This volume of cutting-edge research brings together internationally recognized experts in the field of protest studies and contentious politics to analyse the causes and trajectories of violence as a protest tactic. Cross-national comparisons from North America, Britain, France, Germany, Greece, Iran, Thailand, and elsewhere contribute to the volume's theoretical elaboration, while several case studies add depth to the discussion. This title is of key importance to scholars across the social sciences, including sociology, political science, geography and criminology and is a significant contribution to the study of rioting and violent protest in the contemporary neoliberal states.

This volume probes the intersections between the fields of social movements and nonviolent resistance. Bringing together a range of studies focusing on protest movements around the world, it explores the overlaps and divergences between the two research concentrations, considering the dimensions of nonviolent strategies in repressive states, the means of studying them, and conditions of success of nonviolent resistance in differing state systems. In setting a new research agenda, it will appeal to scholars in sociology and political science who study social movements and nonviolent protest.

This volume of cutting-edge research comparatively analyzes violent protest and rioting, furthering our understanding of this increasingly prevalent form of claim making. Hank Johnston and Seraphim Seferiades bring together internationally recognized experts in the field of protest studies and contentious politics to analyze the causes and trajectories of violence as a protest tactic. Crossnational comparisons from North America, Britain, France, Germany, Greece, Iran, Thailand, and elsewhere contribute to the volume's theoretical elaboration, while several case studies add depth to the discussion. This title will be of key importance to scholars across the social sciences, including sociology, political science, geography and criminology. Johnston and Seferiades's exciting book is a significant contribution to the study of rioting and violent protest in the contemporary neoliberal state.

What happens when a wave of protest, which starts in a homogeneous area, affects other countries in its long ebb? Or, at least, when results in other countries are seen as a sort of continuation of that initial spark? In 2013, protests developed all over the globe, being at least in part inspired by the anti-austerity protest wave of 2011 but also presenting some peculiarity. By looking at protests in the most disparate sites of the globe (including those in Turkey, Brasil, Venezuela, South Africa, Bosnia, Bulgaria and Ukraine), the volume will address three main debates: the effect on social movements of late neoliberal global economy, contentious politics development under authoritarian democracies, and the emergence of new collective identities.

Explains the character of contemporary protest politics through a micro-mobilization analysis of participation in street demonstrations.

The Handbook presents a most updated and comprehensive exploration of social movement research. It not only maps, but also expands the field of social movement studies, taking stock of recent developments in cognate areas of studies, within and beyond sociology and political science. While structured around traditional social movement concepts, each section combines the mapping of the state of the art with attempts to broaden our knowledge of social movements beyond classic theoretical agendas, and to identify the contribution that social movement studies can give to other fields of knowledge.

Protest and Punishment seeks to advance current debates and discussions on the criminalization of dissent as a common feature of neo-liberal governance in the current period of capitalist globalization. Demands for greater democratization and equality have been met by conservative calls for a "moderation of democracy" and the use of police to stifle growing social movements. Part of that response has been the reconstruction of police forces and policing to maintain public order while limiting popular mobilization. The period of alternative globalization protests has seen a number of dramatic clashes between police and protesters. The protests against the WTO in Seattle in November 1999 gained the nickname "The Battle in Seattle." Demonstrations in Quebec City (2001), Genoa (2001), Miami (2003) and London (2009) have seen running street battles between demonstrators and police. Social justice activists who confront and contest neo-liberal governments and global capital have been subjected to tear gas attacks, rubber bullets and concussion grenades, surveillance, illegal searches and seizures, detention, and beatings. The Genoa and London protests also saw the death of civilians due to police actions. For some critics, state violence against demonstrators or political opponents is viewed as an act of state terrorism, designed to strike fear into potential protesters, dissidents or even observers. Such aggressive policing and state violence is intended to send a message to future activists that political demonstrations will not be tolerated. The works collected in Protest and Punishment examine developments in the repression of resistance in the neo-liberal context. They examine shifts and transformations in state approaches to dissent from early developments in the last decades of the twentieth century through to the present period of capitalist globalization in the twenty-first century. Through a discussion of a variety of protests and movements in different national contexts (Canada, Netherlands, US, UK) this collection offers a unique perspective on key practices and policies that mark neoliberal governance and changing visions of citizenship and the accompanying shifts in economic and cultural structures in the current age. The works in this collection are based on contributions from engaged scholars, most of whom have direct firsthand experience in the protests that they analyze. The collection offers insights into the complex struggles that underpin the present period through an extensive and diverse examination of protests and punishment in the global era. It provides important resources for understanding the character of community resistance and repression by governments in the contemporary period.

Dynamics of Political Violence examines how violence emerges and develops from episodes of contentious politics. By considering a wide range of empirical cases, such as anarchist movements, ethno-nationalist and left-wing militancy in Europe, contemporary Islamist violence, and insurgencies in South Africa and Latin America, this pathbreaking volume of research identifies the forces that shape radicalization and violent escalation. It also contributes to the process-and-mechanism-based models of contentious politics that have been developing over the past decade in both sociology and political science. Chapters of original research emphasize how the processes of radicalization and violence are open-ended, interactive, and context dependent. They offer detailed empirical accounts as well as comprehensive and systematic analyses of the dynamics leading to violent episodes. Specifically, the chapters converge around four dynamic processes that are shown to be especially germane to radicalization and violence: dynamics of movement-state interaction; dynamics of intra-movement competition; dynamics of meaning formation and transformation; and dynamics of diffusion.

The complex relationship between violence and nonviolence in social movements. We are living in a time of uprisings that routinely involve physical confrontation—burning vehicles, barricades, vandalism, and scuffles between protesters and authorities. Yet the Left has struggled to incorporate rioting into theories of change, remaining stuck in recurring debates over violence and nonviolence. Civil resistance studies have popularized the term “strategic nonviolence,” spreading the notion that violence is wholly counter-productive. Street Rebellion scrutinizes recent research and develops a broad and grounded portrait of the relationship between strategic nonviolence and rioting in the struggle for liberation.

The battles between Athenian anarchists and the Greek state have received a high degree of media attention recently. But away from the intensity of street protests militants implement anarchist practices whose outcomes are far less visible. They feed the hungry and poor, protect migrants from fascist beatings and try to carve out an autonomous political, social and cultural space. Activists within the movement share politics centred on hostility to the capitalist state and all forms of domination, hierarchy and discrimination. Based on extensive ethnographic fieldwork among Athenian anarchists and anti-authoritarians, Anarchy in Athens unravels the internal complexities within this milieu and provides a better understanding of the forces that give the space its shape.