an introduction to social psychological perspectives on grassroots organizing

Journal of Social Issues. Vol. 52, No. 1 . 1996. pp . 3-14

An Introduction to Social Psychological Perspectives on Grassroots Organizing

Michele Andrisin Wittig California Stare University, Northridge

The primary goals of this issue of the journal are to advance our understanding of the mobilization and empowerment of people who organize locally for social change and to idenrib strategies for initiating and sustaining such grassroots activism. A secondary aim is to encourage the use of action research in this domain. The author de$nes grassroots organizing and explains its suitability for social psychological analysis at the individual, interpersonal, collective, and cultural levels. Action research as a strategy for studying grassroots participation is considered. To situate the present volume in its intellectual context, the author outlines prior related perspectives on collective action. The article concludes with summaries of the remaining articles in the present volume.

This has to be stopped . . . stay off the buses Monday in protest of the arrest and trial [of Rosa Parks]. (Jo Ann Robinson's leaflet for the Women's Political Council of Montgom- ery, Alabama, 1955)

In a massive act of non-cooperation . . . they came to see that it was ultimately more honorable to walk the streets in dignity than to ride the buses in humiliation. . . . Many issues not cleared up intellectually . . . were now resolved within the sphere of practical action. (Rev. Martin Luther King, Jr., 1963)

Throughout history and in many cultures, people have organized themselves locally to find innovative solutions to specific problems. This issue of the journal brings social psychological perspectives to bear on such local organizing where, it has been said, all revolutions begin. In the first part of this introduction, grassroots organizing is defined and distinguished from the more general concept of social movements. A rationale for the social psychological study of grassroots activism is presented that takes into account individual, interpersonal, collective,

Correspondence regarding this article should be addressed to Michele A. Wittig, Department of Psychology, California State University, Northridge, CA 91330-8255. Electronic mail may be sent via Internet to [email protected].

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0022-4537/96/0300-MM3$03.00/1 0 19% The Society for the Psychological Study of Social Issues

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and cultural changes that are likely to occur when local groups organize for social action. Consideration is given to the potential benefits and disadvantages of using action research to study grassroots organizing. Subsequent parts of this introduction include an outline of prior related perspectives and summaries of the remaining contributions to this volume.

Conceptual Analysis of Grassroots Organizing

Defining Features

Grassroots organizing is a form of collective advocacy in behalf of a shared cause or direct action in the service of achieving a collective goal. It is locally mobilized and primarily single-issue based. Members of grassroots groups are local residents who organize themselves, seek to influence more powerful others, “are not appointed, elected or recruited except by themselves . . . [and] are unique in that they use any of a wide variety of methods in working toward change . . . ” (Zander, 1990, p. 22).

Though the intended beneficiaries of such community activism usually include the group itself, the primary goal is often to promote change in power relations, not to advance individuals either within or outside the organizing group. To the extent that grassroots activists focus on such change, they counter- act the tendency to blame the victims of social injustice. In sum, for the purpose of this JSI issue, grassroots organizing is viewed as a local form of collective action by community members employing various techniques, primarily as strategies for addressing the root causes of social problems.

Grassroots activism is related to the more general and inclusive concept of social movements, which often originate in activism at the local level. However, social movements subsequently continue at higher or more central levels of power, where established organizations of more professional activists work (often simultaneously with local activists) on the same issue (Eyerman & Jamison, 1991). Thus, local organizing is often the vanguard of such wider social movements.

Social Psychological Components

While the mobilization of people has traditionally been viewed as a sociological phenomenon, it also involves psychological components that operate at the individual, interpersonal, intergroup, and cultural levels. As a prelude to the social psychological analyses provided by the authors of the remaining articles in this volume, these will be considered here briefly.

At the individual and interpersonal levels, grassroots organizing involves cognitive and affective elements in a complex bidirectional system. For example,

Social Psychological Rerspectives 5

one’s feelings of group consciousness and self-efficacy or empowerment, as well as one’s understanding of what is fair, may affect one’s willingness to become involved in collective action. Moreover, while the goal of collective action is sociological change, individuals may experience psychological changes as a result, for example, of walking in solidarity with others rather than riding at the back of a racially-segregated bus. Perceptions of self-esteem and self-efficacy may improve, new social identities may be formed, attitudes toward the political system may be altered, and skills and resources may be acquired.

Furthermore, grassroots activists and those whom they seek to influence participate in an intergroup dynamic, bringing their interaction within the domain of social psychological research on intergroup relations. The changes just de- scribed as occumng at the individual and interpersonal levels may have counter- parts and promote changes at the group and social structural levels, especially if the grassroots organizing succeeds in transforming a collectivity into a social movement. Intergroup attitudes may shift and new political, cultural, religious, or intellectual alliances may be formed. While these changes have typically been studied with conflict models, cooperative strategies in overcoming traditional group boundaries are also relevant, especially when the focus is on the formation of grassroots efforts across traditional intergroup boundaries, as was typical of racially-integrated busloads of “freedom riders” during the U.S. civil rights era.

Finally, grassroots organizing fits within that part of societal psychology that is concerned with the social construction of cultural norms, values, and knowledge. Community activism can be a starting point for the transformation of norms and values and the social shaping of knowledge at the cultural level that Eyerman and Jamison (199 1) associated with social movements more generally. These include cultural beliefs and understandings about what is just or fair as well as norms and statutes governing the status and treatment of others. For example, Sojourner Truth’s 19th century “Ain’t I a Woman?’ speech to the delegates of the first U.S. Women’s Rights Convention challenged them to include African-American women in the concept of “woman” that was usually applied only to white women.

Relations Among Ordinary and Expert Knowledge and Action Research

Grassroots organizations usually draw their agendas and leaders from their ordinary members, to whom they are responsible. In such groups, shared deci- sion making and accountability are often valued attributes (e.g., Wittig, 1979). Among the prominent roles played by those involved in such movements is that of leaders who articulate the principles, goals, and values of the movement as well as advocate on behalf of their adoption by the larger society. According to Eyerman and Jamison (1991), such “movement intellectuals” are often ordinary people who shape new knowledge from within a social movement. Some of these

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movement intellectuals are transformed by this activity and may become traditional intellectuals subsequently. Meanwhile, some traditional intellectuals are transformed into movement spokespersons.

Action research (e.g., Lewin, 1946) is particularly useful for studying such migrations across the divide between “ordinary” and “expert” knowledge in social movements, because it eschews the traditional expert knowledge model and replaces it with a model of reciprocal knowledge between the researcher and those for and with whom the research is done. A characteristic of such research is that it is a collaborative enterprise, conducted in coordination with its intended beneficiaries. This has several advantages. First, the processes accompanying collective identity formation, empowerment, and social change can often be better understood by the researcher who is engaged in such a collaborative effort (e.g., Hollway, 1989). Second, the validity of the research is likely to be en- hanced when participants with diverse perspectives (including those related to one’s culture, race, class, and gender) bring their knowledge to bear (e.g., Outhwaite, 1987, chap. 7; Sampson, 1993, chap. 12; Wittig, 1985). Third, to the extent that the research incorporates the insights and values of its constituents (community members and other “end users”), it is more likely to be used by them to create structural change (e.g., Vega, 1992; Yeich & Levine, 1992).

The most important potential limitations of action research in this context entail negative consequences of combining research and advocacy. These have been the subject of much debate in the behavioral sciences (e.g., Baron, 1981; Campbell, 1969), especially within those branches of psychology that are social- issues oriented or have emancipatory aims (e.g., Minton, 1986; Wittig, 1985). Often the kind of knowledge acquired by involvement in grassroots organizing is considered suspect by mainstream social scientists because, it is said, one cannot simultaneously advocate the truth of a claim and critically examine its validity. A contending view is that the scholarly and activist roles are not contradictory, but are related dialectically. Accordingly, the knowledge-seeking aspects of research combine with the social change goals of advocacy and intervention resulting in social psychological information that is both descriptive of “what is” and on- ented toward change (e.g., Sztompka, 1979; Wittig, 1985).

Action Research as a Method of Reforming the Research Endeavor

While support for a participatory action approach to doing research on grassroots organizing can be found in Lewin’s (1946) call for research that simultaneously generates new knowledge and solves social problems, incorporating grassroots organizing into psychological research is a relatively new development. It offers an alternative approach in the fields of applied and action research (Yeich, this issue). In Brown and Tandon’s (1983) view, traditional action research has tended to ally itself with organizational authority and promote

Social Psychological Perspectives 7

“top-down’’ social change strategies. In contrast, grassroots action research explicitly allies itself with its intended beneficiaries; employs a “bottom-up” approach; and involves its beneficiaries in developing the research questions, investigative strategy, interpretation of the results, and in developing and imple- menting recommendations. The present journal issue includes contributions by scholar-activists who use grassroots organizing as both the method and subject of analysis.

Prior Related Perspectives

The authors whose contributions appear in this JSI issue bring social psychological principles to bear on the topic of grassroots organizing so as to improve (1) our understanding of the basic processes involved, (2) the applica- tion of the derived knowledge to the social problems grassroots organizers ad- dress, and (3) the training of such community organizers. Their contributions have been preceded by and owe much to those of others. To acknowledge this previous work and to orient the reader, a brief overview of the relevant aspects of prior work on collective action in all three of the aforementioned areas is presented below.

Basic Research

The study of basic principles of collective action is well established in economics, sociology, and political science. Within economics, Olson (1965) offered rational choice theory to explain why people form social movements. Upon this foundation, sociologists and political scientists (e.g., Gamson, 1975; Oberschall, 1973; Tilly, 1978; Zald & McCarthy, 1987) built resource mobilization theory, which emphasized the structural-political factors explaining the success or failure of such movements. More recently, social constructivists within sociology have begun to emphasize such social psychological factors as the construction of meaning, the use of symbols, and the importance of constructing a collective identity (e.g., Moms & Mueller, 1992). Eyerman and Jamison (1991, chap. I ) provide an insightful overview of social change movement perspectives in sociology for the nonspecialist.

Within psychology, early individualistic, psychodynamic theories (e.g., frustration-aggression) of collective action gave way to group-based theories. These include social influence approaches (e.g., Moscovici, 1985) and theories of intergroup relations (e.g., Taylor & Moghaddam, 1995). However, basic researchers in social psychology have heretofore shown little interest in the distinctive features of grassroots organizing as a specific type of collective action. Among the social psychological perspectives that the contributors to the present volume adapt for their use are theories of planned behavior, social identi-

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ty, and persuasion; principles of communication and social networks; and empowerment models.

Applied Research

Grassroots organizing is an aspect of collective action that has received considerable attention from applied researchers in other social sciences, including political science and urban studies (e.g., Chong, 1991; Davis, 1991. Applied researchers in community psychology (e.g., Zimmerman & Rappaport, 1988) and organizational psychology (e.g., Friedman, 1991) have recently begun to turn their analytic lens on community activism. Relying on his extensive knowledge of the social psychology of groups, Zander (1990) analyzed community groups for social action and proposed a set of generalizations concerning circumstances that facilitate them, motivations that movement leaders attempt to strengthen, group attributes that are coordinated with the methods they seek to use, the criteria for those methods, and the types of satisfaction likely to result. He concluded with a set of questions for further research, many of which are addressed by the authors in the current journal issue. The approaches taken by them are mainly social psychological, augmented by concepts originating in community and organizational psychology and psychological anthropology.

Training Activists

Training in community organizing (as opposed to studying it) has a long history in religious organizations and schools of social work and a shorter tenure within community psychology programs. In 1960, Gordon Lippitt edited an issue of JSI on a variety of programs to encourage people to do volunteer work within political parties or to train various groups of citizens (politicians, chamber of commerce members, business managers, union leaders, etc.) in political leadership (Lippitt, 1960). During the past three decades, university-based programs have trained psychologists in community building as an essential component of research for lasting social change (e.g., Wolff, 1987). Writing on community psychology for the 1990 Annual Review of Psychology, Heller called attention to inadequate training in community intervention programs and called for “a strengthened local focus with increased local participation and citizen-researcher collaboration” (Heller, 1990, p. 160). Similarly, Rappaport asserted that “community psychology is at its best when it is responsive to grassroots groups who require . . . support with political, social, and psychological resources” (Rap- paport, 1977, p. 53).

Activists (e.g., Alinsky, 1971; Kahn, 1982; King, 1963; Rustin, 1976) and founders of community training programs such as the Highlander School, Mid- west Academy, and Kellogg Centers have supplied much of the literature on how


to do grassroots organizing. Among psychological sources, Berkowitz’s ( 1982) and Zander’s (1990) books are important practical volumes for those who wish to promote grassroots change. The present journal issue includes articles that consider strategies for grassroots organizing that should prove useful to both trainers and activists.

Organization of the Issue

This issue of the journal highlights the contributions of scholar-activists whose reports integrate psychological analysis with their work as advocates. These authors examine grassroots organizing as both a strategy that attempts structural change to solve social problems and as a way of transforming the research endeavor in collaboration with its intended beneficiaries. Taken togeth- er, our authors examine the circumstances that facilitate the formation of local groups for social change, develop models for predicting participation, and identify factors that distinguish grassroots groups that succeed from those that do not. Strategies for launching and sustaining such groups are distilled.

Section I : Introduction and Overview

Following this introductory paper, Marc Pilisuk, JoAnn McAllister, and Jack Rothman present an overview of types of grassroots organizing and their cultural contexts. They identify three forms of community organizing (social action, locality development, and social planning) and discuss the role that empowerment plays in the first two types. Placing grassroots organizing in cultural context, they consider six conditions of the postmodern age that affect prospects for success. The authors include discussion of two related phenomena: the rise of professional organizers and the heightened burden of interpreting information and using it effectively for grassroots organizing.

Section I t : Social Identity and Group Processes

In Section 11, our authors view grassroots organizing in intergroup terms, emphasizing the processes by which individuals develop social identities (including a collective identity) in the course of organizing into advocacy groups. All the papers are theory-based, but differ markedly in method and level of analysis.

In the first article of this section, Steve Hinkle, Lee Fox-Cardamone, Julia Haseleu, Rupert Brown, and Lois Irwin present a model of grassroots political activism, based on intergroup processes (e.g., Tajfel & Turner, 1986) and compare it to a traditional model using Ajzen’s (1987) theory of planned behavior. They test components of the model using data from pro-choice and anti- abortion activists, as well as from peace activists. Overall, the intergroup model

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explains significantly more variance in activist intentions than the more traditional conceptualization. Their findings emphasize the importance of one’s identi- fication with a grassroots movement and perception of political efficacy as pre- dictors of grassroots activism.

Next, Michele Wittig and Joseph Schmitz use principles borrowed from the social psychology of intergroup relations as well as communication theory, in an account of organizing among housed and homeless users of a municipal electronic network. They emphasize the potential for electronic media to facilitate links across traditional intergroup differences in socioeconomic status and power, if properly implemented. Results document reported positive changes in attitudes toward the homeless, as well as support for the importance of perceived organizational efficacy, in agreement with aspects of Hinkle et al.’s model.

The concluding article in Section 11, by Theresa Satterfield, presents an anthropological perspective on the stigmatizing by environmentalists of timber workers during a significant shift in federal policy concerning the logging indus- try in the U.S. Pacific Northwest. When timber workers began to portray themselves as the new grassroots activists in a battle to save their livelihoods rather than be portrayed as the pawns of corporate timber interests, they claimed the underdog status that environmentalists had traditionally used to their own advan- tage. Adapting Goffman’s (1963) concept of stigma to this intergroup competition for legitimacy, Satterfield argues for the role that the social exchange dimen- sion of dialogue plays in defining our personal and social identities as well as our views of other groups.

Section I l l : CommuniQ Empowerment Models

The papers in Section 111 emphasize the potential of grassroots movements to empower their members. The concept of empowerment is used in several ways by our authors. As a psychological concept, it refers to a person’s sense of self- or group-efficacy. Such feelings may be a cause and consequence of people’s willingness to join grassroots groups. Empowerment also characterizes relations-between individuals, among groups, and between individuals and groups. Finally, empowerment is a concept that is applied sociopolitically, e.g., to cultures, ethnic groups, and nations.

Douglas Perkins, Barbara Brown, and Ralph Taylor provide an ecological approach to the study of empowerment in neighborhoods where most residents are renters and have few material resources. This approach is multilevel, longitudinal, and multidimensional, integrating contextual and individual-level variables from three case studies to predict participation in grassroots community improvement organizations. Participation was assessed at both the individual and residential block levels. In agreement with the Hinkle et al. and the Wittig and Schmitz papers, the authors show that perception of organizational efficacy


and past or current involvement in religious or other community organizations significantly contribute to individual participation, along with other community- based cognitions and behaviors.

Next, Susan Yeich uses empowerment theory in her participant observation of the formation of a homeless persons’ union. She emphasizes grassroots mobilization by homeless and poor people on their own behalf. As a participatory action researcher, she did not design the intervention, but provided support which the collective used in its analysis and problem solving. Empowerment was not viewed as personal self-improvement or character change, but as a cause and consequence of the pursuit of social structural solutions to homelessness. The author includes a presentation of the principles underlying the participatory research method and considers the potential of the method for reforming the research process.

In the final paper of Section 111, Caroline Kroeker, who lived in and worked on Nicaraguan cooperatives for over seven months, examines those elements of the structure of rural cooperatives that facilitate empowerment of their members. Her experience as a participant-observer enables her to provide a rich description of the ecology of the rural cooperative movement, including its capacity for leadership development. The process of “accompanamiento” that she exem- plifies is not merely an act of accompaniment, but of mutual learning that empowers those who participate. Empowerment is viewed at several levels, including its cultural context.

Section IV: Strategies for Mobilizing and Sustaining Participation

Strategies for organizing and maintaining participation in grassroots activism are addressed directly in Section IV. This section should be of special interest, not only to researchers and educators, but to trainers and grassroots organizers.

Laura Woliver introduces the section with a paper on overcoming “rational reasons” for tolerating injustice that make grassroots mobilization difficult to achieve and sustain. Among the barriers to be overcome are the problem of the free rider (Olson, 1965), well-founded fears, a frame of belief in authorities, and stigmatizing forces that “silence” oppositional voices. Strategies for overcoming these include narratives of resistance; framing grievances in group, rather than personal terms; fostering connections with larger movements; appeals to people’s sense of community and moral responsibility; as well as cognitive restructuring of the perceived injustice.

Next, Monroe Friedman provides a conceptual framework for examining historical shifts in strategies, tactics, and targets employed in consumer boycotts. He distinguishes between the marketplace orientation of the past and the media orientation prominent today, as well as between direct and indirect (or surrogate) actions. The emphasis is on strategies that not only succeed but meet ethical

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criteria. The rise of facsimile grassroots boycotts, orchestrated surreptitiously by corporations for their own benefit, provides inadvertent recognition of the power of this growing form of protest and raises ethical concerns.

In the third article of Section IV, B. Ann Bettencourt, George Dillmann, and Neil Wollman examine intragroup processes that contribute to the maintenance and success of grassroots organizations. They view such groups within the framework of theories of group identity and of productivity of small, goal- oriented groups. In their case study of a thriving grassroots peace group, they compare the director’s perceptions of group process with those of the group’s volunteer members. They conclude with suggested strategies for promoting grassroots activism, based on psychological principles.

Anthony Pratkanis and Marlene Turner conclude Section 1V with an article that links social psychology’s longstanding concern with people’s participation in social movements to the volume’s more specific focus on grassroots organizing. They view deliberative persuasion, as opposed to propaganda, as a hallmark of the democratic process and discuss factors that promote thoughtful discovery. Three options for grassroots organizers are discussed, vis-a-vis propaganda. Finally, the authors present two strategies for inducing participation in grassroots activism (social identity and issue relevancy) and conclude with three categories of knowledge needed for informed civic participation.

Section V: Integration and Future Prospects

Ann Bettencourt concludes the journal issue with a thematic overview of the volume organized by recurrent theoretical concepts and methodological approaches. Dimensions of participation and maintenance of community-based groups for social change emphasized by our authors include group dynamics, member characteristics, intergroup coalitions, group leadership, skills and resources, and technology. With respect to methods, the study of grassroots organizing is likely to benefit from greater use of participatory action research, more group-level research, as well as longitudinal and other methods capable of docu- menting change.

Conclusion

The authors in this issue of the journal provide social psychological analyses of grassroots organizing, conceptualized as a local type of collective action for social change. While the study of social movements more generally has been a core issue in sociology and political science, few scholars in either the social or behavioral sciences have been concerned with the specific characteristics that distinguish grassroots organizing. An examination of the motives, beliefs, feelings of empowerment, changes in personal and social identity, as well as acquisi-

Sacial Psychological Perspectives 13

tion of skills that grassroots activists experience, viewed in social context, is a necessary complement to the approaches taken in sociology and political science. In turn, social psychologists who study grassroots organizing are likely to find that conducting such research, especially if done in collaboration with activists themselves, will necessitate incorporating more sociological, political, and cultural variables into their work.

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MICHELE A. WI'ITIG has been involved in grassroots organizing since her graduate school years at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign during the late 1960s. In 1989, she co-edited (with Rosemary H. Lowe) a JSI volume on pay equity. She was 1995-96 President of SPSSI. The Public Electronic Net- work Action Group, a Santa Monica, California, grassroots advocacy organization that she co-founded, was a finalist in the first annual National Information Infrastructure awards competition in 1995.

an introduction to social psychological perspectives on grassroots organizing

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