ACR paragraph by Degtyar Valentyn

Should citizens go out to protest?

Argument	Counterargument	Rebuttal
citizens should engage into protest activities	social protests are ineffective	community and labor protests bring result, wider mobilizations promote democracy and civic liberties.

 

Citizens should be active and engage into protest activities. This promotes democracy, because direct action is the basic warranty of democracy, the same way that violence by the state is warranty of the rule of law. Protest activities are good because: they build up solidarity networks, promote freedom of speech, guard civic liberties and aim for solutions of actual social problems. Many people doubt that social protests are effective. Partly, they have the point. Research by CDS sociological group indicates that in 2012 only 5 out of each hundred of protest actions in Ukraine resulted in positive response by the authorities [1]. However, all of the protests turned media attention thus helping to mobilize and empower the stakeholder parties that suffer from definite problems. The same research shows that more than half of local community protests, such as actions against construction in the neighborhood or public utilities problems, are successful resulting in satisfaction of protesters demands or solving of the problem [1]. The same is actual for mobilizations of trade unions or workers initiative groups caused by wage arrears. This points to the usefulness of social protests for the wellbeing of society, so citizens should be confident that it works and engage into activism when they can.

List of References:

 1. Centre for Society Research - http://cedos.org.ua/protestmonitor/digest/peremogy2012