Rethinking Social Movements: Structure, Meaning, and Emotion

Front Cover
Jeff Goodwin, James M. Jasper
Rowman & Littlefield, 2004 - History - 307 pages
This landmark volume brings together some of the titans of social movement theory in a grand reassessment of its status. For some time, the field has been divided between a dominant structural approach and a cultural or constructivist tradition.. The gaps and misunderstandings between the two sides--as well as the efforts to bridge them--closely parallel those in the social sciences at large. This book aims to further the dialogue between these two distinct approaches to social movements and to show the broader implications for social science as a whole as it struggles with issues including culture, emotion, and agency. Visit our website for sample chapters!

From inside the book

Contents

Caught in a Winding Snarling Vine The Structural Bias of Political Process Theory
3
Wise Quacks
31
Paradigm Warriors Regress and Progress in the Study of Contentious Politics
39
Tending the Vineyard Cultivating Political Process Research
47
Political Opportunity Structure Some Splitting to Balance the Lumping
61
Trouble in Paradigms
75
Culture Is Not Just in Your Head
97
The Poststructuralist Consensus in Social Movement Theory
111
Passionate Political Processes Bringing Emotions Back into the Study of Social Movements
155
Why David Sometimes Wins Strategic Capacity in Social Movements
177
Revisiting the US Civil Rights Movement Toward a More Synthetic Understanding of the Origins of Contention
201
Reflections on Social Movement Theory Criticisms and Proposals
233
Hot Movements Cold Cognition Thinking about Social Movements in Gendered Frames
247
References
263
Index
297
Contributors
305

The Intellectual Challenges of Toiling in the Vineyard
121
Knowledge for What? Thoughts on the State of Social Movement Studies
135

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