Insurrection It takes patience, perseverance, and people by your side with the will to make a change in order to succeed. These characteristics are what an activist needs to have an effective social movement. Bill Moyer’s theory, “8 Stages of a Successful Social Movement” claims that activists need good strategies to get rid of the social issues and see accomplishments in their actions. Bill Moyer claims that all activists go through stages 1, 4, and 6. Stage 1 describes how power holders are keeping social problems hidden in order for them to keep the public unaware. Stage 4 claims that a shocking incident needs to happen in order for the population to be aware and for the activist to gain support which is known as a trigger event. Stage 6 asserts how the movement has obtained the majority of the population on their side and how the power holders are reacting to it. Bill Moyer’s pattern of successful movements can be traced in the Prison Reform Movement, Immigration Movement, and Prevention and Stop Sexual Assault on College Campus Movement. Firstly, the Prison Reform Movement was triggered when George Zimmerman was found not guilty, which led to public outrage. The minorities make up most of the prisons. The novel, When We Fight We Win, states, “According to the Sentencing Project, which promotes sentencing reform and alternatives to …show more content…
Moyer’s theory shows us that the power holders are the last to change. With this knowledge, we can shift focus to the populace to educate them about these issues and obtain their support towards the movements. Shifting our focus will give activists time to prepare to fight against the power holders. This can help us engage in transformational resistance by giving us an effective strategy into finding ways to completely change the
Existing within the movement must be a leader or leaders, as well as a large number of committed followers or members. Additionally, social movements have “organizations or coalitions” working as a guiding backbone for collectivity and regulation (Stewart,
Many reformers were especially concerned with those in prison and how they would be treated upon release. Many people, such as those for the Reformation of Juvenile Delinquents, in 1829, hoped that upon release ex-prisoners would become "valuable members of society," but knew that this would only be possible if they were treated like others.
In the beginning of the twentieth century, the economy was booming, new technology flourished. The rapid industrialization brought achievement to the United States, however, it also caused several social problems. Wealth and power were concentrated in the hands of a few, and poverty and political corruption were widespread. As people became aware of these problems, a new reform group was created. Unlike populism, which had been a group of farmers grown desperate as the economy submerged into depression, the new reform movement arose from the educated middle class. These people were known as the progressives. The Progressive Movement was a movement that aimed at solving political, economic, and social problems. The Progressives were people from the middle class who had confidence that they could achieve social progress through political reform. The Progressives sought after changes and improvements in the society through laws and other federal actions.
Prison Reform in The United States of America “It is said that no one truly knows a nation until one has been inside its jails. A nation should not be judged by how it treats its highest citizens, but its lowest ones” (Nelson Mandela, 1994). The United States of America has more people behind bars than any other country on the planet. The prisons are at over double capacity. It cost a lot of money to house prisoners each year.
Bibliography:.. **Parenti, Christian, Lockdown America (London; New York: Verso, 1999) 17-19. Lynch, Michael J. and Patterson, Britt, Race and Criminal Justice (New York: Harrow and Heinstien, 1991). *Ranese, Celia "Todays Prison system vs. Yesterdays Slave System" USA TALK 13 March 1999. *Palmer, Louise "Numbers of Blacks in Prison Nears 1 Million" The Boston Globe Seattle Post Intelligencer *United States Department of Justice Bureau of Statistics: Prison Inmate Statistics, Washington 1998 *Polowsky, Robert, "Liberal Legacy" Prison Activist Resource Center (weekly).
Some of the main reasons for this movement was the diversity of the people in the prison, the cruelty in the prisons, and the nasty conditions, but to get down to the nitty gritty there were overcrowding issues such as people with major cases put in the same place as those with minor cases this caused the people
When people think of reform movements, they often look for one key sign, and ask one key question of whether that the reform was a success. Did the reform create a lasting change in the way people view the institution that was reformed? All the great reformation movements, from Horace Mann and his education reforms, to Martin Luther, and the Protestant Reformation, to the civil rights movement, all created lasting change in the minds of the average person. One other reform, often overlooked historically is the Prison Reform movement. As the world shifted from 18th to 19th century ways of life, many key aspects of life underwent tremendous change. As the United States gained their independence from Britain and began to shape their own identity, the reforms and revolutions that occurred in this infantile stage of its history played an immeasurable impact on the future of the entire country, with the most notable and impact reform being the reformation of prisons from the 1820s until 1860.
The Civil Rights Movement had a lot going on between 1954 and 1964. While there were some successful aspects of the movement, there were some failures as well. The mixture of successes and failures led to the extension of the movement and eventually a more equal American society.
According to statistics since the early 1970’s there has been a 500% increase in the number of people being incarcerated with an average total of 2.2 million people behind bars. The increase in rate of people being incarcerated has also brought about an increasingly disproportionate racial composition. The jails and prisons have a high rate of African Americans incarcerated with an average of 900,000 out of the 2.2 million incarcerateed being African American. According to the Bureau of Justice Statistics 1 in 6 African American males has been incarcerated at some point in time as of the year 2001.
In the essay "Prison "Reform" in America," Roger T. Pray points out the much attention that has been devoted to research to help prevent crimes. Showing criminals the errors of their ways not by brutal punishment, but by locking them up in the attempt to reform them. Robert Pray, who is a prison psychologist, is currently a researcher with the Utah Dept. of Corrections. He has seen what has become of our prison system and easily shows us that there is really no such thing as "Prison Reform"
applies the principles of civil disobedience in his procedure of a nonviolent campaign. According to him, “In any nonviolent campaign there are four basic steps: collection of the facts to determine whether injustices exist; negotiation; self-purification; and direct action” (King 262). The first step, which is “collection of the facts,” clarify whether the matter requires civil disobedience from the society (King 262). The second step, “negotiation,” is the step where civil disobedience is practiced in a formal way; to change an unjust law, both sides come to an agreement that respects each other’s demand, (King 262). Should the second step fail, comes the “self-purification,” in which the nonconformists question their willingness to endure the consequences without any retaliation that follow enactment of civil disobedience (King 262). The fourth and the last step, “direct action,” is to execute it; coordinated actions such as protests or strikes to pressure no one, but the inexpedient government to conform to them, and advocate their movement, and thus persuade others to promote the same belief (King 262). This procedure along with principles of civil disobedience is one justifiable campaign that systematically attains its objective. King not only presents, but inspires one of the most peaceful ways to void unjust
(Turner and Killian 1987) cited in (Diani 1992, p. 4) define social movements as a “collectivity acting with some continuity to promote or resist a change in the society or organisation of which it is part. As a collectivity a movement is a group with indefinite and shifting membership and with leadership whose position is determined more by informal response of adherents than by formal procedures for legitimizing authority”. Turner and Killian regard a social movement as a peculiar kind of collective behavior that is contrasted to regularity and institutional behavior. Additionally, Turner believes that social movements do not necessarily coincide with movement organisations, although these organisations can carry out a large part of the movement tasks and it is often help to control and speak for movements (Diani 1992).
Bringing Reconstruction to the broken economic structures in the United States has arguably been one of the most enduring and significant issues that the country had faced in its time. As Richard Hofstadter, explain that the progressive movement presented in his essay, “The Status Revolution and Progressive Leaders” by analyzing the common beliefs of the reform groups in the modern perspective. By doing this, it will then to elucidate historical distortions, most notably between the New Deal and Progressivism. The progressive movement brought to the place of entirely during the moment of sustained and prosperity. The reading brought views and thoughts of why did the concerns of the leaders for progression. The leaders contributed the movements for a political and intellectual stand for finance to formulate ideas. I agree with Richard Hofstadter that with a nation for a rather broad diffusion on money, status, and power for an average man in the 1870s can be influence with the absence of many nationwide sources of the powerful and prestige. Also in Hofstadter’s essay, he explained his thought that mugwunps, were Republican political activists who is against the Republican Party by supporting Democratic candidate and also a name given to the unwanted and used up, were Progressives that are victims in the disturbance status. It also presented that the United States was a land that gave people opportunity and place money; however, the civil war increased more. The Mugwump were usually Republican, that were succeeded and thrived; however, people of new wealth in the turn of the century had uncontrollable power unlike the men had seen before. They basically opposed the large attention of wealth and influence th...
Researchers classify social movements according to the type of change they seek (Aberle, 1966, Cameron, 1966, Blumer, 1969, as cited in Macionis, 2007). According to John Macionis, a social movement is when people commonly band together to create an organized activity that encourages or discourages social change (Macionis, 2008). In the case of this radical society, Hippies were typically ...
Incarceration has not always been the main form of “punishment” when it comes to doing an injustice to society. In fact, in the early 1600’s common forms of punishments for doing wrong in society included social rejection, corporal punishment, forced labor etc. (“Prison History.”). It had not been until the 18th century where it had been determined that incarceration could actually be a form of punishment correlating with a set amount of time in which an individual had to serve dependent on the severity of his actions. The logic behind incarceration is to restrict a person of his liberty as retribution for the crime he has committed (Prison History.”) Prisons that were created in the 18th century gained their recognition because of their high goals in perfecting society. But, the truth is as people were focusing on perfecting society prisons soon became overcrowded, dirty, and most of all dangerous. By the late 19th century many more people had become aware of the poor prison conditions which had led to a “reformatory” movement. The reformatory movement was put into place as a means of rehabilitation for inmates (“Prison History.”) Prisons would now offer programs to reform inmates into model citizens by offering counseling, education, and opportunities to gain skills needed for working in a civilian world. However, with the growing amount of inmates each year prisons are still becoming overcrowded. Because prisons are so overcrowded there are not enough resources being spent on achieving the rehabilitation of inmates and reintegrating them into society in order for them to survive in the civilian world once released from prison (“Prison History.”)