SOCIAL MOVEMENTS IN AN AGE OF PARTICIPATION*
How have social movements fared in an era marked by new enthusiasm for citizen participation? I identify several features of today's participatory landscape that make it different from earlier ones, including its scale and scope, its reliance on the Internet, and its relation to state power that is dispersed among multiple actors. Then I trace the mixed consequences of these features for social movement groups.
Contributor Notes
* My thanks to participants in the Future of Democracy After Neoliberalism Conference for their valuable feedback on an earlier version of this article, as well as to two anonymous reviewers, and to the special issue's editor, Edwin Amenta. Funding for the research reported in this article came from a grant from the National Science Foundation (IIS 0306868).
†Francesca Polletta is professor in the Department of Sociology at University of California, Irvine.