Understanding the social movements from the perspective of individualism: Reflections from Latin America

Abstract

The articulation between individualism and social movements is a widely debated issue in US American or European social sciences, but it remains relatively absent within the framework of Latin American sociology. This paper proposes to explore this link through three major movements. Firstly, it briefly revises the ways in which the link between individualism and social movements has been routinely analyzed in social sciences. Secondly, it suggests the ways in which both individualism and social movements should be understood in the context of Latin America. Finally, from this reconsideration, it analyzes the specific tensions between both social phenomena in this region.