24

Social Movements and the Dynamics of Collective Action

Abstract

This chapter is devoted to the mechanisms of engagement and disengagement in

collective action as they are currently conceived in social and political psychology.

Dynamics of collective action are decomposed into dynamics of demand, supply, and

mobilization. Dynamics of demand are about people and their motives, dynamics of

supply about organizations and their appeals, and dynamics of mobilization about the

convergence of demand and supply. So far, the core business of political psychology has

been the demand side of protest. This chapter describes five core concepts affecting

collective action participation: grievances, efficacy, identity, emotions, and

embeddedness. As for the supply side of protest and mobilization, new research lines

(framing, the perceptions of the sociopolitical context, and the role of social media for

dynamics of mobilization and participation) are discussed. The chapter closes with a

discussion of new directions research methodology has taken.

Keywords

social movement, participation, disengagement, engagement, collective action, dynamics,

demand and supply, protest, mobilization, grievances, efficacy, identity, emotions,

embeddedness

Protests in the “new” democracies in central Europe about “stolen elections,” street

demonstrations in the “old” democracies against austerity measures, ongoing protests in

the Arab world for more democracy, and occupied city squares throughout the world to

denounce inequality and to demand better governance: Almost daily our news media

report on how people try to influence politics in contentious manners. This is not to say

that political protest is something people regularly do. In fact, participants in political

protest are most of the time a minority. Even mass mobilization rarely encompasses more

than a few percent of the population. This raises a question that has always occupied

students of social movements and collective action, especially social and political

psychologists: Why do some individuals participate in collective action while others

don’t? The answer to that question is less obvious than many assume.

In 1965 Mancur Olson published his Logic of Collective Action. The core of the

book was the argument that rational actors will not take part in collective action unless

selective incentives persuade them to do so. Olson’s reasoning was soon applied to social

movement participation, as it helped to explain why so often people do not participate in

social movements despite the interest they have in the achievement of the movement’s

goals. Movement scholars argued that movement goals are collective goods. Therefore, if

the goal is achieved, people will enjoy the benefits irrespective of whether they have

participated in the effort. In view of a goal for which achievement is uncertain, but for

which benefits—if materialized—can be reaped anyway, rational actors will take a free

ride, so the Olsonian reasoning goes.

The problem with Olson’s logic of collective action is that indeed it provides an

explanation for why people do not participate in collective action (although one of us

demonstrated that nonparticipation often has reasons other than free riding—

Klandermans, 1988), but fares poorly in explaining why people do participate. While we

are writing, the world witnesses the uproar in the Arab world, worldwide protests against

austerity measures, and the Occupy movement demonstrating if anything that people do

protest. A recurring criticism is that Olson’s model assumes that individuals make their

decisions in isolation, as if there are no social media, no other people with whom they

interact, with whom they feel solidary, and by whom they are kept to their promises. Yet

Olson’s dilemma of collective action can serve well to explain why participation in

collective action cannot be taken for granted even if it seems to be in someone’s interest.

This is the paradox that lies at the roots of the argument we will unfold in the pages to

come. We propose a political psychology of collective action participation. In doing so,

we will introduce dynamics of collective action of engagement, sustainable participation,

and disengagement. But we will begin with a definition of social movements and

collective action, the phenomena we are interested in.

1. Defining Social Movements and Collective Action

“Social movements are collective challenges by people with common purposes and

solidarity in sustained interaction with elites and authorities” (Klandermans, 1997, p. 2;

Tarrow, 1998, p. 4). This definition includes three key elements that deserve elaboration.

First, social movements are collective challenges. They concern disruptive collective

direct action against elites, authorities, other groups, or cultural codes. There is an

obvious reason why this is the case. Social movements typically though not always

encompass people who lack access to politics. Had they had access, there would have

been no need for a social movement. Disruptive collective action forces authorities to pay

attention to the claims brought forward. Second, it concerns people with a common

purpose and solidarity. Social movement participants rally behind common claims; they

want authorities to do something, to change a state of affair or to undo changes. Such

common claims are rooted in feelings of collective identity and solidarity. Third, isolated

incidents of collective action are not social movements. Only sustained collective action

turns contention into a social movement.

Although movement participants are a minority, several authors have observed

that movement types of action has become more frequent over the last 30 years (Jenkins,

1995; Mayer, 2013; but see McCarthy, Rafail, & Gromis, 2013 for diverging figures on

the United States; Meyer & Tarrow, 1998; Neidhart & Rucht, 1993; van Stekelenburg, &

Boekkooi, 2013; 2010). Others have argued that social movements have become a

regular phenomenon in democratic societies (Goldstone, 2003; Johnston, 2011). Some of

these authors have labeled this trend “movimentization of politics” (Neidhardt & Rucht,

1993), while others coined the term “movement society” (Meyer & Tarrow, 1998;

Johnston, 2011). This is also observed at the individual level by Dalton, Van Sickle, and

Weldon (2009). With data from the 1999–2002 wave of the World Values Survey

(WVS), they demonstrate that political protest is seemingly a ubiquitous aspect of politics

in contemporary advanced industrial societies, and that its use may be spreading to less

developed nations as well.

Engaging in social movements most of the time implies taking part in some form

of collective action. In the words of Wright, Taylor, and Moghaddam (1990) an

individual takes part in collective action “any time that [she or he] is acting as a

representative of the group and the action is directed at improving the conditions of the

entire group.” Wright (2001) proposes a simple taxonomy of possible forms of political

action. In response to some political issue, people can chose to stay inactive; if they get

into action, they can engage in individual or collective action; and collective action can

be noncontentious or contentious. Participation can further be distinguished in terms of

duration (ad hoc versus sustained) and effort (weak versus strong) (figure 24.1).

[Insert Figure 24.1]

Some activities require little effort, others a lot, and some are limited in time,

while others are unlimited. Activities in the low-effort/limited duration square typically

require large numbers to make any impression on policymakers. It does not make much

sense to have a petition with only 10 signatures; you need thousands if not hundreds of

thousands. People know this, and thus for them to be motivated it is important to know

that some threshold level will be reached. Therefore, an important element of the

persuasion strategy must be how to convince people that enough other people will

participate. Activities in the high-effort/unlimited duration square, on the other hand,

must solve the free-rider dilemma. For high-effort/long duration activities it usually

suffices to have only a few participants who are willing to make an effort. As a

consequence, many people can afford to take a free ride. Willingness to participate in this

type of activity thus implies readiness to give 90% or more of the supporters that free

ride. The social psychological dynamics vary, as the story of thresholds and free riders

illustrate. Attempts to explain (non)participation must thus take into account the kind of

activity we are talking about.

In this chapter we focus on individuals—what are their fears, hopes, and

concerns? What are the choices they make and the motives they have? These questions

bring us to the level of analysis of the individual and therefore to the realm of political

and social psychology. Obviously, other disciplines like sociology and political science

have social movements and collective action as their study object too; in this chapter we

will focus on the political psychological approach and will point to literature from

sociology and political science where applicable. People live in a perceived world. They

respond to the world as they perceive and interpret it. Indeed, this is what a political

psychology of social movements and collective action is about—trying to understand

why people who are seemingly in the same sociopolitical configuration respond so

different. As political psychology explores the causes of the thoughts, feelings, and

actions of people―and primarily how these are influenced by sociopolitical context―it

has a lot to offer to the study of protest participation. Indeed, context matters. Therefore,

questions we want to ask as well include the following: How are citizens embedded in

their social environment, and how does that influence their political orientation and

behavior? What kind of politics do citizens encounter? In this chapter we concentrate on

movement politics, but we must not forget that movement and party politics are

counterparts and that contextual factors influence whether citizens choose to employ one

or the other.

2. Why Social Movements Emerge

In this chapter we concentrate on why individuals participate in movement activities. The

question of why social movements come into being and why they have become common

practice is not our focal question. There is a rich literature available on that matter (for

instance, Buechler, 2000; della Porta & Diani, 2006; Klandermans, 2001; McAdam,

McCarthy, & Zald, 1996; McAdam, Tarrow, & Tilly, 2001; Meyer & Tarrow, 1998;

Snow, Soule, & Kriesi, 2004; Tarrow, 2011). For our purpose it suffices to summarize

the global answers that have been forwarded, in brief: because people are aggrieved,

because people have the resources to mobilize and seize the political opportunity to

protest, and because their collective identities politicize. These answers parallel the

history of theoretical approaches to collective action. Research began in the 1950s and

1960s with classical theories such as symbolic interactionism, structural functionalism,

and relative deprivation theory. Buechler (2000) classified these theories as classical

collective behavior theories, a category that he characterizes as theories that understand

social movements as a reaction to social stress, strain, or breakdown. The direct causes of

collective behavior are seen as rooted in individuals who are experiencing various forms

of discontent or anxiety. Basically, discontent is viewed as the origin of protest. In social

movement literature these theories have also been labeled “breakdown theories,” which

alludes to the fact that researchers conceived of social movements as indicators of the

existence of major cleavages in a society and of societal tension or even breakdown as a

consequence. The works of Blumer (1951), Turner and Killian (1987), Smelser (1962),

Davies (1962), and Gurr (1970) are classic examples of this research tradition. The first

two are associated with symbolic interactionism, describing social movements as

phenomena emerging in the interaction between dissatisfied people. Smelser is associated

with structural functionalism, an approach that defines social movements as a process to

restore equilibrium in a society. Davies and Gurr brought relative deprivation to the field,

explaining the emergence of social movements from high levels of relative deprivation in

a society. But it was obvious that many aggrieved people never engage in protest. Indeed

in the early 1970s protagonists of resource mobilization theory began to argue that

grievances are ubiquitous and that the real question is not so much what makes people

aggrieved but what makes aggrieved people participate in social movements (McCarthy

& Zald, 1976; Oberschall, 1973).

Resource mobilization theorists saw social movements as normal, rational,

institutionally rooted political challenges by aggrieved people. Differential availability of

resources explains in their eyes why some aggrieved people become involved in social

movements while others don’t. It was argued that people need resources to stage

collective political action, and a key resource for such action is organizations and

networks that exist among the affected population (so-called indigenous organizations,

Morris, 1984). Applying an economic metaphor, McCarthy and Zald (1976) made the

distinction between social movements (beliefs that represent a preference for change in a

society), social movement organizations (organizations that identify with a social

movement), social movement industries (social movement organizations that belong to

the same social movement), and social movement sectors (all social movement industries

in a society). Within the resource mobilization framework, participation in collective

action was analyzed in terms of the costs and benefits associated with it. Rational choice

models of behavior (Klandermans, 1984; Oberschall, 1973; Opp, 1988) and Olson’s

theory of collective action (1965) were employed as models to explain individuals’

participation and nonparticipation in collective action. When the potential benefits

outweigh the anticipated costs, people opt to participate. Paradoxically, the same

deprivation that might motivate people to stage collective action might deprive them of

the resources needed for such action. Indeed, it was proposed that external resources

could tip the balance. Soon a variant of resource mobilization theory developed within

political science—the political process approach—which proposed that political

opportunities available to aggrieved groups with the resources to take action make the

difference (McAdam, 1982). Political opportunities are “those consistent—but not

necessarily formal or permanent—dimensions of the political environment that provide

incentives for people to undertake collective action by affecting their expectations of

success and failure” (Tarrow, 1998, p. 85). Among the many aspects of the political

environment that have been referred to as factors influencing success expectations are the

strength of the state, the level of repression, the party system, the degree of access to

policy, and the dividedness of elites.

In the late 1980s and early 1990s, partly as the result of exchanges between

American and European social movement scholars (Klandermans, Kriesi, & Tarrow,

1988), an interest began to develop in the cognitive and affective origins of social

movements. In response to the structuralist approach of the then dominant paradigms—

resource mobilization and political process theories—social movement scholars from

various angles began to highlight the processes of interaction, the symbolic definition and

negotiation among participants, opponents, and bystanders of collective action.

Grievances, resources, and opportunities are all needed for social movements to develop,

but these scholars hold that they are also the result of the presence of social movements.

They are in the eyes of the beholder and thus socially constructed. Moreover, researchers

working from this perspective argued that aggrieved people might have the resources and

opportunities to protest, but they still need to construct a politicized collective identity to

engage in collective political action. Over the last decade and a half this new approach to

collective action has been elaborated in studies of framing, collective identity, and

emotions in the context of social movements. Together they have been labeled social

constructionist approaches to protest. Snow, Rochford, Worden, and Benford (1986)

were among the first to elaborate on the role of cognitive processes in their treatment of

frame alignment—that is, attempts by movement organizers to persuade people to adopt

the movement’s reading of the situation. At the same time, Melucci (1989) began to point

to the importance of collective identity (Cohen, 1985). In social psychology, scholars

began to elaborate social identity theory and intergroup emotions theory (see Huddy,

chapter 23, this volume). Soon cognition and identity began to proliferate in social

movement literature (see Morris & McClurg Mueller, 1992 for an overview of scholarly

work at that time). The most recent social constructionist attempt to move away from

structural approaches such as resource mobilization and political process concerns the

role of emotions in collective action (Goodwin, Jasper, & Polleta, 2001; van

Stekelenburg & Klandermans, 2007). By way of conclusion it suffices to assert that

social constructionism has carved out its own niche as a legitimate approach to the

analysis of social movements (Buechler, 2000, p. 54).

In sum, breakdown theories, resource mobilization and political process theories,

and social constructionist theories all tried to account for the emergence of social

movements in our societies. All agree that somehow grievances are at the roots of social

movements and contention, but they diverge in their explanations of what makes

aggrieved people protest. While breakdown theories offer little in terms of mobilization

processes beyond high levels of discontent, resource mobilization and political process

theory point to resources and political opportunities as factors in the environment that

impact on the formation and fate of social movements. Social constructionists, on the

other hand, focus more on processes of interaction and sense-making among the

aggrieved as internal factors stimulating the emergence of social movements. The

remainder of this chapter will be devoted to the mechanisms of engagement and

disengagement in collective action as they are currently conceived in social and political

psychology.

3. The Dynamics of Collective Action

Dynamics of collective action can be decomposed into dynamics of demand, supply, and

mobilization (Klandermans, 2004). Dynamics of demand are about people and their

motives, dynamics of supply about organizations and their appeals, and dynamics of

mobilization about the convergence of demand and supply. Although the three are

interdependent, each concerns different aspects of the dynamics of collective action,

refers to different mechanisms, and relates to different literatures.

The demand side of collective action concerns characteristics of a social

movement’s mobilization potential. What is its demographic and political composition?

Which collective identities does it comprise? What are the shared grievances and

emotions? What is the composition of its organizational field; and to what extent are

individuals socially and virtually embedded? The supply side of collective action

concerns the characteristics of the movement. Is it strong; is it effective? Is it likely to

achieve its goals at affordable costs? Does it have charismatic leaders? Is it an

organization people can identify with? What does its action repertoire look like? Does it

stage activities that are appealing to people? Which ideology does the movement stand

for, and what constituents of identification does it offer? Demand and supply do not

automatically come together. In a market economy, marketing is employed to make sure

that the public is aware of a supply that might meet its demand. Mobilization is—so to

speak—the marketing mechanism of the movement domain. The study of mobilization

concerns such matters as the effectiveness of (persuasive) communication, the influence

of social networks, and the role of new media such as the Internet, (smart)phones, and

social media.

Studies of participation tend to concentrate on mobilization and to neglect the

development of demand and supply factors. Yet there is no reason to take either for

granted. To be sure, grievances abound in a society, but that does not mean that there is

no reason to explain how grievances develop and how they are transformed into a

demand for protest. Nor does the presence of social movement organizations in a society

mean that there is no need to understand their formation and to investigate how they stage

opportunities to protest and how these opportunities are seized by aggrieved people.

Between the paradigms a division of labor seems to exist in terms of the study of

demand and supply. Whereas resource mobilization and political process theorists

typically study supply factors, social constructionists study demand factors, and all three

study mobilization. As we are concentrating on the study of collective action in social

and political psychology, we will put an emphasis on demand and mobilization, but we

cannot do without a brief discussion of the dynamics of supply.

3.1. Dynamics of Demand

Little is known about how exactly demand is formed. A few decades ago Klandermans

introduced the distinction between consensus mobilization and consensus formation

(1984; 1988). While consensus mobilization concerns “the deliberate attempts to spread

the view of a social actor among parts of the population,” consensus formation concerns

“the unplanned convergence of meaning in social networks and subcultures”

(Klandermans, 1988, p. 175). Gamson (1992) in his Talking Politics shows that people

use any kind of information source if they talk with their friends about politics.

Employing time-series analysis Vliegenthart (2007) demonstrated for the issues of

immigration and integration that in a complex interplay between real-life events, media

attention, debates in the parliament, and debates between politicians, public opinion is

formed and converted into anti-immigrant party support in the Netherlands. In research

she has yet to report on, van Stekelenburg investigates how, in a newly built

neighborhood, demand for protest develops as a function of the development of formal,

informal, and virtual networks. These days the Internet and social media play a crucial

role in this regard (Earl & Kimport, 2011; van Stekelenburg, Petrovic, Pouw, Limburg,

& Nederlof, 2012).

Indeed, the formation of demand is a process that takes place in social interaction.

Individuals are embedded in formal, informal, and virtual networks, which in turn are

embedded in multiorganizational fields. Taylor (2013) proposes the concept of discursive

communities to signify these settings in which consensus formation takes place.

Understanding the formation of demand in a society requires insight in these processes of

consensus mobilization and formation. We will return to the subject in our section on

mobilization.

3.1.1. Grievances

Grievances concern “outrage about the way authorities are treating a social problem”

(Klandermans, 1997, p. 38). In The Social Psychology of Protest, while expanding on

this definition, Klandermans made the distinction between illegitimate inequality,

suddenly imposed grievances, and violated principles. The notions of suddenly imposed

grievances and violated principles, in fact, originate in the sociological social movement

literature. Walsh (1983) coined the first and Kriesi (1993) the second. Suddenly imposed

grievances—such as the establishment of a waste incinerator or a highway trajectory—

are powerful mobilizers, as are violated principles. Illegitimate inequality is dealt with in

the literatures on relative deprivation and social justice. Relative deprivation theory holds

that feelings of relative deprivation result from a comparison of one’s situation with a

certain standard—one’s past, someone else’s situation, or an ideological standard such as

equity or justice (Folger, 1986). If a comparison results in the conclusion that one is not

receiving what one deserves, a person experiences relative deprivation. The literature

further distinguishes between relative deprivation based on personal comparisons (i.e.,

individual deprivation) and relative deprivation based on group comparisons (i.e., group

deprivation; Kelly & Breinlinger, 1996). Research demonstrates that group relative

deprivation is particularly important for engagement in collective action (Major, 1994),

but work by Foster and Matheson (1999) suggests that so-called “double deprivation,”

that is, a combination of group and individual deprivation, is even more effective. On the

basis of a meta-analysis, van Zomeren, Postmes, and Spears (2008) conclude that the

cognitive component of relative deprivation (i.e., the observation that one receives less

than the standard of comparison) has less influence on action participation than does the

affective component (i.e., such feelings as dissatisfaction, indignation, and discontent

about outcomes).

Social psychologists have applied social justice theory to the study of social

movements (Tyler & Smith, 1998). The social justice literature distinguishes between

two classes of justice judgments: distributive and procedural justice. Distributive justice

is related to relative deprivation in that it refers to the fairness of outcome distributions.

Procedural justice, on the other hand, refers to the fairness of decision-making procedures

and the relational aspects of the social process, that is, whether authorities treat people

with respect and can be trusted to act in a beneficial and unbiased manner (Tyler & Lind,

1992). Research has found that people care more about how they are treated than about

outcomes. Based on these findings, Tyler and Smith (1998) propose that procedural

justice might be a more powerful predictor of social movement participation than

distributive justice; that is what we found indeed both in our research in South Africa

(Klandermans, Roefs, & Olivier, 2001) and among migrants in the Netherlands and New

York (Klandermans, Van der Toorn, & van Stekelenburg, 2008).

Political trust and political cynicism further influence the formation of grievances.

Folger (1986) argues that perceived inequalities will not turn into discontent if people

trust responsible actors (mostly authorities) to deal with the problem. Indeed, we found in

our research in South Africa that relative deprivation is substantially reduced when

people display trust in government (Klandermans et al., 2001). On the other hand, if

people are cynical about politics, feelings of injustice are more likely to turn into

contestation, as our migrants study demonstrated (Klandermans, Van der Toorn, & van

Stekelenburg, 2008).

Table 24.1 summarizes what grievances are strong motivators: suddenly imposed

grievances, group and double deprivation rather than individual deprivation, procedural

justice rather than distributive justice, the emotional component of grievances rather than

the cognitive component, violated principles and threatened interests, and political

cynicism rather than trust.

[Insert Table 24.1]

3.1.2. Efficacy

It would be hard to deny that people who are part of a movement’s mobilization potential

are aggrieved, but as we know meanwhile grievances do not provide a sufficient reason

to participate in collective action. Therefore, the key question of any grievance theory to

address is: why do some aggrieved people protest, while others do not? The first to raise

that question were the resource mobilization theorists (e.g., Oberschall, 1973; McCarthy

and Zald, 1976) and a social psychological expansion thereof (Klandermans, 1984).

More recently, in a large comparative study based on WVS surveys, Dalton et al. (2009)

found that grievances are weak predictors of protest. Rather than aggrieved people, it is

those who possess political skills and resources who generally protest more, independent

of their level of grievances. The underlying political psychological concept is efficacy.

People are more likely to participate in movement activities when they believe this will

help to redress their grievances at affordable costs (Klandermans, 1984). The more

effective an individual believes collective action participation to be, the more likely the

person is to participate. Van Zomeren, Spears, Fischer, and Leach (2004) propose

efficacy as the core of what they call problem-focused coping—one of the two pathways

to collective action they define, the other being emotion-focused coping, with group-

based anger at its core (see below). In a cross-national study Corcoran, Pettinicchio, and

Young (2012) demonstrated the significant role of efficacy for protest participation

across 48 countries. Qualifying the assertions of political process approaches, these

authors report important contextual influences. Feelings of efficacy make people more

likely to participate in collective action, especially if they are faced with closed political

opportunities. But for those who feel efficacious, opportunities or lack of repression don’t

make any difference. Efficacious people participate in collective action no matter what

the opportunities are. Indeed, opportunities or absence of repression only make fatalistic

people take part in collective action. The authors report that social embeddedness is of

crucial importance for the generation and role of feelings of efficacy in that respect. We

will come back to that later.

3.1.3. Identity

Next to efficacy, identity, specifically collective identity, became an important concept in

the social movement literature in the past 25 years. Melucci was among the first to

emphasize the significance of collective identity (1981). In the years to follow the

concept began to gain prominence in the social movement literature (see Stryker, Owens,

& White, 2000). Meanwhile, social psychologists began to explore the role of group

identification in movement participation (Kelly & Breinlinger, 1996; Simon et al., 1998;

de Weerd & Klandermans, 2000; Simon & Klandermans, 2001; Stürmer & Simon, 2004)

and concluded that the more one identifies with a group involved in a protest activity, the

more likely one is to take part in that activity.

A complicating matter in this respect is the fact that people simultaneously hold

multiple identities, while movements tend to emphasize a single identity and refer to a

single place in society. As a consequence, people may experience being steered in

different directions by conflicting identities (cf. Kurtz, 2002). Individuals might find

themselves under cross-pressure when two groups they identify with are on opposite

sides of a controversy (e.g., union members faced with the decision to strike against their

own company). Indeed, workers who go on strike or movement activists who challenge

their government are often accused of being disloyal to the company or the country. This

problem is especially relevant in the case of protest participation by immigrants, these

days specifically Muslim immigrants, which can easily be (mis)interpreted as disloyalty

to their new country of residence. González and Brown (2003) coined the term “dual

identity” to point to the concurrent workings of supra- and subordinated identities. They

argue that identification with a subordinate entity (e.g., ethnic identity) does not

necessarily exclude identification with a supraordinate entity (e.g., national identity). In

fact, they claim that dual identity is a healthy configuration, as it implies sufficient

identification with one’s subgroup to experience basic security and sufficient

identification with the overarching group to preclude divisiveness.

There is evidence that indeed people who hold a dual identity are more satisfied

with their situation than people who do not (González & Brown, 2003; Simon, 2010).

Furthermore, studies of Spanish and Dutch farmers, South African citizens, and

immigrants in the Netherlands and New York suggest that individuals who report holding

a dual identity are more satisfied with their social and political situation than those who

do not hold a dual identity (Klandermans et al., 2001; Klandermans, Sabucedo, &

Rodriguez, 2004; Klandermans et al., 2008). However, if they are dissatisfied,

individuals who hold a dual identity are more likely to participate in collective action.

Simon and his students (Simon & Grabow, 2010; Simon & Ruhs, 2008) have

argued that a politicized collective identity is by definition a dual identity. In 2001 Simon

and Klandermans published their influential paper on the politicization of collective

identity (PCI). In order to become the vehicle of collective action, collective identity

must politicize, they argued. Shared grievances, common enemies, and a search for third-

party support are the building blocks of PCI the authors refer to. Some sense of

identification with the superordinate political entity seems to be a basic requirement of

social and political mobilization in that it ensures that this entity is acknowledged as

one’s own social or political habitat or arena. More specifically, to the extent that one

identifies with the superordinate entity, one should feel entitled to make political claims,

because identity confers rights. Similarly, one should feel motivated to get actively

involved in the political game, because it becomes one’s own game, and one should feel

encouraged to approach third parties as potential allies, because they can be viewed as in-

group members at the superordinate level (Simon and Ruhs, 2008). Politicization divides

people’s social environment into allies and opponents and results in polarization.

Polarization concerns the process of distancing of the opposing camps. The more

polarized the relationship becomes, the less deviation from own opinions and actions is

accepted and the more opinions and acts of the opponents are rejected. Eventually, this

may result in radicalization. Simon suggests that in a polarized situation, to the extent that

PCI is a dual identity including identification with the superordinate polity, PCI has a

pacifying effect on politicization and associated collective action in that it prioritizes

normative claims and actions (i.e., claims and actions that stay within the limits of

normative acceptance in the larger polity). In contrast, collective identities lacking this

pacifying effect, such as separatist identities based on more exclusive cultural, ethnic, or

religious allegiances, should be more prone to nonnormative escalation and

radicalization.

3.1.4. Emotions

Recent work in sociology and social and political psychology has brought emotions to the

study of social movements (Goodwin et al., 2001; Jasper, 1998; van Stekelenburg, 2006;

van Zomeren et al., 2004). For those of us who have been part of protest events or

watched reports on protest events in the news media, this is hardly surprising. Indeed, it is

hard to conceive of protest detached from emotions. Emotions can be avoidance or

approach oriented. Fear, which makes people refrain from taking action, is an example of

an avoidance-oriented emotion. Anger is an approach oriented emotion and is known to

be an antecedent of protest participation (van Zomeren et al., 2004). There appears to be

a relation between emotions and efficacy. When people do not feel efficacious, they are

more likely to experience fear; feeling efficacious, on the other hand, is associated with

experiencing anger (Mackie, Devos, & Smith, 2000). Findings from our study among

migrants confirm this: feelings of efficacy reinforced anger and reduced fear, while in

their turn anger fostered collective action participation, while fear undermined it

(Klandermans et al., 2008). Van Zomeren et al. (2004) show that anger is an important

motivator of protest participation of disadvantaged groups. Leach and colleagues (2007)

examined readiness for political action among advantaged Australians to oppose

government plans to redress disadvantaged Aborigines. They found that symbolic racism

and relative deprivation evoked group-based anger, which in turn promoted willingness

for political action. But advantaged group members can also perceive the in-group

advantage as unfair and feel guilt and anger about it. Anger related to in-group advantage,

and to a lesser degree guilt, appears to be a potent predictor for protest (Leach et al.,

2006). Anger, guilt, and fear are not the only emotions relevant in the context of

movement participation; indeed other emotions such as hope and despair are proposed as

well (D. Gould, 2009; Stürmer & Simon, 2009; Taylor, 2013). Anger moves people to

adopt a more challenging relationship with authorities than subordinate emotions such as

shame and despair (Taylor, 2009) or fear (Klandermans et al., 2008).

In explaining different tactics, efficacy appears to be relevant, too. Anger is

mainly observed in normative actions were efficacious people protest. However, in

nonnormative violent actions contempt appears to be the more relevant emotion (Fischer

& Roseman, 2007; Tausch, Becker, Spears, & Christ, 2008). This suggests two

emotional routes to protest (cf. van Stekelenburg & Klandermans, 2010): an anger route

based on efficacy leading to normative action, and a contempt route when legitimate

channels are closed (Wright et al., 1990) and the situation is seen as hopeless, invoking a

“nothing to lose” strategy leading to nonnormative protest (Kamans, Otten, & Gordijn,

2010).

3.1.5. An Integrating Framework

Strikingly, a comprehensive framework integrating identities, grievances, and emotions

into a single model was lacking for a long time. Recently, however, Simon et al. (1998),

van Zomeren et al. (2008), and van Stekelenburg and Klandermans (2007; 2009, 2011)

have each attempted to build such models. The three models these authors have offered

have in common that they distinguish various pathways to collective action. While Simon

et al. distinguish an instrumental and identity pathway, and van Zomeren et al. distinguish

between an emotion- and a problem-focused pathway, van Stekelenburg and

Klandermans distinguish instrumentality, identity, ideology, and anger as determinants of

participation in collective action. Central to all three models are processes of

identification; in order to develop the shared grievances and shared emotions that

characterize demand, a shared identity is needed. Similarly, all three models include an

instrumentality component with efficacy as a key aspect. In a comparison of the three

models van Zomeren et al. concluded that injustice, identity, and efficacy each

contributed to the explanation of collective action participation (2008).

[Insert Figure 24.2]

Figure 24.2 depicts our summary of the various models. As dependent variable

we took the strength of the motivation to participate in collective action. Motivational

strength results from group-based anger, and instrumental and/or ideological motivation.

Instrumental and ideological motivation each result from grievances and feelings of

efficacy shared with a group that the individual participants identify with. Grievances

may originate from interests and/or principles that are felt to be threatened. The more

people feel that interests of the group and/or principles that the group values are

threatened, the angrier they are and the more they are prepared to take part in collective

action to protect their interests and/or to express their indignation. Whether a specific

level of motivation turns into actual participation depends also on the supply of

opportunities to act.

3.2. Dynamics of Supply

Social movement organizations are more or less successful in satisfying demands for

collective political participation, and we may assume that movements that are

successfully supplying what potential participants demand gain more support than

movements that fail to do so. Movements and movement organizations can be compared

in terms of their effectiveness in this regard. This is not to say that it is easy to assess

effectiveness (Giugni, 1998; 2004; Giugni, McAdam, & Tilly, 1999). Measures of effect

differ (e.g., impact on and access to polity, impact on public opinion, attention of mass

media) and people’s assessment of effectiveness differs as well. A movement

organization’s effectiveness can also be assessed on its ability to provide selective

incentives (McCarthy & Zald, 1976; Oliver, 1980). Nonetheless, movement

organizations try to convey the image of an effective political force. They can do so by

pointing to the impact they have had in the past, or to the powerful allies they have. Of

course, they may lack all this, but then, they might be able to show other signs of

strength. A movement may command a large constituency, as witnessed by turnout on

demonstrations, or by membership figures, or large donations. It may comprise strong

organizations with strong charismatic leaders who have gained respect, and so on.

The political system and the organizational field movement organizations are

embedded in may also show considerable variation that influences the supply side of

movement participation. Repressive political environments may increase the costs of

participation considerably: people may lose friends, they may risk their jobs or otherwise

jeopardize their sources of income, they may be jailed, and they may even lose their lives

(Davenport, Johnston, & Mueller, 2005; Tilly, 1978).

An important element of the supply side of participation is the provision of

information about the behavior of others. Social networks—real and virtual—are of

strategic importance in this respect, because it is through these networks that people are

informed about the behavior or intentions of others (Chew, 1999; Earl & Kimport, 2011;

Kim & Bearman, 1997; Oegema & Klandermans, 1994; Passy, 2001). In his paper on the

Chinese student movement of 1989, Zhao (1998) gives a striking illustration of this

mechanism. He describes how the ecological circumstance that most students in Beijing

live in the same part of town made the success of the movement in terms of mobilization

visible in the streets in front of the dormitories. In the virtual world, social media such as

Facebook do the same (van Stekelenburg & Klandermans, 2012)

Movements offer the opportunity to act on behalf of one’s group. This is most

attractive if people identify strongly with their group (de Weerd & Klandermans, 1999;

Kelly & Breinlinger, 1996; Klandermans, 2002; Simon et al., 1998; Stürmer & Simon,

2004). Interestingly, all these studies show that identification with the more exclusive

group of movement participants is far more influential than identification with the more

inclusive category. Indeed, in addition to the opportunity to act on behalf of the group,

collective political action participation offers further constituents of identification: the

leader of the movement; the movement’s cause; the people in the movement, the

movement organization, or the group one is participating in. Not all these sources of

identification are always equally appealing. Movement leaders can be more or less

charismatic, or the people in the movement can be more or less attractive. Moreover,

movements and movement organizations may be, and in fact often are, controversial. As

a consequence, movement participants are frequently stigmatized (Klandermans &

Mayer, 2006; Linden & Klandermans, 2006). Within the movement’s network, this is, of

course, completely different. There the militant does have the status society is denying

him or her. Indeed, it is not uncommon for militants to refer to the movement

organization as a second family, a substitute for the social and associative life society is

no longer offering them (Orfali, 1990; Tristan, 1987). Movement organizations not only

supply sources of identification, they also offer all kinds of opportunities to enjoy and

celebrate the collective identity: marches, rituals, songs, meetings, signs, symbols, and

common codes (see Stryker et al., 2000 for an overview).

Social movements play a significant role in the diffusion of ideas and values

(Eyerman & Jamison, 1991). Rochon (1998) makes the distinction between “critical

communities,” where new ideas and values are developed, and “social movements,”

which are interested in winning social and political acceptance for those ideas and values.

“In the hands of movement leaders, the ideas of critical communities become ideological

frames” (Rochon, 1998, p. 31). Through processes such as consensus mobilization

(Klandermans, 1988), framing (Snow et al., 1986), or dialogue (Steinberg, 1999)

movements seek to disseminate their definition of the situation to the public at large.

Such definitions of the situation have been labeled “collective action frames” (Gamson,

1992; Klandermans, 1997). Collective action frames can be defined in terms of

injustice—that is, some definition of what’s wrong in the world; identity—that is, some

definition of who is affected and who is responsible; and agency—that is, some beliefs

about the possibilities of changing society. We may assume that people who join a

movement come to share some part of the movement’s ideas and values.

Social movements do not invent ideas from scratch; they build on an ideological

heritage as they relate their claims to broader themes and values in society. In so doing

they relate to societal debates that have a history of its own, and that history is usually

much longer than that of the movement itself. Gamson (1992), for example, refers to the

“themes” and “counterthemes” that in his view exist in every society. One such paired

theme and countertheme he mentions is “self-reliance” versus “mutuality,” that is, the

belief that individuals must take care of themselves versus the belief that society is

responsible for its less fortunate members. In a study of the protests about disability

payments in the Netherlands we demonstrated how in the Netherlands these two beliefs

became the icons that galvanized the debates (Klandermans & Goslinga, 1996). While

“self-reliance” became the theme of those favoring restrictions on disability payments,

“mutuality” was the theme of those who defended the existing system. Another example

is what Tarrow (1998) calls “rights frames”: human rights, civil rights, women’s rights,

animal rights, and so on, in other words, collective action frames that relate a

movement’s aims to some fundamental rights frame. For decades Marxism has been such

an ideological heritage movements identified with, positively by embracing it or

negatively by distancing themselves from it. In a similar vein, fascism and Naziism form

the ideological heritage right-wing extremism must come to terms with either by

identifying with it or by keeping it at a distance.

The supply side of collective action is not static or a constant. In fact, it has to be

constructed again in every mobilization campaign. McAdam et al. (1996) have defined

this phenomenon as mobilizing structures, which are “those collective vehicles, informal

as well as formal, through which people mobilize and engage in collective action”

(McAdam et al., 1996, p. 3). Mobilizing structures are the connecting tissue between

organizers and participants. At any time, all kinds of groups, organizations, and networks

that exist in a society can become part of a mobilizing structure. However, none can be

assumed to automatically become part of it. Networks need to be adapted, appropriated,

assembled, and activated by organizers in order to function as mobilizing structures

(Boekkooi, Klandermans, & van Stekelenburg, 2011). Many studies have shown that

networks are important in explaining differential recruitment and mobilization (e.g.,

Klandermans & Oegema, 1987; Snow, Zurcher, & Ekland-Olson, 1980; Walgrave &

Klandermans, 2010). Assembling a mobilizing structure is an important step in the

process of micromobilization. Which organizations join the mobilizing coalition is an

important predictor of who will participate in the protest (e.g., Heaney and Rojas, 2008).

Most studies assessing organizational affiliations show that organizations predominantly

mobilize their own members. Similarly, networks tend to reach those who are embedded

in their structures. Thus, organizers who assemble different mobilizing structures, be they

coalitions of formal organizations or networks of informal networks or both, reach

different subsets of a movement’s mobilization potential (Boekkooi et al., 2011).

Roggeband and Duyvendak (2013) raise the question of whether traditional

networks and organizations such as parties, unions, or churches have lost their mobilizing

force and are being replaced by light communities and highly fluid mobilizing structures.

They suggest that more and more people avoid “heavy” long-term engagements and leave

more formal institutions for looser engagements in informal, sometimes temporary, or

issue-specific networks. As they also see a change from “identity politics” to “issue

politics,” these authors speculate that the emergence of “light” communities will be

accompanied by a process of individualization resulting in a shift from collective to

individual action. It does not come as a surprise that the Internet and virtual networks are

central in their reasoning. Although the authors admit that much of their argument is

speculative, developments like these raise important questions for social movement

researchers.

In processes of framing social movements, organizations work hard to turn

grievances into claims, to point out targets to be addressed, to create moral outrage and

anger, and to stage events where all this can be vented. They weave together a moral,

cognitive, and ideological package and communicate that appraisal of the situation to the

movement’s mobilization potential. In doing so, social movement organizations play a

significant role in the process of construction and reconstruction of collective beliefs and

in the transformation of individual discontent into collective action. Grievances can be

framed in terms of violated interests and/or violated principles. We demonstrated that

campaigns that emphasize the violation of interests more likely resonate with

instrumental motives, while campaigns that emphasize the violation of principles more

likely resonate with ideological motives (van Stekelenburg, Klandermans, & van Dijk,,

2009). With the concept of resonance we have entered the terrain of mobilization.

3.3. Mobilization

Mobilization is the process that gets the action going; demand and supply would remain

potentials if processes of mobilization did not bring the two together. Social networks are

indispensable in the processes of mobilization. Individual grievances and feelings are

transformed into group-based grievances and feelings within social networks. As early as

1965, Almond and Verba observed a positive correlation between active engagement in

voluntary associations and political efficacy. Hence, a movement’s mobilization potential

can be described in terms of the social capital accumulated in it. Lin (1999, p. 35)

defined social capital as “resources embedded in a social structure which are accessed

and/or mobilized in purposive actions.” Paxton (2002) argued that associational life

cumulates social capital, which “provides space for the creation and dissemination of

discourse critical of the present government, and it provides a way for active opposition

to the regime to grow” (p. 257).

3.3.1. Social Embeddedness

The concept of social capital has important implications for advancing our

understanding of the role of social embeddedness in protest participation.

Exploring the impact of social capital takes into account the social context in

which the decision to participate or not is taken. As a set of relationships, social

capital has many different attributes, which are categorized into three

components: a structural, a relational, and a cognitive component (Nahapiet &

Ghoshal, 1998). The structural component of social capital refers to the presence

or absence of network ties between actors, and it essentially defines who people

can reach. Structural social capital encourages cooperative behavior, thereby

facilitating mobilization and participation. The relational component of social

capital concerns the kinds of personal relationships people have developed

through a history of interaction (Granovetter, 1973). It focuses on the particular

relationships people have, such as respect, trust, and friendship. The structural

position may be necessary, but it does not appear sufficient to help individuals

overcome the collective action dilemma. Relational capital implies what people

are actually able to receive in terms of informational, physical, and emotional

support. When trust is built between people, they are more willing to engage in

cooperative activity through which further trust can be generated (on trust: Lind

& Tyler, 1988; on respect: Simon & Stürmer, 2003). The third—cognitive—

component is defined as those resources providing shared representations,

interpretations, and systems of meaning. It constitutes a powerful form of social

capital in the context of protest (and politics in general, as Huckfeldt, Mondak,

Hayes, Pietryka, & Reilly, chapter 21, this volume, argue). The cognitive

dimension is in protest literature referred to as raised consciousness—a set of

political beliefs and action orientations arising out of an awareness of similarity

(Gurin, Miller, & Gurin, 1980, p. 30). Consciousness-raising takes place within

social networks. It is within these networks that individual processes such as

grievance formation, strengthening of efficacy, identification, and group-based

emotions all synthesize into a motivational constellation preparing people for

action and building mobilization potential. Both resource mobilization theory and

political process theory emphasize the structural component, the role of social

networks, especially as mobilizing structures (Diani & McAdam, 2003; Kitts,

2000; McAdam et al., 1996). Social constructivistic approaches put more

emphasis on the relational and cognitive component.

Part of the infrastructure of a movement’s mobilization potential is the

communication networks that connect individuals. Walgrave and Klandermans (2010)

demonstrate how open and closed communication channels and weak and strong ties

weave a web of connections that influence how easy or difficult it is to reach a

movement’s mobilization potential. Polletta, Chen, Gardner, and Motes suggest that the

Internet plays an important role in grievance formation (2013). This corroborates van

Stekelenburg and Klandermans’s observation that technologies such as mobile phones,

the Internet, Facebook, and so on, played a crucial role in the mobilization of high school

students in the Netherlands in a protest campaign against educational policy (2012).

Social embeddedness―be it in formal, informal, or virtual networks―plays a

pivotal role in the context of protest, but why? The effect of interaction in networks on

the propensity to participate in politics is contingent on the amount of political discussion

that occurs in social networks and the information that people are able to gather about

politics as a result (McClurg, 2003). Klandermans et al. (2008) provide evidence for such

mechanisms: immigrants who felt efficacious were more likely to participate in protest

provided that they were embedded in social networks, especially ethnic networks, which

offer an opportunity to discuss and learn about politics. In other words, this is where

people talk politics and thus where the factuality of the sociopolitical world is constructed

and people are mobilized for protest. Being integrated in a network increases the chances

that one will be targeted with a mobilizing message and that people are kept to their

promises to participate. For example, people with friends or acquaintances who are

already active within social movements are more likely to take part in movement actions

than others (R. Gould, 1993; Klandermans, 1997). Social networks function as

communication channels, discursive processes take place to form consensus that makes

up the symbolic resources in collective sense-making (Gamson, 1992), and people are

informed of upcoming events and social capital as trust and loyalty accumulates in

networks to provide individuals with the resources needed to invest in protest.

3.3.2. The Process of Mobilization

Mobilization is a complicated process that can be broken down into several conceptually

distinct steps. Klandermans (1988) proposed to break the process of mobilization down

into consensus and action mobilization. Consensus mobilization refers to dissemination

of the views of the movement organization, while action mobilization refers to the

transformation of those who adopted the view of the movement and turned into active

participants. The more successful consensus mobilization is, the larger the pool of

sympathizers a mobilizing movement organization can draw from. In their frame

alignment approach to mobilization Snow and Benford and their colleagues elaborated

consensus mobilization much further (see Benford, 1997 for a critical review; and Snow,

2004 for an overview). Klandermans and Oegema (1987) broke the process of action

mobilization down further into four separate steps: people (1) need to sympathize with the

cause, (2) need to know about the upcoming event, (3) must want to participate, and (4)

must be able to participate (see figure 24.3).

[Insert Figure 24.3]

Each step brings the supply and demand of protest closer together until an

individual eventually takes the final step to participate in an instance of political protest.

The first step accounts for the results of consensus mobilization. It divides the general

public into those who sympathize with the cause and those who do not. A large pool of

sympathizers is of strategic importance, because for a variety of reasons many a

sympathizer never turns into a participant. The second step is equally obvious as crucial;

it divides the sympathizers into those who have been the target of mobilization attempts

and those who have not. The third step concerns the social psychological core of the

process. It divides the sympathizers who have been targeted into those who are motivated

to participate in the specific activity and those who are not. Finally, the fourth step

differentiates the people who are motivated into those who end up participating and those

who do not.

In their research on the mobilization campaign for a peace demonstration

Klandermans and Oegema (1987) found that three-quarters of the population of a

community south of Amsterdam felt sympathy for the movement’s cause. Of these

sympathizers, three-quarters were somehow targeted by mobilization attempts. Of those

targeted, one-sixth were motivated to participate in the demonstration. And finally, of

those motivated, one-third ended up participating. The net result of these different steps is

some (usually small) proportion of the general public that participates in protest. With

each step smaller or larger numbers drop out, but the better the fit between demand and

supply, the smaller the number of dropouts.

3.3.3. Mobilization with Minimal Organization

Sometimes the demand for protest can be so overwhelming that very little is needed to

bring large numbers onto the streets. In the context of the massive indignation regarding

the kidnapping and serial killing of children by Dutroux and judicial errors in Belgium in

dealing with it, television and newspapers sufficed as mobilizing actors (Walgrave &

Manssens, 2000). Yet the mobilizing power of the media should not be overestimated

(Kingdon, 1984). They only have the power to mobilize in case of so-called consensual

issues (Verhulst, 2011), that is, issues that root in suddenly imposed grievances that

evoke a communal sense of repulsion and indignation. Examples are the death of a child

caused by drunken driving (McCarthy & Wolfson, 1996) or senseless violence

(Lodewijkx, Kersten, & van Zomeren, 2008). The salience and the consensual character

of the issues compensate for the lack of organizational brokerage, making mobilization

via the mass media possible. Similarly, Walgrave & Klandermans (2010) report findings

from a demonstration against the Iraq war revealing that appeals via mass media were

more effective in countries with high levels of opposition against the war.

Mobilization with minimal organization has become more effective with the

appearance of virtual networks and social media. In November 2007, we conducted a

study on protests staged in the absence of any form of organization (van Stekelenburg &

Boekkooi, 2013; van Stekelenburg & Klandermans, 2012). That week in November

20,000 Dutch secondary school pupils took to the streets protesting the deteriorating

quality of their education. The movement took the shape of protests by several groups

geographically scattered and diffused over a period of time that were impromptu and

short-lived. They were initiated by the stereotypical guy next door, Kevin, whose call for

action was “virally” spread via face-to-face personal and virtual networks (e.g. MSN,

social network sites). Via mobile phones, videos of unrest were uploaded on YouTube,

and the YouTube films facilitated frame-alignment. In nearly real-life time, would-be

protesters came to share grievances and emotions with actual protesters. Questions

related to expected participation of others were instantly answered by the uploaded films

and instant messages. Social media, smartphones, and YouTube facilitated organizing

without organizations.

The secondary school protests are examples of so-called connective action (cf.

Bennett and Segerberg, 2012; van Stekelenburg & Klandermans, 2012). Mobilization for

connective action moves from one person to another―individually, as part of a larger

email list, a listserv, or a social network such as Facebook or MySpace. In a process that

continues to reproduce itself, the message is copied and redistributed. An original sender

cannot know where or when the message stops traveling, stops being copied and

redistributed, stops being translated. Messages with higher degrees of resonance will be

dispersed in greater densities. The Arabian revolutions from Tunisia to Syria and earlier

the Green Protests in Iran are all examples of the power of connective action. The

working of these new forms of mobilization is far from clear. What at first sight seems

mobilization without organization, may in hindsight appears to be more organized than

presumed. For the time being, there are more questions than answers.

4. Dynamics of Sustained Participation

Most research on protest concerns a comparison of participants and nonparticipants in a

specific instance of participation at a specific point in time—be it a demonstration, a

boycott, a sit-in, a rally, or a petition. In terms of our participation typology, this concerns

short-term, most of the time low-risk or little effort participation, and sometimes high risk

or effort. We argue that such short-term activities have different motivational dynamics

than sustained participation, be it low or high risk or effort. Our research among long-

term extreme right activists corroborates that assumption (Klandermans & Mayer, 2006).

Life-history interviews with long-term extreme right activist in Belgium, France, Italy,

Germany, and the Netherlands reveal that such activism has significant impact on

someone’s life and sometimes comes with serious measures of stigmatization. Therefore,

long-term activists tend to be true believers; otherwise someone would not be prepared to

take such consequences (Van Laer, 2011). Nonetheless, even true believers do not always

take the repercussions of their activism easily.

A movement has only a limited number of core activists. For example, 5%–10%

of the membership of the Dutch labor unions is core activists. Empirical evidence

suggests that most core activists are perfectly aware of the fact that they are giving 90%

or more of the movement’s supporters a free ride, but do not care. On the contrary, this is

what seems to motivate them to take the job (Oliver, 1984). They care so much for the

movement’s cause that they are prepared to make that effort knowing that most others

won’t. Indeed, for 29% of the core activists within Dutch unions, this was the single most

important motivation for their sustained participation.

Becoming a long-term activist is to a large extent a matter of biographical

availability. After all, sustained participation requires discretionary time for an extended

period. The concept of biographical availability was proposed by McAdam in his study of

participation in the Mississippi Freedom Summer (McAdam, 1988). What McAdam had

in mind was freedom from other societal commitments. “If college students are uniquely

free of life-course impediments to activism, the Freedom Summer applicants were freer

still. And the actual volunteers were the freest of all” (Goldstone & McAdam, 2001).

Indeed, participants in the Mississippi Freedom Summer Campaign were students who

were biographically available. But in terms of a life history, there is more than available

time, there is also mental availability, that is, susceptibility to the ideas a movement is

propagating.

Activism frequently persists despite pessimism regarding the action’s ostensible

goals (Louis, 2009). Why do people continue participating in movements even if it does

not effectuate their goals? Drury and Reicher (2009) suggest that participation generates

a “positive social-psychological transformation.” They argue that participation

strengthens identification and induces collective empowerment. The emergence of an

inclusive self-categorization as “oppositional” leads to feelings of unity and expectations

of support. This empowers people to offend authorities. Such action, they continue,

defines the participant’s oppositional identity vis-à-vis the dominant out-group. Protest

participation strengthens empowerment and politicization, paving the path to sustained

participation. Sustained participation need not necessarily take the form of the same

activity all the time. People often go from one activity to another, sometimes from one

movement to another, and in so doing build activist careers (Andrews, 1991).

Paths to sustained participation vary. Linden and Klandermans (2007) distinguish

four trajectories: revolutionaries, wanderers, converts, and compliants. The first two

trajectories are instances of biographical continuity (Roth, 2003), that is, life histories

whereby participation appears as the logical result of political socialization from

someone’s youth onwards. Revolutionaries are convinced right-wingers early on, while

wanderers are lifelong political homeless, wandering from one political shelter to the

other. The latter two are examples of conversion (Blee, 2002), trajectories that imply a

break with the past—in the case of converts because some critical events made their

minds turn; in the case of compliants because a significant other persuaded them to

become involved.

Critical events are supposed to play a crucial role in both continuity and

conversion. In the context of biographical continuity the event means the last push or pull

in a direction in which the person is already going, whereas in the context of conversion

the event means an experience that marks a change of mind. Obviously, such conversion

does not come out of the blue. It is rooted in a growing dissatisfaction with life as it is.

The critical event is the last push toward change. Teske (1997) describes the example of

a journalist who ends up in front of the gate of a nuclear weapons plant and whose

experience with the authorities’ suppressive response to that demonstration turns him into

an activist. The story of this journalist made clear that on the one hand it was no accident

that he ended up at that gate, but on the other hand, had the demonstration not taken that

dramatic turn, it would not have had this impact on his life.

Sustained participation is surprisingly absent in the social movement literature—

surprisingly, because long-term participants keep the movement going. Knowing the

motives, conditions, and mechanisms that facilitate or hinder people to become and

continue to be activists is essential for social movements to secure continuity. Therefore,

understanding the mechanisms that make people become activists and persist in their

activism, and which make protest veterans terminate their active involvement, is of

crucial importance not only theoretically, but also for understanding the growth and

decline of social movement involvement.

5. Dynamics of Disengagement

The dynamics of sustained participation in social movements have a clear counterpart,

namely, the dynamics of disengagement. Indeed, the sustainability of a fit between

demand and supply is by no means obvious. Why do people defect from the movement

they have worked so hard for? Surprisingly little attention has been given to that

question. Compared to the abundant literature on why people join movements, literature

on why they exit is almost nonexistent (but see Fillieule, 2012; Fillieule & Broqua,

2005). The guiding principle of our discussion of disengagement is the simple model

shown in figure 24.4.

Insufficient gratification in combination with declining commitment produces a

growing intention to leave. Eventually, some critical event tips the balance and makes the

person quit. Obviously, the event itself only triggers the final step. Against that

background, its impact may be overestimated. After all, it was the decline in gratification

and commitment that causes defection; the critical event only precipitated matters.

[Insert Figure 24.4]

5.1. Insufficient Gratification

The integrated motivational framework presented at the end of the demand section

distinguishes three fundamental motives for participation: identification, instrumental,

and ideological motivation. Social movements may supply the opportunity to fulfill these

demands, and the better they do, the more movement participation turns into a satisfying

experience. However, movements may also fall short on each of these motives. The most

likely reason for movements to fall short is inadequate instrumentality. Although it is

difficult to assess the effectiveness of social movements, it is obvious that many a

movement goal is never reached. Opp (1988) has argued that indeed people are very well

aware of the fact that movement goals are not always easy to achieve, but that they

reason that nothing happens in any event if nobody takes any action. Yet sooner or later

some success must be achieved for instrumental motivation to continue to fuel

participation. In addition to not being achieved, movement goals may lose their urgency

and drop lower on the societal agenda. Finally, the individual costs or risks of

participation may be too high compared to the attraction of the movement’s goals.

Repression adds to the costs and might make participation too costly for people (Tilly,

1978).

Movements offer the opportunity to act on behalf of one’s group. This is the most

attractive if people identify strongly with their group. But the composition of a movement

may change, and as a consequence people may feel less akin to the others in the

movement (Whittier, 1997). Schisms are another reason why movements fail to satisfy

identity motives. Sani and Reicher (1998) and Catellani et al. (2006) demonstrate that

schisms result from fights over the core identity of a movement and that people who

leave no longer feel that they can identify with the movement. Finally, people occupy a

variety of positions in society, and consequently identify with a variety of collectives. A

change in context may make one collective identity more and the others less salient, and

therefore identification with a movement may wither. For example, in their study of

farmers’ protests in the Netherlands and Spain, Klandermans, Sabucedo, Rodriguez, and

de Weerd (2002) observed that in Spain during a campaign for local and provincial

elections the identification with other farmers declined.

Social movements provide the opportunity to express one’s views. This is not to

say that they are always equally successful in that regard. Obviously, there is not always

full synchrony between a movement’s ideology and a person’s beliefs. Indeed, many a

movement organization ends in fights between ideological factions, with schisms and

defection as a consequence (Gamson, 1975).

5.2. Declining Commitment

Movement commitment does not last by itself. It must be maintained via interaction with

the movement, and any measure that makes that interaction less gratifying helps to

undermine commitment. Downton and Wehr (1997) discuss mechanisms of social

bonding that movements apply to maintain commitment. Leadership, ideology,

organization, rituals, and social relations, which make up a friendship network, each

contribute to sustaining commitment, and the most effective context is, of course, a

combination of all five. Although not all of them are equally well researched, each of

these five mechanisms is known from the literature on movement participation as a factor

that fosters people’s attachment to movements. For example, it is known from research

on union participation that involving members in decision-making processes increases

commitment to a union. Taylor and Whittier (1995) demonstrated how rituals in lesbian

movement groups strengthened the membership’s bond to the movement. Unions and

other movement organizations have developed many kinds of services for their members

to make membership more attractive. Selective incentives may seldom be sufficient

reasons to participate in a movement, but they do increase commitment.

5.3. The Role of Precipitating Events

When gratification falls short and commitment declines, an intention to leave develops.

Yet this intention does not necessarily turn into leaving. Many participants maintain a

marginal level of participation for extended periods until some critical event makes them

quit. For example, Goslinga (2002) calculated that a stable 25% of the membership of

Dutch labor unions considered leaving. Such critical events can have many different

appearances, and sometimes even appear trivial. When some decades ago Dutch labor

unions changed to a different system of dues collection and members had to sign an

agreement to participate in the new system, quite a few members chose not to sign. A

change of address may be seized as an opportunity to leave the movement, simply by not

renewing contacts in the new place of residence. More substantial reasons might be a

conflict with others in the organization, disappointing experiences in the movement, a

failed protest, and so on.

5.4. Disengagement versus Radicalization

When a movement declines, many activists quit. But becoming inactive is not the only

response to movement decline. Indeed, radicalization appears as an alternative response

to movement decline (della Porta, 1995). Although violence tends to be present from the

very beginning of a protest cycle, the more dramatic forms of violence occur when the

mass phase of the protest cycle is over (della Porta, 1995). Violence as mobilization

declines is attributed to people’s dissatisfaction with protest outcomes and their attempts

to compensate for the “reduction in numbers” (della Porta, 1995), At the same time the

repression apparatus becomes more effective toward the end of a cycle. Against that

background, sustained participation can take the form of radicalization, making radical,

sustained participation and disengagement different sides of the same coin.

6. Conclusion

A decade has passed since the first edition of the Handbook of Political Psychology was

published. In those years protest participation has gained the interest of social and

political psychologists. This resulted in a whole host of studies, of which we have tried to

take stock in this chapter. Has this burgeoning scholarship moved the field ahead? Let us

return to the unanswered questions Klandermans closed with in 2003. These were

questions concerning the formation of demand and supply and how they affect

mobilization; questions about the relative weight of instrumentality, identity, and

ideology and how these motivations interact; and questions about the role of identity in

the context of movement participation, the formation of collective identity, and the

politicization of collective identity. Equally understudied were the roles of ideology and

emotions, and despite all the work done on networks, their exact roles remained unclear.

Little was known about leadership in social movements, and, finally, many unanswered

questions regarded sustained participation, commitment, disengagement, and the life

course.

Indeed, we have made progress with regard to the dynamics of demand, especially

the role of identity, emotions, and motivation. Compared to a decade ago, the social and

political psychology of protest has become richer, more sophisticated, and more rooted in

state-of-the-art social and political psychology. Yet students of social movements have

for too long neglected social and political psychology. At the same time, social and

political psychologists have for too long neglected to study such phenomena as social

movements and collective action. As a consequence, social movement scholars are not

aware of new developments in social and political psychology, while social and political

psychologists are unaware of the many unanswered questions that they could help to find

an answer to. We hope this chapter has been useful in exemplifying what political

psychology has to offer to the study of social movements and where we stand.

So, where are we heading the next 10 years? One unanswered question a decade

ago that remains largely unanswered concerns sustained participation, disengagement,

and the life course. Basically, many of the same questions are still waiting for answers.

Fillieule (2005) edited a volume on disengagement (unfortunately for English-language

scholars, in French, which makes the work less accessible to the non-French community).

More generally, the theme of sustained participation raises another underexplored issue,

namely the personal consequences of movement participation. But in recent studies

Drury et al. (Drury, Cocking, Beale, Hanson, & Rapley, 2005; Drury and Reicher, 1999;

2000; 2009); Louis (2009), and van Zomeren and colleagues (2012) have begun to

investigate the individual consequences of participation in collective action.

This brings us to probably the most important challenge of the political

psychology of protest, namely to move from static decontextualized explanations of

protest to more dynamic, contextualized models of protest. In 2007 we made a plea for

more dynamic models (van Stekelenburg and Klandermans, 2007). We argued that a

more dynamic approach would provide the opportunity to study mechanisms through

concepts like identification, participation motives, efficacy, emotions, and feelings of

injustice as consequence and antecedent of collective action. This approach is not easy, as

Ellemers, Spears, and Doosje observe: “From an investigational point of view, it is

difficult to deal with a variable that, at the same time, can be a dependent and an

independent variable, can develop over time or change across contexts” (1999, p. 3). Yet

studying protest participation in a more dynamic way would do more justice to the

theoretical and empirical richness of the concepts and may be crucial to gain better

insights in the processes at hand (cf. McAdam et al., 2001). An example of such a

dynamic model, in addition to those we discussed in the previous pages, is van Zomeren

et al.’s dual pathway model of protest (van Zomeren, 2012; van Zomeren, Leach, &

Spears, 2012). These authors introduce a dynamic model that integrates many common

explanations of collective action (i.e., group identity, unfairness, anger, social support,

and efficacy). The model conceptualizes collective action as the outcome of two distinct

processes: emotion-focused and problem-focused coping. The former revolves around the

experience of group-based anger, while the latter revolves around beliefs in the group’s

efficacy. The model makes explicit the dynamic nature of collective action by explaining

how undertaking collective action leads to the reappraisal of collective disadvantage, thus

inspiring future collective action. Tausch and colleagues are among the first to report

empirical findings on how emotions affect the dynamic nature of collective action

participation. They show that protest participants experience more out-group-directed

anger and contempt, and self-directed positive affect. Out-group anger and contempt,

rather than self-directed positive affect, inspire future collective action (Becker, Tausch,

& Wagner, 2011). In yet another study―a two-wave longitudinal field study―they

examined how emotional responses to success and failure of collective action inspire

future collective action (Tausch & Becker, 2012). They found that both pride (in relation

to success) and anger (in response to failure) motivated future collective action. While

anger stemming from failure predicted future protest directly, pride resulting from

success enhanced feelings of efficacy that inspired future actions. These few examples

are an excellent start for the years to come; taking the dynamic nature of collective action

seriously will shed light on the many unanswered questions related to sustained

participation and disengagement—and indeed on another question: Protest, and then

what? (Louis, 2009).

In addition to antecedents and consequences of protest, our plea for dynamic

models also alludes to the thorny issue of causality. Indeed, the majority of the findings

and relations we reported are based on correlational data. Correlational data can be

interpreted in causal terms based on the theories we have, but cannot demonstrate

causality. Take, for instance, the relation between efficacy, embeddedness, and protest.

Based on social capital theories, we interpreted our correlational data in causal terms: that

is, the more embedded people are, the more efficacious they feel and the more they

protest. However, are more efficacious people more inclined to become members of

organizations, or do people become more efficacious in their networks? We simply do

not know. Social psychologists attempt to overcome the problem of causality by

employing experimental methods. These experiments have a high internal validity and

have the potential to make strong causal statements. However, laboratory experiments are

often detached from natural settings, resulting in low ecological validity. Indeed, are

students in the lab who report strong intentions to protest really willing to take onto the

streets? We cannot be sure about it. First of all, this is because the correlation between

intentions and actual participation is moderate at best (Oegema and Klandermans, 1994),

but perhaps more important, we simply do not know whether artificially created

grievances, identification, and efficacy are comparable to real-life indignation stemming

from imperiled interests or violated principles. In a longitudinal field study in a natural

setting we are seeking to address this issue of causality (van Stekelenburg et al., 2012).

Longitudinal data were collected in a newly built Dutch neighborhood. Within

approximately a month of their arrival inhabitants received a questionnaire with four

follow-up surveys, which encompasss predictors of protest, several protest intentions, and

actual participation and network questions. Thus, we monitor the development of demand

and supply of protest as it starts from scratch. This means moving beyond correlation

studies and studies of isolated individuals in surveys or laboratories (see also Huckfeldt

et al., chapter 21, this volume). In that way, we hope to be able to shed more light on

causality issues in protest participation.

The second challenge we envision is to develop protest models that incorporate

contextual variation. Little political psychological research has focused on the subjective

experience of meso- and macro-level factors. Nonetheless, at the meso or macro level,

variables can be identified that affect peoples’ subjective interpretations of their situation

in terms of identities, opportunities, or constraints and injustice. Koopmans and Statham

(2000) and Roggeband (2002, 2004), for example, acknowledge that the dynamics of

participation are created and limited by characteristics of the national contexts in which

people are embedded. Collective action participation is context dependent (van

Stekelenburg et al., 2009), but political psychology theories are not always good at taking

that into account and in conceptualizing how contextual factors impact on social

psychological mechanisms. In a large-scale study of participation in street demonstrations

in different countries and on different issues, we sought to assess the combined impact of

national and mobilizing context on who participates in street demonstrations

(Klandermans et al., 2010). In that way, we hoped to be able to demonstrate the context-

dependency of action participation.

One such matter of contextualization concerns the conceptualization of political

protest, that is, social movement participation (movement politics) vis-à-vis that other

form of political behavior, namely participation in the electoral arena (party politics).

Movement politics centers around active participation in protest events, such as mass

demonstrations, occupations of public sites, boycotts, blockades, and riots. The modal

form of participation in the electoral arena consists of a vote for a candidate (person or

party) who seeks a public office. In a recent paper, reflecting on the state of the art of the

study of contentious politics, McAdam & Tarrow (2013) observe that scholars of social

movements have largely neglect to pay attention to elections, while on the other hand

election researchers have failed to include social movements in their designs. Two

assumptions regarding party and movement politics are encountered in the literature

(Hutter, 2010). (1) The two reinforce each other—people who engage in party politics are

more likely to engage in movement politics as well and vice versa. In statistical terms one

would expect a positive correlation. (2) The two alternate—that is, people who participate

in the one activity are less likely to participate in the other (a negative correlation).

Recently, Hutter (2010) proposed and found empirical support for a third option, namely,

that (3) the two follow a logic of their own (hence, no correlation). We take as our point

of departure that any kind of arrangement between movement and party politics is

conceivable. Movements and parties may compete, complement each other, or

collaborate (Goldstone, 2003; Johnston, 2011). If movements institutionalize, citizens

may opt for party politics, a decision then reflected in electoral successes and declining

protest activity. Conversely, if party politics fail, citizens may resort to movement

politics, a change reflected in declining votes and rising protest activity. We know that all

these options exist and are actually practiced by citizens who want to influence politics

(cf. Teorell, Torcal, & Montero, 2007), but we know very little about the conditions and

mechanisms that make citizens want to influence politics and to take the one option or the

other.

We propose that the relative importance of movement and party politics is context

dependent (see also McAdam & Tarrow, 2013). Figure 24.5 maps the political landscape

citizens are faced with if they want to influence the state. Sociopolitical context can be

described in terms of political opportunities and cleavages that divide citizens along lines

of interests and principles. The social cleavages that are prevalent in a society shape its

multiorganizational field. Political parties and movement organizations are embedded in

such organizational fields. Within the multiorganizational field, movements and parties

assemble mobilizing structures that offer opportunities to participate in politics—party

politics, movement politics, or both (supply of politics). Citizens who want to promote or

protect their interest or principles (demand of politics) may take one or more of these

opportunities to act. Capitalizing on their abilities to mobilize, the political parties and

movement organizations are more or less able to put pressure on the state.

[Insert Figure 24.5]

Evidence underscores the context dependency of the relative importance of

movement and party politics. McAdam and Tarrow (2013) illustrate this with examples

from US history of how electoral politics have influenced protest politics and vice versa.

In the United States, so these authors argue, protest politics increasingly interferes in

electoral politics. They refer to the Tea Party movement as an example. In Europe they

observe the opposite pattern. Movements institutionalize into parties, while parties

professionalize. As a consequence, there is a growing gap between politicians and

citizens, which in its turn results in the growth of populist parties. Hutter (2010) similarly

observed the growth of populist parties, but interprets this development as a consequence

of processes of globalization. Hutter’s observation is made in the context of a study

regarding the question of how electoral politics relates to protest politics. Building on a

study in six European countries, he observes three patterns of relations between the two

forms of politics: congruence—more contestation in the electoral arena goes with more

contestation in the protest arena; counterweight—more contestation in the electoral arena

comes with less contestation in the other; different logic—the direction of the relationship

differs depending on the political orientation of the actors involved.

Burstein (1999) suggests that as long as public opinion is unified and clear,

politicians do not need social movement organizations to define their politics. This

implies that movement politics gains significance if public opinion on an issue is

polarized or diffuse. In other words, according to this reasoning the social movement

sector has grown so much because Western societies have become less hegemonic. A

different sort of reasoning takes the movement sector’s relative effectiveness as its point

of departure (Giugni et al., 1999; Jenkins, 1995). If party politics fails, movement politics

takes over, and, indeed, compared to working one’s way through political institutions,

contentious collective actions can be remarkably effective provided that the right

ingredients are in place, as so convincingly demonstrated by the “Colored Revolutions”

and the events in the Arab world.1 Indeed, some 20 years ago one of us estimated on the

basis of an overview of various literature reviews that approximately one-third of the

instances of collective political action had some degree of success (Klandermans, 1989).

We are not aware of similar estimates for political parties, but we may assume that

experiencing success encourages similar actions in the future, while seeing others

succeed is an incentive to try oneself (Eisinger, 1973; see Tunisia and Egypt for recent

examples). And yet another process of reasoning reveals that protest is the continuation

of party politics because, as Dalton and colleagues show, protesters are those citizens

who already have access to party politics (Dalton et al., 2009).

In other words, evidence underscores that citizens attempt several routes to

political influence, but so far, it is inconclusive and unclear who takes what route and

how that choice is influenced by contextual variation. As political psychology explores

the causes of the thoughts, feelings, and actions of people―and primarily how these are

influenced by sociopolitical context―we believe it has a lot to offer to future work that

will attempt to incorporate contextual variation in protest models.

Note

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Figure 24.1

The process of participation (Klandermans, 1997)

Figure 24.2

Motivational dynamics of collective action participation

Figure 24.3

The process of action mobilization (Klandermans & Oegema, 1987).

Figure 24.4

The dynamics of disengagement

Figure 24.5

Routes to political influence

Table 24.1

Strongly Motivating Grievances

Suddenly imposed grievances

Group and double deprivation

Procedural justice

The emotional component of grievances

Violated principles and threatened interests

Political cynicism

1 Although the failed revolutions in Azerbaijan and Syria also reveal what happens when

the right ingredients are not in place.