Social Movements Contesting Natural Resource Development

John F. Devlin, John F. Devlin

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2019
• ISBN:
  9781351661584
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Sciences sociales
• Subtopic: Sociologie rurale

Presenting a broad range of case studies, this book explores rural social movements contesting natural resource development initiatives.

Natural resource development takes multiple forms, including infrastructure corridors, mines, dams, resource processing plants and pipelines. Many of which are driven by economic valuations, whilst social and environmental effects are given limited consideration. In this volume the authors discuss the emergence, process and outcomes of social movements with respect to these natural resource development projects, including examples of confrontation seeking to either block developments or promote alternative development approaches, such as agritourism. The examples taken from Africa, Asia, North America, Europe and Latin America demonstrate the diversity of struggles stimulated by natural resource development, including both immediate and longer-term effects, repertoires of action, political and cultural work. Taken together the case studies provide a rich overview of current movements engaged in resisting the neoliberal agenda of global resource exploitation.

This book will be key reading for scholars interested in social movements, natural resource development, environmental policy and development studies. It will also be of interest to activists engaged in mobilizations stimulated by natural resource development projects.

1 Introduction

Social movements and natural resources

John F. Devlin

Introduction

This introductory chapter surveys main lines of social movement (SM) analysis. The chapter first suggests a simple framework for organizing the analysis of SMs. It then explores how the literature addresses three questions: What leads to the emergence of SMs? How do SMs act? What outcomes do SMs generate? The presentation demonstrates that SM studies have built up a comprehensive appreciation of the complexity of SMs, their roots, processes, and outcomes (Lofland, 1993). The chapter then offers a short review of literature oriented specifically to natural resource development and finishes with a brief overview of the cases presented in the chapters that follow.

A framework: the SM arena

The term ‘social movement’ refers to two related social objects: first, sets of actors working together to resist or promote some form of social change and second, the social process, sequence of events, or collective actions in which such SM actors are involved. The terms SM actors and SM processes will be used to differentiate these when appropriate. Diani suggests that nearly all definitions of SMs share three criteria: actors, conflict, and collective identity: ‘a network of informal interactions between a plurality of individuals, groups and/or organizations, engaged in a political or cultural conflict, on the basis of a shared collective identity’ (1992, p. 6). Snow, Soule, and Kriesi define SMs as:

Collectivities acting with some degree of organization and continuity outside of institutional or organizational channels for the purpose of challenging or defending extant authority, whether it is institutionally or culturally based, in the group, organization, society, culture, or world order of which they are a part.

(2007, p. 11)

McCarthy and Zald offer an ideational definition: SMs are sets of ‘opinions and beliefs in a population’ representing a preference for change (McCarthy & Zald, 1977, p. 1217). Tarrow provides a political definition of SMs as ‘sustained challenges to powerholders in the name of a disadvantaged population living under the jurisdiction or influence of those powerholders’ (1996b, p. 874). Tilly (2004) views SMs as major vehicles for ordinary people’s participation in politics. Some scholars even go so far as to characterize contemporary democracies as ‘movement societies’ (Meyer & Tarrow, 1998). Taken together these definitions suggest that SMs are cumulative goal-oriented efforts by groups of actors to pursue a shared goal or goals seeking to change political institutions or policy or social institutions, social attitudes, or social behaviour.

SMs are found at many scales. Global movements such as the anti-slavery, the anti-colonial, the anti-globalization, or the environmental movement constitute ‘transnational advocacy networks’ (Keck & Sikkink, 1998; Tarrow, 2005). More geographically delimited SMs can include movements in specific international regions such as Pan-Africanism as well as national, sub-national, or local movements resisting a specific project in a specific place. Given this broad diversity, it is helpful to identify some basic analytic categories that are scale-neutral. The framework suggested here parallels Ostrom’s framework for institutional analysis and Weible and Sabatier’s advocacy coalition framework (Ostrom, 2007, 2010; Weible & Sabatier, 2006). The framework recognizes an ‘internal’ and an ‘external’ space and identifies a set of relevant factors or variables of interest in both spaces. In Ostrom’s framework the internal space is an ‘action arena’, which contains actors, events, and patterns of interaction (processes). Inside this arena individuals ‘interact, exchange goods and services, solve problems, dominate one another, feel guilty, or fight’ (Ostrom, 2005, p. 829). In Weible and Sabatier’s advocacy coalition framework, an ‘internal’ policy subsystem is identified made up of contending advocacy coalitions (actors) mobilizing policy beliefs and resources and seeking to influence the policy decisions of government actors (events and processes) (2006). This can be understood as the SM arena within which allies and antagonists seek to achieve their goals.

The SM arena is embedded within a broader context that includes factors such as the basic distribution of natural resources; fundamental socio-cultural values; institutional structures; and system rules. The movement arena is situated within and can be influenced by these socio-cultural and historical conditions, and other macro-historical factors and events which can affect the dynamic interactions between movement actors and their protagonists. The SM arena can be affected by external system events such as changes in socio-economic conditions; changes in public opinion; changes in governing coalitions; policy decisions; or specific events. The external conditions can help to explain movement emergence, dynamics, and outcomes through time. The framework is systemic meaning that over time outputs from the SM arena can potentially alter conditions inside the arena as well as external conditions through feedback loops. The framework helps to sort out some of the key features of SM processes and can set the stage for descriptions and explanations of SM action and outcomes. The framework invites analysts to identify SM actors and their allies, SM antagonists and their allies, and contextual conditions that affect both.

The most common depiction of a SM arena is to identify the SM actors and antagonists: peasants versus lords, workers versus capitalists, religious reformers versus established church. For political movements the state often plays the role of movement antagonist as in Flam’s collection discussing relations between antinuclear movements and states (1994). But lifestyle movements may see the public or some alternative cultural group holding a set of shared beliefs as the prime antagonist rather than the state. Hence environmentalists oppose the chemical industry or the fossil fuel industry or even public indifference to environmental values, vegans oppose the meat industry, community organizers oppose developers, the #MeToo movement opposes male aggression.

The framework invites three modes of analysis: 1) analysis of the internal characteristics of movement actors, coalitions, and networks; 2) analysis of antagonistic engagements and contention between movement actors and their antagonists; and 3) contextual dynamics that influence and are influenced by SM actors and antagonists. This ‘internal-external’ framework is consistent with a wide range of SM analysis discussing the dynamics of SM actors and processes, the engagement of SM actors and antagonists, and the relationship between SM actors, SM processes, and the wider contexts within which SM processes unfold. These relationships cover the bulk of the analysis presented in social movement studies (McAdam, Tarrow, & Tilly, 2001).

This SM framework is applicable to the analysis of a single SM event, a sequence of events, a movement cycle, multiple cycles, or a movement history. The framework is also applicable to the comparative analysis of multiple movements and the formulation of generalizations perhaps leading to the identification of mechanisms and theories of how elements of movements interact.

Most case studies discuss all three elements of the framework to provide a deep description and analysis. Those seeking to generalize across social movements focus on more limited questions and sets of variables. Much of the richness of the literature arises from the capacity to bring a wide range of theory to bear on these more specific relationships. The framework is helpful in organizing efforts to answer three key questions: Why do movements emerge? How do they act? What outcomes do they generate?

SM emergence

Grievance has long been recognized as a source of SM emergence. Historically political economy has looked to material interests as an explanation of SM emergence. Marxists identified economic exploitation as the source of slave rebellions, peasant, and labour movements. Economic exploitation and capitalism continue to inform SM scholarship (Barker, Cox, Krinsky, & Nilsen, 2013; Della Porta, 2015). For Polanyi, SMs emerged as efforts to protect society from market induced disruptions arising from commodification of land and labour (Císař & Navrátil, 2017; Polanyi, 1957).

American sociology initially looked upon SM grievance as a symptom of social irrationality, pathology, or deviance. This approach was rooted in functionalist sociology and explained social movements as failures of social integration (Leites & Wolf, 1970; Tilly, Tilly, & Tilly, 1975; Turner & Killian, 1957). As Crossley argues recognizing grievances can render SM actions ‘intelligible, understandable and thus rational’ (2003, p. 289). But this functionalist approach was eclipsed by the observation that grievances may exist for many years without leading to the emergence of SMs. Racism in the United States existed for many years before the civil rights movement emerged (McAdam, 1982; McAdam, McCarthy, & Zald, 1996). The Arab Spring gave expression to long suppressed dissatisfaction with governments in the Middle East. Hence, grievances are not sufficient. They must be mobilized.

The resource mobilization approach sought to identify additional factors that transformed grievances into movements. Mobilization is stimulated by changes in available resources, group organization, and opportunities for collective action (Jenkins, 1983; McCarthy & Zald, 1977; Oberschall, 1973; Tilly, 1978). Marxist literature also identified organizational resources such as vanguards, vanguard parties, and organic intellectuals as instruments for the mobilization of economic grievances (Reynolds, 1992).

Marxist and resource mobilization analysts focused on movements for political change, but Touraine in the 1950s observed that SMs can emerge in response to hopes and aspirations that are not economically or materially determined and not oriented primarily to political change (Touraine, 1974, 2002). This line of analysis eventually came to be associated with ‘new’ social movements. Issues concerning identity and rights such as gender, sexuality, race, environment, ethnicity, disability, physical and mental health, HIV/AIDs, anti-poverty, and anti-surveillance can be understood as challenging established institutions or the dominant ‘codes’ of society (Melucci, 1980). Fuentes and Frank (1989) suggested that new SMs focus on morality and (in)justice and confront social power through mobilization against deprivation and for survival and identity. New SMs are often oriented towards changing ideas and attitudes of the broad public. They focus on changing society not necessarily by changing the state or policy.

Aberle (1966) suggested a SM typology built from two variables: 1) who the social movement seeks to change (everyone or specific individuals) and 2) how much change is being sought (limited or radical). This generated four types of social movements: alternative, reformative, redemptive, and revolutionary none of which were necessarily oriented towards material interests. Rucht and Neidhardt (2002) distinguish political change movements from personal change movements and both can be stimulated by non-material values.

The recognition of new SMs widened the scholarly universe of SMs (Crossley, 2002). But by the 1990s, social constructionist and discursive orientations made ideational factors, interpretation, and symbolization important dimensions of most SM analysis. Constructivism suggests that collective action is generated by actors assigning values to events, negotiating the meanings of those events and making decisions seeking to shape event outcomes (Snow & Oliver, 1995). The distinction between old and new SMs is thus less helpful since it is clear that all movements require an ideational foundation, and the distinction between values that are ‘material’ and values that are not, or goals that are political or not political are difficult to draw in practice. Suffragettes demanded the vote as well as recognitions of their social rights. The anti-smoking movement both wants the public at large to stop smoking and wants legislation to prohibit smoking in specific locations. At the same time changes in policy may require changes in lifestyle. Climate change policy will require changes in consumer behaviour. The politics–lifestyle boundary is very permeable.

Emergence as a phase in a SM history is not easily distinguished from the actions that a SM undertakes. Ideas may emerge among a few individuals long before the ideas have attracted sufficient attention to be considered a SM. SMs build through time. It is thus helpful to think of emergence not simply as a temporal question about what happens early in the life of a SM, but as a question about foundational motivations which both create and continually support the reproduction and growth of the movement. But for an emergent SM to persist through time and grow, ideas and values are not sufficient. There must be action. The analysis of SM action draws the focus towards SM processes that have been a central focus of SM studies.

SM processes

Investigations of SM process is a literature rich in description, concepts, and theory. Much recent work suggest that one should begin any general overview of movement processes by seeking to understand how the ideas and values that are foundational to the emergence of the movement have been mobilized through action. This work falls under the concept of ‘framing’.

Framing

Goffman (1974) drew attention to the ways in which information is interpreted or misinterpreted and how this might impact SM participation. A movement’s interpretive framework expresses what is important to the participants in the movement and suggests an agenda for change. Meaning is constructed as different events, experiences, facts, and values are emphasized or downplayed. Whatever the foundational impetus for SM emergence, framing is crucial for movement reproduction and growth. A given social issue may not be of interest to the general public until it has been framed in a way generating concern for a wider audience (Dewulf, Craps, & Dercon, 2004). Framing affects how issues are understood by SM participants and can be part of how the SM presents itself to new potential sympathizers.

Frames such as justice; rights; equity; freedom; independence; identity; history; livelihood; truth; sustainability; or peace are central appeals that attract participants and sustain their participation. They also can serve to build sympathy among a wider public who constitute part of the external SM environment. In relation to movement participants and potential participants, frames are shaped with the intention of rallying public support and engaging bystanders. Through framing activity, a SM can align similar frames, bridge frames that are ideologically compatible and yet structurally distinct, amplify frames to increase the strength of the frame as a source of movement attention, and extend frames to expand their boundaries so that more people are attracted to and drawn into the movement. Frame transformation involves a change in the way that a situation or idea is fundamentally understood, such that what was once considered a non-issue or at the very least, tolerable, is now seen as an injustice that must be righted (Benford & Snow, 2000; Gamson, 199...