Toward an Anthropology of Social Movements

Abstract

A review of the social movements literature reveals that social anthropologists have generally not played a prominent role in theoretical and conceptual debates within this field of research. This article argues that the 'invisibility' of social movements in anthropology is largely attributable to the way in which political anthropology constructs its object, and particularly to the weakness of its concepts of politics and practice. It is concluded that the development of an anthropology of social movements will depend, therefore, on a more general re-orientation of the discipline's approach to politics.