From revolt to organization

A social movement can survive over a period of time inasmuch as it is able to resist its own centrifugal forces and withstand the actions of its adversaries. This becomes possible only if it can develop a relatively stable organization and leadership. An organizational structure which unifies the different components of a movement and is recognized by all of its members is called for to institutionalize decision-making processes to a necessary degree and to dedicate the movement's resources to the achievement of its goals. The organizational features vary greatly according to the conditions of the social environment in which the movement operates and the internal composition of the movement. Before proceeding to an analysis of these processes, however, some general criteria for the investigation of the organizational dimension of social movements should be established.

A sociological tradition dating back to Weber and Michels considers organization to be the inevitable cause of the institutionalization and bureaucratization of collective action (Zald and Ash 1966). The passage from spontaneous protest to organization always involves the emergence of a bureaucratic structure, which transforms its objectives and blunts the movement's initial conflictual thrust. Analytically, ‘bureaucratization’, or the ‘iron law of oligarchy’, contains three distinct processes: (a) the substitution of objectives (or the distortion of ends); (b) the organization's tendency toward self-preservation; (c) the formation of an oligarchical leadership. I shall examine these separately.