The Effectiveness and Purpose of Social Movements

Last weekend I had the privilege of attending the People’s Climate March in New York City. The organizers were only expecting 100,000 participants, but roughly 400,000 people attended. This was the biggest climate march in history, with a purpose of demanding climate change action during the September 23^rd United Nations summit. However, during our in-class discussion on Monday, it was evident that many of my peers did not believe that activism in the form of public demonstration is effective.  I believe that it is effective in producing change, and that it is an important part of our democratic ideals.

            The UN summit was considered by many to be a success. Several European nations announced plans to reduce carbon emissions by 40% of their 1990 levels; the U.S. announced a new climate change initiative and China pledged to increase its use of fossil-fuel alternatives. Additionally, over 1,000 companies backed an initiative to develop new technology that would “reflect the true costs of emissions and other forms of pollution.” [1] Why would countries and businesses choose to reduce emissions if there was not public pressure to do so? It is evident that it is not within the economic interests of anyone to reduce their emissions or to employ new eco-friendly technology, since it is time consuming to develop and costly to implement. I believe that the reason why many companies are capitalizing on environmentally conscious methods of expansion is because they realize that it is what the public wants, and that the public will support eco-friendly businesses, if not now then in the future. Nations are leaning towards less environmentally harmful sources of energy to meet rising public demand.

            Obviously every social movement is different. Some protests, such as the People’s Climate March, are organized by informed leaders and planned well in advance; some marches are spontaneous. A study through Stanford University showed that social movements do have an effect on the actions of congressional leaders[2]. Congressmen and women are more likely to schedule hearing and roll call votes on issues when there is a social movement surrounding the it. However, the study explains that protests are most effective during the earlier stages of policymaking, before the congressional agenda is set. This gives great insight into the inner workings of our political system. Dr. Sarah Soule, Professor of Organizational Behavior at Stanford, explains that this is due to how lawmakers feel that there are fewer consequences for introducing a bill that protesters would support, yet there is more at stake in the later stages of the policymaking process.  Some constituents may not like the newly proposed bill, causing the potential law to become much more controversial. However, it is important to note that when the timing is right, protests can cause legislators to introduce bills that they otherwise would not have.

            I believe that social activism is an important part of living in a democratic state. We are a representative democracy for a reason- we elect policymakers to represent the desires of the people and to translate those desires into law. While calling or writing to your congressional representative may be somewhat effective in swaying public policy, it is undoubtedly more effective when 400,000 people gather in the streets of New York City to demand action. To my classmates who disagreed with me I pose the following question- if not through social activism, then how?

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[1] All information on the 2014 U.N. Climate Summit was gathered from the official United Nations website www.un.org

[2] Professor Sarah Soule Explains Social Movements, http://www.gsb.stanford.edu/news/bmag/sbsm0909/kn-effective-social-movements.html