Abstract
This article asks four questions: (1) What are our theoretical expectations about the incidence of policy-oriented collective action and its impact? (2) What do the data show about the incidence of collective action and its impact? (3) How might the impact of collective action be related to its incidence? (4) What do our findings imply for our understanding of democratic politics? We suggest that predictions that little collective action will occur are more accurate than conventionally believed; that such action is often ineffective; that it may be ineffective partly because it is so infrequent; and that the analysis of the determinants of policy change should be rethought as a result.
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This is a revised version of a paper presented at the annual meeting of the American Sociological Association, San Francisco, California, August 2004. The research was supported in part by NSF grant SES-0001509.
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Burstein, P., Sausner, S. The Incidence and Impact of Policy-Oriented Collective Action: Competing Views. Sociol Forum 20, 403–419 (2005). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11206-005-6595-4
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11206-005-6595-4