From the New Ecological Paradigm to Total Liberation: The Emergence of a Social Movement Frame

Abstract

Drawing on theories of social movements and environmental sociology, this article considers a frame transformation that is taking place within ecological social movements. This transformation produced a new frame: “total liberation.” We explore this phenomenon by analyzing interviews with activists, fieldwork observations, and documents from radical environmental and animal rights movement networks in the United States. Beyond introducing the total liberation frame, the article expands current understandings of how and why frame transformations occur through a consideration of how multiple frames, as well as intra- and intermovement tensions and influences, shape frame transformation.

NOTES

Notes

¹ We include radical environmental and animal rights movements under the banner of ecological politics because these activists are focused on the relationship of human beings to the broader nonhuman world (see White 2003).

² Additional information on these groups and on the process by which we selected them is available upon request.

³ Interviewees for this project came from Arizona, California, Florida, Illinois, Maryland, Minnesota, Missouri, Montana, New York, Oregon, Tennessee, Texas, Utah, Washington, D.C., Washington State, and West Virginia.

⁴ These events took place in Minnesota and Oregon.

⁵ While we propose these were key influences, arguably many other ideas influenced the frame and the activists utilizing it. We cannot review all influences in one article, but we would point out a key example—social ecology. According to its founder, Murray Bookchin, hierarchy within human society predates and is at the root of the human domination and control of nonhuman nature (Bookchin 2005). Thus, social ecology calls for the eradication of hierarchy in order to produce ecologically sustainable societies (Torres 2007).

⁶ While we are not suggesting that the animal and earth liberation movements are merging, there is evidence of collaboration and information sharing between these movements. In many editions of radical animal liberation publications like, No Compromise there are listings of “eco-defense” political prisoners alongside those of animal liberation prisoners and interviews with and articles by earth liberation activists who regularly draw links between the issues driving each movement. Conversely, in every Earth First! Journal published over the last several years, there are updates on various animal liberation campaigns, and listings of animal liberation prisoners.

⁷ The strength of these movements is, even according to many prominent activists, waning in the wake of government crackdowns, with much of the movements' energies being channeled into supporting imprisoned activists.

⁸ The Green Scare is also evidence of opposition to the total liberation frame, which also occurs to some extent from the more moderate mainstream ecological movements.

⁹ While we do not present a specific anticapitalist movement frame (since our interviewees are not specifically influenced by anticapitalist scholarship per se), there is clearly a great deal of overlap on this topic between the total liberation frame and the works of Marxist environmental sociologists we reference in this article (see Foster 1999, 2000; O'Connor 1994; Schnaiberg and Gould 2000; Torres 2007).

¹⁰ It is also critical to note that the process goes beyond a “mainstream/radical” binary in that, even within radical groups, splinters have occurred around total liberation politics. For example, Earth First! saw significant changes and disagreements between members during the early 1990s. For an excellent study on the consequences associated with differences between mainstream and radical movement groups, see Haines 1984.

¹¹ Total liberation does not reflect a mere frame extension. Frame extension is defined as extending or broadening the frame to include issues that might attract potential adherents who would otherwise not be interested in the movement. This concept, like much of social movement theory, is predicated on the idea that, in order to be successful, a movement must grow and attract large numbers of supporters. Radical environmental and animal liberation activists using the total liberation frame are not focused on building a mass movement and understand that their views are so outside of the mainstream that a large following of supporters is highly unlikely and counterproductive. Rather, activists are interested in deepening their analysis of the problem of socio-ecological crises and acting in small cells to promote change.