Do Protests Matter? Evidence from the 1960s Black Insurgency
@inproceedings{Wasow2017DoPM,
title={Do Protests Matter? Evidence from the 1960s Black Insurgency},
author={Omar Wasow},
year={2017}
}How do the subordinate few persuade the dominant many? Elite theories of political influence posit marginal groups exert little power. Pluralistic accounts suggest non-elites can set agendas, sway public opinion and shape policy. This article evaluates both theories in the context of blackled protests in the 1960s. Contrary to the elite model, I find evidence of a punctuated pluralism in which subordinate groups, though protests, can temporarily break elite dominance of political communication…
Figures and Tables from this paper
figure 1 
table 1 
figure 2 
table 2 
figure 3 
table 3 
figure 4 
table 4 
figure 5 
table 5 
figure 6 
table 6 
figure 7 
table 7 
figure 8 
table 8 
figure 9 
table 9 
figure 10 
figure 11 
table 11 
figure 12 
table 12 
figure 13 
table 13 
figure 14 
figure 15 
table 15 
table 16 
figure 16 
table 17 
table 19 
table 20 
table 21 
table 23 
table 24 
table 25 
table 27 
table 28 
table 29 
table 31 
table 32 
table 33 
table 35 
table 36 
table 37 
table 39 
table 40 
table 41
13 Citations
Allies or Agitators? How Partisan Identity Shapes Public Opinion about Violent or Nonviolent Protests
- Political Science
- 2020
ABSTRACT In recent years, scholars have argued that protests that employ nonviolent tactics attract greater support and are therefore more likely to succeed than those that use violence. We argue…
Does Violent Protest Backfire? Testing a Theory of Public Reactions to Activist Violence
- Psychology
- 2018
How do people respond to violent political protest? The authors present a theory proposing that the use of violence leads the general public to view a protest group as less reasonable, a perception…
Effective for Whom? Ethnic Identity and Nonviolent Resistance
- Political ScienceAmerican Political Science Review
- 2021
A growing literature finds that nonviolence is more successful than violence in effecting political change. We suggest that a focus on this association is incomplete, because it obscures the crucial…
TICKED OFF, BUT SCARED OFF? RIOTS AND THE FATE OF NONVIOLENT CAMPAIGNS*
- Political ScienceMobilization: An International Quarterly
- 2021
Research on the relationship between nonviolent and violent dissent has focused on explicit shifts in organized strategies, disregarding less-organized forms of violence such as riots. Even though…
Black Lives Matter for Whites’ Racial Prejudice: Assessing the Role of Social Movements in Shaping Racial Attitudes in the United States
- Sociology
- 2019
Black Lives Matter (BLM) is one of the most prominent contemporary social movements in the United States. Whether the BLM movement has led to racial attitude liberalization remains an open question.…
‘If a fight starts, watch the crowd’: The effect of violence on popular support for social movements
- Political ScienceJournal of Peace Research
- 2019
Social movements often face tactic diversification. In otherwise nonviolent movements, some groups or radical flanks may resort to violent actions such as street rioting. This article analyzes the…
Better the Devil You Know? How Fringe Terrorism Can Induce an Advantage for Moderate Nonviolent Campaigns
- Political ScienceTerrorism and Political Violence
- 2019
ABSTRACT Fringe terrorism is common during nonviolent campaigns. We examine how this can modify the strategic environment between dissident groups and the state in ways that present both challenges…
The Effects of Social Movements: Evidence from #MeToo
- EconomicsSSRN Electronic Journal
- 2019
Social movements are associated with large societal changes, but evidence on their causal effects is limited. We study the effect of the MeToo movement on a high-stakes decision—reporting a sexual…
State Repression and Nonviolent Resistance
- Political Science
- 2017
In this article, we review decades of research on state repression and nonviolent resistance. We argue that these two research programs have converged around six consensus findings. We also highlight…
“WHERE DO WE GO FROM HERE?” THE INFLUENCE OF PERSONALITY AND SOCIAL MOTIVATORS ON ATTITUDES TOWARD STRUCTURAL VIOLENCE AND INTERPERSONAL FORGIVENESS
- Education
- 2019
This Dissertation is brought to you for free and open access by the School of Conflict Management, Peacebuilding and Development at DigitalCommons@Kennesaw State University. It has been accepted for…
References
SHOWING 1-10 OF 95 REFERENCES
Mobilizing Public Opinion: Black Insurgency and Racial Attitudes in the Civil Rights Era
- History
- 2002
What motivates us to change our opinions during times of political protest and social unrest? To investigate this question, Taeku Lee's smartly argued book looks to the critical struggle over the…
Protest and Congressional Behavior: Assessing Racial and Ethnic Minority Protests in the District
- Political Science
- 2012
Although minority protest is often characterized as an effective form of political participation, previous research has been unsuccessful in establishing a direct link between protest activity and…
Testing Theories of American Politics: Elites, Interest Groups, and Average Citizens
- Political SciencePerspectives on Politics
- 2014
Each of four theoretical traditions in the study of American politics—which can be characterized as theories of Majoritarian Electoral Democracy, Economic-Elite Domination, and two types of…
Do Political Protests Matter? Evidence from the Tea Party Movement*
- Political Science
- 2013
Can protests cause political change, or are they merely symptoms of underlying shifts in policy preferences? We address this question by studying the Tea Party movement in the United States, which…
The Political Response to Black Insurgency: A Critical Test of Competing Theories of the State
- LawAmerican Political Science Review
- 2001
Although empirical studies have concluded that political leaders in democratic systems often respond to mass unrest by expanding the welfare state, most of this research fails to explain adequately…
Opinion Backlash and Public Attitudes: Are Political Advances in Gay Rights Counterproductive?
- Political Science
- 2016
One long-recognized consequence of the tension between popular sovereignty and democratic values like liberty and equality is public opinion backlash, which occurs when individuals recoil in response…
Why Civil Resistance Works: The Strategic Logic of Nonviolent Conflict
- Political ScienceInternational Security
- 2008
The historical record indicates that nonviolent campaigns have been more successful than armed campaigns in achieving ultimate goals in political struggles, even when used against similar opponents…
Ella Baker and the Black Freedom Movement: A Radical Democratic Vision
- History
- 2003
One of the most important African American leaders of the 20th century and perhaps the most influential woman in the civil rights movement, Ella Baker (1903-1986) was an activist whose remarkable…
Racial Orders in American Political Development
- SociologyAmerican Political Science Review
- 2005
American political science has long struggled to deal adequately with issues of race. Many studies inaccurately treat their topics as unrelated to race. Many studies of racial issues lack clear…
Us Against Them: Ethnocentric Foundations of American Opinion
- Sociology, Political Science
- 2010
Ethnocentrism - our tendency to partition the human world into in-groups and out-groups - pervades societies around the world. Surprisingly, though, few scholars have explored its role in political…