Enacting Resistance, Performing Citizenship: Trajectories of Political Subjectification in the Post-Democratic Condition

Abstract

Dominated by the ‘weak postsocialist civil society’ thesis, Central and Eastern Europe has generally been uninspiring for social movement scholars. In recent years, a growing body of scholarship has challenged this pessimistic notion, highlighting the emergence of grassroots activism. What remains under-researched, however, is the process of political subjectification of society’s apolitical segments through contentious practices. Informed by pragmatic sociology, this article explores three case studies – of student, civic and environmental movements, respectively – that demonstrate how citizens constituted themselves as collective political subjects by performatively enacting their citizenship through resistance in post-democratic Montenegro (2010–2015). Through analysis of news media sources and interviews with activists, this article postulates three trajectories of political subjectification – political becoming, political bonding and political embodying – by which citizens (re)gain their civic autonomy, allowing them to challenge dominant power relations and to attain political legitimacy to think, speak and act as relevant political actors on the public stage.