Insurgency of the Powerless: Farm Worker Movements (1946-1972)

TLDR

Farm workers are powerless and their demands are systematically ignored, so we analyze the political process of farm worker insurgencies using perspectives from Oberschall, Tilly, and Gamson. The study argues that classical social movement factors fail to explain farm worker insurgencies, instead showing that sponsorship by established organizations and neutralization of the national elite can override powerlessness. The authors coded and statistically analyzed New York Times Annual Index entries to test how the political environment either contains or enables farm worker insurgencies. The results indicate that when the political environment is favorable, insurgencies succeed; when it is hostile, they are contained.

Abstract

Drawing on the perspective developed in recent work by Oberschall (1973), Tilly (1975) and Gamson (1975), we analyze the political process centered around farm worker insurgencies. Comparing the experience of two challenges, we argue that the factors favored in the classical social movement literature fail to account for either the rise or outcome of insurgency. Instead, the important variables pertain to social resources-in our case, sponsorship by established organizations. Farm workers themselves are powerless; as an excluded group, their demands tend to be systematically ignored. But powerlessness may be overridden if the national political elite is neutralized and members of the polity contribute resources and attack insurgent targets. To test the argument, entries in the New York Times Annual Index are content coded and statistically analyzed, demonstrating how the political environment surrounding insurgent efforts alternatively contains them or makes them successful.