Chapter 26 — Quiz
Multiple Choice (12 questions)
1. Which of the following best distinguishes a social movement from an interest group?
A. Social movements are larger than interest groups. B. Social movements operate primarily outside formal political institutions; interest groups operate primarily inside them. C. Interest groups have leaders; social movements do not. D. Social movements always succeed; interest groups always fail.
Answer: B.
2. The conventional starting point of the modern American women's suffrage movement is:
A. The ratification of the 19th Amendment in 1920. B. The Seneca Falls Convention in 1848. C. The founding of the National Organization for Women in 1966. D. The publication of The Feminine Mystique in 1963.
Answer: B.
3. Erica Chenoweth and Maria Stephan's Why Civil Resistance Works (2011) found that, in their global dataset of 20th- and early-21st-century resistance campaigns:
A. Violent campaigns succeeded more often than nonviolent ones. B. Nonviolent campaigns succeeded approximately twice as often as violent ones (about 53% vs. 26%). C. Nonviolent and violent campaigns succeeded at approximately equal rates. D. The success rate could not be measured.
Answer: B.
4. The Federalist Society, founded in 1982, is best understood as:
A. A political party. B. A litigation organization that argues conservative cases in federal courts. C. A network and brokerage institution that connects conservative and libertarian lawyers, students, and judges, and does not officially take legal positions. D. A campaign-finance organization.
Answer: C.
5. Doug McAdam's "political process" framework identifies which three conditions for movement success?
A. Money, leadership, and luck. B. Political opportunity, mobilizing structures, and cognitive liberation/framing. C. Violence, nonviolence, and electoral competition. D. Federal, state, and local political action.
Answer: B.
6. The Tea Party movement of 2009–2014 produced which formal institutional successor in the U.S. House of Representatives?
A. The Republican Study Committee. B. The Problem Solvers Caucus. C. The House Freedom Caucus, founded in 2015. D. The Congressional Progressive Caucus.
Answer: C.
7. The Civil Rights Movement of 1955–1968 developed its institutional infrastructure over decades before the famous moments. Which of the following is NOT part of that pre-existing infrastructure?
A. The NAACP, founded in 1909. B. The Highlander Folk School, founded in 1932. C. The Sunrise Movement, founded in 2017. D. Black churches and historically Black colleges and universities.
Answer: C.
8. Estimates from the Crowd Counting Consortium and other sources put the number of Americans who participated in 2020 racial-justice protests in the range of:
A. About 100,000. B. About 1 million. C. Approximately 15 to 26 million. D. More than 100 million.
Answer: C.
9. The 1979 founding of which organization is conventionally taken as a marker of the Religious Right's emergence as an organized movement?
A. The Heritage Foundation. B. The Moral Majority. C. The Christian Coalition. D. The American Enterprise Institute.
Answer: B.
10. The Inflation Reduction Act of 2022 included approximately how much in federal climate investments?
A. About $30 billion. B. About $370 billion. C. About $1 trillion. D. About $5 trillion.
Answer: B.
11. The Equal Rights Amendment (ERA), passed by Congress in 1972, ultimately:
A. Was ratified by the required 38 states and is part of the Constitution. B. Was rejected by Congress and never sent to the states. C. Was ratified by 35 states by 1977, three short of the required 38, and stalled — partly due to Phyllis Schlafly's STOP ERA campaign. D. Was struck down by the Supreme Court.
Answer: C.
12. Which of the following is the most accurate description of the typical relationship between successful American movements and the major parties?
A. Successful movements always form their own third party. B. Successful movements are typically absorbed by one of the two major parties as a faction or coalition partner. C. Successful movements have no relationship with parties. D. Movements that ally with parties always lose their independence and disappear.
Answer: B.
Short Answer (4 questions)
13. Define a "social movement" in the analytical sense used by McAdam, Tilly, and Tarrow, and identify three features that distinguish movements from other forms of political action. (Approximately 100 words.)
Sample answer: A social movement is sustained, coordinated collective action by people who lack routine political access, aimed at making claims on authorities. Three distinguishing features: (1) operating outside the formal political system, distinguishing movements from parties (which contest elections) and interest groups (which lobby inside the system); (2) being sustained and coordinated over time, distinguishing movements from one-off riots or protest events; (3) making claims on authorities — demanding action from a legislature, executive, court, corporation, or other institution holding power, distinguishing political movements from purely cultural or expressive associations.
14. The chapter argues that movements across the political spectrum are "institutional phenomena that operate by similar mechanics." Drawing on at least two specific cases from across the spectrum, explain what is meant by this claim. (Approximately 150 words.)
Sample answer: The claim is that the institutional form of a successful movement — networks, infrastructure, framing, recruitment, persistence — is recognizable across ideologically diverse cases. The Civil Rights Movement and the Federalist Society are not similar in their goals or their values; they are similar in their institutional mechanics. Both built networks of trained members (SNCC and SCLC field organizers; Federalist Society chapters at every law school). Both developed an intellectual framework that made coherent demands (the rights tradition; constitutional originalism). Both cultivated leadership pipelines (the civil-rights ministerial network; clerkship and academic placement). Both persisted across decades. The institutional analysis treats these as comparable cases without endorsing or condemning the substantive politics — making it possible to study movements analytically across the political spectrum without taking sides.
15. Explain the empirical and strategic argument behind movement nonviolence, drawing on Chenoweth and Stephan's findings and at least one specific American case. (Approximately 150 words.)
Sample answer: Chenoweth and Stephan's analysis of resistance campaigns 1900–2006 found that nonviolent campaigns succeeded about 53% of the time, while violent campaigns succeeded about 26% of the time. The mechanism: nonviolent campaigns recruit broader and more diverse participation (lower personal risk), make defection from the regime by security forces and middle-class supporters more likely, and avoid the legitimacy costs that violence imposes on the movement. The American Civil Rights Movement is a strong case study. King and James Lawson taught nonviolence as a strategic methodology — the theory was that violence by segregationists against peaceful demonstrators would be filmed and would shift Northern public opinion, which is empirically what happened in Birmingham (1963) and Selma (1965), producing the Civil Rights Act and Voting Rights Act. Nonviolence here was a strategic discipline, not just a moral preference, and the discipline produced the legislative breakthroughs.
16. The chapter treats January 6, 2021 as "an institutional fact" but does not editorialize about its meaning. Explain why the chapter takes this approach, and identify what the chapter does state and what it leaves to the reader. (Approximately 100 words.)
Sample answer: The chapter is committed to ideological balance and to distinguishing empirical from normative claims. The chapter states the institutional facts: a joint session of Congress was meeting to certify the 2020 electoral results; the Capitol was breached; Congress evacuated; multiple deaths occurred; the joint session resumed and certified the results; more than 1,400 individuals have been prosecuted; pardons or commutations were granted in January 2025. The chapter also notes that the political and historical interpretation of these events is unresolved and contested. It does not characterize the events as an "insurrection," "patriotic protest," "riot," or any other normative term, leaving that interpretation to the reader.
Total approximately 1,000 words.