Observing Protest from a Place: The World Social Forum in Dakar (2011) [Hardcover]

Social movements throughout the world have been central to history, politics, society, and culture.Observing Protest from a Placeexamines the impact of one such campaign, the global justice movement, as seen from the southern hemisphere. Drawing upon a collective survey from the 2011 World Social Forum in Dakar, the contributions explore a number of vital issues, including the methodological problems of studying international activist gatherings and how scholars can overcome those challenges. By demonstrating the importance of the global justice movement and the role of non-governmental organizations for participants in the southern hemisphere, this volume is an important addition to the literature on community action.

Johanna Siméantis professor of political science at Paris 1 Panthéon-Sorbonne University.Marie-Emmanuelle Pommerolleis assistant professor of political science at Paris 1 Panthéon-Sorbonne University and director of the French Institute of Research in Africa in Nairobi, Kenya.Isabelle Sommieris professor of political sociology at Paris 1 Panthéon-Sorbonne University and former director of the Centre de recherches politiques de la Sorbonne.

Acknowledgements
 
Introduction
Johanna Siméant, Marie-Emmanuelle Pommerolle and Isabelle Sommier
1. Methodological reasons for observing a WSF in Africa
2. The division of labor and the paradoxes of activist internationalization
3. Contexts of international collective action
 
1. What can quantitative surveys tell us about GJM activists?
Isabelle Sommier
1.1 Data and methods
1.2 The seemingly convergent portrait of the alter-global activist
1.3 The evolution of the multi-organizational f ield of alter-globalism: a delicate comparison
1.4 Conclusion
 
2. Activist encounters at the World Social Forum
Nationalism and sovló#