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The concept of resilience has been captured by a neoliberal discourse displacing responsibility to individuals and regions. This article specifically examines the regional labour market resilience of workers and other regional stakeholders relating to an ongoing economic restructuring process of deindustrialization and redundancies in Anglesey, North West Wales, in the UK. Using 11 years of longitudinal qualitative research, we provide an empirical narrative that applies a labour market resilience framework (challenge, context, responses and outcomes) from a workers' perspective. It connects the empirical findings from this critical case study to broader generalizability for regional studies and regional policy implications. Regarding generalizability to regional studies theory, the labour market resilience of workers is impacted at different but interlinking levels: the global systemic level of neo-liberal capitalism; the national country level of institutional varieties of capitalism (liberal market economies versus coordinated market economies); and regional variations across countries. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this article we explore the emergence of a cluster of social movement organisations that have critically taken issue with nanotechnology in Germany, the UK and internationally. By applying concepts borrowed from Social Movement Research we demonstrate that this cluster is a 'spin-off' from the preceding movement against agrofood biotechnology, however, never succeeds in mobilizing a comparable 'antinanotechnology movement'. We argue that the turn toward participatory and deliberative practices that is characteristic of nanotechnology policy and, to a major extent, is based on the perceived threat of a 'public backlash' against nanotechnology, while being of little political impact, reinforces the activity of these critical organisations through the provision of political opportunities. We further argue that the stagnation of these organisations can be explained by low policy impact and low public responsiveness respectively and conclude that their trajectories hinge to a major extent on policy impact and the responsiveness of the mass-public. We end by making a concluding remark about the limits to the project of democratizing social contention through public engagement. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The UK Climate Camp protests of 2007 are an important moment in an ongoing analysis of the success of ‘green protests’ in the UK. A legacy of knowledge transfer between activist groups, NGOs and UK publics is visible; in the initiation and development of recent climate-related protests, their key frames (the stakes raised), targets and forms of mobilisation, and the allies the protestors were able to attract. Defining terms (success in particular) is difficult, due to multiple differences in aims and objectives among a variety of social actors. The paper identifies a complex spectrum of green perspectives among activists and broader green networks. UK green protest success is defined and identified in terms of capacity building; protest waves spanning several activist generations have framed important sustainability citizenship stakes with broad public resonance and uptake. The use of protest tactics among broader publics is also a significant legacy. However, the mainstreaming of green stakes and their co-option — ‘green washing’ — is causing clashes between ‘strong green’ and ‘weak green’ perspectives, particularly around issues of green consumption, power relations and political economy. These struggles over green stakes and strategies re-emphasise long-standing difficulties with defining protest success. This is an ongoing narrative.British Politics (2008) 3, 92–109. doi:10.1057/palgrave.bp.4200081 [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Public participation in technological decision-making is increasingly seen as de rigueur, but the limits and purpose of such participation remain open to debate. In this paper we explore the tension between different rationales for widening participation and examine their implications for its practice. Taking debates about medical genomics in the UK as an illustrative example, we argue that more heterogeneous participation and debate have the potential to improve the scrutiny and accountability of science within representative democracies. In doing so we also argue that it is necessary to replace the language of `lay expertise' with a more systematic and rigorous treatment of the expertise or its absence that characterizes different participants. Drawing on the theoretical work of Collins & Evans (2002), we distinguish between those processes where expert knowledge is required and debate is conducted within the public domain, rather than by the public itself, and those where the views of non-expert lay citizens are needed and valued. The effect of adopting this approach is to permit a more inclusive treatment of the `technical' while also providing a positive role for non-expert citizens in the democratic control and oversight of science. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Using the Blackwood (South Wales) roads protest during February to April 2004 as a case study, the article discusses the potential for a re-emergence of UK eco-action, examining the possibility that re-engagement with ‘single issue’ environmental protests is a probable direction for the UK direct action movement. Tactically and strategically, Blackwood could be a signifier for a new environmentally focused ‘cycle of contention’ which explicitly makes the links between the environment/climate change, and the frames of oil, war and capitalism which have been some of the key discursive repertoires of the anti-globalisation and anti-war movement(s). A potential return to ‘single issue’ eco-action should not be seen as ‘wheel reinvention’ but rather evidence of a movement which has reflexively built capacity over an activist generation. The article provides evidence of predisposed and latent mobilisation potential; emergent networks and campaigns focusing on eco-action in the United Kingdom. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Ecological sabotage (ecotage) has been a feature of the more radical parts of the environmental movement in the Western world for several decades. While it may be perceived as being the preserve of underground cells of 'eco-terrorists', in the UK those who carry out small-scale acts of sabotage are also often engaged in relatively conventional political activity; view sabotage as a complement to other action, not as an end in itself; and are committed to avoiding physical harm to people. Drawing on ethnographic data from research with British activists, this article seeks to define ecotage and to explain its place in the repertoires of the environmental direct action movement in the UK. It is argued that the self-limiting form of ecotage in the UK has its roots in cross-movement debates that have developed over several decades and that national traditions remain important in understanding the development of social movement repertoires. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Based on ethnographic research funded by the Economic and Social Research Council this article defines the nature of the British direct action movement, interpreting its protests in terms of the strategic rationales given by its activists. The breadth of the movement's targets distinguishes it from pressure groups and makes it harder to apply conventional notions of success and failure to its actions. Most activists are young and, in previous generations, most had moved on to less demanding forms of action after a decade. Direct action groups are typically involved in a range of practical community projects as well as protest and are much less isolated from ties with other groups than is often thought. Direct action protest has become more frequent and the intensity of intra-movement divisions has reduced. Although more provocative than other forms of protest, direct action has come to be an important means of voicing concerns largely excluded from the political mainstream, with evidence of significant public support. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Abstract We describe and analyse the fuel protests in the UK in September and November 2000. We draw on theories of social movements to explain the success of the first of these protests and the failure of the second. We show how the loose, network forms of organisation contributed to the success in September, and the attempts to impose more formal organisations helped to cause the failure in November. We also show how the success of the protests depended on the articulation of the aims of the protesters with dominant social forces in British politics, in particular the oil companies, the police, and the mass media. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Discusses the protests against high fuel prices in 2000 and their implications for the environmental movement in Great Britain. Public support for the protests; Relationship between environmental groups and the fuel protesters; Active participation of farmers in the protests.