Chapter 12 Quiz

1. Which of the following is not often cited as the difference between a political and social revolution?

a. Social revolutions involve people spending more time together.

b. Social revolutions change major social structures like the relationships between classes.

c. Political revolutions mostly change political institutions.

d. Both can be dramatic, but social revolutions are typically more transformative.

2. Which of the following would likely increase the likelihood of successful actions aimed at bringing about change?

a. Unified organizational leadership

b. New methods of communication

c. Pre-existing grievances in the citizenry

d. All of the above

3. Which of the following is considered an example of contention outside of formal political institutions?

a. Knocking on doors for a political candidate

b. Voting in an election

c. Participating in a work stoppage

d. Running for local office

4. The American Revolution might be considered an example of

a. A great social revolution and a "weapon of the weak"

b. A social revolution and a political revolution

c. A political revolution and an anti-colonial revolution

d. A form of everyday resistance

5. Which of the following might cause us to classify an instance of conflict as a revolution and not just a regular civil war?

a. It leads to dramatic structural change.

b. Its leaders say they want change.

c. It includes terrorist acts.

d. The fighting has lasted for many years.

6. Which of the following would not be a form of "everyday resistance"?

a. Joining a community group

b. Work stoppage

c. Deliberately completing only a portion of assigned work at your job to purposely lower the company's productivity.

d. Political graffiti

7. Which of the following is a likely consequence of social movement organization?

a. Leaders and organizations working for the movement's cause of choice also developing their own interests in relation to the movement

b. Increase in "everyday resistance"

c. Terrorism

d. Increasing confusion about what the movement stands for

8. Which of the following factors is not an important part of the "relative deprivation" theory of revolutions?

a. Rising expectations cause important groups of actors to become dissatisfied with the status quo.

b. Revolutions are caused by discontent, which is often related to social inequalities.

c. Revolutions are more likely when important groups of actor's rational calculation of interests change so that revolutionary participation seems rational.

d. Social psychological dynamics are important.

9. Zeynep Tufecki argues that the use of social media in social movements has drawbacks. Which of the following is not a drawback?

a. Sustained relationships do not develop to keep the movement going.

b. Technology allows leaders to overcome coordination problems.

c. Decentralized organizational structure created by social media weakens the central organizing leadership.

d. Sustained participation by movement followers appears to drop off after a time.

10. The benefit of social media to terrorist organizations is that "taking out the leader" doesn't work due to decentralized, often world-wide satellite organizations. This thesis is argued by:

a. Mark Sageman

b. James Scott

c. Tocqueville

d. Samuel Huntington

11. Which of the following statements is true about social movements?

a. Social movements take place outside of civil society.

b. Social movements are relatively common in modern, democratic societies.

c. Social movements are equally likely under all regime types.

d. All social movements are left wing.

12. Which of the following theories is a supply side theory of revolution?

a. Lichbach's theory of contention

b. Skocpol's theory of state breakdown

c. Relative deprivation theory

d. Marxist theory

13. Which of the following would likely not constitute part of a "frame" for social movement activity?

a. An election

b. A way to link movement demands to core values in the society

c. A new way of expressing and describing grievances

d. A language for describing protest activities as laudable and mainstream

14. Which of the following conclusions could probably not be drawn with high confidence from our discussion of the "Arab Spring" in the "Thinking Comparatively" section of this chapter?

a. The uprisings will lead to successful democratization in all or most cases.

b. The uprisings will not lead to successful democratization in all or most cases.

c. The best explanation for the various outcomes in the different cases is the cultural or framing theory.

d. None of the above.

15. Which of the following would likely be a critique that proponents of cultural or framing theories might make of rational-choice theories?

a. Rational choice theorists assume too much rationality in people.

b. Rational choice theories fail to take into account the diverse ways that different groups think about their goals and values.

c. Demand for social change likely fluctuates in ways that the theory has trouble accounting for.

d. All of the above

Quiz Content