Publications by Type: Journal Article

2018

Almeida, Paul, and Chris Chase-Dunn. 2018. “Globalization and social movements.” Annual Review of Sociology 44:189–211.

A growing body of scholarship acknowledges the increasing influence of global forces on social institutions and societies on multiple scales. We focus here on the role of globalization processes in shaping collective action and social movements. Three areas of global change and movements are examined: first, long-term global trends and collective action; second, research on national and local challenges to economic globalization, including backlash movements and the types of economic liberalization measures most associated with inducing oppositional movements; and third, the emergence of contemporary transnational social movements. In each of these arenas we address debates on diffusion, intervening mechanisms, and the outcomes of collective mobilization in response to global pressures.

Mora, Maria De Jesus, Rodolfo Rodriguez, Alejandro Zermeño, and Paul Almeida. 2018. “Immigrant rights and social movements.” Sociology Compass 12(8):e12599.

The disciplinary fields of immigration and social movements have largely developed as two distinct subareas of sociology. Scholars contend that immigrant rights, compared to other movements, have been given less attention in social movement research. Studies of immigrant-based movements in recent decades have reached a stage whereby we can now assess how immigrant movement scholarship informs the general social movement literature in several areas. In this article, we show the contributions of empiricalstudies of immigrant movements in four primary arenas: (a) emergence; (b) participation; (c) framing; and (d) outcomes. Contemporary immigrant struggles offer social movement scholarship opportunities to incorporate these campaigns and enhance current theories and concepts as earlier protest waves advanced studies of collective action.

2017

Inclán, Maria, and Paul D Almeida. 2017. “Ritual demonstrations versus reactive protests: Participation across mobilizing contexts in Mexico City.” Latin American Politics and Society 59(4):47–74.

Using an innovative survey of protest participants and nonparticipants from five major street demonstrations in Mexico City in 2011 and 2012, this study tests the assumption that influences on protest participation vary across different types of events; namely, ritual demonstrations and reactive protests. The comparison is based on two assumptions: that these are two of the dominant forms of protest in contemporary Latin America, and that specifying the context for different types of social movement participation provides a better understanding of the individual mobilization process for groups seeking to defend their rights or gain new benefits. The comparative analyses reveal some crucial differences. Political interest and previous political experience are more influential in the decision to take part in reactive demonstrations. For ritual demonstrations, the decision to participate tends to be driven more by personal and organizational connections.

2015

Almeida, Paul D. 2015. “Unintended Consequences of State-Led Development: A Theory of Mobilized Opposition to Neoliberalism.” Sociology of Development 1(2):259-76. doi: 10.1525/sod.2015.1.2.51.

The mass mobilizations against neoliberal reforms are rooted in the weakening of the state-led development model and the erosion of social citizenship rights. At the same time, infrastructures created by the developmental state provide the organizational capacity to resist market-driven globalization. The study develops a conceptual framework for understanding the major arenas of state-led development in the twentieth century in relation to the infrastructures and organizations that mobilize social movement campaigns against neoliberalism in the twenty-first century. Special attention is given to public education, health care, public utilities, state subsidies, and transportation networks as laying the foundation for civil society’s ability to collectively defend social protections granted in the preglobalization era in the global South.

Almeida, Paul. 2015. “Neoliberal Forms of Capital and the Rise of Social Movement Partysim in Central America.” Journal of World Systems Research 21(1):8-24. doi: 10.5195/jwsr.2015.524.

Historical shifts in global economic formations shape the strategies of resistance movements in the global South. Neoliberal forms of economic development over the past thirty years in Central America have weakened traditional actors sponsoring popular mobilization such as labor unions and rural cooperatives. At the same time, the free market reforms produced new threats to economic livelihood and well-being throughout the region. The neoliberal measures that have generated the greatest levels of mass discontent include rising prices, privatization, labor flexibility laws, mining projects, and free trade. This article analyzes the role of emerging anti-neoliberal political parties in alliance with popular movements in Central America. Countries with already existing strong anti-systemic parties in the initial phases of the global turn to neoliberalism in the late twentieth century resulted in more efficacious manifestations of social movement partyism in the twenty-first century resisting free market globalization.

2012

Almeida, Paul. 2012. “Subnational opposition to globalization.” Social Forces 90(4):1051–1072.

Using a unique dataset on the geographic distribution of reported protest events from local sources, the study explains the variation in community-level mobilization in response to neoliberal reforms in two countries in the global periphery. Building on insights from macro, cross-national studies of protests related to market reforms, this article highlights local structural conditions that more likely generate popular contention in poorer countries. Count regression models show that localities with greater levels of state and community infrastructure (highways, administrative offices, universities, NGOs and local chapters of oppositional parties) were associated with heightened collective action opposing the privatization of health care and public utilities. These state and community infrastructures were shaped by national contexts in the era of state-led development preceding the current epoch of accelerated globalization.

2010

Almeida, Paul. 2010. “El Salvador: Elecciones y movimientos sociales.” Revista De Ciencia Política 30(2):319–334.

Esta investigaci\ on se enfoca en las elecciones presidenciales e hist\ oricas en El Salvadoren 2009. Hay un \ enfasis dado a la transformaci\ on del partido pol\ ıtico FMLN en laera despu\ es de la guerra civil y la alianza entre el partido y los movimientos socialesen la sociedad civil. La combinaci\ on de los procesos de la democratizaci\ on y laspol\ ıticas de liberalizaci\ on econ\ omica en los 1990 y 2000 aport\ o al reforzamiento de lacoalici\ on entre el partido de la izquierda y los movimientos populares. Gradualmenteel FMLN se pod\ ıa canalizar la energ\ ıa de las campañas de los movimientos socialescontra las pol\ ıticas neoliberales y opini\ on p\ ublica en triunfos electorales al nivellocal, parlamentario y Ejecutivo.

2009

2008

Almeida, Paul D. 2008. “The Sequencing of Success: Organizing Templates and Neoliberal Policy Outcomes.” Mobilization 13(2):165-87.

In the 1990s and early 2000s, government privatization and austerity programs served as the cornerstone of free market reforms implemented throughout the developing world. The selling off of government utilities, resources, and services laid the groundwork for a highly contested battleground in the global South over social and economic distribution. This study examines the sequencing of campaigns against neoliberal reforms in Central America. Two successful movement campaigns against privatization in El Salvador and Costa Rica followed failed collective attempts to impede similar economic reforms. The policy outcomes against neo-liberal measures are explained by the path-dependent nature of the organizing templates activists chose to employ and the breadth of social movement unionism achieved. The article offers insights into similar battles currently waged in the third world over the pace of economic globalization and the conditions in which oppositional movements are likely to succeed or fail.