Dissenting Voices and Transformative Action

This collection of essays examines the emerging patterns of social movements taking shape all over the world locally and also cutting across the geographical boundaries of the state and the nation globally. It not only critically analyzes the conceptual underpinnings of the functional, symbolic interactional, Marxian, neo-Marxian, political process-resource mobilization, new social movement-identity, subaltern, Gandhian perspectives among others, but also delineates alternative viewpoints of social movement analysis. It focuses on the nature and forms of local resistance against global domination by predefined but rearticulated social categories like caste, race, tribe, and ethnic groups, and the emerging nature of the protest of women, farmers, students, and migrants in a changing scenario citing social movements taking place in North and South America, Eastern and Western Europe, Africa, Asia and Australia. Both in terms of intensive empiricism and theoretical depth it is a unique treasure of intellectual contribution on social movement studies. This collection would be of immense use to students, researchers, teachers of sociology, political science, economics, history, social psychology and development studies, and also civil society activists, planners, executives and politicians dealing with the issues of social movement, conflicts, social developments, marginalization and social exclusion.

Debal K. Singh is a professor of sociology in the department of sociology at Indira Gandhi National Open University. He is a recipient of the Australian Government Endeavour Fellowship, 2010.