Locked down? Speaking from the shadows and silence for survival

I write to speak of silencing and the suffering of survivors of domestic abuse in the family courts of England and Wales and the struggle to find a voice to articulate the hardship faced in this lockdown through court. It has taken the whole period of lockdown to find the words, the courage to keep writing, even as tears stream down my face, even as I sit in a virtual court hearing, even as my voice breaks as I fight to be heard. This text is a glimpse into a world that is hidden in plain view, where I will share fragments of my lived experience. I am scared to write but know I speak or am lost in the silent void that I have known for too long. Domestic abuse and the taboo around it screams at me to remain unseen, hidden, and invisible. I keep returning to find the words, as the very real cost of not naming the violence and reaching out to speak through it is too high. The fragmented account that follows is a raw telling of living life through the court system; it is written to share a voice that was unheard in the family law court and has been minimized, side-lined, ordered, and silenced through 3 years of the court journey and the embodied effects this has had. It moves between space and time to show a journey endured. Can you hear me? Will you bear witness?     

Impact of Covid-19 pandemic on the transnationalization of LGBT* activism in Japan and beyond

The global Covid-19 pandemic has strongly impacted social practices, relocating communications and social networks into the digital space. Contextualized in such impact of the Covid-19 pandemic, the local LGBT* activism in Japan achieved a special momentum: both the acceleration of the socio-spatial relocation of LGBT* activism to the digital space and the postponement of the Tokyo Olympics 2020 by 1 year enabled activists to mobilize people domestically and globally. The pandemic was not the actual cause or driver of the local LGBT* activism, yet it has been an important catalyst for the transnationalization of the local movement in Japan, pushing evidently the spatial boundaries to achieve broader public outreach but in turn also receiving stronger support from the global community through transnational networks. This study explores novel dynamics of spatiality and temporality of social transformations through the Covid-19-induced increase in global digital connectedness as well as transnationalization of local actions.     

走向法庭还是走上街头：超越维权困境的一条行动路径

制度外抗争与制度内法律维权有着显著不同的结果和制度逻辑。现有文献中的“依法抗争”或“以法抗争”可以通过制度外或者制度边缘的集体行动获得政府及时的反应,但却有着多重困境：机会困境、风险困境、组织困境、制度困境。制度内法律维权可以很大程度上破解这些困境,但也有着该模式下独特的结果困境：费时费力而又缺乏即时直接的回报困扰或者阻碍制度内法律维权者去为了获得长期的有益于整个群体的普遍性制度化后果采取行动。但本研究中的业主维权行动在一定程度上破解了这一困境。他们的制度内维权行动让法律在实践中最大可能地运转了起来,从而超越了传统维权的困境。独特的政治机会结构和制度内维权本身所具有的特征,促进一些群体走向法庭,而非走上街头。     

Lesbian Parent Activism and Meaning-Making in the Current Political Environment

This article discusses the impact of lesbian mothers' activism on legislation and personal well-being. Using a meaning reconstruction framework, the activism of lesbian parents is evaluated as a source of resilience and strength in the current political climate. A case history of one community where lesbian mothers formed a local coalition in response to a statewide proposition to ban same-sex marriage in Texas is described. This community example shows how the activism of lesbian parents can transform both community and activists. Implications for community organizers, therapists and LGBT parents/allies are discussed.     

“Anchoring” white community: White women activists and the politics of public schools

This article discusses the political clout wielded by a group of white women who participate in “Presidents’ Committee,” an organization of Parents Association presidents in a New York City Community School District. The school district, like many urban areas, is experiencing an exodus of white families to the suburbs, which are seen as offering better resources and a safe social distance from blacks and other non‐whites. In this context of social change, white mothers who participate in Presidents’ Committee push at gender boundaries in the public sphere by professionalizing motherhood and watching over potentially corrupt political practices. At the same time, their activism can be understood as a key component of local efforts to reproduce “white” community. Through this ethnographic analysis, “whiteness” is unpacked as a construct that is fractured by gender, class, and place of origin, while remaining a resilient idealized resource with which to reproduce a black/white racial binary.     

Rebuilding Community Organizing Education in Social Work

Although the campaign and election of Barack Obama as the nation's first President with a background in community organizing (CO) has boosted the visibility and popularity of the field, graduate social work programs have not taken full advantage of the opportunity. This article, therefore, presents a three-fold argument regarding the future of CO education. There is an increasing demand and need for trained organizers and community organizing education. This historical moment holds significant potential for CO education in social work. Graduate schools of social work with CO programs should broaden their outreach to attract potential students and activists to careers as social change agents.     

Social Workers’ Conflict of Loyalty in the Context of Social Activism: The Case of the 2011 Social Protests in Israel

ABSTRACT

This qualitative study examined the experiences of social workers who participated in the 2011 Israeli social protests. Data were collected through 1 focus group interview. The sample included 11 social workers employed in 11 social welfare departments throughout the country. Findings highlight the complexities and dilemmas experienced by social workers who protested against the system that employs them. Research findings contribute to the discourse regarding the conflict of loyalty experienced by public social workers engaged in social activism that targets the system that employs them.     

Muslim Women's Challenges to Islamic Law The Case of Malaysia

The reform of Islam by women and especially the lessons this activism might contain for feminist praxis is a highly topical and important issue. This article outlines some of the lessons to be drawn from studying this area with a specific focus on the activism of some groups of Malaysian Muslim women aimed at the reform of Islam. Two different strategies for reform are explained and traced in their attempts to reform religious interpretation and the Islamic legal system, the Syar'iah. The aim of the article is to provoke dialogue over the relationship of Islam to women's rights, while highlighting the agency of Muslim women within an Islamic framework. Another aim is to contribute to the debate over what constitutes feminism and the need to subject the debate continuously to cross-cultural and international perspectives.     

Organizational Elaboration as Social Movement Tactic: A Case Study of Strategic Leadership in the first US School-sponsored Program for Gay and Lesbian Youth

This research contributes to our understanding of two central and related problems in the study of social movements: tactical innovation and strategic leadership. Focusing on the leadership history (1984–2003) of the founder and director of the first US public school program for gay and lesbian youth, called Project 10 and located in the Los Angeles, California public school system, this case study illustrates the importance of leadership agency on the part of those ‘organizing from within’. Analyses herein indicate the significance of both institutional constraints and life course circumstances in determining leadership choices. This paper maps organizational obstacles and the tactical dilemmas they produced to explain how successful strategic choices get made. The case of Project 10 indicates that institutional constraints can be overcome tactically with organizational elaboration. Additionally, hybridity, assumed in the literature to produce organizational precariousness, is shown here to be a mechanism for stability, facilitating networks and resource acquisition over time.     

Strategies,Action Repertoires and DIY Activism in the Animal Rights Movement

Following Tilly, this paper argues that a social movement is what it does as much as why it does it. This approach is particularly important in the case of the animal rights movement, which is often demonized as extremist and violent. Critics of the movement claim that animal activists use letter bombs, arson attacks and threats to intimidate those they see as animal abusers and that violent direct action of this kind is typical of the movement as a whole. The present paper argues that the mainstream animal movement – in the USA, the UK and Australia – is overwhelmingly non-violent and that its core strategies and tactics have two broad aims, namely to gain publicity for the movement and to challenge conventional thinking about how we treat non-human animals. This is achieved primarily by the deployment of the key tactical mechanisms of persuasion, protest, non-cooperation and intervention. These tactics may be deployed collectively or as DIY (Do-It-Yourself) activism which many grassroots animal activists – ‘caring sleuths’ to use Shapiro's apt term – seem to prefer. The paper focuses on demonstrations and pamphleteering as examples of publicity strategies or liberal governance strategies as well as critical governance strategies or interference strategies such as the hunger strike, ethical vegetarianism and undercover surveillance.