Political movement

A political movement is a collective attempt by a group of people to change government policy or social values.[1] Political movements are usually in opposition to an element of the status quo [2] and are often associated with a certain ideology.[3] Some theories of political movements are the political opportunity theory which states that political movements stem from mere circumstances [4] and the resource mobilization theory which states that political movements result from strategic organization and relevant resources.[2] Political movements are also related to political parties in the sense that they both aim to make an impact on the government and that several political parties have emerged from initial political movements.[5] While political parties are engaged with a multitude of issues, political movements tend to focus on only one major issue.[6][7]

The mid-19th century Scandinavism political movement led to the modern use of the term Scandinavia.

Definition

A political movement is a type of social movement [2] where several people form a group in order to collectively achieve changes in policies or social values on a local, national or global level.[8][6] The goals of political movements are often about making an impact on policy in the political sphere [1] or achieving social change in general.[9] While political movements involve both dealing with conflicts and compromise, the discourse of these movements tends to consist of a confrontational nature.[2] There are several types of political movements such as reform movements, mass movements, totalitarian movements [10] or violent political movements like guerrillas and insurgencies.[11]

Ideologies play a large role in political movements and individuals that are a part of a movement usually have a similar ideological reasoning for their participation.[3] These ideologies can be very oppositional to the current political system, and how it operates in comparison to the goals that the members of the movement aspire to achieve. This can however, help promote the message of the political movement.[2]

Political movement theories

Some of the theories behind social movements have also been applied to the emergence of political movements in specific, like the political opportunity theory and the resource mobilization theory.[2][12]

Political opportunity theory

The political opportunity theory asserts that political movements occur through chance or certain opportunities and have little to do with resources, connections or grievances in society.[4][12] Political opportunities can be created by possible changes in the political system, structure or by other developments in the political sphere and they are the driving force for political movements to be established.[4]

Resource mobilization theory

The resource mobilization theory states that political movements are the result of careful planning, organizing and fundraising rather than spontaneous uprisings or societal grievances. This theory postulates that movements rely on resources and contact to the establishment in order to fully develop. Thus, at the beginning and core of a political movement there lies a strategic mobilization of individuals.[2][13]

Relation to political parties

Political movements are different from political parties since movements are usually focused on a single issue and they have no interest in attaining office in government. A political movement is generally an informal organization and uses unconventional methods to achieve their goals.[6] In a political party, a political organization seeks to influence or control government policy through conventional methods,[6] usually by nominating their candidates and seating candidates in politics and governmental offices.[7]

However, political parties and movements both aim to influence government in one way or another[6] and both are often related to a certain ideology. Parties also participate in electoral campaigns and educational outreach or protest actions aiming to convince citizens or governments to take action on the issues and concerns which are the focus of the movement.[7] What links political movements to parties in particular, is that some movements have turned into political parties. For example, the 15-M Movement against austerity in Spain led to the creation of the populist party Podemos[14] and the labor movements in Brazil helped form the Brazilian Workers' Party.[15] These types of movement parties serve to raise awareness on the main issue of their initial political movement in government, since the established parties may have neglected this issue in the past.[5]

For groups seeking to influence policy, social movements can provide an alternative to formal electoral politics. For example, the political scientist S. Laurel Weldon has shown that women's movements and women's policy agencies have tended to be more effective in reducing violence against women than the presence of women in the legislatures.[16]

Examples

Some political movements have aimed to change government policy, such as the anti-war movement, the ecology movement, and the anti-globalization movement. With globalization, global citizens movements may have also emerged.[17] Many political movements have aimed to establish or broaden the rights of subordinate groups, such as abolitionism, the women's suffrage movement, the civil rights movement, feminism, gay rights movement, the disability rights movement, the animal rights movement, or the inclusive human rights movement. Some have represented class interests, such as the labour movement, socialism, and communism, while others have expressed national aspirations, such as anticolonialist movements, Rātana, Zionism, and Sinn Féin. Political movements can also involve struggles to decentralize or centralize state control, as in anarchism, fascism, and Nazism.

Famous recent social movements can be classified as political movements as they have influenced policy changes at all levels of government. Political movements that have recently emerged within the US are the Black Lives Matter Movement, and the Me Too Movement. While political movements that have happened in recent years within the Middle East is the Arab Spring. While in some cases these political movements remained movements, in others they escalated into revolutions and changed the state of government.[18]

Movements may also be named by outsiders, as with the Levellers political movement in 17th century England, which was named so as a term of disparagement. Yet admirers of the movement and its aims later came to use the term, and it is this term by which they are most known to history.[19]

References

Meyer, David S. (1997). Coalitions & Political Movements: The Lessons of the Nuclear Freeze. Lynne Rienner Publishers. pp. 164–166. ISBN 978-1-55587-744-6.
Rochon, Thomas R. (1990). "Political Movements and State Authority in Liberal Democracies". World Politics. 42 (2): 299–313. doi:10.2307/2010467. ISSN 1086-3338. JSTOR 2010467.
Nicholas, Ralph W. (1973). "Social and Political Movements". Annual Review of Anthropology. 2 (1): 63–84. doi:10.1146/annurev.an.02.100173.000431. ISSN 0084-6570.
Koopmans, Ruud (1999). "Political. Opportunity. Structure. Some Splitting to Balance the Lumping". Sociological Forum. 14 (1): 93–105. doi:10.1023/A:1021644929537. ISSN 0884-8971. JSTOR 685018. S2CID 148013872.
Kitschelt, Herbert (2006). "Movement Parties". Handbook of Party Politics. London: SAGE Publications Ltd. p. 282. doi:10.4135/9781848608047. ISBN 978-0-7619-4314-3.
Hague, Rod; Harrop, Martin; McCormick, John (2019). Comparative Government and Politics. London: Red Globe Press. p. 317. ISBN 978-1-352-00505-9.
McDonald, Neil A. (1955). The Study of Political Parties. Garden City, New York: Doubleday & Company. hdl:2027/mdp.39015003545509.
"political movement | Definition of political movement by Webster's Online Dictionary". www.webster-dictionary.org. Retrieved 2020-05-13.
Edwards, Bob; Kane, Melinda (2014). "Resource mobilization and social and political movements". Handbook of Political Citizenship and Social Movements. Cheltenham, UK: Edward Elgar Publishing. pp. 205–232. doi:10.4337/9781781954706.00018. ISBN 9781781954690.
John, Bruce M. (1960-10-01). "The Politics of Mass Society". Social Forces. 39 (1): 89. doi:10.2307/2573585. ISSN 0037-7732. JSTOR 2573585.
Grisham, Kevin, E. (2014). Transforming violent political movements rebels today, what tomorrow?. London: Routledge, Taylor & Francis Group. p. 7. ISBN 978-0-415-73019-8. OCLC 1050072697.
Goodwin, Jeff; Jasper, James M. (2004). Rethinking Social Movements: Structure, Meaning, and Emotion. Rowman & Littlefield. pp. 80–81. ISBN 978-0-7425-2596-2.
Inwegen, Patrick Van (2018-10-10), "Non-Violence in Ireland's Independence", The Routledge History of World Peace Since 1750, New York : Routledge, 2018. | Series: The Routledge histories: Routledge, pp. 273–283, ISBN 978-1-315-15734-4, retrieved 2020-10-06CS1 maint: location (link)
Della Porta, Donatella; Fernández, Joseba; Kouki, Hara; Mosca, Lorenzo (2017). Movement Parties Against Austerity. Cambridge: John Wiley & Sons. ISBN 978-1-5095-1149-5.
van Cott, Donna Lee (2005). From Movements to Parties in Latin America: The Evolution of Ethnic Politics. Cambridge: University Press. p. 14. ISBN 978-0-521-70703-9.
Weldon, S. Laurel (November 2002). "Beyond Bodies: Institutional Sources of Representation for Women in Democratic Policymaking". The Journal of Politics. 64 (4): 1153–1174. doi:10.1111/1468-2508.00167.
George, Susan (2001-10-18). "The Global Citizens Movement. A New Actor For a New Politics". Transnational Institute. Retrieved 2020-05-13.
Bendix, Reinhard; Huntington, Samuel P. (March 1971). "Political Order in Changing Societies". Political Science Quarterly. 86 (1): 168. doi:10.2307/2147388. ISSN 0032-3195.
Plant, David (2005-12-14). "The Levellers". British Civil Wars and Commonwealth website. Archived from the original on 13 May 2008. Retrieved 2020-05-11.