Spontaneous Mobilization Research Articles

Coming together for a cause - Benjamin Abrams, The Rise of the Masses: Spontaneous Mobilization and Contentious Politics (Chicago, University of Chicago Press, 2023, 307 p.)

Coming together for a cause - Benjamin Abrams, The Rise of the Masses: Spontaneous Mobilization and Contentious Politics (Chicago, University of Chicago Press, 2023, 307 p.)

The Rise of the Masses: Spontaneous Mobilization and Contentious Politics

The Rise of the Masses: Spontaneous Mobilization and Contentious Politics

Features of political participation of Russian youth in the context of digitalization

The article is devoted to identifying the specifics of the influence of the "digital" factor on the dynamics and transformation of political activity of modern Russian youth. The author pays special attention to the role of social networks and digital media on the political participation of the younger generation. Today, not only is the trend towards the emergence of diverse strategies for online political activity of Russian youth increasing, but significant changes are taking place in the differences in role models of political participation that differentiate passively engaged "viewers" and active activists. Those young Russians who actively use online resources in their socio-political activities are already quite effectively using digital technologies and ways to attract a new audience, social mobilization, finding supporters, coordinating joint actions, etc. It is noted that the key trend in recent years has been the "digitalization of political participation" of young people and the spread of the phenomenon of online political participation. The author concludes that despite the steady growth in the number of young users of social networks and consumers of digital media, the increasing role of these online resources as political factors should not be exaggerated in the process of political mobilization. The transformation of the socio-political context and the decrease in the general level of protest moods in society, the "calming down" of spontaneous mobilization in the "offline" certainly leads to a decrease in the mobilization value of social networks, and to a reduction in the number of protest-minded youth.

Review of “The Rise of the Masses: Spontaneous Mobilization and Contentious Politics”

Review of “The Rise of the Masses: Spontaneous Mobilization and Contentious Politics”

Why Fight? The Combatant Careers of the Anti‐Kyiv Fighters in the Donbas War1

Based on original qualitative data on the mobilization of anti‐Kyiv combatants during the war in eastern Ukraine (started in 2014), this article suggests an approach for understanding the spontaneous mobilization of nonstate armed groups during contemporary military conflicts. This approach is based on the notion of career as a collective path of mobilization unfolding over time. It explains how different mobilization factors usually proposed in the literature on contemporary civil wars acquire their mobilization power. The article identifies five combatant careers leading to joining the anti‐Kyiv armed groups: evolving localists, disrupted outcasts, nationalist warriors, adventurous ideologues, and inspired sympathizers. It demonstrates that (1) mobilization requires the combination of factors such as economic incentives, ideological affinity, social connections, and conflict dynamics in a particularly sequenced way, (2) this combination is different for each career path, and (3) these factors acquire their mobilizing capacity only in the context of particular social trajectories.

The Suicidal “Spirit of 1914”: Self-Destruction, National Sacrifice, and the Spontaneous Mobilization in Germany

AbstractThis article examines the spectrum of suicidal behaviors in Germany at the outbreak of World War I. It argues that the recorded suicides of August 1914 highlight core vectors that eventually led to Imperial Germany's collapse in 1918: the mass shattering of socioemotional ties and moral certainties, engendered by political and military authorities’ decisions to prosecute the war, as well as those they undertook during the conflict. But the spectrum extended beyond these recorded suicides and ironically included the quintessential “war-enthusiastic” figure: the warvolunteer (Kreigsfreiwilliger), who willingly joined the military despite widespread public knowledge of the new war's massive lethality. The self-destructiveness of this volunteerism was then largely concealed by its emotionally resonant moral coding by both state and nonstate actors as “national sacrifice,” in line with the “spirit of 1914.” Right from the beginning, suicide was not the “flipside” of sacrifice, but its largely unspoken, implicit shadow: what sacrifice risked becoming in the absence of an adequate victory.

Eighteen Days in Tahrir Protests: The Perfomatives of Civic Action in Egypt’s 2011 Revolution

Abstract On January 25, 2011, a spontaneous mobilization of masses of Egyptian folks congregated in Tahrir Square calling for change in Egypt. ‘Bread, freedom and social justice’ is what Egyptian demonstrators chanted throughout their encampment in the Midan. Shortly after Tahrir Square had turned into a community of protestors congregating and setting up camp day and night in the large plaza, random protestors and performers started devising means of entertainment imbued with political satire with which to engage and incite the crowds. Songs and dances as well as lengthy dramatic monologues, verbatim testimonies, poetry recitations and various styles of storytelling emerged. Those performative acts of protest are similar in nature to renowned Egyptian dramatist Yusuf Idris’s recounting of the Egyptian village al-samir performance tradition, which was also performative and unruly in nature. This interdisciplinary study compares that indigenous dramatic art form, al-samir, with the revolutionary performatives of protest that sprang up extemporaneously in the Midan during the Egyptian revolution in 2011. The paper raises questions about the nature of protest and community formation, democracy, performativity and focuses only on the first 18 days of the January uprising, that specific historical moment only and its transformative effect on theatrical performances, performers and protestors at the time. The paper proposes that the Tahrir performatives of protest were an ephemeral phenomenon that appeared as embodiments and celebrations of political freedom in a specific time and place, and they ended when the call for democracy and the euphoria of the uprising of 2011 gradually faded away.

Fighting COVID-19 in Hong Kong: The effects of community and social mobilization.

The globalized world economy has been affected by the COVID-19 pandemic since early February 2020. In the midst of this global public health crisis, a prompt review of the counterinsurgencies that have occurred in different jurisdictions is helpful. This article examines the experience of Hong Kong (HKSAR), which successfully limited its number of confirmed cases to approximately 1100 until early June 2020. Considering the limited actions that the government has taken against the pandemic, we emphasize the prominent role of Hong Kong's civil society through highlighting the strong and spontaneous mobilization of its local communities originating from their experiences during the SARS outbreak in 2003 and the social unrest in 2019, as well as their doubts regarding the pandemic assessments and recommendations of the HKSAR and WHO authorities. This article suggests that the influence of civil society should not be overlooked in the context of pandemic management.

Exercises in expansion. Colonial threads in the National Democracy’s turn toward discipline

1895 was the first year of the “Brazilian fever” in Galicia, i.e. a migration wave of peasant masses from Galicia to Brazil. In my article, I analyze the content of the 1895 “transitional” volume of Przegląd Wszechpolski (“All-Polish Review”), previously called Przegląd Emigracyjny (Migration Review), when the Lviv journal passed into the hands of the National League. I shall discuss the ways in which folk masses were presented in particular articles, and reflect on the meaning of the concept of colonization used there. In the articles of Przegląd Wszechpolski, the idea of Polish colonization (i.e. the settlement in Brazil and the United States of the peasant masses expelled by poverty from their home villages in partitioned Poland) began to intertwine with the idea of the colonization of these masses – attempts to ensure that they would remain Polish and Catholic, and with the idea of the expansion of Polish national body, so that it takes its proper place in the global capitalist economy. I argue that dealing with Polish colonisation played significant role in the National Democracy’s “turn toward discipline,” usually associated with another example of spontaneous mobilization of the masses – the 1905 revolution.

MOBILIZATION WITHOUT ORGANIZATION: GRIEVANCES AND GROUP SOLIDARITY OF THE UNEMPLOYED IN TUNISIA*

The article investigates the role of social grievances, emotions and group solidarity in the spontaneous mobilization of unemployed university graduates in post-revolutionary Tunisia. Using a mixed method approach, I rely on interviews with political and civil actors conducted during fieldwork in 2018, protest event data from the Armed Conflict and Event Data Project, Facebook posts, and secondary literature including additional media reports. My findings indicate that in January 2016, unemployed citizens organized autonomously in response to perceived social grievances and increasing levels of corruption among established trade unions and unemployed organizations. In the case of Tunisia, shared feelings of relative deprivation, compared to the coastal regions, strengthened in-group solidarity among the unemployed in the interior and south and resulted in their collective mobilization.

Политические парадоксы Ноябрьской революции и контрреволюции в Германии

The article identifies distorted and politicized interpretations of November Revolution in Germany, from recognition of full dependence of the new authorities on the armed forces and monopoly capital to interpreting the revolution as a chain of mistakes and betrayals of democracy on the part of left-wing parties. The authors consider development of the revolutionary movement of 1918 in Bavaria against the background of the First World War. The paper emphasizes that the described events were spontaneous mobilization of right-wing forces rather than a social revolution.

Migration, Ethnicity and Solidarity: ‘Multinational Workers’ in the Former Soviet Union

AbstractWe investigate migrant construction workers’ experiences in the Former Soviet Union, examining their attitudes to other ethno‐national groups, unions and collective action. Industrial relations and migration studies view migrant workers’ hypermobility and diversity, under conditions of low union coverage and rising nationalism, as potentially obstructing consciousness‐raising and mobilizing. Workers in our study faced union indifference, ethno‐national segregation and discrimination. However, managerial abuses, informality and contestation from below led to spontaneous mobilization. Lack of institutional channels to solve these disputes drove workers’ further mobility. Complex mobility trajectories and collective action translated into increased awareness of collective interests and rejection of nationalist ideologies. The outcome is ‘multinational workers’ potentially resistant to nation‐state politics and capital's logics but also aware of the value and usefulness of collective solidarities. Thus, previous arguments solely associating exit with individualistic attitudes, and post‐socialist legacies with workers’ quiescence present only partial pictures.

The Yellow Vests in France

The Yellow Vests (gilets jaunes) movement first appeared in October 2018 and is active everywhere in France. As this article was written, the spontaneous mobilization was in its twenty-first week. The demonstrations are mainly organized around traffic circles, where protesters block transportation lines. While their concrete demands are about wages, these demands are not presented by workers' actions aimed at defending the value of labor power, but rather as part of a citizens' movement, as referred to by the media and many of the demonstrators. In this way, the site of political confrontation has been shifted.

Anti-depressive effect of Shuangxinfang on rats with acute myocardial infarction: Promoting bone marrow mesenchymal stem cells mobilization and alleviating inflammatory response

Bone marrow mesenchymal stem cells (BM-MSCs) are recruited to injured site for cardiac self-repairing in acute myocardial infarction (AMI), but the spontaneous mobilization of BM-MSCs is insufficient for self-repairing. Inflammation initiated by necrosis cardiomyocytes induced cardiac remodeling and depression. Given the anti-inflammatory effects of BM-MSCs and the inextricably relationship among inflammation, ventricular remodeling and depression following AMI, methods focused on enhancing BM-MSCs mobilization are promising. Shuangxinfang (Psycho-cardiology Formula, PCF) is a classical traditional Chinese medicine prescription. In this study, we explored its psycho-cardiology effects in rats with AMI and explore its potential mechanism. Our results showed PCF inhibited inflammation caused by injured myocardium, improved heart function and depression developed from myocardial infarction, and these might partly attribute to the higher BM-MSCs mobilization efficiency promoted by PCF.

Chaihulonggumulitang Shows Psycho-cardiology Therapeutic Effects on Acute Myocardial Infarction by Enhancing Bone Marrow Mesenchymal Stem Cells Mobilization

Ischemic myocardium initiates the mobilization and homing of bone marrow mesenchymal stem cells (BM-MSCs) to promote myocardial regeneration after acute myocardial infarction (AMI). Inflammation caused by necrotic cardiomyocytes induce major pathological changes (cardiac remodeling and myocardial apoptosis) as well as anxiety disorder. This process may be inhibited by the differentiation and paracrine effects of BM-MSCs. However, the spontaneous mobilization of BMSCs is insufficient to prevent this effect. Given the anti-inflammatory effects of BM-MSCs, ventricular remodeling and anxiety following AMI, methods focused on enhancing BMSCs mobilization are promising. BFG is a classical traditional Chinese prescription medicine and has been proved effective in treating AMI and reducing anxiety, but the potential mechanism of its function remains unknown. In the present study, we explored the effects of Chaihulonggumulitang (BFG) on AMI and anxiety in vivo and in vitro. We also tested its effects in promoting BMSCs mobilization and alleviating inflammation. Our data showed that the classical Chinese prescription BFG promoted BM-MSCs mobilization, inhibited inflammatory response, and improved heart damage and anxiety developed from AMI. Thus, we provided an underlying mechanism of BFG function in psycho-cardiology conditions such as AMI.

Statin therapy and bone marrow CD34 + cell frequency in type 2 diabetes mellitus: Dose and form

Statins are widely used to decrease cholesterol synthesis and reduce cardiovascular events and mortality. Recently, it has been recognized that mobilization of progenitor cells plays an important role in the cardioprotection of statins. Circulating progenitor cell activity, indicated by CD34+ counts, is positively associated with statin therapy in a large cohort [1]. Statin therapy can directly increase circulating progenitor cells in patients with cardiovascular diseases [2]. Moreover, after acute myocardial infarction, the spontaneous mobilization of bone marrow progenitor cells is augmented in patients on statin therapy, and this contributes to a favorable cardiac remodeling [3,4].

The Collective Transformation of Labor Relations and Improvement of the Government’s Labor Policy

China is currently undergoing a transition from individual to collective labor relations. The enactment of the Labor Contract Law marks the initial completion of adjustments to individual labor relations in terms of legal construction, as well as the starting point for the adjustment of collective labor relations. The construction and regulation of individual labor relations is not sufficient to resolve the conflict between labor and capital or to maintain industrial peace. In the shift toward collective labor relations there are two complementary forces and paths: the government-led top-down construction process, and the workers’ spontaneous bottom-up mobilization. The shift from disputes over rights to disputes over interests is an important characteristic of the transition toward collective labor relations. Chinese labor policy urgently needs to be reconstructed and refined. Its content should include the guiding role of labor relations theory and choice of adjustment models, sound collective labor law, recognition of the collective rights of workers, handling of the relationship of labor’s two forces, etc.

Mobile Communication, Popular Protests and Citizenship in China

AbstractDigital telecommunication technology has expanded the potential of the mobile phone to be used increasingly as a weapon against authoritarian rule and censorship. Since the content of mobile communication is unpredictable and unregulated, mobile phones have the capability to breach state-sponsored blockage of information. This in turn helps the Chinese people to maintain contact with each other, receive information from outside the country, and make political waves in an aggressive battle for control over information. This paper examines spontaneous mobilization via mobile phones, with a focus on two concrete popular protests in rural and urban areas, demonstrating how Chinese citizens have expanded the political uses of mobile phones in their struggle for freedom of information flow, social justice, and the rule of law, while seeking to build an inexpensive counter-public sphere. These processes destabilize China's conventional national public sphere by shaping political identities on an individual level as well as the notion of citizenship within the evolving counter-public sphere. The political significance of mobile phones in the context of contemporary China's political environment can be observed by various social forces that communicate their struggles with the aid of this technology, pose challenges in governance, and force the authorities to engage in new kinds of media practices.

Conservative Treatment of Stable Volar Plate Injuries of the Proximal Interphalangeal Joint in Children and Adolescents

The purpose of this study was to assess a standard conservative management for stable volar plate injuries of the proximal interphalangeal joint in children and adolescents. No study is available regarding this subject for this age group. A prospective study was performed on 37 consecutive patients (aged between 9 and 15 years; mean, 13 years) with stable acute volar plate injuries of the proximal interphalangeal joints, including 22 avulsion fractures without dislocation. All patients had a standardized conservative treatment consisting of a dorsal aluminum extension block splinting at a 15-degree flexion for 10 days, followed by a spontaneous mobilization and taping to adjacent fingers for sports only. At follow-up visits, active and passive ranges of motion, swelling of the affected joints, analgesic intake, and pain perception by the patient were recorded. Regular follow-up consisted of standardized assessments at 2, 6, and 12 weeks, with additional consultations if symptoms persisted. Healing was uneventful, and hand therapy was not necessary to regain full range of motion in 32 of 33 children with a regular follow-up. The only flexion contracture observed responded well to splinting. Of the 33 patients, 31 had an excellent outcome and 2 had a good outcome. Dorsal extension block splinting was an efficient, simple, well-tolerated treatment for stable volar plate injuries of the proximal interphalangeal joint in a preliminary series of patients younger 16 years. Flexion contractures were rare and responded well to dynamic splinting.

The Transcription Factor EGR1 Controls Both the Proliferation and Localization of Hematopoietic Stem Cells

EGR1 is a member of the immediate early response transcription factor family and functions in cell growth, development, and stress responses in many tissues. Here we report an additional role for EGR1 in regulating homeostasis of hematopoietic stem cells (HSCs). HSCs normally express Egr1 at high levels, but dramatically downregulate its expression when induced to divide and migrate. Consistent with this finding, mice lacking Egr1 exhibit significant increases in steady-state levels of dividing HSCs in the bone marrow (BM), and a striking spontaneous mobilization of HSCs into the peripheral blood. These data identify EGR1 as a transcriptional regulator of stem cell migration that normally functions to promote HSC quiescence and retention in the niche. The ability of this single factor to regulate both proliferation and mobilization of HSCs suggests that EGR1 commands a genetic program that coordinates stem cell division and migration to maintain appropriate HSC number and function.