STRUCTURE, STRATEGY, SUSTAINABILITY:

WHAT FUTURE FOR NEW SOCIAL MOVEMENT THEORY?

Alana Lentin, European University Institute

Sociological Research Online 4(3), September 1999 http://www.socresonline.org.uk

ABSTRACT The theoretical domain developed for the study of New Social Movements

(NSMs) in the early 1980s has recently been largely abandoned by its main advocates.

Increasingly, the cross-class, 'post-materialist' movements of the 1970s and 1980s, typified by

the issues of environment, peace and feminism, cease to pose a radical challenge to

contemporary western politics. This paper revisits the theoretical work of three of the

European voices central to understandings of the emergence and success of New Social

Movements. Claus Offe, Alberto Melucci and Alain Touraine succeed in amalgamating an

essential emphasis on structural transformation and an understanding of the importance of

identity in bringing about 'new' collective action in the 1970s and 1980s. In response, to the

significant decrease in European work on the NSM phenomenon today the paper proposes that

the existing body of theory may be insufficient for describing collective action at the turn of

the Millennium. The increasing predominance of 'identity' politics (e.g. in the realms of

ethnicity and sexuality) in the arenas previously dominated by 'universalist', post-particularist

themes; the institutionalisation of elements of NSM action and concerns; and the perceived

appropriation by transnational agencies of the issues dominating original state-NSM struggles

are cited as reasons for the need to develop a new language to describe contemporary

collective action phenomena.

KEYWORDS New Social Movements • Structural Transformation • Identity •

Collective Action • Transnationalisation

1
INTRODUCTION

Recent trends in the social sciences have revealed a preoccupation with social

processes beyond the realm of the nation state. Responses to the growing pressures of

'globalization', in addition to those concerning economics and international relations, have

stressed the role of ‘transnational new social movements’ (c.f. Smith et al., 1997). These

protectors against the abuse of human rights, environmental degradation and the denial of

equality on the grounds of ethnicity, gender or sexuality have, over the last decade, developed

professionalised strategies employed on an international scale. However, the continued use of

the label New Social Movements to refer to that which resembles advocacy or ‘lobbying’

points to important changes in the ways in which social collective action is now

conceptualised.

In building a theoretical framework for my doctoral research into anti-racism

movements and the particularistic nature of collective action in that field, I returned to the

literature on New Social Movements (NSMs), originating in the early 1980s. It became clear

that the type of movement to which the NSM label was pinned, primarily the environmental,

peace and women's organisations of the 1970s and 1980s, now used widely differing

strategies for promoting similar messages. On the other hand, movements evolving later

around the issues of ethnicity, 'race' or sexuality could not be captured within the same frame.

Nevertheless NSMs are usually exemplified by a list which - alongside the ecological, peace,

women's triad - includes anti-racism, gay rights and other 'identity based' organisations

(Waters, 1998). The ideology of the original NSMs of the early 1980s as well as some of their

actors, could now be identified with the policies of both governmental and supranational

institutions and of the private sector. Others had been relegated to the fringes or had ceased to

exist. The anti-racism movements or those promoting gay rights, however, could not be said

to have followed as neat a route. In recognition of the importance of 'dealing' with social

issues from within institutions, many western governments (local and national) as well as the

European Union, the Council of Europe, trades unions, political parties and other

2
organisations promoted anti-racist campaigns1, equality training and other measures. Yet,

when independently formed, movements tended to remain at 'grassroots' level, non-

institutional and strongly linked to the 'community'.

These differences would not appear problematic to those within social movements

research who take either a rational choice approach (resource mobilisation) or one prioritising

the centrality of identity alone yet paying little attention to structural constraints. However, a

view on collective action which either imposes a means-ends analysis or simply questions

actors' motivations for ‘joining in’ without looking at the socio-political conditions enabling it

will not be taken here. The paper will introduce the concept of New Social Movements and

briefly distinguish between the various approaches used to study them. I will then review the

work of three authors who identify NSMs in terms of the changing political and social

structures of the 1970s and 1980s and in recognition of the 'new identities' created within the

New Social Movements: Claus Offe, Alberto Melucci and Alain Touraine.

This will serve to address three questions that I see as emerging from a comparison of

a review of this work with the contemporary processes briefly identified in the preceding

paragraphs. Firstly, is 'identity' in the sense in which it was described by these authors

(reflexive, post-material, knowledge-based) comparable to the identities of proponents of the

'new' politics of minority ethnicity, sexuality and the like? Does the 'universalist' appeal of the

message promoted by the original NSMs, in which identity was moulded around issues, not

oppose the 'particularism' of new movements for whom essential identities give rise to issues?

Secondly, in what ways can the New Social Movement label continue to be applied? Given

that 'universalist' NSM agendas have been largely institutionalised in recent years and that

'particularist' movements have little concrete parallels in the NSM phenomenon there is a

need for new vocabularies. Lastly, in consideration of the institutionalisation of NSMs (or of

their concerns) and the concomitant localisation of the communal politics of 'race' and

ethnicity, have social scientists been right to have stressed transnational over state-based

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processes? Has the state's collusion in the transnationalisation of social concerns witnessed a

backlash in the growing significance of 'particularist' politics?

THE BIRTH OF THE NEW SOCIAL MOVEMENT

New Social Movements most effectively describe a specific movement-type

emerging in the late 1970s; principally the peace, women’s, ecological and local-autonomy

associations (Cohen, 1985) that have characterised mass-based collective action for roughly

two decades. Their successes continue to have an effect upon the nature of political decision-

making in western societies. New Social Movements emerged as a direct response to the

overly bureaucratic nature of established institutions - of both state and civil society - and the

modes of political action pursued by collective actors in the past (routinised, hierarchical,

representative). NSMs sought to “politicize the institutions of civil society in ways that are

not constrained by the channels of representative-bureaucratic political institutions, and

thereby to reconstitute a civil society that is no longer dependent upon ever more regulation,

control and intervention” (Offe, 1985: 820).

Various approaches have been used in the study of NSMs with different elements of

both the conditions for their emergence and their mode of functioning stressed by different

authors. However, their heterogeneous nature has been central to all approaches, exemplified

by their abandonment of both class-differentiated politics and strictly delineated modus

operandi. Contemporary movements have also been understood in terms of an hermeneutic

approach which places emphasis on the self-understanding or reflexivity of collective actors

(Touraine, 1985). In sum, NSMs have been aptly described by Jean Cohen (1985: 664) as:

“…a self-understanding that abandons revolutionary dreams in favour of the idea of

structural reform, along with a defense of civil society that does not seek to abandon

the autonomous functioning of political and economic systems – in a phrase, self-

limiting radicalism.”

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 Defining New Social Movements along these lines recognises two different

approaches to their study. The first has stressed the structural conditions in changing forms of

political organisation, economic concerns and the shifting relations between public and

private spheres characteristic of ‘complex societies’ (Melucci, 1995) to which NSMs are said

to respond. Such arguments have principally been taken up by Claus Offe in his comparison

of ‘old’ and ‘new’ paradigms of collective action, Alain Touraine who emphasises the

importance of ‘post-industrial’ society and Alberto Melucci, who concentrates on “systems of

high information density” (1995: 101) and their effects on contemporary conflicts.

A second approach to the study of NSMs has centred upon strategic elements as key

explanations for their ‘newness’. Such an approach may be split into two divergent

understandings of NSM functioning. The first was developed in the late 1970s as a theoretical

tool for the understanding of collective action in general by a group of American sociologists

within the rational-choice school (McCarthy and Zald, 1977; Tilly, 1978) and is known as

Resource-Mobilisation Theory2. This theory emphasises strategic interaction and cost-benefit

calculations in understanding the logic behind new modes of collective action (Cohen, 1985).

A second approach may be termed the Identity-Oriented Paradigm. Here a certain amount of

overlap exists with authors such as Offe, Melucci and Touraine who place the greatest stress

on structural conditions. A significant portion of the literature (essentially American as

opposed to the European-based analyses presented by the fore-mentioned writers) also places

a strong emphasis on culture as central to NSM activity (Dalton, 1994; Klandermans, 1990).

Whilst both schools agree upon the relevance of culture to new forms of social

movement organisation, their methodological strategies seem to be divided along

European/theoretical-American/empirical lines. In general, it appears to me that the

distinction can be made between two types of authors. On the one hand, Johnston and

Klandermans claim in their 1995 volume, Social Movements and Culture, that “…students of

social movements have felt the limitations of excessively structural and interest-oriented

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perspectives” (p. vii) and call for a “common framework for the integration of cultural

variables in the study of social movements” (idem.). Others, on the other hand, whose work

concentrates on Europe, look to historical explanations of social movement activity (Offe,

1985; Tarrow, 1996) and discussions of contemporary political and social transformation

(Melucci, 1994) as the means for explaining the centrality of identity to the study of NSMs.

A third branch of thought has emerged among commentators on the NSM debate in

the academic literature. Both Dalton (1994) in his analysis of European Green networks and

Cohen (1985) call for an approach, which unites the useful elements of Resource-

Mobilisation and Identity-Oriented approaches. However, as has briefly been shown, the

latter may not be conceptualised in itself as a unified theoretical perspective. There will be no

effort made here to re-enter the well-frequented debate that compares and seeks to

amalgamate Resource-Mobilisation and Identity-Oriented approaches3. The quest for

solutions to thorny theoretical problems is seldom found through the joining of approaches at

once diverse and incomplete. Rather, I will argue that a closer reading of explanations that

emphasise structure as a way of addressing the questions of power and powerlessness as they

relate to social movements (Offe, 1985) and of giving meaning to action within an overall

paradigm that emphasises identity assists in understanding the ‘newness’ of New Social

Movements.

SHIFTS IN STRUCTURE / CHANGING PATTERNS IN COLLECTIVE ACTION

Discussions of NSMs that have stressed the structural conditions in which they

emerged generally refer to the types of political system, the institutions of state and civil

society and the extent to which decision-making is accessible as well as to general processes

of transformation and the global social and political pressures that influence collective action.

The influence of shifts in social and political priorities and possibilities on the choices open to

collective actors is prominent in all accounts that examine the novelty of NSM activity. It is

the process of describing what is new about New Social Movements that informs us both

6
about the strategies that they follow and about the changing nature of power and politics that

create the conditions necessary for their emergence. In my opinion, Touraine, Offe and

Melucci, albeit in varying degrees of success, have presented more holistic accounts of NSM

rationale than have those who concentrated on strategies of collective action, whether taking a

Resource-Mobilisation approach or one centred upon methodological concerns - such as

frame analysis - in Identity-Oriented paradigms (e.g. Johnston and Klandermans, 1995;

Laraña, 1994).

What have been the conditions stressed in bringing about a ‘new paradigm’ (Offe,

1985) of social movement activity? Various authors have emphasised structural elements of

either the specificities of collective action in the domain of civil society (Offe, Tarrow) or

related to the wider pressures brought about by the rise in importance of information as a

primary resource in ‘knowledge-based’ (Melucci) or ‘post-industrial’ societies (Touraine). I

will present an brief account of these different theories in an attempt to accent the importance

of structural accounts in explaining both the emergence of NSMs, thus their ‘newness’, and

the strategies that they follow in achieving their aims.

The significance of structural conditions in defining the possibilities for social action

has been seen as vital to the study of movement politics for as long as they have existed.

Sydney Tarrow (1998, 1996) usefully introduces the concept of the ‘political opportunity

structure’ for explaining the various options open to collective actors across diverse political

systems. He returns to Alexis de Tocqueville’s comparison of ‘strong’/centralised and

‘weak’/decentralised states to illustrate the historical role of social movements in the project

of state building. The ‘political opportunity structure’ refers to the governmental type which,

depending on the extent to which agents in civil society are granted access to decision-making

structures, affects their ability to bring about social and political change. Tarrow uses

Tocqueville’s original examples: France, the prototype ‘strong’ state with a near

impenetrable, centralised system of government, and federalist USA, with its diffused locuses

7
of power, encouraging citizen participation at sub-levels. Weak states, Tarrow argues, allow

for widespread, moderate participation that reduces the chances of violent state-society

clashes. Centralised systems, on the other hand, weaken the institutions of civil society and

discourage citizen participation so that when conflict appears it most often takes a violent

form.

The notion of ‘political opportunity structure’ is worth recalling in discussions of

New Social Movements because it highlights both the similarities and the differences between

the structural frameworks for ‘old’ and ‘new’ paradigm movements. NSMs have been said to

have arisen due to the search for alternative life forms (Touraine, 1985) and the growth in

significance of ‘postmaterialist’ issues (Waters, 1998). Whilst the contemporary swing away

from traditional modes of organisation and interest categories is marked to be sure, the

structuring of political opportunities does not appear to have been altered to as large an

extent. As a consequence, NSMs are often characterised as operational at trans- or sub-

national levels, no longer looking for conflicts at the level of the state and tending less than

their predecessors towards struggles over issues of material distribution or production

(Melucci, 1995). It would be interesting to ask to what extent the impenetrability of certain

political systems and the more participatory-oriented ideals of others shape the evolution of

NSMs. But for my purposes, it is more relevant to bear in mind the historically dualistic

nature of state-social movement interaction. The influence that social action had upon the

evolution of modern state systems historically is vital to any work that seeks, by examining

the changing nature of social movements, to understand the interrelationships between

citizenship and participation.

STRESSING STRUCTURE / PRIORITISING IDENTITY

This section presents a brief overview of the work of Offe, Melucci and Touraine. I

have chosen to return to these authors in particular because their amalgamation of structural

8
arguments with new ways of conceptualising actors' motivations in terms of identity are still

relevant to the debate on social movements. However, the ways in which identity is

constructed and played out differ (especially in the work of Offe) to the processes observable

in today's 'particularist' movements. A review of this work thus helps us both to contextualise

today's movements and to identify in what ways they differ from original NSMs.

All three authors display strong commonalties in their stress on the specific nature of

‘advanced capitalist industrial’ (Offe), ‘post-industrial’ (Touraine) or ‘highly differentiated’

(Melucci) societies. Claus Offe calls on Foucault who espouses an “…even more radical

version of the ‘dispersed’ nature of power and powerlessness that can no longer be attributed

to any central or fundamental causal mechanism” (1985: 845) to explain what he calls the

‘broadening’, ‘deepening’ and ‘irreversible’ forms of social control which render institutions

powerless and cause the blurring of class divisions in late-modern European societies. These

processes have the effect of making formerly localised problems applicable at a broader level

as flexibility enhances the possibilities for finding solutions through non-institutional

channels. This leads diverse groups to experience first-hand, by means of a ‘spill-over’ effect,

the once specific concerns of class. A second outcome is the deepened experiencing of

deprivation caused by bringing closer the formerly distinct realms of the controlling

institution and that of the private or individual. Finally, they recognise that social and political

institutions (most notably the Welfare State) are no longer able to cope with global threats and

their resultant deprivations. Problems of this nature (environmental decay, military

technology, severe poverty) are deemed irreversible because of the state’s incapacity to

provide solutions for them despite its continued control over social life. Protest is thus

directed against states’ success (rather than their failure) in promoting economic wealth

(Berger and Berger, 1983), the factor responsible for the desensitisation brought about by the

wielding of such enhanced power.

9
 Claus Offe places a strong emphasis on the 'newness' of New Social Movements. He

does this through the development of two prototypes of collective action: the 'old paradigm'

social movements and the emergence of a 'new paradigm' (Offe, 1985). Offe links the

structural transformations necessary for bringing about these observed shifts to the emergence

of a type of actor who reflects changing concerns in the domain of class. Western ‘old’

paradigm social movements were at their most prominent post-1945, in a period defined by

the liberal-democratic structures of the free market economy and its required flip-side - social

security - and by the predominance of party-politics. Offe argues that this period witnessed a

lesser degree of social and political conflict than before or immediately since in so far as

“collective bargaining, party competition, and representative party government were the

virtually exclusive mechanisms of the resolution of social and political conflict. All of this

was endorsed by a ‘civic culture’ which emphasised the values of social mobility, private life,

consumption, instrumental rationality, authority, and order and which de-emphasised political

participation” (Offe 1985: 824).

Offe characterises new movements as non-institutional. He does not imply that these

alternative forms of collective action have completely replaced the ‘old’ paradigm. Rather, he

argues, the two compete and at the time of writing, he foresees the success of the ‘new’

paradigm as based on its ability to form alliances with the old Left against the project of neo-

conservatism. The fact of having the advantage of hindsight and the knowledge that he largely

bases his analysis on the case of Germany aside, Offe’s emphasis on the changing nature of

class structure is integral to understanding NSM emergence. Offe sees NSM politics as rooted

in the concerns of the ‘new middle class’ made up of highly educated, economically secure

individuals many of whom work in the field of ‘personal-services’. This body characterises

the membership of issue-based movements such as peace, ecological, women’s and civil-

rights associations. It is joined by members of ‘decommodified’ groups (students, the

unemployed, housewives etc.) described as ‘trapped’ in highly authoritarian and often

exclusionary regimes of social control yet with a significant amount of free time for

10
movement activity. Such alliances are said to cut across traditional class conflict and resist

class-specific themes, favouring either highly universalist issues on the one hand, or strongly

particularist4 ones on the other.

The predominance of the ‘new middle class’ is crucial to Offe's understanding of

structural change. He recalls the observations of mass behaviour in early psychologising

theories, described as irrational and arising from disaffection and exclusion (e.g. Smelser,

1963). Within such accounts it was impossible to conceive of either the elites or the core

groups of society participating in a challenge to the institutions of the state. This was seen as a

reaction against transformations brought about by the process of modernity to which such

groups were deemed central. This supposition was negated early on by Gramsci (1971), who

claimed that key players in civil society belong either to the hegemonic bloc or are resolutely

counter-hegemonic in their consciousness. Along these lines and in complete contrast to

theorists of ‘deviant’ mass behaviour, Offe’s ‘new middle class’ actors are neither disaffected

nor peripheral to the concerns of mainstream politics nor are they economically marginal.

Actors’ self-awareness of their social status is central to Offe’s ‘new middle class’. The

process of self-understanding embarked upon by the members of this new class - straddling

traditional class divides - “ultimately determines one’s ability to free oneself of the dominant

ideology, overturn the institutional forms of hegemony, create new associational forms, and

thereby act in counterhegemonic terms” (Lynch, 1998: 165).

Offe, in agreement with Touraine and Melucci, sees structural transformation as key

to understanding the increased role of a 'new middle class' in New Social Movement politics.

Favouring structural over 'functionalist' theories of NSMs, he argues, indicates a commitment

to theories for social movements as opposed to the latter's tendency to mere description. Thus,

Offe recognises that a discussion of collective action that is ignorant of structure disregards

the significance of shifting power relations for all social phenomena and especially for those

that prioritise human agency in situations of social and political conflict.

11
 Alberto Melucci's stress on the primacy of structure makes use of a rather different

language to that employed by Claus Offe. Whilst Offe speaks in the language of institutions

giving the reader an overview of the historical processes, post-1945, that saw the rise and

demise of state centrism in the domain of social life, Melucci prioritises information and

communication as fundamental to structural transformation. While Offe's accounts resonate

for many students of western European national societies, Melucci says more about the

'globalisation' of knowledge at multiple levels and in different contexts. Like Touraine,

Melucci's prioritisation of, what he calls, 'identitisation' (Melucci, 1997a) in the commitment

of actors to movements, strongly locates subjective human agency in its structural and

political contexts.

Melucci prioritises the production and processing of information in contemporary

societies as crucial to the understanding of changing paradigms in collective action (Melucci,

1994; 1995). Information is constituted as the key resource in a 'planetary' world denoted by

its pluralisation: "The pluralisation of languages, pluralisation of perspectives, pluralisation of

theoretical standpoints" (Melucci, 1997b: 95). This multiplicity creates the need to access

knowledge because the very plurality of 'complex' societies also raises the risk of being

confined to one domain. This immediately reduces the chances of survival in a society which

has become 'highly differentiated'. In Melucci's terms, social movements of newly 'identitised'

actors contribute to avoiding this. Therefore, "the movements of the 1970s and the 1980s

were the last signs of the transition from movements as political actors to movements as

media" (Melucci, 1997b: 108).

Melucci's emphasis on the acquisition of information in the evolution of movements,

their functioning and their role in society as the conveyors of this vital knowledge stems from

his view of the "systemic forms of the development of power as an issue that is very

problematic within contemporary societies" (Avritzer and Lyyra, 1997). Such a perspective

recognises the uneven nature of power relations that are diffused throughout social life and

12
that cannot be embodied in a single, impenetrable locus. This Foucauldian standpoint is

translated into Melucci's insistence that in spite of subordination "people, in their own ways,

were able to use the space of their own power to act against and to act for" (Melucci, 1997b:

96). Seen in relation to the structural transformative effects that social movements may have

by appropriating power spaces, Melucci considers movements to constitute

"that part of social life where social relationships have not yet crystallised into social

structures, where action is the immediate carrier of the relational texture of society

and its meaning. They are therefore, at least for me, not only a specific sociological

object, but a lens through which many problems can be addressed"

(Melucci, 1997b: 95)

Melucci sees as significant social movements' capacity to effect change in institutional

and political structures in both direct and indirect ways. He sees 'everyday networks' as the

spaces in which public confrontations are prepared in the self-reflexivity of negotiation. Social

movements have been implicit in broadening the boundaries of the political and changing the

nature of participation and representation also by providing new institutional personnel.

Indirectly, social movements have contributed to both a change in organisational life and to

the acceptance of new languages, such as the languages of ecology and gender, by institutions.

These effects are not wholly welcomed by Melucci who views the focus on organisation and

the domain of the institutionally political as being a rather narrow outcome of NSM activity.

The work of Alain Touraine has focused explicitly on the link between structural and

cultural concerns. He has sought to build a theory to frame the structural and cultural

dimensions of the contemporary western societies where collective action takes place and to

conduct an action-theoretical analysis of the conflictual processes of identity formation in

actors. He, therefore, examines the reflexive processes that sustain social movement agency

through the development of norms in the realm of identity and focuses on the democratisation

of society and on the centrality of culture (Cohen, 1985). In order to develop a global

13
perspective on the relevance of social movement activity to the ensemble of social and

political processes, Touraine believes in identifying the common cultural field in which

opponents compete, rather than focusing on the different identities of particular groups.

Groups whose action centres wholly on the self-understanding of their identity or culture

cannot be described as social movements. “A social movement […] is a collective action

aiming at the implementation of central cultural values against the interest and influence of an

enemy which is defined in terms of power relations. A social movement is a combination of

social conflict and cultural participation” (Touraine, 1991; cited in Waters, 1998: 180).

Unlike both Offe, who focuses on the overcoming of class divides, and Melucci, for

whom the understanding of cultural differentiation and multiplicity is crucial to the

understanding of contemporary struggles for the control of information, Touraine sees the

relationship between culture and movements as problematic. Whilst Offe generally ignores it

and Melucci tends to embrace it, Touraine has difficulty in attributing collective struggles in

the domain of culture to the Subject as social movement. Therefore, while identity remains

key, as it does for all three, Touraine's conceptualisation of this identity remains entangled

with the notion of the subject as individual. So, "the individual asserts him or herself as a

subject by combining desire with empathy, without surrendering the temptation to identify one

with the other, as that would reduce the I to the Ego, which is effectively its antithesis"

(Touraine, 1995: 223). Thus, the 'Subject as social movement', or the struggle to "transform

the relation of social domination that are applied to the principal cultural resources" (Touraine,

1984: 64) enables the subject to overcome her tendencies to egoism through commitment or

responsibility.

Such claims are consistent with Touraine's difficulty with arguments that propose the

increased individualism of contemporary society and the hegemony of consumerism. He

believes in a collective ability to resist the advent of a totalising individualism:

14
 "The modern world…increasingly abounds with references to a Subject. That Subject

is freedom, and the criterion of the good is the individual's ability to control his or her

actions and situation, to see and experience modes of behaviour as components in a

personal life history, to see himself or herself as an actor. The Subject is an

individual's will to act and to be recognised as an actor" (Touraine, 1995: 207)

Unlike Melucci's proposal of the possibility for social action in the spaces of diffused,

yet uneven power, Touraine's equation of the Subject and an alternative modernity with the

choices of the individual to act underplays the role of power in collective struggles. He sees as

a "perversion" (Touraine, 1995: 210) Foucault's (c.f. 1988) view that subjectivation (the

engendering of the Subject) necessarily entails subjectification (or the creation of subjects).

For this reason, Touraine's equation of social movements with the birth of the Subject presents

some fundamental problems for the development of a theory of collective social action which

recognises the realities of asymmetric power. The centrality of the 'Subject' and the relegation

to the sidelines of the 'subject' hinders the possibility of applying Touraine's perspective on

social movements to the domain of today's 'particularist' movements that start from a position

of marginality. The universalisation of Subject possibilities inherent in his theory encumbers

the student who reads Touraine on multiculturalism5 and remind us of the importance of

theoretical clarity in writing about diverse movement forms6.

I have presented three structural analyses of New Social Movements. Each author

approaches the subject from an angle that cannot escape the strong influence of national

constraints – German, Italian and French – on the evolution of the “special type of social

conflict” that is entailed in collective action (Touraine, 1985: 750). Despite this, all three

make justifiably strong inferences as to the nature of NSM action on a global (western) scale.

Revisiting these theoretical contributions helps to clarify the problems created for social

movements as a field of study by the contemporary changes in the nature of movements

labelled NSMs.

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CONTEMPORARY RELEVANCE: NSM THEORY IN A FUTURE PERSPECTIVE

I now return to the three questions posed in the introduction of the paper. I shall start

by outlining in greater detail the content of the problem in light of my discussion of NSM

theory in the previous section. I will then attempt to address the issues by referring to the

needs of students of 'minoritarian' movements at the turn of the Millennium.

My first question asks, to what extent the identity constructed by actors in New Social

Movements has changed with the emergence of a greater number of particularist movements

claiming recognition in public space? Can movements such as those that claim rights for

ethnic minority groups or AIDs sufferers, who indeed use non-conventional, self-reflexive

means of action, be conceived merely as later versions on a continuum of NSMs? A

distinguishing factor of the original New Social Movements is that they uphold the egalitarian

values contained in a ‘universalist’ world vision that includes notions such as peace, sexual

equality and environmental protection. If this is the case, as Lynch (1998) argues (although I

am not sure it pertains where gender is concerned), do movements of predominantly

homogeneous groups or ‘communities’ constitute a return to the old particularism exemplified

by class-based struggles?

Secondly, if we agree that the need to table the issues promoted by the original NSMs

in the 1970s and 1980s (peace, equality, environment) is now less urgent, can groups

continuing to organise around such issues still call themselves social movements? Have they

not, as a result of their success, undergone a process of institutionalisation that de facto

complicates their aim of being representative of the interests of civil society? Is this an

inevitable and generally applicable outcome of successful collective action? Alternatively,

can it be said to be based, in a Gramscian sense, on the predominance in NSMs of core groups

with privileged access to decision-making that eventually take their ‘rightful’ place at the seat

of institutional power?

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 Lastly, have global developments, such as those stressed in Melucci’s account of

societies governed by non state-bound flows of information, and the concomitant

transnationalisation of collective action come full circle? Social movements' criticism of the

state’s powers of coercion has facilitated the imposition of the constraints over state

sovereignty institutionalised by the strengthening of international governmental bodies and

the ethereal strong arm of global finance. Is it, as Lynch (1998) claims, paradoxically

necessary that social movements return now to tackle the state in an attempt to halt the

appropriation of ‘public’ issues (human rights, the environment, peace) by international

institutions or by professionalised non-governmental lobby groups?

Three issues have been identified. Addressing these questions will contribute to

explaining what we mean when we talk about social movements at the end of the 1990s and

may go some way towards setting an agenda for further research. I will examine each issue in

turn. However, my central claim is that original NSM activism, ‘universalist’ in its appeal

must be distinguished from contemporary movements with ‘particularist’ demands. The other

two issues that I have raised, those of institutionalisation and the viability of transnational

categories, revolve around this main point. My purpose is two-fold: to demonstrate in what

ways contemporary 'particularist' movements differ from the NSMs and to propose that the

privileging of structure in the theories summarised above should not be discarded in the study

of 'new' New Social Movements.

In answer to the first question, my main claim is that a distinction must be made

between original NSM activism which carried a 'universalist' message and the 'particularism'

of many contemporary movements organised around ethnicity or sexuality. It has become

mandatory, particularly in the North American context, to equate the NSM phenomenon with

a new 'politics of identity' through which "neither women nor racial 'minorities' nor sexual

'minorities' nor the handicapped nor the 'ecologists'…would ever again accept the legitimacy

of 'waiting' upon some other revolution" (Wallerstein, 1989). Immanuel Wallerstein reflects

17
the tendency of some writers to present an all-encompassing view of NSM activism in which

any group with a grievance in some way based upon culture or identity, pre-existing or

'imagined' (Anderson, 1983), represents a whole new collective action form. This confusion

can largely be accounted for by the predominance of the notion of identity first in NSM theory

and later through 'identity politics'.

I argue that a perspective from the 1990s, during which professionalised activism has

increased in dominance, obscures our vision. Lobbying or advocacy tackles particularist

grievances by couching them in the language of universal human rights. But when groups call

for special rights or recognition (Taylor, 1994) on the grounds of their ethnic, sexual or other

difference we must discount the appeal of these claims to universality. Moreover, such groups

generally speak from a minoritarian position and have little access to decision-making

centres. In making these comments I would strongly disagree with Waters (1998) who

analyses contemporary movement politics in France to conclude that these would be more

usefully categorised as a ‘new citizenship’ movement. She claims that groups such as the

purposefully subversive ActUP (AIDS Coalition to Unleash Power) are exemplary of the

“profoundly democratic nature of contemporary movements and their attempt to further the

rights of all social groups rather than the narrow concerns of a particular movement or social

category” (Waters, 1998: 178). The confinement of such movements within the liberal

democratic political project represents a profound misunderstanding of their mission.

Furthermore, the grouping together of ActUp (anti-institutional) and SOS Racisme (strong

institutional connections) is indicative of a complete misreading of social movement politics

in that country. In a different way, movements for the political recognition of ethnic or

‘racial’ minorities increasingly call for an understanding of their needs which is 'particular'

rather than 'universal', often inciting criticism on the grounds of separatism and a rejection of

dominant/majoritarian cultural themes. These groups, victims of a social exclusion based on

identity as well as poverty, obviously cannot choose to be determinedly counter-hegemonic.

18
 Having made this distinction, I must stress that the separation of ‘universalist’ from

‘particularist’ political ideals cannot be dealt with by recourse to the popular theme of

‘identity politics’. Today, particularly in the United States, this label is imposed on the

majority of movements working in the domain of ethnicity, sexuality and the like. I draw a

barrier between ‘identity politics’ and other movements such as ActUp and various anti-racist

movements for example, because many writers over-state the claim to exclusivity manifested

by some and apply it to all identity-based groups. Adam (1992: 52) reflects this general trend:

“Much of the confusion surrounding ‘identity politics’ reflects the ‘nationalist’, ‘fundi’, or

‘culturalist’ face of new social movements, which valorises difference, essentializes identity,

and affirms the self.”

Furthermore, by concentrating on exclusive identities rather than on the collaborative

strategies developed by many minoritarian movements, there is a tendency to elevate such

movements to a universalist purpose that all do not share. Ernesto Laclau shows how the

“proliferation of particularisms” (1996: 27) contributes to the ‘universalisation of

particularism’:

“If each identity is in a differential, non-antagonistic relation to all other identities,

then the identity in question is purely differential and relational; so it presupposes not

only the presence of all the other identities but also the total ground which constitutes

the differences as differences. Even worse: we know very well that the relations

between groups are constituted as relations of power... Now, if the particularity asserts

itself as mere particularity, in a pure differential relation with other particularities, it is

sanctioning the status quo in the relation of power between groups.”

(Laclau, 1996: 27)

This serves to illustrate the importance of separating between the various types of

(new) social movements. I have argued that the original NSMs of the 1970s and 1980s

enjoyed a claim to universality because the identity constructed by actors was based on issues

19
with a wide-ranging appeal. Secondly, the categorising of all novel movements as NSMs

denies the important claim to difference of ‘particularist’ movements that lack any aim to

assimilate into society at large. Nevertheless, this conflation is understandable in an overall

climate that emphasises the proliferation of identity politics. If we take Laclau’s point about

the universalisation of identities we can see how some movements, especially for ethno-

nationalist, religious or indigenous people’s rights, have demonstrated success. The majority

of currently active movements against racism, sexism and homophobia in western societies

call for a whole new set of descriptors. Yet, these movements continue to be described, as

they have by Wallerstein, Adam and Waters cited in this article, as NSMs.

The second question raised at the start of this section relates to the first and most

important problem discussed above. There has been a significant trend towards the

institutionalisation of both NSM demands and of many movement actors. I argue that the

universal appeal of the NSM’s core issues to some extent facilitated this process. The NSMs

of the 1970s and 1980s have enjoyed success in driving home their message and influencing

decision-making whether through the continuation of non-conventional, mediatised action

modes or through an ascendance to positions of institutional power. The environmental

movement is at the fore of both phenomena with associations such as Greenpeace continuing

to resist bureaucratisation and attract a wide-level, international base of support and Green

parties winning seats in national and European parliaments.

The attraction of individuals to concrete ‘causes’ such as environmental degradation

and threats to security have at times been attributed to the NIMBY (not in my backyard)

factor (Roche, 1995). Certainly, the success of collective pressure to bring about changes that

affect individuals’ daily lives may explain in part the relatively rapid institutionalisation of

some NSMs (e.g. liberal feminism, Green parties). Furthermore, Offe shows how the location

of core or elite groups in NSMs is vital for the success through institutionalisation of NSM

issues and actors. Actors were able to use their knowledge of the 'system' to avoid the

20
institution during the early NSM years. Later, the same privileged knowledge allowed them

access to it.

On the level of research and theory production also, there has been an increasing

emphasis placed upon the resource mobilisation approach to NSM theory. This shows

movements as principally oriented towards the adoption of highly routinised structures that

maximise efficiency in mobilising resources for the resolution of public grievances. The

approach favours the establishment of alliances with any public or private collaborative agent

with the sole purpose of mobilising the appropriate organisational or entrepreneurial resources

deemed necessary for attaining a desired outcome (Dalton, 1994). The heavy bias on

opportunity and organisational features and the neglect of political or structural motivations in

this perspective supports a view of NSMs that concludes either in their dissolution after the

attainment of the identified goal, or in their institutionalisation. However, if we want to stress

the structural conditions as a result of which NSMs emerge and the return effects of collective

action on political and social structures, this type of means-ends analysis remains insufficient.

The complexity of the matter may have contributed to the demise in concern for NSMs in the

European context or, as Melucci (1997b)7 claims, the increasing attraction of American

rational choice models for European writers.

"What resource mobilization brings to the analysis of social movements is an attention

to the how… But there are two shortcomings in this success. One is the eclipse of the

question about the why. Thereby, the attention to structural roots - the best inheritance

of the Marxist tradition - is completely erased as everyone in the Left, the entire

European Left, and maybe even in the third world as well, is switching to rational

choice theories". (Melucci, 1997b)

These arguments connect to the discussion of my first question. To a certain extent the

institutionalisation of NSM issues replies to public demand for greater control against

environmental hazard, the promotion of equal opportunities and the protection from nuclear

21
threat, to give some examples. Information about these issues was no doubt provided by the

NSMs. In that many of these concerns have been submitted to a degree of institutionalisation

it is to some extent justified that sociologists now study the how, the mobilising of resources

for the attainment of concrete aims. But this cannot be separated from my core argument that

NSM institutionalisation was facilitated by the universalist appeal of the issues, on the one

hand, and by the dominant position of the actors, on the other. Whereas there is evidence of a

linear trajectory from movement to institution for some original NSMs, the same linearity

cannot be seen in the history of 'particularist' movements. In particular the case of anti-racism

demonstrates how movements have always been either more or less institutionally allied, more

liberal or more radical in different contexts and depending on their protagonists. Indeed, an

overall problem for anti-racism has been the practical inability of enjoying wide-spread

support without a modicum of institutionalised, mainstream backing. Movements that rejected

any form of collaboration with state-bodies, the church or other central institutions have often

been labelled subversive or deviant by proponents of a liberal anti-racism as well as by forces

on the Right (Gilroy, 1987).

My final point relates to the transnational nature of the original NSMs. One of the

most important factors stressed by all theorists of NSMs is their ability to work across and in

spite of borders. This backs up my point about the universal appeal of NSMs and helps stress

why 'particularist' movements are mostly local and often appeal for recognition from

nationally-bound politico-legal institutions. Lynch (1998) supports these claims by arguing

that transnational NSMs' criticism of the state has paradoxically assisted it in relinquishing

responsibility for resolving social problems: “For either a minimum or maximum program to

take hold, social movements delegitimized rigid conceptualizations of state sovereignty,

legitimized the demobilization of the state’s coercive capacities, and encouraged guarantees

of controls placed on the state by international mechanisms of oversight” (Lynch, 1998: 163).

22
 This problem is particularly significant when related to the concerns of the

'particularist' movements. There is little doubt that the issues raised by the original NSMs, in

particular ecological and security concerns, need to be tackled at supra-national level.

However, the marginalisation of some groups in society may be conceptualised only in

relation to the state and its failures in the face of civil society. The NSMs' criticism of the

entrenched bureaucracy of the Welfare State has helped give governments an excuse for

dismantling it with no efficient replacement. This has led to growing disaffection in reaction

to the exclusion of society’s most marginalised groups. It is around these issues that many of

today's social movements are most active, particularly in the face of AIDs, growing

homelessness or the recent case of entrenched institutionalised racism demonstrated by the

Stephen Lawrence case in the UK. There is no doubt a dialogue between similar movements

in different countries. However, whereas environmental degradation and nuclear threat are

and must be global concerns, social problems arising as a direct function of the failure of

states to provide for their citizens demand a case-by-case approach. Lastly, there is a stark

contrast between many of the actors involved in original NSM activity, exemplified by Offe's

'new middle class', and the ethnic, racialised or sexual minorities active in 'particularist'

movements. Transnational activity may be less realistic for today's movement actors.

The discussion of these three questions may act as pointers for the development of a

viable theory of the changing patterns in social movement structure and function. It has been

suggested (Waters, 1998) that the term ‘New Social Movement’ has lost resonance in the

description of collective action today. As it relates to a distinct form of activism emerging due

to specific structural conditions in the 1970s and 1980s I would agree that the NSM label no

longer covers social movements. I have shown that the original NSMs had a 'universalist'

appeal whereas many of the movements that are still defined today as NSMs raise

'particularist' issues. Further, many actors in original NSMs had privileged positions which

assisted in institutionalising their claims. Lastly, the transnational ideals of the NSMs have

inadvertently given rise to the issues raised by contemporary movements. The option of

23
organising across borders is not as accessible for such movements as it had been for the

NSMs.

If differences have been recognised between original NSMs and today's movements it

has been generally been put down to the proliferation of 'identity politics' (ethnicity, sexuality,

nationality, religion). I have argued that this perspective cannot adequately explain the

function of many movements. Rather, 'particularist' movements need to be analysed in terms

of the shifts in the structural political conditions of the states in which they emerge. They

should not be seen as products of an alien 'identity' with little bearing on the societal

processes experienced by majority groups. Yet, neither are they New Social Movements in

the way I have described them. In conclusion, I propose that whereas the description of

original NSMs does not fit many of today's movements, the methods used to research and

theorise them by the three authors whose work I described does. Contemporary work on

'particularist' movements should free them from the NSM label. Yet the structural approach

taken to studying the original European NSMs is useful for showing how it is neither identity

alone nor means-ends functioning that defines the emergence, the ideals or the trajectories

followed by social movements. 'Particularist' movements need to be studied as intrinsic to the

societies that give rise to them and not as separate, other or alien.

24
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Dissent: Contemporary social movements in theory and practice. (Ed.) William K.
CarrollToronto: Garamond Press.

Anderson, Benedict. 1983. Imagined Communities: Reflections on the origins and the spread
of nationalism. London: Verso.

Avritzer, Leonard and Lyyra Timo. 1997. New cultures, social movements and the role of
knowledge: An interview with Alberto Melucci. Thesis Eleven 48: 91-109.

Berger, B. and Berger, P. 1983. The War Over the Family. London: Hutchinson.

Cohen, Jean L. 1985. Strategy or Identity: New theoretical paradigms and contemporary
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Dalton, Russell J. 1994. The Green Rainbow: Environmental groups in western Europe. New
Haven: Yale University Press.

Gramsci, Antonio. Prison Notebooks. London: Lawrence and Wishart.

Johnston, Hank and Klandermans Bert. 1995. Social Movements and Culture: Social
movements, protest and contention, Volume 4. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota
Press.

Klandermans, B. 1990. New Social Movements and Resource Mobilization: The European
and the American approach revisited. Department of Social Psychology. Vrije
Universiteit, Amsterdam.
Laclau, Ernesto. 1996. Emancipation(s). London: Verso.

Laraña, E. Johnston Hank and Gusfield J. R. Eds. 1994. New Social Movements: From
ideology to identity. Philadelphia: Temple University Press.

Lynch, Cecilia. 1998. Social Movements and the Problem of Globalization. Alternatives 23:
149-73.

McCarthy, John D. and Zald Mayer N. 1977. Resource Mobilization and Social Movements:
A partial theory. American Journal of Sociology 82, no. 6: 1212-41.

Melucci, Alberto. 1996. Challenging Codes: Collective action in the information age.
Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

———. 1997. Identity and Difference in a Globalized World. in Debating Cultural

Hybridity: Multi-cultural identities and the politics of anti-racism. (Eds.) Pnina
Werbner and Tariq Modood. London: Zed Books.

———. 1995. The New Social Movements Revisited: Reflections on a sociological

misunderstanding. in Social Movements and Social Classes: The future of collective
action. (Ed.) Louis Malhue. London: Sage.

———. 1992. Nomads of the Present: Social movements and individual needs in
contemporary society. (Eds.) J. Keane and P. Mier. London: Hutchinson.

———. 1998. The Playing Self. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

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———. 1994. A Strange Kind of Newness: What's "new" in new social movements. in Social
Movements: From ideology to identity. (Eds.) H. Johnston and J. R. Gusfield E.
Laraña. Philadelphia: Temple University Press.

Mouffe, Chantal. 1988(a). Radical Democracy. Social Text 21.

Offe, Claus. 1985. New Social Movements: Challenging the boundaries of institutional
politics. Social Research 52, no. 4: 817-68.

Roche, M. 1995. Rethinking Citizenship and Social Movements: Themes in contemporary

sociology and neoconservative ideology. In Social Movements and Social Classes:
The future of collective action. (Ed.) L. Malheu London: Sage.
Smelser, N. J. 1963. Theory of Collective Behaviour. New York: Free Press.

Smith, Jackie Chatfield Charles and Pagnucco Ron Eds. 1997. Transnational Social
Movements and Global Politics: Solidarity beyond the state. Syracuse: Syracuse
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Tarrow, Sidney. 1998. Power in Movement: Social movements and contentious politics,
Second Edition. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

———. 1996. States and Opportunities: The political structuring of social movements. in
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structures and cultural framings. (Eds.) J. D. McCarthy and M. N. Zald D. McAdam.
Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Taylor, Charles. 1994. Multiculturalism. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.

Tilly, C. 1978. From Mobilization to Revolution. Chicago: Addison-Wesley.

Touraine, Alain. 1984. Le retour de l'acteur. Paris: Fayard.

———.1985. An Introduction to the Study of New Social Movements. Social Research 52,
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———. 1995. The Critique of Modernity. Oxford: Blackwell.

———. 1997. Pourrons-nous vivre ensemble, égaux et différents? Paris: Fayard.

Waters, Sarah. 1998. New Social Movement Politics in France: The rise of civic forms of
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26
Notes

1. The Council of Europe ran a European Youth Campaign against racism, xenophobia, antisemitism and

intolerance (1994-1996). The European Union designated 1997 as the European Year against Racism.

2. Resource-Mobilisation theory does not seek specifically to explain the novelty of contemporary collective

action although it has been used to do so. Melucci (1995: 109) points out that “The notion of ‘novelty’ was

first used to indicate the weakness of the existing theories of collective action, if applied to the emerging

phenomena, and to stress the need for a more comprehensive framework. It was also a temporary critical tool

for addressing the shortcomings of resource mobilization theory.”

3. For a discussion of Resource Mobilisation, see McCarthy and Zald (1977) or Tilly (1978). For an analysis of

the debate comparing Resource Mobilisation and Identity-Oriented approaches, see Cohen (1985) or Dalton

(1994).

4. Here, it is important to distinguish between the types of movement that Offe sees as having particularist

interests (largely, reading from the context of his analysis, local-autonomy or women’s groups) and the types

of movement characterised by the term ‘identity politics’. This is a later phenomenon, at least in Europe (it

emerged earlier and has more prominence in the United States) and refers mostly to associations organised

around ethnicity, colour, religion, sexuality and disability.

5. Touraine, A. (1997) Pourrons-nous vivre ensemble égaux et différents? Paris: Fayard.

6. Indeed, Touraine's work on social movements in the 1980s concentrated on the domain of the factory

(industrial struggles) and that of political liberation movements, principally Solidarity in Poland (anti-

totalitarian, nationalist struggles). The relative homogeneity inherent in the composition of his research

objects problematises his continued insistence on social movement/Subject primacy in his more recent work

on democracy and multiculturalism.

7. The reference to Melucci (1997b) is to the interview carried out with Alberto Melucci by Avritzer, Leonard

and Lyyra Timo. 1997. New cultures, social movements and the role of knowledge: An interview with

Alberto Melucci. Thesis Eleven 48: 91-109.

27
1
The Council of Europe ran a European Youth Campaign against racism, xenophobia, antisemitism

and intolerance (1994-1996). The European Union designated 1997 as the European Year against

Racism.

1. Resource-Mobilisation theory does not seek specifically to explain the novelty of contemporary collective

action although it has been used to do so. Melucci (1995: 109) points out that “The notion of ‘novelty’ was

first used to indicate the weakness of the existing theories of collective action, if applied to the emerging

phenomena, and to stress the need for a more comprehensive framework. It was also a temporary critical tool

for addressing the shortcomings of resource mobilization theory.”

4
Here, it is important to distinguish between the types of movement that Offe sees as having
particularist interests (largely, reading from the context of his analysis, local-autonomy or women’s
groups) and the types of movement characterised by the term ‘identity politics’. The relationship to
particularism as it is now more commonly understood as being related to the domain of culture and
'community' is not developed in Offe's analysis.
5
Touraine, A. (1997) Pourrons-nous vivre ensemble égaux et différents? Paris: Fayard.
6
Indeed, Touraine's work on social movements in the 1980s concentrated on the domain of the
factory (industrial struggles) and that of political liberation movements, principally Solidarity in Poland
(anti-totalitarian, nationalist struggles). The relative homogeneity inherent in the composition of his
research objects problematises his continued insistence on social movement/Subject primacy in his
more recent work on democracy and multiculturalism.
7

28