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Eitan Y. Alimi is an assistant professor of political sociology at the Department of Political Science, Hebrew University. He received his PhD in sociology from Boston College in April 2004. His research interests include contentious politics and social movements, radicalization and political terrorism, and conflict resolution with special reference to Israeli political system and the Middle East. Recent publications include articles in Political Studies, British Journal of Political Science, International Journal of Press and Politics, Mobilization, International Political Science Review, Sociological Forum, Ricerche di Storia Politica, and the book, Israeli Politics and the First Palestinian Intifada (Alimi, 2007).

The extent to which opposition movements engaged in contention are able to broaden the scope of their struggle has garnered the attention of scholars of ethnic conflict, social movements, and contentious politics alike. The ability to broaden the scope of contention is known as scale shift. It is of paramount importance in cases of ethnonationalist movements, given the nature of their claims and the oppressive and repressive sociopolitical setting in which they are often situated. Our study advances social movement theory by developing a more nuanced understanding of the process by analyzing rich historical evidence from a failed attempt of scale shift: the case of Israeli-Arab 1976 Land Day. Utilizing Tarrow and McAdam's (2003) model, we analyze scale shift and its constituent mechanisms of brokerage and diffusion as they operate across different political opportunity structures and encounter different levels and types of repression. Based on our findings, we modify the model by highlighting a set of intermediary mechanisms, namely individualization, segmentation, resource restriction, exclusion, co-optation, defection, and internalization/externalization. We argue that these intermediary mechanisms largely account for the failure of scale shift in the specific repressive settings of the Arab minority in Israel.

Being a dancer who is also active in political change efforts, I've long been struck by the quote from the famous Russian-American anarchist and organizer Emma Goldman who said something to the effect that, “If I can't dance, I don't want to be in your revolution.” Apparently, Goldman well understood the many intimate connections between emotions and work for political and social change. Those connections have to do not only with mobilization, but also with sustainability. For people to remain mobilized over the long haul they often require expressive outlets that are rich in emotion. Many might argue, as Goldman did, that at least some of this expression must be fun, enjoyable, and stimulating – like dancing, for example.

In this chapter, I examine how religion can serve as an ideology that has the capacity to bridge people of the same faith who hold divergent political stances. Building on Williams’ work (1996), I propose that religion operates as an ideology when it diagnoses the source of social conflicts, proposes solutions, and justifies action. Yet religious ideological appeals are not always effective at bridging political divides. Thus the key question of this study is: under what social conditions are religiously-based ideological appeals effective at winning people’s support for social and political movements? To address this, I examine the relationship of religious leaders to Latin American movements that aimed to nonviolently overthrow authoritarian states. In particular, I analyze the conditions that led some religious elites to become pro-revolution while others sided with the incumbent regime. Using comparative historical methods, I analyze the different political stances of the Catholic Church hierarchy in the 1970s–1980s in Chile (where the church opposed the dictatorship), Argentina (where the church was largely supportive of the regime), and El Salvador (where the church hierarchy was divided). I argue that ideological appeals for religious leaders’ support are most effective when the religious institution receives no financial or political benefits from the regime and when leaders have relational ties to the aggrieved. Two factors had mixed effects on the decision to remain loyal to the state or not; these include the presence of an armed radical flank, and the state’s use of indiscriminate repression.