Acts of Dissent: New Developments in the Study of Protest

Although living conditions have improved throughout history, protest, at least in the last few decades, seems to have increased to the point of becoming a normal phenomenon in modern societies. Contributors to this volume examine how and why this is the case and argue that although problems such as poverty, hunger, and violations of democratic rights may have been reduced in advanced Western societies, a variety of other problems and opportunities have emerged and multiplied the reasons and possibilities for protest. Acts of Dissent: New Developments in the Study of Protest examines some of those problems, progressing from methodological issues, to discussions of the part that the mass media plays in protest, finally to several case studies of protests in different contexts.

Dieter Rucht, Ruud Koopmans, and Friedholm Neidhardt are members of the Research Unit "Social Movements and the Public Sphere" at the Social Science Research Center Berlin (WZB), Berlin, Germany.