Abstract

CORCUFF, Philippe  and  MATHIEU, Lilian. Partidos y movimientos sociales: de las ilusiones de la "actualidad" a una puesta en perspectiva sociológica. Cultura representaciones soc [online]. 2011, vol.5, n.10, pp.7-30. ISSN 2007-8110.

Two competing stereotypes can currently be identified in the debates within the radical left and in social movements. One of these stereotypes postulates the death of political parties and prophesies a political renewal animated by social movements. The other stereotype projects a resurrection of the party-structure and considers the role of social movements to be merely subaltern. The present article adopts a position which is sociologically antithetical regarding this issue: it begins by examining the numerous similarities between political parties and social movements and, more particularly, their shared vulnerability to the traits of professionalisation and the monopolisation of power. Contemporary social movements are not immune to such trends, despite repeated protestations of their commitment to horizontality. The article goes on to examine the process of differentiation which caused social movements to establish a specific space, separate from the political sphere. In the wake of this process, the political and the social appear to constitute two distinct universes, traversed by their own specific logics, while at the same time retaining relations which are both close and fluctuating.

Keywords : Partidos Políticos; movimientos sociales; poder político.