Movement 'Clusters': New Directions of Study
SOC 8090-002 Topics in Sociology
5:30 - 8:30 p.m., Tuesdays and Thursdays September 4-13
1114 Social
Sciences, 1 credit
Instructor: Doug McAdam, Professor of Sociology at Stanford University, who will be in
residence at the Institute for Advanced Study September 4-14.
Scholars persist in conceiving of social movements and revolutions as
largely independent of one another. But the most consequential
movements/revolutions typically cluster in time and space. Europe in
1848-49, Eastern Europe in 1989-90, the "Color" Revolutions of 2003-05,
the South American independence movements of 1810-25: all of these are
examples of "movement clusters" that dramatically changed the
geopolitical landscape. But conventional theories of social movements
and revolution fail to explain the phenomenon of "movement clusters."
The goal of the course will be to sketch a provisional theoretic
framework that explains the origin and development of such clusters.