Page 135 - Contemporary Political Sociology Globalization Politics and Power

Social Movements 121

been ruled out as inadequate: the negotiation of individuals ’ reasons for
participating and the collective identities which are constructed as a result
are what creates social movements as such.
(3) “ Social movement actors are engaged in political and/or cultural

conflicts, meant to promote or oppose social change either at the systemic

or non - systemic level ” (Diani, 1992 : 11). As Diani notes, the idea that
social movements aim at social change through confl ict is central to
NSMT. For Touraine especially, but also Melucci, one of the core com-
ponents of a social movement is that it is engaged in conflict with an

adversary who interprets the same values in an antagonistic way. However,
Diani argues that, although the RMT tradition is ostensibly more con-

cerned with processes of social change, conflict is implicit in their under-
standing of social movements insofar as they acknowledge that social

change is achieved only through conflict with other actors, whether insti-
tutions, other social movements, or counter - movements.
The main difference between the two traditions is, as we have seen,
that while RMT is concerned above all with the way in which social
movements effect change through the mainstream political process, New
Social Movement theorists see activity at this level as that of a “ public
interest group ” or even a political party, not a social movement. They see
social movements as active in culture, as engaged in challenging shared
meanings, and, in the case of Melucci, in self - transformation. Diani plays
down this difference, clearly seeing it in terms of the difference between

formal political activities and conflicts in civil society and arguing that it
is a matter of emphasis rather than of fundamentally incompatible under-
standings of social movements. However, his reading of both traditions
is rather selective on this point. In order to reach consensus on the dif-
ferent orientations of social movements, adjustments have to be made
both to RMT and NMST.
RMT has, above all, been concerned with political change at the “ non -
systemic ” level, that is, through the institutions of the state. In order to
engage fully with cultural change, it would be necessary for Resource
Mobilization theorists to give less emphasis to social movement organiza-
tions as the principal actors in social movements and more emphasis to
the negotiation of collective identity and social action in processes of
interaction. It is true that this is possible within the terms of RMT but,
as we have seen, it would also mean giving up the commitment to objec-
tivity and scientifi c neutrality on which the tradition has been based. It
would mean RMT following the implications of the more cultural under-
standing of politics it has developed to a conclusion which would bring
it much more fully within the “ cultural turn. ”