Moving Beyond Poor People’s Movements: Global Change and New Opportunities

• In Event: 473 - Section on Political Economy of the World-System Roundtables (one-hour)
  In Refereed Roundtable: Table 03. Movements

Abstract

This paper is driven by the following question: how can we understand globalization’s influence on social movement activity through the lens of Piven and Cloward’s work on protest? The paper draws on their classic book "Poor People’s Movements: Why They Succeed, How they Fail" as well as Piven and Cloward’s other important contributions to social movement research. But this paper also recognizes that forty years of neoliberal policy have led to social changes that provide new opportunities to understand anti-globalization mobilization. These changes are largely rooted in the failure of the neoliberal economic model, as that model has created and exacerbated globally shared hardships, while polarizing wealth nationally and internationally. Examining these trends through the classic work allows us to both think through what political activity is consistent with their model, and what elements of the model would be useful to re-think. First, we provide a summary of Piven and Cloward’s influential work and then offer a very brief exploration of globalization as it relates to the model. Next, we discuss two global movements, the World Social Forum and anti-austerity protests, and conclude by addressing how Piven and Cloward help us understand these events.

Authors

• Zachary Joseph McKenney, University of Tennessee

• Jon D. Shefner, University of Tennessee