Do environmental shocks create new coalitions? The development of a contingent coalition after Three Mile Island
Bibliographic Data
| ID | 6452995 |
|---|---|
| Authors | Jasper Cattell (0009-0004-3681-3799, Department of Sociology Brown University Providence Rhode Island USA, corresponding author) |
| Year | 2025 |
| Volume | 40 |
| Issue | 4 |
| Pages | 538-551 |
| Publication date | 2025-03-28 |
| Peer Reviewed | Yes |
| Open Access | Yes |
| Type | ARTICLE |
| Venue | Sociological Forum (JOURNAL) |
| Journal identifiers | ISSN: 0884-8971 • E-ISSN: 1573-7861 |
| Publisher | Wiley (PUBLISHER • GB) |
| DOI | 10.1111/socf.13056 |
| OpenAlex | W4408983222 |
| Language | EN |
| Citations received | 1 |
| References cited | 51 |
Do “environmental shocks lead to the formation of new political coalitions? To answer this question, this study examines how Environmentalists for Full Employment (EFFE), an organization founded to bridge the American labor and environmental movements, mobilized a coalition of labor unions to oppose nuclear power after the Three Mile Island accident. Through an in‐depth analysis of EFFE's activities following the accident, I show how the sense of risk associated with an environmentally shocking event unsettled existing relations within the American labor and environmental movements, allowing new actors to wrest agenda‐setting power away from incumbent movement leaders. Based on this analysis, I argue that inter‐movement brokers are particularly well‐positioned to take advantage of environmental shocks, create novel alliances, and inaugurate contention over movements' agendas. However, as I also show, coalitions born after shocks are highly contingent and face hurdles enduring after the shock loses its salience. These arguments contribute to the literature in social movement theory and environmental sociology by theorizing the political implications of environmental shocks, which are expected to become more important as the climate crisis intensifies
Development economics · Economic geography · Economic growth · Economics · Geography · Mile · Political economy · Political science · Regional science · Sociology · Electoral Systems and Political Participation
Fear at work
The green revolution
What Is an Event?
Labor and the Environmental Movement
The Politics Of Social Protest
The Wisconsin Labor-Environmental Network
It's About Time
Putting Social Movements in their Place
Silence and Voice in the Study of Contentious Politics
Power in Movement
Energy democracy and social movements
Social movement coalitions
The Shelf Life of a Disaster
Climates of Capital
Information and the New Movements for Citizen Participation
Risk society
Coalitions of Contention
Nuclear Ontologies
Process Tracing and Historical Explanation
The Spirit of Black Lake
"Disrupting the "Quotidian
Political Opportunity Structures and Political Protest
Neoliberalism as Creative Destruction
Social Movement Theory and the Prospects for Climate Change Activism in the United States
Working sunset to sunrise
This Nation Has Never Honestly Dealt with the Question of a Peacetime Economy
The limits of environmentalism without class
Democracy in the Shadows
Recruiting Strangers and Friends
Resource Mobilization and Citizen Protest in Communities around Three Mile Island
Theory Construction in Qualitative Research
Toward a Historicized Sociology
Sociology and the Climate Crisis
Toward a General Theory of Strategic Action Fields
The Structure of Contingency
Media Discourse and Public Opinion on Nuclear Power
Grievances do matter in mobilization
Historical events as transformations of structures
| Unique citing works | 1 |
|---|---|
| Citations per year | 1 |
| Citation span | 2026 - 2026 (1) |
| Citation velocity | current |
| Highly cited | No |
| Citation types | Neutral: 1 |