Democracy in Social Movements

Democracy in Social Movements

Author: Donatella della Porta

Publisher: Springer

Published: 2009-07-31

Total Pages: 315

ISBN-13: 0230240860

DOWNLOAD EBOOK

This collection explores conceptions and practices of democracy of social movement organizations involved in global protest. Focusing on the global justice movement this book shows how they adopt radical new democratic approaches and thus provide a fundamental critique of conventional politics.


Waves of Democracy

Waves of Democracy

Author: John Markoff

Publisher: Routledge

Published: 2015-11-17

Total Pages: 242

ISBN-13: 131724933X

DOWNLOAD EBOOK

The second edition of this classic text covers contemporary democracy movements including the Arab Spring and its aftermath, Occupy, and new nations as well as old issues from the Balkans to Africa, from Latin America to Ukraine. The author has traveled widely around the world to take the pulse of transition and to profile journeys toward democracy and journeys away from democracy, too. At the same time, the book addresses important challenges that have emerged in even well-established democracies. These show up in declining voting rates, diminished membership in political parties, and, in some countries including the United States, negative views of central democratic institutions (like the US Congress).


Waves of Democracy

Waves of Democracy

Author: John Markoff

Publisher: Pine Forge Press

Published: 1996-02-07

Total Pages: 196

ISBN-13: 9780803990197

DOWNLOAD EBOOK

Waves of Democracy looks at two centuries of history of democratization as a series of multicontinental episodes in which social movements and elite power holders in many countries converged to reorganize political systems. Democracy is defined and redefined in these episodes. John Markoff examines several ways in which governing elites of national states mimic each other and ways in which social movements and elites interact. There is no other book written for undergraduates that looks at democracy over such a broad sweep of time and across so many countries and cultures.


Non-Western Social Movements and Participatory Democracy

Non-Western Social Movements and Participatory Democracy

Author: Ekim Arbatli

Publisher: Springer

Published: 2017-03-02

Total Pages: 207

ISBN-13: 3319514547

DOWNLOAD EBOOK

This book analyzes social movements across a range of countries in the non-Western world: Bosnia, Brazil, Egypt, India, Iran, Palestine, Russia, Syria, Turkey and Ukraine in the period 2008 to 2016. The individual case studies investigate how political and social goals are framed nationally and globally, and the types of mobilization strategies used to pursue them. The studies also assess how, in the age of transnationalism, the idea of participatory democracy produces new collective-action frames and mass-mobilization strategies. The book challenges the view that most social movements unequivocally seek to achieve higher levels of democratization. Instead, the authors argue that protesters across different movements advocate more involved forms of citizen participation, since passive representation through liberal democratic institutions fails to address mass grievances and demands for accountability in many countries.


Social Movements and Democracy in the 21st Century

Social Movements and Democracy in the 21st Century

Author: Dylan Taylor

Publisher: Springer

Published: 2017-01-16

Total Pages: 293

ISBN-13: 3319396846

DOWNLOAD EBOOK

This book contends that the impasse of the Left today is in part, a result of an anarchist ‘common sense’ among activists. The author argues that the vital dynamics of anarchism and social movements need to be combined with a reappraisal of the Communist party and state. While cynicism towards capitalism and existing political institutions is plentiful, this book argues that the Left appears mired in a reactive politics of resistance, unable to formulate programmes for substantive social change. Drawing insights from the history of the Left, political economy, contemporary critical theory and an in-depth study of Occupy, the author provides concrete suggestions as to how the Left might ‘claim the twenty-first century’ and realise a more equitable social order. Social Movements and Democracy in the 21st Century challenges activists and scholars to rethink social movements and political organisation, and to actively work towards enduring social change. The book will be of interest to students and scholars of social movement studies, Left theory, critical theory, political sociology and Marxism, as well as anyone with an interest in ‘political change’.


Freedom Is an Endless Meeting

Freedom Is an Endless Meeting

Author: Francesca Polletta

Publisher: University of Chicago Press

Published: 2012-06-12

Total Pages: 297

ISBN-13: 0226924289

DOWNLOAD EBOOK

This “excellent study of activist politics in the United States over the past century” challenges the conventional wisdom about participatory democracy (Times Literary Supplement). Freedom Is an Endless Meeting offers vivid portraits of American experiments in participatory democracy throughout the twentieth century. Drawing on meticulous research and more than one hundred interviews with activists, Francesca Polletta upends the notion that participatory democracy is worthy in purpose but unworkable in practice. Instead, she shows that social movements have often used bottom-up decision making as a powerful tool for political change. Polletta traces the history of democracy from early labor struggles and pre-World War II pacifism, through the civil rights, new left, and women’s liberation movements of the sixties and seventies, and into today’s faith-based organizing and anti-corporate globalization campaigns. In the process, she uncovers neglected sources of democratic inspiration—such as Depression-era labor educators and Mississippi voting registration workers—as well as practical strategies of social protest. Polletta also highlights the obstacles that arise when activists model their democracies after nonpolitical relationships such as friendship, tutelage, and religious fellowship. She concludes with a call to forge new kinds of democratic relationships that balance trust with accountability, respect with openness to disagreement, and caring with inclusiveness. For anyone concerned about the prospects for democracy in America, Freedom Is an Endless Meeting will offer abundant historical, theoretical, and practical insights.


Deliberative Democracy and Social Movements

Deliberative Democracy and Social Movements

Author: Andrea Felicetti

Publisher: Rowman & Littlefield

Published: 2016-12-14

Total Pages: 242

ISBN-13: 1786601664

DOWNLOAD EBOOK

Deliberative democracy is increasingly central in democratic theory and its concepts are employed in a growing number of fields, including social movement studies and environmental politics. At the same time, contemporary citizen activism seems to feature some forms of engagement that resonate with deliberative democratic ideas. This book provides an in-depth investigation of the qualities of citizens’ engagement from a deliberative democratic standpoint. The key concept through which such qualities are investigated is ‘deliberative capacity’, the extent to which organisations host authentic, inclusive, and consequential discursive processes. This book is based on a comparative study of four grassroots local initiatives, two from Australia (in Tasmania and Queensland) and two from Italy (in Emilia-Romagna and Sicily). By offering a critical assessment of deliberation in social movement organisations, this study identifies key aspects affecting their ability to pursue democratic deliberation and sheds new light on the role of community actors in deliberative democracy.


Social Movements for Global Democracy

Social Movements for Global Democracy

Author: Jackie Smith

Publisher: JHU Press

Published: 2008-02-04

Total Pages: 306

ISBN-13: 9780801887444

DOWNLOAD EBOOK

Contested globalizations -- Rival transnational networks -- Politics in a global system -- Globalizing capitalism : the transnational neoliberal network in action -- Promoting multilateralism : social movements and the UN system -- Mobilizing a transnational network for democratic globalization -- Agenda-setting in a global polity -- Domesticating international human rights norms -- Confronting contradictions between multilateral economic institutions and the UN system -- Alternative political spaces : the world social forum process and "globalization from below"--Conclusions: Network politics and global democracy.


Doing Democracy

Doing Democracy

Author: Bill Moyer

Publisher: New Society Publishers

Published: 2001-08-01

Total Pages: 254

ISBN-13: 9780865714182

DOWNLOAD EBOOK

An empowering guide to understanding the strategies behind successful social movements.


The Oxford Handbook of Social Movements

The Oxford Handbook of Social Movements

Author: Donatella Della Porta

Publisher: Oxford University Press

Published: 2015

Total Pages: 865

ISBN-13: 0199678405

DOWNLOAD EBOOK

The Handbook presents a most updated and comprehensive exploration of social movement research. It not only maps, but also expands the field of social movement studies, taking stock of recent developments in cognate areas of studies, within and beyond sociology and political science. While structured around traditional social movement concepts, each section combines the mapping of the state of the art with attempts to broaden our knowledge of social movements beyond classic theoretical agendas, and to identify the contribution that social movement studies can give to other fields of knowledge.