The sense of crisis that marks our times may be seen as a crisis for dominant groups whose once-secure hegemony is being challenged by marginalised others. It is in theorising the reply from the dominant group to the voices of the oppressed that existing Western conceptions of social change fall silent. The dominant Pakeha group in Aotearoa New Zealand has used discourses of benign colonisation and harmonious race relations to resist 165 years of communication from indigenous Māori about their oppression and a dishonoured treaty for settlement. My research documents the appearance of the Treaty of Waitangi into the Pakeha consciousness, and the now 30 year-long response by a Pakeha antiracism movement to educate their own cultural group about its agreements. Targeting government, community and social services organisations, activist educators used Freire's (1975) approach of conscientising dialogue to present a more critical view of colonisation, and to encourage participants to consider the complicity of their organisations in ongoing structural and cultural racism. Based on my membership of local and national networks of activist educators, I was able to organise and facilitate data gathering from three sources to investigate processes of Pakeha change in: (i) unpublished material describing the antiracism and Treaty movement's historical theorising and strategies over 30 years, (ii) a country-wide process of co-theorising among contemporary Treaty educator groups about their work and perceived influence, and (iii) a collection of organisational accounts of Treaty-focused change. The collected records confirmed that a coherent anti-colonial discourse, which I have termed 'Pakeha honouring the Treaty', was in use to construct institutional and constitutional changes in non-government organisations. My interpretation of key elements in a local theory of transforming action included emotional responses to counter-cultural information, collective work for cultural and institutional change and practising a mutually agreed relationship with Māori. I concluded that these emotional, collective and relationship processes in dominant group change were crucial in helping to construct the new conceptual resources of 'affirming Māori authority' and 'striving towards a right relationship with Māori'. These counter-colonial constructions allowed Pakeha a non-resistant and facilitative response to Māori challenge, and enabled a dialogue with Māori about decolonisation. By examining in one research programme the genealogy and interdependencies of a new discourse, my research contributes to theorising about the production of new, counter-hegemonic discourses, and confirms the crucial part played by social movements in developing new, liberatory constructions of the social order. My research calls for further theory-building on (i) emotional and spiritual aspects of transformational learning, (ii) processes involved in consciously-undertaken cultural change by dominant/coloniser groups, and (iii) practising of mutually agreed relationships with indigenous peoples by dominant/coloniser groups. My research has implications for theorising how coloniser and dominant groups generally may participate in liberatory social change and decolonisation work, and the part played by the Western states in the global struggles by indigenous people for recognition of their world-views and aspirations. It remains to be seen whether counter-colonial discourses and organisational changes aimed at 'honouring the Treaty' with indigenous peoples will be sufficiently widely adopted to help transform Western dominating cultures and colonial projects. In the meantime, acknowledging and documenting these counter-colonial discourses and their constructions opens up increasing possibilities for constructing, from a history of colonisation, a different future.

This thesis examines futōkō (school non-attendance) in Japan from the perspective that futōkō is a social movement. It analyses citizens’ activism in support of futōkō students over the twenty year period from 1984. Drawing upon social movement approaches the thesis examines how futōkō citizens successfully grasped political opportunities, established a network of organizations, launched a new interpretive frame for futōkō, and challenged the dominant representation of futōkō in society –that 'futōkō is an illness’. To explore in detail the ideological aspect of the futōkō movement’s framing, a content analysis of 140 editorials in the movement newspaper – the Futōkō Shimbun (School Non-attendance Newspaper) was conducted. Commencing with a critique of schooling practices that create futōkō, over the survey period Futōkō Shimbun expands its analysis to develop a critical appraisal of Japanese society that has broad implications for many different aspects of the everyday life of its citizens. Adopting the typology of movement outcomes, this thesis assesses the outcomes of futōkō movement framing through two sets of factors: first, changes in government policies and attitudes and second, cultural and ideational changes as experienced by the movement organizations, futōkō activists and children, and as represented in shifts in media representation of futōkō. Government policies in the handling of futōkō students have become more flexible although not always positive, while government interactions with the movement are suggestive of recognition that futōkō citizens are valid spokespersons with a legitimate set of interests in relation to futōkō children. Futōkō movement activists have been successful in framing their movement in terms of: expanding and increasingly sophisticated networks of futōkō movement organizations; the professional development of activists; and a more positive media discourse. The thesis concludes that the futōkō movement has influenced government policies, the media and wider social commentary about the phenomenon of and responses to futōkō. The thesis contends that the social movement perspective enables us to understand the issue of futōkō beyond the educational context, in its wider social, cultural and political contexts. / http://proxy.library.adelaide.edu.au/login?url= http://library.adelaide.edu.au/cgi-bin/Pwebrecon.cgi?BBID=1330998 / Thesis (Ph.D.) -- University of Adelaide, School of Social Sciences, 2008

<p>This licentiate thesis examines the development of the life insurance industry during the period 1855-1914. The aim with the study is to recognise dimensions not frequently addressed by previous research on the insurance industry, namely the impact of social dimensions, including the implicit and explicit economic importance of social movements and the diffusion of knowledge in society at large for the development of the life insurance industry. The study shows that income and price had limited importance in explaining the demand for life insurance before the 20th century and that this can be attributed to a lack of sufficient knowledge regarding financial issues and to a far too high access cost in acquiring a life insurance for a large part of society. The development of the life insurance industry must therefore be understood through improved knowledge both on the part of the life insurance companies and on part of the consumers. The licentiate further shows how diffusion of knowledge throughout society also was due to a diffusion of democratic ideas and the rise of social movements, movements that life insurance actors were a part of. These actions helped open up the financial market for the masses and probably also strengthened the trust towards the industry. It is however hard to dismiss the life insurance actors’ engagement in women’s movement as a cover-up for other disguised motives not so honourable, while a direct economic gain for the life insurance industry is hard to establish.</p>

<p>Abstract</p><p>Why do Political Parties emerge? – A Study of "Sjukvårdspartiet i Värmland"</p><p>Political Science, Johan Utter</p><p>The political parties have important roles to play in contemporary society. They act as bearers of power and presents the voters with finished packages of ideas on how society should grow, develop and change. Political parties are essential to the survival and wellbeing of representative democracy. Many theories have been developed over the years concerning matters related to political parties, but one area of research remains largely unexplored, namely the topic on why political parties do emerge in the first place. Why do some individuals become creators of political parties?</p><p>Since this is a weak theoretical field an attempt will be made to contibute to the understanding concerning what makes new political parties emerge. This is done by relating previous contributors theories to the results obtained from a case study undertaken on the emergence of "Sjukvårdspartiet i Värmland", a political party risen from a protest-movement concerning the preservation of the local hospital in Kristinehamn. By testing this case against earlier research a foundation will be created and from which new ideas about political parties can be generated.</p><p>By interviewing the creator of the political party "Sjukvårdspartiet i Värmland" an attempt is made to reveal the incentives which led to the party formation. These results are then compared to the causal mechanisms proposed by earlier research. The purpose is to analyze if theories from earlier research is able to explain the emergence of "Sjukvårdspartiet i Värmland".</p><p>The results show that party formations are cryptic political phenomena, which needs larger and more developed theoretical constructions before the question "Why do political parties emerge?" can be properly answered.</p><p><strong><p> </p></strong></p>

Historically, black women have always played key roles in the struggle for liberation. A critical determinant of black women’s activism was the influence of both race and gender, as these factors were immutably married to their subjectivities. African American women faced the socio-cultural and structural challenge of sexism prevalent in the United States and also in the black community. My study examines the life of Fulani Sunni Ali, her role in black liberation, her role as the Minister of Information for the Provisional Government for the Republic of New Africa, and her communication strategies. In doing so, I evaluate a black female revolutionary nationalist’s discursive negotiation of her identity during the Black Power and Black Nationalist Movement. I also use womanist criticism to analyze interviews with Sunni Ali and archival data in her possession to reveal the complexity and diversity of black women’s roles and activities in a history of black resistance struggle and to locate black female presence and agency in Black Power. The following study more generally analyzes black female revolutionary nationalists’ roles, activities, and discursive identity negotiation during the Black Power Movement. By examining Sunni Ali’s life and the way she struggled against racism and patriarchy to advocate for Black Power and Black Nationalism, I demonstrate how her activism was a continuation of a tradition of black women’s resistance, and I extrapolate her forms of black women’s activism extant in the movement.

In recent times, increasing instances of population displacement from many large dam construction projects have led to increase in anti-dam protest movements. But some of these protest movements are more successfully mobilized than others. The differences in success are largely due to the kind of political system they are based in. Studies show that formation and mobilization patterns of the protest movements are largely determined by the nature of state and its political system. However, there is lack of comparative study in this regard especially in the field of anti-dam protest movement. This thesis aims to fill that knowledge gap by comparing the anti-dam protest mobilization in Sardar Sarovar Dam, India and Three Gorges Dam, China. The Study finds that political structures have significant impact on anti-dam protest mobilization and citizens of democracy enjoy more freedom in anti-dam protest mobilization than those in authoritarian polity.

This is volume II in a dissertation in two parts. In addition to the papers found in this volume, the major publication is a book: The nonprofit sector in Sweden (Manchester University Press, Manchester, 1997, written together with Tommy Lundström). Our points of departure in the book were that Sweden, within previous international research, often has been described as a country with a small nonprofit sector. Based on a comprehensive set of first-hand empirical data, the first systematic, consolidated account of the Swedish sector, its development, legal situation and current position, is provided, and the previous results are questioned. The two initial texts found in this volume focus on conceptual tools. The first article, The Swedish Nonprofit Sector in International Comparison is based on a critique of the dominant US/economics perspective found in mainstream nonprofit literature. It is argued in the article, that earlier attempts to understand the Swedish nonprofit sector have been biased by a cultural ethnocentrism. The purpose of the article is to broaden the understanding of this part of society by using a socio-economic approach. The second paper, Hate groups and outlaw bikers: part of civil society?, addresses the issue of definitions. The aim of the paper is to test two existing definitions of organizations in civil society. This test is conducted on two extreme forms of organization, the white hate group and the outlaw motorcycle club. It is shown that – according to existing definitions – both of these organizations, in their ideal-typical form, can be regarded as civil society organizations. The final two essays are more explorative and the author has taken the freedom to experiment. In Strategic dilemmas for Swedish popular movement organizations, the object of study is the Swedish popular movements (folkrörelserna) and an experienced sense of crisis in some of the organizations within these movements (PMOs). It is argued that a number of major external shifts have had a profound impact on the traditional Swedish PMOs. Underlying reasons for the reactions of the PMOs are discussed and some interpretations of the effects are presented. In the final essay – Outlaw biking in alternative frames of interpretation – an even more limited and empirically derived phenomenon is taken as point of departure. The study focuses on outlaw biking and approaches this social phenomenon from three different angles with the help of metaphorical images derived from the outlaw literature. The purpose was not to develop a best possible frame for the study of outlaw biking, but rather to lay bare some already existing images of outlaw motorcycle clubs, found in the previous literature. / <p>Utgör jämte: The nonprofit sector in Sweden / Tommy Lundström and Filip Wijkström, diss. Stockholm : Handelshögskolan, 1998</p>

This thesis explores the social dynamics of community gardens and their participation within them in the contemporary food justice movement in Seattle, Washington. Community gardens are seen as solutions to myriad urban and environmental problems, such as food deserts, community empowerment, urban greening, environmental education and sustainability of the food system. Three case studies of Seattle organizations, the P-Patch Program, Lettuce Link and Alleycat Acres, provide a basis for analysis of the purported benefit of community empowerment as a function of organizational structure, history and policies. City government support, flexibility, and a critical outlook towards the processes of inclusion and methods of fostering community-based leadership are found to be essential to a garden project. However, the definition of who is the ‘community’ in a community garden is called into question as more potential stakeholders and beneficiaries emerge in a changing and increasingly interconnected city. These networks of organizations and activists, complicated as they may be are a boon to the community gardening scene as they increase avenues for access for more Seattleites to healthy, local food. Community gardens are another representation of the current global movements against social inequalities, and therefore, to take full advantage of this opportunity for social change, community garden organizers must remain critically conscious of who is included and how this participation occurs.

Since the first years of the 21st century, the Ecuadorian indigenous movement, classified as the most overwhelming social actor since its emergence in the mid 1980s, finds itself in crises, with its principal organizations marked by tensions and conflicts. With a departure in the fragmentation of the indigenous movement, the context of the study is the impact of issues related to the concepts of class and ethnicity. In order to achieve a deeper understanding of the topic, the approach is based on a comparative study of different historical periods. The theoretical part of the study mainly focuses on analysing the concept of social movement in relation to indigenous movement. By comparing different periods, the study seeks to demonstrate that the inter-relationship between class and ethnicity has changed due to the context. For example, the revival of once-impotent leftist parties and movements has altered the relations of power and the incentives that strucktured past linkages between the indigenous movement and the political left. Thus, due to the meteoric rise of Rafael Correa and his radical political project, the indigenous movement is confronted with a new kind of challenge. In this context, the concepts of plurinationality and interculturality have emerged and further polarized the positions both between the left and the indigenous movement and between the two indigenous organizations: CONAIE and FENOCIN. In light of these aspects, the ambition of this study is to emphasize the importance of highlightning the concepts of class and ethnicity, when analysing the cause of the current fragmentation of the indigenous movement in Ecuador.

Contemporary activists in the United States find it increasingly difficult to negotiate socio-political constraints to build a social movement. Those looking for relatively safe and effective venues for participation in and communication of dissent face oppression by the hegemonic power of the political right and, in the case of climate activism, anti-climate-science discourse. I use the case study of the climate action movement to explore how contemporary activists use new communication media technologies (hereafter new media) to establish and strengthen a movement. Even though climate change affects the daily lives of ordinary Americans, no U.S. policy exists to mitigate carbon emissions. New media offer the potential for new, safer venues for participation in and communication about social movements. I used empirical qualitative and critical methods to analyze the communication of climate change activism in Texas, USA. I examined how Step It Up! 2007 (SIU) used new media to facilitate or constrain public participation in climate action. I used critical discourse analysis to examine information provided to citizens on the SIU website, and I attended the SIU event in San Antonio, Texas. I found SIU organizers successfully used new media to increase agitation and to shift power away from the federal government to the local grassroots level. I recommend activists use new media as a unifying tool, to provide a fragmented and apathetic citizenry with a message that can be used to affect change. I conducted a critical rhetorical analysis of Working Film’s 2007 documentary on global warming, Everything’s Cool, as a means to suggest how, and in what ways, activists use new media to build a movement. I also hosted an activist screening. I examined how new media facilitate or constrain communication of movement messages. I found activists used the documentary and open source activism as a rhetorical exercise in agitation to refigure public understanding of climate science and attitudes toward U.S. climate change policy. Everything’s Cool positioned climate activism, and participating in the movement broadly, as accessible and acceptable, helping to rhetorically constitute a new kind of citizen activist, shifting power roles to a grassroots network of local leaders.