[lbo-talk] flush *that* social movement thesis?

shag carpet bomb shag at cleandraws.com
Mon Oct 3 11:31:38 PDT 2011


actually, i mistyped my characterization of the thesis doug has espoused: people don't get politically active when they're economically downtrodden, feeling insecure, etc. rather, history has shown a rising tide of activism during economic good times. I was wondering if the latest protest was an example of one emerging during economic hard times...

meanwhile, I think Carrol is right to say that it's a lot of people looking for a movement. it sickens me to watch the vultures move in - the unions, moveon, etc.

as for McAdam, I can't doublecheck right now, but IIRC, the thesis was that people who stuck with FS were people who had a very high opinion of how great the u.s. was.

that's a theory about why they got involved to being with.

the rest of the theory is about how this one event, FS, created the resources - people, ideas, commitment, connections, contact lists, human relationships, etc. - that would be mobilized in the women's movement, the free speech movement, gay liberation, etc. He traces how the people at the center of those movement were part of FS and how they mobilized the resources they created during that experience and deployed them to spur on other movements.
> shag: "Or do we go with McAdam's thesis in Freedom Summer? That people
> get
> pissed off when their expectations have been raised and then the
> politicians who've been elected to meet those expectations fail
> miserably at doing so."
>
> [WS:] That is the J-curve theory of movements, no?
> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_Chowning_Davies
>
> If memory serves McAdam & Co. argued that personal connection to
> movement participants are better predictors of participation than the
> state of mind (i.e. being dissatisfied or agreeing with movement's
> ideals.)
>
> As I see it, you need both. J curve theory may explain growing
> dissatisfaction even as living conditions improve, but it does not
> explain who joins a movement addressing that dissatisfaction.
> Personal connections do.
>
>
> Wojtek
>
> On Mon, Oct 3, 2011 at 11:22 AM, shag carpet bomb
> <shag at cleandraws.com> wrote:
>>
>> Ok, so the social movement thesis bandied about here has been that
>> people are move apt to get pissed off and demonstrate about their
>> anger during economically good times.
>>
>> Does OWS contradict this?
>>
>> Or do we go with McAdam's thesis in Freedom Summer? That people get
>> pissed off when their expectations have been raised and then the
>> politicians who've been elected to meet those expectations fail
>> miserably at doing so.
>>
>> shag
>>
>> --
>> http://cleandraws.com
>> Wear Clean Draws
>> ('coz there's 5 million ways to kill a CEO)
>>
>>
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