Collecting a Representative Sample of Social Movement Events to Study Change Over Time

University Of Notre Dame, Notre Dame IN

Investigators

Abstract

Social movement events are an integral part of democracy, giving people the opportunity to come together collectively to voice concerns about elected officials and governmental policies. Despite longstanding scholarly attention to these events, until recently no nationally representative sample of them existed because of methodological limitations. Most significantly, newspapers--prior research's go-to data source--disproportionally cover larger and more contentious events, generating a skewed view of their social dynamics. A 2010-11 national survey of these events changed that. With the first-ever nationally representative sample of these events in hand, researchers made many new discoveries, such as capturing the average size of events and the most common causes for which events mobilized across the nation. By collecting another wave of such events and comparing it to the original one, this project breaks new ground in the study of social change. The project will analyze two types of change. First is change in the characteristics of the events. Are event sizes in the second wave study larger or smaller relative to those in the first wave? Do today's events focus around certain causes (for example, gun violence, immigration, or women's issues) more often than they did eight years ago? Second is explanatory change. Are certain factors stronger or weaker predictors now than in the first survey? For instance, does the proportion of blacks attending events generate more or less police presence today compared to eight years ago? Findings will inform understanding of democratic life and civil society, allowing elected officials and governmental agencies to have important information about trajectories for collective action, thus enabling better planning for citizen safety and participation. Social movement events reflect attendee concerns with governmental policies, but tracking changes in these events has been hampered by lack of reliable data. This project builds on earlier work that produced a representative sample of these events; this project will conduct a second such survey. The second survey wave will employ hypernetwork sampling to draw a nationally representative sample of over 1,000 event attendees to answer questions about objective features of events they attended, such as turnout, date, location, tactics used, organizational sponsorship, and police and other citizen presence. Duplicate events will be removed. Additionally, statistical weights will be developed and applied to adjust for: (1) the greater probability of inclusion for larger events given hypernetwork sampling; and (2) the fact that some citizens attend more than one event in the last 12 months, and thus not all events have an equal probability of selection. Events will be geocoded by city and linked to Census-place level codes. Then, Census variables (for example, population size) will be attached to them, so that contextual variables can be examined. To analyze change between the two samples, both bivariate (t-tests) and multivariate (regression) statistical models will be used. Moreover, data visualization techniques will be implemented to facilitate interpretation and understanding of changes in events over time. These findings will advance sociological theories about social movement dynamics, with implications for greater knowledge regarding the types of social issues most likely to motivate collective action. Findings will also inform larger literatures in several fields regarding democratic participation, particularly regarding contextual differences in event characteristics and trajectories, thus informing theories of social change. This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.