Social movements in Southeast Europe: from urban mobilisation to electoral competition

ABSTRACTThis special issue explores the role of grassroots activism and social movements in creating counter-spaces of democratic learning and resistance to authoritarianism in Southeast Europe in the 2020s. It investigates the role of social movements and new political actors on the Left in containing democratic decline as well as their attempts to strengthen democracy from below. The contributions to this special issue demonstrate how social movements, which emerged across Southeast Europe in the last decade, can be conceived as spaces of innovation resistance, and also act as important bulwarks against democratic backsliding. Furthermore, the articles delve into the factors that foster the engagement of social movement actors in electoral politics, exploring the trajectories that political parties take when they enter into the electoral arena.KEYWORDS: social movementsSoutheast Europegrassroots activismdemocratic backslidingelectoral platformsurban movements Disclosure statementNo potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).Additional informationFundingThis work was supported by H2020 Marie Skłodowska-Curie Actions [grant number 792782]; Schweizerischer Nationalfonds zur Förderung der Wissenschaftlichen Forschung [grant number IZ11Z0_166540].Notes on contributorsChiara MilanChiara Milan is an Assistant Professor in Political Sociology at the Department of Political and Social Sciences of the Scuola Normale Superiore.Danijela DolenecDanijela Dolenec is an Associate Professor of Comparative Politics at the Faculty of Political Science of the University of Zagreb.