To demonstrate the value of operationalizing the efficacy of action beliefs in terms of peaceful and violent actions in understanding why people engage in different forms of collective action (CA), we conducted a study (N = 211 students) in Catalonia in 2019, during the massive protests after the Spanish Supreme Court ruling on the Catalan leaders. We tested six models differing regarding the operationalization of CA and inclusion of group identity and perceived injustice as control factors. The role of the efficacy of peaceful protests was model-dependent. Conversely, we found evidence in favour of the efficacy of violent protests as a robust predictor of intentions to participate in non-normative CA -participants perceiving violence as effective exhibited stronger intentions to participate in non-normative CA. Furthermore, no predictor other than the efficacy of violent protests predicted the variance of non-normative CA isolated from the variance of normative CA, implying that studying the perceived efficacy of different types of CA could improve our understanding of why people engage in different forms of CA.
RESUMENPara demostrar la relevancia de operativizar la eficacia de las creencias de actuación en términos de acciones pacíficas y acciones violentas y comprender por qué las personas participan en distintas modalidades de acción colectiva (AC), en 2019 realizamos un estudio (N = 211 estudiantes) en Cataluña, durante las protestas masivas tras el fallo del Tribunal Supremo sobre los líderes catalanes. Probamos seis modelos distintos de operativización de la AC, incluyendo la identidad grupal y la injusticia percibida como factores de control. El rol de la eficacia de las protestas pacíficas era dependiente del modelo. Por el contrario, hallamos evidencia en favor de la eficacia de las protestas violentas como predictor robusto de la intención de ARTICLE HISTORY