Why Black Rights Matter: Discursive Constructions of Black Political Rights in the Mississippi Freedom Movement

• In Event: 450 - Section on Political Economy of the World-System Paper Session. Human Rights and the Political Economy of the World System

Abstract

This study focuses on two allied activist and political organizations mobilizing around black political rights in Mississippi in the early to mid-1960s – the Mississippi Freedom Democratic Party (MFDP) and the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC) – to examine the role of four factors in shaping the discursive practices of social movement organizations: (1) information politics, (2) social positions, (3) logics, and (4) narratives. I utilize comparative discourse analysis to analyze pamphlets from each organization from the period between 1961 and 1966 oriented toward mobilizing, on one hand, largely white college student activists (SNCC) and on the other, lower socio-economic class blacks (MFDP). The findings suggest how positionality in structures of race and class and information politics combined to shape each movement’s use of narratives and logics in the discursive construction of black political rights. The SNCC’s pamphlets construct the denial of black political rights as a problem of oppression and injustice and tie the movement ideologically and morally to historical struggles against racism. The MFDP’s pamphlets construct the denial of political rights for blacks as directly affecting their quality of life and mattering for the advancement of their interests. For social movements coalitions mobilizing groups occupying different social locations, logics and narratives may conflict leading to fragmentation and misunderstanding. These dynamics uniquely shape the impact of social movements on institutions and everyday practices that reproduce or challenge racial inequality. Future research should explore these implications and engage in deeper sociological inquiry at the intersection of race, politics, and rights.

Author

• Michael Rosino, University of Connecticut