The international is actionable: protest as agency and linkage between domestic and international politics

Yu, Agnes Cheuk Yiu (2024) The international is actionable: protest as agency and linkage between domestic and international politics. PhD thesis, London School of Economics and Political Science.

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Abstract

Why do people mobilize when issues and protest payoffs are distant from their everyday contexts? This three-paper thesis examines conditions under which individuals infer domestic consequences from internationally oriented political participation and vice versa, and how those shapes perceived functions of ‘international’ protest. I am primarily concerned with protests with explicit, internationally located goals/causes, such as the Roe V. Wade protests in France, Black Lives Matter protests in South Korea, and Pro-Palestine protests in the Philippines. Utilizing novel survey data across four country-contexts, each paper examines a different factor from the local to international level whilst maintaining focus on individual-level perceptions. Comparing individual perceptions across the US, Poland, Japan, and Chile, the first paper theorizes and shows how international-oriented protest participation is affected by perceived relative geopolitical position and role preferences for other states, which shapes perceptions of (non-)efficacy. The second paper demonstrates how interpersonal network structures shape individuals’ willingness and motivations for attending domestic and international-oriented protests. It theorizes the ‘proximal effect’ of social networks, where networks can make issues that are geographically and politically removed from protest participants more tangible and closer to home. The final paper examines domestic partisanship, where I argue Democrats are more willing to participate in an international-oriented protest relative to Republicans. Utilizing abortion-rights as a case study and not taking for granted the assumed overlap between issue-partisanship, I also theorize that pro-life Democrats are most likely to participate in an international-oriented protest due to a combination of protest efficacy and religious organizational ties. Ultimately, this project examines how protest allows individuals to perceive and form linkages between international and domestic politics. It explores and theorizes how individuals can utilize international-oriented protest to strategically affect domestic outcomes, and how ‘everyday individuals’ have become important ‘critical mass’ actors in a globalized world.

Item Type:	Thesis (PhD)
Additional Information:	© 2024 Agnes Cheuk Yiu Yu 余卓瑤
Library of Congress subject classification:	H Social Sciences > HM Sociology H Social Sciences > HN Social history and conditions. Social problems. Social reform J Political Science > JZ International relations
Sets:	Departments > International Relations
Supervisor:	Lake, Milli and Ayoub, Phillip
URI:	http://etheses.lse.ac.uk/id/eprint/4833

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