Oportunistic Moments

Precipitating incidents are opportunitic moments that can only be utlized by preparation. If there is no preparation then the opportunity cannot be capitalized upon. Preparation can identify opportunities.

Slogans Tell it All

Toyota - Drive your dreams
Toyota (in America)- Moving Forward
Toyota Nets - Make the Style
Nissan - SHIFT the future
Honda - The Power of Dreams
Subaru - Think feel drive
Mazda - Zoom-Zoom
Mitsubishi - Heart, Beat, Motors (until 2005)
Sony - It’s a SONY. Like no other
Nintendo DS - Touch!
Nisshin Cup Noodle - Hungry?
Mitsubishi Electric - Changes for the Better
Financial Group - Quality for You
Mizuho Financial Group- Channel to Discovery
Kyocera - The New Value Frontier
Bridgestone - Passion for Excellence
KDDI - Designing The Future
Matsushita Electronic Industrial - Ideas for life
Hitachi - Inspire the Next
NEC - Empowered by Innovation
Toshiba Corp - Leading Innovation
Mitsubishi Electronic - Changes for the Better
IBM Japan - Business on demand
Microsoft - Your potential. Our Passion
Pioneer - Sound Vision Soul
Recruit - Follow Your Heart
Teijin - Human Chemistry, Human Solutions
Eisai - Human health care
Astellas - Leading Light for Life
Phizer - Working for a healthier world
Sanofi-Aventis - Because health matters
Tokyo Electric Power Company - Switch!
JT - The Delight Factory
JAL - Dream Skyward
Nippon Express - With Your Life
Fuji Xerox - The Document company

Mama Africa is Home

Mama Africa, Miriam Makeba returned home for the last time. She died in Italy as she left stage at age 76. She was the voice of the movement and suffered 30 years of exile. She had the voice of a nightingale, she was stripped of her citizenship in 1960 for speaking out against apartheid and was refused the right to attend her mother's funeral. In all her sacrifice and suffering her song remained strong. Mama Click Song we will miss you. Sing with the angels.

The Browning Effect

President Obama was elected by the young open minded supporter and the browning effect in America. Of course he was helped by John McCain not having lucid policies and for his choice of Palin.
Not to mention the economy, stupid. Movements occur at historic junctures where opportunity meets its moments.

SASO Nine BPC Trial

The SASO Nine BPC trial was also called the Black Consciousness Trial since Black Consciousness itself was on trial with Steve Biko.
His writings and his poetry was used as evidence of this thoughts which the prosecution contended were treasonous.

Chicago 8 Trial

The Chicago 8 Trial was a result of the protests at the Democratic Convention of 1968.

Rivonia Trialists

The Rivonia Trial is the one where Mandela made his famous speech from the dock explaining why he chose to switch from non-violent protest strategies to armed struggle. He and his co-defendents were found guilty and sentenced to life imprisonment and hard labor.

Treason Trial

The Treason Trial of 1956 - 1961 was a disaster for the government but a boon for the defendents. The government lost its case and did not prove treason but in the process brought together the leaders of the struggle to a single location for an extended period of time, something they could not achieve themselves.

Gandhi

The Richard Attenborough epic, Gandhi, traces the story as accurately as possible. Ben Kingsley lookls remarkably like Gandhi and in interviews shares that he was louded in villages in India by ordinary people. He also says that the final scene was eerily quiet as I am sure a cast of thousands relived the experience.

Gandhi and the train

One of the precipitating incidents for the South African struggle is when Gandhi was thrown off a train because of the color of his skin.


Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh ( R ) is accompanied by his wife, Kaur Singh (L),as they take a train ride from the Pentrich railway station to the Pietemaritzburg railway station, some 90 kilometres north of Durban, 30 September 2006. The train ride is a symbolic gesture that Singh undertook to commemorate the ride taken by the Father of Indian freedom struggle Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi exactly a century ago. Gandhi was thrown out of the train by the minority racist government.Singh is on a four day official tour to attend the Gandhi' Centenary celebrations taken on by the South African government. AFP PHOTO / RAJESH JANTILAL (Photo credit should read RAJESH JANTILAL/AFP/Getty Images)

Call for a Mass Movement

Barbara Ehrenreich, author of Nickel and Dimed, says we need a mass movement for economic justice. on CSPAN as a result of the $700 billion bailout package before congress.

Booking Rosa

Rosa Parks was arrested for not giving up a seat to a white passenger. It may not be well known that she was sitting in the black section. There is a rule though that if you are in the black section and the whites do not have a seat the driver can get you to move back or stand. The idea is not only to get a white man a seat but to get a white passenger all of the row. Three other passengers in that row moved back but Rosa refused. I am sure there was a seat available to the white passenger but they wanted all the rows cleared and she was arrested not for giving up her seat but for not clearing out her row. The same driver had evicted her from a bus 12 year earlier after she paid her fare, she had to leave the bus to enter from the back door and he drove off leaving her in the rain. This too was the custom.

Mongomery Bus Boycott

The Montgomery Bus Boycott officially started on December 1, 1955. In South Africa, the first Alexandra bus boycott took place in 1940 paving the way for bus boycotts as a strategy of protest.

Rosa Parks

Rosa Louise McCauley Parks (February 4, 1913 – October 24, 2005) was an African American civil rights activist whom the U.S. Congress later called "Mother of the Modern-Day Civil Rights Movement".
On December 1, 1955 in Montgomery, Alabama, Parks refused to obey bus driver James Blake's order that she give up her seat to make room for a white passenger. Her action was not the first of its kind: Irene Morgan, in 1946, and Sarah Louise Keys, in 1955, had won rulings before the Supreme Court and the Interstate Commerce Commission respectively in the area of interstate bus travel. But unlike these previous individual actions of civil disobedience, Parks' action sparked the Montgomery Bus Boycott. (Wikipedia, 2008)

Moments in Mass Movements

There are many moments that are memories ingrained in the fabric of mass movements.

Civil Rights Movement:
Rosa Parks
Bus Boycott
Marches
Civil Rights Act

Anti-Apartheid Struggle
Gandhi Protests
Treason Trial
Sharpeville
Steve Biko
UDF
Funerals
Mandela

Examples of Mass Movements

The two already mentioned are the Civil Rights Movement and the Anti-Apartheid Struggle.
Other candidates for mass movements are:
The Slavery Abolitionist Movement
The Womens Liberation Movement
The French Revolution
The GLBT Movement

General movements include
Political Movements
Religious Movements
Art Movements
Cultural Movements

Mass Movement Stages

When mass movements are formed, they often go through a number of stages. These stages were described by Donovan and Bowers:
Petition
People who believe in a cause petition the sources of power (government, industry, etc.) to meet demands that are, rather annoyingly, just a bit too far for the holders of power to concede. This gives the petitioner reason to continue the game, getting angry at the powerful and finding a personal power through their own helplessness.
Promulgation
Fired up by the non-cooperation of those in power, the agitators now seek allies and like-minded individual (or, perhaps, those who are easily led). They hand out leaflets, they hold rallies, they feed stories to the press and generally propagate the idea that those in power are unreasonable and dangerous.
Solidification
With the success of promulgation, the group solidifies into a coherent organization that revolves around its leader. Social grouping starts to appear and a hierarchy is created to provide a system of control. The leader will, of course, seek to maintain the group and stamp his or her identity onto the group.
Polarization
One way the leader maintains control is to retain focus on the enemy, who is increasingly cast as bad and evil, which naturally leads to the conclusion that the members of the movement are good and righteous. Key 'flag' issues are identified and receive intense focus. Individuals in the opposition are singled out and vilified as embodying all that is bad about them.
Non-violent resistance
Initially, resistance is likely to be non-violent and passive, with actions such as 'work to rule', strikes, sit-ins, blocking access and cold-shouldering the opposition. A common subversive goal is to goad the opposition into violence or at least to force them to call the police. The group will then manipulate the media to make themselves appear harmless and helpless whilst the opposition is spiteful and immoral.
Escalation
This may then lead to public confrontation, where confrontation may be aggressive, at least in language. Threats may be made. Property may be damaged. It is less and less possible to converse and even mediators may be rejected.
'Gandhi vs. guerrilla'
The non-violent elements within the movement may now go to the opposition and plead with them to concede, lest those who are more violent give in to their basic drives and take even more radical and dangerous action. In effect, this is a variant on the hurt and rescue theme.
Revolution
Finally, when the opposition refuse to concede, the movement will take to the streets, publicly breaking the law and using violence with anyone who stands in their way. They act as a mob, and people who would normally be peaceful get drawn into the violence and commit acts of which they may later bitterly regret. Yet whilst the leaders of the group can sustain the maelstrom, primitive drives are whipped into the fore and revolution has its day.

Bowers, J. and Donovan, O. (1971). The Rhetoric of Agitation and Control, Reading, MA: Addison Wesley

Precipitating Event

Every Movement requries a precipitating event. The event has a number of requirements. One is that it is follows a pattern so there are a number of people who suffer the event. Another aspect is that it is ordinary in the face of a broad community experience. Of course the movement may be defined by an actual event and the other aspects may not be as apparent.
For instance the precipitating event of the Civil Right Movement is recognized as Rosa Parks refusal to give up her seat, and her arrest. There were manyothers before her who had a similiar expereince and hers was not an isolated event.

Mass Topics

The topics for mass organizations are the simple injustices that can be easily identified by a large population. The issues cannot be complicated or have multiple interpretations or even multiple reasonable points of views. The injustices will in fact have many justifications but the ordinary experience must be straightforward enough to nullify all the justifications.

Creation of Mass Organizations.

The NAACP was formed in 1909. One of its founding members was the composer of "Lift Every Voice and Sing" a song that was sung at NAACP meetings and became known as the Black National Anthem.
The ANC was formed in 1913. One of its founding members was the composer of "N'Kosi Sikele Africa" a song that was sung at ANC meetings and became known as the Black National Anthem. It finally becamse the National anthem of South Africa when Mandela was elected President in 1994.

Creation of a Mass Movement

The creation of a mass movement is a merging of many factors. The moment one is born is not predictable but it is usually tied to a provoking incident of injustice. Many small cuts may occur before the final straw is encountered. What is required to accompany the precepitating incident is some organization and leadership.

Define Mass Movements

Mass Movements are defined by those who create them. The number of people that make a mass movement is a point to consider.

Songs of the Movements

We Shall Overcome is the well-known song of the Civil Rights Movement.

The Black National Anthem, Lift Every Voice and Sing was popularized through the NAACP.

The South African National Anthem, Nkosi Sikelel' i Afrika was popularized through the ANC.

Online Movements Classroom

Welcome to the Movements online classroom. This blog is set up to study movements. Rather than only be a study of movements there will be practical opportunities to participate in movements and also to create movements especially using online technologies as part of the growing strategies.