Struggling to reform: a strange phrase to use in introducing a discussion of the outcomes of social movements! For few movements seek only reform, and many reject reformism altogether. Movement activists demand fundamental social change, the recognition of new identities, entry into the polity, the destruction of their enemies, or the overthrow of a social order – seldom “reform.” When, as we saw in the preceding chapter, movements cumulate in a general cycle of contention, claims become so broad and elites so besieged that profound changes are forced onto the agenda. Nevertheless, as I argue in this chapter, the structure of politics through which claims are processed in democratic states forces them into a common crucible from which cycles of reform are the most likely outcome.

THE AMBIGUITY OF POLICY OUTCOMES

For many years, analysts of social movements have bewailed our lack of knowledge of their policy outcomes (Giugni 1994,1997; Gurr 1980; Marx and Wood 1975). In the absence of convincing information on movement outcomes, a number of taxonomies have been produced – almost as many as there are studies of the subject. The best-known typology is also the simplest and the most often used, that of William Gamson. In The Strategy 0/ Social Protest, Gamson distinguished between challengers receiving new advantages and gaining acceptance (1990: ch. 1). This produced his familiar fourfold classification of “full response” and defeat, at the two extremes, and “co-optation” and “preemption” in between (ch. 3).