The Human Rights of Good Environmental Governance

From Democracy to Civil Society

Lecture 3

Social Movements

"the form in which new combinations of people inject themselves into politics and challenge dominant ideas and a given constellation of power" (Timothy Doyle and Doug Mc Eachern)

According to collective action theory social movements come about because of changes in:

1) basic conditions of life to produce discontent

2) changes in beliefs and values

3) changes in the capacity to act collectively

4) changes in opportunity for successful action

This is based on the assumption of an individual that responds rationally to rapid social changes

Old versus new social movements

• Old movement: labour movement
• New movements: Women’s and environmental movements

Some characteristics of "new social movements"

• NSMs transcend class structure (more important are social strata: youth, gender, sexual orientation and profession)
• Ideology is no unifying and totalising element (such as Marxism), instead multitude of ideas
• New dimensions of identity based on beliefs, symbols, values and meanings rather than economic grievances
• Blurred relationship individual and collective (movement acted out in individual actions: clothing; eating; what is enjoyed, while the movement is a mix of collective and individual identities)
• Awareness of cooptation of old social movements - increased radicalism
• Participatory, informal and ultra-democratic modes of organization

General explanations for origins of NSMs

• Post-materialist values: Maslow’s ‘hierarchy of needs’ from physical sustenance and safety towards belonging, self-expression and the quality of life (Inglehart, 1990)
• Post-industrialist values: From Enlightenment project to global industrialism with a democratic, pluralist political system (Carl Boggs, 1986)

On the origin of "green" movements:

"There is no unifying teleological purpose that drives them. There is no single causal reality that made them. Interpretations of the origins and significance of environmental movements are as contested as the movements themselves"

The "psalimpsest" structure of NSMs

Five levels:

• Individual
• Network
• Group
• Organization
• Movement

Structure of social movement

Views on NGOs

Pluralist view of NGOs as interest and pressure groups:

• Power is diffuse and non-concentrated
• groups with varying degrees of skill/power battle for influence
• State is neutral
• Incremental political change

Postmodern view of NGOs:

• World is fragmented and in crisis due to modernization project
• Nation-states have no capacity to solve environmental problems
• NGO style of politics have more direct, creative and transformative powers

Typology of NGOs

See Milton Esman

Add: Geopolitical origins (according to Doyle and McEachern)

Structure, politics and activities of NGOs

The "Eternal Dilemma" of the triangular relation: Nation-State, NGO and Business Community

Pluralism versus Post-Modernism

Cooptation versus Radicalism and Independency

"Statist"structure

Participatory democratic structure

Corporate structure (the "exception"?)