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Cosmos

The Centre on Social Movement Studies

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Publications

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Beyond Euroscepticism: radical left and right ‘visions of Europe’ across party and protest arenas

Journal Article - 2026

Author: Caiani, M., & Fenner, L. S.

This article for Journal of European Public Policy makes a case for reassessing what counts as pro- or anti-European identity. Over the past decade, the rise of radical right mobilisations has prompted many progressive social movement organisations and parties within the EU to anchor their activism in a defence of ‘Europe’ and in resistance to… more
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Conspiracism and Political Conflict

Edited Volume - 2026

Author: Manuela Caiani, Marco Solinas, Hans-Jorg Trenz

This book explains how and why conspiracy theories have become such a powerful political weapon. From stolen-election claims to vaccine scepticism and global “elite” plots, conspiracy theories have moved from the political margins to the centre of public life. In an era of polarised politics, digital campaigning, and democratic backsliding, they increasingly shape elections, mobilise… more
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Invisible Politics: Lessons from the Iraqi Tishreen on Unaffiliated Activist Trajectories and Long Revolutions in Divided Societies

Journal Article - 2026

Author: Alice Franchini

Non-ethnic mobilization in divided societies is often read through a lens of exceptionalism shaped by the adoption of narrowly outcome-oriented paradigms. Processual approaches have problematized such interpretative distortions by introducing longitudinal explorations of movement trajectories, but often apply rigid distinctions between explicitly political forms of mobilization and those which, occurring outside recognizable political organizations, are… more
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Nationalism as sovereignty? Renegotiating state-citizen relations through counterhegemonic discourse in the Iraqi Tishreen revolution

Journal Article - 2026

Author: Alice Franchini

Nationalist mobilization is mostly associated with ethnic and territorial grievances. However, studies in recent uprisings, such as the SWANA revolutions of 2011 and 2019, found that nationalist discourse prominently featured in social movements’ repertoires of contention. A widely understood signifier, nationalism was reappropriated by movements to build consensus on ideas of popular sovereignty and direct… more
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The Temporal Turn in Social Movement Studies: Political Readings of Temporality

Journal Article - 2026

Author: Nerea Montejo-López

The study of temporality has gained increasing prominence in sociology and social movement studies. As this wave of research on temporality has risen, scholars have increasingly argued that time should not be understood as a neutral backdrop but as a dimension of power and conflict. Building on the concept of the capitalist timescape as a… more
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Title: Feminist strategies against the far right in Chile: the #EnContra campaign and the 2023 exit plebiscite

Journal Article - 2026

Author: Rosario Freire Saray

The article examines the feminist campaign #EnContra, which emerged in Chile in response to the 2023 constitutional plebiscite led by far-right actors. Drawing on ethnographic fieldwork conducted between September and December 2023, this study analyses how autonomous feminist groups collectively diagnosed the socio-political threat posed by the proposed constitution and mobilized against it through a… more

Communication creates partial organization: A comparative analysis of the organizing practices of two climate action movements, Youth for Climate and Fridays for Future Italy

Journal Article - 2025

Author: Marco Deseriis, Lorenzo Zamponi, Diego Ceccobelli

ABSTRACT: This article focuses on a neglected aspect of the climate action movement Fridays for Future, namely, the relationship between its mediated communication practices and its early organizational processes. Drawing from a strand of organizational communication that underscores the constitutive dimension of communication to organizing processes, we analyze the significance of mediatized leadership and networked… more
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Free download for "Contentious Politics of Global Health Movements"

Monograph - 2025

Author: Donatella Della Porta, Stella Christou

While much research has addressed the regressive anti-vax protests, the book focuses on campaigns by progressive social movements to promote the development of vaccines for Covid-19 and ensure their equal access on a global level. Over the course of the pandemic, health and care have become central claims, mobilising health workers and patients as well… more
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From ‘Wokeism’ to ‘Le Wokeisme’: Diffusion of Anti-Wokeness as a Far-Right Master Frame From the United States to France

Journal Article - 2025

Author: Batuhan Eren, Manuela Caiani

The transnationalization of the far right is a noteworthy and evolving phenomenon, characterized by extensive networks of actors, their collaborative activities and the exchange of novel ideas and frames. The emergence and cross-national spread of ‘anti-wokeness’ is a recent trend in the ongoing transnationalization process. As a concept to criticize the woke ideas while promoting the illiberal… more
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Normalization through transnationalization? Far right international coordination and cooperation

Journal Article - 2025

Author: Manuela Caiani

This paper examines the normalization of the far right via the transnationalization of identities, networks and mobilization. Normalization is related to transformations in the socio-political landscape, and the travelling across borders of discursive strategies and practices of backlash political players play a role on it. Focusing on the crucial Italian case, first, we distinguish extent… more

News

08/06/2026

Social movements in intense times. Notes for a (semiserious) auto-ethnography
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01/04/2026

Critical Political Economy of the European Polycrisis
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19/03/2026

Books Against Censorship: Libraries as Bastions of Freedom/Libri contro la censura, le Biblioteche come presidio di libertà
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17/03/2026

Travelling with the European Convoy for Cuba
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09/02/2026

Genova 2001 in historical perspective, a conference and a call for papers
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03/02/2026

Call for papers: Contentious Politics in Spain: Cycles, Transformations and New Repertoires of Contention
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Publications

Journal Article - 2025

Communication creates partial organization: A comparative analysis of the organizing practices of two climate action movements, Youth for Climate and Fridays for Future Italy
Marco Deseriis, Lorenzo Zamponi, Diego Ceccobelli
This article focuses on a neglected aspect of the climate action movement Fridays for Future, namely, the relationship between its mediated communication practices and its early organizational processes. Drawing from a strand of organizational communication that underscores the constitutive dimension of communication to organizing processes, we analyze the significance of mediatized leadership and networked communication for the foundation and early development of two national chapters of Fridays for Future: Youth for Climate (YFC) Belgium and Fridays for Future Italy (FFFI).

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.

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.
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Faculty of Political and Social Sciences Scuola Normale Superiore Palazzo Strozzi Piazza degli Strozzi 50123 Firenze Italy
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