diani - networks and social movements_from metaphor o theory

7/29/2019 Diani - Networks and Social Movements_from Metaphor o Theory

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Very first draft, NOT for citation or quotation

Networks and social movements: from metaphor to theory?

Mario Diani

University of Strathclyde in Glasgow

Paper for the conference "Social Movements Analysis: The Network Perspective" Ross

Priory, Loch Lomond, 23-25 June 2000

Department of Government

University of Strathclyde

16, Richmond Street

Glasgow G1 1XQ

Phone: 0141 - 548 2734

Fax: 0141 - 552 5677

E-mail: [email protected]


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This paper is, I'm afraid, a late addition to the long tradition of conference papers which fail

to live up to their pompous titles. For all its promise, it does not go beyond summarizing a

few key themes which have run through network approaches to the study of collective

action, and more specifically of social movements, in recent (and sometimes not so recent:

Gerlach, 1971; or Pinard, 1968) years. Hopefully, a few bold statements, coupled with as

many and as bold examples, will be enough to get discussion on its way. I'd like to organize

my discussion around four main points. First, I will briefly recall some important applications

of network analytical techniques to our object of interest.1 I then will address the most

crucial question, namely, what is the analytical gain - or at the very least, the promise of

analytical gains - over established approaches to social movements, that we may expect

from a network perspective? In other words, why should social movement researchers

engage with a set of concepts and procedures which is undoubtedly complex, at times

cumbersome in its application, and always difficult to digest (at least for the novice)? Third, I

will attempt to identify a few tasks for future investigation.

Consistently with my inclination to emphasize continuities and consistencies between

approaches rather than the opposite (Diani, 1992), I will stop short of claiming that a

paradigmatic shift is required towards a network view of social movements, if we are to

prevent social movement analysis from getting stuck into its own recent success. I will argue,

however, that social network approaches may offer an opportunity for expanding social

movement research in new directions; more specifically, they may also launch bridges to

cognate fields, and to scholars applying similar concepts to different, but not necessarily

incommensurable, empirical problems.2 Having consolidated impressively over the last

decades as an independent field, social movement analysis now needs to engage in a new

exercise of cross-fertilization or risk losing some of its intellectual appeal and promise. 3

1. Social network applications to social movement analysis

The goal of this section is not to provide an up-to-date, comprehensive treatment of

network contributions to social movement analysis (although this will be a future task, given

the flourish of recent work in the field which renders the single available piece obsolete:

Knoke & Wisely, 1990). Nor am I going to engage in a reconstruction of different positions

driven by a strong theoretical framework (for that see Emirbayer & Goodwin, 1994). I will

simply point at some contributions in the field which have either focused on individual, ego-

1 Although structural analysis does not necessarily need formal network analysis, and may

also be conducted in qualitative terms, in the current draft emphasis will be on the former.

This shortcoming will be remedied at a later stage through a systematic reassessment of

contributions which adopt this approach from an explicitly qualitative perspective (e.g.,

Rochon, 1998; Lichterman, 1996).2 Obvious examples here include work by social historians (Gould, 1995; Bearman, 1993),

analysts of organizations and policy making (Knoke et al., 1996), sociologists interested in

class relations (Scott, 1997).3 See also Zald (2000) and Diani (2000a); for a more skeptical view of the need for new

agendas in social movement research, Klandermans (2000).


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networks, or global networks, and at the role of network variables in the different analytical

models.

Analysts of social movements and collective action have been paying increasing attention to

the network structure and dynamics of political contention. The notion that collective action

ultimately depends upon the existence of pervasive social ties between prospective

participants has a long history in the field (e.g. Oberschall, 1973; Tilly, 1978; Snow et al.,

1980); as does recognition that social movements largely consist of networks of

organizations and cannot be reduced to any specific formal group or association (as

acknowledged even by those who have mostly focused in their empirical work on specific

movement organizations: Zald and McCarthy, 1987).

More recently, however, the interest of the scholarly community in the relationship between

social movements and social networks has grown in both the range of the research topics

addressed, and the depth of the research results. If social network analysis at large has

moved from metaphor to substance (Wellman, 1988), the same may be safely claimed for

social network approaches to the study of collective action.

The most important set of contributions has dealt with processes of individual recruitment.

The key question has been, to which extent do the shape and the characteristics of

individuals' ego-networks affect their chances to get involved in collective action? From the

generic recognition of the role of social linkages in recruitment processes, as opposed to the

social isolation argument from mass society theorists we have gradually moved towards a

greater recognition of the peculiar contribution of specific linkages to specific types of

involvement. Embeddedness in specific relational context has been found as more or less

conducive to various forms of collective engagement (Snow et al., 1980) has been explored

in a variety of contexts (Oliver, 1984; Kriesi, 1988; Opp, 1989; McAdam and Paulsen,

1993; McAdam and Fernandez, 1990; Fernandez and McAdam, 1989). More recently,greater attention has been paid to the role of social networks in securing individual

commitment over time (Tindall, forthcoming; Passy, forthcoming). Whatever the specific

approach, social networks are measured here at the ego-centric level and operate as

predictors of individual behavior.

Another set of studies has focused on the structure of global networks and its impact on the

development of collective action (Gould, 1991, 1993, and 1995; Marwell and Oliver,

1993; Oberschall and Kim, 1996; Kim and Bearman, 1997). In some cases (e.g. Marwell

and Oliver, 1993) the properties of the network as a whole have been treated as a

predictor of individuals' propensity to overcome the free rider problem. In other cases (e.g.Gould, 1991 and 1995), the nature and distribution of social relations within and across

local communities has been identified as one major determinant of their overall levels of

collective action.

The analyses mentioned above deal primarily with the problem of collective action at large.

Another line of inquiry has paid more explicit attention to the structure of social movements

per se. More specifically, scholars in this vein have tried to identify patterns in the flows of

exchanges which bind together people and/or organizations which mutually identify - and are


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perceived by external actors - as part of a broader collective endeavor. Studies in this area

have focused on the patterns of alliances and/or overlapping memberships within specific

movements (e.g. Diani, 1995) or movement sectors (e.g. Carroll and Ratner, 1996). In

some cases, they have taken an explicit diachronic perspective and traced the evolution of

linkages between movement elites and movement organizations during a long-term campaign

(e.g. Mische, 1997) or over several decades (e.g. Rosenthal et al., 1985 and 1997). While

most analyses focusing on recruitment processes emphasized the role of social networks as

predictors of behavior, works focusing on interorganizational or intersectoral linkages tend

to regard networks as much as outcomes as predictors of action. The configuration of a

given network at a given point in time is in other words taken as a representation of the logic

of action movement actors follow in their linkage-building activities (Rucht, 1989; Diani,

1995).

Yet another set of studies have been devoted to the role of social movements in the political

and policy process. Network analyses of the role of advocacy groups, public interest

groups, social movement organizations in policy making have been conducted as part of

broader studies of political dynamics in a number of countries including the US and Japan

(e.g. Laumann and Knoke, 1987; Broadbent, 1998). A historical perspective has also

been adopted to chart the evolution of patterns of alliances between different social groups

and/or political organizations in both unsettled political systems such as post-WWI Italy

(Franzosi, 1999) and more stable democracies like contemporary Unites States (Bearman

and Everett, 1993).

Finally, there has been a growing interest in locating the analysis of collective action in the

context of broader theories of structure and agency. Attempts have been made to develop a

relational approach to social theory, which draws explicitly upon recent developments in the

study of collective action, while at the same time opening up new avenues for the latter

(Emirbayer and Goodwin, 1994; Emirbayer, 1997; Emirbayer and Mische, 1998;Emirbayer and Sheller, 1998).

2. Social movement theory as social network theory?

Few would disagree that social networks are an important component of social movements,

better, of those empirical phenomena we conventionally designate as "social movements".

Similarly few would deny that some attention to network processes is essential in order to

make sense of the prevailing logic of action and concrete behaviors in those milieus. But do

we really need to go that further step, and assign the concept of social network a centralposition in our theoretical and empirical work? A few years ago, a systematic comparison of

definitions of "social movements" by scholars from different intellectual traditions led me to

identify in a view of movements as networks a potential terrain for convergence and

paradigmatic integration in the field (Diani, 1992). More specifically, I defined social

movements as informal networks of individuals and/or organizations, sharing a collective

identity and the same side in political and/or cultural conflicts (Idem, p.13).


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This approach was influenced by Melucci's argument (for a recent restatement, see 1996) in

favor of an analytical view of social movements as a specific type of collective action.

Although I disagree with his emphasis on the link between contemporary movements

network organizational forms and the systemic properties of contemporary conflicts, as if

network forms were peculiar of new social movements (Melucci 1996, pp.113-117), I

definitely share his approach to the problem.4

My specific definition was mainly influenced by Tillys (1978) concept of catnet, Pizzornos

(1978) view of collective identity, and Meluccis (1996) concept of submerged networks.5

My 1992 definition was meant to facilitate the integration of different theoretical

perspectives. Such outcome might not be necessarily desirable. But I still hold that a focus

on social networks may help us overcome a current paradox: namely, that for all the

richness of empirical results, the methodological breakthroughs, and the increasing

conceptual sophistication, we still lack a social movements theory proper.

By "theory of social movements" I mean a set of propositions which explicitly address the

analytical peculiarity of the concept of social movement vis a vis cognate concepts, and treat

the concept as the building blocks of a distinctive theoretical argument. What we have

nowadays are theories which, in contrast, treat movement as a largely denotational term to

identify phenomena which could be - and indeed frequently are - equally referred to with

cognate concepts such as protest activity, coalition, sect, "interest group", etc. (Diani

1992).

Let me illustrate this claim with a few references to established "social movement theories" in

the field, starting with resource mobilization theory (henceforth, RM).6 RM is first of all a

theory of collective action, more specifically, of the dynamics which facilitate the conversion

of a potential for collective action into actual collective action. As such it is indispensable to

understand a lot of what is going on in the "real" world of contentious politics and/orcountercultures, and its contribution at this level has been immense. But on the analytical

level there is nothing which constrains RM to the social movements field. Its own

development is in this sense revealing, as it grew out of organizational studies, and in

dialogue with Olsons theory, which did not include social movements within its empirical

domain.

We have here an interesting case of how an established analytical perspective, creatively

applied to a new empirical domain to highlight some specific processes, then becomes

increasingly popular among practitioners whose main intellectual identification is with the

specific empirical field rather than with the approach, and eventually is turned into a theoryof the empirical object. Even one of the best known expansions of RM theory, Bert

Klandermans (1997), actually has trade unionism as its major empirical focus. One could

4 A feeling he apparently does not reciprocate (Melucci, 1996, p.29).5 I also find it close to more recent - and more sophisticated - theoretical work by Somers

(1994) and Emirbayer and Goodwin (1994).6 This discussion largely reproduces sections of a recent article of mines (Diani, 2000a).


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add many other examples, but the key point seems clear to me: although extremely useful as

a theory of collective action, as a theory of social movements, RM is unspecified.

The paradox of a theory of social movements that actually overlooks the peculiarity of its

supposed focus does not apply to RM only. One could similarly claim that large part of the

so-called European, new social movements approach is fundamentally a theory of social

conflict, i.e., a theory of how structural changes in society generate the potential for the

emergence of new social groups and/or new types of conflicts whose stakes (or enjeux)

differ from those dominant in industrial society. This largely overlooks the question of

whether established forms of political organization could not mobilize on the same issues

along with more movement-oriented forms. Once again, the analytical specificity of social

movements would be lost unless one could convincingly demonstrate that certain types of

new conflicts can only be acted upon by social movements and not by other political

actors - a claim which cannot be proved to the extent that the definition of movements tends

to conflate them with the conflicts of which they are bearers.7

Again, this does not mean that key scholars traditionally associated with this approach like

Touraine or Melucci8 have not contributed substantially to the understanding of key aspects

of the social process I associate with social movements, namely, the creation and

maintenance of a specific conflictual network (think in particular of their analysis of identity

dynamics). However, I think their definitions of a movement either conflate the movement

and the underlying conflict (Touraine), or, by connoting the movement as a peculiar form of

collective action "breaking the limits of a system", they miss the organizational peculiarity of

movements (Melucci). I actually think that Melucci's strongest contribution to our

understanding of social movements is not his definition but his analysis of the internal

complexity of collective actors which are usually portrayed - and portray themselves - as

homogenous and coherent. (A task to which he devotes incidentally much greater attention

and space than to specifying his definition of movements).

The political process perspective also seems to me unsatisfactory in its treatment of social

movements, despite providing what is now probably their most accepted definition: "a

sustained challenge to power holders in the name of a population living under the jurisdiction

of those power holders by means of repeated public displays of that population's

worthiness, unity, numbers, and commitment" (Tilly, 1999; p.257). It seems to me however

that, in particular when operationalized via protest event analysis, the political process

approach is fundamentally a theory of the changing forms of political contention rather than

of social movements. Its focus is on the factors - in particular, shifts in political opportunities

7 On an even more massive scale, similar problems may be found in theories of "new

politics" originated within political science (Inglehart, 1977; Dalton & Kuechler, 1990).

They relate changes in material conditions and in the structure of labor to shifts in beliefs and

fundamental orientations, which in turn generate predisposition to engage in contentious

political action on new types of "postmaterialist" issues.8 However, such association is not always consensual: Melucci in particular has long

expressed his unease with the new social movements label in both public (e.g., 1994 and

1996) and private communication.


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- which account for variations in the intensity of the challenge, its targets, and its forms. For

example, the account political process theory provides of the rise and decrease in levels of

protest not only differs from resource mobilization's in its explanatory variables, but also in

the explanandum. What matters for political process theorists is not so much the overall

level of collective action, as reflected e.g. in levels of participation within groups and

associations, but the amount of publicly visible action, as reflected in the media. This shift in

emphasis also stems from/reinforces the perspective's focus on interactions between

challengers and other actors. Interactions among challengers are, by comparison, largely

ignored.

This oversight may also be due to the limitations of an otherwise powerful research tool: if

data originating from newspaper reports require a considerable degree of care in their

interpretation (Fillieule, 1997; Fillieule & Jimenez, 2000), data about interactions between

protesters from the same sources may be expected to be largely unreliable.9 And yet there is

an irresistible temptation to conflate social movements and protest events, and to treat the

former as aggregates of the latter. A major example comes from Kriesi et al.'s (1995)

research on new social movements in Western Europe, where "the movements" actually

coincide with the sum of protest events on specific issues. There is of course widespread

recognition of the problems attached to treating movements as aggregates of actors/events

and ignoring identity dynamics and interactions within such aggregates. This has been

frequently pointed out by long-serving critics of the political process theory (e.g. Melucci,

1987), and has more recently been openly acknowledged by some of its most distinguished

advocates (e.g. Tarrow 1998b, pp.57-58). Still, when it comes to research practice the

tendency to treat movements as aggregates persists.

Let us subscribe for a while to Philip Selznick's view of good theory as the capacity to

"summarize in a sentence the guts of a phenomenon" (cited in Stinchcombe, 1968; p.v). One

might try and summarize the three approaches we have just briefly discussed as follows:

"grievances become a matter of collective action depending on the availability of

relevant mobilization resources and skills";

"changes in social structure generate new types of social conflict and new forms of

political participation";

"the intensity and radicalization of political protest depends on the configuration of

political opportunities".

All of these statements are absolutely crucial to our understanding of the empirical processes

conventionally referred to as "social movements". At the same time, though, any of these

statements is perfectly meaningful without any reference to "social movements" at all. Their

capacity to discriminate between phenomena is actually limited. The first proposition may

9 For example, a comparison between my network data on the Milanese environmental

movement in 1990 and those generated from local newspaper reports in the same year,

generated very different pictures.


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apply to any instance of collective action, including those promoted by organizations who

are either established or try to conform since the very beginning to a classic organizational

model (parties, public and private interest groups, etc.).

The second proposition is discriminant only if it posits that certain types of conflicts have to

be acted upon by specific collective actors. This seems to be for instance Melucci's point

when he strongly identifies in informal networks - which maximize margins of individual

autonomy - the distinctive organizational forms taken by conflicts about symbolic

production and meaning constructions (1996, cit.p.). Another version of the same argument,

Inglehart's and followers', suffers from a similar problem in that individuals are associated to

movements or not depending on their attitudes, socio-demographic profile, and individual

behavior.

The third proposition refers to social movements only under the disputable assumption that a

certain mass of events inevitably generate interdependence and ultimately a movement. This

may often be true empirically, yet the process through which this happens is largely left

outside the domain of the theory.

What is lost in these formulations? First of all, the peculiarity of the relationship between

action, identity, and organization which takes place in social movements. I would like to

concentrate on two dynamics, which I regard as particularly important to our understanding

of movements, yet are largely overlooked in present formulations:

1) a movement is a form of collective organization with no formal boundaries, which allows

participants to feel part of broad collective efforts while retaining their distinctive identities as

individuals and/or as specific organizations. In particular, individuals may feel part of

movements without being part of any specific organization. Accordingly, a movement is in

place - as opposed to a set of political organizations dealing with the same issues - whenmovement identities coexist along with more specific organizational identities. Movements

die out when organizational identities become overwhelmingly dominant (which explains for

example why Greenpeace is regarded by many as an environmental organization outside the

environmental movement).

2) at the same time, movement identities are reproduced through interaction (the status of

computer-mediated interaction will have to be assessed). In particular, a movement is a

form of collective organization with no formal boundaries, and where membership ultimately

depends on mutual recognition; and an organizational from which lacks formal decision-

making procedures of any sort - including unstable ones like those attached to "umbrellaorganizations". We have movement dynamics in progress to the extent that the ever present

attempts to shape strategic decisions by specific organizations are subject to unstructured

and unpatterned negotiations.

This is therefore the essence of social movement experience from my particular perspective:

being part in a conflict which is at the same time embedded in specific, "local" orientations,

interest, identities, but at the same time exceeds their boundaries, while maintaining the

freedom and individuality of specific actors. Ignoring these dimensions generates


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misunderstandings and results in lack of theoretical clarity. In contrast, taking them into

account allows us to deal with some of the recurrent problems in the field.

In relation to resource mobilization theory, viewing movements as networks allows us to get

over the tendency to treat movements as organizations of a peculiar type, and therefore to

address the issue of the relationship between movements, parties, and interest groups from a

different, and I think better, perspective. Admittedly, the distinction between movements

and SMOs is very clear in the programmatic formulations of the RM perspective

(McCarthy and Zald 1977). Likewise, attention has been paid to interorganizational

relations among SMOs, with a special focus on the interplay of competition and cooperation

in a specific movement industry. However, all in all it is safe to claim that its focus in on

(social movement) organizations. But if movements are organizations, then inevitably

questions arise Is Greenpeace - or Sierra Club, WWF, Earth First! a movement or an

interest group? or, What is the relationship between the environmental movement and the

Greens? On this shaky ground, dialogue across professional boundaries - as well as, more

substantially, attempts to grasp the peculiarity of concrete processes - becomes difficult.

There is indeed no ground to claim that WWF is an SMO rather than a public interest

group, or EF! a social movement rather than a radical grassroots organization. Identifying

them as one or the other depends ultimately on the socially constructed professional

identities of the researchers (on environmental organizations cfr. e.g. Rucht 1989; Jordan

and Maloney 1997).

If, alternatively, we regard movements as non-hierarchical network forms of organization

with boundaries defined by collective identity - i.e. by actors mutual recognition as

members of the movement linked by a distinctive culture and solidarity - then the questions

introduced earlier take a different meaning. The question will no longer be whether a

movement has become an interest group, but how different actors, both individuals and

groups and organizations, with varying degrees of formal structure, relate to each other. Arewe witnessing sustained interactions between different political organizations, which go

beyond a single-issue campaign - for that we have the concept of coalition - but are based

and in turn strengthen shared and distinctive collective identities? Then we have a social

movement process in motion, instead of a social movement as a specific empirical object.

Do the same organizations act mainly on their own, and do their activists loyalties refer

principally if not exclusively to them rather than to the idea of a broader and more loosely

defined movement? Then we have (public) interest group politics at play and little in the way

of movement dynamics .

In relation to new social movements theory, the main analytical gain is that the existence of a(new) movement is no longer tied to the existence of distinct (new) conflictual stakes, and

no specific correspondence is expected between the two. A network form may be an useful

analytical tool to apply to both "old" and "new" movements; likewise, conflicts on issues of

knowledge control, and opposing technicians and experts to bureaucrats and technocrats

may not necessarily result in extensive networks forms of organizations but be instead

carried on by informal organizations acting as experts' interest groups (e.g. Hoffman, 1989).


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In relation to political process, what we get is the connectivity between events, both in terms

of meaning attribution and in terms of chains of actors (connected by events) and events

(connected by actors). Accordingly, events falling within the same broad category may or

may not turn tout to be related to a specific movement, depending not only on the definitions

of the conflict adopted by mobilized actors, but on the continuity guaranteed by individual

activists and organizations.

This view of movements represents in my view a way out to the current paradoxical

situation whereby theories of social movements are actually theories of other distinctive if

related social processes, developed by people who happened to have an empirical interest

in social movements, rather than theories of social movements. My specific elaboration on

Selznick's suggestion therefore reads as follows:

"Social movements are informal networks of individuals and/or organizations who promote

social conflict on the basis of a shared collective identity, while retaining their autonomy and

specific identities".

Admittedly, there is no explanatory mechanism here, while there was in the other "gutsy"

propositions. We have identified a process but are still short in explanation. To this purpose

we have two tasks. First, we have to define parameters to identify the structure of

movement networks. Second, we have to elaborate appropriate theoretical models to

explain certain network patterns and/or the incumbency by certain actors of certain specific

positions.

3. Mapping movement networks

Two qualifications are in order. First, my discussion will focus largely on organizations, whilethe issue of how linking individuals and organizations will be addressed later. Second, and

more urgent, one has to acknowledge the multiplicity of linkages (at least, potential linkages)

between actors bearing a given collective identity. "Who identifies whom and is identified by

whom as part of a movement" is an interesting question in itself (Melucci, 1984 and 1996),

which may lead to the identification of several network forms. However, the latter do not

necessarily overlap with the networks which result from alliance building, information

exchanges, shared resources, multiple memberships. The extent to which identity boundaries

and patterns overlap with concrete exchanges is an interesting question in itself. It is sensible

to expect that looking at multiple linkages will often result in the identification of movement

networks with quite different shapes and properties.

I propose a model of movement networks which highlights two important dimensions of

networks: density and centralization. In the case of social movements, network density

reflects the extent to which actors are prepared to invest scarce resources in ties among

actors sharing the same identity. In other words, density measures levels of mutual

interdependence and is a reflection of how much movement actors invest in inframovement

relationships, in a situation of limited resources (Mayhew & Levinger, 1976). In principle, a

dense network does not necessarily correspond to a strong identity; in practice, however,


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given the limitations to the number of actors any individual/group may engage with, a high

dense network is likely to reflect a relatively low amount of ties reaching outside the

network itself. It may accordingly be seen as a pattern of ties which at the same time reflects

an identity and reinforces it.

The concept of centralization allows us to differentiate between the informality of social

movement networks and the often related assumption of the absence of asymmetries and

differences within those networks. An informal network may indeed range from being totally

de-centralized to totally centralized. Although the extent to which differences in

centralization correspond to differences in influence and possibly power remains to be seen,

organizations most central in movement networks have been found to play a greater role in

external exchanges to powerful actors, which suggests something about their potential

leadership (Diani, 1997; Ansell, 2000). At the very minimum, differences in centrality testify

to a tendency of flows of exchange and communication to concentrate towards specific

actors, and thus to affect the way a movement operates and builds its identity.

By combining the two dimensions we obtain four different types of network structure.

A. Movement cliques (figure 1).

A clique (better: a 1-clique) is a network where all nodes are adjacent to each other. This

type of structure is conventionally associated to a redundancy of ties which suggests strong

emotional involvement and high investment in the building and maintenance of the network.

The pattern of linkages has a strong expressive dimension. The number of ties that actors

are part of within the movement suggests quite defined boundaries between actors in the

network and the rest of society. This may be due to strong ideological and/or cultural

profiles, to strong identities, but also to a strong interests in a specific, restricted issue.

Whatever the case, commitment to this specific network is likely to reduce actors'opportunities to engage in external relationships (obviously allowing for substantial

differences in resources controlled by specific actors, and thus in their network-building

capacity). At the same time, the clique is also a de-centralized network, in which there is no

opportunity for any actor to control exchanges among network members. To be sustained

over time this pattern of relations requires a strong equalitarian culture.

Social movements which emerge in parallel with the development of a major protest cycle,

and countercultural movements in general are the most likely to display a relational pattern

which at least for some time approximates this model. In the first case, the mounting of a

fundamental challenge to established institutions may facilitate the spread of strongequalitarian and participatory identities which extend the boundaries of any specific

organization and reject any principle of hierarchy, even informal (one example being the

student movement of the late 1960s in Italy: Passerini, 1988). In the second case, the

distinctiveness of the cultural model adopted by the movement facilitates - and requires -

horizontal patterns of interaction between movement actors.


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At the same time, though, neither political nor countercultural radical challenges require

necessarily a non-centralized, fully equalitarian structure. This draws our attention towards

another model.

B. Policephalous network (figure 2).

I borrow Gerlach's (1971) characterization of social movements as reticular and

policephalous to denote a network which combines (relative) high density with some degree

of centralization. In doing so I am probably slightly unfaithful to Gerlach, who used this

expression to underline the non-hierarchical, segmented, and multifarious nature of social

movements. Here I focus instead on the centralization of linkages between movement

actors. Figure 2 shows a situation in which a few actors (A and B) are more central than the

others and are therefore in the best position to control relational flows within the network -

as well as to assume some indirect leadership roles. At the same time, the network is

relatively dense - although not as dense as the clique - due to the presence of horizontal

linkages between semi-peripheral actors. This suggests the persistent effort to engage

actively in collective action without delegating important tasks to a few centrally positioned

actors.

One example of these tension between centralization and dense patterns of interaction may

be found in the transformation of the Italian movements in the early 1970s.While the student

movement was originally largely a network of independent or semi-independent local action

committees, it was gradually replaced by political organizations with a broader political

scope and a more distinct ideological profile. Organizations like Lotta Continua or

Avanguardia Operaia developed special linkages to cultural associations (e.g. Circoli

Ottobre, related to Lotta Continua), student action groups at high school or faculty level,

groups of radical trade unionists (e.g. CUB, related to Avanguardia Operaia), etc. (Lumley,

1990). While the extent of formal association of these groups with the main new leftorganizations varied considerably, they also maintained a significant degree of interaction

among themselves and with other movement organizations in specific localities or on specific

issues. This generated a policephalous structure which displayed at the same time a certain

amount of centralization, but considerable levels of density.

C. Wheel networks (figure 3).

A wheel-shaped network combines high centralization with low density. There is one central

position coordinating exchanges across the network and acting as a linking point between

peripheral components which are not related to each other. Incumbents of that position arelikely to exert considerable influence over the network in terms of the pooling and

redistribution of resources. At the same time, the lack of horizontal exchanges at the

periphery suggests a comparatively low level of investment in the building of the network as

a whole. Network members are likely either to be involved in a considerable amount of

exchanges with actors outside the movement boundaries, or to conduct most of their

projects on their own. This is a network characterized by an instrumental pattern of

linkages, with most actors investing the minimal resources in linkage-building. Ties to a

central actor are sufficient to secure easy access to the rest of the network through a


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minimal number of intermediate steps. While peripheral positions are unlikely to exert any

substantial influence over the network as a whole, the low level of investment in linkage

building suggests this not to be among their incumbents' priorities.

Examples of wheel structure include those movements which combine a fairly high degree of

inclusiveness with a low propensity to expand the scope of collective action beyond the

actors' specific interests and the most obvious central political goals as articulated by the

movement core actors at any given point in time. Environmental movements often match this

profile. Italian environmentalism in the 1980s (Diani, 1995) and British environmentalism in

the previous decade (Lowe & Goyder, 1983) presented a pattern of relationships where a

group of core - and strongly interconnected - organizations acted as a bridge between a

number of local actors, who acted mostly on an independent basis. The same actors had

however frequent contacts and exchanges with actors who did not share in an environmental

identity still were prepared to collaborate on specific issues (ties to non-environmental

actors were about half of those to environmental actors in Milan, 1995: Diani, 1995,

pp.134-135).

D. Segmented, horizontal networks (figure 4)

By this expression I mean networks which combine low density with decentralization of

ties. The former property is a reflection of network actors operating on their own or

developing small collaborations on specific issues, but failing/being uninterested in

developing more extended and encompassing patterns of linkages. The latter is as much a

consequence of the small amount of ties as of the actors' tendency to focus on their specific

and restricted areas of concern, and to reject attempts by prospective leaders to coordinate

their action into broader overarching projects.

It is difficult to think of movement networks showing this type of structure. This structureactually fits either of two otherwise opposite models. On the one hand, it fits a model of

pluralistic politics, in which specific actors tend to maximize their own outcomes without

paying any attention to broader moral constraints/obligations such as those attached to large

scale collective identities. It is in other words closets to a situation in which movement

identities are at their lowest vis a vis organizational identities, and in which loyalties go to the

latter rather than the former. In such a model, specific organizations operate as

(public/private) interest groups, community organizations, even political parties in several

political arenas. They may well get involved in multiple coalitions, but without developing

long term identifications to any of them. Greenpeace is a proper example: it may be involved

in coalitions with other environmental organizations, however a) it gives priority to theorganization's identity over the movement's; b) it denies relevance to the collaborative

activities in which it is involved (Rootes, 2000).

On the other hand, this formal model captures the relationships - better, the lack of

relationships - between actors which are distinctly radical in their challenges to political

and/or cultural institutions, yet do so by emphasizing their organizational, rather than

movement identities. For example, religious sects or revolutionary parties come to operate

along these lines when they abstain from cooperation with similar actors following a


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combination of quest for ideological purity and attempts to discredit potential competitors

for the same pool of constituents.

Despite substantial differences in content, both examples reflect a weakening of the process

that I refer to as "social movements", in favor of processes which assign greater space to

organizational as sources of agency and identity.

Some comments to round up this section. First, my treatment of these models here is

admittedly rough. In particular, I completely overlook their relationship to broader and more

encompassing attempts to classify patterns of social structure. For example, one could re-

analyze them in terms of Douglas' (1966) group-grid scheme, with group standing in for

density, and grid for centralization, or Collins' (1975) historical typology of ritual cultures.

These are potentially interesting developments, especially as they link patterns of social

relations and symbolic practices.

Second, these models do not imply any necessary trend - in particular, I do not suggest any

renaming of the "from movement to institution" dynamic (one possible "relational" version of

which might be "from clique to wheel".....). If such a reading might fit the evolution of the

radical movement sector in Italy (for a formulation of this hypothesis see Diani, 1992), it

does not universally apply. For example, in his analysis of the evolution of environmental

movement networks in Spain (based on unpublished data from press reports of

environmental action 1988-1997), Jimenez illustrates a transformation from a wheel to a

policephalous structure as the movement specific identity strengthened, and the aggregate of

local environmental initiatives led eventually to a broader political project - if one largely

conducted along conventional lines. These models may also be applied in different historical

and research contexts both to differentiate across movements. A preliminary exploration of

network patterns in environmental movements in Italy and UK (also based on press reports

from 1988-1997) shows a more centralized and less dense structure in the former than inthe latter (Diani, unpublished materials; Rootes, unpublished materials).

Third, one should expect no overlap between network boundaries, defined by mutual

recognition of actors as part of the same movement, and the structure of networks based on

specific relations such as alliance or information exchange. It is indeed sensible to assume

that feelings of identity be stronger among actors who collaborate on a regular basis than

among those who relate occasionally or hardly ever. However, one has to recognize the

difference between "real" exchanges - which may not necessarily imply identity, as in

instrumental, ad hoc coalitions - and actors' interpretation of their social space in terms of

who is perceived as close/similar/part of the same collectivity, and who is not. In particular,strong identities (corresponding to a clique structure of mutual recognition) should not be

expected to overlap with cliquish patterns of interaction in the long term: the very need to

re-affirm and strengthen strong identities is likely to result either in policephalous networks,

with some degree of internal differentiation, or in the fragmentation of a movement in an

aggregate of isolated actors giving priority to organizational (and often sectarian) identities

over the movement's, and restraining from systematic interaction to other cognate actors.


15/21

Finally, it should be noted that the same model of analysis might be applied to the network

structure of relations among individuals within a specific (movement) organization. In that

case, however, there would be no automatic correspondence between structures at the

interorganizational level, and structures at the individual, infraorganizational level. For

example, organizations with a dense and decentralized, clique structure of interaction among

their members are more likely to end up in segmented, horizontal interorganizational

networks than in cliquish ones. Relying heavily on members' participation and therefore on

ideological and solidarity incentives, they are more likely, all the rest being equal, to fall prey

to ideological factionalism than organizations operating on more instrumental bases.

4. Explaining movement networks: issues and problems

Having identified some elementary criteria to differentiate between network structures, we

should then proceed to address a few fundamental questions: i) how to treat the multiplicity

of actors and relational levels within movements; ii) how to explain the position played by

certain organizations/individuals within a network (how, in other words, account for

homophily).

i. Multiplexity.

I can identify two main problems at this level. First, if social movements are networks of

both individual and organizations, how to deal with this duplicity? It would be very nice if we

could simply assume that individual participation take place through organizations. Alas, this

is not always the case. What is worse, the exceptions are relevant. The stronger the sub-

and counter-cultural element within a movement, the more likely we are to witness important

forms of participation and action which take an individual form (both in terms of the

production and the fruition of cultural services, communitarian activities, etc.). Also,individual movement leaders/intellectuals/political entrepreneurs may often play relevant

roles independently from specific organizations.

There are several ways to address this issue. One may treat individual activists' multiple

memberships as indicators of linkages between groups (Diani, 1995; Carroll & Ratner,

1996) and eventually take these linkages as the basis for a particular type of network among

others. Or, one could take a stronger individualist and reductionist stance, and treat

movements basically as networks of individuals, where particularly dense clusters

correspond to people sharing memberships in one (possibly, more) organizations, and also

to people sharing active involvement in specific events. Whatever the case, the analyst's taskshould then be to reconstruct the web of linkages which connect people identifying with a

broad cause and mobilizing on activities related to it. By extending the idea of the duality of

persons and groups (Breiger, 1988) to persons, groups, and events, one should be able to


16/21

identify networks linking events and organizations and thus the core of a movement's

activities.10

The second question is how to treat multiple linkages. One possibility would be treating

them in an additive way, thus distinguishing between multiple, "strong" ties from weaker ties,

based on fewer types of connections. Alternatively, one could acknowledge the

heterogeneity of network linkages when this is the case, and try to account for differences

between specific network structures. For example, in the Milan environmental movement

the network of interorganizational relations had a more centralized, wheel structure than the

network based on multiple memberships and intragroup personal friendships (Diani, 1995).

As usual, the choice between the two approaches is largely driven by the specific

theoretical perspective. If we are mainly interested in identifying the most solid components

of a movement, then looking at multiplexity in additive terms might be advisable

(commitment to collective action is often supported by strong ties: Krackhardt, 1992). If on

the other hand we are interested in the outreach of a given movement network as, e.g., a

proxy to its potential to spread political proposals and cultural models, then acknowledging

differences in network structures might be advisable.

ii. Homophily

Identifying the traits which bring certain actors together and facilitate their incumbency of

specific positions within a network also provides us with a clue to its main lines of

segmentation. Movement networks are far from homogeneous in their degree of internal

segmentation. What are the mechanisms which facilitate or discourage relations between

actors who none the less identify with a specific movement? Do these mechanisms result in

specific relational patterns? And under what conditions are certain differences turned salient,

i.e., turned into positive lines of segmentation? In order to address these issues we can

conveniently refer, among others, to existing theories of collective action and social conflict.

Resource mobilization theorists point at the differences in resources, at the competitive

dynamics among organizations, at the role of pre-existing social relations - or "social capital"

- as factors which may facilitate or discourage interaction. Theorists of new social

movements do the same by emphasizing the different conflictual stakes around which

alliance and opposition may develop, the importance of processes of identity creation and

maintenance, the contribution to the mobilization process from different sections of class (in

particular the middle class, though one need not necessarily to restrict oneself to that). Yet

again, these may represent as many possible lines of alliance and fission within movement

networks.

As for political process theorists, their contribution may take two different forms. It may

highlight the differential capacity of factors which shape the structure of traditional divisions

and cleavages (e.g., the salience of established ideological models and identities, the strength

10 In this case the data matrix would take an MxN form, where M=individuals and N=n1

(organizations of which one is [active] member) + n2 (events in which one may have played

an active role).


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of established organizations, etc.). These factors may be also expected to affect indirectly

the profile of movement networks, e.g., a salient left-right cleavage is likely to shape

relational patterns even in a movement which aspires to cut across it.11 Political process

approaches may also contribute to highlight under which conditions certain differences may

prove more or less effective at shaping alliances and segmentation. In particular, movements

operating in a close political environment may be expected - once again all the rest being

equal - to rely more on ideological incentives than movements who have a reasonable

chance of being influential through inclusion in the political process. Emphasis on ideology as

a mobilizing weapon and on collective identities will be likely to affect the solidity of

network forms based on mutual recognition. On the one hand, it will make it difficult to

reproduce the strong collective commitment necessary to support dense structures like the

clique: organizational identities will tend to prevail as organizations compete to get their

ideological standpoints accepted as the movement's orthodoxy. On the other hand, the

growing centrality of ideological discourse will pose similar problems to structures which

also rely on mutual recognition, but with a lower degree of emotional investment like the

wheel. In one case, the network will collapse because of the struggle for ideological purity;

in the other case, because of latent differences in orientations between its components

becoming more salient in the new context. Both transformations might lead to segmented or

policephalous structures.

5. Does it matter at all?

The final question is of course whether network approaches to social movements may

contribute to our substantive understanding of these phenomena and not merely to their

more proper formalization. I believe that viewing movements as networks can provide

important insights into both their internal dynamics and their overall impact. Social

movements are no homogeneous phenomena, but consist of exchanges and solidarities

between actors with very different profiles, orientations, and agendas: mapping the coalitionsas well as the lines of segmentation between actors sharing broad identities may improve our

grasp of movement complexity and enable us to generate a more accurate profile of these

phenomena. Moreover, a network perspective can tell us a lot about the influence exerted

by specific actors in the networks, and their capacity to act as movement leaders (Diani,

1997b).

Network approaches may also contribute to our analyses of the role of social movements in

a broader societal context. They may tell us about the extent to which movement actors are

integrated in broader networks of social and political influence, offering us a different

standard to assess the long term impact of social movements (Diani, 1997). They may alsoprovide us with the tools to assess the novelty of movements from a relational perspective,

e.g., by evaluating to which extent networks linking actors in supposed "new" movements

actually overlap rather than cutting across established political cleavages (Diani, 2000b).

Finally, they may improve our understanding of the role of social movements in governance

11 I illustrate this dynamic in reference to the Italian environmental movement of the 1970s,

where the persistent strength of left-right divisions played against the development of

systematic alliances between political ecologists and conservationists (Diani, 1995).


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processes. Growing attention has been paid to the role of NGOs in policy making (e.g.

Maloney, Smith, & Stoker, 2001), following earlier seminal analyses of the "organizational

state" (Laumann & Knoke, 1987). A network perspective allows us to explore the

relationship between incumbency of distinct structural positions within a movement network,

and involvement in exchanges with other political actors (Ansell, 2000).

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