Being costly, seeming worthy: Does authenticity matter for social movement success?

抗议重要吗？这仍然是社会运动学术的一个长期问题；我们仍然在争论社会运动是否以及如何引起社会和政治变革。我的研究通过扩展社会运动理论三大巨头中应用最少的方法，即资源动员、政治机会结构和框架过程理论，为这场辩论做出了贡献。后者调查社会运动的文化和“意义创造”工作，只是偶尔被用来解释抗议的后果，当使用时，可以说没有得出令人信服的结论。然而，框架理论所做的，尽管并不总是明确的，是提醒我们，我们需要考虑社会运动要求什么（主张），以及他们如何要求（框架），而不仅仅是他们是否有可以动员的资源或他们可以利用的政治机会。我以此为基础，表明社会运动的主张和框架策略确实有助于解释其结果，并且即使在不利的政治环境下也可以直接导致积极的结果。正如我的博士论文所示，这在很大程度上取决于社会运动可能带来的物质和象征成本，以及满足他们的要求所带来的目标成本。因此，例如，我能够解释秘鲁的土著抗议者如何能够在2009年推翻向采掘业开放土地的法令，尽管掌权的总统称他们为“野蛮人”。他们能够做到这一点，是通过物质上昂贵的破坏，以及通过他们的要求（保护我们的“祖先”土地），框架策略（为亚马逊的守护者争取祖先的权利，并展示看似真实的土著）的组合施加足够高的象征性成本，以及沉重的镇压使公众舆论对他们有利的事实。在上述轨迹中需要进一步研究的是感知真实性对社会运动的作用。我们从拉丁美洲了解到，原住民领袖和活动人士总是沉浸在真实性的斗争中，因为他们需要说服支持者、选民、反对者和公众，他们是他们所谓的选民的真正代表，他们有合法的目标，他们使用可接受的手段来尝试和实现这些目标。这并不局限于土著人民的斗争；然而，在一般的社会运动中，北方学者还没有研究过真实性之争的动态。我的博士论文能够表明，土著运动的主张和框架的外部共鸣对其结果很重要。由于缺乏关于舆论的可比较的跨国和长期数据，它无法充分评价运动战略与舆论之间关系的性质。特别是，它不能测试框架一致性——要求和框架之间的一致性——对运动结果是否重要。我们从政治理论和哲学中知道，感知的一致性——身份和行动之间、宣言和政策之间等等——会影响个人或政治家是否被视为真实的，从而也值得信赖和合法。我认为这对社会运动及其后果也很重要；然而，这需要进一步的研究。社会运动如何试图传达真实性？什么样的主张、框架和策略组合被认为是真实的？被认为是真实的就能保证积极的结果吗？为了寻求这些问题的答案，我建议巩固我目前的研究，进行有限数量的新研究，并为下一个关于英国社会运动和真实性的重大研究项目做准备，详见上文和下文，以及附件中的支持文件。

Does protest matter? This remains a perennial question of social movement scholarship; we still debate whether and how social movements cause social and political change. My research contributes to this debate by expanding on the least applied approaches of the three giants of social movement theory, namely resource mobilisation, political opportunity structure, and framing processes theories. The latter, which investigates the cultural and 'meaning-making' work of social movements, has been used only sporadically to explain the consequences of protest, and when used, has arguably not reached convincing conclusions. Yet what framing theory does, although not always explicitly, is remind us that we need to take into what social movements are asking for (claims), and how they are asking for it (frames), not just whether they have resources they can mobilise or political opportunities they can take advantage of. I build on this to show that the claiming and framing strategies of social movements do help explain their outcomes, and can directly lead to positive outcomes even under unfavourable political circumstances. As my DPhil thesis shows, this depends very much on both the material and symbolic costs that social movements can impose, weighed against the cost that meeting their demands would present for their targets. Thus, for example, I was able to explain how indigenous protesters in Peru we able to get decrees opening up their land to extractive industry overturned in 2009, despite a President in power that described them as 'savages'. They were able to do so through materially costly disruption, and by imposing high enough symbolic costs through the combination of their claiming (protecting our 'ancestral' land), framing strategies (arguing for ancestral rights as guardians of the Amazon and displaying seemingly authentic indigeneity), and the fact that heavy repression turned public opinion to their advantage. What needs further research in the above trajectory is the role of perceived authenticity for social movements. We know from Latin America that indigenous leaders and activists are always immersed in authenticity battles as they need to convince supporters, constituents, opponents, and the public in general that they are genuine representatives of their purported constituents, that they have legitimate goals, and that they use acceptable means to try and achieve them. This is not confined to indigenous struggles; yet the dynamics of authenticity battles have not been researched in Northern scholarship on social movements in general. My DPhil thesis was able to show that the external resonance of indigenous movements' claims and frames matters for their outcomes. It was not able to, due to lack of comparable cross-national and over-time data on public opinion, fully evaluate the nature of the relationship between movement strategies and public opinion. In particular, it could not test whether frame coherence-the coherence between claims and frames-mattered for movement outcomes. We know from political theory and philosophy that perceived coherence-between identity and actions, between manifestos and policies, etc.-influences whether an individual or a politician are seen as authentic, and thus also trustworthy and legitimate. I argue that this also matters for social movements and their consequences; yet this needs further research. How do social movements try to signal authenticity? What combinations of claims, frames and tactics are perceived as authentic? Does being perceived as authentic guarantee positive outcomes? In order to seek answers to these questions, I propose to consolidate my current research, carry out a limited amount of new research, and prepare for the next major research project on social movements and authenticity in the UK, as detailed above and below, and in the attached supporting documents.