Equality Movements

Equality movements are organized collective efforts to secure equal rights, status, recognition, and treatment for groups that face discrimination or exclusion, including civil rights, feminist, labor, disability rights, and LGBTQ+ movements. They use protest, litigation, lobbying, cultural change, and community organizing to challenge unequal laws and norms. Charles Tilly analyzed repertoires of contention and the claims movements make on states, while Doug McAdam’s political process model explained the rise of the American civil rights movement through shifting political opportunities and indigenous organization. John McCarthy and Mayer Zald’s resource mobilization theory emphasized organization and funding, and Alberto Melucci and Alain Touraine stressed identity and new social movements. Aldon Morris documented the role of Black churches and local leaders, and Verta Taylor examined feminist abeyance structures. Nancy Fraser distinguished struggles for redistribution from struggles for recognition, and Kimberle Crenshaw’s intersectionality shaped debates about coalition. Frances Fox Piven and Richard Cloward argued that disruption can win concessions from the poor. Movements often provoke counter-movements and backlash. Equality movements remain central to research on social change, rights, inequality, identity, and political participation.