Stability and Volatility in Cultural Models of Contention.

This article examines the short-term stability of the public's cultural models—specifically, assumptions about the legitimacy of contentious political tactics—in the United States during the 2020 Black Lives Matter (BLM) and anti-lockdown protests. Using a combination of a three-wave longitudinal panel survey and two preregistered survey experiments, the study finds that individuals tend to view contentious tactics as more legitimate when employed by their partisan ingroup rather than the outgroup, with this effect being more consistent for conventional protest tactics (e.g., marching) than for transgressive tactics (e.g., looting). Despite some volatility linked to salient events like the BLM protests, overall assumptions about legitimacy remain relatively stable across partisan lines, suggesting a resilient normative order in the realm of contention. The findings highlight the nuanced influence of partisanship on democratic norms without indicating a wholesale erosion of shared assumptions about acceptable political protest.