Protest Rituals Research Articles

“Rites of Resistance” Between Belonging and Protest Review of Jean DeBernardi’s Rites of Belonging: Memory, Modernity and Identity in a Malaysia Chinese Community

Unlike the perspective of historical anthropology and the constraints of one's own profession, this review attempts to refer to this book in terms of a subject of concern to contemporary Confucian researchers, which may provide an alternative reading, namely: how can a harmonious view of rituals coexist with disagreement in a Confucian perspective? And even, if necessary, how "rituals of protest" are possible. Rites of Belonging shows us the aspirations of the Malaysian Chinese to belong to the land, but the situation of the Malaysian Chinese is still one in which neither belonging nor protesting is possible, but resistance is more in line with the realities of life, which is why this review is titled "rituals of resistance". The review is intended to be read from two perspectives: 1) the necessity and purpose of rites, and 2) the limitations of the "rituals of resistance"; the former organizes this book about the practice of rituals, while the latter is a reflection on it.

‘The people’ exposed: spatio-racial-affective alterity in Haitian popular protest

ABSTRACT Beginning in 2013, urban Haitians staged several antigovernment protests that eventually led, in 2016, to the removal of President Michel Martelly without an elected successor. This protest movement used racial, spatial, and affective markers to expose an image of pèp la (the people) and to rework old and new race-class divisions in the Haitian population. Conducting ceremonial bonfires, donning black and red masks, and chanting Vodou songs to summon cho (hot) spirits, the protesters sought to embody revolutionary soldiers who defeated colonial troops in 1804. They framed the conflict as one between black militants of the downtown geto (ghettos) and the lighter-skinned, uptown, ruling elites. This article traces how a culturalization of ‘the people’ as black, ‘hot,’ and of the geto emerged through the rituals of protest, and how this movement ultimately identified a new, militant persona – the nèg geto (ghetto black) – as the popular subject of Haiti. This article goes on to elaborate the potential consequences of this configuration of the people: on one hand, it can be viewed as an effective tool of empowerment; on the other hand, it may propagate racist tropes that have long been used to marginalize poorer and darker people in Haiti.

In the name of immigrant mothers: Gendered mobilization of Korean-Chinese women in South Korea

ABSTRACTDrawing on ethnographic data from the anti-deportation protest of the Seoul Korean-Chinese Church (SKCC) in 2013, I examine the impact of gender on the mobilization of Korean-Chinese immigrant women in South Korea. Despite legal, economic, and religious differences, these protesters have bonded greatly among themselves, largely because of their immigrant mother identity. As the leaders of their family migration projects, both Christians and non-believers have grown to feel a strong sense of kinship and acknowledge the efficacy of collective action. Emotional protest rituals and the political impact of the activist-clergy have prompted the mobilization and consequent politicization of these largely women demonstrators. Early social movement literature has overlooked the impact of gender identity on women’s collective action, while my study shows how gender intersects with diasporic identities, to enable the mobilization of immigrant women for the collective goal of justice.

The changing nature of labour protest: Comparing the fragmentation of protest rituals on May 1st in Berlin and Budapest

The transition from industrial to post-industrial society has changed the conditions for labour protest in Europe fundamentally. In this paper recent forms of labour protest are explored in two European capital cities, Berlin and Budapest. In the context of growing job insecurity, flexibilisation and fragmentation of labour markets, the motivations and class positions of protest participants are scrutinised, along with the diversified geographies of protest events. Building on empirical results by means of a survey based on structured mini-interviews, the paper argues, first, that a fragmentation of labour protests on May 1st is observable. This fragmentation is driven by an overall change of Labour Day celebrations from trade union oriented demonstrations towards segmented party zones of protest in both cities. Second, neither traditional forms of labour protest is nor newly created, more festive forms of labour celebrations attract a significant proportion of people suffering from precarity or unemployment. Thus, most marginalised people in the service-dominated economy do not have a voice in labour protests today.

Popular protest in Switzerland during the 1830s: Opposing models of political participation and citation of traditional ritual

The article examines specific forms of popular protest and their political background in Switzerland during the liberal era after the French Revolution of 1830. In this era one finds two distinctive models of political participation: the older model of the so-called Landsgemeinde and the new liberal model. The Swiss protesters combined ideas, forms and symbols of both models. However the relation between the two models proved to be ambivalent and conflict-prone. This is demonstrated with a focus on several specific cases of popular protest. While the liberal leaders of the early 1830s mostly referred to the age-old Landsgemeinde to use it as a vehicle for their new aims, the protest action of the late 1830s against liberal governments encompassed a variety of forms and mixed symbolic references. We can observe a virtuoso mode of citation of protest rituals from different contexts and time periods. The primary function of the citation of old ritual was to provide the protestors' action with social acceptance. Thus, new and very different claims could also be made. Despite striking similarities, under the auspices of the post-revolution period one must avoid the assumption of a simple linear continuity of protest practice from the Ancien Régime.

Watery friction: the River Narmada, celebrity and new grammars of protest

This essay examines the construction of the River Narmada – the site of one of the largest popular protests in post-Independence India – as celebrity and cultural icon. It argues that the river’s iconicity emerges from a grammar of protest built around the friction of discourses of environmentalism and social justice. In the first section, examining the myths around the river, I propose that its iconicity lies in its cultural legibility as mother, goddess and nation. The second section turns to the rituals of protest, discourses of ecological ethnicity and spectacles of suffering. I suggest that Narmada-as-brand is the effect of the semiotics of protest that focuses less on a ‘face’ of protest than on the space of protest: the space is the face. In the conclusion, I treat the river as a chronotope. Moving beyond its immediate spatial and temporal dimensions, Narmada’s iconicity is less about being an event than a scandalous, affect-ridden process. It becomes fully celebratised when its grammar of protest appeals to the global humanitarian regimes.

Transformative Terrains: Counter Hegemonic Tactics of Dissent in Israel

What makes citizens choose a particular mode of protest? This paper discusses the role of space in recent protests by three Israeli groups, Machsom Watch, Anarchists Against the Wall, and Women in Black, in Israel/Palestine. It looks at the way groups protest state violence (i.e., the occupation of the West Bank and Gaza and the construction of the separation wall) by initiating counter hegemonic strategies and tactics, and by creating new terrains of opposition. More specifically, I elaborate on their model of action and its function within a range of spheres (physical, geographical and virtual), supported by four key principles (difference, decentralisation, multiplicity and informal order). I argue that unlike more conventional protest rituals, often led by the dominant political parties, contemporary dissent takes place in parallel spheres constructing what I call transformative terrain – a social platform that challenges bounded politics by using imagination and space in creating new possibilities.

A Visual Dimension of Protest: An Analysis of Interactions during the Russian March

In this article I analyze the Russian March as a multi-meaning demonstration of political protest. A theoretical perspective of political ritual is used to analyze the structure of the Russian March. The data were collected for the whole period of existence of this March (2005–2008). Data include the visual imagery produced by members and posted on the Internet or published in online newspapers, as well as the results of participant observation on-site during 2007–2008. This case-study of the development of political ritual in post-Soviet Russia helps one to examine the social integrative function of the public holiday and the rituals that it engenders. The Russian March offers a rare window for investigating interaction between activists of a nationalist movement and state authorities. It is one of the few protest rituals to have been repeatedly performed in Russia over the last 5 years.

High Church Rituals and Rituals of Protest; the 'Riots' at St George-in-the-East, 1859–1860

For a period of nearly 18 months, services at St George-in-the-East were disrupted by protest at the ritualistic practices adopted by the Rector and his Anglo-Catholic curates. This East End parish was the locus for a bitter conflict between the High and Low Church wings of the Church of England over the meaning of the English Reformation. Church historians, usually sympathetic to the clergy, have generally approached this episode from a very narrow perspective. This article offers an alternative appraisal grounded in 'history from below'. Based on Home Office files and extensive newspaper reports, it examines the various rituals of protest used by the Vestry and its supporters against the clergy and their allies. It shows how evangelical Protestantism underpinned popular notions of Englishness in an era of sectarian tension and locates the behaviour of the protesters in the context of mid-century popular politics.

Social Sharing, Participation in Demonstrations, Emotional Climate, and Coping with Collective Violence After the March 11th Madrid Bombings1

This study examined how social sharing and participating in secular political rituals regarding the March‐Eleven (M‐11) 2004 train bombings in Madrid, Spain, helps to cope with the wounds of trauma and enhances the reconstruction of a positive emotional climate. A questionnaire was completed by college students (63% of sample) and their relatives (37%) (N = 661) from five Spanish regions and eight universities at 1, 3, and 8 weeks after the bombing. Participating in demonstrations and experiencing a positive emotional climate, as reported a week after M‐11, predicted the degree of social support and positive affect as well as the amount of posttraumatic growth reported at the 3‐week period. Demonstrations (indirectly) and social sharing (directly) predict positive emotional climate 2 months after the attack. Participation in protest rituals or demonstrations, coupled with elections and changes in government office, helps overcome the effects of collective trauma and leads to an improvement of the emotional climate in the aftermath of a terrorist attack. Participating in ceremonies and rituals reinforces social cohesion and can be conceived of as a communal form of coping, which enhances a culture of peace.

Protest Rituals and Uncivil Communities

Our world features communities suffering from an excess of collective identity. If these communities value group over individual liberties, resort to violent means in order to pursue their goals, and members join them on a relatively voluntary basis, they qualify as ‘uncivil’. Two such contemporary communities are compared: the Basque movement around the terrorist organisation ETA and the right‐wing constellation around the National Democratic Party in Germany. Both are of a radical nationalist nature. Out of the resource‐pool at the disposal of social groups and communities to preserve their boundaries in a largely hostile environment, this article will consider one central factor: namely, their political liturgy and politics of the streets. Contemporary western political religions, it will be argued, stage ritual demonstrations with such extraordinary frequency not merely to put forward their demands in society, but also as an inner means of communication in order to preserve group solidarity.

The ‘politics of poverty' in a post-apartheid South African metropolis

More than ten years after South Africa celebrated its first democratic election the post-apartheid state finds itself confronting mass protests reminiscent of popular struggles in the apartheid era, as poor people demand houses, jobs and speedier delivery of basic services. South Africa is currently experi encing high levels of poverty and widening gulfs between the wealthy and poor of all racial groups. 1 Whether the circum stances of the poor are getting worse or not in post-aparthei d South Africa has been a subject of heated debate between government officials, academics and civil society activists. Whilst government points to social grants and poverty allevi ation programmes in place, critics suggest that the adoption of neo-liberal policies, rising unemployment and the failure to elicit the partic i pation of the poor in constructing ameliorative inter ven tions have under mined attempts to reduce economic hardship and improve people’s lives. In this paper I draw on selected aspects of recent research on poverty by the University of Pretoria 2 in four commu nities in the vicinity of the city. The most striking findings, in analysing and comparing the quanti tative and quali tative data, relate to grass roots percep tions of unchanging or worsening socio-economic circum stances and of the exclusion of poor commu nities from the benefits of a trans forming political economy. In seeking to situate and explain the responses, the paper argues that the deep pessimism that infuses popular discourses is shaping a robust critique of state insti tu tions as funda men tally indif ferent to the plight of the poor. In addition, although the data reflect ‘group specific’ differ ences insofar as poverty and insecu rities are concerned, there appears to be a coalescing of political discourses and rituals of protest across racial divides.

The Power of Demonstrations

People take to the streets for several reasons. Advancing their demands to the authorities is an obvious one. Establishing communication channels among participants and thus helping to buttress a collective identity is another, latent one. Both combined express the power of protest. In what follows, I focus on the group-integrative function of protest. First, I conceptualize the notion of ritual and import it to the field of collective action. Then, I illustrate my argument by analyzing the extraordinary level of protest in the Basque Country. Mass protest rituals performed by a radical nationalist actor allow its participants to visualize themselves in movement and thus create and reinforce enduring bonds of solidarity. Occasionally, the argument about the relevance of a ritualized physical gathering might be extended to other revolutionary movements which push and threaten to transcend the limits of the system, be it because they substantially alter its morphology, because they challenge its foundational values, or both. Owing to the generalized disapproval these groups engender in wider society, revolutionary movements are in greater need of preserving group boundaries. Protest rituals are an important, sometimes essential, way of accomplishing such a task.