Conceptualising backlash movements: A (patch-worked) perspective from social movement studies
| Author | Donatella della Porta |
| DOI | 10.1177/1369148120947360 |
| Published date | 01 November 2020 |
| Date | 01 November 2020 |
| Subject Matter | Symposium on Backlash Politics in Comparison |
research-article2020
Special Issue Article
The British Journal of Politics and
International Relations
Conceptualising backlash
2020, Vol. 22(4) 585 –597
© The Author(s) 2020
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movements: A (patch-worked)
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DOI: 10.1177/1369148120947360
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Donatella della Porta
Abstract
This article discusses the potential contribution to the concept of backlash in social movement
studies. If we consider backlash politics as characterised by the convergence of an intensified
organisational networking, increased capacity for collective actions and aggressive framing by
retrograde actors (including movements), social movement studies might provide (a) theoretical
suggestions to embed the analysis in an established sets of concepts and hypotheses on the
development of contentious politics, of which backlash politics is a type and (b) empirical
knowledge on a specific form of retrograde movements, those related to the radical right. Building
upon some established concepts in social movement studies, I will address the identity framing,
organisational resources and contextual opportunities for backlash politics.
Keywords
backlash, contentious politics, radical right, social movements
Conceptualising backlash within social movement studies
This article aims at building upon social movement studies in order to assess the concep-
tualisation of backlash politics as well as speculate on its conditions. In this effort, I focus
especially on domestic politics and societies through the lenses of comparative political
science and comparative sociology, in which concepts and theories related to political
contestation take different meanings than in international relations. Karen Alter and
Michael Zürn (introduction to this issue) define backlash politics as ‘a particular form of
political contestation with a retrograde objective as well as extraordinary goals or tactics
that has reached the threshold level of entering public discourse’. This is presented as ‘a
sub category of contentious politics’. I will start by addressing the three definitional ele-
ments in the light of social movement studies. I will then suggest that proto-theorisation
Faculty of Political and Social Sciences, Scuola Normale Superiore, Pisa, Italy
Corresponding author:
Donatella della Porta, Scuola Normale Superiore, Palazzo Strozzi, Piazza Strozzi, 50122 Firenze, Italy.
Email: donatella.dellaporta@sns.it
586
The British Journal of Politics and International Relations 22(4)
could be helped by looking upwards for addressing the question of what is it a case of?
More specifically, what type of contentious politics is backlash politics?
First and foremost, social movement studies look at forms of politics that are non-
conventional, encompassing then a focus on extraordinary means/goals, albeit defined
somewhat differently than Alter and Zürn do. Contentious politics developed as an
approach within social movement studies that aimed to bridge social science knowledge
regarding social movements with literatures focused on exceptional phenomena such as
revolutions, civil wars, regime transitions, and ethnic conflict phenomena rather than
routine politics (Tilly and Tarrow, 2007). The very concept of social movements is also
related to contention as an extraordinary – non-routine – forms of political participation,
including radical ones. At the same time, a main contribution of social movement studies
is to embed contentious politics into normal politics, which means looking at continuities
even within breaks.
Social movement studies have also looked at movements with retrograde objective –
defined as a backward-looking move. The empirical research on radical right-wing (or
extreme or far right) movements is a notable case in point. These movements have been
considered as collective actors that aimed at the reversal of some rights, doing so in the
name of restoring old privileges. While social movement studies have not used the term
‘retrograde objective’, they have investigated the framing of the past as an important
component in the building of collective identities. While I understand that Alter and Zürn
want to move beyond ideological or normative assessments, it is indeed not by chance
that several of the examples they give of domestic backlash are within the domain cov-
ered by studies of the radical right. In this perspective, the concept of backlash politics
can contribute to social movement studies a specific focus on moments of which radical
right politics, having reached the threshold level of entering public discourse, is an exam-
ple. In this sense, especially the rejection of a vision of backlash as response to fast and
deep changes paves the way for a dialogue with social movement studies (see conclusion
to this special issue).
On their side, social movement studies can add to the definition of backlash politics
first of all by specifying the use of terms like contentious politics or movements that enter
the discussion in the introduction to this special issue, but are not themselves conceptual-
ised. Second, they can contribute empirical knowledge about certain backlash movements
that, like radical right movements, have been relevant in the past and remain relevant in
the present. Research on this form of retrograde social movements provides relevant
empirical bases for the proto-theorisation that this issue aims at.
In this endeavour, some caveats about conceptualisation are in order. Concepts are not
per se true or false. Science often creates concepts to define new theoretical ideas or
empirical phenomena. Political and social scientists also redefine at times concepts that
have emerged in political debates, without ever reaching total agreement on their mean-
ings. Concepts can, however, be more or less useful for theorising and empirical research.
Their utility depends on their capacity to illuminate (often new) phenomena which have
not yet been named. As Gerring (2001) noted, qualities to be considered when conceptu-
alising are familiarity (as a concept should be intuitively clear), resonance (as capacity to
activate a cognitive click), parsimony (in terms of the number of attributes), coherence
(using elements that belong together), differentiation (avoiding the duplication of con-
cepts with the same meaning), depth, theoretical and empirical utility. Trade-offs between
the conceptual connotation (definitional attributes) versus denotation (area of empirical
instances covered) (Sartori, 2009, see also Collier and Gerring, 2008), but also between
della Porta
587
the reference to specialist versus every-day language have to be considered during any
effort at conceptualisation. This does not mean that concepts are merely instrumental. To
the contrary, in order for a new concept to be useful, not only must it not overlap with
already existing concepts, but moreover it has to ‘point to detectable phenomenon that
exhibit some degree of causal coherence’ (Tilly, 2004: 8).
The aim of this volume is to rescue the concept of backlash from the normative or
political use of the term in common language and to discuss if and how it has a social
science content, that is if it covers homogeneous phenomena that are not already covered
by other concepts and if it points to phenomena which show some similarity in their
causes. Keeping general conceptual qualities and trade-offs in conceptualising in mind,
when located within social movement studies, a conceptualisation of backlash can be use-
ful to single out situations characterised by the contemporaneous strengthening of retro-
grade social movements and other collective actors (including parties, governments, etc.),
in different policy fields, geographical areas and territorial levels. In this sense, the con-
ceptualisation of backlash politics could add to the research on radical right movements,
as movements characterised by retrograde objective and extraordinary aim/goals, the
reflection on their specific characteristics when they overcome a threshold of access to
public debates.
In short, as I argue in what follows, if we consider backlash politics as characterised
by the convergence of an intensified organisational networking, increased capacity for
collective actions and aggressive framing by retrograde actors (including movements),
social movement studies might provide (a) theoretical suggestions to embed the analysis
in an established sets of concepts and hypotheses on the development of contentious poli-
tics, of which backlash politics is a type; and (b) empirical knowledge on a specific form
of retrograde movements, those related to the radical right. Building upon some estab-
lished concepts in social movement studies, I will address the identity framing, organisa-
tional resources and contextual opportunities for backlash politics. All along, my aim will
be to map questions which are still open for empirical investigation rather than to provide
definitive answers.
Retrograde framing: What can we learn from studies of the
radical right
If we think about backlash politics as retrograde, aiming at reverting to an (imagined)
prior social condition, a main challenge to address is then how to assess if and how much
a movement (or...
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