Alignments in social movement fields: the construction of small and large-scaled performance outcomes

Abstract

The paper explores how members of social associations construct the outcomes of their efforts. It focuses on the experience of two Russian civic initiatives: a historic preservation movement in Nizhny Novgorod, and an environmental movement in St. Petersburg. Relying on the theory of social movement fields (B. Useem, J. Goldstone), the authors show what small and large-scaled goals the participants of these movements set, what efforts to achieve the goals they undertake, how their actions are embedded in the configurations of social movement fields, and how the activists retrospectively estimate the immediate and long-term outcomes of their activity. As a result, the authors conclude that the micro-goals of the social movements under study are (potentially) accomplishable — but only within a specific alignment of the social movement field: when the powerholders are open to a productive dialogue with the activists, when relations of cooperation between the activists and individual politicians or political structures have been shaped, when there are no mutually beneficial alliances between business stakeholders and local politicians, etc. Meanwhile, the macro-goals and related successes in the field seem principally unrealizable. Thus, the activists are confined to “small deeds” by performing in “conservation areas” only, i.e. focusing on local city territories and/or commensurating their claims with the sanctions of strong stakeholders but not going as far as to essentially transform the social movement field.