Social and Behavioral Sciences Commons^™

The Logic Of Protest Action, Herman L. Boschken

Herman L. Boschken

In recent years, there has been a noticeable growth in political protest involving groups of widely diverging interests. The rising incidence of protest seems paradoxical to the apparent growth of affluence in society. This paper attempts to resolve this paradox by contending that most forms of protest are a function of the degree of separation between (a) the values and goals of those controlling collective decision processes and (b) the diversity of interests and aspirations in segmented society at large. Through protest action, disenfranchised groups are able to impose "external" costs on "establishment" regimes that lead to alteration of the …