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Negotiating Moral Boundaries: Social Movements and the Strategic (Re)definition of the Medical in Cannabis Markets

Social Movements, Stakeholders and Non-Market Strategy

ISBN: 978-1-78754-350-8, eISBN: 978-1-78754-349-2

Publication date: 6 August 2018

Abstract

How can organizations use strategic frames to develop support for illegal and stigmatized markets? Drawing on interviews, direct observation, and the analysis of 2,497 press releases, I show how pro-cannabis activists used distinct framing strategies at different stages of institutional development to negotiate the moral boundaries surrounding medical cannabis, diluting the market’s stigma in the process. Social movement organizations first established a moral (and legal) foothold for the market by framing cannabis as a palliative for the dying, respecting moral boundaries blocking widespread exchange. As market institutions emerged, activists extended this frame to include less serious conditions, making these boundaries permeable.

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Acknowledgements

Acknowledgments

Special thanks to Heather Haveman, Laura Stoker, Neil Fligstein, Mike Hout, Jens Beckert, Dave Harding, Cristina Mora, Kim Voss, Cybelle Fox, Sarah Brothers, and Gillian Gualtieri, as well as participants in the Berkeley-Stanford Organization Behavior Conference and Berkeley’s CCOP workshop and the anonymous reviewers/editors at Research in the Sociology of Organizations for their helpful comments. Also, thanks to Amazon Web Services and Github, as well as the Berkeley URAP program for their generous grants and support. All mistakes and omissions are my own.

Citation

Dioun, C. (2018), "Negotiating Moral Boundaries: Social Movements and the Strategic (Re)definition of the Medical in Cannabis Markets", Briscoe, F., King, B.G. and Leitzinger, J. (Ed.) Social Movements, Stakeholders and Non-Market Strategy (Research in the Sociology of Organizations, Vol. 56), Emerald Publishing Limited, Leeds, pp. 53-82. https://doi.org/10.1108/S0733-558X20180000056004

Publisher

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Emerald Publishing Limited

Copyright © 2018 Emerald Publishing Limited