The impact of social movements
Understanding how social movements can improve the world
This profile is tailored towards students studying history, political science and sociology, however we expect there to be valuable open research questions that could be pursued by students in other disciplines.
Why is this a pressing problem?
Building social movements is a common strategy when attempting to change the world, and social movements like the anti-apartheid, civil rights, women rights, animal rights, LGBT rights and environmental movements have achieved major changes. Learning more about how this strategy of changing the world works and how social movements can affect positive change and avoid harmful change could help current and future movements to maximise their positive impact.
Much attention has been paid to mass social movements, but it may also be impactful to study smaller, more niche movements (like the neoliberal or effective altruism movements) to better understand in which situations these kinds of movements may be the best strategy. A big problem in this field is the lack of systematisation. It would be most immediately useful to answer the questions below for specific scenarios or cause areas, but to do so in a way that provides knowledge that others can build on.
See the talk below for considerations that could be further explored in relation to the effective altruist movement.
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Contributors: This profile was last updated 31/12/22. Thanks to Vaidehi Agarwalla for originally creating this profile. Thanks to James Ozden and Viktoria Spaiser for helpful feedback. All errors remain our own. Learn more about how we create our profiles.
