Gains and Losses in The Urban Political Field: Multilayered Outcomes of Mobilization in Moscow’s Housing Controversy

Abstract

Social movements attain a variety of incremental gains as they strive to achieve their primary goals. The gains include new worldviews (“frames” and “cognitive toolkits”) and relationships (social networks, alliances, and adversities). Even if a movement does not achieve its primary goals, the accumulated gains can pull people further into new arenas of collective action, transforming the configuration of the political field., This article builds on the literature on intermovement interaction and the strategic interaction perspective to apply a microsociological approach to the transfer of gains aamong arenas. The empirical material for the analysis comes from the mobilization in response to an urban renewal project in Moscow and its subsequent “spillover” into electoral arenas of Moscow’s politics. I collected data from 2017–2019, including interviews, observations, and digital ethnographies of online communities created to organize supporters and opponents of the proposal. I identify the microlevel mechanisms facilitating and blocking the transfer. I also demonstrate that individual players simultaneously assess potential gains and losses at multiple levels: in their private lives, civic communities, and national politics.