Tag: Protest
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Every protest is an imagined future
Protests often emerge from a mix of grievance and hope – i.e., dissatisfaction with the present with an aim to change it for the better. Whereas street protests are commonly understood as physical, dynamic, interactive, and collective expressions of objection and dissent, less common is the idea that this form of collective action is future-oriented;…
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Prefiguration, or “Be the Change”
Prefiguration is the future-oriented construction of political alternatives during protest and movement-building, where activists reflect their political goals and values within the processes of their movements. This post is a summary of the well-cited article on the topic by Luke Yates, “Prefigurative politics and social movement strategy: The roles of prefiguration in the reproduction, mobilisation…
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Reconstructing Protests with Text and A/V: Conference Abstract
We presented a paper called, “Reconstructions of the Covid-19 Protests in Poland: Using Text, Pictures, and Video Data to Derive Visions of Social Change.” See also: NCN Grant on Pandemic Protests in Poland: Presentation Abstracts in 2023 This presentation and the paper we submitted for the conference was funded by the National Science Centre (NCN),…
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Naomi Klein on Disaster Capitalism and Political Change
Why does the news seem overwhelming? How can we get past the “shock” and change the world for the better? In this post, we present the ideas of Naomi Klein, a renowned author and activist whose work has made a significant impact on discussions surrounding social change. Klein’s thoughts and theories help us understand the…
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President Obama on Money in Politics
The influence of money in politics continues to undermine American democracy. Despite former President Obama’s well-intentioned efforts to tackle this pervasive problem, his administration’s attempts fell short. We explore Obama’s fight against the corrupting power of money in politics, including the various initiatives he championed and the obstacles he faced, such as the Citizens United…
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Piketty: Policy, Institutions, and a Brief History of Equality
Does equality rise? What is the role of policy, institutions, and collective mobilization for increasing equality? This post delves into the work of French economist Thomas Piketty, whose influential books examine wealth and income inequality. Piketty highlights the long-term trend towards greater political, economic, and social equality, driven by political mobilizations, social struggles, and institutional…
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Effects of Political Inequality on Society
Inequality — economic, political, social — is at the heart of society’s troubles. Political inequality is a particular kind and it has many definitions. In the main, it refers to structured differences in influence and outcomes of political processes. What are the effects of political inequality on society? Here we explore the consequences of political…
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Zolberg’s Moments of Madness
I summarize and critique a classic article in the fields of protest and social movements by Aristide R. Zolberg, “Moments of madness.” Politics & Society 2, no. 2 (1972): 183-207. See also… Zolberg’s Thesis Zolberg’s thesis, designed to help us understand social and political change, is simple. During an intense social and political situation, such…
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Social Movement Theory: Fields, Arenas, and Players
Social movement theory typically uses the concepts of fields, arenas, and players or actors. But these concepts seem to be conceptually similar. In this post, I critique two articles by prominent social movement theorists to understand fields, arenas, and players. At the end, I attempt a synthesis. See also: Social Movement Outcomes Social Movement Fields…
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Visions of a Post-Pandemic Society via Street Protest in Poland: NCN Grant (2021/43/B/HS6/01155)
We are looking for hired a post-doctoral scholar and a graduate research assistant to be part of the research team led by dr. hab. Joshua K. Dubrow at IFiS PAN on the implementation of the international research project funded by the National Science Centre, Poland (2021/43/B/HS6/01155) entitled “The Construction of Post-Pandemic Society: Covid-19 Street Protest…
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Political Voice and Economic Inequality: Institutional Factors
We at the POLINQ project examined 18 quantitative cross-national articles by major scholars in the leading journals to develop a typology of institutional factors that influence the relationship between political voice and economic inequality. We comment on how scholars have measured these factors, or “concepts.” At a glance… Institutional Factors that Link Voice to Inequality…
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Political Participation and Democracy
What is the relationship between political participation and democracy? Democracy and political participation — such as protest or voting — feed off of each other. Social scientists argue that when democracy is strong, more people participate. Why? Because democracy opens up possibilities for political participation such as voting, protest, and working for political parties and…
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Gender and Political Inequality in Eastern Europe: Open Access Resources from the POLINQ Project
What is the relationship between gender and political inequality (POLINQ)? Despite the promises of political equality of the Communist era, and the promises of the post-Communist era, from 1945 to now women in Eastern Europe have endured political inequality. Political inequality is defined as structured differences in influence over political decisions, and the outcomes of…
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When Local Governments Protested the USA Patriot Act
Mass Protests over Federal Government Policy The US Presidential of 2016 election sparked protests across the nation. There were mass demonstrations over immigration and refugee policies, pro-Trump rallies, town hall debates over health care, the Women’s March on Washington, and declarations of support for sanctuary cities, to name just a few. We have not seen such…
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Political Inequality and the Revolution of Dignity in Ukraine
This is a guest post by Olga Zelinska, Polish Academy of Sciences, based on an early article (2015) on local Maidans. The Start of Euromaidan in Ukraine It was the summer of 2013 and the people of Ukraine felt helpless. During this time of ‘soft authoritarianism,’ they saw rampant corruption while corporations and other business…
Political Inequality: A blog since 2010 