Introduction

This collection is dedicated to the dynamic radical social movements that have mushroomed since the late 1980s, and the social and political critiques and alternatives they have inspired. The radicalism of these movements is broadly defined by the advancement of a politics that challenges existing institutional arrangements, by an ethics supporting the disruption of the status quo, and by the interaction of theory and practice. We do not explore frames of action or cultures of protest, nor do we examine the socio-economic, cultural and political contexts in which activism takes place, or the spaces allowed for the expression of transgressive ideas. These are all well documented in a substantial and growing body of work (Flesher Fominaya, 2014; della Porta, 2015) and across the movement-facing research of academic journals like Interface, Antipode, Social Movement Studies and The Journal for the Study of Radicalism. Instead, the collection concentrates on the ways that radical politics is theorised through practice, and on the perspectives of the actual groups who participate in radical politics.