Page 107 - Managing Change in Organizations

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Chapter 5 ■ Theories of change: critical perspectives
‘social movements’ are about achieving large-scale change. Whether we are look-
ing at civil rights, the ban the bomb campaign, the anti-smoking campaign or the
campaign (in the UK) to ban fox hunting (with hounds) it is clear that social
movements may have something to tell us about how to engage people in large-
scale change. Lack of ambition is not something one would associate with cam-
paigns of this sort.
Bate, Bevan and Robert (2004) offer the following contrast between a project or
programme approach to achieving change and a social movements approach.
Mainly the difference is about engaging people at a ‘deep’ or even emotional level.
Change is essentially self-directing and follows an absolute, some might say mes-
sianic, commitment to the cause. Ultimately ‘social movements’ are voluntary.
Of course we have already argued that the change management literature is
richer than this contrast allows for. You have only to look at Collins (2001) to
realize that this comparison just will not do. Moreover, can we really argue that
‘social movements’ have no leader? Martin Luther King? Nelson Mandella?
Nevertheless, while the comparison may not stand up to detailed scrutiny there
is something to be said for it. While Martin Luther King was a civil rights leader
who captured world attention how much progress would he have made without
someone like Rosa Parkes? Certainly change models do not always work on crude
‘what is in it for me’ assumptions about people (see the Collins (2001) ‘Good to
Great’ model as an example). Nevertheless, it is right to note that social move-
ments often inspire courageous choices where cost or danger or hardship may be,
and sometimes is, involved for those making choices.
While it may be reasonable to characterize traditional organizational models
as emphasizing questions like ‘What is this programme seeking to achieve and
what evidence is there that it will have the desired effect?’ it is simplistic to con-
trast that with a social movements emphasis on ‘Who supports the programme,
how were they mobilized and how much influence can they deploy?’ Following
Kelman (2005) it is clear that such questions could and would be asked by the
organization practitioner and theorist. However, it may be reasonable to argue
that within the context of ‘social movements’ change is released, liberated, chan-
nelled and enabled. Elites seek to mobilize processes rather than engender spe-

cific programmes of change. Clearly the organization change literature provides
for this through the idea of emergent change and concepts such as ‘whistle-blow-
ing’ have some of the characteristics of social movements.
To summarize, social movements can lead to transformational change, albeit
the achievement of many social movements may be more modest. Traditional
approaches to organization change and the social movement notion share some
characteristics, particularly if one is contrasting the idea of emergent change with
social movements ideas. The latter involve collective action by people who have
voluntarily come together around a common cause, typically, although not
always, they involve radical action and protest and have spontaneous begin-
nings. Interestingly enough organization changes often have less spontaneous
beginnings and are more typically a process of learning, systematically carried
out. Conversely social movements are informal networks, based on shared beliefs
and mobilized around conflicting and often very controversial issues through the
frequent use of protest.

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