William & Mary Journal of Race, Gender, and Social Justice
Abstract
This Article investigates how the Black Lives Matter (BLM) movement leveraged social media and mass protest to generate cultural, legal, and policy change in the United States. Using Twitter conversation and protest data, we build on a previously developed model which traces the progression from online discourse to structural change. We focus in particular on the link between the second and fourth stages of our model and the relationship between protest and policy changes, examining how the protests of summer 2020 influenced state and local legislative action over the following year. Our analysis reviews that large-scale demonstrations built political pressure that translated into reforms aimed at individual accountability, institutional restructuring, and systemic change. At the same time, these reforms remain uneven and fragile, as federal action has largely stalled and backlash policies threaten to entrench existing inequalities.
Repository Citation
Jamillah Bowman Williams, Naomi Mezey, and Lisa Singh, #BlackLivesMatter: From Protest to Policy, 28 Wm. & Mary J. Race, Gender, & Soc. Just. 103 (2021), https://scholarship.law.wm.edu/wmjowl/vol28/iss1/6Included in
Law and Race Commons, Law Enforcement and Corrections Commons, State and Local Government Law Commons