Past debates over social movements have suffered from a focus on Anglo-America and Europe, often neglecting the significance of collective actions of citizens in the Global South. This authoritative new title redresses this imbalance with case study material from movements for change in Brazil, India, Bangladesh, Mexico, South Africa, Kenya and Nigeria. In these examples, social movements have formed without the benefits of the structural or institutional resource base found in the North, and have persevered even when the state does not have the resources to effectively respond to collective demands. Each expert contribution points to the complexity of relationships that influence mobilization and social movements; unsettling the notion that social activism leads inexorably to democracy and development and questioning what motivates collective action and what does it achieve?

This book is about how ordinary citizens and their organizations mobilize to deepen democracy. A collection of new empirical case studies from Angola, Bangladesh, Brazil, India, Kenya, Nigeria and South Africa illustrate how alternative forms of political mobilization -- such as protests, social participation, activism, litigation and lobbying -- engage with the formal institutions of representative democracy in ways that constitute the very essence of democratic politics and not, as many authors suggest, an indication of its failure. No other volume has brought together examples from such a broad Southern spectrum and covering such a diversity of actors: rural and urban dwellers, transnational activists, religious groups, politicians and social leaders. The cases illuminate the crucial contribution that citizen mobilization makes to democratization and the building of state institutions. Yet neither are these movements driven purely by idealism. They cases also reflect often the uneasy relationship between citizens and the institutions that are designed to foster their political participation. This book suggest ways to confront these challenges by recognizing -- as so many ordinary citizens already have -- that more just and equitable democratic systems can only emerge from more just and equitable societies.

Past debates over social movements have suffered from a focus on Anglo-America and Europe, often neglecting the significance of collective actions of citizens in the Global South. This authoritative new title redresses this imbalance with case study material from movements for change in Brazil, India, Bangladesh, Mexico, South Africa, Kenya and Nigeria. In these examples, social movements have formed without the benefits of the structural or institutional resource base found in the North, and have persevered even when the state does not have the resources to effectively respond to collective demands. Each expert contribution points to the complexity of relationships that influence mobilization and social movements; unsettling the notion that social activism leads inexorably to democracy and development and questioning what motivates collective action and what does it achieve?