So you basically interested what drives changes in ruling class opinion? And feel comfortable with more or less equating elite opinion change with social change?
I’m interested in what attempts to cause social change actually “work.” A theory that activism never works seems no more consistent with the evidence than a theory that activism without elite support is the primary cause of social change. On the specific example we’re discussing, the evidence seems to be that the NAACP was activist, not a “ruling institution” from its founding (1909) until some point in the post-WWII period. Yet the NAACP created conditions that led to enormous social change.
So you basically interested what drives changes in ruling class opinion? And feel comfortable with more or less equating elite opinion change with social change?
I’m interested in what attempts to cause social change actually “work.”
A theory that activism never works seems no more consistent with the evidence than a theory that activism without elite support is the primary cause of social change.
On the specific example we’re discussing, the evidence seems to be that the NAACP was activist, not a “ruling institution” from its founding (1909) until some point in the post-WWII period. Yet the NAACP created conditions that led to enormous social change.