The Mobilization of Paid and Volunteer Activists in the Neighborhood Movement

This paper compares the mobilization of paid social movement activists with the mobilization of volunteers, a topic mentioned but not treated systematically in previous work. Classic treatments of paid movement activists assume that they are the most dedicated and ideologically committed members of movement .organizations, while collective action theory underlying the resource mobilization perspective suggests they may be less committed, that material incentives can compensate for lower ideological commitment. McCarthy and Zald's work documenting the rise in outside Sources of support for movement activists furthers the idea that paid activists may be less committed to particular movements than volunteers. Their historical analysis of changes in resources in the 1960s raises the possibility of political generations affected by those changes; generations can also be analyzed in Research in Social Movements, Conflicts and Change, Vol. S, pages 133-170. Copyright © 1983 by JAI Press Inc. All rights of reproduction in any form reserved. ISBN: 0·89232·301·9