Sidney Tarrow has been one of the seminal students of social movements and political contention ever since his first book came out in the 1960s on communist peasants in southern Italy. In the 1990s, along with Charles Tilly, Doug McAdam, and a few others, he was one of the leading architects of the political process model of social movements, an elegant synthesis that quickly became, and remains to this day, the dominant paradigm in the field. Since then he has continued to expand and refine his thinking on contentious politics with books on the Dynamics of Contention (with McAdam and Tilly, 2001) and the New Transnational Activism (2005), among others. In the two books presently under review—a substantially revised third edition of Power in Movement, as well as Strangers at the Gate, an artfully arranged and revised collection of previous articles—Tarrow looks back upon this earlier work in the light of recent developments in the research and practice of contentious politics and offers what is essentially a new synthesis of his thinking. Together, these two books provide not only a comprehensive and insightful inquiry into contemporary contentious politics but also a rare and intriguing glimpse into the intellectual evolution of one of the discipline's most distinguished scholars.
The point of departure for both books is the political-process model of social movements, and there is no better place to understand that approach than the in first edition of Power in Movement, published in 1994. In this book, Tarrow points out that grievance and contention have always existed; the question is when grievance gives rise to social action, and with what consequences. The highly abridged answer is that it depends upon the surrounding political and institutional environments: What are the appropriate targets? Where does one look for allies? How does one gain access?
In each edition, Tarrow begins with a short history of contention, describing how the rise of capitalism, the print revolution, changes in associational patterns, and “more than anything” the development of the modern state (p. 47), altered patterns of contention away from the mostly local, narrow protests typical of agrarian societies to the broad-based, strategic, and sustained social movements of the modern era.
It then describes four components that enable aggrieved populations to overcome the obstacles to collective action: political opportunities, mobilizing structures, strategic frames, and repertoires of collective action. Most important is a shift in political opportunities—the result perhaps of an expansion of political access, a change in political alignments, or division among the elites—that allows people to think that contentious social action might be successful. In addition, people are more likely to engage in collective action if they can build upon already existing formal and informal connective networks; if their action is framed in a compelling, culturally resonant account that identifies the problem and prescribes remedial action; and if they share similar notions of the sort of actions that are possible and appropriate in particular circumstances.
Finally, the book's third section puts the model into motion, describing the cycles of protest in which the escalating opportunities and activism in social movements' early stages often give way to routinization, co-optation, or suppression, as well as discussing the kind of outcomes, both intentional and unintentional, that result from such activism.
The most notable difference between this first edition of Power in Movement and the books currently under review is the scope of the endeavor. Tarrow has redefined the targets of his inquiry beyond social movements to a much more inclusive set of social phenomena he identifies as contentious collective action: “[C]ollective action becomes contentious when it is used by people who lack regular access to representative institutions, who act in the name of new or unaccepted claims, and who behave in ways that fundamentally challenge others or authorities” (Power in Movement, 3d ed., p. 7). Under this rubric, he includes expressions of extreme nationalism, terrorist incidents, and other forms of collective action that do not meet the standard of a social movement defined as a coalition of actors able to mount “sustained opposition against a powerful opponent (p. 7).
Second, he argues that the original political-process model was “so movement-centered that it was difficult to track how movements interact over time with other elements of the polity” (p. 22). To address this problem the new books devote more attention to the ways in which social movements, political parties, and government agencies react to and learn from each other; how these interactions expand or contract the opportunities for contentious action for themselves and others; and how they shape the ultimate outcome of contentious action. For example, he notes that the dramatic events in Paris during May 1968 produced relatively few lasting results because the activists cultivated few connecting structures among themselves and established few lasting ties with conventional political institutions; by contrast, the slow-moving march of the U.S. women's movement through the institutions accomplished a great deal.
Third, Tarrow notes with irony that, despite its name, the model pays more attention to the structural features conducive to the rise of social movements than it does to the “processes and mechanisms” by which they expand and contract.
In addition, Tarrow acknowledges critiques from constructivist scholars that the model's structuralist approach implicitly accepts an assumption of rational individualism to explain social outcomes. In deference to these scholars, both books go to some length to show how notions of identity and social meaning inform perceptions of solidarity, entitlements, and threats, among other things. In one particularly interesting chapter in Strangers at the Gates, the author explains why some frames and repertoires, such as the boycott and the term “sexual harassment,” diffuse successfully into other contexts of contention, whereas others, such as “male chauvinist pig,” do not. He also notes that the phrase “sexual harassment” acquired a slightly different meaning in Europe than it had in the United States, partly because it arrived in Europe through the bureaucracy in Brussels rather than emerging from below, as it did in the United States.
Finally, Tarrow devotes a great deal more time to the phenomenon of transnational activism. He notes that increased globalization has provided activists with additional opportunities, venues, resources, and frames with which to press their agenda, but he also argues, contra the claims of an emerging global civil society, that most of these agendas are still centered on national goals and authorities. Here, he particularly emphasizes the role of “rooted cosmopolitans” as intermediaries between the local and the global, referring to people who may have diverse connections and loyalties but “continue to be linked to place, to the social networks that inhabit that space, and to the resources, experiences and opportunities that place provides them” (Strangers at the Gates, p. 185).
One key criticism of the original political process model that Tarrow does little to address, and indeed may aggravate further, is that it is too broad and imprecise, that it explains too much and therefore may not explain anything specifically. This criticism in its strong form is probably unfair. As he makes clear, the political-process model “is best seen not as a theory, but as a framework in which to examine the dynamics of contention” (Power in Movement, p. 28), and as such it has been unusually rich and productive. Yet one cannot help wondering what the boundaries are to “contentious collective action” if it encompasses such diverse events as petition drives, sit-ins, mass demonstrations, the tea party, the bombing of a government building in Oklahoma, and the French Revolution. In addition, as Tarrow himself acknowledges at one point, one can legitimately ask whether or not adding more processes and mechanisms to an already elaborate framework significantly enhances our understanding of social movements or simply weighs us down.
This last problem is particularly evident in the new edition of Power in Movement, where enormous amounts of new information, research, and thinking are grafted onto the original three-part structure. The book clearly provides a thorough, judicious account of contemporary thinking on contentious politics, but it also reminds one just a little of the Ptolemaic models of the universe, which became increasingly complex and contorted as they tried to assimilate more and more new information. Of course, social movements are not self-contained orbs following neatly prescribed orbits, and there is no reason to believe that the core assumptions of the political-process model are faulty in any significant way. Yet the result can be confusing. For example, Tarrow's conclusion in this book expresses alarm over the increased violence associated with contentious politics in recent years, but there is little elsewhere that should give us cause for such alarm.
Strangers at the Gates covers much the same ground, but is a more congenial companion. In this book, Tarrow revises and republishes a selection of articles—nearly all of them since 1994—that mark some of the key conceptual moments leading up to his new synthesis: the interaction of social movements with other elements of the polity, the increased appreciation for contingency and process, the nod toward constructivism, and, most importantly, the analysis of transnational activism. In this book, though, the arguments are lengthier, more grounded in empirical detail, and organized so that their significance to the larger arguments are made apparent. As a result, the reader has a better understanding of the reasons Tarrow has made the choices he has.
In sum, these books should be required reading for all serious students of social movements and contentious politics. If one has only limited time and only a tangential interest in the topic—say, for an advanced undergraduate seminar—the new edition of Power in Movement should suffice. For the graduate student or more advanced scholar seeking to make contentious politics a focus of his or her research, (re)reading the first edition of Power in Movement along with Strangers at the Gates might be a more rewarding strategy. But regardless of how one engages the work, it is work that must be engaged.
