ABSTRACT
This chapter examines how an analysis of the processes of what McCarthy and Zald call 'resource mobilisation' has explanatory power for money-focused social movements. It explores how the American approach only takes analysis so far. The chapter also examines how the best elements of the two schools might be combined into a more convincing analysis. The American school conceptualises social movement actors as seeking to influence, change or overthrow political structures – i.e. with an articulation on political society. Resource Mobilisation Theory privileges the organising processes that lead to the development of social movement organisations operating within a social movement. The American school is a useful place to start to conceptualise Local Exchange Trading Schemes (LETS) as a social movement. New Social Movement theorists envisage a postmodern society where the large decisions about what this society is going to mean are as yet undecided.
