Social Movements & Trends
The rules and cultural norms of an organized society may not be written in stone, but often it does take a dedicated collective effort to disrupt and revise them. Throughout history, people have come together in group campaigns to effect change in the structure or values of a society. Movements such as abolitionism, the women's rights movement, the American civil rights movement, and the gay rights movement illustrate how common citizens can influence legislative action and modify cultural norms when they unite with the shared goal of bringing about a certain social change. Societal change can also take place naturally as a result of the accumulation of many smaller changes within a society. Large-scale trends such as industrialization, modernization, and urbanization provide examples of this more passive process of change.
Social Movements & Trends Encyclopedia Articles
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communism
Communism, political and economic doctrine that aims to replace private property and a profit-based economy with public ownership and communal control of at least the major means of production (e.g., mines,...
Gloria Steinem
Gloria Steinem American feminist, political activist, and editor who was an articulate advocate of the women’s liberation movement during the late 20th and early 21st centuries. Steinem spent her early...
anarchism
Anarchism, cluster of doctrines and attitudes centred on the belief that government is both harmful and unnecessary. Anarchist thought developed in the West and spread throughout the world, principally...
new liberalism
New liberalism, in British history, a body of distinctive legislation on social welfare enacted between 1906 and the outbreak of World War I. Herbert Louis Samuel, Winston Churchill, and David Lloyd George...
Martin Luther King, Jr.
Martin Luther King, Jr. Baptist minister and social activist who led the civil rights movement in the United States from the mid-1950s until his death by assassination in 1968. His leadership was fundamental...
Abby Hadassah Smith and Julia Evelina Smith
Abby Hadassah Smith and Julia Evelina Smith American suffragists who relentlessly protested for their property and voting rights, drawing considerable national and international attention to their situation...
progressivism
Progressivism, in the United States, political and social-reform movement that brought major changes to American politics and government during the first two decades of the 20th century. Progressive reformers...
Oliver Cromwell
Oliver Cromwell English soldier and statesman, who led parliamentary forces in the English Civil Wars and was lord protector of England, Scotland, and Ireland (1653–58) during the republican Commonwealth....
liberalism
Liberalism, political doctrine that takes protecting and enhancing the freedom of the individual to be the central problem of politics. Liberals typically believe that government is necessary to protect...
modernization
Modernization, in sociology, the transformation from a traditional, rural, agrarian society to a secular, urban, industrial society. Modern society is industrial society. To modernize a society is, first...
election
Election, the formal process of selecting a person for public office or of accepting or rejecting a political proposition by voting. It is important to distinguish between the form and the substance of...
Mahatma Gandhi
Mahatma Gandhi Indian lawyer, politician, social activist, and writer who became the leader of the nationalist movement against the British rule of India. As such, he came to be considered the father of...
animal rights
Animal rights, moral or legal entitlements attributed to nonhuman animals, usually because of the complexity of their cognitive, emotional, and social lives or their capacity to experience physical or...
democracy
Democracy, literally, rule by the people. The term is derived from the Greek dēmokratia, which was coined from dēmos (“people”) and kratos (“rule”) in the middle of the 5th century bce to denote the political...
socialism
Socialism, social and economic doctrine that calls for public rather than private ownership or control of property and natural resources. According to the socialist view, individuals do not live or work...
social movement
Social movement, a loosely organized but sustained campaign in support of a social goal, typically either the implementation or the prevention of a change in society’s structure or values. Although social...