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Social Movements 119

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them without doing injustice to either. It is clear that the basis of Diani ’ s
synthesis is a sympathy with the work of Melucci, who has already tried
to incorporate some elements of RMT ’ s understanding of the importance
of mobilizing structures and political opportunities. Here we will look at
Diani ’ s synthesis with a view to drawing out the importance of cultural
politics to both major traditions in social movement theory.

Diani begins his task by laying out a working definition of “ social
movement, ” pointing out that it is striking how little work has been done
on actually identifying social movements as distinct from other types of
collective action. A social movement is a:

specific social dynamic. … It consists in a process whereby several different
actors, be they individuals, informal groups and/or organizations, come to
elaborate, through either joint action and/or communication, a shared defi -
nition of themselves as being part of the same side in a social confl ict. By
doing so, they provide meaning to otherwise unconnected protest events or
symbolic antagonistic practices, and make explicit the emergence of specifi c

conflicts and issues … This dynamic is reflected in the definition of social
movements as consisting in networks of informal interaction between a
plurality of individuals, groups and/or organizations, engaged in a political
and/or cultural conflict, on the basis of a shared collective identity. (Diani,

1992 : 2 – 3)

It should be noted that Diani ’ s definition differs in one crucial respect
from the understanding of cultural politics developed here. According to
this understanding, there is no distinction between “ political ” and “ cul-

tural ” as different kinds of conflict in the way Diani suggests. All confl icts
necessarily take place in culture and, insofar as they involve struggles to
realize only one of various possible courses of action in practice, they are
political. It is, however, the case, as we have noted, that social movements
engage in cultural politics in civil society and also at the level of the state,

contesting exclusionary definitions of citizenship. It is no doubt in this
sense that Diani intends his distinction between “ political ” and “ cul-
tural ” : the first term referring to conventional forms of politics aimed at

mobilizing political parties and lobbying to change legislation and the
latter referring to the politics of everyday life. He apparently does not
recognize both as cultural, although this is clearly the implication of the
terms on which RMT and NSMT converge. This will become clear as we
work through the synthesis he has constructed.

According to Diani, his definition of social movement emphasizes at
least four aspects of their dynamics: