A World to Be Remade: Sociopolitical Circumstances of Solidarity

Abstract

According to the definition of “social movement” introduced in chapter 1, social movements involve deliberate efforts by everyday people to alter radically their social and political order. Movements are neither simply disrespectful gestures toward government authority nor simply disruptive behavior within social institutions (even though movements sometimes manifest such characteristics). Movements entail critiques of existing social conditions, proposals for new values and institutions, and strategies for change. Consequently, the analyst cannot understand the aims and activities of a social movement ahistorically but must become familiar with its social and political context. The question that must by asked: “What is the existing order that participants in a movement wish to remake?”