Are you concerned about social justice reforms, feeling impatient with the limitations, restrictions in limited democracies, but feeling unsure of what the alternatives are? Are you interested in learning from successful social movements that have overcome the limitations of authoritarian regimes? If you are someone that enjoys using research and education as means of achieving social change, consider joining as a research collaborator to learn about the theory and practice of organizing social movements in authoritarian regimes from the case study of the successful Polish Solidarity movement from the 1980’s.
As a collaborator you will be working with a team of unaffiliated individuals for 2 months from Apr to May 2021 to prepare a report to identify practical lessons from this case study. If you would like to learn more about the opportunity, let me know by filling out the form or you can send an email to sggreennewdeal@gmail.com
Learning from success
On December 13 1981 martial law was declared in Poland. Through the winter of 1981 and 1982 the Polish military initiated an aggressive campaign to disarm and dissolve the popular Solidarity labor organization. They put the leader Lech Walesa under house arrest and even outlawed the organization for a period. For almost a decade the organization continued to survive, resisting the authoritarian regime. The movement would eventually prevail in a second growth wave starting in 1988 and ultimate transformational political victory permanently removing the authoritarian regime from Poland in the 1989 elections.
Concerned citizens in Southeast Asia may feel a tension between their desire to make an impact in moving towards a more just society and the uncertainty of how to make that a reality in an authoritarian or semi-authoritarian regime. For example in Singapore, as a limited democracy, the state has a strong authoritarian capacity to maintain political dominance, suppress dissent in comparison to the small group of activists and opposition sympathizers with limited capacity to challenge, change status quo institutions. Historical examples of activism in Singapore have been described as “Pragmatic resistance” strategy characterized as working mostly within the authoritarian system while selectively looking for reforms and opportunities where they are safe on an incremental basis. This report is written to those social justice activists who are critical of the limited effectiveness, scale and speed of the strategy and are open to learning from the successes and failures of social movements in other countries past and present which have embraced more high stakes, confrontational strategies and aimed for broader transformational changes on shorter timescales. There are several cases of successful nonviolent pro-democracy regime changes to draw from not only recently the 2011 Arab Spring to the late 1980’s movements in the Philippines, South Korea, and Eastern Europe. Any of these cases could be instructive; there are lessons common to all of them. The Solidarity movement is selected as a starting point. The case study uses the resource mobilization theory of social movements as a diagnostic frame to organize the analysis. The report is organized into four perspectives of the case study - external factors, the intentional strategic effort of the organizers, managing public legitimacy and practical strategies for adapting to authoritarian regimes.
Writing about social movements
The Report
The output of the case study analysis is a report. The report is intended to be available to different audiences with different accessibility needs. The main report will contain the full set of analysis and recommendations in 10-20 pages intended for an audience interested in depth and quality. For a general audience and to facilitate discussion, the highlights of the report and audience prompts will be adapted into a 20-min presentation. Any supplemental materials to introduce concepts such as Resource Mobilization Theory and the list of sources used in the preparation of the report will be available in an Appendix.
The Social movement writer
is responsible for understanding the activist audience, the concepts of resource mobilization theory, how to apply that diagnostic framework to the case study of Solidarity and identity lessons learned uniquely adapted to the audience. You will be working in a small group team to collaboratively produce a common set of resources that will be delivered for use by the audience. The project is expected to last for 2 months from 01 Apr to 31 May and you should prepare to commit to 1-4 hours per week of contribution for the duration of the project. This is a voluntary unpaid role for a non commercial entity.
Responsibilities
Understand the characteristics and concerns of the social justice activists audience
Understand resource mobilization theory, key details of the solidarity events
Preparing presentation slides
Research/review sources, learn theoretical concepts
Original analysis uniquely adapted to the audience needs
Propose new content ideas and edits
Write report sections
Skills and competencies
Fluent English
Basic familiar with concepts in sociology, political science
Familiar with the target audience - impatient social justice activists in authoritarian states
Writing skills - able to construct original creative writing response using secondary research methods
Other ways to get involved and contribute
Share your feedback / interest in activism in illiberal democracies/authoritarian regimes
Contribute to the discussion on twitter
Register to attend one of the events in May/June
To learn more visit the project page