Social Protest Movements and American Democracy -- Theoretical Perspectives of Social Protest Movements -- Types of Social Protest Movements -- Stages of Social Protest Movements -- What Makes A Successful Social Protest Movement? -- Social Work Practice and Social Protest Movement Participation -- Where Social Protest and Social Work Meet -- Emerging Trends and The Future of Social Protest Movements.
After years of armed conflict, Iraqi citizens are fed up with the corruption and mismanagement of a political class that has allowed conditions in cities like Basra to deteriorate.
Discusses the importance of Bayard Rustin to the African American protest movement, reviewing Rustin's involvement with the activist March on Washington movement, the pacifist Fellowship of Reconciliation organization, & Rustin's influence over Martin Luther King's adoption of pacifism. Rather than challenging racial hegemony throughout the US, the 1963 March on Washington, identified as the apex of the African American protest movement & organized under the leadership of Rustin, is most remembered for the promulgation of coalition politics. Rustin's subsequent emergence as a political leader & the transformation in his political agenda are discussed in the contexts of the 1964 Democratic National Convention; his essay, "From Protest to Politics" (1965); & his support for the Lyndon B. Johnson administration's Vietnam policy; Rustin's humanitarian & pacifist objectives & his emphasis on class injustice best explains the transformation in his political agenda. It is concluded that Rustin's substitution of politics for protest threatened the entire African American protest movement. J. W. Parker
This paper asks whether, and in what sense, civic protests can contribute to some form of 'reconciliation'. Focusing on the 2014 protests in Bosnia and Herzegovina, it analyses the actions and activities involved in the practice of protesting. In this context, reconciliation can be understood as civic solidarity: a forward-looking commitment to fighting for social justice and against the privileges of political elites. Solidarity is not only built horizontally across social or ethnic groups, but also vertically through opposition to the ruling ethnonationalist elite. Solidarity-building activities such as protests, however, are hindered by an institutional system that crystallises social divisions and dilutes citizens' efforts.
This research seeks to spotlight the phenomenon of the social protest movement that has swept a number of the Arab States. The researcher relied on the historical points of departure and sociology and political terminology in monitoring these movements so as to describe them and determine their identity, history, components, strength and ability to affect change. This came within a gradual approach starting with the onset of the Arab uprisings and ending with the time of preparing this discourse. The researcher point of departure was that no matter how the political system tries to safeguard itself through despotism, violence and security forces, it will reach a point where it cannot meet the internal challenges, since these arise from one side of the equation of the composition of the state… which means the people. And in order to put this assumption to the test, the researcher posed a set of principles, and adopted the historical approach, the approach of the systems, as well the approach of the decision – maker and political participation. The research concluded that the these protest movements face immense challenges… like the fear of falling into chaos, confusion or the trap of time slackness that cause them to lose momentum. Those in charge of these movements must be vigilant so as not to go outside the desired objectives.
The article argues that contemporary protest movements are facing a convergence of what has traditionally been coined as mainstream and alternative media. Traditionally, the broad term 'alternative media' has been employed to embrace a wide range of oppositional media channels that can be considered to carry on the tradition of the early radical and party press: micro-media operating at the grassroots level, discontinuous, non-professional, persecuted or illegal. Today, heavily commercialised media and online communities such as Facebook, YouTube and MySpace constitute a common part of the repertoire of communication channels for activists engaged in alterative politics and protest movements. Are these new media channels a necessary means in order to reach beyond the circles of the likeminded? Or, do the use of these media point towards a mainstreaming process of political cultures of resistance to the establishment, eroding their very raison d'être? Combining a theoretical discussion of the inherent paradoxes in the celebration of new media technology as a source of democratisation and empowerment of civic cultures with an empirical focus aimed at exploring the changing repertoire of communicative tools used by social movement actors, this paper analyses two cases of online media practices in contemporary Scandinavian protest movements: 1) A series of civil disobedience actions and mobilisations of mass demonstrations before and after the eviction and destruction of the Youth House (Ungdomshuset) in Copenhagen, Denmark, in 2007-2008; 2) The popular demonstrations in connection with the European Social Forum in Malmö, Sweden in September 2008.
Recent years have witnessed a resurgence throughout the Muslim world of movements calling for radical social reforms and for changes in the form of government. These movements are characterised by a strong religious component. Their calls for reform are couched in the Muslim idiom — that is, in demands for social justice (adala) and the satisfaction of man's basic necessities, and are accompanied by demands for a return to an Islamic form of government, one that is ruled by the sharia. The supporters of such movements frequently are dressed differentlyfrom the rest of their compatriots, an outward manifestation of their allegiance to a Muslim-guided and a Muslim-oriented goal. It has become customary in the West to refer to such movements as Muslim fundamentalists, but the Arab world refers to them more correctly as Muslim organizations, or jamaat islamivya. This nomenclature covers a multitude of organizations with different principles and slogans, but all have one common denominator — their reformist appeals derive from religious belief and are asserted to be founded in Muslim principles.