Essay on Social Movements and Social Change – Social movements play a very important role in highlighting some of the social problems. Some undesirable conditions can exist for years or even centuries before they are recognised as social problems.
Slavery, the subordination of women, untouchability, racial discrimination, communalism, poverty, inequality, pollution etc., were all generally regarded as either as natural or inevitable, or, as less important, until social movements drew the attention of the public, mobilised public opinion and campaigned for change.
The degree of success of a social movement determines not only how the social problem is confronted but also what happens to the movement itself. The interplay of social problems and social movement’s produces a typical “life cycle” or “natural history” that often ends with the disappearance of the movement.
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Social Movements and Social Change:
Social movements do not necessarily bring solutions to the social problems. They may champion the cause of social problems but cannot always promise a lasting solution. Social movements may promise to bring about social change and they do bring it. But it is not a one-way-process. Not only do social movements bring about change, but social change sometimes gives birth to movements.
Social change often breeds social movements, and movements, in turn, breed additional change. In fact, Smelser has defined a social movement “as an organised group effort to generate socio- cultural change.”
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For nearly every social movement, there is a counter movement. The purpose of these counter movements is to oppose the original movement. Counter movements struggle to maintain the status quo.
For example, some parties, organisations and leaders have started the “pro-reservation movement “, while some others, have floated “anti-reservation movement”, in India. Similarly, good number of leaders, organisations and parties supported the Ayodhya movement and insisted on the construction of Sri Ram Temple at the “disputed place” at Ayodhya.
At the same time, a sizeable number of people and parties launched a counter movement against the pro-Ram Temple movement. In the very same manner, trade union movements generate capitalist counter movements that try to preserve the free enterprise system. Youth moments stiffen the resistance of older groups.
Society is not a static element. It is a complex system of movements and counter movements pulling it in different directions. When this tussle is finally in favour of the movement, it becomes part of the social structure.
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A successful movement may become a part of the social order. Example, a trade union movement or “save environment movement”. The movement may disappear after achieving its goal as it has been in the case of “Indian freedom movement”.
Finally, it can be said that the intricate relationship between social movements and social change cannot be completely understood. Smelser’s remarks are worth noting at this stage; “while there is much that we don’t understand about the interplay of social movements and social change, it is clear that the two are linked in an intricate pattern.”