Collective identities and formal ideologies in the Irish grassroots pro-asylum seeker movement

Abstract

This article examines the relationship between formal ideologies and processes of collective identity construction across two key waves of mobilisation of pro-asylum-seeker groups in Ireland, namely radical anti-racism and the multicultural support group. In each period, a formal ideological stance delimited the scope of actions available to members. In examining the interplay between collective identity and ideology, the actions and trajectories of individual social movement organisations (SMOs) and the movement at large can be better understood. Processes of collective identity construction facilitated SMO members in creating conditional senses of ‘weness’. In instances, these challenged formal ideologies with differing results. In the case of radical anti-racism, it created a reformist/radical division among members. In the multicultural support group, it created a reformist/non-reformist division. These cleavages are crucial to understanding how the movement progressed over time. Collective identity work is understood as a means through which individuals can challenge or reinforce formal ideologies, thus playing a crucial role in the trajectories of the SMOs examined and their repertoire of actions.

Introduction: The Contentious Politics of Refugee and Migrant Protest and Solidarity Movements: Remaking Citizenship from the Margins

“…Our aim here is to bring into conversation scholarship and discussions that have thus far largely remained separate. Although social movements literature has studied pro-migrant solidarity groups (Tazreiter 2010;Rosenberger and Winkler 2014;Monforte 2016;Moran 2015), it has only minimally engaged with the subject of migrant and refugee struggles (Ataç et al 2015;Refugee Review 2013;Schwenken 2013). Moreover, social movement literature has often paid insufficient attention to the nuances of space, preferring to retain analysis at more macro scales of analysis and, as the literature on 'contentious politics' makes clear, it has also been anemic in its attention to the political dynamics at the heart of struggle as discussed below in the third section.…”