Philosophiae Doctor - PhD / This study assesses the role of service delivery protests (SDPs) in promoting access to services such as water, electricity, and housing in Gugulethu and Khayelitsha, Cape Town. The study was conceptualised within the context of escalating frequency and scale of SDPs in South Africa. Although the first decade of democracy saw a decline in protests, some groups and movements protested. However, since 2005, when SDPs took national prominence, South Africa has experienced soaring levels of dramatic protests. This frequency of SDPs invites research. Why have SDPs (e.g., for housing, water, and electricity) increased despite the government promising a ‘Better life for all’ for nearly three decades, and how have they unfolded?

This study compares repertoire and framing between two protests in the early Dutch environmental movement and two protests in the modern Dutch environmental movement. The aim of the study is to find differences and similarities between the two time periods the protests take place in. The four cases are studied using the comparative case study method, specifically doing a historical comparison. In each case, the theoretical concepts of repertoire and framing are analyzed. Each case is studied through a qualitative analysis of archival and secondary sources, including newspaper articles, publications and social media posts. Using the theoretical concepts of framing and repertoire, several similarities and differences are found between the four cases. All four cases use the frame of the threat to human health in their campaigns and aimed for a low threshold for people to join their campaigns. Frames differed more across campaigns with different topics than across campaigns from different time periods. In repertoire, cases differed across time periods more than within time periods. The contemporary cases focus on commitment by showing the willingness to bear great personal risk, whereas the historical cases focus on showcasing their worthiness through alliances with strategic actors. Overall, the comparative historical analysis employed in this research reveals that there are greater differences between time periods when it comes to repertoire than in framing, showing that repertoire is defined more by time period than framing for the chosen cases.

The purpose of this study is to explore the biography of a white, Southern Baptist-reared Clarence Jordan and his goals in the creation of Koinonia Farm. This thesis explicitly evaluates these motives through the examination of archival material—specifically Jordan’s sermons and speeches—that uncovers Jordan’s own words and testimony. This thesis answers the following questions: (1) What was Clarence Jordan’s aim in founding Koinonia Farm and continuing to implement it over time? (2) How did he go about methodically achieving his aim? And (3) How effectively were the objectives achieved as reflected in measurable outcomes—did Jordan’s sermons frame his position so as to make Koinonia Farm work over its lifetime? Additionally, this thesis challenges the methods of Clarence Jordan and Koinonia Farm in the way they employ the agricultural and industrial educational models as a means of liberation and uplift for African Americans and poor whites in Sumter County, Georgia. / Master of Science

The indigenous of the Amazon region of Ecuador unite against the petroleum industry and destructive resource extraction practices in order to preserve environment and indigenous cultures. Since the 1990s, the indigenous movement of Ecuador has played out in the international arena and become a transnational movement, which includes social actors from the international legal, human rights, and environmental communities. This transnational movement exemplifies identity politics through the projection of ethnicity and essentialized signifiers of indigenousness. Indigenous actors, Ecuadoran nongovernmental organizations, international filmmakers, and US nongovernmental organizations all use ethnic identity and signifiers via documentaries and cyberspace as symbolic resources to represent the movement. This thesis explores the intersection of external actors (international community of filmmakers and NGOs) and internal actors' (the indigenous themselves and Ecuadoran NGOs) projection of ethnicity as symbolic resource. Utilizing resource mobilization theory and new social movement theory as a syncretic to understand the movement and theoretical contributions of identity and representation to explore the process of mobilization, the study explores the question of ethnic identity as symbolic resource in four documentaries and on fifteen websites. The discourse analysis of the four documentaries and content analysis of the fifteen websites illustrate that there is consistency in the message within the transnational social movement community of actors who strive to work for and on behalf of the indigenous of the Ecuadoran Amazon. / Master of Arts

With the increase and popularity of the use of internet, hate speech has reached wider dimensions in societies. This thesis will provide empirical examples to show the relation between speech and actions. This paper will use speech-act theory and social movement theory to portray the relation between hate speech on social media and domestic terrorism inspired by far right extremist. Even though, there has been a lot of work for counter terrorism, domestic terrorism is still overlooked. Empirical sources say that domestic terrorism poses a threat as much as international terrorism. This thesis will bring light over the connections of hate speech and domestic terrorism inspired by far right extremists. It will conclude that there is an evident relation that hate speech on social media is contributing to domestic terrorism actions encouraged by far right extremism.

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This thesis studies the ‘Black Lives Matter’ movement and what achievements it has been able to accomplish related to its objectives, in order to create a better under- standing of how new social movements work and what they can accomplish. The objectives and achievements were divided into different categories: cultural recognition, physical security, socio-economic, and other. The findings show that most of the objectives were of the physical security and socio-economic category while most of the achievements were outside of the objectives the BLM movement set and are mostly related to the cultural recognition category. The study argues that this is due to the characteristics of the BLM movement as a new social movement as well as the BLM not being specific enough in its objectives. With this knowledge there is an understanding that new social movements are very good at engaging people but could improve in their achievements.

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Fatta - vilken kampanj! Den digitala samhällsutvecklingen de senaste decenniet har förändrat kommunikationslandskapet och bidragit till att engagemang för samhällsfrågor antagit nya former. Detta har skapat nya sätt för individer att ta ställning i samhällspolitiska frågor och nya möjligheter för organisationer att mobilisera och engagera. Men engagemanget i sociala medier har ifrågasatts. De senaste årens forskning kring engagemang i sociala medier visar upp en dubbelsidig och tvetydig bild av vilken betydelse engagemanget i sociala medier kan ha för en aktör. Genom att genomföra en processtudie av hur aktören Fatta lyckats skapa stort engagemang i sociala medier och växt från framgångsrik kampanj till inflytelserik organisation, ämnar denna studie bidra till en djupare förståelse för vilken betydelse engagemang i sociala medier har för aktörer som eftersträvar samhällsförändring. Det empiriska materialet utgörs av en processbeskrivning som består av datainsamling från en mängd typer av data, observationer i digitala kanaler och intervjuer med människor som har koppling till Fatta. Studien visar att Fattas förflyttning möjliggjordes av att det fanns en social rörelse som Fatta med hjälp av sociala medier lyckades kroka i, nämligen den feministiska rörelsen. Den möjliggjordes också av den identitet de lyckades skapa kring Fatta samt av den uppmärksamhet de gavs utanför sociala medier som delvis kan härledas till det starka stöd och engagemang som fanns för Fatta sociala medier. Förutom att bekräfta tidigare forskning kring att sociala medier förenklar och möjliggör mobilisering och ger möjligheter till att snabbt agera, kan sociala medier ge aktörer som verkar för samhällsförändring symbolisk makt. Genom de människor som visade sitt stöd för Fatta beviljade de så väl fysiska resurser som tillträde till maktens korridorer där de kunde påverka beslutsfattare. / <p>Stort tack till FATTA och alla informanter som med stort engagemang gjort detta arbete till ett rent nöje!</p>