Page 115 - Contemporary Political Sociology Globalization Politics and Power

Social Movements 101

A “ frame ” works because “ it simplifi es ‘ the world out there ’ by selectively
punctuating and encoding objects, situations, events, experiences, and
sequences of actions in one ’ s present or past environment ” (Snow and
Benford, 1992 : 137). Frames enable the interpretation of what would

otherwise be a mass of complex data, fleeting impressions, and confusing
ideas. It is “ collective action frames, ” in particular, which work to mobi-
lize the members of social movements: they “ punctuate ” or emphasize the

intolerability of some aspect of a group ’ s social condition, defining it as
requiring corrective action; they make what Snow and Benford call “ diag-
nostic attributions ” – attributing blame to individuals, groups, or social
structures – and “ prognostic attributions ” – suggesting how the problem
could be ameliorated; and they “ encode ” an array of events, observations,
and experiences into meaningful “ packages ” for the targets of mobiliza-
tion (1992: 137 – 8).

Influenced by Goffman, Snow and his associates consider mobilization
to take place in face - to - face interaction, in what they call “ micromobiliza-
tion. ” Building on earlier work concerning different processes of recruit-
ment into different social movements, on how movements “ solicit, coax,
and secure participants, ” they locate mobilization in the face - to - face
interactions of everyday life (Snow et al., 1980 : 799, 1986: 464 – 5). Social
movements recruit and secure adherents by linking individual interpreta-
tions with those of the movement in an ongoing process which Snow et
al. (1986) call “ frame alignment. ” There are four strategies of frame
alignment, as they see it, which depend on how far individuals are from
the orientation of the movement: “ frame bridging ” in which “ ideologi-
cally congruent but structurally unconnected frames ” are linked; “ frame
amplifi cation ” in which there is the “ clarifi cation and invigoration ” of an
already existing interpretation; “ frame extension ” in which the objectives
of the movement are portrayed as continuous with the values and interests
of potential adherents; and “ frame transformation ” in which a movement
puts forward a radically new set of ideas and must therefore totally
reframe old understandings of issues and problems (Snow et al., 1986 ).
In more recent years, while still focusing on micromobilization insofar
as they see framing and reframing as interactive, Snow and his associates
have turned their attention to the wider context in which social movements
mobilize resources, to look at the “ master frames ” through which a variety
of movements are created and constrained (Snow and Benford, 1988,
1992 ). This enables them to take a more historical view, and they argue
that, using this concept, they can explain the well - documented “ cycles
of protest ” which characterize the activities of new social movements.
Like collective action frames, master frames are modes of punctuation,