassroots mobilization of conservative agents, which is reminiscent of the ways in which Western conservatism was revived in the same years.

Shifting Discourse on Climate and Sustainability: Key Characteristics of the Higher Education Fossil Fuel Divestment Movement

In the last decade, the fossil fuel divestment (FFD) movement has emerged as a key component of an international grassroots mobilization for climate justice. Using a text analysis of Facebook pages for 144 campaigns at higher education institutions (HEIs), this article presents an overview and analysis of the characteristics of the higher education (HE) FFD movement in the US. The results indicate that campaigns occur at a wide array of HEIs, concentrated on the east and west coasts. Primarily student led, campaigns set broad goals for divestment, while reinvestment is often a less clearly defined objective. Campaigns incorporate a mixture of environmental, social, and economic arguments into their messaging. Justice is a common theme, used often in a broad context rather than towards specific populations or communities impacted by climate change or other social issues. These insights contribute to the understanding of the HE FFD movement as ten years of campus organizing approaches. In particular, this study illustrates how the movement is pushing sustainability and climate action in HE and in broader society towards a greater focus on systemic change and social justice through campaigns’ hardline stance against fossil fuels and climate justice orientation.

AN INTERSECTIONAL THEORY OF STRATEGIC DECISIONS: MUSLIM AMERICAN IMMIGRANTS AND THE DILEMMAS OF POLICING*

When faced with a collective dilemma, why do individuals from the same group perceive their strategic choices differently? A growing actor-centered stream of social movements research shows that strategic decision making is a cultural process where actors decide upon a strategy by drawing on past experiences to make sense of the present and anticipate what might happen if they act in a particular way. However, actors’ past experiences are not only contextual and variable, they are also patterned by social location. It is in these patterns that we can better understand the relationship between structure and agency in processes of social change. Integrating an intersectional framework, I draw on evidence from forty focus groups with about 200 Muslim community members discussing the policing of Muslim communities. I find that perceptions of agency are patterned across intersections of race and ethnicity, gender, class, and nativity, driving three central interpretations of the dilemma and strategic decisions: fear and disengagement; anger and grassroots mobilization against police; and neutrality and collaboration with police.

Two factors, one direction towards social regulation policy convergence: Learning from policy experts in Norway and India

Two significantly different countries such as Norway and India have adopted similar social regulation policies aimed at the employment of disabled people since the 1990s. Countries can adopt social regulation policies, such as anti-discrimination provisions, owing to multiple factors. This article uncovers two common factors leading to policy convergence within social regulation reforms aimed at the employment of disabled people in Norway and India. An exploratory qualitative case study was conducted, wherein 25 policy experts (11 from Norway and 14 from India) were interviewed. Findings from expert interviews indicate that the observed policy convergence are connected to two trends that can be detected both in Norway and India. The first concerns the influence of international treaties; the second concerns grassroots mobilization of disabled people and their organizations. Findings point towards increasing internationalization of social regulation policies and these policy developments transcend the global North and global South divide.

"A Monument to Blackness"

Murals have been present at pivotal moments during the Black freedom struggle, yet they remain on the margins of scholarship. Birthed during the Harlem Renaissance, cresting in the streets during Black Power, and resurrected today during #BlackLivesMatter, murals are radical, visual counterparts to the spoken politics of a movement. This article highlights the instrumental role murals played in fostering Black unity and empowerment in grassroots mobilizations since the 1920s. It introduces their complex, malleable roles as touchstones of communication, sites of ritual, visual tombstones, and talismans of a new Black consciousness, demonstrating how they became what a 1968 newspaper called “a monument to blackness.”

Grassroots Mobilizations, Social Media and Civic Culture in Canada.

Grassroots Mobilizations, Social Media and Civic Culture in Canada.

Voice and Listening in Social Media Facilitated Activist Collectives

This paper examines the articulation of Canadian civic culture from below. Focusing on digitally mediated grassroots mobilizations, it asks how citizens construct and discursively deploy voice and listening as civic values. The paper draws from three empirical cases: the 2014 mobilization of parents during the teachers’ strike in British Columbia; the 2015 citizen mobilizations in support of Syrian refugees; and the 2016 sit‐in protest outside the Toronto Police headquarters. Citizens participating in these initiatives were keen to “speak up,” establishing voice as a civic value. Yet, this is not accompanied by equal attention to the role of listening. This invites simplistic takes to citizen participation, leaving it vulnerable to populist hijackings.

How did Wuhan residents cope with a 76-day lockdown?

Wuhan, the original epicenter of the COVID-19 outbreak, was under strict lockdown for 76 days. We conducted 30 in-depth interviews to understand Wuhan residents’ lived experiences of lockdown life. We found that despite strong emotions initially, Wuhan residents quickly adapted to life under unprecedented lockdown. We identified three pre-existing structures that facilitated the effective implementation of the massive lockdown: ready-made containment units offered by urban “gated” housing, a comprehensive grassroots governance network coordinated by shequ (community residence committees), and the ubiquitous WeChat app in Chinese daily life. We also showed that the pre-existing structures provided space for uncontentious self-organizing, grassroots mobilization, and civic engagement that often dove-tailed with state-mandated measures. This study details the resources Wuhan residents drew upon to get by during the lockdown, and it illustrates that the feasibility of lockdown measures relies heavily on a society’s structural and institutional conditions.

From Black Power to Broken Windows: Liberal Philanthropy and the Carceral State

During the 1960s, the Ford Foundation was one of the largest philanthropic organizations in the United States. This article examines the shifting strategies which Ford deployed in an attempt to tackle urban disorder in U.S. cities between 1965 and 1982. From 1966 to 1969, Ford engaged in a series of experimental projects which sought to dampen unrest through “community action” and grassroots mobilization, many of which required working with Black Power organizations. Yet, after this generated considerable political controversy, the foundation shifted toward funding liberal police reform, establishing the Police Foundation in 1970, a Washington-based organization whose research provided the intellectual underpinning for “Broken Windows” policing. Studying the Ford Foundation’s programming during this period can illuminate the understudied contribution of liberal philanthropy to the rise of the carceral state, as well as the connections between the grassroots antipoverty efforts of the 1960s and the punitive turn of the 1970s.

“No Med School!” Black Resistance to The New Jersey College of Medicine and Dentistry (NJCMD) Urban Renewal Proposal, Between 1960 and 1970

This article is a historiographical study of urban renewal in Newark, New Jersey. The paper offers a cross-sectional view of policymaking and appropriation at the federal and local levels, which is critical when analyzing the delimitations of ethnic coalition building. The article centers on a typological study of Black resistance to the New Jersey College of Medicine and Dentistry (NJCMD) construction project that was slated to commence around 1965-1966. NJCMD, renamed the University of Medicine and Dentistry, New Jersey (UMDNJ) in 1981, was initially proposed as a revitalization project that would stymie urban decay in Newark. However, the project proposal would also displace close to 22,000 people in the Central Ward—a predominately poor, majority Black section of Newark. Using social movement scholarship, specifically the literature on resource mobilization during the mid-twentieth century Civil Rights Movement, this article examines the distinct ways that Black residents of Newark responded to the NJCMD project. The response involved community board meetings, rallies, and surveys that ultimately led to significant overhauls of NJCMD’s initial design. Black resistance to NJCMD also culminated in the 1970 election of Kenneth Gibson, Newark’s first Black mayor. Key concepts such as “collective action framing” and “frame diffusion” inform this study of grassroots mobilization and community resistance. Also included in this work is an exploration of Black Power politics, its key figures in Newark, and the impact that such solidarity movements had on municipal politics. A thorough analysis of “pressure politics” and “protest politics” in the public sphere will also shed light on how racial exclusion frames elections and electorates.

Corporate Grassroots Mobilization: The Role of Self-Interest and Moral Proclivity

This paper draws on the corporate political strategy, social movements, and legitimacy literatures in proposing a conceptual framework that explicates the essential role of self-interest and moral inclination in firms’ ability to engender political mobilization on the part of their stakeholders. In forwarding this theoretical model, I argue that firms can induce mobilization through appealing to constituents’ self-interest in the traditional economic since, as well as through embedding constituents’ political modus operandi within the firm’s political strategy. While with respect to moral inclination, I assert that firms will be able to induce mobilization by their stakeholders when they are perceived as possessing admirable dispositional characteristics, when their actions consistently lead to positive outcomes, when they utilize socially accepted structures, policies, and procedures for their operations that demonstrate a commitment to prosocial behavior, and when they have a charismatic leader who embodies the values of stakeholders. In substantiating our theoretical claims, I provide case examples of firms that have successfully mobilized their stakeholders through the aforementioned mechanisms (i.e. self- interest and moral inclination in their various manifestations).

A Vanguard for the Counterrevolution: “Catholic Action” and the Transnational Project of La Ciudad Católica in Argentina, 1959-1976

This article examines the impact of La Ciudad Católica, an organization formed in 1959 by French and Argentine lay activists who coined and proposed a counterrevolutionary interpretation of Catholic social doctrine. Prompted by the rise of progressive Catholicism, Argentina’s internal crises, and the global Cold War, Ciudad Católica advocated the formation of a counterrevolutionary vanguard and the grassroots mobilization of an “Army of God” to counter the threat of “revolutionary war” and build a new Christian state. While partaking in a transnational network of counterrevolutionary Catholicism, these activists provided theological justifications for “anti-subversive war” and the dismantling of the liberal state.

Fatherland, faith, and family values: anti-liberalism and the desire for difference among Russian grassroots conservatives

ABSTRACT This is a revised and extended version of my contribution to the Vega Symposium on Resurgent Nationalisms and Populist Politics in the Neoliberal Age, held at the Swedish Academy of Sciences, Stockholm, in April 2018. It is part of a Special Issue of Geografiska Annaler, Series B which also includes articles by Gillian Hart, Kanishka Goonewardena, and Manu Goswami. The article investigates how understandings of the concept ‘liberalism’ have shifted among ultranationalist Russian grassroots as the ‘roll-back’ neoliberalism (in Peck and Tickell’s terms) of the turbulent 1990s has developed into ‘roll-out’ governance during Putin’s presidency. A moral conservative Russian grassroots mobilization is traced from its origins as a crusade against sexual education in the late 1990s, to a campaign against reforms of the state child protection system initiated in the mid-2000s. In this time span, understandings of ‘liberalism’ as chaos and elimination of boundaries have been superseded by an image of liberalism as totalitarianism, a conception resembling academic criticism of neoliberal governmentality despite the movement’s rejection of the purportedly ‘liberal’ Academy. The principal rejection of ‘liberalism’ is in practice mitigated also by ideals of communitarianism and civic engagement bearing many similarities to Western notions of ‘civic liberalism’.

Rebellious Parents: Parental Movements in Central-Eastern Europe and Russia by F�bi�n Katalin (review)

SEER, 98, 3, JULY 2020 594 Fábián, Katalin and Korolczuk, Elżbieta (eds). Rebellious Parents: Parental Movements in Central-Eastern Europe and Russia. Indiana University Press, Bloomington and Indianapolis, IN, 2017. x + 364 pp. Illustrations. Notes. Works cited. Index. £40.00 (paperback). Notwithstanding the constantly evolving dynamics of social activism around the globe and scholarly interest captured by social movements, certain regions still have a tendency to be overlooked and misrepresented. This ‘scholarly negligence’ is particularly significant in the studies of Russian and Central-Eastern European regions since they remain stigmatized as having dormant and monolithic societies. The volume, Rebellious Parents: Parental Movements in Central-Eastern Europe and Russia, presents us with a welcome departure from the stigmatizing approach to studying these former Eastern Bloc societies. It is edited by Katalin Fábián, whose research is concerned with the intersection of gender and globalization as they influence various policy processes of emerging democracies, and Elżbieta Korolczuk, a researcher of civil society, social movements and gender studies. The book consists of twelve chapters where a number of scholars, through their analysis of various aspects of parental activism, not only challenge the still prevalent prejudices but also provide us with a structured contribution (both theoretical and empirical) to the relatively underexplored field of scholarly venture. Among other relevant topics, the volume sheds light on the particularities and dynamics of fathers’ movements, new reproductive technologies, natural childbirth movements, resistance against mandatory vaccinations, and advocacy for children with intellectual disabilities in the Russian and Central-Eastern European context. The introduction is followed by Tova Höjdestrand’s ‘Nationalism and Civicness in Russia: Grassroots Mobilization in Defence of “Family Values”’, which provides us with a thorough discussion of conservative grassroots mobilization through an in-depth exploration of the concepts of ‘civil society’ and ‘civic activism’ as they relate to the contemporary sociopolitical context of Russia. Höjdestrand’s essay stands in contrast to Olena Strelnyk’s ‘Conservative Parents’ Mobilization in Ukraine’ which follows. Even though parent activists in both countries share worries about ‘lurking threats’ of homosexuality (which is quite often perceived as metonymous with paedophilia), sexual education in schools and the ‘Western import’ gender, they also have differences concerning their agendas and tactics to achieve them. Ukrainian activists, unlike their Russian counterparts who tend to signal their distancing from ‘dirty party politics’, have a history of cooperation with the state as well as transnational institutions. Perhaps the most significant of these was the campaign against European Union accession. In ‘Constructing Parenthood and Nation in Bulgaria through New Reproductive Technologies’, Ina Dimitrova explores REVIEWS 595 the notion of ‘reactionary techno-progressivism’, which is used as the agendaachieving strategy by individuals seeking assistance from reproductive technologies in Bulgaria. The author concludes that ‘this health movement invokes culturally reasonable frames, which greatly enhances its efforts to gain public support-being symbolic as well financial’ (p. 107). ‘In the Name of the Family and the Nation: Framing Father’s Activism in Contemporary Poland’, by Elżbieta Korolczuk and Renata E. Hryciuk, provides a thorough study of Polish father movements, including groups like ‘Centre for Father and Children’s Rights’ (Centrum Praw Ojca i Dziecka), ‘Brave Dad’ (Dzielny tata), as well as ‘Cyril and Methodius Foundation’ (Fundacja Cyryla i Metodego). The essay emphasizes three major frames employed by the father activists: ‘misogynist’, ‘gender equality’ and ‘state violence’. On the other hand, Steven Saxonberg’s ‘Down and Out in a “Femo-Fascist” State: The Czech Father’s Discussion Forum’, discusses the notion of marginalized masculinity in the context of divorced father activists in the Czech Republic. According to Saxonberg, divorce has a tendency to generate a sense of lost status, which pushes fathers to turn to marginalized masculinity. This provides men with a safe haven, which allows them to act beyond the framework of hegemonic masculinity, i.e., in a highly emotional and aggressive manner. The behaviours assigned to marginalized masculinity stand in stark contrast to hegemonic masculinity, which is considered to be a context-dependent concept, and in the Czech case is seen as less ‘macho’ or emotional and rather milder or more reserved than the typical version of ‘extroverted’ hegemonic masculinity found in Western...

The political socialization of Latinx youth in a conservative political context

Drawing on semi-structured interviews, participant observations, surveys, and voting records, this mixed-methods study investigates Latinx youths' political socialization and grassroots organizing efforts in a conservative, anti-immigrant regional context. This investigation makes three contributions. First, findings suggest that under hostile political contexts, vertical (adult-to-youth) forms of political socialization may rarely guide Latinx youth in taking political action, and may sometimes even discourage participation. Second, we show that, despite political opposition, youth organizing groups can function as vehicles of horizontal (peer-to-peer) socialization, bolstering members' political engagement and providing them with valuable civic knowledge and skills. Third, youth-led grassroots mobilization efforts can increase young voter turnout, as evidenced by our experimental findings. We argue that grassroots youth organizing groups can empower their members to operate as agents of political socialization among a peer constituency that extends far beyond their friendship networks and schoolmates.

The Healthy Hawai\u2018i Initiative: insights from two decades of building a culture of health in a multicultural state

BackgroundThe Healthy Hawai‘i Initiative was created in 2000 with tobacco settlement funds as a theory-based statewide effort to promote health-supporting environments through systems and policy change. Still active today, it is imbedded explicitly in a multi-sectoral, social ecological approach, effectively striving to build a culture of health before this was the name for such an ambitious effort.MethodsFrom interviews with key informants, we analyze two decades of the Healthy Hawai‘i Initiative (HHI) in the context of the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation (RWJF) Culture of Health Action Framework (CHAF). We list HHI accomplishments and examine how the Initiative achieved notable policy and environmental changes supportive of population health.ResultsThe Healthy Hawai‘i Initiative started with an elaborate concept-mapping process that resulted in a common vision about making “the healthy choice the easiest choice.” Early on, the Initiative recognized that making health a shared value beyond the initial stakeholders required coalition and capacity building across a broad range of governmental and nonprofit actors. HHI coalitions were designed to promote grassroots mobilization and to link community leaders across sectors, and at their height, included over 500 members across all main islands of the state. Coalitions were particularly important for mobilizing rural communities. Additionally, the Initiative emphasized accessibility to public health data, published research, and evaluation reports, which strengthened the engagement to meet the shared vision and goals between diverse sector partners and HHI. Over the past two decades, HHI has capitalized on relationship building, data sharing, and storytelling to encourage a shared value of health among lawmakers, efforts which are believed to have led to the development of health policy champions. All of these factors combined, which centered on developing health as a shared value, have been fundamental to the success of the other three action areas of the CHAF over time.ConclusionsThis evidence can provide critical insights for other communities at earlier stages of implementing broad, diverse, multifaceted system change and fills a key evidence gap around building a culture of health from a mature program in a notably multicultural state.

Planning amid crisis and austerity: in, against and beyond the contemporary conjuncture

ABSTRACTThis article introduces the special issue ‘Planning amid crisis and austerity: in, against and beyond the contemporary juncture’. It starts by acknowledging two limits of the existing body of literature on the planning/crisis/austerity nexus: on the one hand, the excessive reliance on cases at the ‘core’ of the financial crisis of 2007–2008, with impacts on the understanding of austerity as a response to economic crises; and, on the other, the limited attention given to the impacts of austerity on planning, and their implications for planning practice and research. Based on the contributions in the special issue, the article reflects on some lessons learned: first, the need for a more nuanced understanding of the multiple geographies and temporalities of crisis and austerity; second, the problematic standing of planning practice and research in the face of crisis and austerity; and, third, the potential and limitations of (local) responses and grassroots mobilizations in shaping alternatives.

The Roots of the Grass: Patterns of Grassroots Urban Mobilization in Russia

Based on the analysis of over 500 cases of grassroots mobilization in Russian cities in 2012–2014, the author analyzes basic characteristics of urban protests and their patterns. The data demonstrate that mobilization against construction projects is the most frequent one, followed by the protests against the demolition of the recreational areas, insufficient quality of municipal services, and degradation of transport infrastructure. Also of high visibility are protests of evicted citizens and hoodwinked house investors. Citizens experience all types of the problems related to the urban development and governances regardless of the type of the city. However, mobilization in metropolitan areas is more intensive and diversified, while protests in the smaller cities tend to be more direct in repertoire and particularistic in demands. The study shows that grassroots urban mobilization constitutes a lasting backdrop for urban governance in Russia. Urban dwellers mobilize when public authorities or business encroach upon their living environment, however, they are less able to be proactive and turn protests into sustained collective challenges like campaigns or movements. The results of the study also point to the necessity of developing effective institutions for communications between all stakeholders in the urban governance process.