A leaderless mass movement can outflank its own nominal leaders’ proposals

Evidence

The square quickly dubbed these “dictatorship laws.” Opposition politicians, including boxer Vitali Klitschko and former foreign minister Yatsenyuk, called for snap presidential elections and constitutional reform. But from the beginning, the Maidan had always rejected the authority of so-called leaders in the political class, and the two men did not actually have any forces behind these proposals, or even any way to pressure for them. The square insisted on going further. — Vincent Bevins, If We Burn, 506

Categorization

• XREF: connects to: Leaderless movements that cede representation get represented by opponents — Vincent Bevins, If We Burn: The Mass Protest Decade and…, 443; Leaderless structures hide informal rules that exceed formal authoritarianism — Vincent Bevins, If We Burn: The Mass Protest Decade and…, 772; Identity-based actions can reshape political power structures without being intended as political — John T. Jost and Jim Sidanius, Political Psychology, 4416 (+6 more)

Broader Connections

• Spontaneous mass uprising without organized revolutionary leadership invites state suppression #contradicts (0.82) — Antonio Gramsci, Selections from the Prison Notebooks, 77
• Decentralized pursuit of non-domination breeds accumulating petty despotisms, not freedom #complicates (0.80) — Philip Pettit, Republicanism, 456
• Local protest movements can aggregate into a national politics without top-down coordination #expands (0.80) — Eddie S. Glaude Jr., Democracy in Black, 620
• Strong leadership signals the weakness of the underlying social movement #corroborates (0.78) — Arthur Borriello and Anton Jäger, The Populist Moment, 272
• Leaderless structures hide informal rules that exceed formal authoritarianism #complicates (0.75) — Vincent Bevins, If We Burn, 772
• Mass movements radicalize because masses grasp only simple shared ideas #complicates (0.75) — Georg Simmel, The Sociology of Georg Simmel, 3106
• Identity-based actions can reshape political power structures without being intended as political #expands (0.72) — John T. Jost and Jim Sidanius, Political Psychology, 4416
• Polycentric commons movements coordinate without central authority through shared goals #exemplifies (0.72) — Laura Albareda and Alejo Jose G. Sison, Commons Organizing, 96