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Convergence as organization: Blockupy against the ECB

Yannick Nehemiah Antonio Harrison (Department of Social Sciences and Business, Roskilde University, Roskilde, Denmark)
Bjarke Skærlund Risager (Department of Philosophy and History of Ideas, Aarhus University, Aarhus, Denmark)

International Journal of Sociology and Social Policy

ISSN: 0144-333X

Article publication date: 10 October 2016

2088

Abstract

Purpose

On 18 March 2015, the transnational anti-austerity Blockupy coalition protested the inauguration of the new European Central Bank premises in Frankfurt. The purpose of this paper is to analyse this mass protest event by highlighting the organizational differences, possibilities, and conflicts that was involved.

Design/methodology/approach

The paper is based on participant observation of the Blockupy event and interviews with a group of Danish activists who also participated.

Findings

The paper constructs sociospatial narrative that unfolds through three different scales of organization: the Blockupy coalition, the participating formal and informal organizations, and the activist subject. This narrative explicates the mode of organization as a “convergence space” (cf. Routledge, 2003), with different “roots” and “routes” of organization (cf. Davies, 2012).

Originality/value

Thus, through an analysis of the modes of organization constituting this mass protest event, this paper restates the relevance of the concept of organization, which have recently been ignored or understated in favour of master-narratives of networks or the dichotomy of horizontalism and verticality. It concludes by posing a set of questions for further discussion among both activists and sociologists.

Keywords

Acknowledgements

The authors would also like to thank for comments on an earlier version of this paper from participants in the Politics and Protest Workshop at the CUNY Graduate Center, especially the designated critics, Emily Campbell and Nara Roberta Silva, and from participants in the Research Unit for the History of Political and Economic Ideas at the Aarhus University. Also special thanks for comments to Thomas Olesen, Mikkel Thorup, the two anonymous peer reviewers, and the Editors of this special issue, Richard White and Patricia Wood.

Citation

Harrison, Y.N.A. and Risager, B.S. (2016), "Convergence as organization: Blockupy against the ECB", International Journal of Sociology and Social Policy, Vol. 36 No. 11/12, pp. 843-859. https://doi.org/10.1108/IJSSP-12-2015-0132

Publisher

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Emerald Group Publishing Limited

Copyright © 2016, Emerald Group Publishing Limited

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