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Title
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Hope as struggle : Working with Narratives, Temporalities, and Emotions in the Belgian Climate Movement
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Author
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Abstract
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| In this dissertation, I study hope in the Belgian climate movement. Against climate breakdown and societal inertia, a need for hope is becoming salient. While climate movement organizations struggle to cultivate and maintain hope, this collective challenge is understudied. This gap is addressed through qualitative and ethnographic research as a co-participant in the Belgian climate movement. I understand hope as a collective yet complex cognitive-emotional process. This thesis systematically unpacks how climate movement participants work with hope along the dimensions of (i) narratives, (ii) temporalities, and (iii) emotions. The data illuminates how the Belgian climate movement is multi-faceted and multi-paced, linking hope to other emotions in their front- and backstage activities. First, I show how a wide range of climate movement actors envision and strategically narrate diverging pathways for change that varyingly relate to climate justice as an overarching metanarrative. Next, I demonstrate how participants navigate competing temporalities of urgency and long-haul hopes by learning to rethink past, present, and future possibilities. These narrative and temporal processes shape what to hope for, where to direct hope, and what sources to draw hope from. I then adopt an emotion-sociological lens to reveal how local Extinction Rebellion groups struggle to maintain hope and cultivate it through collective action and backstage emotion work. I show how hope is cultivated to persist in adverse circumstances, involving managing emotions like anger, fear, and grief. While concrete hopes can be hard to sustain amidst narrowing possibilities and increasing uncertainty, a sense of togetherness within the movement acts as a key source of hope, aiding in coping with disappointment and despair. By furthering theoretical and empirical knowledge of “hope as struggle” within the Belgian climate movement, this dissertation aims to enrich the collective work to see, feel, and act on transformative possibilities. |
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Language
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English
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Publication
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Antwerpen
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Universiteit Antwerpen, Faculteit Sociale Wetenschappen, Departement Sociologie
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2024
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DOI
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10.63028/10067/2079540151162165141
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Volume/pages
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258 p.
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Note
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Vandermoere, Frédéric [Supervisor]
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Loots, Ilse [Supervisor]
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Full text (open access)
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