2 - Social Movements in Germany and the United States: The Peace Movement and the Environmental Movement

Summary

MOVEMENTS, MARKETS, STATES

After 1968, citizen participation in virtually all the advanced capitalist countries expanded beyond political parties and reconstituted itself in new forms. Most if not all parties subscribed to a “politics of productivity” based on economic growth as a solvent for potential class antagonisms. The terms of this postwar settlement left little room to accommodate sensibilities of affluent new middle-class strata, which focused on quality-of-life issues. Between 1968 and 1978, it became obvious that baby boomers reaching college age around 1968 were only the spearhead of a broader change in both the themes and modalities of politics. The emerging social movement sector involved an impressive variety of actors, which, in addition to peace and antinuclear protestors, included environmentalists, activists for the Third World, human-rights groups, women's groups, gay and lesbian initiatives, squatters, and alternative economy projects.

Although some movements were by no means new, they shared a novel element that justifies their designation as “new social movements.” Both the peace and environmental movements turned largely on risks associated with the introduction of potentially life-threatening mega-technologies. An additional novelty was the cyclicity of protest. In some countries, movement segments and campaigns blossomed for brief periods into a generalized challenge of the entire social and political order. This “totalization” pattern distinguishes continental European movements from those of the United States. The persistence of the state in continental Europe has created the conditions for a social-movement configuration quite unlike America’s. Therefore, despite common themes, individual movement segments as well as the entire movement ensemble are specific to national context.