Predictors of participation in protest in the Philippines

ABSTRACT Social movement theory links protest to psychological (grievance, system justification, uncertainty salience), strategic (costs, trust, norms), resource-based (sex, age, income, group membership, political interest, media consumption), and structural (political opportunity structures) predictors. This paper answers the question, “Why do people protest in the Philippines?” by assessing whether these variables predict protest in the Philippines using data from the 2012 World Values Survey. Specifically, it tests the following hypotheses: (1) more altruistic people are more likely to engage in protest; (2) more trusting respondents are more likely to engage in protest; (3) the relationship between trust and protest differ among active group members, non-active group members, and non-members; and (4) the association between trust and protest and between altruism and protest will differ between low- and high-cost protests. Estimates using binary logistic regression suggest that sex, group membership, political interest, and consumption of certain types of media consistently predict participation in protest. In addition, there is also evidence that factors that predict high-cost protest action do not predict low-cost protest action. Lastly, trust and system justification were also found to predict protest but in directions opposite those established by previous research.