Indignation as Affective Transformation: An Affect-Theoretical Approach to the Belgian Yellow Vest Movement

Abstract

In social movement research, indignation features prominently as an affect that triggers protest and mobilization. Yet, scholarly accounts rarely unpack the precise ways in which indignation performs these roles, and how it transforms individuals who join mobilization. This article conceptualizes indignation as a moment of affective transformation, based on affect-theoretical insights and drawing on the empirical analysis of the Belgian yellow vest movement (BYV). Building on focus groups, participant observations, and interviews, we unpack the complex affectivity of indignation and the dynamics that underlie indignation in the context of protest and mobilization. We find that indignation enables three affective transformations: (1) it acts as a tipping point that follows from individual feelings of resentment; (2) it is a moment of affective resonance that binds individuals in affective communities, (3) it acts as affective bifurcation from the disempowered state of fear and towards the reclaiming of political power.

Queer in Cyprus? The LGBTIQ Movement, Normativity, and Resistance in a Changing (Trans)national Landscape

“…There is a huge difference between constructive disagreement and questioning things all of us erroneously used to believe at some point, and between having reached a point where we compete and fight each other over stupidities, to the extent that the [LGBTIQ] movement in Cyprus is falling apart. (PP, 2018) Social movement studies have highlighted the important role emotions, such as anger produced by feelings of exclusion, play in social movements and mobilization (e.g., Gould 2009;Jasper 2014Jasper , 2018Knops and Petit 2022;Taylor 2000). As Knops and Petit (2022, p. 170) explain, understood as relational, multidimensional, and dynamic concepts that include both individual activists' emotions and the relations, transformations, and actions they engender, in certain situations and contexts, emotions of indignation may function "as a passage from a sense of powerlessness and inaction to increased feelings of agency and empowerment".…”

“…However, feelings of exclusion and experiences of marginalization do not necessarily, automatically, or directly lead to action. For experiences and feelings to turn into critiques and motivate action, a problem and specific responses and solutions to it need to be identified, while the context of mobilization and the sociobiographical trajectories of the individuals who experience them impact this process (Benford and Snow 2000;Knops and Petit 2022). In the case under examination in this article, participants feeling marginalized within Accept and/or feeling that Accept generates and sustains LGBTIQ in-group exclusions identified the problem as one of problematic employed campaigns and tactics, which uncritically mimic mainstream transnational LGBTIQ campaigns and tactics.…”

The politics of resentment: what is it and how is it mobilized by populist radical right-wing parties in different contexts?

“…From the field of social movements studies (Goodwin et al, 2001;Jasper, 2018;Knops and Petit, 2022) to political theory and philosophy (Nussbaum, 2013;Lordon, 2016;Rosanvallon, 2021), the role of emotions in politics is drawing increasing scholarly attention (Thompson and Hoggett, 2012;Demertzis, 2013;Jasper, 2018). In the field of political behavior, this trend is illustrated by a growing interest in "affective" rather than "ideological" polarization (Iyengar et al, 2012(Iyengar et al, , 2019.…”

Development and Validation of an Instrument to Assess Activism towards Environmental and Social Sustainability in Career Counseling

“…Anger is an intense negative emotion that seems to combine with cognitive components in the prediction of online activism (Feldman & Hart, 2016). Several studies also have focused on the emotion of indignation (e.g., Castells, 2015;Knops & Petit, 2022) emphasizing its importance, especially when situations of discrimination arise. Indignation plays an important role in triggering people to take actions aimed to produce positive changes.…”