analyze the Belarusian opposition in connection to elections (Ash 2015; Bedford 2017 ; Nikolayenko 2015 , 2017 ; Silitski 2012 , 2015 ) and consequently deal with the electoral protests (e.g., Korosteleva 2009 ; Navumau 2016 ). As elections are
Belarusian Professional Protesters in the Structure of Democracy Promotion
Enacting Politics, Reinforcing Divisions
Alena Minchenia
Protest Wave or Protest Spike?
An Examination of European Protest Activity, 2008–2012
Matthew Schoene
Many scholars have cited the social unrest stemming from the European sovereign debt crisis as a prime example of a protest wave ( della Porta and Mattoni 2014 ; Flesher Fominaya 2015 ; Gerbaudo 2013 ). Protest is an accepted form of
Shutting Down Protest
Policing, International Summitry, and the G20 Experiment in Brisbane
Binoy Kampmark
of protesters is being increasingly insulated and marginalized from such gatherings. In Brisbane 2014, the G20 summit witnessed one of the more successful efforts at limiting and in most cases shutting down public protest in its entirety. The
Protesting in Pandemic Times
COVID-19, Public Health, and Black Lives Matter
Binoy Kampmark
intrusive measures on public movement across the globe placed activists and protesters in a dilemma. To protest on the streets could result in fines and imprisonment. To not protest might constitute abject surrender. This necessitated either finding
Material Obstacles to Protest in the Urban Built Environment
Insights from Jordan
Jillian Schwedler
In 2003, I was sitting with some activists at a café in Amman, Jordan, discussing recent changes to the Public Gathering Law. Organizers of protest events were required to obtain a permit to hold any kind of demonstration or march, a restriction
Social Protest and Its Discontents
A System Justification Perspective
Vivienne Badaan, John T. Jost, Danny Osborne, Chris G. Sibley, Joaquín Ungaretti, Edgardo Etchezahar, and Erin P. Hennes
purely rational manner when it comes to decisions about whether or not to protest ( Elster 1993 ). For example, Melvin Lerner ( 1980: 14 ) proposed that images of a “manageable and predictable world” are essential to the pursuit of long-term goals
Pollyanna Ruiz
In The Practice of Everyday Life, de Certeau likens himself to a Solar Eye reading the city spread out like a text below. He compares this all-seeing position to the enmeshed position of those whose intermingled footsteps pass through the city streets, writing stories that deliberately elude legibility. These two ways of experiencing the city offer a theoretical frame through which I will explore both the administration of protest spaces, and protesters’ ongoing attempts to subvert and evade those controls. In doing so, this contribution will examine the way in which the police practice of kettling depends upon the police’s ability to draw a series of distinctions between ‘good’ protesters who comply with state demands, and ‘bad’ protesters who err from official routes. It will go onto to explore the way in which the practice of maptivism impacts upon protesters’ ability to occupy city spaces and resist the totalizing administrations of the state.
Rage and Protest
The Case of the Greek Indiginant Movement
Marilena Simiti
In 2011 numerous 'Occupy' and anti-austerity protests took place across Europe and the United States. Passionate indignation at the failure of political elites became a mobilizing force against formal political institutions. In Greece a mass movement known as the Aganaktismeni (the Indignant) became the main agent of social resistance to the memorandum signed by the Greek government, the European Union and the International Monetary Fund. The Greek movement did not take the form of a social movement sharing a collective identity. Left-wing protestors played a prominent role. Protestors embracing right-wing populist frames also participated actively in collective mobilizations, while segments of the extreme right attempted to manipulate rage to their advantage. During the Greek Indignant movement civil society remained a terrain contested by conflicting political forces. This unique feature of the Greek movement posed a completely different challenge to the principles of diversity and inclusiveness than the one debated within the Spanish Indignados and the Occupy protests. Furthermore, it illustrates that rage and indignation may spark dissimilar forms of political contention. Hence, rage and indignation do not merely motivate ‘passive citizens’ to participate in collective protest. They are linked to cognitive frames and individual preferences, which influence protestors’ claims and mobilizations’ political outcomes. Accordingly, advances in democratization and inclusive citizenship are only one of the possible outcomes of mobilizations prompted by rage and indignation.
Adi Binhas
The killing of George Floyd by a Minneapolis police officer in May 2020 triggered nationwide protests in the US against police brutality and racist policies ( Bennett et al. 2020 ). The Black-led protest wave that started in Minnesota eventually
Protest Voting in Eastern Germany
Continuity and Change Across Three Decades
David F. Patton
In 1989-1990, peaceful protests shook the German Democratic Republic (GDR), ushered in unification, and provided a powerful narrative of people power that would shape protest movements for decades to come. This article surveys eastern German protest across three decades, exploring the interplay of protest voting, demonstrations, and protest parties since the Wende. It finds that protest voting in the east has had a significant political impact, benefiting and shaping parties on both the left and the right of the party spectrum. To understand this potential, it examines how economic and political factors, although changing, have continued to provide favorable conditions for political protest in the east. At particular junctures, waves of protest occurred in each of the three decades after unification, shaping the party landscape in Germany.