Success in Social Movements

Della Porta and Diani discuss what it means to have success in social movements, in chapter nine of their textbook. They give 4 ways that success is measured within social movements. The first is policy. Many movements define themselves by the policy that they put out there. If they don’t achieve their goal, they fail. Della Porta and Diani, however, say that a passage of law doesn’t always mean anything, so measuring by policy is not a good method. The second is symbolic messages. Some movements think that spreading messages to others is most effective. Della Porta and Diani say that when this is done right, it can be more effective than policies because the law can change, but symbolic messages can be consistently effective. Yet social movements often still need the law to change what they want. The third measurement is increased influence of the movement. Politicians sometimes find ways to make movements part of the commission by ways such as giving normal citizens the right to participate. When this occurs, many movements feel as though they have reached a success. Yet the government can make those decisions to please the movements, without really giving them much power or gain. The fourth and final measurement Della Porta and Diana discuss is whether or not the movement leads to change throughout society. If their accomplishment emboldens other movements, then many people see the movement as a success.

Defining success within a movement is a tricky thing to do. Perhaps what really defines success is just a matter of opinion. In movements like the Civil Rights movement, it is evident that they achieved success because they made changes starting small, and ending big – end to segregation, the right to vote, and the road to true equality. However, all a long their journey to their final end results, there were many successes as each small victory contributed to the overall achievements of the movement. Maybe success can not be defined in the midst of present movements; maybe it takes looking back on past efforts and evaluating their effectiveness in the present. Perhaps true success is found in persistence, determination, and hard work a lone.