Collective Behavior &

Social Movements

Electrical Department Bahria University Islamabad

Contents

• Collective behavior • Characteristics of Collective Behavior• Collective behavior theories• Crowd and its types• Mobs and Riots• Mass Behavior• Disasters• Social movement and its types• Claims Making• Theories of Social Movements• Stages of Social Movements

Collective Behavior

Definition Voluntary, often spontaneous activity that is engaged in by a large number of people

Collective behavior refers relatively spontaneous and relatively unstructured behavior by large numbers of individuals acting with or being influenced by other individuals.

– Examples: Mobs, riots, panic, mass hysteria, and social movements

Collective Behavior• Collective behavior is diverse

• Collective behavior is variable

• Much collective behavior is transitory

CollectivityA large number of people whose minimal interaction occurs in the absence of well-defined and conventional norms

•Localized collectivity

•Dispersed collectivity

Characteristics of Collective Behavior

1. Represent the actions of groups of people, not individuals.

2. Involve relationships that arise in unusual circumstances.

3. Capture the changing elements of society more than other forms of social action.

4. May mark the beginnings of more organized social behavior.

5. Usually appear to be highly emotional, even volatile.

Collective behavior theories

• Emergent Norm Theory

• Value added theory

CrowdDefinition:A temporary gathering of people who share a common focus of attention and who influence one another

•Crowds share several characteristics:– Crowds involve groups of people – Transitory.– Volatile.– Sense of urgency.

Types of Crowd

Sociologist Herbert Blumer (1969)1.Casual Crowds2. Conventional Crowds3. Expressive Crowds4. Acting crowds

 Clark McPhail and Ronald T. Wohlstein (1983)5. Protest Crowd

Types of Crowd

1. Casual Crowd

2. Conventional Crowd

Types of Crowd

3. Expressive Crowd

4. Acting Crowd

Types of Crowd

5. Protest Crowd

Mobs and Riots

• MobWhen an acting crowd starts to engage in destructive and sometimes

violent behavior they become mob.

• A mob is a crowd that is easily persuaded to take aggressive or violent action in order to gain attention or solve their problem.

• Mobs are dangerous because they often lead to behavior that an individual would not normally engage in and cause a lot of damage to physical property and others.

Mobs and Riots

• Riot

A social eruption that is highly emotional, violent, and undirected

Types of Riots

Several types of riots may be identified according to the motivation and goals of the participants in the riots.

One popular typology distinguishes between protest riots and celebration riots

Another popular typology distinguishes four types of riots: purposive, symbolic, revelous, and issueless

Explaining Crowd Behavior

• Le Bon’s contagion theory

Explaining Crowd Behavior

• Convergence theory

Whereas the contagion theory states that crowds cause people to act in a certain way, convergence theory says the opposite.

Mass Behavior

• Collective behavior among people dispersed over a wide geographical area

Rumor and gossip

Public opinion

Propaganda

Fashions and fads

Panic and mass hysteria

Rumor and gossip

• RumorUnconfirmed information people spread informally, often by word of

mouth

• Gossip

Public Opinion & Propaganda

• Public opinionWidespread attitudes about controversial issues

• PropagandaInformation presented with the intention of shaping public opinion

Fashions and Fads

• FashionA social pattern favored by a large number of people

• Fadsone fad fades, another one becomes popular.

Panic & Mass Hysteria

• PanicA form of collective behavior in which people in one place react to a

threat or other stimulus with irrational, frantic, and often self-destructive behavior

• Mass hysteriaA form of dispersed collective behavior by which people respond to a

real or imagined event often with irrational and even frantic fear

Disasters

An event, generally unexpected, that causes extensive harm to people and damage to property

• Natural disaster• Technological disaster• Intentional disaster

Social movement

• An organized activity that encourages or discourages social change

• Social movements are organized efforts by large numbers of peopleto bring about or impede social change.

• Often they try to do so by engaging in various kinds of protest, such as the march depicted here.

Social movementSociologists identify several types of social movements according to the nature and extent of the change they seek. •Alternative•Redemptive•Redemptive •Reformative•Revolutionary

Claims MakingThe process of trying to convince the public and public officials of the importance of joining a social movement to address a particular issue•For a social movement to form, some issue has to be defined as a problem that demands public attention.•Usually, claims making begins with a small number of people.

•Example???

Social Movements

1) Deprivation theory: Social movements seeking change arise among people who feel deprived

•Relative deprivationA perceived disadvantage arising from some specific comparison

Social Movements

2) Kornhauser’s mass-society theorySocial movements attract socially isolated people who feel personally insignificant.

• Movements are personal as well as political, giving people with weak social ties a sense of purpose and belonging.

Social Movements

3) Smelser’s Structural-Strain Theory1. Structural conduciveness2. Structural strain3. Growth and spread of an explanation4. Precipitating factors5. Mobilization for action6. Lack of social control

Social Movements

4) Resource-mobilization theoryNo social movement is likely to succeed or even get off the ground without substantial resources

5) Culture theoryThe recognition that social movements depend not only on material resources and the structure of political power but also on cultural symbols.

Stages of Social Movements

• Stage one:Emergence

• Stage two:Coalescence

• Stage three:Bureaucratization

• Stage four: Decline