Thomas Crosbie is a Postdoctoral Research Fellow at the Center for Research on Military Organization in the Department of Sociology at the University of Maryland, College Park. He received his Ph.D. in 2014 from Yale University. Crosbie studies power in democracies, particularly its concentration in the military and other state institutions; its flow through media; and its contestation by civil society actors.


Yesterday, the Program for Society and the Environment and the Center for Research on Military Organization cohosted a fascinating presentation from Marina Malamud, titled “Resource-Based Conflict in Latin America: From Border Disputes to Internal Battles for Land Control.”  Malamud is a tenured assistant researcher at CONICET, the Argentinian equivalent of the National Science Foundation, and was formerly a professor of military sociology at the Argentine Air War College. She previously visited UMD’s Department of Sociology to present her work on civilian control of the military in Argentina, Brazil and Chile. This presentation was also comparative and introduced her ambitious new project which links violence with environmental concerns throughout South America. The presentation and Q&A raised a number of questions that remain unsettled in my mind but which I think worthy of serious thought.

Malamud has a great hook for her project. South American countries have extraordinarily high rates of violence by global standards. They also have extraordinarily rich ecosystems, which are valued globally and locally and are essential to the survival of many indigenous and rural communities. Ironically (and tragically), South American economies are based on the extraction of raw materials, which pits metropole economic interests against peripheral communities’ reliance on the environment. Might the high rates of violence reflect the dark reality of this struggle over the environment?

PSE Fellow William Yagatich was recently featured on the Maryland Sea Grant Fellowship Experiences blog, where he wrote about preliminary findings from a study of Watershed Stewards Academies in the state of Maryland and the connections between environmental stewardship and civic participation.

Read it on the Maryland Sea Grant website: 
http://www.mdsg.umd.edu/fellowship-experiences/who-volunteers-watershed-stewards-academies

What are your prior degrees?
BA from Yale University. Majored in Art (concentration: Painting), Graduated 2005
Masters in Urban Planning, from Hunter College, CUNY, NYC, concentration: Planning and Social Equity, graduated 2012

What brought you to the Sociology Department at the University of Maryland?
In my search for a PhD program it was very important to me that there be an emphasis on the environment - I have a masters in urban planning, and wanted to continue emphasizing physical space in my studies. When I visited UMD everyone was incredibly warm and knowledgeable, and Dana Fisher convinced me that University of Maryland's Sociology department was the right place for me. 

When thinking about "Society and the Environment," what are the issues that interest you most? 
I am most interested in the interface between people and the built environment. Particularly, I'm interested in how certain elements of the physical environment can ameliorate or exacerbate poverty and the health risks associated with poverty. In the past I've looked at crime (CPTED), food security, and sustainability efforts on the local government level. I would like to continue to study these areas, while definitely digging in much more deeply. 

When you aren't studying sociology, what do you like to do for fun?
I love to spend time with people -- my fiancé, family, and friends -- usually over a home cooked meal and a glass or two of wine. I also make a lot of art. I am a classically trained painter, and I draw and paint, and spend a lot of time going to look at art. Besides this, I love being outside and in nature. In DC, I often concede to just being on my roof and by the pool (which I'm definitely not complaining about!), but in general I would like to be in the woods! 

PSE Director Dana R. Fisher is featured on the current blog series of Mobilizing Ideas , which focuses on new ways to define activism. Her essay, "The Problem with Research on Activism," is cross-posted here.

Social movement scholars have a problem: since the 1970s, when collective behavior and social movements emerged as a growing sub-field of sociology, research has focused on a very limited definition of activism. In many ways, this definition was constructed as a response to the psychologically driven work on collective behavior, which tended to focus on what McPhail called the myth of the maddening crowd.

Even today, however, the well-incorporated notion of contentious politics continues to focus its attention on actors that target the political system, with the majority coming from outside the political system. This predisposition in the field was on clear on display at last week’s CBSM Workshop on Protesters and their Targets (which was extremely informative and interesting by the way). But, as a result of the limitations of the ways we conceive of activism, the object of inquiry in much of the research on social movements overlooks the manifold ways that citizens (or non-citizens) participate, the organizations that mobilize them, and the tactics that they choose.

Although, recent research has expanded to look at social movement outcomes and to assess how individuals and organizations target corporations, much is still being missed! In particular, we are overlooking broad forms of activism that do not fit these narrow definitions and those of us who study them are left answering questions about how what we are studying is, in fact, activism. Let me propose a new, potentially overly broad definition of activism:

“Efforts by individuals or collectives to affect social change.”

With this definition, we as social movement scholars will be able to assess the ways that individuals or organizations affect social change through their everyday lives. Such a broadening will include everyday efforts that include individualized activities—like “liking” something or changing the colors of your Facebook page in support of marriage equality.

These everyday activities also include working for social change through an actual job. People work as canvassers, service members for AmeriCorps projects, as well as many other jobs as what we tend to call “social movement professionals.” This work is all about social change, but is frequently not considered activism.

These efforts also include participation in activities to affect change through institutional politics. One popular example is working for a political campaign as a paid (or unpaid) organizer or volunteer to affect social change by working within the political system itself to get people elected or referenda passed. In 2009, I organized a presidential session at the ASA in San Francisco with the theme: the movement to get Barack Obama elected.

Among other topics, presenters discussed how Unions pay their workers to be foot soldiers of democratic campaigns in key states and districts. Instead of working their usual job, these workers are paid to register voters who have been identified as likely supporters, to knock on doors, make phone calls, and even drive voters to the polling stations. Most of these efforts were not new to the 2008 election and persist today. Although many of their presentations used the term “movement”, most of the final papers that built on those presentations were published outside of the traditional outlets for social movements, and many were published outside the field of sociology itself.

At the same time, the activism of everyday life also includes efforts to affect social change by contributing to small initiatives in communities, such as volunteering to plant trees or clean up green space in local neighborhoods. One example of this type of activism can be seen in my recent book on volunteer environmental stewards in New York City. In the study, my collaborators and I found that New Yorkers got involved in planting trees as part of the MillionTrees initiative to make the city greener and more livable for themselves and their families.

For the sub-discipline to move forward, I suggest that we adopt such a broad definition of activism. I am well aware that broad definitions come with challenges of their own. Although expanding the definition is based on the assumption that these very individualized activities matter and make a difference, understanding how they matter is, in and of itself, an important research question.

By broadening our definition of activism, social movement scholars will be able to aim their research at more of the ways that individuals and organizations are affecting social change. In an increasingly complex world of shifting targets, tactics, and technologies, getting a sense how people make a difference and why is all the more important.