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The Centre on Social Movement Studies

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Publications

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The populist politics of Euroscepticism in times of crisis: A framework for analysis

Journal Article - 2018

Author: Andrea L. P. Pirro and Paul Taggart

The European Union has been recently exposed to the multiple shocks of the Great Recession, the migrant crisis, and Brexit. Populist parties have been, either directly or indirectly, considered the principal beneficiaries of these crises in light of their Eurosceptic profiles. In this introductory article, we lay out the conceptual and analytical tools necessary to… more

The populist politics of Euroscepticism in times of crisis: Comparative conclusions

Journal Article - 2018

Author: Andrea L. P. Pirro, Paul Taggart, and Stijn van Kessel

This article offers comparative findings of the nature of populist Euroscepticism in political parties in contemporary Europe in the face of the Great Recession, migrant crisis, and Brexit. Drawing on case studies included in the Special Issue on France, Germany, Greece, Italy, the Netherlands, Portugal, Spain, and the United Kingdom, the article presents summary cross-national… more

’Solidarietà sconvenienti’. Reti online di estrema destra contro e per la riforma dell’Europa

Journal Article - 2017

Author: Elena Pavan and Manuela Caiani

In spite of an increasing interest for how ICTs entwine with collective participation dynamics, the ways in which their relational and communicational potential is exploited by extreme right organizations remain overlooked. In this article, we aim at moving forward along this research avenue by focusing on how extreme right organizations and groups employ digital communications… more

A situated understanding of digital technologies in social movements. Media ecology and media practice approaches

Journal Article - 2017

Author: Alice Mattoni

The article tackles two main aspects related to the interaction between social movements and digital technologies. First, it reflects on the need to include and combine different theoretical approaches in social movement studies so as to construct more meaningful understanding of how social movement actors deals with digital technologies and with what outcomes in societies.… more

Anti-Corruption from Below. Social Movements Against Corruption in Late Neoliberalism

Special Issue - 2017

Author: Donatella della Porta, Loris Caruso, and Andrea L. P. Pirro

In the last decades, a growing awareness has emerged in progressive social movements about the relevance of corruption as a hidden factor that negatively influences political and economic decision-making processes in both liberal-democratic and authoritarian regimes. Rampant corruption has been denounced by social movements, which have developed specific diagnostic and prognostic frames as well as… more

Comparing Digital Protest Media Imaginaries: Anti-Austerity Movements in Greece, Italy & Spain

Journal Article - 2017

Author: Emiliano Treré, Sandra Jeppensen and Alice Mattoni

This article presents findings from an empirical study of repertoires of contention and communication engaged during anti-austerity protests by the Indignados in Spain, the precarious generation in Italy, and the Aganaktismenoi in Greece. Drawing on 60 semi­structured interviews with activists and independent media producers involved in the 2011 wave of contention, we bring together social… more

Digital Capitalism and the End of Politics: The Case of the Italian Five Star Movement

Journal Article - 2017

Author: Loris Caruso

In the Italian national elections in 2013, the Movimento Cinque Stelle (Five Star Movement, M5S), founded just four years earlier, gained 25 percent of votes, more than any other party. Analyses and interpretations are divided between those who consider M5S a member of the family of European populism and those who see M5S’s propositions as akin to… more

Digital Innovation and the Fourth Industrial Revolution: Epochal Social Changes?

Journal Article - 2017

Author: Loris Caruso

ITC technologies have come to comprehensively represent images and expectations of the future. Hopes of ongoing progress, economic growth, skill upgrading and possibly also democratisation are attached to new ICTs as well as fears of totalitarian control, alienation, job loss and insecurity. Currently, with the terms Industry 4.0. and ‘Fourth Industrial Revolution” (FIR), public institutions… more

Dissenting youth: how student and youth struggles helped shape anti-austerity mobilisations in Southern Europe

Journal Article - 2017

Author: Lorenzo Zamponi, Joseba Fernández González

Social movements do not appear spontaneously. They are rooted in cultures and contexts and their evolution depends both on macro structural factors and on the action and organisation of pre-existing actors. In particular, the anti-austerity protest events that characterised southern European countries in the last few years cannot be understood through a focus on them… more

Framing exclusion in the public sphere: Far-right mobilization and the debate on Charlie Hebdo in Italy

Journal Article - 2017

Author: Pietro Castelli Gattinara

While the January 2015 Paris terrorist attacks presented a crucial opportunity for far-right mobilisation, the focus on liberal democratic values and Charlie Hebdo’s non-conformist progressive profile presented challenges for right-wing discourse. Taking Italy as a paradigmatic case of public controversies on cultural and religious affairs, this article examines the opportunities and constraints generated by multicultural… more

News

21/03/2024

CFP: Feminism as a method - Feminist Epistemologies, Methodologies and Methods in Social Sciences

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International Conference 14-15 November 2024 Anastasia Barone, Giada Bonu Rosenkranz and Donatella della Porta (Scuola Normale Superiore)

16/05/2023

CFP: Analyzing protest in the digital age. Challenges and opportunities in combining text and video sources

Organizers Donatella della Porta, Scuola Normale Superiore Swen Hutter, Freie Universität Berlin & WZB Berlin Social Science Center Place and date WZB Berlin Social Science Center, December 7-8, 2023

22/02/2023

15 fully funded PhD positions

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The Faculty of Political and Social Sciences at the Scuola Normale Superiore in Florence, Italy is pleased to announce 15 PhD fellowships beginning on November 1, 2023. The deadline for applications is April 13, 2023.

16/02/2023

Applications now open! Fourth Edition of the ECPR-COSMOS Summer School on Methods for the Study of Political Participation and Mobilisation

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Applicants must send their application materials no later than March the 17th 2023.

10/01/2022

SNS announces 14 fully-funded PhD positions

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The Faculty of Political and Social Sciences at the Scuola Normale Superiore in Florence, Italy is pleased to announce 14 PhD fellowships beginning on November 1, 2022.

16/07/2021

Prof. della Porta to lead VolkswagenStiftung-funded ECSEuro project

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Reflecting the European challenge of transnational cooperation and multiple crises, this project asks how local political initiatives across Europe enact citizenship and solidarity and contribute to the vision of a more democratic Europe from below.

Publications

Journal Article - 2023

Resisting right-wing populism in power: a comparative analysis of the Facebook activities of social movements in Italy and the UK

Niccolò Pennucci
This paper aims to present a comparative study of the civil society reaction to right-wing populism in power through social media, by looking at cases in Italy and the United Kingdom.

Journal Article - 2023

Emotions in Action: the Role of Emotions in Refugee Solidarity Activism

Chiara Milan
This article investigates the different types of emotions that result from participation in refugee solidarity activism, investigating how they change over time and to what extent they explain why individuals remain involved in action in spite of unfavorable circumstances.

Journal Article - 2023

‘Love is over, this is going to be Turkey!’: cathartic resonance between the June 2013 protests in Turkey and Brazil

Batuhan Eren
This study addresses the question of why and how a protest can inspire individuals in distant countries. Taking the June 2013 protests in Turkey and Brazil as cases, it investigates the reasons why the Turkish protests were framed as one of the inspirational benchmarks by some Brazilian protesters.

Journal Article - 2023

Mutual aid and solidarity politics in times of emergency: direct social action and temporality in Italy during the COVID-19 pandemic

Lorenzo Zamponi
From the spring of 2020, the COVID-19 pandemic and the social distancing measures introduced created a series of social problems and needs that were partially addressed in Italy as well as in other countries by grassroots mutual aid initiatives. While many of these initiatives were strongly rooted in the Italian social movement and civil society landscape and the choice to engage in mutual aid activities was the result of long years of reflection and planning, the article shows how strongly the temporality of emergency affected the nature of these initiatives, their development and their outcomes, in particular with regard to the extraordinary number of people who volunteered and their relationship with politicisation processes.

Monograph - 2023

Populism and (Pop) Music

Manuela Caiani, Enrico Padoan
The book provides a detailed account of the links between production of popular culture to the rise of populism and contributes to studies on populism and popular culture in Italy, using a comparative approach and a cultural sociology perspective

Monograph - 2022

Labour conflicts in the digital age

Donatella della Porta, Riccardo Emilio Chesta, Lorenzo Cini
From Deliveroo to Amazon, digital platforms have drastically transformed the way we work. But how are these transformations being received and challenged by workers? This book provides a radical interpretation of the changing nature of worker movements in the digital age, developing an invaluable approach that combines social movement studies and industrial relations. Using case studies taken from Europe and North America, it offers a comparative perspective on the mobilizing trajectories of different platform workers and their distinct organizational forms and action repertoires.

Monograph - 2022

Resisting the Backlash: Street Protest in Italy

Donatella della Porta, Niccolò Bertuzzi, Daniela Chironi, Chiara Milan, Martín Portos & Lorenzo Zamponi
Drawing interview material, together with extensive data from the authors’ original social movement database, this book examines the development of social movements in resistance to perceived political "regression" and a growing right-wing backlash.

Journal Article - 2021

Learning from Democratic Practices: New Perspectives in Institutional Design

Andrea Felicetti
Drawing from literature on democratic practices in social movements and democratic innovations, the article illustrates three ways to advance institutional design in the wake of the systemic turn.

Monograph - 2021

Migrant Protest. Interactive Dynamics in Precarious Mobilizations

Elias Steinhilper
This book explores the interactions and spaces shaping the emergence, trajectory, and fragmentation of migrant protest in unfavorable contexts of marginalization.

Journal Article - 2021

Populism between voting and non-electoral participation

Andrea Pirro & Martín Portos
The article focuses on a neglected aspect of populist mobilisation, i.e. non-electoral participation (NEP), and elaborates on the extent to which populist party voters engage politically outside the polling station. While challenging common understandings of populism as inherently distrustful and apathetic, and protest as an exclusive practice of the left, the study critically places NEP at the heart of populism in general, and populist right politics in particular.