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- Herausgeber: John Wiley & Sons
- Kategorie: Geisteswissenschaft
- Serie: Social Movements
- Sprache: Englisch
How does gender influence social movements? How do social movements deal with gender? In Gender and Social Movements, Jo Reger takes a comprehensive look at the ways in which people organize around gender issues and how gender shapes social movements. Here gender is more than an individual quality, it is a part of the very foundation of social movements, shaping how they recruit, mobilize and articulate their strategies, tactics and identities. Moving past the gender binary, Reger explores how movements can shift understandings of gender and how backlash and countermovements can often follow gendered movement successes. Adopting both an intersectional and global lens, the book introduces readers to the idea that gender as a form of societal power is integral in all efforts for social change. With a critical overview across different types of movements and gender activism, such as the women's liberation, #Metoo and transgender rights movements, this book offers a solid foundation for those seeking to understand how gender and social movements interact.
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Seitenzahl: 352
Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2021
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CONTENTS
Cover
Series Page
Title Page
Copyright
Acknowledgements
Introduction: Integrating Gender and Social Movements
How Gender “Sorts” Society
How Social Movements Change Society
How More Than Gender Matters
How Gender and Social Movements Intertwine and Influence Each Other
Organization of the Book
Sources to Explore
Questions to Consider
Reflection
1 People in Movements: When Movements Focus on Single-Gender Concerns
U.S. Women’s Movements
Women’s Movements – Thinking Globally
U.S. and British Men’s Movements
Men’s Movements – Thinking Globally and Intersectionally
Conclusion
Sources to Explore
Questions to Consider
Reflection
Notes
2 Gender in Movements: What Happens in Multi-Gender Movements
Womanhood, Femininity, and Movements
Manhood, Masculinity, and Movements
Societal Concerns and Shifting Gender Norms
Conclusion
Sources to Explore
Questions to Consider
Reflection
Notes
3 Coming to the Movement: How Gender Influences Pathways to Activism
Recruitment
Frames and Mobilization
Movement Identities
Emotions and Movements
Conclusion
Sources to Explore
Questions to Consider
Reflection
Notes
4 Guiding Social Change: When Gender Shapes Movement Trajectories
Gender and Leadership
Gendered Strategies
Gendered Tactics
“Hidden” Gendered Strategies and Tactics
Conclusion
Sources to Explore
Questions to Consider
Reflection
5 Legacies of Rise and Resistance: How Gender Sparks Change and Backlash
Breaking Down the Binary
Rise of the trans social justice movement
Societal Backlash and the Rise of Countermovements
Conclusion
Sources to Explore
Questions to Consider
Reflection
Notes
Conclusion: Where Do We Go from Here?
Is Gender Still Relevant in Social Movements?
How Does Gender Organize Social Movements?
How are Key Aspects of Social Movements Influenced?
How Do People Respond to the Binary?
What Does the Study of Gender Bring to Social Movements (and Vice Versa)?
Notes
References
Index
End User License Agreement
Guide
Cover
Table of Contents
Series Page
Title Page
Copyright
Acknowledgements
Introduction: Integrating Gender and Social Movements
Begin Reading
References
Index
End User License Agreement
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Social Movements series
Colin J. Beck, Radicals, Revolutionaries, and Terrorists
Amy J. Fitzgerald, Animal Advocacy and Environmentalism: Understanding and Bridging the Divide
Stephanie Luce, Labor Movements: Global Perspectives
Ziad Munson, Abortion Politics
Jo Reger, Gender and Social Movements
Lisa M. Stulberg, LGBTQ Social Movements
David Walls, Community Organizing: Fanning the Flames of Democracy
Gender and Social Movements
Jo Reger
polity
Copyright © Jo Reger 2021
The right of Jo Reger to be identified as Author of this Work has been asserted in accordance with the UK Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.
First published in 2021 by Polity Press
Polity Press65 Bridge StreetCambridge CB2 1UR, UK
Polity Press101 Station LandingSuite 300Medford, MA 02155, USA
All rights reserved. Except for the quotation of short passages for the purpose of criticism and review, no part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the prior permission of the publisher.
ISBN-13: 978-1-5095-4134-8
A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Names: Reger, Jo, 1962- author.Title: Gender and social movements / Jo Reger.Description: Medford : Polity Press, 2021. | Series: Social movements | Includes bibliographical references and index. | Summary: “How to understand gender activism, from Women’s Lib to #MeToo and trans rights”-- Provided by publisher.Identifiers: LCCN 2021003009 (print) | LCCN 2021003010 (ebook) | ISBN 9781509541324 (hardback) | ISBN 9781509541331 (paperback) | ISBN 9781509541348 (epub)Subjects: LCSH: Sex role. | Social movements. | Social change.Classification: LCC HQ1075 .R4354 2021 (print) | LCC HQ1075 (ebook) | DDC 305.3--dc23LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2021003009LC ebook record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2021003010
The publisher has used its best endeavours to ensure that the URLs for external websites referred to in this book are correct and active at the time of going to press. However, the publisher has no responsibility for the websites and can make no guarantee that a site will remain live or that the content is or will remain appropriate.
Every effort has been made to trace all copyright holders, but if any have been overlooked the publisher will be pleased to include any necessary credits in any subsequent reprint or edition.
For further information on Polity, visit our website: politybooks.com
Acknowledgments
Writing a book like this one is a chance to review and remember so much of what I have read over the course of my career. Often certain scholars whom I cite or know personally come to feel like old friends and this book was a chance to renew my acquaintance. Some of them are scholars I have known and cited for years such as Verta Taylor, Leila Rupp, Nancy Whittier, Kathy Blee, Rachel Einwohner, Michael Messner, David Meyer, Suzanne Staggenborg, Judy Taylor, and Patricia Yancey Martin. Others are new acquaintances such as Tristan Bridges, Kelsy Kretschmeyer, Heather McKee Hurwitz, Miriam Abelson, Kristen Barber, and Fátima Suárez. I am so grateful for knowing you and your work. Your work is a key part of the scaffolding of this book.
Essential in writing this volume is the work I did as editor of the journal Gender & Society. This experience honed my understanding of gender and intersectionality and gave me the foundation and the confidence to start examining how gender and social movements intertwine. It also allowed me to cast a critical eye on social movement research and explore how gender often is left out of our analyses. I wrote this book because this is the book I wanted to have earlier in the course of my academic career. As a gender and social movement scholar I have often tried to cobble together an understanding of how each influences the other. This book was my opportunity to puzzle this out in my own way. I hope students find this useful in thinking about how the world changes through social movements as well as how the world is structured through gender. As I finish this book, I continue to be amazed by the complexity of gender in our social world – from how it shapes us to how we rebel and seek to change gender. I find that the lens of social movements allows for that complexity to emerge.
I am also grateful to the team at Polity. I had multiple conversations with editor Jonathan Skerrett starting at the 2017 ASA meetings. I was initially unwilling to start on this project, having just completed four years with Gender & Society. He was very patient and, through our continued conversations, I grew excited about the project and the opportunity to bring gender and social movement research into conversation with each other. Assistant Editor Karina Jákupsdóttir was also very patient as she repeatedly checked in and kept this project on track. I am grateful for the three reviewers and their comments on an earlier version of the manuscript. Their insights helped to strengthen my arguments, deepen my discussions, and clarify the points I want to make. I am grateful for their time and attention. Despite these revisions, I am not sure I was able to satisfy Reviewer 2 completely, but I did my best and their comments made for a better book.
In regard to the actual process of writing, I am forever grateful for my writing group extraordinaire – Jennifer Law-Sullivan and George Sanders. Our weekly meetings keep me on track and, as I review the chapters in the final proofing, I can recall where I wrote them, often in the library, and often in your presence. I also thank you two for being a support group through a really difficult year of Covid and online teaching. Sometimes, I needed those venting (and laughing) sessions more than I needed to write. A very special appreciation goes out to George, who read this entire book, offered excellent revisions and settled some of my anxiety.
Finally, to my cast of characters at home – Angel and Faith. I love you both dearly. Thank you for making a home. And to my fur babies – Silvia, Cricket, and the irreplaceable Ray-Ray – you all wandered down to the basement every once in a while to check on what I was doing and sometimes sit on my lap. I appreciated your love and the writing breaks I took to go upstairs one more time to see why Cricket is barking at the neighbors and to see if Silvia is really out of food and starving, as she seems to be claiming.
Introduction: Integrating Gender and Social Movements
A 2017 MeToo rally in Los Angeles, CA.
Credit: Ronen Tivony/NurPhoto via Getty Images
Imagine you check your social media one morning and the hashtag #MeToo is everywhere. People you know, most of them women, are sharing stories of sexual harassment, abuse, and assault. Along with the personal posts, you see multiple news stories of prominent men in politics, business, entertainment, and the media being accused of sexual harassment and impropriety (of all degrees). The narrative in each case is similar. A man (rarely a woman) in a position of power, repeatedly used that power over a subordinate regardless of her objections. Most of these men had been engaging in these behaviors for years, some of them decades. As you watch the news coverage, it seems that as quickly as the accusations come to light, the accused is punished, losing their job and access to resources, privilege, and status. The mainstream media is full of reports, and pundits are perplexed as to the source of this tsunami of accusations. You begin to think over your own life and have a few “aha” moments of your own – A boss who stood too close; A teacher who made inappropriate comments; A romantic partner who would not listen to “no.”
Emerging in 2017, the importance of #MeToo was captured later that year when Time Magazine named the Person of the Year – “The Silence Breakers” – acknowledging the number of women who had come forward claiming they too were victims of harassment and sexual assault by powerful, cisgendered men. The beginnings of hashtag movement can be traced back to the multitude of women who accused media mogul Harvey Weinstein of sexual harassment, assault, and rape (Johnson and Hawbaker 2019; NPR 2018). Quickly following these accusations against Weinstein, the names of prominent men (and a few women) accused of behaviors ranging from sexual harassment to rape began to snowball. The list included powerful men in politics (U.S. Senator Al Franken, U.S. Senate nominee Roy Moore), entertainment (comedians Bill Cosby and Louis C. K., actor Kevin Spacey, R&B artist R. Kelly), and business (Uber CEO Travis Kalanak). Charges of sexual assault, harassment, and rape against President Donald Trump, along with his infamous statement about grabbing women by the “pussy,” also added to the moment.
#MeToo was not confined to the United States. It quickly spread with charges against prominent men across the globe in countries including South Korea, Sweden, and Egypt, all experiencing “landmark” victories for the accusers (Stone and Vogelstein 2019). Initially the hashtag was attributed to white actor Alyssa Milano; however it was later credited to long-time sexual assault activist Tarana Burke, who coined the term “Me Too” in 2006. Reflecting on #MeToo, it is clear that this wave of accusations challenged beliefs about gendered interpersonal relations, forced a redefinition of sexual consent, and illustrated how power cannot always win the silence of victims.
For as much as #MeToo tells us about the society we live in, it is also a productive place to begin an examination of gender and social movements. First, it allows us to see how social change occurs and how social movements play a role in those changes. Second, it highlights how issues of gender can be at the core of social change efforts. Third, taking a historical view of #MeToo illustrates that what appears to be a contemporary issue has its roots in the past. Finally, the mis-crediting of the hashtag to a white actor instead of the Black woman activist who created it demonstrates the importance of looking at gender issues through the lens of race and other social identities. Using the #MeToo movement as a starting place, this book explores the intersections and interactions of gender and social movements. To untangle these dynamics, I examine how gender influences social change by exploring how it shapes participants, social change goals, and the means (i.e. tactics and strategies) by which change is sought. In other words, the who, how, and why of social change is shaped by gender, even when it is not obvious to observers and participants. To understand these dynamics, I start by defining the ways in which we understand gender.
How Gender “Sorts” Society
While the common usage of “gender” often refers to whether someone identifies as male or female (e.g. sex), theorists argue that gender is more than sex and is, in fact, embedded in society in a multitude of ways beyond the individual. Judith Lorber (1994) defines gender as a process, a system of stratification, and as a structure shaping social life. To understand the difference between gender and sex, Lorber explains that we typically are assigned a sex at birth (male or female), and due to the assignment are placed in a sex category (woman or man, boy or girl). That sex category then takes on the attributes of gender dictated by our culture, prescribing our behaviors and lifelong expectations related to our gender. Gender is a core identity for individuals, set up on the binary of woman/man or masculine/feminine. People whose gender identity and sex category are in alignment are called cisgender. People also have identities outside the binary. Identities such as gender non-binary, gender non-conforming or gender fluid are present in society with more diverse identities being articulated. However, since gender is also a structure in society (Lorber 1994), it is used to sort people into the categories, making it difficult to completely break out of the binary in all aspects of life. For example, it is a relatively recent development that some places will allow identification outside the binary on official documents such as IDs, driver licenses, and birth certificates. Gender also resides outside of the individual and is commonly assigned to traits or behaviors such as acting masculine (i.e. active, rational, instrumental) or feminine (i.e. passive, emotional, nurturing). Embedded in this binary way of seeing identities and behaviors are value judgments (e.g. it is better to be active rather than passive) as well as indications of societal power (e.g. instrumental/action-oriented actions are rewarded more than emotional/nurturing ones). This illustrates how gender is both a system of stratification, that is distinguishing, valuing, rewarding individuals who show the most prized behaviors, and a structure with gendered ideas built into the very organization of society such as the home or workplace. Overall, gender is used to sort where people “belong” and what they should “do” in a society.
As such, gendered identities shape the way an individual experiences social life. Candace West and Don Zimmerman (1987) coined the phrase “doing gender” to explore how we integrate gender into everything we do. Seen as a type of performance, gender is not only a set of behaviors (e.g. acting masculine, feminine or fluid), but is also a set of social expectations for which we are held accountable. People who step out of their “side” of the gender binary – men who act feminine, women who act masculine – can be sanctioned by others in society (Lorber 1994; West and Zimmerman 1987). As West and Zimmerman put it, we can be “held hostage” to gender’s production in everyday life (1987: 126). It is important to note that with the hierarchy of gender characteristics, women can often “get away with” acting more masculine than men who do “too much” femininity. The unevenness of sanctions against these forms of “deviance” tells us that gender is, in fact, a system of inequality, operating on multiple levels of privilege and oppression (Connell 1987).
Despite having our gender evaluated in everyday life, scholars note that there are places that allow more agency and control over our “doing” of gender. For instance, Mimi Schippers (2002) argues that in the alternative hard rock community, participants engage in “gender maneuvering” that reworks some of the hierarchy embedded in their interactions and contributes to an alternative gender order, while not completely eradicating it. Tony Silva (2016) found that a group of rural men who identified as heterosexual also engaged in sexual practices with other white, masculine, heterosexual, or secretly bisexual men. Silva labels this “bud sex” and notes that men continued to define themselves as masculine and heterosexual, despite having same-sex sexual encounters. In other words, they controlled the gender discourse around their behavior. Overall, despite being held accountable for doing “appropriate” gender, people can find ways to resist and change how they “do gender,” to some degree.
In addition to “doing” and learning our gender, we also “determine” the gender of others. Laurel Westbrook and Kristen Schilt (2013) note that in social interactions, we draw on visual and behavioral cues to determine an individual’s gender category. However, Westbrook and Schilt problematize this process by noting how transgender individuals in public settings can confuse this process and cause “gender panics.” These panics are particularly apparent in spaces that are gender segregated such as public restrooms. Westbrook and Schilt remind us that even when binary-focused ideas of gender identity are changing, core beliefs in a dichotomy of sex, gender, and sexuality are still maintained. Gender then is not only something we do throughout our days, but it also something that is determined about us, based on the cues we provide through dress, behavior, and social context.
Returning to the idea that gender is a structure as well as a process, we can see how gender is present in large-scale structures and processes, such as in institutions, organizations, societal norms, and ideologies. Joan Acker (1990) noted how gender is integral in the construction of organizations, shaping policy, practices, and infrastructure. While she notes that feminist sociologists have examined male dominance in leadership, hierarchy, and opportunities in organizations, missing is a sense of how gender is embedded in the documents and policies that construct the organization and become the groundwork for its belief system. She writes that “advantage and disadvantage, exploitation and control, action and emotion, meaning and identity, are patterned through and in terms of a distinction between male and female, masculine and feminine” (1990: 146). For example, considering gender as a structure includes understanding how it shapes the division of labor, wages, performance evaluations, and job descriptions within the workplace (Martin 2003; Ridgeway 2001). These differences are not due to innate differences between women and men but instead are the result of gender positioning people differently in the social structure (Lorber 1994).
Barbara Risman (2004) adds to our understanding by arguing that it is best to conceptualize gender as an overall structure that is found in the individual level (through processes such as socialization and the construction of selves), the interactional, cultural level (evident interactions around status, bias, and power), and the institutional domain (which accounts for organizational practices, legal regulations, resources, and ideology). This conceptualization captures the complex ways in which gender exists in society with multiple levels extending from the individual, sustained in interaction, and embedded in the ways the social structure, institutions, and organizations function. Drawing on this multi-level conception of gender allows us to see how the #MeToo movement is more than just the result of the actions of individuals but is also the result of gendered interactions that are supported within organizations and structured by gendered policy, norms, and regulations. For instance, Weinstein was able to escape any sanctions for his behavior due to the institutional order he was embedded in, the power he held over those lower on the hierarchy, and laws and policies that have limits in terms of enforcement. His behavior was also supported by a culture that accepted and encouraged his domination over women.
How gender binary sorts society is also illustrated in the Weinstein case. Much of the power and control evident in his assaults were derived from his status as the most powerful person – masculine, manly, male – in the room. The power and status he achieved outside the room were also a benefit of masculinity in society. In other words, Harvey Weinstein was not just a bad person, he was a person, because of the divisions of masculinity and femininity in society, who was able to dominate, control, and assault women. Overall, the gender binary divides all levels of gender from the individual to the societal. In many societies the gender binary is accepted because it aligns with Western thought’s use of dichotomies to understand the social world. Dichotomies divide the world into simple binaries, such as black and white, rich and poor, men and women, and in the process solidify one side’s power and value in society. Our cultural aversion to ambiguity makes it difficult to see past binaries and recognize that a more complex situation exists. Therefore, the gender binary structures and sorts our world, even when people identify as being outside of it.
In sum, acknowledging that gender is multi-dimensional and always in flux contributes to how we understand the social world around us and how it changes. Understanding gender as a form of power and control in society is also key in social change. Knowing that society is always changing also helps us to understand what social movements are and how they arise.
How Social Movements Change Society
We know that social change happens in a variety of ways and is sometimes unintentional – for example, shifts in societies occur when new economies, populations, and/or technologies are introduced. However, sometimes social change is intentionally sought and can be the result of social movements. Social movements are made up of individuals who come together in organizations, communities, and/or networks with the goal of making or resisting change happening in society (Tarrow 1998). What makes these “social movements” versus other efforts to change society is that they are in opposition to some segment of society. Aspects of society targeted by social movements include the powerful elites who control institutions and the rules, laws, or cultural norms that disadvantage a societal group. Some social movements challenge the state working to change laws or policies. For instance, movements on both sides of the abortion debate work to change the laws around access to abortion with a focus on the Supreme Court, as well as on state laws. Social movements also challenge cultural ideas and work to change social norms. For example, some participants in the women’s movement in the 1970s sought to change the language used to refer to women, arguing that calling women “girls,” “chicks,’’ or “foxes” was denigrating (Mallinson 2017). Overall, social movements are about changing the social order, which entails personal as well as collective change, and cultural as well as institutional transformation. For example, the lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, queer, and beyond movement (LGBTQ+) not only worked to change laws but also to change social norms around the acceptance and portrayal of LGBTQ+ people and worked to create a sense of pride versus marginalization in individuals. In either case – the focus on institutions or the focus on culture – the key to understanding social movements is that they are not spontaneous but are often the result of generations of organizing. Social movements are also not chaotic but instead have some sort of organizing structure, which can often vary depending on the beliefs and goals of the organization. As such, social movements can survive for long periods of time and engage multiple generations of activists (Reger 2012; Rupp and Taylor 1987; Taylor 1989; Whittier 1995).
To achieve their goals, social movements draw on a variety of actions called tactics. Those tactics can range from large-scale demonstrations such as marches on Washington, to the more individual such as legislative lobbying. Tactics can also be more symbolic and use everyday actions such as embracing an activist identity in daily life, through actions such as recycling or wearing a T-shirt connected to a movement. Movements often draw on more than one tactic, in what social movement scholars call a “tactical repertoire” (Taylor and Van Dyke 2004). Important in the creation of that repertoire is the overall strategy, or plan of action, embraced by the movement activists. For example, if the movement adopts the strategy of non-violence as the means to achieve their goals, the corresponding tactics would include those that endorse non-violent civil disobedience such as sit ins or street theater.
Strategy and tactics emerge from individuals’ interactions within the movement, along with the sense of being a united group sharing a set of common values and interests. Identified as a collective identity (Melucci 1989), this sense of belonging emerges from the construction of a sense of who “we” are as a group, as opposed to “them,” the opposition or target. This shared activist identity emerges from three processes: the development of a group consciousness with common values, beliefs, and goals, the delineation of boundaries between “us” and “them,” and the negotiation across those boundaries in pursuit of the overall goal (Taylor and Whittier 1992). The creation of collective, or activist identities, is essential in sustaining movements and directing the course of action.
While we often think of social movement dynamics as face-to-face interactions, like the rest of society social movements moved into new dimensions on the internet. Social movement scholars turned their attention to virtual activism as the internet grew. For example, Alan Schussman and Jennifer Earl (2004) studied “strategic voting” in the 2000 U.S. presidential election. Websites popped up that allowed individuals to coordinate their votes, ensuring that “blue” or largely Democratic states would go to Al Gore, while allowing left-leaning, third-party voters to cast their ballots for Ralph Nader. The overall goal was to keep George Bush from the presidency. While the overall goal of strategic voting failed, the political activism on the internet caught the attention of researchers. Schussman and Earl coined the label “e-movements” to identify this new terrain for activism. Despite the fact that the term “e-movements” didn’t catch on; the internet is now the home to much social movement activism. Activists use the internet to recruit, educate, and advocate for actions either online, such as e-petitions, or to attend in-person events and demonstrations. The lines between virtual and in-person spaces for activism often becomes blurred. For instance in 2011 when Occupy Wall Street – a social movement focused on income and wealth inequality – emerged, it focused on in-person encampments as a main tactic but also had a lively internet presence through the more than 1,500 Facebook pages established across the globe (Gaby and Caren 2015). As platforms such as Instagram, Facebook, and TikTok are developed, activists find a way to move into those spaces.
While websites and other digital spaces connect activists and serve as virtual organizing areas, hashtags promote issues and topics and connect people through subject matter. Hashtag activism results when # is added to a phrase or word as a way to spread a message or topic key to a movement, usually done through Twitter. The scenario at the start of this chapter – #MeToo – is an example of hashtag activism that is linked to a larger social movement. Hashtags organize social media content by allowing people to search for particular topics and notifying them on what is trending. Indeed, young people often turn to their social media instead of more traditional outlets for news. One of the most influential hashtags to develop is #BlackLivesMatter (BLM), which was tweeted in 2013 and became the label for one of the largest protest cycles in U.S. history. As #MeToo and #BLM illustrate, social media can be the impetus for the start of social movement organizing and protests. The United States has been the site of campaigns and movements sparked by a single tweet such as #MeToo and #BLM but hashtags play a global role as well. Examples of this include #ArabSpring and the uprisings in Tunisia, Morocco, Syria, Libya, Egypt, and Bahrain, #StopFundingHate, a pro-immigrant campaign in the U.K., and #BringBackOurGirls, a campaign to return kidnapped girls to their families in Nigeria. Overall, “[The internet] speeds up the processes of organizing and network building, creates and nourishes communities across geographic divides, and introduces new tactics and strategies” (Crossley 2017: 127).
Scholars of social movements often view their work through theoretical lenses that provide explanations for movement origins, goals, and outcomes. Those frameworks often take different views of what movements need to emerge and achieve their goals. Resource mobilization theory argues that social movements emerge when organizations and groups are able to accumulate the resources they need to build an infrastructure to support the mobilization of activists (McCarthy and Zald 1977; Jenkins 1983). The political process lens views social change as emerging when there are openings or opportunities in a society. Called “opportunity structures,” these openings allow movements to emerge at times that are optimal, despite historical and long-lasting long-term experiences of discrimination or prejudice (Tilly 1978; McAdam 1982; Tarrow 1998). Scholars also argue that when one movement emerges, it often can foster other movements. Through what are called “cycles of protest,” movements can interact with each other sharing ideas, tactics, and organizations, and consequently create more protest opportunities (Meyer and Whittier 1994). Another approach used by scholars is to examine the ways in which identities and group cultures are important to social movements. This perspective illustrates how being engaged in social movement communities is meaningful to the individual, sustaining activism (Buechler 1990; Taylor and Whittier 1992). Finally, the contentious politics approach views social movements as made up of public protest events such as demonstrations and sees movements as connected to other forms of collective action such as unions, strikes, and revolutions (McAdam, Tarrow, and Tilly 2001). These different frameworks tell us that the study of social movements, similar to the study of gender, examines social movements from all levels and asks a variety of questions making more complex (and interesting) answers.
How More Than Gender Matters
Any discussion of gender and social movements needs also to include a discussion of intersectionality. Often credited to Kimberlé Crenshaw (1991), and emerging from the work of Black feminist activists and scholars, intersectionality is the idea that we are a complex combination of social identities that need to be considered in relation to each other (Combahee River Collective 1978; Deborah King 1988; Patricia Hill Collins 1990). Black feminist theorists conceptualized race, class, and gender as interlocking systems of oppression, forming a “matrix of domination” in which one social identity cannot be understood completely without considering all aspects of a person (Collins 1990). This matrix of identities influences our interactions, opportunities, and access to resources (Collins 1990; hooks 1989). Intersectionality was conceived through the work of U.S. Black feminist theorists to address the racism, classism, and homophobia of the women’s movement with the goal of dismantling the concept that all women experience society in the same way – or “universal womanhood.” In particular, Black feminists argued that they could not be understood as either Black or women but as both. They argued for understanding people as both/and as opposed to either/or. The concept of intersectionality is key in much of the research on gender, allowing scholars to conceptualize people as more than just a gender category. Instead, scholars explore the ways in which other social identities such as race and class influence how people experience gender.
The use of intersectionality in gender theory is important to the study of social movements. A singular focus on gender in movements does not adequately capture the dynamics of gender, race, and class (among other social identities) for people engaged in social movements and how this intersection of identities shapes their experiences. An intersectional perspective also allows for an examination of how political resources and access to power varies by social groups. By not treating all social movement participants as equal in their ability to mobilize resources and influence political elites, intersectionality as a lens can examine the impact of gender along with race, ethnicity, class, sexuality, and religion (among other categories) when considering social inequality. In the chapters that follow, I present research that often examines only gender and social movements, and then work to complicate these views with an intersectional perspective.
How Gender and Social Movements Intertwine and Influence Each Other
This chapter then raises the question – Why is this combination of gender and social movements important? There are three key reasons to combine the study of gender with social movements. First, the study of social movements has been slowly integrating gender scholarship, expanding our ability to see complexity of social change efforts. Understanding that gender is more than an individual quality allows for a greater grasp of inequality and efforts to address it. Second, since gender is a system of stratification, integrating it into social movements scholarship allows for new insights into the nature of inequality and social change. As we will see, gender inequality can be the start of a social movement, as well as shaping how people experience social movements. Third, as social movements seek to change society and gender norms are constantly in flux, the integration of gender and social movements captures the dynamic of how societies change over time. I address each of these – integrating scholarship, intersectionality, studying social change – in more detail.
Integrating scholarship
Over three decades ago, Judith Stacey and Barrie Thorne (1985) argued that gender was the “missing revolution” in sociology. Doug McAdam (1992) echoed their call, focusing on social movements and asking scholars to consider gender as a factor in movements. Since the 1990s, social movement studies have begun to answer that call with an increase in gender scholarship, particularly focusing on women in movements. Feminist scholars argued that all social movements, regardless of whether or not they agitate for gender equality, operate within gendered institutions and settings and are engaged in the social construction of gender. This scholarly progress has come in two waves, with the first focused on understanding women’s social movement activism (Whittier 2007). However, as gender scholars expanded their research beyond the study of women, the second wave began. It was then that scholars began to consider the topic of masculinity and intersectionality in all movements.
As a result, gender scholarship has expanded social movement theories. For example, Judith Gerson and Kathy Peiss (1985) detailed how a gendered identity is formed through the development of a gender consciousness, the negotiation of gender boundaries and the interaction with “the other.” Verta Taylor and Nancy Whittier (1992) drew on this scholarship to illustrate how activist identities are created within movement communities and how they are constantly being constructed as the external environment, and group norms, beliefs, and goals shift. Relatedly, scholars have drawn on the dynamics of women’s movements to advance theorizing on social movements in general (Reger and Taylor 2002; Taylor and Whittier 1995; Staggenborg and Taylor 2005; Taylor 1999). Studies of the U.S. women’s movement have shaped social movement theory in multiple ways. Investigations of feminist culture prompted new understandings of movement continuity and change. Scholars of feminism articulated important concepts for all social movements, such as the existence of multiple activist identities, distinctive movement cultures, and networks of activists not visible to mainstream society. All of these concepts moved the study of social movements away from a strictly structural and resource-focused analysis. This was brought in part by feminist activists studying the movement around them, a dynamic seen in other movements such as the student, anti-war, peace, and anti-nuclear movements. In studying the movements around them, feminist researchers could also see how a movement could shape society, and how, as gender issues shifted in movements, so did the focus and goals of movements. In sum, the study of a gendered social movement such as U.S. feminism has influenced the social movement theories and concepts that can be applied to all social movements.
Addressing inequality
In addition to integrating the study of gender and social movements, studying gender within social movements allows for an investigation of a system of inequality. Even when the movement is not specifically organized around gender, gender stratification is present in movements, shaping who has power and resources. Raewyn Connell refers to this structural inequality as “gender regimes” (1987: 120) built into an institution or organization. These regimes establish who has power and who does not. Verta Taylor calls the ideology underlying these regimes “gender logic” even when they do not draw specifically “on the language of femininity and masculinity or of gender contention” (1999: 21). Taylor offers the example of “beloved community” during the civil rights movements as an illustration of how a movement not focused specifically on gender used a language of care and concern in its understanding of the social movement community. These gender regimes and gendered logics reflect the larger society and by examining them we can learn about the society in which movements form and some of the ways in which gender inequality manifests itself.
Studying social change
Studying the relationship between gender and social movements is also an investigation of how social change occurs. When social movements focus on gendered issues, such as the men’s rights movement discussed in Chapter 1, gender norms and societal understandings of gender can shift. However, shifts in society, such as in the economy and labor market as well as social disruptions of war or global pandemics, can alter gender norms and spur social movement activism. For example, many African women’s movements started out as peace and anti-war movements and became gender-focused movements (Tripp 2017). Here we can see how the end of the wars often brought social reorganization and a call by activists for reforming society. In the course of pressing for reforms, women peace activists also experienced political openings that “helped foster new women’s activism, which sped up processes of women’s rights reform” (Tripp 2017: 46). There is a consistent pattern across time and place in which movements focused on non-gendered issues give birth to gender-focused movements.
Focusing on gender inequality and dynamics of social change leads us back to the example of the #MeToo movement. Gender norms and expectations, particularly around expressions of sexuality and expectations, can result in the identification of a problem, such as sexual harassment and assault, that spreads through society. Understanding these problems as more than individual issues but as inequality embedded in societal norms can lead to the formation of a social movement. This problem, or as social movement scholars call it a “grievance,” is articulated by social movement participants, diffuses into society and is embedded in activist networks. Sparked by an event, such as the highly publicized case of Harvey Weinstein, experiences are reexamined, stories are told, activists are organized, and a societal shift begins. In sum, in the #MeToo movement, a societal issue moves from being an accepted norm to a social problem and then a grievance articulated through a social movement. Through sustained attention by activists, combined with shifting social attitudes, we see that though the emergence of #MeToo can appear spontaneous and somewhat puzzling, it is instead an outcome of a movement that drew on and redefined what it means to experience sexual assault and harassment through an analysis of gender. In all, combining gender and social movements provides us with a lens to understand the world around us.
Organization of the Book
To investigate these dynamics, this volume moves from examining how the sex and gender of participants shapes a movement, to gender as an ideology or social logic shaping movements and ends by exploring reactions and responses coming from gendered movements. In doing so, Chapters 1 through 4
