Social Movement Transnationalization: A Multi-Level ATTAC

Social Movement Transnationalization: A Multi-Level ATTAC

M.A. thesis (2005), Political Science, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill

Abstract: This study attempts to gain insight into the relative importance of national and international political arenas to transnational social movement organizations. To do so, it examines the role of national contexts and the functions of the transnationalization processes of diffusion, internalization, and transnational collective action. The analysis is based on a case study of the anti-neoliberal globalization group ATTAC in the two countries where it is largest, France and Germany. The author looks at the differing national and international political opportunities that led to the emergence of ATTAC in each country, highlighting the importance of national contexts for the French organization and transnationalization processes for the German one. The study also includes an analysis of some of the campaigns conducted by the two national groups, emphasizing the role played by internalization and transnational collective action, which are sometimes synthesized in the solidarity actions of the different nationally bounded groups.