Document Type
Article
Publication Date
1973
Abstract
The thesis of this paper is a simple generalization: To the extent that social protest draws attention to its form rather than to the grievance it seeks to redress, it is likely to be unproductive. I add a quick qualification. In offering this generalization, I am assuming that the protester is genuine in seeking to redress one or more grievances and that he is not using the grievance as a subterfuge to pick a fight. If the purpose of the protest is in fact to provoke a repressive response, then, of course, my generalization is inapplicable.
We obviously have a "more-or-less" proposition before us. A protest may succeed even though there is some objection to its form. But when concern over the mode of protest blots out concern over the condition protested against, the protester has obviously failed.
Disciplines
Law | Law and Politics | Law and Society
Recommended Citation
Michael I. Sovern,
Militants, Moderates, and Social Change,
1(1)
Iustitia
16
(1973).
Available at:
https://scholarship.law.columbia.edu/faculty_scholarship/4406
Comments
Originally published in 1:1 Iustitia 16 (1973).