Community Mobilization for Environmental Problems: How a Grassro ...

Even 10 years later, the community faced multiple sources of information concerning the problem. Consequently, some residents mobilized to form a community organization, whereas others did not participate. Identifying the stages of the mobilization process in relation to information that residents had access to, I have analyzed the complexities in each component of citizen-activist mobilization—specifically, leadership, organization, strategy, and goals. Did frames of the environmental problem affect mobilization outcomes?

The framing processes of environmental contamination and the subsequent mobilization that occurred are primary issues that guide this analysis. In this study, framing is the process of telling the story of Hickory Woods; frames are vehicles created to reveal an interpretation of the issue. Those actors framing the issues are identified as community residents, local media, and government and scientific agencies.

This book focuses on understanding social movement mobilization first, by considering the role of framing in movement activity; second, by highlighting the role of fluctuating framing processes throughout mobilization activity; and third, by explaining how environmental framing activity in the case of a community health risk affects community mobilization. The components of mobilization—grievance or issue construction, leadership, organization, strategy, and goals—have traditionally been viewed as primary areas in which resources and political-process opportunities are located (Tilly, 1978). Adding an analysis of framing activities to these components helps account for how movement actors receive and interpret movement messages, thereby shaping the critical aspects of mobilization. Flux and change in movement frames and messages—as well as dimensions of human agency, such as consensus, conflict, negotiation, and coercion—are areas of complexity that scholars of social movements have identified as in need of further investigation (Benford, 1997). These nuanced concepts within mobilization activities include the role of influential factors, such as various community stakeholders