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- Convenors:
-
Oliver Walton
(University of Bath)
Mathilde Maîtrot (University of Bath)
Joe Devine (University of Bath)
Waradas Thiyagaraja (University of Bath)
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- Format:
- Paper panel
- Stream:
- Political change, advocacy and activism
- Location:
- 8W 2.10
- Sessions:
- Friday 27 June, -, -
Time zone: Europe/London
Short Abstract:
This panel explores the recent wave of protests that have reverberated across the global South. It reflects on the drivers of these protests, how we theorise them, how they challenge existing visions of politics and development, and how they incorporate marginalised groups.
Description:
Economic and political crises have reverberated across the Global South in recent years, giving rise to non-violent protests that have succeeded in toppling governments. From Sudan (2018) to Sri Lanka (2022) and from Lebanon (2019) to Bangladesh (2024), protestors have railed against authoritarianism, clientelism, corruption, and cost of living pressures. These protests highlight the dangers and the opportunities associated with the polycrisis: they have spurred both violent crackdowns and unprecedented energy and new forms of political imagination.
A range of theoretical frameworks have been applied to understand these movements. While social movement theories have sought to unpick the tactics and strategies of these movements, authoritarian resilience theories have generated insights into how elites have navigated protest movements. Political settlements analysis has shed light on how social and political order is underpinned by elite bargains, but has largely failed to theorise how relatively spontaneous maximalist protest movements may drive sudden shifts in the balance of power. Social contract frameworks have provided insights into how citizen-state relationships may break down but have neglected the strong moral dimensions of protests.
We invite paper proposals from academics and activists that explore several interrelated questions.
What are the drivers of protest? How should we best conceptualise and theorise them? What narratives have these movements presented and how do they challenge existing visions of politics and development? What helps a protest turn into a ‘revolution’? To what extent have protests included or excluded marginalised groups?
Accepted papers:
Session 1 Friday 27 June, 2025, -Paper short abstract:
I aim to share insights on the dynamics of digital activism in authoritarian contexts, focusing on coalition-building, inclusivity, and the potential for systemic change, while engaging in discussions on the intersection of governance, resistance, and development in repressive regimes.
Paper long abstract:
In an authoritarian context, where public dissent is severely suppressed, online protests have emerged as critical spaces for resistance. These digital movements unite diverse actors, including pro-democracy advocates and policy-based protesters, to challenge state authority and address corruption, environmental degradation, and social injustice. This paper examines how online protest coalitions navigate authoritarian constraints and garner public support.
The study argues that public support depends on the prominence of either the policy or democracy component in protest narratives. Policy-oriented frames resonate more strongly in tightly controlled public discourse, often overshadowing pro-democracy agendas and limiting their visibility. Using a qualitative methodology, including interviews with activists and content analysis of protest narratives, this research explores how digital platforms facilitate collective action.
Findings reveal two key dimensions of online protests: their moral foundation and strategic approach. The moral foundation is rooted in narratives of accountability, justice, and solidarity framed within national identity. These narratives resonate with the public and provide a strong basis for collective action. However, tensions arise as pro-democracy advocates struggle to ensure policy demands do not overshadow democratic goals.
Strategically, online protests capitalise on digital platforms' anonymity and rapid dissemination capabilities to unite diverse actors. However, the decentralisation of these movements presents challenges for sustaining momentum and leadership post-protest, often limiting their potential for systemic change.
This research contributes to understanding the dynamics of digital activism in authoritarian contexts, offering insights into fostering sustainable collective action in repressive environments.
Paper short abstract:
This paper brings the lived experiences of the activists and researchers from the crisis hit Southern and Western Asian countries to reflect on protest, civil society and regime change to unpack the nuances of navigating the crisis.
Paper long abstract:
This paper interrogates the broader themes of protest, civil society and regime change by looking at the nature and outcome of the spontaneous, maximalist protest movements in Western and Southern Asia around and after the COVID-19 pandemic. We ask what drives the varying outcomes of protest in different countries of these regions. Similarly, this paper is also interested in exploring continuities and cross-border similarities between these countries. Focusing on Sri Lanka and Lebanon the panel brings the lived experiences of researchers and practitioners to the conversation.
Activists and researchers who have been witnessing protests and regime changes reflect on their experiences of politically volatile crises articulate and problematise established notions of democratic change and the role of civil society. It also suggests that micro-level approaches can unpack the internal tensions, solidarities and temporalities of different marginalised groups navigating such changes.
Paper short abstract:
The longest period of political continuity in Bangladesh’s history ended in 2024 when a student movement became a mass movement, which became a revolution. This paper examines three broad reasons for the revolution: criminal politics, internal party tensions, and a crisis of youth.
Paper long abstract:
The longest period of political continuity in Bangladesh’s history ended in 2024 when a student movement became a mass movement, which became a revolution. This paper examines three broad reasons for the revolution. First, and most fundamentally, the revolution is the result of a contradiction in how the ruling Awami League achieved dominance. Dominance rested on both pervasive criminality underpinning a politicised state and party, but also development legitimising such rule with the public at large. So egregious was the corruption that it undermined development. Second, intra-party dynamics were also crucial. In recent years the Awami League senior leadership had proven themselves unable to deal with this contradiction in failed wars on drugs and corruption. Factional tensions were rife in the aftermath of the 2024 election, and a longer-term erosion of leadership was evident locally with the growth of so-called ‘hybrid’ leaders and business interests. Finally, the revolution was a product of the instability and frustrations of the youth, who face poor job prospects, widespread drug use, politicised educational institutions and failed changes to school curriculum. Indeed, some have called this the world’s first Gen-Z revolution. These factors melded in a period of economic stress, resulting in a revolution that followed a well-worn, almost predictable path. Students protested, opposition parties escalated events, and the violent reaction of the state undermined the Prime Minister and regime’s moral authority, resulting in a mass movement that the military ultimately refused to suppress.
Paper short abstract:
Using frameworks of social movement theory, anti-caste thought, and queer ethnography, I explore how shared spaces, like Mumbai’s pride parades, resist hierarchies yet reproduce caste privilege, questioning citizenship and justice from anti-caste standpoint.
Paper long abstract:
Recent years have seen protests and movements across the Global South that challenge entrenched inequalities, authoritarianism, and clientelism. Similarly, in India, pride parades have emerged as a powerful symbol of the queer movement, bringing queerness into public spaces where it otherwise remains elusive. While these protests and parades seek to challenge hegemonic social and political structures, they also reflect deeper exclusions within their own spaces. This paper explores how movements—from anti-authoritarian protests to pride parades—serve as contested sites for reimagining citizenship, belonging, and justice, while simultaneously reproducing exclusions based on class, caste, and other axes of marginality. Drawing on frameworks of social movement theory, anti-caste theory, and vulnerable queer ethnography, we examine how protests and public mobilizations navigate power, privilege, and resistance. From the visible omission of caste bodies in pride parades to the evolving narratives of marginalized groups during broader political protests, I discuss how shared spaces function both as sites of resistance and as arenas where dominant structures are subtly reinforced. For instance, the spatial and social dynamics of pride in cities like Mumbai highlight how neoliberal logics sustain caste privilege, even within movements that ostensibly aim to dismantle hierarchical power structures. How do movements and spaces like pride parades challenge and reproduce marginalities? What narratives do these movements construct, and how inclusive are they of those at the intersection of caste, class, and queerness? From a marginalized standpoint, this paper unpacks how protests and shared spaces confront systemic inequality while reimagining pathways to solidarity and inclusivity.
Paper short abstract:
This paper explores how groups representing ‘marginalised’ communities navigated mass protest movements in Sri Lanka (2022) and Lebanon (2019) and assesses how conditions of prolonged ‘crisis’ can both undermine existing mobilisation efforts and generate new forms of solidarity and resistance.
Paper long abstract:
This paper explores how groups representing ‘marginalised’ communities navigated mass protest movements in Sri Lanka (2022) and Lebanon (2019). In both countries, protests sought to transform political systems and had profound effects on the political landscape, leading to the resignation of the President (in Sri Lanka) and the Prime Minister (in Lebanon).
The paper draws on qualitative research conducted in 2024 to understand how groups representing ‘marginalised’ communities (including sexual minorities, women, and sexual and gender minorities) navigated the constraints imposed by prolonged and overlapping political and economic crises and war, while using periods of political opening to advance their agendas and forge new networks. As well as exploring how these groups navigated protest movements ‘in the moment’, the paper examines the longer-term trajectory and outcomes of these movements and how these outcomes are linked to broader shifts in the political settlement. Finally, the paper assesses how conditions of prolonged ‘crisis’ can both undermine existing mobilisation efforts and generate new forms of solidarity and resistance. In doing so, the paper reflects on the diverse ways in which these groups envision change and, in some cases, seek to move beyond dominant western frameworks.
Paper short abstract:
This paper will examine the place of female protestors in the youth-led protest that took place in Nairobi between June 2024 and January 2025. The visibility of women protestors has highlighted their abilities as astute and articulate planners and communicators.
Paper long abstract:
This paper examines the place of female protestors in the youth-led protests in Nairobi which were dubbed as ‘Gen-Z’ protests. For the first time in Kenyan history, young people from all walks of life took to the streets to protest what they deemed as Government excesses. In seeking to pass an already flawed and deeply unpopular Finance Bill 2024, the government drew the ire of the youth. Using social media platforms, especially, X, formerly known as Twitter, they organized marches all over the country. Indeed, the country’s mainstream media reported that there were protests in more than half of the 47 counties. Emerging for the smoke and loss of the protests, were fearless female protestors who took their place to organize, lead protests, carry placards and fundraise. They proved to be an important part of the revolutionary process by increasing the visibility of issues raised on their social media accounts; and highlighted in protests in the city of Nairobi and other urban centers in Kenya. Drawing on historical material and the emergent media source, this paper seeks to highlight how these female protestors are a part of the history of astute and articulate Kenyan females who agitated for the rights of the downtrodden. I shall also question the need to harness the momentum gained to further entrench the place e of women in the public sphere of the discussion on regime change or institutional change in Kenya and the Global South.
Paper short abstract:
Women-led development and democracy advocacies in Nigeria have been constantly met with tides of state and peer resistance. How do women activists in Nigeria navigate these challenges? How do their pushbacks mirror the ‘no gree for anybody’ (translated, let no one bully you) metaphor?
Paper long abstract:
From the Aba Women Riot of 1929 to the Bring Back our Girls campaign from 2014, to the #EndSARs protest of 2020, women have perpetually voiced against oppressive systems in Nigeria. However, their advocacies oft encounter rhythms of resistance – expressions of which are reinforced by other intersectional issues such as ethnicity, class, and religion. The handshake between the resulting experiences of discrimination and political intransigence further weakens women’s capacities to drive successful advocacies. However, modern Nigeria has witnessed the rise of new women voices. These actors have introduced new mechanics of navigating resistance. Whilst there has been significant academic devotion to the activism of black women, feminist peace activism, and women rights movements, as discussed within the bounds of critical race feminist theories, less has been documented in especially Africanist literature on how women experience resistance. Beyond exploring resistance strategies among women activists, how do they experience and navigate encountered resistance from outside and within their movements? This includes state resistance and peer or intrafeminist resistance, among others. Based on in-depth interviews with women activists and protest leaders in Nigeria, this study captures the lived experiences of women navigating attempts to suppress and factionalize their movements. It also accounts for how their strategies have evolved and been adapted across social, political, and technological developments in Nigeria. This approach refines our understanding of the multifaceted nature of women activism in Africa, and especially of critical theories by highlighting the intersectional dynamics of agency and gendered activism within repressive ecosystems.
Paper short abstract:
While protests attract scholarly attention, environmental protests remain less examined. This study explores environmental protest outcomes in Bangladesh, arguing that state-led environmental injustice can escalate protests, and highlights that the recent regime change has a link with such protests.
Paper long abstract:
Environmental protests have emerged as key social events addressing rapid environmental degradation. Using two case studies from Bangladesh—the Phulbari movement and the Rampal movement against coal-based energy projects, this paper examines why and how environmental protest outcomes vary. Findings, based on both primary and secondary data, reveal that the Phulbari movement succeeded because local resistance successfully turned into a collective action and the nature of the political regime was such that the government was bound to adopt a concessionary approach due to a credible threat to its ruling position. In contrast, the Rampal movement failed as the local resistance partially turned into collective action and the regime did not face a credible threat to its ruling position, allowing it to remain firm on project implementation. Here, we argue that the key to local resistance essentially depends on whether the impacts of the project were perceivable by the protesters for the short or long term—what we clarify under the novel concept of ‘anticipated externality’. Overall, we contend that the variation in the environmental protest outcomes can be better understood by paying closer attention to the complex interaction between anticipated externality—protesters’ perceptions of the externality of an environmentally detrimental project and the nature of the existing political regime.
As concern over critical minerals and rapid ecological breakdown grows, environmental protests are becoming frequent. Therefore, understanding why such protests succeed or fail is crucial. Anticipated externality might help analyse environmental protest outcomes in diverse political contexts, guiding future protests towards sustainable environmental governance.