Papers by Sotirios Karampampas
Frontiers in Political Science, 2026
Comparative European Politics, 2019
The recent economic crisis has witnessed a surge in demonstrations and other protest actions all ... more The recent economic crisis has witnessed a surge in demonstrations and other protest actions all over Europe, while in the most affected countries—such as Greece—the use of personal violence and damage of property became an everyday phenomenon. What are the drivers of violent political action in times of crisis? How do these drivers interact? And to what extent does context matter? These questions are examined in the light of a new and original survey data set carried out across nine European countries, all affected to different degrees by the financial crisis. Four theoretical paradigms from social movement research that account for violent political action are examined. This study looks beyond the staple explanations of relative deprivation and resource mobilisation, expands the analysis to include a relational approach—namely, conflictual irrelevance—and explores the soundness of an integrative approach that attempts to reconcile the traditional divide between grievance and resou...
Acta Politica, 2019
In this paper we analyse whether relative deprivation has divergent effects on different types of... more In this paper we analyse whether relative deprivation has divergent effects on different types of social and political action. We expect that it will depress volunteering with parties as well as different types of conventional political participation more generally while stimulating volunteering with anti-cuts organisations and engagement in various kinds of protest activism. There is little research into how relative deprivation impacts on different types of social and political action from the wide range of activities available to citizens in contemporary democracies as well as into how this relationship might vary based on the wider economic context. While many studies construct scales, we examine participation in specific activities and associations, such as parties or anti-cuts organisations, voting, contacting, demonstrating and striking to show that deprivation has divergent effects that depart from what is traditionally argued. We apply random effects models with cross-level...
Social Movement Studies, 2019
Frequently dubbed the ‘movement of movements,’ the Global Justice Movement (GJM) emerged during t... more Frequently dubbed the ‘movement of movements,’ the Global Justice Movement (GJM) emerged during the 1990s and rapidly developed from a series of national campaigns into a transnational network agai...
https://doi.org/10.1057/s41295-019-00191-4
The recent economic crisis has witnessed a surge in d... more https://doi.org/10.1057/s41295-019-00191-4
The recent economic crisis has witnessed a surge in demonstrations and other protest actions all over Europe, while in the most affected countries-such as Greece-the use of personal violence and damage of property became an everyday phenomenon. What are the drivers of violent political action in times of crisis? How do these drivers interact? And to what extent does context matter? These questions are examined in the light of a new and original survey data set carried out across nine European countries, all affected to different degrees by the financial crisis. Four theoretical paradigms from social movement research that account for violent political action are examined. This study looks beyond the staple explanations of relative deprivation and resource mobilisation, expands the analysis to include a relational approach-namely, conflictual irrelevance-and explores the soundness of an inte-grative approach that attempts to reconcile the traditional divide between grievance and resource-based models. By measuring actual behaviour rather than merely intention, the article furthermore contributes to the discussion over the participation of individuals in violent activism and gives empirical support to the dual-pathways model of collective action for the understanding of violent political action during times of crisis.
https://doi.org/10.1080/14616696.2019.1583356
Current literature on the economic determinants of... more https://doi.org/10.1080/14616696.2019.1583356
Current literature on the economic determinants of prejudice focuses on how relative deprivation might lead to bias by focusing on group perceptions, with little or no attention given to individual-level deprivation. We address this gap in literature by examining how relative and objective individual-level hardship affects generalised prejudice and suggest that both forms of deprivation lead to increase in a wide variety of out-group biases. We test our hypotheses with data from an original cross-national survey conducted in 2015 in nine European countries (N∼18,000) by applying multilevel models. We include macro-level measures of economic context, including measures of unemployment levels and GDP growth. We make a novel contribution to the growing literature on prejudice in European societies: our results are surprising and suggest that individuals experiencing deteriorating living standards are less likely to express generalised prejudice. We suggest that these findings can be explained using political psychology literature: recent studies suggest that low self-esteem increases altruistic behaviour and reduces the level of out-group bias. These findings open new avenues of research and suggest a new way of theorising the relationship between economic deprivation and prejudice.
https://doi.org/10.1080/14616696.2019.1584324
Analysing data from an original cross-national sur... more https://doi.org/10.1080/14616696.2019.1584324
Analysing data from an original cross-national survey conducted in 2015 in nine European democracies covering five different types of welfare regime and asking individuals a variety of questions on their deprivation during the crisis, this paper shows that there are important cross-national and cross-class inequalities in deprivation as reported by individuals in different social classes. Cross-nationally, deprivation patterns reflected the welfare regimes of the nine countries as well as the severity of the economic crisis. Working class individuals in countries that were not so deeply affected by the crisis were generally found to be worse off than middle class individuals in countries that were more deeply affected. Semi/unskilled manual classes were found to be the most deprived and class differentials were diminished but not accounted for in multilevel models including a series of controls linked to risk factors and socio-demographic position. At the macro-level, higher inequality as measured by the Gini coefficient was associated with higher levels of reported deprivation. However, cross-level interaction tests did not provide evidence that being in semi/unskilled manual occupations has a further heightened effect on reported deprivation in contexts of higher inequality or lower social spending.
https://doi.org/10.1057/s41269-017-0072-y
In this paper we analyse whether relative deprivation ... more https://doi.org/10.1057/s41269-017-0072-y
In this paper we analyse whether relative deprivation has divergent effects on different types of social and political action. We expect that it will depress volunteering with parties as well as different types of conventional political participation more generally while stimulating volunteering with anti-cuts organisations and engagement in various kinds of protest activism. There is little research into how relative deprivation impacts on different types of social and political action from the wide range of activities available to citizens in contemporary democracies as well as into how this relationship might vary based on the wider economic context. While many studies construct scales, we examine participation in specific activities and associations, such as parties or anti-cuts organisations, voting, contacting, demonstrating and striking to show that deprivation has divergent effects that depart from what is traditionally argued. We apply random effects models with cross-level interactions utilizing an original cross-national European dataset collected in 2015 (N = 17,667) within a collaborative funded-project. We show that a negative economic context has a mobilizing effect by both increasing the stimulating effect of relative deprivation on protest activism as well as by closing or reversing the gap between resource-poor and resource-rich groups for volunteering with parties and voting.
https://doi.org/10.1111/polp.12160
Since the 1980s, Britain's two largest political parties have... more https://doi.org/10.1111/polp.12160
Since the 1980s, Britain's two largest political parties have been converging ever closer on the political spectrum, in line with a Downsian model of two party majoritarian systems. While both Labour and the Conservatives have been moving toward consensus, we investigate the extent to which the recent financial crisis, understood as a critical juncture, interrupted this movement. Using a “fuzzy set” ideal type analysis with claims-making data, we assess whether or not we can detect any signs of this consensus breaking down as a result of the crisis and the events which followed. Our results show that despite this most critical event, consensus was maintained as we found both parties adopting very similar framing and narrating strategies on the economic crisis in their public discourse. The study concludes that the shared discursive framing and narrating between both parties on the crisis demonstrates a continued Thatcherite, neoliberal consensus in British politics.
https://doi.org/10.1111/polp.12161
Using political claims analysis on 1,000 articles from five n... more https://doi.org/10.1111/polp.12161
Using political claims analysis on 1,000 articles from five national newspapers (Daily Mail, The Sun, The Times, The Guardian, and Daily Mirror), this article demonstrates that press coverage of the financial crisis, recession, and austerity in the United Kingdom between 2007-14 drew heavily on a neoliberal discourse. Political, market, and civil society actors discussed the impact of hard times on people using a reductionist neoliberal narrative, framing people as “economic actors” and consistently underplaying any social or political traits. By examining communicative, rather than coordinative, discourse this research expands the focus of previous studies which have examined the embeddedness of ideology in society, and highlights potential links to studies of citizen participation and mobilization.
Book Chapters by Sotirios Karampampas
Russia and the Future of Europe: Views from the Capitals, 2022
While Russia’s image in the West has been traditionally negative since the Soviet era, Greece has... more While Russia’s image in the West has been traditionally negative since the Soviet era, Greece has been one of the few exceptions to the rule. Indeed, support for Russia has been recurrently high among Greeks, with 57.5% and 67% of the population, according to the most recently available data (2017), holding a favourable opinion of Russia and President Putin, respectively. Greeks’ peculiar Russophilia can be explained by the critical role that Russia played during the Greek War of Independence (1821–1829) and the cultural heritage that the two nations share due to their common Christian Orthodox faith. Greece’s special relationship with Russia has also been criticised within NATO and EU circles, as Greece was the first NATO country to purchase military material from Moscow (2007), provoking accusations of being Russia’s ‘Trojan horse’ within the EU.
9781472461469_text.3d; 9 Rethinking transformative events to understand the making of new content... more 9781472461469_text.3d; 9 Rethinking transformative events to understand the making of new contentious performances: The "autonomous left" and the anti-fascist blockade in Lund 1991 ANDRÉS BRINK PINTO AND JOHAN PRIES 10 The radical left movement, revolutionary groups, and Syriza: Framing militant dissidence during the Greek crisis SOTIRIOS KARAMPAMPAS 11 Diffusion of radical repertoires across Europe: The arrival of insurrectionary anarchism to Finland
Dissertations by Sotirios Karampampas
This thesis addresses a major issue in contentious politics. Why are revolutionary groups resilie... more This thesis addresses a major issue in contentious politics. Why are revolutionary groups resilient in Greece? Greece has experienced regular instances of political violence in the past decades – from low-level phenomena, such as vandalisms, riots and clashes with the police, to high-level occurrences, such as the operation of clandestine groups. Particularly critical has been the rise of a series of revolutionary groups from the 1960s onwards. Identified as clandestine left-wing groups that organise underground and use violent methods to disrupt the political system and cause radical political change, revolutionary groups have been one of the most enduring challenges faced by the modern Greek state. By employing mixed methods for a deep analysis of the phenomenon’s causes in Greece, this thesis shows how the emergence of the revolutionary groups can be traced back in the military junta’s era (1967 – 1974) – making Greece the oldest and most protracted case of revolutionary violence in Europe, and one of the most resilient globally. To trace the phenomenon, this thesis follows a relational analytical approach (McAdam, Tarrow and Tilly 2001; Alimi, Demetriou and Bosi 2015) that emphasises the role of mechanisms and posits the content of interactions as key to the understanding of groups’ violence. Based on a comparative design across generations of armed groups and the study of their communiqués, this research provides a detailed analysis of the mechanisms that facilitated the radicalisation process of two different revolutionary groups: the Popular Revolutionary Resistance (LEA) (1965 – 1974) and the Revolutionary Organisation November 17 (17N) (1975 – 2002). By combining a process-oriented approach with an analysis of the groups’ collective action frames and framing strategies, this thesis traces the similarities and dissimilarities of the two contentious episodes, revealing the recurring mechanisms that triggered the revolutionary groups’ emergence, resilience and decline in Greece.
Book Reviews by Sotirios Karampampas
Karampampas, S. (2021), “Review of The Historical Roots of Political Violence: Revolutionary Violence in Affluent Countries, by I. Sánchez-Cuenca.”
Critical Studies on Terrorism, 2021
Karampampas, S. (2020), “Review of Street Citizens: Protest Politics and Social Movement Activism in the Age of Globalization, by M. Giugni and M. Grasso.”
Democratization, 2020
Karampampas, S. (2020), “Review of Becoming a Movement: Identity, Narrative and Memory in the European Global Justice Movement, by P. Daphi.”
Social Movement Studies, 2020
Social Movement Studies, 2017
The British Journal of Sociology, 2016
Southeast European and Black Sea Studies, 2014
Uploads
Papers by Sotirios Karampampas
The recent economic crisis has witnessed a surge in demonstrations and other protest actions all over Europe, while in the most affected countries-such as Greece-the use of personal violence and damage of property became an everyday phenomenon. What are the drivers of violent political action in times of crisis? How do these drivers interact? And to what extent does context matter? These questions are examined in the light of a new and original survey data set carried out across nine European countries, all affected to different degrees by the financial crisis. Four theoretical paradigms from social movement research that account for violent political action are examined. This study looks beyond the staple explanations of relative deprivation and resource mobilisation, expands the analysis to include a relational approach-namely, conflictual irrelevance-and explores the soundness of an inte-grative approach that attempts to reconcile the traditional divide between grievance and resource-based models. By measuring actual behaviour rather than merely intention, the article furthermore contributes to the discussion over the participation of individuals in violent activism and gives empirical support to the dual-pathways model of collective action for the understanding of violent political action during times of crisis.
Current literature on the economic determinants of prejudice focuses on how relative deprivation might lead to bias by focusing on group perceptions, with little or no attention given to individual-level deprivation. We address this gap in literature by examining how relative and objective individual-level hardship affects generalised prejudice and suggest that both forms of deprivation lead to increase in a wide variety of out-group biases. We test our hypotheses with data from an original cross-national survey conducted in 2015 in nine European countries (N∼18,000) by applying multilevel models. We include macro-level measures of economic context, including measures of unemployment levels and GDP growth. We make a novel contribution to the growing literature on prejudice in European societies: our results are surprising and suggest that individuals experiencing deteriorating living standards are less likely to express generalised prejudice. We suggest that these findings can be explained using political psychology literature: recent studies suggest that low self-esteem increases altruistic behaviour and reduces the level of out-group bias. These findings open new avenues of research and suggest a new way of theorising the relationship between economic deprivation and prejudice.
Analysing data from an original cross-national survey conducted in 2015 in nine European democracies covering five different types of welfare regime and asking individuals a variety of questions on their deprivation during the crisis, this paper shows that there are important cross-national and cross-class inequalities in deprivation as reported by individuals in different social classes. Cross-nationally, deprivation patterns reflected the welfare regimes of the nine countries as well as the severity of the economic crisis. Working class individuals in countries that were not so deeply affected by the crisis were generally found to be worse off than middle class individuals in countries that were more deeply affected. Semi/unskilled manual classes were found to be the most deprived and class differentials were diminished but not accounted for in multilevel models including a series of controls linked to risk factors and socio-demographic position. At the macro-level, higher inequality as measured by the Gini coefficient was associated with higher levels of reported deprivation. However, cross-level interaction tests did not provide evidence that being in semi/unskilled manual occupations has a further heightened effect on reported deprivation in contexts of higher inequality or lower social spending.
In this paper we analyse whether relative deprivation has divergent effects on different types of social and political action. We expect that it will depress volunteering with parties as well as different types of conventional political participation more generally while stimulating volunteering with anti-cuts organisations and engagement in various kinds of protest activism. There is little research into how relative deprivation impacts on different types of social and political action from the wide range of activities available to citizens in contemporary democracies as well as into how this relationship might vary based on the wider economic context. While many studies construct scales, we examine participation in specific activities and associations, such as parties or anti-cuts organisations, voting, contacting, demonstrating and striking to show that deprivation has divergent effects that depart from what is traditionally argued. We apply random effects models with cross-level interactions utilizing an original cross-national European dataset collected in 2015 (N = 17,667) within a collaborative funded-project. We show that a negative economic context has a mobilizing effect by both increasing the stimulating effect of relative deprivation on protest activism as well as by closing or reversing the gap between resource-poor and resource-rich groups for volunteering with parties and voting.
Since the 1980s, Britain's two largest political parties have been converging ever closer on the political spectrum, in line with a Downsian model of two party majoritarian systems. While both Labour and the Conservatives have been moving toward consensus, we investigate the extent to which the recent financial crisis, understood as a critical juncture, interrupted this movement. Using a “fuzzy set” ideal type analysis with claims-making data, we assess whether or not we can detect any signs of this consensus breaking down as a result of the crisis and the events which followed. Our results show that despite this most critical event, consensus was maintained as we found both parties adopting very similar framing and narrating strategies on the economic crisis in their public discourse. The study concludes that the shared discursive framing and narrating between both parties on the crisis demonstrates a continued Thatcherite, neoliberal consensus in British politics.
Using political claims analysis on 1,000 articles from five national newspapers (Daily Mail, The Sun, The Times, The Guardian, and Daily Mirror), this article demonstrates that press coverage of the financial crisis, recession, and austerity in the United Kingdom between 2007-14 drew heavily on a neoliberal discourse. Political, market, and civil society actors discussed the impact of hard times on people using a reductionist neoliberal narrative, framing people as “economic actors” and consistently underplaying any social or political traits. By examining communicative, rather than coordinative, discourse this research expands the focus of previous studies which have examined the embeddedness of ideology in society, and highlights potential links to studies of citizen participation and mobilization.
Book Chapters by Sotirios Karampampas
Dissertations by Sotirios Karampampas
Book Reviews by Sotirios Karampampas