Social movements as schooling for careers: career consequences of the Nashville civil rights movement

Occupational Activism and the New Labor Activism: Illustrations from the Education Sector and an Agenda for Future Research

“…How frequently do participants in labor movements (or other social movements) go on to engage in occupational activism? Past research has qualitatively shown that movement participation can lead to multiple modes of occupational activism (Coley et al, 2022;Cornfield et al, 2019), but we need more quantitative research that examines how often movement participants go on to engage in different types of occupational activism (Augustine & King, 2022). 2.…”

“…6. Past scholars have conceptualized occupational activism as a biographical consequence of movement participation (Augustine & King, 2022;Coley et al, 2022;Cornfield et al, 2019). To what degree might the opposite be true-can movement participation be conceptualized as a biographical consequence of occupational activism (cf.…”

“…As scholars examine occupational activism in the context of this new wave of labor activism, we encourage them to consider several potential lines for future research: How frequently do participants in labor movements (or other social movements) go on to engage in occupational activism? Past research has qualitatively shown that movement participation can lead to multiple modes of occupational activism (Coley et al, 2022; Cornfield et al, 2019), but we need more quantitative research that examines how often movement participants go on to engage in different types of occupational activism (Augustine & King, 2022). What types of participants in labor movements (or other social movements) are most likely to pursue occupational activism?…”

“…For example, are movement leaders more likely to pursue occupational activism than rank-and-file movement participants (Coley et al, 2022;Isaac et al, 2020)? Are people who undergo "social movement schooling"i.e., formal training in social movement ideology, strategies, and tactics -more likely to engage in occupational activism than those who do not undergo such schooling (Coley at al., 2022;Isaac et al, 2020)? 3.…”

“…They profile the organizer Bernard Lafayette, who ran workshops to train others in nonviolent praxis; the late Congressman John Lewis, who worked to pass legislation that promoted racial justice; the late Dr. Gloria Johnson Powell, the first Black woman to be tenured in Harvard's Medical School, who went on to write a book that raised consciousness about the impacts of school desegregation; and James Murph, a former manager at General Electric who practiced exemplary activism by exercising nonviolent restraint when he faced harassment in the workplace. The first author of this essay and his colleagues have similarly discussed how former Nashville civil rights movement participants engaged in occupational activism in their subsequent jobs as K-12 educators and small business owners (Coley et al, 2022).…”