Protest journey: the practices of constructing activist identity to choose and define the right type of activism (original) (raw)

This paper investigates how participants in global justice movements create their activist identity through protest journeys to convergence spaces. Recently, scholars have shown an increasing interest in prefigurative politics, but their focus is not on the mobility process. A focus on activists' journeys to convergence spaces is relevant because social movements enable them to prefigure processes such as choosing accommodation, transportation, and destination. This study discusses the 'protest journey' that is practised by Japanese activists while focusing on activist identity, which is different from organisational and collective identity. Based on open interviews with activists, this paper discusses two key findings. First, protesters' activist identity in a particular protest journey was influenced by two types of movements. In the tourism process, they built organisational identity through social movement organisations (SMOs) and formed a collective identity that was provided by the global justice movement in advance. Second, participants distinguished between ideal and unfavourable places to visit and what behaviours constitute the right type of activism by a true activist on a protest journey. These findings demonstrate that participants in global justice movements form a collective identity, even in the individualised process of a protest journey.