Analysis Of Social Movements Research Articles

An Innovative Methodological Approach to Analysing Social Media Movements

Social media movements take place in an increasingly volatile technological landscape. Researchers who want to analyse their spread must navigate methodological challenges relating to data accessibility, combining qualitative and quantitative data, and remaining attentive to the shifting technological affordances of social media platforms. In response to key challenges, the paper outlines an innovative, three-fold methodological approach to the analysis of social media movements integrating three strands: the Linguistic, Material, and Processual (LMP). Using the hashtag #JeSuisCharlie as a case study, the paper demonstrates how an LMP approach can provide richer insights into social media movements which would be missed by most current methods. Its low-cost design, flexible approach, and technical accessibility equips the researcher in anticipation of further change in the technical landscape. The framework outlined in the paper can be applied to other social media platforms.

Reacting to Black Lives Matter on Social Media: Pedagogical Implications for Social Studies Education

This Q methodological study explored the ways preservice and in-service social studies teachers engaged with a collection of social media posts about the Black Lives Matter movement. The study asked participants to share their reactions to the posts as well as how they would determine which posts they might present to their students in the classroom. The analysis of the Q sorts identified three subject positions available to these social studies teachers—labeled the Context Provider, the Data Debater, and the Critical Confronter. Notably, each of these subject positions was underscored by a prevalent discourse of teachers working as a Guide on the Side. These findings suggest that social studies teachers’ pedagogical imaginings of engaging students with social media content and in the analysis of current social and political movements for justice are significantly informed by dominant discourses of teacher “neutrality.”

TRACING MEDIA SOLIDARITIES WITH MUSLIMS: CONTESTING ISLAMOPHOBIA ON TWITTER

Solidarity has been cited as a necessary prerequisite for transformational structural change and therefore contains revolutionary potential (Featherstone, 2012). This paper examines the role and evolution of mediated solidarities, which have become increasingly central to an analysis of social movements with the advent of participatory technologies, by drawing on data from a project on anti-Islamophobic counter-narratives. Online platforms have the affordances to contest Islamophobic hate speech as demonstrated by the dynamics of #stopIslam following the Brussels terror attack, 2016. In this instance, the hashtag gained its prominence through the contestations of users who sought to question, critique and undermine its original message (reference redacted). However, research has also shown the limitations of social media for online activism, in particular for creating meaningful debates or change (Schradie, 2019). This paper examines data from a large-scale study that used methods of computational, quantitative, and qualitative analysis to examine the dynamics of discourse about Muslims on Twitter in the case of Brexit, the Christchurch terror attack and Covid. We will examine whether the high incidence of solidarity discourses in this dataset are limited to acts of counter-speech (and other acts of weak solidarity) or if they contribute to sustainable counter-narratives that have implications for wider discursive formations related to Islam. Rather than reinforce existing binary arguments regarding the potentials and limitations of Twitter as a platform for solidarity, we wish to demonstrate the contradictory dynamics of the solidarities that arise from the logics of Twitter which relies on and produces these entanglements.

Prophetic dissent in dark times: the new Poor People’s Campaign and the rhetoric of national redemption

ABSTRACT In this paper, we offer an analysis of an important social movement challenging the fantasy of Christian nationalism: the new Poor People’s Campaign, and specifically the rhetoric of the Bishop Dr. William J. Barber II. We argue that Barber’s rhetoric represents a source of dissent against Christian nationalism through his strategic use of the jeremiad. Barber’s progressive jeremiad offers a distinctively moral narrative that recovers the radical Christian legacy of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Ultimately, we argue that Barber’s jeremiad advances a distinctive narrative of American national redemption through democratic renewal and reconstruction.

Informal Civic Activity of Participants of the “Black Protests” and “Women’s Strike”: An Analysis of Scientific Journal Publications

A recent attempt to impose restrictions on the right to carry out abortions due to developmental abnormalities of a foetus and risks to the mother’s health has triggered widespread protests in Poland. These have resulted in the formation of a new social movement, the so-called “Women’s Strike,” which the author of this paper sees as a significant manifestation of informal civic activity. This paper seeks to generate and systematise the meaning of scientific research dealing with these phenomena. The main problem is the following: What categories of a social movement analysis and the meaning imparted to the new social movement called “Women’s Strike” can be identified in scientific papers? The author has chosen to employ a non-reactive research approach, and the sample selection was deliberate. The process of selecting and narrowing down the documents focused on identifying fragments of papers that could offer insights and answers to the research questions. The analysis was performed with the use of a categorisation key developed by the author, which was used to identify the thematic distribution of the scientific papers devoted to the new movement. Results: Five categories were identified together with the assigned meanings: experience and citizenship, emotions expressed by the movement participants, feeling of community and sisterhood, development of the movement participants’ identity, the Women’s Strike future and development prospects. The conclusions contain examples of potential pedagogic studies, in particular, the educational aspects of the new movement’s impact on the young people participating in it, the experience of the identity transformation of the women participating in the strikes, reactivating the ideas and values of sisterhood and the feeling of community in the face of the threat to the freedom of reproduction, a change of the social attitude towards abortion caused by mass protests sparked by the toughening of the law, and media presentation of the new woman’s movement and its demands.

The Frame Analysis of Social Movements: The Illustration of A Dynamic Approach to Framing

There is a diversity of approaches to the use of frame analysis in political studies of social movements. In this study, the concept of framing is considered as an analytical tool for considering the processes associated with civic activism of social movements’ representatives and their subjective coverage of these processes within the framework of positioning themselves in social media. The study presents the so-called “dynamic approach” to framing as the most adequate to the subject of research. It is presented in application to the case of the modern Russian political movement “Future. Society” and the campaigns of its activists to protect the Bitsevsky forest from development in 2022-2023. This example describes various opportunities provided to researchers by frame-analytical optics for working with the analysis of social movements. In particular, it can deepen the understanding of the reasons for the emergence of new social movements in modern Russian public space, their gaining popularity and support among the Internet audience and the mobilization of their activists. In addition, the study suggests that researchers consider a number of new questions about the essence of frames and their connection with narratives and storytelling.

Interactions among national and supranational identities: mobilizing the independence movement in Scotland

As nationalism rises worldwide, understanding the relevance of national identities is at a premium in both the study of mass political behavior and the analysis of social movements. Drawing on research in social psychology, this study explores interactions among national and supranational identities using the concepts of identity interference (i.e., negative interactions) and identity complementarity (i.e., positive interactions). These interactions extend beyond the direct effects of identity considered in many previous studies. Focusing on interactions centers the analysis on the contextual aspects of identity during nationalist mobilizations. Survey data from Scotland demonstrate that interactions among Scottish, British, and European identities were consequential for mobilizing support for Scottish independence in 2019. Strong evidence indicates interference between Scottish and British identities. European and Scottish identities complement one another among independence supporters but not in the general population. The possibility of interference between European and British identities is backed by only mixed results. The timing of this study in the aftermath of the Brexit referendum was likely relevant to its findings on European identity. Overall, this research illustrates the benefits of widening the empirical examination of multiple identities in the social sciences.

Tricontinental Reverberations: Anti-Imperialist Solidarity in the International War Crimes Tribunal on Vietnam

Abstract In 1967, amid the U.S. war in Vietnam, distinguished leftist intellectuals and activists gathered in Sweden and Denmark to establish the first citizens’ tribunal. Initiated by the philosopher Bertrand Russell, the purpose of the International War Crimes Tribunal (iwct) was to put the U.S. government on trial for its military actions in Southeast Asia. This article has two objectives. First, it argues that this activist endeavour was embedded in a larger internationalist movement against Western imperialism, namely Tricontinentalism, of which the war in Vietnam was a connecting factor. Second, the article investigates the tribunal as a manifestation of the solidarity that the New Left in the West maintained with revolutionary movements in the Third World. It aims to show the utility of the theoretical concept of political solidarity, most thoroughly elaborated by Sally J. Scholz, for the global history analysis of social justice movements. At the same time, it contends the necessity of additional parameters when studying manifestations of political solidarity in a post- and settler-colonial context, drawing on new scholarship on colonial-sensitive solidarity. By carving out the specificities of this case of activism on the theoretical ground, this investigation also highlights the importance, advantages, and pitfalls of political anti-imperialist solidarity.

The interconnection between the global and the local: case study of the indigenous Baka community of Nomedjoh, Cameroon

The impact of globalisation on local communities is a widely debated topic in sociology and anthropology. This article explores the dynamics and statics of local communities in the context of globalisation using the concepts of deterritorialisation and imagined community. The study focuses on the indigenous Baka community of Nomedjoh in Cameroon and their response to globalisation through the redefinition and reconfiguration of their identities. Utilising Arjun Appadurai’s theoretical framework of scapes, the article delves into the processes by which the Baka community of Nomedjoh creates connections with or resistance to the global community. The study is based on data from a documentary film and endeavours to answer the question of how globalisation affects the local life of the Baka of Nomedjoh. The conclusion highlights the importance of considering the dialectic of the local and the global in the analysis of social transformations and movements.

Toward an integrated analysis of social movements and new religious movements research

AbstractDespite calls from researchers for intersectional studies between religion and social movements over the past few decades, scholars have not engaged in fruitful conversation about integrating the two disciplines. This article aims to facilitate such discussion by examining the topic of new religious movements (NRMs). I first review the existing literature on NRMs and discuss why NRM research has been neglected in social movement studies. Then, I explore a few research areas where both NRM studies and social movement research could intersect and benefit from a synthetic approach. Specifically, I suggest that social movement studies could advance through the examination of some relatively ignored subjects of research, such as persistent participation and disengagement, by drawing on empirical cases of NRMs. I also propose ways in which the application of social movement theories would enhance our understanding of different aspects of NRMs, such as their leadership and coalition practices. In making these arguments, I refer to one of the prominent, long‐term NRMs, the Unification Church or Movement, to help illustrate my ideas.

Waves, Floods, Currents: The Politics and Poetics of Water in Social Movement Analysis

AbstractThe task of conceptualising social movements draws on a wealth of watery images, from protest waves and political currents, to imagining mobilisations as tides, ripples, cascades or high‐pressure hydraulics. Called upon to analyse complex processes, these waters have a life of their own, carrying analytical implications while extending a relationship to water that is never only symbolic and is material, embodied and historical. This article explores the ways water is “enrolled” to understand movements, to advance three arguments: first, these use familiar water morphologies to naturalise particular, located understandings of political change and social form; second, they imply normative claims and ideological affinities regarding political struggle; third, this has implications for our relationship to water, echoing the abstract and alienating “modern water” of capitalist world‐ecology. The article considers how critical water knowledges and subjectivities, often sustained by social movement spaces, indicate possibilities of a being‐otherwise with water and its meanings.

Politics, publicity and social movements in the works of J. Habermas and P. Bourdieu

Modern social movements should be considered in the context of the existing public sphere, the main theorists of which are J. Habermas and P. Bourdieu. The article analyzes various aspects of the functioning of the public sphere, examines the role of mass media in the formation of the public sphere and the orientation of public opinion. Using the example of social movements in France, the author examines how the public sphere affects the functioning of social movements. Nowadays, the media largely determines the agenda and controls public debate. Besides, the experience of each person is completely mediated by the communication means. At the same time the media is largerly influenced by politics and, as a result, the public sphere loses its functions. Nevertheless, the public of organized individuals could become an effective participant in public communication, through which it is possible to legitimize the achievement of political compromises. The author concludes that social movement's analysis should be focused not only on the political, economic and social causes of demonstrations, but also on the public sphere in which they exist. In addition, the discourse constructed by the mass media is not only imposed on society, but belongs to it. Each person contributes to its creation, and social media platforms play an important role in this. If public discourse is the result of the activity of many actors, then it is necessary to consider the possibility of interference in its construction.

How the ‘Lejabys’ Came into Being: Artists and Workers in Struggle. A Spatio-Temporal Odyssey between ‘Mobilising’ and ‘Organising’

Art and other creative approaches can be a resource or a mobilising strategy for activists and artists. Little work has been done, however, on what happens in the interactions between artists and activists in the daily life of a conflict. We suggest that social mobilisations may be seen as organising processes as well as mobilising actions, and we analyse how creative and artistic approaches may contribute to this organising/mobilising reciprocal relationship. Based on an analysis of the conflict that accompanied the announcement of the Lejaby plant closure in Yssingeaux in 2012, which inspired several artists, we show that these approaches, by their capacity to grasp sensitive dimensions, favour spatio-temporal episodes that structure the struggle: some constitute protected spaces, which can correspond to an intimate reflexive time or to a collective moment of synchronisation of subjective temporalities; others correspond to hybridised spaces, which can be sometimes empowering and sometimes theatrical. We thus contribute both to the field of social movement analysis and to the role of art and creativity in the organisation and mobilisation within these movements; we also contribute to a relational reading of the spatial and temporal dimensions of organisation and collective action, in the tradition of Lefebvre and Massey.

Iconic 21st Century Activist "T-Shirt and Tote-Bag" Combination Is Hard to Miss These Days!

Iconic 21st Century Activist "T-Shirt and Tote-Bag" Combination Is Hard to Miss These Days!

Claiming Urban Form for Liveability: An Analysis of Urban Social Movements in Istanbul

All dimensions of liveability, from economic to social, are directly related to urban space and its production process. However, the production of urban space, with its forms and functions, is always situated in the con flicting domain of (spatial) political economy. Conventional space production processes that favour dominant classes and produce space regarding exchange value are frequently contested with the social reaction of dominated classes defending use values and liveability. In this vein, Urban Social Movements (USMs) seem one of the key instruments for the social production of urban space with be er liveability conditions. From this perspective, the study aims to investigate USMs' space transforming capacity by focusing on the case of Istanbul. A five-step spatial analysis is conducted, assuming that USMs are closely related to the characteristics of urban development projects. In these steps (i) the location of the urban development projects and USMs; (ii) existing land use in the project areas; (iii) scale of the projects, (iv) organization level of USMs; and (v) relationships of four USM-related projects within the urban fabric are analysed. Findings of the study reveal that centrality plays a vital role in both development projects and related USMs and aff ects the programme, scale, and organization level. Considering liveability conditions, faced with aggressive capitalist behaviour supported by local and central state apparatus, USMs can realize their space transforming potential only by protecting existing programmes and urban fabric.

Exploring social movement concepts and actions in a knowledge uptake and sustainability context: A concept analysis

ObjectivesTo share a concept analysis of social movement aimed at advancing its application to evidence uptake and sustainability in health-care. MethodsWe applied Walker and Avant method to clarify the concept of social movement in the context of knowledge uptake and sustainability. Peer-reviewed and grey literature databases were systematically searched for relevant reports that described how social movement action led to evidence-based practice changes in health and community settings. Titles, abstracts and full texts were reviewed independently and in duplicate, resulting in 38 included articles. ResultsSocial movement action for knowledge uptake and sustainability can be defined as individuals, groups, or organizations that, as voluntary and intrinsically motivated change agents, mobilize around a common cause to improve outcomes through knowledge uptake and sustainability. The 10 defining attributes, three antecedents and three consequences that we identified are dynamic and interrelated, often mutually reinforcing each other to fortify various aspects of the social movement. Examples of defining attributes include an urgent need for action, collective action and collective identity. The concept analysis resulted in the development of the Social Movement Action Framework. ConclusionsSocial movement action can provide a lens through which we view implementation science. Collective action and collective identity – concepts less frequently canvassed in implementation science literature – can lend insight into grassroots approaches to uptake and sustainability. Findings can also inform providers and change leaders on the practicalities of harnessing social movement action for real-world change initiatives. By mobilizing individuals, groups, or organizations through social movement approaches, they can engage as powered change agents and teams that impact the individual, organizational and health systems levels to facilitate knowledge uptake and sustainability.

REVIEW: “ANTHROPOLOGY OF CONFLICTS: POLITICS AND CULTURE IN CHILE IN THE 1990s”, BY ANDRÉS G. SEGUEL

This bibliographic review seeks a complete description of the investigative work of the book “Anthropology of conflicts: politics and culture in Chile in the 1990s”, which highlights the relationship between the political system and culture. This is done through an introductory body to the work, consisting of the delivery of general data that enters the reader in the discussion about cultural conflicts, dynamic systems and figures of catastrophes of meaning. The review concludes with the presentation of the analysis of the cases addressed by the author, after understanding them as emerging phenomena that reveal the transformation of the limits of politics and that, in their maximum degree, point to new forms of symbolic structuring. The relevance of this book lies in the analysis of new social movements during the 1990s and 2000s, around environmental, gender, and cultural issues, which are relevant for social change in Chile after the social outbreak of 2019.

Lectio praecursoria

In this lectio praecursoria, which I presented as part of my doctoral defense at the University of Eastern Finland on 5 November 2021, I delve deep into the Brazilian anti-mining movement to understand the context in which activism take place, their main strategies and course of actions, and their ability to influence the overall mining debate in Brazil in the 2010s. It sheds light on the key challenges faced by groups fighting for more environmental and social justice in mining conflictual situations. More specific, the research covers the 2013–2017 time frame, when discussions on the mining framework and a severe tailings dam failure happened. These two cases are analyzed and their effects on anti-mining activism are explored through a twofold focus on social movements and environmental justice studies. The study contributes to scientific discussions on mining and society by seeking conceptual bridges across political-ecologically oriented studies on social movements against mineral extraction. It also expands, significantly, analyses of social movements in Brazil by contributing to the international comparative literature on the social and environmental impacts of mining, Brazilian and Latin American studies, studies on mining history, sociology of mining, and mining policy.

Conflicted transitions: Exploring the actors, tactics, and outcomes of social opposition against energy infrastructure

Given the growing frequency, severity, and salience of social mobilization and community action on energy and climate issues, in this study we systematically explore the configurations of types of infrastructure, actors, tactics, and outcomes of recent opposition to energy transitions across seven carbon-intensive regions in Asia, Europe, and North America. Based on both a literature review and an original dataset of 130 case studies spanning the past decade, we track opposition to a wide range of energy infrastructure in these regions, including low-carbon options such as renewable energy and nuclear power; provide network analyses of the actors and coalitions involved in such events; and develop a typology and frequency analysis of tactics (such as litigation or protest), and outcomes (such as remuneration, policy change, concessions, or labor protections). We show that the politics of energy transitions in carbon-intensive regions varies significantly from country to country and across types of energy, and we discuss how the configurations of infrastructure, actors, tactics, and outcomes can be explained by differences in national institutions and their responses to global or supranational pressures. By bringing both a sociotechnical and comparative perspective to the global analysis of social movements and energy transitions, we suggest how goals of energy transition are refracted through national and subnational institutions and through local mobilizations both in support of and opposed to those transitions.

Sense of place in transitions: How the Hambach Forest Movement shaped the German coal phase-out

This article analyses how social movements shape the sense of place and influence energy transitions. It combines the Multi-Level Perspective of transition studies with the concept sense of place, allowing for an analysis of social movements at different levels linked to the role of placemaking. The Hambach Forest Movement and its network in Germany are taken as a case, drawing on 25 qualitative interviews with people related to the movement, the German Coal Commission, from civil society, and the energy company RWE. The paper finds that the interplay of activities of the network aiming for the protection of the Hambach Forest, and its international reverberations, led to the development of a strong sense of place. The sense of place was clearly reflected in the Coal Commission's final report in which a pathway for the German coal phase-out was outlined, a critical element of Germany's energy transition.