Strategies of Resistance: Diversification and Diffusion

Abstract

Why do organizations choose to use nonviolence? Why do they choose specific nonviolent tactics? Existing quantitative work centers on mass nonviolent campaign, but much of the nonviolence employed in contentious politics is smaller-scale nonviolent direct action. In this article, we explore the determinants of nonviolence with new data at the organization level in self-determination disputes from 1960 to 2005. We present a novel argument about the interdependence of tactical choices among nonviolent options in self-determination movements. Given limitations on their capabilities, competition among organizations in a shared movement, and different resource requirements for nonviolent strategies, we show that organizations have incentives to diversify tactics rather than just copy other organizations. The empirical analysis reveals a rich picture of varied organizational resistance choices, and a complex web of interdependence among tactics.

The value of sub-national data: The dynamics of contentious politics in Nepal

“…Explanations for contentious dynamics are therefore interested in explaining how these actors behave. To do so, this agent-centred understanding assumes that these actors are unitary (Cunningham et al, 2017; Horowitz et al, 2018).…”

“…the Nonviolent and Violent Campaigns and Outcomes (NAVCO) data project). The agency problem is not so relevant for the cross-country datasets with a single issue focus such as the Strategies of Resistance (SoR) (Cunningham et al, 2017) and the Minority at Risks Organizational Behavior (MAROB) datasets. Both datasets include information about ethnic organizations and their activities which allow us to take into account the agency dimension of CCA concepts.…”

“…Explanations for contentious dynamics are therefore interested in explaining how these actors behave. To do so, this agent-centred understanding assumes that these actors are unitary (Cunningham et al, 2017;Horowitz et al, 2018). Figure 1 shows that the coverage of actor types is limited and most often does not identify unitary groups, particularly in global and regional datasets.…”

“…Research on social movements and contentious politics now include diverse forms of organized resistance with varied political goals and tactics (e.g. Cunningham et al, 2017; Muñoz and Anduiza, 2019). Combining information on contentious campaigns and events, recent scholarship has turned to analyze previously neglected dimensions in the study of contentious collective actions (CCA), including groups’ characteristics, composition, and tactical preferences—whether violent or not (Horowitz et al, 2018; Cunningham et al, 2017).…”

The Power of Words: State Reactions to Protest Announcements

“…Most of the research focuses on the particular protest tactic employed, such as nonviolent resistance campaigns (Chenoweth & Stephan, 2011;Gleditsch & Rivera, 2017) or street protests (Andrews & Biggs, 2006). Recently, studies have focused on internal organizational structures and competition between various organizations to explain the organizations' decisions to protest in a particular way (Cunningham et al, 2017;Pearlman, 2011). These studies provide comprehensive explanations of organizations' employment of a particular protest tactic, but not for the mere announcement of a protest.…”