This clear and concise book examines social movements and transnational networks in the context of globalization in all its forms—economic, political, cultural, and technological alike. Deftly combining nuanced theory with rich empirical examples, leading scholar Valentine M. Moghadam focuses especially on three transnational social movements—Islamism, feminism, and global justice. Now updated to explore the European anti-austerity protests, the Arab Spring, and Occupy Wall Street, the book considers the ways in which these socio-political protests were affected especially by the role of young people and social networking media. The book also includes a new chapter on the democratic nature of social movements, or the ways in which social movements contribute to democratization at both national and global levels. Defining globalization as a complex process in which the movement of capital, peoples, organizations, movements, and ideas takes on an increasingly international form, the author shows how growing physical and electronic mobility has helped to create dynamic global social movements.
Exploring the historical roots of Islamism, feminism, and global justice, the book also shows how these movements have been stimulated by relatively recent globalization processes. Moghadam examines similarities and differences among the three movements, along with internal differentiation within each. Her argument is informed by feminist, world-systems, world polity, and social movement theories in a seamlessly integrated framework that will be essential reading for all students of globalization.