The Power of Being Heard : How Claims Against Racism Are Constructed, Spread, and Listened to in a Hybrid Media Envirotment

Peer reviewe

From ‘Seeing’ to ‘Seizing’ Opportunity: Critical Events, Turning Points and Ethnolinguistic Mobilization in the Basque Country

This article examines how social movement actors carry out the transition from ‘seeing’ to ‘seizing’ critical events as empowering structures of political opportunity. Drawing on qualitative data, the discussion looks at how Basque language activists affiliated with the ikastola schooling movement in France engaged with a chain of events linked to the rise of democracy and autonomy in the Spanish Basque Country from 1975 to 1987. The analysis shows how intersubjective perceptions of ‘opportunity’ inspired French Basque activists to orchestrate a strategic turning point through the formation of cross-border ties with parallel actors in Spain. Subsequently, consideration is given to some of the outcomes generated by the formation of these ties for activists in France. In addition to shedding empirical light on the Basque case, the article contributes to micro-cultural studies of macro-political processes in social movement studies by illuminating the discursive and organizational practices through which grassroots actors transform opportune situations into empowering outcomes during times of large-scale societal crisis and transformation