How do protest actions succeed in winning public support? In this paper, I theorize how features of protest can persuade citizens to support demonstrators. In particular, I argue that broadcasting an ...attractive collective identity by means of diverse, worthy, united, numerous and committed participants (dWUNC) triggers supportive reactions of observers through increasing identification with protesters. I test this argument by exposing respondents to manipulated television news items of a protest event in two video vignette experiments. Study 1 scrutinizes the effect of dWUNC displays in an asylum seeker demonstration on a sample of Belgian citizens. Study 2 replicates this design in the US for the Black Lives Matter issue of police brutality. Both studies show predispositions of citizens to strongly affect favorability towards protesters. On top of these potent receiver effects, however, also the dWUNC features prove persuasive. In both experiments, a consistent pattern of feature effects is found: demonstrations that mobilized more diverse participants, who behaved worthy and acted in unison, elicited more supportive reactions. Study 2 adds that these protest feature effects are in part mediated by increasing identification with the demonstrators. The heterogeneity of protest feature effects is explored.
Demonstration turnout is a crucial political resource for social movements. In this article, we investigate how mass media cover demonstration size. We develop a typology of turnout coverage and ...scrutinize the factors that drive turnout coverage. In addition, we test whether media coverage underestimates, reflects, or exaggerates “guesstimates” by organizers and police forces. Together, these analyses shed light on whether turnout coverage fits a logic of normalization or marginalization. We rely on a unique dataset of 428 demonstrations organized in Brussels (2003–2010). For these demonstrations, we have information on the turnout as reported in national television news, as counted by the police, and as expected by the organizers. We find that media present turnout most often as a fact, rarely as contentious (10 percent). Although few demonstrations pass the media gates, our study yields little to no evidence for a logic of turnout marginalization. Media coverage does not systematically underestimate demonstration size, nor does it blindly follow police counts. Rather, turnout coverage attests of a logic of normalization, following standard news-making practices. The more important the demonstration (size, lead item) and the larger the gap between police and organizer guesstimates, the more attention is paid to turnout in the news. Discussion centers on the generalizability and normative interpretation of the results.
Abstract
How do political parties react to different signals from society indicating the saliency of a particular social problem? Are all parties equally responsive to all signals or do certain ...signals prove more effective in engaging some parties than others? We address these questions from an agenda-setting perspective. In particular, we investigate how media attention, protest activity and real-world signals shape parties’ attention for immigration in the federal parliament of Belgium. A time series model suggests that media attention, protest activity and real-world indicators all increase parliamentary attention as measured by weekly oral questions. More detailed models show the impact of these signals to differ across parties. Media attention and protest activity engage left wing parties, whereas asylum applications drive political action of the party delivering the responsible secretary. Far-right parties, finally, react both to media attention and real-world indicators. We conclude that political parties are ‘selectively deaf’; they act (or do not act) strategically upon incoming signals, depending on whether the signal fits their political goals or not. This article contributes to agenda-setting research by including multiple societal signals in its research design and by focusing on party characteristics and party competition to disentangle the conditionality of various agenda-setting effects.
How do public opinion signals affect political representatives' opinion formation? To date, we have only limited knowledge about this essential representative process. In this article, we theorize ...and examine the signaling strength of one type of societal signal: protest. We do so by means of an innovative experiment conducted among Belgian national and regional politicians. Elected officials were exposed to manipulated television news items covering a protest demonstration. Following Tilly's previously untested WUNC claim, four features of the event were manipulated: the demonstrators' worthiness, unity, numerical strength, and commitment. We argue that these protest features present elected officials with useful cues about what (a segment of) the public wants. We find that these cues affect elected officials' beliefs. The salience they attach to the protest issue, the position they take, and their intended actions all change as a consequence of exposure. The size of a protest event (numbers) and whether the protesters agree among themselves (unity) are the most persuasive protest factors. The effects of the protest signals come on top of strong receiver effects. We find no evidence that elected officials' predispositions moderate the effects of the protest features.
Abstract
Social movement scholars have frequently pointed to individuals’ personal networks to explain protest participation. While the recruitment function of micro networks has been explored in ...depth, the support effect of networks has received only scant attention. The study explores how and to what extent social support and social constraints in people’s personal networks explain differential protest participation. Three dimensions of support are distinguished: the politicization of a person’s network, the political agreement about the protest topic within a person’s network, and the social approval of protest participation within a person’s network. Drawing on panel survey data (N=1,684) of a large protest in Belgium including both participants and non-participants, we test whether the support effects of networks play a role on top of the recruitment effect. We find evidence that two functions of social networks (politicization and social approval) affect protest participation. Additionally, we find differences in support-effects across types of social ties. Co-members of an organization exert influence on protest participation across a variety of support functions. The most intimate ties prospective participants have (partners), in contrast, matter only in so far as they approve of participation.
On social media, politicians present themselves on public issues to achieve re-election. Protest provides one opportunity for politicians to do so. In this study, we ask: How do politicians respond ...to protest on social media? And, which factors determine how politicians react? Building upon classic typologies of politicians’ rhetorical strategies, we study Twitter and Facebook posts ( N = 8211) of Belgian politicians ( N = 225) who respond to protest ( N = 124) staged in Brussels (Belgium). Results show that politicians predominantly engage in position taking when responding to protest and rarely engage in advertising, blame attribution, or credit claiming, although latter reactions are more prevalent on Facebook than Twitter. A pattern of how politician features impact rhetorical responsiveness stands out. Executives are more likely to claim credit, opposition politicians are more likely to blame politics, right-wing politicians are more likely to blame demonstrators. Findings lay bare politicians’ online protest communication strategy and speak to party–protest interactions.
Media attention is both an important outcome and a resource for protest groups. This paper examines media-movement dynamics using television news coverage of 1,277 protests in Belgium (2003-2019). We ...situate protest coverage in media issue attention cycles and scrutinize whether features of protest or rather media issue attention fluctuations are key for protest's agenda-setting effect. Our results show that while most protests fail to alter the attention cycle, a considerable share of protests is followed by a significant increase in media issue attention, especially when surfing issue attention already on the rise. Overall, media issue attention cycles rather than protest features affect protest's agenda-setting effect, suggesting that protest agenda-setting is more a matter of exploiting discursive opportunities than of forcing one's issue on the media agenda by signaling newsworthiness. These findings have serious implications for our understanding of protest group agency in news making and agenda-setting.
Media attention is a crucial political resource for protest groups. This study examines the description of protests in Belgian television news. Specifically, it analyzes the degree to which the ...coverage of protests is episodic (event- or exemplar-oriented) or thematic (issue-oriented) and looks into the factors that drive these coverage types. Protest event data from police archives (Brussels; 2003-2010) are combined with detailed measures of television news content (public and private broadcasting) to analyze media description (N = 564). The results show that the coverage of protest is primarily thematic. Episodic coverage is dominated by coverage about the details of the event; exemplars are rarely used. Protests that are disruptive, staged by organizations with low media standing, and covered by the commercial station are more event-oriented. Reports of large demonstrations and reports with follow-up items contain more episodic-exemplar coverage. Results are discussed in light of the conditionality of the protest paradigm.
Mobilization for protest is a process of diffusion in interpersonal networks. Extant work has found that being asked by people one knows is a key determinant of participation, but the flip ...side--asking others--has been neglected. The authors examine which prospective participants are most likely to ask others to participate and whom they ask. Drawing on a new and unusual data set including evidence on more than 7,000 participants in 48 demonstrations across Europe, the authors find that activists who are committed to the demonstration's cause (willing to recruit others) and who are part of participation-friendly networks (able to recruit others) are the most active recruiters. Asking others is dependent on being asked: participants tend to recruit people similar to those who have recruited them and, most importantly, participants who are recruited via strong ties are less active recruiters themselves.
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