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Beyond our backyard: Social networks, differential participation, and local opposition to coal mining in Europe
Abstract
As the energy transition proceeds, local opposition against various energy developments is increasingly widespread. This paper explores the role of social networks for participation in opposition to coal mining in the Czech Republic. A case study of the opposition movement examines whether network connections and social influence channeled through cooperation networks increase the intensity of opposition. It uses a novel approach of autologistic actor attribute models to include both individual-based and network-based predictors. The number of an individual’s network connections was found to be the sole positive predictor. By contrast, the effects of social influence, individual sociodemographic predictors, and sociopsychological predictors were not present. This shows the critical importance of the underlying cooperation network, which increases both opportunities and incentives to cooperate. The results further suggest that the opposition movement network has multiple centers revolving around high-level participants. Such arrangement indicates a division of labor among the professional activists, radical grassroots activists, and residents, thus enabling the opposition to efficiently access various resources. It also shows that research on local opposition should consider not only individual attributes but also relational contexts which allow to adequately capture the opposition’s organization. Only with such understanding may more suitable and inclusive future policies be designed.
... In Germany, the socio-technical regime of coal has come under substantial pressure, culminating in a discontinuation 1 law in which the government proclaimed the coal exit by 2038 with the possibility to antedate it to 2035 last year. Pressures lead to destabilisation processes [2] and situate the discontinuation of the socio-technical regime as a wicked governance problem [3][4][5], as part of broader transitions [6]. The abandonment of coal mining and energy production in Germany is a discontinuation process in the making and highly dynamic. ...
... We will first present the state of research and the theoretical focus (2), then explain the methodology of our approach (3) in order to develop the case study itself in detail (4). Following this, we compile the answers we have found to the research question which encompass the actor constellation, their interactions and three framing categories (5). We conclude the paper by arguing that looking into local conflicts can illustrate fault lines in discontinuations within energy transitions and give an outlook on what requires further research on the topic (6). ...
... Other studies do not focus on the production of energy, but at the extraction of coal, and investigate how the closure of mines works: for instance, regarding the closure of coal mines in the Netherlands [39] and Germany [9,10,40,41]. Social movement research has investigated mobilisation processes [42] and opposition movements to coal mining in various countries like the Czech Republic, Romania, Chile, Indonesia, or the UK [5,[43][44][45][46] and has drawn attention to the lived experiences of energy transitions, places of coal extraction and resistance towards it [10]. What remains missing is research that connects the role of local protests with the lens of governance of discontinuation to analyse how contestations of exit pathways take place and how actors interact with each other. ...
The exit from socio-technical regimes enjoys increasing scientific interest. While many studies which cover energy or sustainability transitions focus on system contexts, there is still a lack of research focusing on the locations and arenas of negotiation. The Hambach Forest in Germany is one such opportunity to investigate the discontinuation of coal energy production. Reconnecting the global with the local sides of policy issues, we focus on the local policy arena in the context of the national coal phase out. The question is how the coal discon-tinuation is negotiated in the context of the Hambach Forest conflict and how actors engage in framing interaction over the course of the conflict, and how the competing framings changed over time. With an analysis of the controversy in the social and mass media about lignite mining in a very specific location, we were able to identify framings along which two groupings clashed in a physical and discursive struggle in 2018-2019, the 'Climate and Landscape Protectors' and the 'Protectors of Public and Economic Order'. We found the framing categories of 'responsibility', 'cost-lose-gain nexus', and 'dependencies' and identified their fluctuation during the period of analysis. Energy transition and environmental protection clash with energy production incumbency, primacy of economy or ecology, and law and order. The Hambach Forest conflict has become a representative struggle about the speed of the coal exit pathway in Germany.
... Discussions that preceded major decisions, such as the switch to gas, were reported to be heated and to have created a political cleavage within communities. Existing research on the acceptance and acceptability of (energy) infrastructure [76,77] should inform district heating policies and, considering the role of district heating in reducing energy vulnerability, more research on the specificities of the local acceptance of district heating systems should be conducted. ...
... Ultimately, mine operations require community participation before, during and after operation. Ocelik et al. [13] affirm that the reluctance of companies to integrate and involve communities can result in local opposition to mining. In this context, Cao [14] stated that the mine land reclamation program will involve many social units, both the central government as regulator, local governments, mining companies, and local communities. ...
Mining, along with plantations, is one of the main economic backbones of the Indonesian provinces of Kalimantan. The main concern of extractive economics is deforestation and environmental damage that threatens natural sustainability. Most of the previous research focused on the issue of environmental sustainability in the industrial context and regional spatial planning. To fill this void, this study originally aims to analyze how local wisdom is useful in managing ex-mining reclamation practices. This research was conducted in Margahayu, Kutai Kertanegara, East Kalimantan Province. The method used in this research is empirical legal research by adopting a data-based approach. The results show that ex-mining reclamation in Margahayu aims to restore the land use according to its function and is beneficial for agriculture and small-scale plantations. The findings underline that the participation of local communities is very useful in restoring the function of the ex-mining land, due to their interest in rehabilitating spatial planning and ecological supports that are useful for their livelihoods. In this context, this finding requires inclusion of local interest-based participation as an important social infrastructure in reforestation and mine land reclamation in Kalimantan.
... A negative impression of similar incidents made the public highly aware of the resistance to new facilities . Second, unreasonable risk-shaping from government or other project stakeholders (Aoki, 2018), information guidance from media coverage and interpersonal communication (Wang et al., 2021c), and even social networks all made a huge amplification effect on NIMBY conflicts (Ocelík et al., 2021). ...
“Not In My Backyard” (NIMBY) conflict refers to public resistance to the government in delivering and operating NIMBY facilities. Although the antecedents of NIMBY conflicts are widely explored (e.g., negative externalities, public sensitivity, external triggers), there is rare literature systematically exploring their integrated effects on public resistance from the public social psychology perspective that considers the interplaying effects of public risk and emotion perception. Besides, to reflect the nonlinear change of public resistance (i.e., “emergency” and “discontinuity” features of NIMBY conflict), we originally integrate the catastrophe theory into the system dynamic method to establish an SD-Catastrophe model to simulate the evolution process of public resistance behavior. The effect of governmental response on NIMBY conflicts is especially examined in the simulation model, and the catastrophe characteristics of public resistance behavior in NIMBY conflict are verified. The result shows that governmental response contributes to eliminating NIMBY conflicts in four aspects: 1)Different facilities, different urgency; 2) The faster, the better; 3) The higher intensity, the better; and 4) Existing effect lag. Based on the nonlinear change of public resistance, two governance strategies, including the internal strategy (i.e., optimizing public psychological states) and the external strategy (i.e., controlling project external triggers), are formulated to help the government eliminate the risk of NIMBY conflict.
... A negative impression of similar incidents made the public highly aware of the resistance to new facilities . Second, unreasonable risk-shaping from government or other project stakeholders (Aoki, 2018), information guidance from media coverage and interpersonal communication (Wang et al., 2021c), and even social networks all made a huge amplification effect on NIMBY conflicts (Ocelík et al., 2021). ...
... In addition to innovative business models and financing gates, SI initiatives focused on organizational forms also refer to: local energy markets and peer to peer trading [44,105,126]; industrial community energies [146,147]; renewable energy cooperatives, e.g., [147][148][149]; community energy storage [42,59,92,113,114]; and the integration of smart and digital tools to innovative community energy developments, e.g., VPPs [124]. [28,71]; co-production of energy services [21,134,[150][151][152][153]; shared governance of community energy [122]; participatory development of tools to support local energy transitions [154]; co-creation for unlocking sustainable transitions and envisioning energy pathways [1,117,155,156]; public participation [99,157]; and self-governance [118,158]; innovative social configurations related to the presence of intermediaries [53,54,159], local entrepreneurship [98,160], the development of social networks [45,112,135,159,161], and new actors coalitions [162]. Out of the 64 papers on this category, eight also connect new forms of governance and social configurations for the energy transition to the discourse of energy democracy [63,153,[162][163][164][165][166][167]. ...
For the energy transition, Social Innovation (SI) has been defined as innovations that contribute to the low-carbon energy transition, civic empowerment, and social goals through initiatives such as new forms of governance, social configurations, supportive policies and regulations, and new business models. This work systematically reviews the literature to identify (potential) impacts of SI and bottom-up initiatives on sustainable energy transitions. Based on bibliometric and qualitative content analysis, works were classified by the type of SI, related renewable energy source, and geographical context. Associated sociotechnical changes, obstacles, and enabling factors of SI are also indicated. Main findings show that SI has an important role in local transitions but limited power to challenge the regime and scale-up. For just energy transitions, it can facilitate energy access, co-production, energy democracy, and participatory processes besides bringing regional socio-economic development and building community capacity. SI can contribute to renewable energy deployment through co-ownership and community finance. Also, community-led actions are in a unique position to access local tacit knowledge, influence individual behavior, and use them to build more sustainable cities. Finally, research limitations and directions towards future research are presented.
... They can cause forces for change and reforms by putting pressure on energy regimes (Hess, 2018) and exemplify a movement that advocate energy justice (Delina and Sovacool, 2018). While the literature on coal dissent has been widely discussed in the context of the Global North (e.g., in Germany (Markard et al., 2021), Czech Republic (Ocelík, et al., 2021), and Australia (Einfeld et al., 2021)), and in coal-rich countries in the Majority World (e.g., in Indonesia (Brown and Spiegel, 2017) and India (Lahiri-Dutt, 2016), very few papers have been published on social mobilizations against this fossil fuel in countries that are non-coal majors, such as the Philippines. One exception is Marquardt and Delina (2019), which discussed mobilizations in the island province of Palawan in the Philippines and a forest community in Thailand. ...
Developing countries need sufficient, reliable, and affordable energy for economic development; yet, the source of this energy remains contested. In the Philippines, coal-based electricity supplies most of the country's energy requirement. Until the moratorium on new coal-fired power plant development in 2020, the Philippine government aggressively pursued the development of the coal sector, labelling coal projects as nationally significant. With this policy direction, many local governments, including provinces and cities, rallied around coal. Dissent against this fuel, nonetheless, was also prominent, with civil society often leading these mobilizations. This paper discusses one of these movements: a civil society-business-and-ecclesial-led dissent on the proposed coal-based energy system for Bohol province. Using primary data from interviews, supplemented by social media and secondary data analysis, this paper describes the modes, strategies, and tactics of this local coal dissent. Led by a trifecta of actors, including private citizens, businesspeople, and the clergy, the movement employed nonviolent approaches through network-building, letter-writing, and social media-campaigning. As a result of this movement, the provincial government banned future coal-based development in Bohol.
... In particular, the inclination of each community participant towards specific goals (e.g. energy donations to impoverished people) may vary significantly depending on factors such as their trust in local institutions [59], social norms, cultural aspects, individual preferences, and their social network [60]. Therefore, the willingness-to-cooperate and inclination of participants towards different goals should be accurately estimated and modelled. ...
Social relationships can influence individual behaviours and personal choices, foster cooperation, and build solidarity. In this Perspective, we argue that harnessing social relationships connecting people living in the same community can help improve the functioning of smart local energy systems and facilitate cooperation towards shared objectives. These shared objectives could include reducing energy poverty, investing in clean technologies, and fostering energy justice. Therefore, we propose the new concept of smart energy neighbourhoods, which we define as a local energy system sharing (i) the same local energy infrastructure, (ii) a network of social relationships and group-focused concerns, and (iii) smart adaptive mechanisms enabling participation, coordination and cooperation. The paper discusses the beneficial role that smart energy neighbourhoods could play within future energy systems, their possible design, and key challenges for their implementation.
... These changes are enacted through the interaction of multiple actors and resources [2]. Systematic attention is paid to actors facilitating the transition [3,4], delaying the process [5][6][7][8], or fulfilling some of the myriad other roles affecting the transition in a more nuanced or unclear way [9][10][11][12], all in the hope that a better understanding of such actors would help us to comprehend the mechanisms behind the ongoing shift from fossil fuel-based systems to low carbon ones and to guide this shift successfully. ...
Parallel to the ongoing energy transition, Energetický a průmyslový holding (EPH) has emerged as one of the leading energy companies in the EU. Since its expansion started in 2009, the company has acquired assets worth EUR 16.7 billion while entering eight European markets, establishing itself as a crucial EU natural gas stakeholder and essential coal mining company in Germany and Poland, collecting around 26 GW of installed electricity generation capacity, and becoming the second largest polluter in the EU ETS. Unlike other rising stars of the shifting socio-technical regime such as Orsted or Tesla, EPH swims against the current. Depending on the perspective, it acts like either a scavenger, buying out “dirty” coal assets from energy incumbents, or a profiteer, taking advantage of the recently introduced capacity mechanisms which give an afterlife to such assets, thereby extracting rents from transition policies. EPH thus simultaneously contributes to the transition and compromises the goal of decarbonization.
This paper offers a detailed analysis of EPH’s investment strategy. The resulting image is one of a company with Europe-wide aspirations but the structure and behaviour of a garage start-up—an image that does not fit the traditional perception of transition as a conflict between status quo and niche actors over the fate of the regime. EPH is interested not in the end-state of the regime change but in the change itself. We conclude by discussing what the emergence of such an actor could mean for current European energy transition policies.
Migrant workers' social networks are an important source of social support in their collective behavior. This study adopts the whole network method and proposes a measure of accumulated social capital in social networks, which makes up for the insufficiency of direct social capital. It compares the heterogeneous effects of formal and informal networks and accumulated and direct social capital on migrant workers' collective behavioral willingness and dissects their interaction mechanism. The results indicate that informal networks are more conducive to collective behavioral willingness. The formal network is the regulator of the informal network, which can strengthen the effect of the informal network on migrant workers' collective behavioral willingness. Accumulated social capital more robustly affects collective behavioral willingness than direct social capital. Therefore, optimizing the measurement of social capital can help to grasp the social effects of social capital more comprehensively. To sum up, fully stimulating the role of informal network center members as a communication bridge between factory and ordinary migrant workers is conducive to promoting the positive coupling of formal and informal networks and improving governance efficiency.
Striking a balance between high-intensity coal mining and environmental protection has been a challenge in the Yushen mining area, which is an important coal production base in China located in an arid and semi-arid ecologically fragile environment. The 122,109 working face of the Caojiatan coal mine was used as a model to coordinate coal production with ecological protection. Theoretical analysis and field monitoring revealed that the maximum surface subsidence was 5.6 m, and the development height of the diversion fracture zone was 21 times the coal seam thickness. The influence of mining process parameters and mining methods on surface ecological damage and water loss was further analyzed using the fluid–solid coupling method. The results showed that exclusive pursuit of high-intensity mining would induce irreversible disasters including aquifer water loss and cultivated land damage; the degree of influence was directly proportional to the working face length, mining height, and mining method. Proper adjustments of these parameters could help realize water-controlled coal mining. The results provide an empirical basis for allowing both exploitation of coal resources and protection of the environment in ecologically fragile areas.
Responses to current environmental challenges, such as the energy transition, require collaboration among diverse actors interacting in complex and conflicting policy settings. This study examines the drivers of inter-organizational collaboration within the conflictual context of Czech coal phase-out by investigating hypotheses on belief homophily, political influence, and expert information. It uses a sequential mixed-methods research design combining exponential random graph modeling, which controls for network self-organization processes, and directed qualitative content analysis, which validates and extends the findings from the previous stage. The results show that organizations perceived as influential and organizations providing expertise are more likely to be involved in inter-organizational collaboration. Belief homophily does not predict collaboration but is relevant for disincentivizing collaboration among actors with low-compatible beliefs, thus contributing to conflict reproduction. The study concludes that future collaborative arrangements need to avoid such design flaws as those of the recently established Coal Committee, which reinforced existing power asymmetries and conflicts.
Given the growing frequency, severity, and salience of social mobilization and community action on energy and climate issues, in this study we systematically explore the configurations of types of infrastructure, actors, tactics, and outcomes of recent opposition to energy transitions across seven carbon-intensive regions in Asia, Europe, and North America. Based on both a literature review and an original dataset of 130 case studies spanning the past decade, we track opposition to a wide range of energy infrastructure in these regions, including low-carbon options such as renewable energy and nuclear power; provide network analyses of the actors and coalitions involved in such events; and develop a typology and frequency analysis of tactics (such as litigation or protest), and outcomes (such as remuneration, policy change, concessions, or labor protections). We show that the politics of energy transitions in carbon-intensive regions varies significantly from country to country and across types of energy, and we discuss how the configurations of infrastructure, actors, tactics, and outcomes can be explained by differences in national institutions and their responses to global or supranational pressures. By bringing both a sociotechnical and comparative perspective to the global analysis of social movements and energy transitions, we suggest how goals of energy transition are refracted through national and subnational institutions and through local mobilizations both in support of and opposed to those transitions.
This book summarizes a three-year research project on local opposition to coal mining in the Northwestern part of the Czech Republic. The research focused on the relational dimensions of the opposition movement and the political context in which the movement operates.
This article examines the social and material politics of coal, focusing on mobilizations against opencast mining in the United Kingdom and Indonesia. Contested spaces and practices elicited by coal extraction provide important openings through which to understand how ‘hydrocarbon modernity’ is experienced and entangled with different processes of neoliberal capitalism. We investigate resistance against coal at Ffos-y-Fran in South Wales and the IndoMet project in the Indonesian province of Central Kalimantan, exploring how assemblages of protest have challenged the material effects, discursive practices and regimes of accumulation attendant within the coal industry. In both countries, campaigns seeking to ‘end coal’ have built dynamic geographical alliances, and as collective challenges to mining activities have unfolded, we consider how movements targeting specific sites of extraction have sought to disrupt the industry’s 'dis-embedding' of coal from the landscape. Drawing on accounts of how hydrocarbon politics shape societies, the approach we present draws attention to changing linkages between economic, environmental and social advocacy while illuminating the varied ways in which coal mining can compound and perpetuate inequality.
Transitioning to a decarbonized economy is a crucial part of climate change mitigation, with the phasing-out of coal, as the most significant source of carbon dioxide emissions, being the centerpiece of this effort. In the European context, the increasing pressures exerted especially on the basis of the European Union's energy and climate policy, coupled with the inherent uncertainty of the transition process, encourage various struggles among the involved policy actors over the setting of specific transition pathways. One site of such contestation is media discourse, which may facilitate or limit policy change through agenda-setting, framing, and other processes. Importantly, discursive struggles also include industry incumbents, who have a vested interest in preserving the existing sociotechnical regime. This paper focuses on the position of incumbents in terms of their relationship with governing political parties and the discursive strategies they employ. It explores the policy debate on coal mining expansion which took place in 2015 in the Czech Republic, a post-communist country with a coal-dependent economy, skeptical position on energy transition, and a powerful energy industry. The research employs discourse network analysis to examine a corpus compiled from daily newspapers and applies block modeling techniques to analyze patterns of relationships within and between actor groups. The results show that incumbents successfully prevented policy change in the direction of rapid coal phase-out by exploiting discourse alignment with governing parties and efficiently employing discursive strategies based primarily on securitization of socioeconomic issues.
This conceptual paper applies a mobilization model to Collective Action Initiatives (CAIs) in the energy sector. The goal is to synthesize aspects of sustainable transition theories with social movement theory to gain insights into how CAIs mobilize to bring about niche-regime change in the context of the sustainable energy transition. First, we demonstrate how energy communities, as a representation of CAIs, relate to social innovation. We then discuss how CAIs in the energy sector are understood within both sustainability transition theory and institutional dynamics theory. While these theories are adept at describing the role energy CAIs have in the energy transition, they do not yet offer much insight concerning the underlying social dimensions for the formation and upscaling of energy CAIs. Therefore, we adapt and apply a mobilization model to gain insight into the dimensions of mobilization and upscaling of CAIs in the energy sector. By doing so we show that the expanding role of CAIs in the energy sector is a function of their power acquisition through mobilization processes. We conclude with a look at future opportunities and challenges of CAIs in the energy transition.
Powerful coal interests construct activists as radical "others" who oppose mountaintop removal at the expense of jobs, but how can we deconstruct these "other" identities? Focusing on the Coal River Valley in West Virginia, where miners have opposed environmental justice activists, I examine how these oppositional groups-activists and miners-can build power by engaging in deconstructive bridging. Drawing on semi-structured interviews, I diagnose the affective barriers to miners' participation in the environmental justice movement and explore how activists have attempted to bridge to miners. I unpack the differences between activists and miners and present the miner mountaineer consciousness, or a sense of linked fate with those in the community rather than with the industry, to explain how activists and miners could stand together. While barriers between activists and miners persist, bridging attempts to deconstruct difference by emphasizing shared positive place-based attachments and negative affective industrial attachments. In the context of intractable environmental and social conflicts, the study builds on how deconstructing "other" identities undercuts the powerful by aligning workers and environmentalists.
https://authors.elsevier.com/a/1aGHM7tZ6Zn9Yo
Coal phase-out is an integral part of the ongoing energy transition to a decarbonized economy. Any such process involves diverse actors that compete over the nature and pace of such transition. This research uses the Advocacy Coalition Framework to analyze the conditions of policy change within an adversarial subsystem. It focuses on the coal subsystem in the Czech Republic, a post-communist coal-dependent country with comparatively large economically recoverable reserves. Using data from an organizational survey, exploratory social network analysis techniques are applied to identify advocacy coalitions and deductive block-modeling is used to test hypotheses on the subsystem’s functioning. The focus is on: (1) fragmentation of decision-makers, (2) targeting of decision-makers, and (3) use of expert information. Two competing and ideologically distant coalitions were identified: The Industry Coalition and Environmental Coalition. The results further show high fragmentation among decision-makers, as indicated by their cross-coalition membership and the heterogeneity of their beliefs. The targeting of decision-makers is practiced by principal members of both coalitions, i.e. environmental non-governmental organizations and industry, but also by research organizations. Lastly, expert information exchange strongly overlaps with the identified coalitions and thus increases their cohesiveness. It is argued that such subsystem configuration limits the potential for policy change through negotiated agreement or policy learning. Policy brokers and policy venues are suggested as remedies to moderate the adversarial nature of the subsystem.
Given a myriad of challenges and technological advancement, the energy system has been constantly evolving and transforming, which requires compatible adjustments in energy policies. For regions with highly diverse energy sources, such as the United States, it’s important to not only analyze public perceptions of various energy sources, but also examine relative levels of support for energy transition policies. We examine public perceptions of two energy sources, coal and solar energy, as well as the public’s support for energy transition policies that assist the transition from coal to renewable energy, specifically solar. To better understand how place influences attitudes and policies of coal and solar, we sampled respondents from three areas with varying ties to coal and solar: Saline County, IL, Houston, TX, and Burlington, VT. Our results suggest that one’s place has an important effect in differentiating the public perceptions of renewable and nonrenewable energy and for support in an energy transition from fossil fuels to renewable energy. While residents of places with historical attachment to coal mining have positive attitudes toward coal, our data show that they have even more positive attitudes toward sustainable energy sources. These attitudes hold for future development and government assistance. If federal or state governments seek to reduce greenhouse gas emissions (and consequently energy from coal, a major source of greenhouse gases), solar and other sustainable energy policies need to be targeted at places with historical ties to coal and other fossil fuels to ensure a procedurally just energy transition.
International institutions such as treaties and organizations shape, and are shaped by, the large web-like architecture of global governance. Yet we know little about what this architecture looks like, why certain structures are observed, and how they are linked to the functioning of international institutions as well as the overall effectiveness of global governance. Over the past decade, network science has emerged as a promising and indispensable approach to unraveling structural nuances and complexities of the system of international institutions. This article presents a state-of-the-art review of this emerging field of research and seeks to stimulate its further development. In this article, I draw connections between various network analyses of global governance that are found in different bodies of literature. In so doing, I integrate three separate but overlapping strands of work on institutional fragmentation, polycentricity, and complexity and bring much-needed conceptual clarity to the debate. Building on previous studies, I propose a framework for operationalizing fragmentation, polycentricity, and complexity in network terms in order to enable systematic and comparative analysis of global governance systems. This article argues that there is much potential in the network approach and makes a case for advancing the “network science of global governance.”
The rhetoric of the 'just transition' lies at the heart of energy and development policies internationally. In this context, it is crucial that communities dependent on fossil fuel extraction and production for employment do not become 'victims' of the decarbonisation process. This paper involves a theoretically and conceptually grounded comparative analysis of policy measures that have been introduced in three first world jurisdictions which have been dependent on coal for employment-North Rhine-Westphalia in Germany, Alberta in Canada and Victoria in Australia. In so doing, measures which have successfully ameliorated the socioeconomic well-being of coal dependent communities are identified and a framework for successful just transition is proposed. Recognising, but notwithstanding, inherent power dynamics, the framework identifies an important role for government in assisting workers and communities in navigating the transition process and in supporting new and emerging low-carbon industries in the context of 'strong' sustainable development.
An important but sometimes overlooked dimension of the study of energy, democracy, and governance is the role of social movements. Industrial transition movements (ITMs) emerge when there is resistance from incumbent organizations, such as large utility companies in the electricity industry, to grassroots efforts to change the industry. A classification of ITM goals is developed based on two types of sociotechnical transition goals (developing alternative technologies and ending existing technologies) and two types of societal change goals (the democratization of industrial organizations and political processes and the equitable access to jobs and industrial products). The study of processes and outcomes of ITMs also has implications for social movement theory, which are outlined. This approach enables a comprehensive analysis of the relations among the state, industry, civil society, and social movements that can identify causal mechanisms in the effects of social movements on industrial transitions and energy democracy.
A series of weaknesses in creativity, research design, and quality of writing continue to handicap energy social science. Many studies ask uninteresting research questions, make only marginal contributions, and lack innovative methods or application to theory. Many studies also have no explicit research design, lack rigor, or suffer from mangled structure and poor quality of writing. To help remedy these shortcomings, this Review offers suggestions for how to construct research questions; thoughtfully engage with concepts; state objectives; and appropriately select research methods. Then, the Review offers suggestions for enhancing theoretical, methodological, and empirical novelty. In terms of rigor, codes of practice are presented across seven method categories: experiments, literature reviews, data collection, data analysis, quantitative energy modeling, qualitative analysis, and case studies. We also recommend that researchers beware of hierarchies of evidence utilized in some disciplines, and that researchers place more emphasis on balance and appropriateness in research design. In terms of style, we offer tips regarding macro and microstructure and analysis, as well as coherent writing. Our hope is that this Review will inspire more interesting, robust, multi-method, comparative, interdisciplinary and impactful research that will accelerate the contribution that energy social science can make to both theory and practice.
Recently the field of social acceptance research on energy was mapped by Gaede and Rowlands (Energy Res & Soc Science, 2018). Some of their observations are worrying and need reflection. Two essential pivot points have not been recognized, and observed trends in current research practice that must be assessed as highly undesirable are associated with these unnoticed issues.
● Missing in the analysis is the start of social acceptance research in the 1980-ies, when the focus was mainly on acceptance by the public. The conceptualization in three process dimensions, each with different actors and objects of acceptance, reveals that public acceptance can never be a valid proxy for social acceptance. Many researchers continue to maintain this harmful conceptual confusion, and Gaede and Rowland’s narrative conclusions seem to suggest we are dealing with a heavy relapse towards public instead of social acceptance.
● The crucial turn in 2000 concerning the object of social acceptance, towards institutional change is also missing. Hence, this recognition of institutions as the core object of acceptance research remains underexposed.
As the interpretation and labelling of most research fronts by Gaede and Rowlands is questionable, an alternative interpretation is paramount. This is done based on a conceptual elaboration, in which social acceptance is recognized as a bundle of dynamic processes instead of a set of actors positions. The object is ‘energy innovation’, which is also a process. Social acceptance research aims at understanding the transforming social-technological systems, and studies the complex, multi-level and polycentric processes of escaping our institutionally locked-in energy systems.
Keywords:
institutional change; coproduction; lock-in; common pool resources; prosumers; acceptance of innovation; acceptance process; polycentric governance; multi-layered governance; self governance
The decarbonisation of energy systems is leading to a reconfiguration of the geographies of energy. One example is the emergence of community energy, which has become a popular object of study for geographers. Although widely acknowledged to be a contested, capacious, and flexible term, “community energy” is commonly presented as singular, bounded, and localised. In this paper, we challenge this conception of community energy by considering evidence about the role and influence of three categories of actors: community, state, and private sector. We demonstrate how community energy projects are unavoidably entangled with a diversity of actors and institutions operating at and across multiple scales. We therefore argue that community energy is enabled and constituted by trans‐scalar assemblages of overlapping actors, which demands multi‐sectoral participation and coordination. We point to the need for further academic attention on the boundaries between these actors to better understand the role of different intermediary practices and relationships in facilitating the development of decentralised energy systems with just outcomes.
This study develops research on social movements, political coalitions, and sustainability transitions with a multi-coalition perspective. The perspective begins with a typology of coalitions based on two pairs of goals—general societal change versus the sociotechnical transition of an industry or technological system, and sunrising versus sunsetting of systems and structures. Mapping the diversity of energy-transition coalitions makes it possible not only to identify the various wings of a broader industrial transition movement in a specified time and place but also to show the dynamics of how coalitions interact and change over time. Drawing on case studies of four energy-transition coalitions in New York State that approximate the four ideal types, the study shows differences in the goals, strategies, organizational composition, and frames of the coalitions. The study then shows the mechanisms that enable integration across coalitions, including the role of bridge brokers and new frames. As the networks of the energy-transition coalitions become more connected, the organizations make use of a wider set of frames, including the newer frame of energy democracy. Thus, the study develops an approach to the study of energy democracy that shows how it can serve as a frame that bridge brokers use to integrate coalitions.
In 2007, Petrova and Tarrow coined the term transactional activism, arguing that, despite weak individual-level political participation, civil societies in Central and Eastern Europe were surprisingly strong due to their capacity to establish transactional links. Yet the research which followed, relying mostly on quantitative data, has not uncovered much evidence of how transactional activism works. To make advances here, we take a more qualitative approach and focus on transactional ties among NGOs, developing a more fine-grained conceptualization. Specifically, we distinguish associative ties of loosely defined cooperation and interlocking ties based on the division of labour. We utilize this new conceptualization through a successful anti-corruption initiative known as ‘Reconstruction of the State’. The initiative presented itself largely in transactional terms (plurality of participating actors) and was extremely successful in the run-up to the Parliamentary elections in 2013 in the Czech Republic, inspiring similar initiatives abroad. We use social network analysis and qualitative interviews to test our concept of interlocking transactional ties. In contrast to our expectations, we find limited division of labour in the initiative, with just one organization, in the main, shouldering most of the important tasks. We use our findings to question the previously claimed importance of transactional activism in Central and Eastern Europe. Specifically, we call for more robust evidence describing how cooperation among organizations empowers civil society.
This paper examines how learning has been treated, generally, in policy network theories and what questions have been posed, and answered, about this phenomenon to date. We examine to what extent network characteristics and especially the presence of various types of brokers impede or facilitate policy learning. Next, a case study of the policy network surrounding the sustainability of palm oil biodiesel in Indonesia over the past two decades is presented using social network analysis. This case study focuses on sustainability-oriented policy learning in the Indonesian biodiesel governance network and illustrates how network features and especially forms of brokerage influence learning.
‘Energy democracy’ epitomizes hopes in energy transformation, but remains under-defined, a political buzzword rather than a real concept. After presenting its activist roots and mapping its usage, ‘energy democracy’ is positioned in relation to similar normatively derived concepts: environmental, climate, and energy justice, and environmental democracy. Drawing on insights from political theory and political sociology, it is shown what is democratic in energy democracy. Referencing the question of experts and democratic publics in complex technological areas, the paper explains why it is desirable for energy governance to be more democratic. To show what is unique in ‘energy democracy’ beyond increased participation in energy policy, the prosumer is introduced as the ideal-typical citizen, highlighting the importance of the energy transition, the agency of material structures and a new emergent governmentality. ‘Energy democracy’ is conceptualized as an analytical and decision-making tool, defined along three dimensions: popular sovereignty, participatory governance and civic ownership, and operationalized with relevant indicators.
The role of social networks in the sustainability transformation of Cabo Pulmo: A multiplex perspective. Coastal tourism is often caught in a crossfire between economic benefits, ecological impacts and social tensions. Development of large-scale resorts can reduce the provision of certain ecosystem services and threat local people's livelihoods. Social networks might influence the transitions of governance systems into new adaptive models. We focus on the role of multiplex networks in the process of sustainability transformation by examining social networks that protected a marine reserve against the construction of a large scale development. The multiplex network exhibited a structure with five blocks: " scale-crossing brokers " , " visible leaders " , " ecosystem managers " , " visionaries " and " public sector ". This last block was structurally isolated from the rest of organizations. Multiplex networks facilitated the coordinated mobilization of information and resources across spatial scales. " Scale-crossing brokers " with the aid of " visible leaders " propelled up the local conflict toward national and global arenas, affecting the decision of Mexico's federal government to annul large scale resort's construction. Understanding the social processes that enable adaptive governance systems is crucial for sustainability transformations and resilience of coastal ecosystems.
Collaborating with scientists from a different field or country is important for scientific progress in general, and especially for scientists working in small peripheral scientific communities. The aim of this study was to investigate the network effects in three disciplinary scientific communities in social sciences in Croatia on the probability of scientists to have co-author(s)/ collaborator(s) outside the community. The co-authorship data from publications indexed in two international (Web of Science and Scopus) and one national database (National and University Library) were used to define the networks. Autologistic actor attribute models enabled the testing of three network effects (Activity, Contagion and Popularity (Ego-2Star)) while controlling for six actor attributes. The results confirmed the hypothesis about positive Contagion (the probability of having outside collaborations is higher if immediate network partners also have been collaborating with persons outside the field) and negative Activity (scientists collaborating with one or more scientists outside the national and disciplinary community are less active in that network) for educational sciences, gave mixed support for sociology (only negative Activity was confirmed), while the field of psychology did not show any network effects. A significant effect was observed for the number of co-authored papers, whereas age and number of single-authored papers were not significant in all three disciplines; but gender, location and maximal strength of a tie proved to be of different importance for different fields. Methodological issues in co-authorship network analysis are discussed and directions for future research are proposed.
This paper provides new insights about the factors shaping social acceptance of and opposition to coal mining. It is based on a comparative survey of communities living in two towns with different demographic development and residential quality located in a close proximity to expanding opencast mine in the Czech Republic, which are threatened by displacement due to possible revisions of the current territorial mining limits. We analyze social-spatial differences in perceptions of landscape and place attachment, and the influence of geographical and sociodemographic factors on personal attitudes and the involvement in local anti-coal activities. A strong place attachment that is determined by the quality of living environment and the length of residence proved to be significant predictor of anti-coal attitude, while the employment tied to coal industry and weak place attachments are key factors shaping a pro-coal attitude. A typical active opponent of the coal mining expansion has a higher age, university education and strong place attachment. While both studied communities are characterized by strong active engagement in protest activities, a low level of confidence in the effectiveness of protests to affect decisions of political authorities was also detected.
Since the interest in social movements started to develop in the 1960s, networks have been analyzed from two main perspectives (Diani and McAdam, 2003). On the one hand, they have been treated as important facilitators of individuals’ decisions to become involved in collective action, in the context of the debate inspired by Mancur Olson's seminal work The Logic of Collective Action , published in 1965. On the other hand, analysts have looked at social movement networks as the structure of the links between the multiplicity of organizations and the individualness of activists committed to a certain cause. From this perspective, movement networks have been treated as the consequence rather than the precondition of collective action, a specific instance of the broader processes through which actors modify social structures through agency. More specifically, looking at the configuration of movement networks has provided observers with a clue to grasp the logics by which movement actors choose their partners, thus generating broader and more complex organizational fields. In their most basic sense, social networks consist of sets of nodes, linked by some form of relationship and delimited by some specific criteria. In social movement networks, nodes usually consist either of the individuals who mobilize or sympathize with a certain cause or subscribe to certain alternative lifestyles, or of the organizations that promote collective action on such issues or encourage alternative cultural practices. Analysts have looked at both direct and indirect ties. Direct ties are present when two nodes are directly linked in explicit interaction and interdependence – for example, when two activists know each other personally or two organizations jointly promote a rally. Indirect ties are assumed to exist between two nodes when the latter share some relevant activity or resource – for example, interest in certain issues or in the same campaigns – yet have no face‐to‐face interaction.
The reclamation of mined land in the Czech Republic has been focused on preparing the land for final use for productive purposes. The current national regulatory framework does not consider non-productive habitats as a legal type of post-mining land use. In the study presented here, we mapped, categorized, and analyzed non-productive post-mining habitats and defined appropriate management measures applicable under the present legal framework. Thirty different types of non-productive and productive post-mining habitats were distinguished in the study area of the North Bohemian Brown Coal Basin. Spatial and on-site analyses were conducted to identify their landscape and ecological functions, using measures such as the average area, the perimeter, and the relative length of the ecotones. The results showed that non-productive habitats accounted for 9.9% of the study area and that the non-productive habitats were significantly smaller than the productive habitats. There was an average area of 1 ha for non-productive habitats and an average area of 4 ha for productive habitats. In hydric reclamation, we identified more than 96% of the habitats as non-productive. However, only 6.7% of forest reclamation land, 4.4% of 'other' reclamation land, and 2.6% of agricultural reclamation land have been officially classified as non-productive habitat. Supported by a case study and our literature review, we have developed a typology of non-productive post-mining habitats. The typology systematizes non-productive habitats and makes clear recommendations for their establishment and management measures. The typology can be communicated to a multi-stakeholder audience to increase the knowledge baseline for incorporating non-productive habitats into post-mining land use.
Substantially decreasing carbon emissions is both necessary to stave off the worst impacts of climate change and also certain to result in a loss of jobs and revenue for fossil fuel communities and workers. Just transition policies aim to mitigate these losses and provide an equitable transition away from fossil fuel extraction and use. Yet, just transition is often contested in the regions the policies are meant to aid. This paper presents a case study of the Powder River Basin, Wyoming, the largest coal mining region in the U.S where the energy transition is deeply contested. In the summer of 2019, two large coal mines suddenly and unexpectedly shut down. The research conducted explored whether this sudden change in conditions changed perceptions toward the energy transition or just transition polices based on interviews with decision makers, environmental advocates, coal industry officials, and union officials. I find that the energy transition and just transition remains deeply contested and opposed, even after the sudden closure of the mines, indicating that transition may always be contested due to the long-standing role coal has played in the region. Despite opposition and efforts to prolong the life of the coal industry, an energy transition is occurring and a government-led managed decline with just transition policies is the best way to prevent severe economic distress in the region.
Environmental movements and their activities are studied from various angles, by different methods, and at different levels. While both detailed studies on single incidents of conflict and broad overviews of movements are available, relatively little work has been done at the intermediate level between these extremes. We argue that it is fruitful to engage at this level by undertaking comparative analysis of environmental campaigns. Such studies could help deal with inconclusive observations and findings on the changes of environmental movements during the last three decades. We hypothesize that indeed environmental activism has changed remarkably. By and large, conflicts are no longer marked by a relatively simple constellation of one challenger facing one target or opponent. Instead, we find a complex web of involved actors reaching from local to international levels. These actors tend to form broad alliances, and to link on different issues. Also, their activities are not restricted to only one arena or strategy but involve all available channels, arenas, and action repertoires to have an impact. Quite often, we observe loose coalitions of groups that act in an implicit division of labor, thereby playing on their respective backgrounds, foci, and experiences. Given the variety of actors, their organizational forms and tactics on the one hand and their different contexts on the other, it is unlikely that a common pattern of conflict will emerge across various issues and geographical areas. This is all the more true when comparing environmental conflicts in the Western and Non-Western world.
The aim of this paper is to map the potential for nation states to adapt to global coal phase-out targets. An assessment framework using three core indicators: ‘economic health’, ‘dependency on coal’ and ‘carbon contribution to climate change’ is used to identify key constraints and contradictions. The indicators include 8 secondary measures. From a complete global list of 264 countries provided by World Bank, a final sample of 118 countries was selected, based on availability of data for the indicators. The sample was further refined using a two-step process. First, 118 countries were characterized according to their capacity to transition from coal (combining ‘economic health’ and ‘dependency on coal’) then divided into 4 groups of countries (A-D). Second, the groups were categorized by their level of carbon dioxide (CO2) contribution. This step resulted in a further refinement of the categories showing the different constraints to nations achieving set transition goals. In designing and analyzing our framework, we considered the importance of interrelationships between the measures. ‘Carbon contribution to climate change’ and ‘economic health’, in particular, show strong links across the evaluated indicators. Our research demonstrates a direct correlation between CO2 emissions and the size of national economies, as well as the important role of coal imports in transitioning market systems. Green growth is widely promoted as a lever for continued economic expansion. The new energy-efficient technologies and capital investment required for this environmentally sustainable economic growth, however, present significant challenges, particularly for nations that have historically contributed little to global CO2 levels. This article provides a comprehensive multi-step analysis of country-level dependencies that will shape the decision-making pathways available to individual nation states. Recalcitrant nations frame this pathway as a trade-off between short-term economic viability and long-term, even deferrable, climate security issues. While policy platforms that defer climate action are becoming deeply unpopular in most democratic societies, there remains the fundamental question of how coal-dependent nations will stabilize their economies in the absence of coal. In a choice between imperfect alternatives, conservative politics appears to gravitate towards maintaining a cautious balance of market protectionism with the façade of supporting incremental investments in cleaner energy alternatives.
Scientifically informed climate policymaking starts with the exchange of credible, salient, and legitimate scientific information between scientists and policymakers. It is therefore important to understand what explains the exchange of scientific information in national climate policymaking processes. This article applies exponential random graph models to network data from the Czech Republic, Finland, Ireland, and Portugal to investigate which types of organizations are favored sources of scientific information and whether actors obtain scientific information from those with similar beliefs as their own. Results show that scientific organizations are favored sources in all countries, while only in the Czech Republic do actors obtain scientific information from those with similar policy beliefs. These findings suggest that actors involved in climate policymaking mostly look to scientific organizations for information, but that in polarized contexts where there is a presence of influential denialists overcoming biased information exchange is a challenge.
This article addresses the future of coal in the European coal heartland, i.e. in the area of Germany, Poland and the Czech Republic, which together account for nearly 57% of coal consumption and 87% of coal-mining jobs in the EU. It approaches the problem within the interpretative tradition of social research and explores the coverage of the future of coal in major newspapers and political magazines in the three countries. The results show that despite similar material conditions, the issue is presented in a fundamentally different manner as the media tend follow the dominant energy policy paradigm in their countries: in Germany, they facilitate the phase-out policies; in Poland, they act as an inhibiting factor; while in the Czech Republic, their coverage echoes the political uncertainty around lignite mining in the northwest part of the country. The results also suggest that the media act mainly as a platform for the countries’ decision makers and energy policy stakeholders to voice their perspectives. The prevalent media coverage thus simultaneously enable and constrain policy options by promoting dominant discourses and preventing alternative views from surfacing.
The article, authored by Černoch, Lehotský, Ocelík, Osička, and Vencourová, is titled “Anti-fossil frames: Examining narratives of the opposition to brown coal mining in the Czech Republic” and was published in Elsevier´s Energy Research and Social Science. It examines coalmining opposition in the Czech Republic, country with strong coal identity, in the context of territorial ecological limits. These limits were established in 1991 to restrict mining in highly exploited North Bohemian and Sokolov brown coal basin and were partially rescinded in 2015.
Analyzing the discursive level of the conflict between proponents and opponents of the mining authors identified three frames, used by the latter to affect the debate. The Local Impact frame, accentuating the unfairness of local community and environment being utilized for the benefits of the whole country, the Low-Carbon Transition frame, emphasizing both local and global environmental impact of the coal industry, and the Anti-Systemic Environmental frame, radical anti-capitalist narrative calling for the reconstruction of the way the economy and social order approaches energy in the country.
On a theoretical basis the article questions the NIMBY narrative, which is regularly used by mining advocates to denounce the opposition.
[Available open access at https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2214629618307667.] A significant topic of research in the analysis of the politics of sustainability transitions is the role of coalitions. This study builds on previous research that utilizes discourse coalition and framing theories to develop a method for analyzing coalitions that integrates the analysis of three, inter-related changes: the challenger-incumbent relationship, the internal composition of both types of coalitions, and the choices of frames. The study focuses on community choice aggregation (CCA) in California, which is a decades-long industrial transition movement that has contributed to local, democratic control over electricity in the state. The analysis shows how both the CCA-coalition and the utility coalition underwent changes in composition over time and how the changes were connected with frame innovation, with counterframing, and with different types of policy conflicts. Thus, the study develops a general framework for an integrated analysis of coalitions and frames that emphasizes the connected changes of coalitions and frames over time. The analysis shows how the changing discourse of energy-transition politics is connected with coalition composition, ongoing experimentation with counterframing, and the evolving challenger-incumbent relationship. For the pro-CCA coalition, frames regarding pricing benefits recede and are replaced with frames involving energy democracy, good government, and job creation.
This paper conducts content and bibliometric analysis of 857 articles representing the knowledge domain for the social acceptance of energy technology and fuels. The objective is to identify basic trends and characteristics in the literature, identify current research fronts and pivotal papers therein, and map these fronts to their respective intellectual bases. We accomplish this by analyzing metadata, keyword use and citation networks within our dataset. We conclude with an evaluation of influence, structure, and collaboration and interdisciplinary dialogue in the field.
In the middle of the heated debate on how to reverse climate change, some countries in Eastern Europe are returning to extractive industries and the exploitation of natural resources to finance their national budgets. The paper looks at mobilization in one locality in Romania and the Czech Republic and investigates the radically different pattern of mobilization in these two otherwise similar areas. Whereas in many Romanian cities affected by this economic "transformation," citizens have protested against it, as in Câmpeni with regard to the Roşia Montana gold mining project, in the Czech Republic, however, the extension of coal extraction was hardly opposed by the general population, with the exception of environmental groups. Using critical political economy approach, the paper explores the interaction between the economic changes, politics, and citizens' reactions and argues that the difference in outcome can be explained by the configuration of the economic organization, and the dominant "social blocks" that sustain it, in each of the areas considered.
The article explores framing of the siting process of a deep geological repository of nuclear waste in the Czech Republic by the municipalities' representatives in the pre-selected localities. Three distinguished frames have been reconstructed. The risk frame, which connects the project with a number of predominantly environmental threats, is counterbalanced by the responsibility frame that uses the 'Not-In-My-Back-Yard' label to delegitimize the local opposition. The third frame then portrays the siting process as a display of general distrust towards political elites and state institutions. It is argued that the distinguished frames stem from a deeper ideological conflict about the nature of democratic governance and the value attributed to environment, further stressing the importance of a siting process' institutional arrangement that goes beyond technocratic solutions.
While numerous studies stress the crucial role of networks for social movement participation, they generally do not specify how networks affect individual behaviors. This article clarifies the role of social networks for individual social movement participation. It argues that networks perform three fundamental functions in the process leading to participation and that they intervene at different moments along this process. First, networks socialize and build individual identities—a socialization function. Second, they offer participation opportunities to individuals who are culturally sensitive to a specific political issue—a structural-connection function. Third, they shape individual preferences before individuals decide to join a move-ment—a decision-shaping function. These network functions allow us to disentangle the mechanisms at work in the process of participation. They also integrate structural and rationalist theories, which are often considered opposing explanations of individual movement participation. This article presents several hypotheses about these network functions, and uses both quantitative (survey) and qualitative (life history) data of participation in the Berne Declaration SMO to examine them.
Objective:
Although disasters are a major cause of mental health problems and typically affect large numbers of people and communities, little is known about how social structures affect mental health after a disaster. The authors assessed the extent to which mental health outcomes after disaster are associated with social network structures.
Method:
In a community-based cohort study of survivors of a major bushfire disaster, participants (N=558) were assessed for probable posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) and probable depression. Social networks were assessed by asking participants to nominate people with whom they felt personally close. These nominations were used to construct a social network map that showed each participant's ties to other participants they nominated and also to other participants who nominated them. This map was then analyzed for prevailing patterns of mental health outcomes.
Results:
Depression risk was higher for participants who reported fewer social connections, were connected to other depressed people, or were connected to people who had left their community. PTSD risk was higher if fewer people reported being connected with the participant, if those who felt close to the participant had higher levels of property loss, or if the participant was linked to others who were themselves not interconnected. Interestingly, being connected to other people who in turn were reciprocally close to each other was associated with a lower risk of PTSD.
Conclusions:
These findings provide the first evidence of disorder-specific patterns in relation to one's social connections after disaster. Depression appears to co-occur in linked individuals, whereas PTSD risk is increased with social fragmentation. These patterns underscore the need to adopt a sociocentric perspective of postdisaster mental health in order to better understand the potential for societal interventions in the wake of disaster.
Investments in extractive industries, predominantly mining, have catalyzed significant economic growth at the national level in Latin America. However, they have also been met with opposition and resistance from many local communities. This paper argues that global extractive industries have not only introduced radical changes and territorial pressures across many local communities but have also introduced important changes in the “dynamics of contention.” The paper analyzes the ‘glocalization’ of mining conflict, examining, on one hand, the globalization of communities' mobilization against mining, and on the other, the localization and fragmentation of these protests domestically. It argues that the combination of three conditions has provoked these simultaneous and paradoxical characteristics. First, technological changes within the mining industry have led to an increasing geographical extension of mining operations, reaching small localities where the industry had never arrived before. Second, the centrality of the industry in the economy of the country has resulted in a direct institutional nexus and in a contentious ‘counterpoint' between scattered mining communities and agencies of the central government. Third, rural communities opposing transnational mining companies have become allied to transnational networks of activism injecting mobilization resources and facilitating international media coverage.
The German Energiewende, or energy transition, is an ambitious suite of policy measures which aim to decarbonize the German economy and achieve an almost complete transition to an energy system based on renewable energy by mid-century. This article contends that the energy transition is also a social process. We develop a provisional local ethnography of the Energiewende, an account of the lived experience of this social process from the perspective of villagers in Atterwasch, Kerkwitz and Grabko, in the region of Lusatia in Eastern Germany. Their experiences are particularly salient, since their villages are facing demolition to make way for the expansion of the nearby Jänschwalde coal mine. The villagers’ struggle to defend their homes highlights a fundamental contradiction in the energy transition, sometimes referred to as the “coal conundrum”. The contest over the future of coal in Lusatia can be seen as a struggle to control key cultural ‘scripts’ or narratives, of home, belonging, ecological modernization, climate change, and democratic deficit. Our research suggests that any resolution of the coal conundrum, and effective implementation of the Energiewende, must be informed by an understanding of these scripts, and how they underpin the motivations and mentalities of different social actors.
In our article entitled “The Social Bases of Environmental Concern: A Review of Hypotheses, Explanations and Empirical Evidence”
(POQ 44:181–97), two rows of correlations were reversed in Table 1. Under the study by Van Liere and Dunlap, 1978, figures for
the environmental funding scale appear where figures for the environmental regulations scale should be, and vice versa. We
regret the error and hope it has not caused undue confusion for anyone using these data.
Illustrates relational approaches to the study of social movements and collective action. Contributors analyse most recent developments in the analysis of the role of networks as facilitators or constraints of individual recruitment, various forms of interorganizational networks, and the relationship between social networks and the political context in which social movements operate. They also relate the growing attention to social networks by social movement analysis to broader theoretical debates. Both quantitative and qualitative network analysis are considered, and attention is paid to the time dimension and the evolution of networks, through both simulation models and empirical data. Empirical chapters cover both contemporary and historical episodes of collective action, in reference to authoritarian as well as progressive, left-libertarian movements. Chapters focusing on individual networks specify different effects of network embeddedness over participation in different types of collective action (Passy, Anheier). Interorganizational relations are explored by looking at leadership dynamics (Diani), the relationship between categorical traits and network position within coalitions (Ansell), and the role of individuals in linking different organizations both synchronically and diachronically (Osa). Network approaches to the political process illustrate shifts in alliance and conflict networks at a time of regime change (Tilly and Wood), the evolution of social networks during protest cycles (Oliver and Myers), and the role of local elites in shaping protest networks in the community (Broadbent). Theoretical chapters discuss network perspectives on social movements in relation to recent theoretical developments in rational choice theory (Gould), cultural analysis (Mische), and the analysis of social mechanisms (McAdam). A radical case is also made for a reorientation of the whole social movement agenda along network lines (Diani).
Protest campaigns against large-scale public works usually take place within a local context. However, since the 1990s new forms of protest have been emerging. This book analyses two cases from Italy that illustrate this development: the environmentalist protest campaigns against the TAV (the building of a new high-speed railway in Val de Susa, close to the border with France), and the construction of the Bridge on the Messina Straits (between Calabria and Sicily). Such mobilizations emerge from local conflicts but develop as part of a global justice movement, often resulting in the production of new identities. They are promoted through multiple networks of different social and political groups, that share common claims and adopt various forms of protest action. It is during the protest campaigns that a sense of community is created. © 2008 Donatella della Porta and Gianni Piazza. All rights reserved.
Focusing on interorganizational networks, analysed with reference to the Italian environmental movement in the 1980s, this chapter challenges the assumption that social movements be necessarily decentralized and anti-hierarchical. The position of different organizations within the environmental movement network is assessed in the light of two criteria , namely network centrality and brokerage. These measures reflect two different types of movement influence, based on the capacity to attract support for specific initiatives (centrality) and the capacity to connect sectors of a movement who hold different stances and worldviews (brokerage). These measures are differently correlated with external indicators of leadership like access to institutions and the media. The chapter also discusses the conditions under which centrality and brokerage positions tend to be occupied by the same actors or by different actors.
Article Outline: Glossary Definition of the Subject Introduction Notation and Terminology Dependence Hypotheses Bernoulli Random Graph (Erdös-Rényi) Models Dyadic Independence Models Markov Random Graphs Simulation and Model Degeneracy Social Circuit Dependence: Partial Conditional Dependence Hypotheses Social Circuit Specifications Estimation Goodness of Fit and Comparisons with Markov Models Further Extensions and Future Directions Bibliography Exponential random graph modelsExponential random graph model, also known as p∗ models, constitute a family of statistical models for socialnetworks. The importance of this modeling framework lies in its capacity to represent social structural effects commonly observed in many human socialnetworks, including general degree-based effects as well as reciprocity and transitivity, and at the node-level, homophily and attribute-basedactivity and popularity effects.The models can be derived from explicit hypotheses about dependencies among network ties. They are parametrized in termsof the prevalence of small subgraphs (configurations) in the network and can be interpreted as describing the combinations of local social processes fromwhich a given network emerges. The models are estimable from data and readily simulated.Versions of the models have been proposed for univariateand multivariate networks, valued networks, bipartite graphs and for longitudinal network data. Nodal attribute data can be incorporated in socialselection models, and through an analogous framework for social influence models. The modeling approach was first proposed in the statistical literature in the mid-1980s, building on previous work in the spatial statistics andstatistical mechanics literature. In the 1990s, the models were picked up and extended by the social networks research community. In this century, withthe development of effective estimation and simulation procedures, there has been a growing understanding of certain inadequacies in the originalform of the models. Recently developed specifications for these models have shown a substantial improvement in fitting real social network data, tothe point where for many network data sets a large number of graph features can be successfully reproduced by the fitted models. © 2012 Springer Science+Business Media, LLC. All rights reserved.
Recent research has focused on the role of social networks in facilitating participation in protest and social movement organizations. This paper elaborates three currents of microstructural explanation, based on information, identity, and exchange. In assessing these perspectives, it compares their treatment of multivalence, the tendency for social ties to inhibit as well as promote participation. Considering two dimensions of multivalence—the value of the social tie and the direction of social pressure—this paper discusses problems of measurement and interpretation in network analysis of movement participation. A critical review suggests some directions for future research.
Since the interest in social movements started to develop in the 1960s, the relation between networks and movements has been analyzed from two perspectives. By far the most popular one has treated networks as important facilitators of individuals' decisions to become—and remain—involved in collective action (e.g., McAdam 1988; Kitts 2000). This reflected, on the one hand, the need to stress the social embeddedness of movement participants, in contrast to their earlier characterizations as marginal and disorderly personalities (McAdam 2003: 281–284), on the other, the interest in identifying the mechanisms behind people's commitment to collective causes, contributing to the debate inspired by Mancur Olson's seminal work on The Logic of Collective Action. At the same time, analysts have looked at social movement networks as the structure of the links between the multiplicity of organizations and individual activists, committed to a certain cause. From this perspective, movement networks have been treated as the consequence, rather than the precondition, of collective action, a specific instance of the broader processes through which actors modify social structures through agency. More specifically, looking at the configuration of movement networks has provided observers with a clue to grasp the logics by which movement actors choose their partners, thus generating broader and complex organizational fields (e.g., Diani 1995).