B. The Movement-Electoral Nexus

So in this segment will focus on the relationships between

social movements and elections in particular, as one form of

institutionalized politics.

And I'm choosing to do this because what we find

is that elections and movements have become the two major

forms of political conflict in democracies like the US.

So it's really important to understand how they speak to

one another.

The most basic or general relationship that I can point

out about elections and movements is that they arose historically

at around the same time.

And that's because both movements and Democratic elections are built

on the shared principle that ordinary people deserve a political

voice. Now, let's take a look at more specific relationships

between them.

First, we find that many of the same activists and

organizations that are involved in social movements are also involved

in electoral politics.

This happens in a number of ways.

Um social movements can join electoral coalitions that can run

their own candidates in elections, or sometimes they can even

turn into political parties themselves.

So, for instance, here in the United States, the Republican

Party was originally the electoral offshoot of the abolitionist movement.

Or we can also look at the Farmers Alliance, which

was a leftist movement of Economic Justice for Farmers that

actually became the populist party.

And this was a third party that won a number

of congressional and gubernatorial seats in the late 18 hundreds,

early 19 hundreds, but they would eventually fuse with the

democrats and that's because it's incredibly difficult for a third

party to gain any traction in US politics because of

the way that our electoral is set up around the

first past the post um structure.

But that's a whole another conversation.

And we can also look at black lives matter adjacent

candidates who have won congressional offices like Jamal Bowman here

in new york city or Cori Bush in Missouri or

charlie booker in Kentucky.

Social movements can also mobilize before an upcoming election if

they see something about that election as either being a

threat to their interests or being an opportunity to advance

their interests.

So, for instance, one of the goals of the civil

rights movements Freedom Summer campaign was to register black voters

across Mississippi and changed the very white delegation to the

1964 Democratic National Convention and really challenge or push the

Democratic Party to commit to a civil rights platform.

Now, sometimes social movements don't mobilize before an election, but

they actually mobilize after an election um to either contest

the results of that election or because the person elected

as a threat to the movement's interests or the movement

wants to ensure that their new leader will keep the

promises that they made on the campaign trail to the

movement, so they might actually support the person who was

elected, but they just want to make sure that the

person elected would do what they promised the movement, especially

if the movement helped them come into office.

So um one of the examples that we saw of

movements mobilizing after an election was after Bush lost the

popular vote to gore in 2000, but was going to

win the presidency anyway because he won the Electoral College,

there was this recount throughout florida and the Republican Party

sent staffers and canvassers to a stage of demonstration that

actually became known as the brooks brothers riot in order

to shut down the recount.

They wanted to shut down the recount because they really

thought that Bush might actually lose the Electoral College too

if there was a recount in florida, and so they

just wanted to shut that down and to give the

election to Bush.

Yeah, and then of course, we see um the post

election mobilizations after trump was initially elected.

This included that historic Women's March that we talked about

in unit one.

Um and then again after trump lost reelection and his

supporters stormed the capitol building.

Now on the other side of this we find that

candidates who seek office and political parties trying to win

office can often rely on social movements in order to

help them with.

Um So sometimes this involves adopting movement, platforms, or sometimes

it just means using existing movement infrastructure and networks um

and supporters in order to help them get the word

out to Dornoch to Canada's whatever and if politicians or

parties formed these sorts of relationships with movements, it can

actually move the politicians are the party closer to the

movement agenda so it can move the right order leftward

depending on what movement they align themselves with.

Um so for instance, Black Lives Matter or the movement

for Black Lives was one of the primary forces that

really pushed biden towards more progressive politics at least domestically

while he was on the campaign trail.

And so now he's basically one of the most progressive

president, at least on the domestic front that we've ever

had in our history, which is incredibly surprising given his

rather conservative record in Congress.

Um and this is largely a result of all of

the movements that arose right before he became president, and

and he had to rely on those movements in order

to win against trump.

Now some electoral campaigns will even adopt protest repertoires.

So for instance, Um there were these huge protests against

the World Trade Organization and it's free trade policies that

actually privileged already rich countries and um and subjugated poorer

countries in global economy.

And these protests occurred in 1999 in Seattle.

This was the epicentre, but then it really occurred all

around the world and it was heavily repressed, lots of

police brutality, lots of arrests.

But this protest was the first movement to be organized

online and to have a widespread online presence.

And so the Howard Dean presidential campaign in 2004 actually

learned from this, and they became the first electoral campaign

to use the internet to bring all of Howard Dean

supporters together.

And then this technique was then later perfected by Obama's

campaign was really hugely responsible for how popular Obama got

among young people who were largely living on the internet.

Now, at other times, social movements not don't really provide

like a mobilization all force from parties, but they can

divide political parties internally as when certain factions of parties

will align with a movement, whereas other factions will oppose

the movement.

And sometimes these divisions get bad enough that factions of

the party will split off entirely.

And this happened in 1968 when a pro segregationist white

southerner faction of the Democratic Party called the dixiecrats defected

from the Democratic Party and during the Republican Party.

Um and this really changed the whole fundamental nature and

orientation of the Republican Party.

Um So they did this, the dixiecrat defected from the

Democratic Party because they thought that the Democratic Party was

being too influenced by the civil rights movement and they

were opposed to integration.

Um so their defection from the Democratic Party actually dismantled

the new deal coalition and ushered in 40 years of

Republican dominance in the presidency.

Now, this relates to um this next thing that I

want to point out, which is sometimes when one party

dominates politics for a very long period of time, they

can empower certain groups over others and thus impact patterns

of mobilization and impact what sorts of social movements can

arise. So, for instance, between 1932 and 1968 the democrats

really dominated the presidency with only one republican who was

Eisenhower interrupting the string of five democratic presidents.

And even then, Eisenhower was pretty centrist.

Now this movement went, or I'm sorry, this period when

the democrats dominated politics was marked by a stronger labor

movement and more popular support for socialists and leftist groups.

Um and the rise of the civil rights movement, the

rise of the New Left, which you got a taste

for the trial.

The Chicago seven movie that was about the persecution of

the new left, but basically with the new left is

was very much an umbrella broad term for a series

of anti Vietnam war.

Anti imperialist countercultural movements In the 1960s and 1970s all

across the West.

And it would also include movements for LGBTQ rights for

women's rights and for the empowerment of black, indigenous and

people of color.

Yeah, now in 1968 to 2008, the republicans dominated this

period was marked by the rise of the christian right,

by the anti government militia movement, by a strong and

sustained pro life movement, um rising anti immigration sentiment, especially

under Reagan.

And this period of time really was a conservative, mostly

white backlash to the gains made by all of the

protests and protests, induced cultural changes throughout the sixties and

the seventies.

So again, we see that in these two periods where

different regimes were impact, right, the democratic regime first, and

then the republican regime, that different groups in society became

more mobilized and more empowered.

So this is another way in which parties um and

electoral politics really affect the shape or the potentials of

the opportunities and the threats opposed to social movements.

Now, as a result of all of these relationships that

I've mentioned.

Um cycles of protests and cycles of electoral change are

remarkably synchronized because they have so many interactions between them.

And often times when there's elections happening movements will want

to mobilize because they think that it's an a opportunity

structure opening for them to really get in there and

try to change policy and try to change society because

during times of elections, politicians have to listen because they

need votes right now.

This relationship between protests and elections are amplified even more

during large scale changes like war or economic crises.

Because these large scale changes will shake the faith that

people have in their elected leaders or the parties that

they usually follow.

So in these movements, people are a lot more open

to leaving established parties and joining new ones And politicians

know this so they're forced to listen more to the

movements that mobilized during these times.

Um so that they can continue to have their electoral

support base

B. The Movement-Electoral Nexus

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