Activism, Terrorism, and Social Movements: The “Green Scare” as Monarchical Power

Abstract

This paper explores the relationship between social movement protest, economic sabotage, state capitalism, the “Green Scare,” and public forms of political repression. Through a quantitative analysis of direct action activism highlighting the Earth Liberation Front and Animal Liberation Front, the discourse surrounding mechanisms of social change and their impact on state power and capitalist accumulation will be examined. The analyses examines the earth and animal liberation movements, utilizing a Marxist-anarchist lens to illustrate how these non-state actors provide powerful critiques of capital and the state. Specifically, the discussion examines how state-sanctioned violence against these movements represents a return to Foucauldian Monarchical power. A quantitative-qualitative history will be used to argue that the movements’ actions fail to qualify as “terrorism,” and to examine the performance of power between the radical left and the state. State repression demonstrates not only the capitalist allegiances between government and industry, but also a sense of capital’s desperation hoping to counter a movement that has produced demonstrable victories by the means of bankrupting and isolating corporations. The government is taking such unconstitutional measures as a “talk back” between the revolutionary potential of these movements’ ideology as well as the challenge they present to state capitalism.

Citation

Loadenthal, M. (2016), "Activism, Terrorism, and Social Movements: The “Green Scare” as Monarchical Power", Narratives of Identity in Social Movements, Conflicts and Change (Research in Social Movements, Conflicts and Change, Vol. 40), Emerald Group Publishing Limited, pp. 189-226. https://doi.org/10.1108/S0163-786X20160000040007

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