S. Laurel Weldon, "When Protest Makes Policy: How Social Movements Represent Disadvantaged Groups" (U Michigan Press, 2011)

Summary

S. Laurel Weldon is Professor of Political Science, Purdue University, and Director of the Center for Research on Diversity and Inclusion. She is the author of When Protest Makes Policy: How Social Movements Represent Disadvantaged Groups (University of Michigan Press, 2011). The book provides a theoretical and empirical case for the relationship between women's movements and social change. In a manner similar to Clifford Bob's work on the Global Right Wing, Weldon's expands the conversation about social movements to the international arena. She weaves together both cross-national and 50-state data to argue for ways to think about social movements that move beyond narrow studies of interest groups. The dot-connecting effort to bridge her strong theoretical arguments with these data, make the book a major contribution to the field of public policy. Weldon's incorporation of social movement literature also is a contribution to political science literature, which has tended to shy away from engaging deeply in social movements.

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