The Durability of Disputes in the Digital Era

• In Event: 3161 - Critical Studies and Social Movement Frameworks

Abstract

Social Movement Organizations’ (SMOs) responses to online public critique is neglected in the extant research on social movements. This work begins to fill this gap through exploring frame disputes, movement strategy, and social media activism among Women’s March participants and commentators. I conducted a content analysis of 9000 tweets from January 19th – 25th, 2017 and January 19th and 21st, 2018. I address the following questions: 1) what are Women’s March supporters having frame disputes over and (2) do Women’s March’s efforts to address frame disputes lead to fewer disputes in later marches?



Frame disputes look different with social movement engagement than in previous contexts. More people feel empowered to engage in the framing discussion, leaving Women’s March in a position to debate which opinions to take into consideration. Most points of disagreement in the 2017 data regard the exclusion of Hillary Clinton from the honoree list for the event. Following the 2017 march, the most common dispute is the lack of a discussion of race. Women’s March supporters argued that the march did not engage with the fact that 53% of white women voted for Donald Trump, and that white women do not support black women enough in other movements to truly stand in solidarity. Women’s March tried to address criticism in several ways. The organization allowed pro-life groups to march, discouraged marchers from wearing pussyhats, and partnered with sex worker rights organizations. Leading into the 2018 march, the leading disagreement was how the organization handles race. However, following the 2018 march, little critiques were discussed; the most common criticism returned to the exclusion of Hillary Clinton. This project shows the disagreements present during the 2017 march, considers the actions that Women’s March took to address these issues, and assesses points of disagreement before and following the 2018 march.

Author

• Jessi Grace, Florida State University