Millbank tendency
The strengths and limitations of mediated protest 'events' in UK student activism cycles
Bibliographic Data
| ID | 2306116 |
|---|---|
| Authors | Alexander Hensby (0000-0002-1087-8453, University of Kent, corresponding author) |
| Year | 2019 |
| Volume | 67 |
| Issue | 7 |
| Pages | 960-977 |
| Publication date | 2019-11-01 |
| Open Access | Yes |
| Type | ARTICLE |
| Venue | Current Sociology (JOURNAL) |
| Journal identifiers | ISSN: 0011-3921 • E-ISSN: 1461-7064 |
| Publisher | SAGE Publications Inc (PUBLISHER) |
| DOI | 10.1177/0011392119865761 |
| OpenAlex | W2973043213 |
| Language | EN |
| Citations received | 1 |
| References cited | 23 |
UK students' desire to create disruptive, media-friendly 'events' during the 2010-11 protests against fees and cuts is reflective of wider cycles and processes in student activism history. First, constant cohort turnover restricts students' ability to convert campaigns into durable movements, necessitating that they must periodically 'start from scratch'. This informs a second process, namely the need to gain the attention of mainstream media, as this can potentially amplify students' grievances far beyond their own organizational capacities. Both have shaped student activism over the past 50 years, compelling contemporary students to create protest events that live up to their radical history. These processes were evident in autumn 2010, when an NUS demonstration saw students attack and briefly occupy Conservative Party headquarters at 30 Millbank. The protest's mass mediation was central to activists' 'eventing' processes, and provided the spark for the radical UK-wide campaign that followed. Yet once the fees bill was passed by Parliament, students' dependency on mainstream media cycles was quickly exposed. With 'mediatization' tendencies having dogged student activism since the 1960s, this article argues that creating 'events' epitomizes students' longstanding strengths and limitations as society's 'incipient intelligentsia
Intelligentsia · Mainstream · Media studies · Mediation · Parliament · Political science · Politics · Public relations · Social science · Sociology · Critical Theory and Political Philosophy · Law · Political theory and Gramsci · Youth Education and Societal Dynamics
Bystanders, Public Opinion, and the Media
Memory, Individual and Collective
Whole World Is Watching
Social Movements, Memory and Media
Challenging Codes
Power in Movement
Angelic Spirits of ‘68’
From alterglobalization to Occupy Wall Street
Media Practices, Mediation Processes, and Mediatization in the Study of Social Movements
The changing role of students’ unions within contemporary higher education
Social movements
Temporality in social movement theory
Open networks and secret Facebook groups
Moments of Excess
Student power in a global perspective and contemporary trends in student organising
Social Networks and Student Activism
Hotbeds of Activism
Critical Mass, Social Networks and Collective Action
Historical events as transformations of structures
Student radicalism
| Citations per year | 0.17 |
|---|---|
| Citation span | 2020 - 2020 (1) |
| Highly cited | No |