The Stubblefield Institute hosted a campus-wide discussion at Shepherd University on Feb. 20, analyzing the historical evolution, psychological influences and political implications of contemporary protest movements.
“Our mission is to champion conversations and collaboration across political, cultural, and ideological divides,” said Graham Scott, the program coordinator for the Stubblefield Institute.
“We empower individuals to listen deeply, speak truthfully, and engage constructively.” Said Scott.
During the opening remarks, Scott highlighted the programs the institute offers students, such as community leadership and a civil advocacy course. Along with their first upcoming Dialogue Dinner taking place on Mar. 4.
The conversation soon turned to the protest movements currently taking national attention, including the “No Kings” protests and rallies against federal immigration enforcement efforts.
Scott stated that on Oct. 18, reports showed more than 2,700 protests across all 50 states, with participation estimates reaching the millions. In reference to the national conversation surrounding immigration enforcement, Scott invited three speakers from the campus to give statements on the matter.
“To help us step back and consider the historical evolution of protests in America, as well as the effectiveness and internal dynamics of protest movements, we have three distinguished members of Shepherd’s faculty,” Scott said.
Dr. Julia Sandy, associate professor of history, emphasized that while modern protests may feel new, their tactics are rooted deeply in history.
“One of the things that I find really striking is that, in a lot of ways, there isn’t really evolution of protests,” Sandy said. “The tactics that people employ, the ways that they go about protesting, we’ve seen these same tactics over and over again. I think people are learning from movements in the past.”
Using examples from the women’s suffrage movement, the 1932 Bonus Army march, and the Civil Rights Movement, Sandy argued that government overreach creates greater public sympathy for protestors.
“When the government, local, states, federal, steps in to suppress, and sometimes violently suppress these movements, it often causes those moments to gain a lot more sympathy and, in fact, gain a lot more followers for those movements,” Sandy said.
Sandy cited the 1960s sit-in movement as an example of strategic nonviolent resistance that shaped national policy. The televised images of violence, such as “Bloody Sunday,” helped prompt the federal government to advance civil rights legislation.
Dr. Samuel Green, associate professor of science, explained why the government responds with force to protests, even when there could be backlash.
“We sometimes think about suppression as something an authoritarian government does,” Green said. “Sometimes, you see, when government officials, particularly in a democracy, respond with disproportionate force, often their audience may be different. Their audience may be a group that they think will approve of that. “
Green also commented on the role of polarization in shaping the public’s perception, saying recent polling results show a decrease in support for certain enforcement actions.
“This is highly skewed in terms of political lead,” Green said. “There is a disconnect between a government’s sort of assessment of protesters, support, and the actuality.”
Successful protest movements tend to have focused goals and a broader appeal.
“The protestors’ language and framing tend to appeal to a broad audience, rather than a narrow one, and protestors avoid being broadly framed or classified as outside the mainstream as extremists,” Green stated.
Dr. Lindsay Levitan, professor of psychology, added to this, offering insights into why peaceful protests can sometimes turn volatile.
A key concept explained by Levitan is “deindividuation,” when large groups of individuals feel less personally identifiable and more influenced by crowd norms.
“When you put a lot of people together in one place, they become a crowd, and so what that crowd does is going to depend on the emerging norms of that crowd,” Levitan said. “When an individual is surrounded by a lot of other individuals, when they are hard to identify individually, they can get swept away by the crowd.”
However, Levitan highlights that strong normalizations of nonviolence can reinforce restraints.
“If we’re talking about nonviolent protests where nonviolence is really core to that movement, they are actually going to be more committed to that nonviolence,” Levitan said.
In addition, polarization on how protests are perceived was discussed.
“The more it is that people have a strong view, the more it becomes a lens through which they are viewing the rest of the world,” Levitan stated about bias and selective views.
To close, Sandy gave a historical perspective on modern worries.
“Studying American history does not make one terribly optimistic, but if there is anything to try to hold on to, it’s that our divided governments may be what saves us,” Sandy said.
The event then concluded with audience discussion and a thank-you to the panelists, followed by a notice of upcoming programming details to be shared via email.
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