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This paper explores the role emotion play in individual political action. We analyze strategic decision-making at the individual level by examining if (and when) individuals use emotions in their efforts to persuade a political target. To test whether individuals choose what emotions best complement their claims-making relative to their political targets, we assess patterns between political framing and emotional indicators as they appear in a coded sample of constituent emails sent to Governor Jeb Bush pertaining to the removal of the feeding tube of Terri Schiavo. The Terri Schiavo case is so compelling for the study of spontaneous deployment of emotion in individual political action because it encompasses a number of intense issues that resonate with individuals on a personal level. In general, our analysis lends evidence to the notion that emotions are used by individual actors as a resource in their political activism. We find patterns consistent with our understanding of the use of negative emotions, moral batteries, and moral shocks theorized as part of political action. Our analysis provides evidential weight and insight to these concepts noting that they extend beyond their deployment within social movements. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Depsite scholarly interest in mass media and social movements, know little about how activism is visually portrayed to the broader public across political issues or over time. Our analysis, which systematically examines 269 broadcast news stories sampled between 1970 and 2012 on five social movements, 1) examines the demographics of the individuals who have standing on social movement issues and 2) compares the depictions of individual activists to groups of activists. We find that movement coverage provides women and men of color opportunities to give their opinions on the news of the day, but that white men dominate movement visuals. We also find that FOX news is significantly less likely to include men of color in its coverage, that technological innovation has little influence on who has standing in coverage, and the inclusion of women in coverage is largely associated with the Women's Movement. In our second set of analyses we find that individual activists and groups of activists are portrayed differently in coverage. Individual activists are depicted as professionals - wearing business clothing and minimizing emotional expression - while groups of activists often are shown in street clothes and expressing a broader range of emotions, including anger. More importantly, activists participating in contemporary movements (Occupy and Tea Party Movements) are shown as engaged in rebellious and militant behavior - and engaged in conflict with one another - far more often than the past. This shift may reflect a trend in which journalists use contemporary movements to visually illustrate political polarization in America. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

An earlier version of this paper was presented at the symposium "NGOs and Reputation" hosted by the Oxford University Centre for Corporate Reputation. I thank David Meyer, Jill Quadagno, Brayden King, Jennifer Earl, Suzanne Staggenborg, Cal Morrill, David Snow, and activists from Amnesty International, Witness International, and Greenpeace for comments on earlier drafts of this paper. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper, we take a first step at examining how political generation affects collective action generally and identity processes specifically. Here, we expand on a collective coping approach to understand how political generation provides a foundation for diverse individuals to come together and change their social and personal identities. Drawing on 52 in-depth interviews with members of the Red Hat Society as well as a two year participant observation of organizational events, we show that women draw on their political generation, and the gains of the women's movement specifically, to oppose cultural constructions of aging. The Red Hat Society provides a "free space" for women to foster a collective age identity that both visibly challenges aging norms and provides its members new standards for self-approval. We conclude by highlighting the importance of focusing on political generation to understand collective action over the life course and call for more scholarship on the function of political generation in social change. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Despite scholarly interest in identity, we know very little about how individuals strategically deploy identity in their political action apart from social movements or outside of the voting booth. Drawing 2,509 emails sent by individuals to Governor Jeb Bush regarding his efforts to reinsert the hydration and nutrition tubes of Terri Schiavo, we analyze 1) how often individuals deploy one or more identities in their efforts to encourage and dissuade Bush's intervention on the Schiavo case, 2) whether there are patterns in what identities individuals deploy in their strategic efforts, and 3) how individuals use identity to bracket their support for or against intervention. We find that individuals, indeed, invoke identity in their emails and that some identities are more likely to be deployed alone while others are layered in ways designed to buttress claims as to why intervention is (in)appropriate. Additionally, we find some support for our expectations regarding how individuals use identity to bracket their support for or against government intervention on the Schiavo case. We conclude the paper with a discussion of the implications of our findings for research on identity and political action. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

There is a great deal of debate regarding the role of the Internet in social movement processes. Scholars on one side argue that the Internet does not fundamentally alter social movements but makes processes more efficient, while others claim the Internet alters both social movement dynamics and environments. We find that although the Internet affects social movement dynamics, it is not always in desirable ways. Drawing on archival and media analyses, participant observation, and interview data of MoveOn and Billionaires for Bush, we find that e-organizations, or groups primarily mobilized in the virtual world, employ a range of operating procedures that allow them to involve a broad array of individuals in activism and thus achieve their immediate goals. However, we also find that this involvement is often ephemeral, which means e-organizations must constantly identify new threats in order to attract constituents. ..PAT.-Unpublished Manuscript [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Social movement scholars long have argued that culture is important to movement dynamics and outcomes because cultural spaces and activities nurture political consciousness and action. However, this work often ignores how such spaces and activities contribute to organizational efforts to affect societal norms and stereotypes. Drawing on a comprehensive analysis of mass media coverage from 1998 to 2008 and 55 in-depth interviews with members of the Red Hat Society, an organization designed to change how older women are regarded in American society, we find that explicitly non-political, social groups can mobilize large numbers of people and affect broad change. Specifically, we find that social groups simultaneously alter the self-perceptions of members, bystanders who come in contact with group members and the market, which creates products and services to capture consumer dollars. We conclude by discussing the importance of considering the market as a potentially positive force in cultural change. ..PAT.-Unpublished Manuscript [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article contributes to a more systematic understanding of media coverage outcomes by examining how organizational characteristics, government action, and allies and opponents interact and combine to account for differences in media coverage in mainstream, liberal, and conservative outlets over time. Using Qualitative Comparative Analysis (QCA) to assess archival data collected on four social movement organizations mobilizing on the abortion issue during the 1980 to 2000 time period, the study highlights the importance of organizational characteristics to mainstream media coverage and calls attention to other organizational factors that affect outcomes in liberal and conservative outlets. Additionally, the study emphasizes the differential role that government action and elite allies and opponents play in media outcomes. The analysis suggests that the pathways to media coverage in liberal and conservative outlets are more complex and require a more nuanced understanding of media coverage outcomes as well as the role of organizational characteristics in these outcomes. ..PAT.-Unpublished Manuscript [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

While conceptually discursive opportunities provides a bridge between structural and cultural approaches to social movements, there is still relatively little known about how discursive opportunities are produced, change over time, and affect movement dynamics and outcomes. This is largely a result of scholars focusing on claims makers and the challenges they face in diffusing their ideas throughout society rather than how the institutional processes affect discursive opportunities. I address this shortcoming in the literature by building on existing theories of social movements, mass media, and organizations to analyze how the principles and practices of journalists working in different kinds of media outlets (mainstream, conservative, and liberal) affect the discursive opportunities available to social movement actors over time. Drawing on media coverage of the abortion issue from 1980 to 2000 and interviews with journalists, editors, and producers in nine media outlets, I find that discursive opportunities are fluid, meaning that they both vary during the same historical moment and over time. Conceptually, I expand understandings of discursive opportunities by focusing on how journalistic principles and practices affect journalistic evaluations of different events, alter the standing of social movement actors across outlets and over time, and affect issue agendas. ..PAT.-Unpublished Manuscript [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Movement outcomes, in part, are a reflection of the tactics, strategies, and opportunities of activists and their opponents. While scholars have emphasized the importance of coalitions in movement success, they have ignored the role that competiton plays in shaping opportunities and outcomes over time. This paper analyzes the role of competitors, or like-minded actors, in media coverage outcomes of four social movement organizations in the abortion debate from 1980 to 2000. Drawing on archival data, interviews with activists and journalists, and a content analysis of 1,424 media stories, the analysis shows that competitors are as important as opponents and media strategy in determining media opportunities and coverage outcomes. The implications of the analyses for social movement theory and for the understanding of how both cooperation and competition affect different kinds of outcomes are discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

There is a general agreement among scholars that mass media have failed the American citizenry in one way or another. However, scholarly work almost exclusively draws on analyses of mainstream media outlets to make this claim. Here, I trace the reasons for this myopic focus and is offer a re-conceptualization of mass media- one that moves beyond the mainstream and considers the relationships between different kinds of outlets, the audience, and journalistic principles and practices. I argue that mass media constitute an organizational field that is hierarhically organized and shaped like a prism, which filters and refracts issues and events in ways that resonate with target audiences. I then draw on interviews with journalists, editors, and producers in nine media outlets and a content analysis of 1,424 media stories on abortion to illustrate the utility of this conceptualization. Specifically, the analysis shows that journalists working in different kinds of media outlets (partisan and mainstream) differently conceptualize their contributions to public interest, and this in turn affects journalistic principles, practices, and how they discuss controversial issues like abortion. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In recent years, social movement scholars have increasingly focused on the role of media in creating opportunities for movement actors to mobilize a broader public on political issues. However, the mechanisms and processes that affect the ability of a social movement organization (SMO) to get its preferred messages in mass media are undertheorized. This paper begins to remedy this deficit by using a relational approach to offer an account of how social movement organizations interact with mass media organizations and the larger social and political environment in an attempt to get their preferred messages on the media agenda. I begin with a brief discussion of how scholars address the relationship between social movement organizations and mass media. I specifically address three approaches: the closed system approach, the open system approach, and the relational approach. Then, I outline the relational approach as it pertains to movement-media interactions, specifically focusing on those factors that affect the ability of activists to garner media attention and get their preferred messages to a broader audience. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In recent years, social movement scholars have increasingly focused on the role of media in creating opportunities for movement actors to mobilize a broader public on political issues. However, the mechanisms and processes that affect the ability of a social movement organization (SMO) to get its preferred messages in mass media are undertheorized. This paper begins to remedy this deficit by using a relational approach to offer an account of how social movement organizations interact with mass media organizations and the larger social and political environment in an attempt to get their preferred messages on the media agenda. I begin with a brief discussion of how scholars address the relationship between social movement organizations and mass media. I specifically address three approaches: the closed system approach, the open system approach, and the relational approach. Then, I outline the relational approach as it pertains to movement-media interactions, specifically focusing on those factors that affect the ability of activists to garner media attention and get their preferred messages to a broader audience. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

From global political organizing to vote swapping, the Internet has altered the form, content, and context of social movements. While there is growing scholarly attention on the tactics cyber activists use and the outcomes of these efforts, there has been very little work on how Internet organizations are structured or how they move their virtual activists from the computer to the street. In this paper, we examine this process through an analysis of four Internet movement organizations: Moveon; Students for Academic Freedom, Billionaires for Bush; and the Foundation for Individual Rights in Education. Drawing on resource mobilization theory, we argue that the Internet is an endogenous resource that can be used to mobilize sympathesizers in both the virtual and the real world -- particularly at the local level. However, we find that the structure of an Internet organization (in the real and virtual world) as well as the kinds of communications networks they maintain with e-activists greatly affects mobilization and campaign success. We conclude by suggesting how resource mobilization theory can deepen our understanding of social movements in the Internet age. ..PAT.-Unpublished Manuscript [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Despite increased scholarly interest in how activists use visuals in claim-making and mobilization, little is known about how mainstream news media visually represent social movements and their causes over time. Given the number of studies that argue that journalistic routines, norms and conventions create hegemonic discourse around political issues, this gap is surprising. In this paper we examine whether the images used to visually represent the abortion issue are homogenized. Drawing on an analysis of 2093 print and electronic news images associated with the abortion debate, we find that the visuals used in media coverage are very similar. Likewise, we find that the most frequently shown visual landscapes for the abortion issue are relatively stable across six different kinds of events including commemorations, incidents of clinic violence, legislation, Supreme Court decisions, presidential elections and executive nominations. We conclude with a discussion of the implications of this work for the study of social movements and call for more research on how visual landscapes influence audience understanding of both new and enduring issues. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Drawing on an extensive, two-year, qualitative analysis of two organizations mobilizing around academic freedom, Students for Academic Freedom (SAF) and Foundation for Individual Rights in Education (FIRE), this paper examines how organizational identity shapes media strategy. We find that organizational identity affects media strategy by determining a group's media targets as well as its credibility with, and access to, media professionals. The unabashedly conservative SAF has limited credibility with its mainstream media targets and must use its website and alternative venues to build the legitimacy of its issues. In order to get coverage, SAF must engage professors and administrators in public debate or, if this strategy fails, generate enough controversy that its issue gets covered by alternative outlets and, then, crosses over into local mainstream outlets. In contrast, as a mainstream organization with relatively modest goals, FIRE has some credibility with media professionals and more options regarding how it uses media to accomplish its goals. FIRE primarily affects change by threatening to use media to expose the "illiberal" policies and practices of institutions. However, when it does need to follow through on its threat, FIRE collaborates with actors from across the political and institutional spectrum and devises tactics that attract the media spotlight. We conclude the paper with a discussion of how the implications of this research for understandings of social movements and mass media. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]