2.COLLECTIVE ACTION, MOBILISATION AND COLLECTIVE IDENTITY CONSTRUCTION IN TODAY’S SOCIETY

The key concepts that are involved in the processes of competition, cooperation and conflict that we are analysing here are the concepts of social movement and collective identity. By social movement I understand the result of a collective action constituted by the ensemble of formal and informal interactions carried out by a purality of individuals, collectives and organised groups. These share amongst themselves, to a greater or lesser degree, a sentiment of collective identity on entering into conflict with other social or political agents for the appropriation of, participation in, or transformation of the relationships of power, or the goals to be reached through the mobilisation of determinate sectors of the society12.             Collective identity, in Melucci’s words, answers to a process of social construction by the individuals or groups that form part of a social movement. As the result of a continuous process of shaping and reshaping itself or, to be more exact, of defining and redefining itself, collective identity is in constant transformation; this breaks with the idea of collective identity as something that remains unaltered over time with the consequent danger of “reification”. On the other hand, collective identity as process is distanced from that conception which considers it as something unitary and coherent.      Three types of elements can be found in a collective identity. In the first place, it implies the presence of cognitive aspects that refer to a definition of ends, means and the ambit of collective action. This cognitive level is present in a series of rituals, practices and cultural productions that on occasion show a great coherence (when they are widely shared by the participants in the collective action or, even, in the whole of a determinate society), and in other circumstances show a broad variety of divergent or conflicting views. In the second place, it makes reference to a network of relationships amongst actors who communicate, influence, interact and negotiate amongst themselves and adopt decisions (Touraine). According to Melucci, this framework of relationships can show great versatility with respect to forms of organisation, leadership models, channels and technologies of communication. In the third place, it requires a certain degree of emotional involvement, making it possible for the activists to feel part of a “we”. Given that the emotions also form part of a collective identity, their signification cannot be entirely reduced to a cost benefit calculation, and this aspect is especially relevant in less institutionalised expressions of social life such as the social movements (Melucci, 1989; 1995; 1996). By the term “collective identity” I refer to the feeling of belonging that is shared by the members of a group or several groups, through which reality is defined and interpreted, orientating the actions of those who participate in this feeling. Collective identity can become crystallised and objectivised, but it is subjected at every moment to the possibility of change and re-elaboration. Collective identity is not something purely symbolic – belonging to the world of symbols and interpretations, it also belongs to the world of social practices2.     The type of political mobilisations that we are considering in this paper refer to collective actions developed by social movements and which are, besides, directed to the struggle for the defence, spread or recognition of a determinate collective identity.
Having carried out this conceptual clarification of what we understand by social movement and by the process of construction of collective identity, we now ask a) what has happened to the traditional sources of meaning in modern society in the context of the increasing globalisation of recent decades, b) if there exist new resources for the production of collective identities provided or facilitated by globalisation, and c) if a greater emergence or signification is being acquired by pre-existing forms of identity that are reactivated as a result of the impact of some process of uncontrolled globalisation.

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