Do Protests Make a Difference? : The impact of anti-privatisation mobilisation in India and Peru

Abstract

The mobilisation of protests has become more visible during the last few decades and the amount of literature focusing on the links between protest and policy has significantly increased. Nevertheless, scholars acknowledge that there is a lack of theoretical advancements, careful empirical analysis and attention to developing countries regarding these links. In this thesis I endeavor to address the above shortcomings. I elaborate on and evaluate existing theories on social movement outcomes by applying an event history analysis to my data on anti-privatisation struggles in India and Peru. The thesis consists of a comprehensive introduction and three interrelated essays. Essay I provides a systematic description of labor movements' reactions to privatisation processes in India. I demonstrate that the Indian trade unions which were affiliated with pro-privatisation parties avoided protesting even when their party was not in the government. Of two Communist-ruled states – Kerala and West Bengal, only the first accepted the protests of the affiliated union. Essay II discusses how the anti-privatisation struggle in India affected privatisation processes during the years 1990-2003. It focuses on mechanisms explaining the impact of a social movement's mobilisation, and on the role of protest characteristics. I demonstrate that challengers to privatisation were more successful in gaining favorable policy outcomes in those cases where they used large or economically disruptive protests. Essay III seeks to explain the varying outcomes of anti-privatisation protests in India and Peru. I test the prevalent theory on the conditionality of the protest impact in a novel empirical setting – that of developing countries. In contrast to previous studies, my results show that the impact of protests is not necessarily dependent on public support nor on support from political allies. However, the outcomes of mobilisation depend on political regime as protests are shown to be more influential within democracies.

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