As in Timothy Doyle’s book and as we discussed in class, there are three categories of people’s movements: (i) Social Movement, (ii) New Social Movement, and (iii) Environmental Movement. As per the discussion in class and as per Manuel Castelle’s lecture give an example of each category summarizing briefly the main cause & characteristics of each of the examples you will discuss.
Urban & Environmental Studies 
Social movements in the United States and other countries have been strong influence for social change. However, governments and other opponents, such as corporations with capitalist financial plans have often tried to prevent the movements’ efforts. The American society of the 21st Century, benefits from many earlier social changes; but our society also continue to struggle from social and gender inequality, mostly due to corporate and political institutions that suppress many social transformations. For example, in 1962 Cesar Chavez co-founded the National Farm Workers Association, later known as the United Farm Workers Union. Through effective strategies during the right political climate, Chavez was able to promote social labor rights for many farm workers. These days, many union workers around the United States struggle due to corporate ruling and state legislations, which prevent them from unionizing.
New Social Movements (NSM) emerged during the middle of 1960s, in Western societies – Europe and the Unites States. In fact, the North American viewpoint is more commonly known as Resource Mobilization (RM), which addresses the possibility of members within a movement to bring financial resources, supporters, and media coverage towards accomplishing the movement’s goals; in contrast, the “original” social movement bring a collective group of individuals together without specific guidelines and actions, then to share a unified viewpoint on society. An example for the NSM in the United States is the Same-Sex Marriage movement, which was initially created in single states, and later became a new federal legislation because of the Supreme Court ruling. The achievement for marriage equality is due to grassroot efforts and fundraising of organizations such as the Human Rights Campaign (HRC) and the Freedom to Marry, networking between individuals and groups, media coverage, and national pressure by multiple agencies on state and federal representatives.
The discussions about protecting the natural Environmental began by the late 19th century in England. Alfred Newton, a British Zoologist published several researches about the conservation of animals, which highlighted the impotence of protecting native species. In the United States, the Environmental Movement began by the mid-1960s, and it brought attention to environmental issues over oil spills, pollutions (i.e. water, land), poor societal planning for roads, transportation, and communities in general; and it also addressed concerns over militarized testing of the hydrogen bombs. When looking back, we can recognize many accomplishments of the movement on states and federal policies and legislations’ reforms. There are also many collaborations of organizations and individuals, who works together to protect and raise awareness of the natural world. Unfortunately, there are also many challenges and obstacles that prevent the much-needed transformation of our growing society into a “greener” space, mostly due to economic reasons. Many corporations and nations are not willing to take the financial burden, and they delay the anticipated modification of our communities.
Innovated technologies and social media collaborate to find solutions for the growing environmental concerns. Online networking and global campaigns, are important communication channels for raising sustainable awareness, as it generates international pressure on decision makers to make a change.
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“There’s power in numbers” echoes, in the background of parades and protests as people march together for a change. Multiple people unifying for a signal cause gives that cause power, if there is proper leadership. All throughout history people are seen gathering to make a difference, and with large enough number impacts are made and society is changed. Following are three examples of people movements: social movements, new social movements, and environmental movements. Here I will describe the movements and give examples of each, stating the importance of the people movements.
Social movements historically from the Marxist theory focus on class, working or other, and usually occurred in history before the industrial revolution. The classic way of starting a social movement has emotions at the core; they are not bigger issues like seen in the new social movement that will be explained later. Social movement spread through communication. An example of a social movement that happened in history would be abolitionism. This is the idea that slavery is wrong and shouldn’t be allowed, the group that pushed for this change where the Quakers. This was a Christian branch that wanted to make sure the belief of slavery was abolished because they felt it was unchristian; they succeeded by sharing their ideas and connecting to the other branches of Christianity making it an issue for most people in the early 1800’s. Eventually slavery was abolished so this was a successful social movement. Analyzing this example it is clear that this social movement was brought into concern by a class of people and the concern became overpowering when the Quakers said this was an improper way of being Christian. Slavery was also an economical concern, which is a set of issues that social movements deal with.
Unlike social movements, new social movements are more inclusive, where it’s not just a class concern, but a larger concern, some examples of new social movements include issues dealing with race, gender, youth, sexuality, spirituality, and environmentalism. Through a new social movement scope the abolishment example would be looked at through the race issue, protested because it is racist to own people or to believe that a group of people is superior to another. New social issues put more justice in the field of people movements where things are argued that might not affect a person, or class, directly but are argued or protested do to the fact that an issue is unjust. New social movements also focus on representing the voice less, like the environment.
Environmentalism is a type of a new social movement that is the most inclusive of all new social movements, because in theory it includes everyone, but yet cannot represent itself. Protecting or protesting for the environment puts, politics, gender, gentrification, race, and class all on the table, it also puts the abiotic things in the environment on the table. When trying to understand environmental movement its important to first state what the environment protested actually is, since the term environment is broad. To have a movement that focuses on the abiotic factors of the environment for example, there should be an established definition, establishing a definition makes it possible to target certain aspects of environmentalism. Abiotic factors would need political protection, so the movements leaders would need to target political figures. Environmental issues also include injustices with things like air and water pollution in low income or predominantly African American communities, where race, class, income, and politics are all involved. Environmentalism is a movement that pushes towards a world with more juctice, because protection of the environment is protection of the people.
In conclusion people movements usually start with injustice or oppression and lead to change. Good movements have great leaders that give the movement direction and purpose. All three social, new social, and environmental movements are important examples of people coming together in unison to make a difference in history and in society.
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Social movements have been around and directing change for hundreds of years. It is a worldwide phenomenon that encourages collective action towards a cause. Usually social movements are formed outside of the political/ governmental institutions that we abide by in our societies. Seeing as social movements have been going on for years and are worldwide, they are diverse and all deal with the fundamental issues in society. There are three categories of people’s movements, according to Timothy Doyle’s book, and they are as follows: social movement, new social movement, and environmental movement.
As cultures evolve, and our technologies, so do the needs of the people. In the 1800’s there was rise of social reforms, because people wanted more. More education, more rights, and as a result more control. In the 1800’s education played an important role in the cultivation of the nation. Horace Mann, of the Massachusetts state legislature, introduced the idea of the common-school movement. This translated into demanding for local property taxes to be allocated into the state education budget. This was an effort to improve the education in the country and also make schooling more readily available to everyone. Before this movements started and manipulated change, education was more of a luxury for white men, and in these educational institutions, there were often practices of punishment and religion was a huge part of the curriculum. Education was more so done by tutors that the rich could hire, and not really done by teachers in a classroom. By 1890, there were elementary schools for free in all states and this vastly improved literacy and encouraged upward mobility. However although institutions were actually built and were funded by the federal government, it wasn’t until the 1890’s , when the Morrill act, was introduced and allowed people of color to attend these institutions. This is an introduction to the New Social Movements, which were more inclusive.
Minority-world movements rose in the 1900s. This is where the shift between social movements and the new social movement started. Before, there were movements regarding the issues of the minority, and often neglected to include women or people of color. NSM explore a more dynamic aspect of society, and has evolved to include religions, sexuality, race, ect. And rose as a national dissatisfaction in the previous social movements that revolved around class system and economy. These new social movements were more informal and called for more supporters, as opposed to members. They have the potential to be global and gain traction at a faster rate due to the inclusion. They are more universal goals, such as the gay rights movement. This is a movement that involves people of all genders that identify with being gay. With a more humanist approach, and the education of the middle class, these movements created an environment in which they could thrive and deliver change. For example in the gay rights movement, there was the localized understanding that it was a movement that sought out to obliterate the sodomy laws which allowed the discrimination of gay individuals in institutions. They could be fired from their job if the boss found out, or they couldn’t buy a home if it was with their partner. This law made it impossible for gay people to function as normal members of society, and through this movement there became a rise in the issues and there were changes instilled into the system. This is also a good example of how new social movements question society as it is, and in turn this results in the movements being around for year because of how hard it is to change aspects of the government. It wasn’t until 2015 that gay marriage became legal and there are still many things ahead.
As our societies thrive and technology and medicines become better, the environment gets worse. The environment is one of the many things we have in common with people around the world. Each countries has their own environmental issues that they focus on, but as a whole we are all conscious of the state of our environment and how human activity has impacted it. For example there is the Anti- nuclear movement in Germany, and the Anti- Dam movement in India. These are the things that impact their environment. The environmental movements have become a type of social movements. This is due to their effect on not only the environment but the inhabitants of it. These movements grew so that they included a multitude of things such as the impact that contaminated water was having on communities on the lower economic tier. It also manifested sustainability. Seeing as we were depleting resources, there was a rise of concern for the population. Sustainability is a huge part of the environmental movement as is global warming. These are conditions that are taken into consideration in general but environmental issues and action varies within communities. What might be important for Flint, Michigan might not be for Aspen, Colorado.
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The United States of America is based on social movements. From the Boston Tea Party to the abolishing slavery many key American events that shaped are country are based on social emotions. Though these movements founded on emotion some were more organized than others. Looking at the abolishment of slavery, there were many movements within the movement such as John Brown’s raid on Harpers Ferry. Though his attempt to raid the arsenal with the intent to arm the slaves failed it brought attention to the need to end slavery. Some even believe that this movement was a catalyst of the Civil War. Frederick Douglas was an abolishinist just as John Brown but did not use violence as an approach to end slavery. Instead Douglas used his pen and his voice as his tool against oppression. Douglas who went on to become famous for his autobiography, Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, wrote in full detail about the brutality of slavery from his experiences. Although both men fought oppression using different platforms, their messages rang the same. These collective movements brought about social change; the abolishment of slavery.
In recent history, we saw a New Social Movement being born. It was coined Occupy Wall Street. This movement gained steam when the infamous hacker group, Anonymous, begin to endorse the movement via the Internet. In the midst of the global recession many began to call for change. The failure of the banking system in America which lead to 100,000 of people losing their homes and life savings sparked a massive backlash. This backlash was not just isolated for those who had been affected by this. In July 2011, protesters took to Wall St in New York City to be heard. The were against the suffering of the common person at the expense of corporations. The movement was also questioning why .01 of the population holds more than 40 percent of the wealth in America. This movement picked up steam quickly. Across the nation almost every major city had an occupy movement. This movement brought support from the wealthiest celebrities and philanthropist in the country. But as some social movements can be impacting, unfortunately Occupy became the victim to becoming a craze. After about two months of protesting many cities became fed up with the crowds. Many of the camps became plagued with homeless camps and violence. Events like these across the nation began to deteriorate the message. Instead of the movement shining a light on corporate greed it became evident that it fueled the governments need to control protest.
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Frank Delgado
ENVS 300
Professor Amir Gohar
10 February 2018
The Social Movement
The social movement is something that drives the idea behind the United States of America. Our founders wanted to create a nation in which citizens would have the right to vocalize their opinions in such a way that they could reach the people who run this country and make a difference. Unfortunately as history dictates, this is not always the case. A standard social movement is an organization of likeminded people who gather together to support a cause. They may fight for such things as economic wellbeing or a better workplace. These types of movements benefitted the group that was conducting the movement. These types of movements were concerned with social or economic class and are not in the headlines as much anymore due to a rise in a very different kind of movement.
New social movements were similar to the original social movement, with one main difference. Most of these new social movements were started during the 1960s during an era of cultural enlightenment. These movements sought not only to benefit the people pushing for the cause, but other groups as well. They benefitted a far greater cause and for lack of a better term, they were more unselfish. One example of such a movement was the most arguably the most famous one of all time- the American Civil Rights Movement. During the Civil Rights Movement people of all races and religions came together to stand for the rights of African Americans in the United States. They became a global force for change and accomplished their goal of equality. This was also an example of a social movement being beaten down time and time again by our supposedly all-inclusive government. Nevertheless, they prevailed in their cause.
The environmental movement is the last type of social movement and is far more specific than any other. It refers to a group of people who wish to impose environmental change. They can take up a variety of causes under the all encompassing theme of environment, from fighting air pollution to cleaning up the ocean. In the United States, the environmental movement began in the 1960s when a multitude of natural disasters caused by man occurred. Radioactive waste in Love Canal caused birth defects, rivers caught fire, one of the most catastrophic oil spills in human history happened off the southern California coast- people knew things had to change. During the time frame of about ten years, we saw the voices of Americans ring throughout the nation for environmental accountability. During the span of about ten years of post industrial legislation, we saw the Clean Air Act, Clean Water Act, and EPA all established. The United States was ready to move in another direction. This is something we must now repeat.
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Social movement throughout history until now are created by triggered emotions of a community that have been collectively enduring or noticing injustice and oppression directed towards them or others. As we discussed in class, social movement can not only be an organized set of array, but can also be spontaneous. Whether it be through rallies, protests, mass speech, newspaper, or internet, social movement relies on the logic of virality. For instance, the concept of veganism were originated by activists who were against commodity status of animal, and animal brutality. They also believed that industrial farming of animals eventually would have negative impact on the sustainability of our environment. Scholarly articles, media, dietetic associations were established and regulated to fight for this cause.
During mid 1960s, post materialist movements of the minority world, and the end of industrial economy brought a decentralized movements known as, New Social Movements (NSM) into western societies. Manuel Castelle states examples of various new social movements from Iran (July, 2009), Indonesia (Dec 2010), Egypt (2011, USA (Sep, 2011), and many more. No matter where and about what the new social movements occured, the common topic for all of these movements was “Dignity”. Castelle further mentions that the internet has brought the activists closer demolishing the barriers of distance, maximizing the level of involvement. New social movement has been able to use internet to build autonomous communication, transforming the movement from the cyberspace onto physical urban space. Characteristics of NSM are consisting participants with no relations regards to their race, ethnicity, status, political backgrounds, religious beliefs, nationality, gender, and the like.
Environmental movement is also a type of social movement that focuses on diverse scientific, social, and political movement to address environmental issues. Humans around the globe, no matter where they are from have one thing in common and that is their planet. When the sustainability of this planet is threatened every environmentalist and people who care about the environment stand together to be a part of environmental movements. For instance, many joined earth day observance across the nation in 1970; political leaders like Bernie Sanders encouraged huge mass to stand against fossil fuel use in 2017. Overall, social movements are voices for the weak and silent. Like Castelle said in his lecture that fear drives society, and civilization is based upon fear. We need to overcome fear to change for the better. Sharing and togetherness can help overcome fear, creating hope for the future and social movements have been and will be one of the best ways bring forth the change that humankind need.
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There are three types of people’s movements that we can categorize all over the years. They are the Social Movements, the New Social Movements, and the Environmental Movements. These three types of people’s movements recorded the change of our society and they can also explain the social structure we have nowadays. From lecture notes, a movement is not just a crowd of people fighting for something they want. A crowd cannot stand for a long time while a movement can sustain even though it is loosely organized. Also, movements are going to communicate and coordinate activities over a wide area which marked the social change and formed the society we are enjoying right now.
For social movement, it means the first movement people take and it starts before the new social movement and environmental movements.
From what I get from lecture, social movements are movements that people fighting for body needs and security needs. These two elements are at the bottom of the pyramid of Marxism. People are usually fighting for monetary items for physical needs. One of the examples would be the Labor Movement. Labor movements are usually about the salary, the working hours and the working environment.
After people are satisfied with physical needs, then it comes the new social movement.
For new social movement, it means the movement fighting for the minority world after they fighting for body needs and security needs. The adjective used on lecture notes would be “post-materialistic.”
There are a few characteristics for new social movements. They are “no clear relation between participants,” “Not typical Marxist uprising,” “multiple beliefs not economic/class issues only,” “relation individual and collective are blurred” and “decentralized.”
New social movements are describing the movements people fighting for self-actualization, ego needs, and social needs when considering the pyramid of Marxism. The movements usually start from individuals rather than groups so they are more diffuse in structure while their intention is to transcend class structure. One of the examples would be the LGBTQ social movements. They are fighting for the rights of LGBTQ like gay marriage should be legalized. It is a mentally need rather than a physical one.
For environmental movement, it is about the movement the environmentalists hold to deal with the environmental issues. They usually focused on ecology, health and human rights. These movements can involve the political, scientific and social aspect.
Environmental movements can be divided into three parts, they are the campaign, movement issue banner, and nation. An example on lecture note would be the “Wet Tropics” campaign held in Australia for Wilderness.
These movements usually want to enlarge the base of the potential entrepreneurs, people, and organizations that will support the activities by forming a network to make resources flow, to reduce cost and to increase organization founding.
These three movements, the social movements, the new social movements and the environmental movements are also important to understand as they formed the society we have right now. However, I think environmental movements will increase a lot more than the other two as people nowadays are getting more aware about the environment which has not drawn much attention yet.
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Social movements are methods of group action that geared towards a specific cause in order to create or resist some form of change. These type of gatherings are generally informal and are typically reserved only for those who share a common outlook on how they believe society should be and also have a direct relation to the issue that is being addressed. At the beginnings of the first social movements, the topics generally centered around basic life necessities and freedoms.
Over time the needs and outlooks of our society have changed, so the mechanisms that are used to create change must change as well. These are known as new social movements. Unlike the previous movement before the new social movements have distinct characteristics that define them. The first characteristic being that there is no strong common factor between those that are participating. It no longer matter if one has a direct relation with the issue, many can participate now just out of the wanting to do so. Another main characteristic is the fact that within a movement people can have a variety of different beliefs and many of the main issues are not only focused on economic or class issues, but instead more progressive social and moral problems. The most important distinction of new social movements is that they are decentralized. In today’s modern age, there is no longer a need for everyone involved in a movement to conviene in one location. Advances in technology have allowed society to reach a broader audience without even having to leave home. This allows a message or movement to reach a great distance than they normally might and allows for the creation of locals segments to spread the group’s ideals.
An important product of the new social movement is the creation of the environmental movement. Unlike the social movements that came before it, the environmental movement strays away from focusing just on social issues alone. This movement is greatly varied, focuses can be scientific, social, or political movements that address environmental issues. Rather than simply creating or resisting change, environmental movements take on problems at a higher level by framing the problems in our society that need to and change be changed. They theorize solutions in order find the best solution for each situation, considering every impact that the solution may cause. Lastly there is a mobilization of resources, whether it be from the members of the movement, or outside organizations that are willing to help out the cause. The more readily available these resources are, the easier it is for others to join the movement in areas where it may not have been able to previously. No matter how they have evolved over time, social movements have and always will be the greatest form of power that can be used by the general society for good or for bad outcomes.
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There has been a boom of social movements since the creation of the internet, as it connected a vast majority of people together, creating groups of similar interests together. This has led to revolutions around the world, changing policies that have disrupted the lives of many people. An example of social movements would be the Arab Spring in which the people went to the streets and connected to each other through the internet This was caused by the people revolting and demonstrating protests against the regime that had mistreated and misrepresented the people. Social movements are spread through whatever means, like the media or the internet, to get as many people to join for a cause they all believe in, and change or prevent a change in social structure or their values. Social movements are a collective that results from more or less spontaneously gathering of people that have no true affiliation with each other, other than the singular cause that unites them. The social movements have organization and, signs and mechanisms that inspire and motivate those in the movement to carry on and move forward to the threats and violence that might await them. The signs and chants also can lead the crowd through the streets when there is much noise and sounds that might drown out the commands of the leaders. Social movements also generally have some sort of leadership to continue and lead the charge against the opposition. This leadership gives the movement the ability to harness the power of the people as that is generally a feature that is forgotten about by most movements. The leadership utilizes the power of the people and uses it to make the changes and demands that are wanted by the people.
New Social Movements are different from the original social movements by stating that the movements is post-materialistic, grouped together for a cause that is for the totality of humanity. While the original social movements had some sort of connection other than the cause, the New Social Movements were of only participants at the time and place. The original social movement would have gathered people from churches or temples, that have a common interests, the New Social Movement would just have people that are in common with the cause alone. The injustices are more general and vague that would not have much support, while the original social movements have a specific grievance against a specific group or person in order to achieve an obtainable goal. The New Social Movement tends to have the people and the individual blend into the crowd, and the individual starts to identify themselves as the crowd itself. Instead of having an individualistic self that happens to follow or cheer for a cause, the self is part of the congealed blob with many others, adding their faces and sounds to the vague, general cause. And finally, there is no true leadership that would lead the charge, as well as no real, true opposition to go against. An example would be the cause for women’s rights. No one will out right deny women their rights, except for the internet. The rights of women would be opposes en mass. These vacancy of leadership condemns the new social movement to confusions and chaos with the groups being autonomic and no one leading and corralling the people to a focused goal.
The environmental movement is different from the original social movement and from the new social movement as it contains a bit of both. Like the new social movement, the environmental movement has no true specific goal as the goal would be a healthier world to live in, but the goal is one that is complex to fulfill. There are oppositions like that of non-believes of climate change, or people in disbelief in the massive, but fragile planet size. This combines the opposition that is being fought with from the original social movement and the vague, generalization of the new social order. The environmental movement is odd in that there are leaderships but it doesn’t need one. There are spokesmen and women that would stand for the environment and speak out for the change in policy, but there are also segmented groups that have nothing to do with those that are part of another group. An example would be a person being in the group, Green Peace, but not be affiliated with the Sierra Club. That is why the environmental movements are so intriguing as the movement contains both parts of the original social movement and the new social movement, and makes the environmental movement its own.
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