The Racial Limits of Disruption: How Race and Tactics Influence Social Movement Organization Testimony before Congress, 1960–1995.

This article examines how social movement organizations (SMOs) use different protest tactics to gain congressional recognition, focusing on racial disparities between Black and non-Black SMOs. Analyzing data on 1,462 SMOs from 35 movement families and over 41,000 congressional testimonies between 1960 and 1995, the study finds that nondisruptive tactics generally increase the likelihood of congressional testimony, but this effect is about ten times weaker for Black SMOs compared to non-Black SMOs. Nonviolent disruptive tactics increase congressional acceptance for non-Black SMOs but decrease it for Black SMOs, while violent tactics reduce testimony likelihood for all groups. These results suggest that Black SMOs face a strategic dilemma: nondisruptive tactics yield limited political access, whereas nonviolent disruption garners media attention but hinders congressional acceptance, reflecting racialized perceptions of protest and contributing to unequal political influence.