Protest

Democratic Deficits and Manufacturing Legitimacy at the World Trade Organization

by Bill Paterson

This is a draft, but never published. It has now been updated with a critical perspective on the concept of legitimacy, and is now with Globalizations. The new abstract reads,
The legitimacy crisis of the WTO is often described in terms of the inequality of gains for the membership, a deficit internal (amongst members) and external (public) transparency and participation. Recognizing its legitimacy crisis, the WTO has responded by declaring procedural reforms to increase internal and external transparency. Hindering the pace of these transparency and participation reforms has been the demand for efficiency in decision-making A key question is can the WTO address its legitimacy crisis in the face of the competing demands of procedural fairness (input legitimacy) and efficiency (output legitimacy) or whether a ‘fundamental overhaul’ is necessary? My contributions to this debate are both theoretical and empirical. Firstly, I suggest the current debate over the WTO’s legitimacy is too liberal and normatively focused which uncritically accepts and thereby de-politicizes the practice of trade liberalization. Whilst, sociological methodological approaches (social constructivist and post-structuralists’) acknowledge that legitimacy is a social relation they still return to liberal procedural reforms. In contrast, I advocate applying an historical materialist approach that explicitly acknowledges that the WTO does not exist in a vacuum; rather the WTO’s purpose is to promote, secure and enforce agreements for trade liberalization amongst its members for the expansion of neoliberal capitalism. In the past the WTO has attempted to legitimize its exercise of power on the grounds that trade liberalization would bring collective goods. I highlight that trade liberalization has been rejected by many in its two social constituencies (the membership and civil society groups). Using interviews with the NGO activists I evaluate the WTO’s reforms for engagement with its global constituency. The limited nature of the current external transparency and participation reforms of the WTO leads me to propose that the WTO cannot go further. To do so would be to politicize trade liberalization, and the WTO was created to promote and enhance neoliberal capitalism through trade liberalization. To address its legitimacy crisis the WTO may require a ‘fundamental overhaul’ verging on a revolution.

In this paper, I want to evaluate the World Trade Organization’s (WTO) public transparency and participation reforms... more In this paper, I want to evaluate the World Trade Organization’s (WTO) public transparency and participation reforms as a response to its democratic deficits and legitimacy crisis. Campaigns by social movements and Non-Governmental Organizations (NGOs) have generated this crisis of legitimacy through highlighting, not only the inequalities of policy outputs, but also the undemocratic practices amongst members (internal transparency and participation) and the absence of public oversight and accountability (external transparency and participation). To transform policy outputs and address internal and external democratic deficits (transparency and participation) many NGOs have sought the right to contribute to ‘policy-making, policy-implementation, compliance-monitoring, and dispute settlement’ (Goetz and Jenkins 2005, Van de Bossche 2008). By 2005, the Director General of the WTO applauded reforms aimed at NGOs engagement as ‘important steps towards greater transparency’. Academics from a social constructivist perspective perceive such official NGO accreditation to be responsible for generating new behavioural norms for states (Ruggie 1998; 2002, Park 2006). From a more critical perspective, I outline the democratic deficits at the WTO and assess its response to these deficits through public transparency and participation reforms. I argue current reforms use the language of ‘public access’ (WTO 2005a), ‘public hearings’ (WTO 2005b), ‘public observations’ (WTO 2005b), ‘transparency’ (WTO 2005c), ‘partnership’ and ‘dialogue’ (WTO 2005d) to enhance the WTO’s legitimacy, whilst crucially ensuring these reforms do not allow significant changes to the WTO’s policies, processes or philosophy.

Finding a new folk devil:(mis) constructing anti-capitalist activists March, 2002

by Fiona Donson

The many travels of Dopdi Mejhen: Women, borders and the Indian state

by Abhijit Roy

Essay to be published in a collection tentatively titled 'Women & Literature: Different Faces Different Voices' ed. Nandini Jana and Swati Mitra, Stree, Calcutta. (forthcoming, 2012)
                                                             

Extract:
The grand discourse simultaneously legitimizing coercion and communicative rationality in dealing with... more Extract:
The grand discourse simultaneously legitimizing coercion and communicative rationality in dealing with the forces threatening the state apparatus is the statist discourse of ‘security’. While coercion is endorsed in the name of security for the citizens, the communicative (and reformative) modes of negotiation with the ‘other’ are apparently also for the security of the outlaw, enabling the state to pose as ‘democratic’ or sensitive to the rights of both the ‘citizen’ proper and the outlaw willing to be part of a citizenizing process. It doesn’t take much strain to identify the imbalance in such apparently symmetrical propositions: the right and privileges of the citizen proper are unquestionable and due, while the same on the other side of the line are debatable and a matter of generosity. Brutal state repression can then be justified by the double logic of citizen’s security and parallel “humanitarian” negotiation. In a majoritarianist system that is Democracy, the project of communicative rationality and reform in the negotiation with a minority group, parallel to coercion, would therefore always more successfully legitimize state violence than contradicting it.

Český protest od dob normalizace - sociálně-politické podmínky disidentů a současné anti-systémové opozice v komparativní perspektivě

by Olivie Brabcová

Cílem práce je popsat změny anti-systémové opozice v Čechách za státního socialismu a po změně režimu na demokratický,... more Cílem práce je popsat změny anti-systémové opozice v Čechách za státního socialismu a po změně režimu na demokratický, konkrétně v časovém období od
počátku normalizace až do pádu komunismu v kontrastu s polistopadovou érou až do současnosti. Po obecném porovnání anti-systémových opozic autorka staví proti sobě
dvě konkrétní protestní události důležité pro daná období. První jsou násilně potlačené demonstrace v lednu 1989 známé jako Palachův týden a druhou alterglobalizační protesty proti zasedání Mezinárodního Měnového Fondu a Světové Banky v září 2000.

Contesting the commons - reconstructing the politics of English common land, c. 1550-1650 (Working Paper).

by Jonathan Healey

Protest Behavior in European Societies. The Role of Individual Incentives and the Political Context

by Bengü Hosch-Dayican

Paper presented at the 7th Dutch-Belgian Political Science Conference (Politicologenetmaal), Berg en Dal, 29-30 May 2008
Co-authored with Hanna Bäck

Empirical research has provided different explanations for political protest. Yet, from a cost-benefit perspective the... more Empirical research has provided different explanations for political protest. Yet, from a cost-benefit perspective the motivation for protest behavior still remains unclear. Why do people engage in protest activities, even though participation is costly and collective outcomes are available to everybody? This paper aims to provide an explanation for this paradox by analyzing which individual-level incentives foster protest participation, and by considering the specific political context in which protest activities take place. We rely mainly upon the European Social Survey (ESS) data from 2002–2003, which covers a large number of countries, and includes important items for measuring political protest. The findings suggest that both individual-level incentives and contextual features are crucial to take into account when explaining protest activity. More specifically, we find that collective and selective incentives motivate protest in most European countries, and that protest levels are higher in systems with proportional representation, in less fractionalized systems and in more polarized systems. Looking at interactions between contextual and individual-level factors, we find that people are less likely to be driven to protest by collective incentives in countries where left parties are in the cabinet.

An Interview with Jeremy Cronin

by Andrew van der Vlies

Contemporary Literature 49.4 (Winter 2008): 514–39. [DOI: 10.1353/cli.0.0039]

The Revolutions Will Not Be Globalized?

by Sinan Erensü

A TSP roundtable discussion on the world-historical importance of the uprisings of 2011. Participants: Mohammed Bamyeh, Michael Kazin, James Jasper, Francesca Polletta.

(Please check out the link - http://thesocietypages.org/roundtables/global-uprising)

The Arab Spring, Greek riots. Protests in Wisconsin and Indignados in Spain. The Chilean education conflict, rural... more The Arab Spring, Greek riots. Protests in Wisconsin and Indignados in Spain. The Chilean education conflict, rural uprisings in China, and the Occupy Movement. 2011 was a year of social uprisings. As we leave their anniversaries behind, we asked some of the top social movements scholars to reflect on these events and what we can learn from them.

[2010] The Production of ALF/ELF Tactical & Operational Intelligence: Moving Towards Active Participation within a Continuum of Involvement

by Michael Loadenthal

Center for the Study of Terrorism and Political Violence, [written within a 'security studies' framework so please excuse the liberal use of Statist terrorism rhetoric...but hey, we all write for an audience from time to time]

The execution of politicized acts of violence by individuals and groups cannot exist as the sole indicator of an... more The execution of politicized acts of violence by individuals and groups cannot exist as the sole indicator of an actor‟s involvement with terrorism. The identity of “terrorist” and the status of “involved” in terrorist acts must be understood as a gradated categorization that exists with fluidly over a time period of sustained political engagement. This continuum, discussed herein as a scale of terrorist involvement, can contain a veritable infinite degree of distinct identities, accounting for increasingly nuanced levels of engagement. With this complexity in mind, this essay attempts to develop four broad categorical labels for describing terrorist involvement, discussing them in relation to their legality as well as their utility in terrorist operations. The examples utilized for discussion come from the participants and supporters of the Animal Liberation Front and the Earth Liberation Front, two groups typically conflated under the “eco-terrorist” label of “special interest” or “single issue” terrorism. Through examination of three types of actors within this movement, People for the Ethical treatment of Animals, Peter Young and the clandestine cell network termed “the family,” this essay seeks to examine the increasingly difficult task of determining terrorist involvement; a task more complex as fighters move from the formalized training camps of Amman and Colombo to the apartments and computer desktops of North American cities.

[2010] The Earth Liberation Front: A Movement Analysis

by Michael Loadenthal

Center for the Study of Terrorism and Political Violence [written within a 'security studies' framework so please excuse the liberal use of Statist terrorism rhetoric...but hey, we all write for an audience from time to time]

The Earth Liberation Front is a radical environmental movement that developed from the ideological factionalization of... more The Earth Liberation Front is a radical environmental movement that developed from the ideological factionalization of the British Earth First! movement of the 1990s. Its ideological underpinnings are based in deep ecology, anti-authoritarian leftism highlighting its critique of capitalism, a commitment to non-violence, a collective defense of the Earth, and a warranted feeling of persecution by State forces. In its current form, the Earth Liberation Front is a transnational, decentralized network of clandestine, autonomous, cells that utilize illegal methods of protest by sabotaging and vandalizing property. The small unit cells are self-contained entities that can operate without the support of external entities such as financiers or weapons procurers. Tactical and operational knowledge is developed and shared through commercially available books written by the broader environmental movement throughout the last four decades, as well as inter-movement publications produced by the cells and distributed through numerous sympathetic websites. Membership in the Front can be understood as occurring on two levels, the covert cell level and the public support level, both of which operate in tandem to produce and publicize acts of property destruction. At the cell level, individuals conduct pre-operational reconnaissance and surveillance, develop and construct weapons systems, carry out orchestrated attacks, and announce their actions to support groups and media while maintaining internal security and anonymity. At the aboveground level, support entities help to publicize attacks carried out by cells, respond to media inquiries and other public engagements, identify and coordinate aid to imprisoned cell members, and develop and distribute sympathetic propaganda produced by, and in support of affiliated individuals. This case study uses the history of the Earth Liberation Front‟s United States attacks as its unit of analysis, and seeks to outline the ideology, structure, context and membership factors that constitute the movement.

Symbols of Power in Rituals of Violence: The Personality Cult and Iconoclasm on the Soviet Empire’s Periphery (East Germany, 1945–61)

by Alexey Tikhomirov

published in: Kritika: Explorations in Russian and Eurasian History, Volume 13, Number 1, Winter 2012, pp. 47-88.

The Occupy Movement: Product of this time

by Jacquelien van Stekelenburg

Van Stekelenburg, Jacquelien (2012). The Occupy Movement: Product of this time. Development, 55, 2.

Nederlanders & De Occupybeweging

by Jacquelien van Stekelenburg

Co-authored with Irene de Goede and Christine Carabain. NCDO publicatie Opiniepeiling 3 uitgave 2012

Protest in the City: Counter‐hegemonic Resistance in China's Hong Kong (Abstract)

by Daniel Garrett

To be presented at the 2012 International Visual Sociology Association Annual Conference (IVSA 2012) 'Re‐Visualizing the City', July 9 ‐ 11, 2012.

After fifteen years of Chinese communist rule the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region remains a vivacious and... more After fifteen years of Chinese communist rule the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region remains a vivacious and provocative enclave of counter-hegemonic protest and resistance against local and mainland dominate forces.  As a special enclave within the People's Republic of China (PRC), Hong Kong enjoys limited democracy and liberal freedoms such as freedom of speech, press,  and of protest. The territory is also the only part within the PRC where multi-party democratic elections, commemorations over the 1989 Tiananmen incident, and provocative protests for greater democracy and against the local and mainland governments can occur;  so vibrant is its protest tradition that it has even been called the City of Protests where past, present, and future narratives of the city are frequently, and sometimes, hotly contested.  This paper and associated repertoire of images examine how the city has been visually re-imagined, transformed, and utilized by its subalterns to reproduce their aspirations and demands for greater democracy and social justice while subversively contesting and resisting hegemonic pressures.  The co-optation of key cultural, economic, social, and political venues within the city during its many demonstrations, processions, and protests are visually explored as are their protest materials.

Des black blocks aux alter-activistes: pôles et formes d'engagement des jeunes altermondialistes»

by Geoffrey Pleyers

Pleyers G., “Des black blocks aux alteractivistes : Pôles et formes d’engagement des jeunes altermondialistes”, Lien Social et Politiques, 2004, n°51, pp. 123-134.

Voir aussi le chapitre 3 de
"Alter-Globalization. Becoming actors in the global age", Cambridge, Polity, dec. 2010.
http://uclouvain.academia.edu/GeoffreyPleyers/Books/347185/Alter-globalization._Becoming_Actors_in_the_global_age

Massivement impliqués dans les mobilisations altermondialistes, les jeunes n’ont pas pour autant renoncé à leur... more Massivement impliqués dans les mobilisations altermondialistes, les jeunes n’ont pas pour autant renoncé à leur profond désenchantement à l’égard des structures et acteurs traditionnels de la vie sociale et politique, ni à leur individuation. C’est au contraire sur ces bases et en s’appuyant sur leur adaptation à la société informationnelle qu’ils créent progressivement de nouvelles cultures de l’engagement et des visions différentes du politique.
A partir d’une recherche réalisée en Europe et en Amérique Latine, cet article tentera dans un premier temps de dégager différents pôles parmi ces jeunes altermondialistes. Il se penchera ensuite sur les formes d’engagement privilégiées avant d’analyser leurs conceptions du politique.

The Social Forums as an ideal model of convergence

by Geoffrey Pleyers

The Global Justice Movement

by Geoffrey Pleyers

Globality Study Journal, N°19.
See also:
Alter-Globalization. Becoming Actor in the Global Age, Polity Press, Cambridge, (Dec. 2010).

http://uclouvain.academia.edu/GeoffreyPleyers/Books/347185/Alter-globalization._Becoming_Actors_in_the_global_age

After providing a brief overview of the global justice movement
history, this article analyzes the main argument... more After providing a brief overview of the global justice movement
history, this article analyzes the main argument raised by its activists to oppose the neoliberal ideology, as notably asserted by the shifts in the discourses of some G20 leaders. Activists however call attention to the gap between the speeches of the G20 leaders and the measures actually implemented.
Accordingly, global justice activists have decided to focus on seeking concrete outcomes through the following: specialized advocacy networks, empowerment at the local level and alliances with progressive regimes.

Horizontalité et efficacité dans les réseaux altermondialistes

by Geoffrey Pleyers

Pleyers G., “Horizontalité et efficacité dans les réseaux altermondialistes”, Sociologie et sociétés, 2009, Vol. 41(2), pp. 89-110

Contrairement aux modèles classiques du développement des mouvements sociaux, l’altermondialisme n’a pas globalement... more Contrairement aux modèles classiques du développement des mouvements sociaux, l’altermondialisme n’a pas globalement évolué vers une institutionnalisation de ses associations et de ses événements. Sa structure organisationnelle reste largement basée sur des réseaux relativement autonomes. Cet article invite à considérer la réflexivité des acteurs et leurs cultures politiques comme l’un des facteurs explicatifs majeurs du maintien de structures réticulaires relativement souples au sein de l’altermondialisme. A partir d’études de cas, d’observations qualitatives, d’entretiens menés entre 1999 et 2008, cet article montre que le plébiscite apparent des organisations spécifiquement altermondialistes pour la forme réticulaire repose sur un malentendu opératoire. Les uns valorisent le réseau pour son efficacité, les autres parce qu’il favorise une organisation horizontale et participative. La forme du réseau renvoie ainsi pour les altermondialistes à deux ensembles de valeurs qui ne sont pas forcément compatibles.

Flaunting our way to Freedom? SlutWalks, Gendered Protest and Feminist Futures

by Theresa O'Keefe

The Rhetoric of the Web: The Rhetoric of the Streets Revisited Again

by Brett Lunceford

Lunceford, Brett. “The Rhetoric of the Web: The Rhetoric of the Streets Revisited Again.” Communication Law Review, 12, no. 1 (2012): 40-55.

Protest rhetoric has always provided a prime example of how communication can work to change the human condition, but... more Protest rhetoric has always provided a prime example of how communication can work to change the human condition, but strategies of protest have evolved as the United States has transformed into an information economy. Although protest remains “on the streets,” it has also moved into the digital realm. This essay builds on the work of Franklyn Haiman by considering the ethical and rhetorical dimensions of hacktivism (politically motivated computer hacking). After briefly tracing the historical development of hacktivism, I discuss several recent politically motivated website defacements and denial of service attacks, concluding that Haiman’s argument that the rhetoric of the streets should be held to different rhetorical and ethical standards still holds true in the online world.