The growing interdependence on a global scale which characterizes the human condition at the turn of the century constitutes a challenge for both the mobilization of social movements and social movement theory. The present volume makes an attempt to adjust the perspective of the political process approach to a world in which political opportunities, mobilizing structures, framing processes and collective action of social movements are no longer confined to national political contexts.

ROBERT D. BENFORD Associate Professor of Sociology, University of Nebraska-Lincoln, USA MYRA MARX FERREE Professor of Sociology, University of Connecticut, USA WILLIAM A. GAMSON Professor of Sociology, Boston College, USA and Co-director of the Media Research and Action Project (MRAP) DOUG IMIG Member of the Department of Political Science, University of Memphis, USA and Visiting Scholar, Weatherhead Center for International Affairs, Harvard University BERT KLANDERMANS Professor in Applied Social Psychology, Free University, Amsterdam, the Netherlands RUUD KOOPMANS Senior Researcher, Wissenschaftszentrum Berlin fuer Sozialforschung (WZB) CHRISTIAN LAHUSEN Assistant Professor, Department of Sociology, Otto-Friedrich-University of Bamberg, Germany GARY MARKS Professor of Political Science and Director of the Center for European Studies, University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill, USA DOUG MCADAM Professor of Sociology, University of Arizona, USA JOHN D. MCCARTHY Professor of Sociology, Pennsylvania State University, USA CLARK MCPHAIL Professor of Sociology, University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign, USA FLORENCE PASSY Assistant Professor, Department of Political Science, University of Geneva, Switzerland JACKIE SMITH Assistant Professor of Sociology, State University of New York, Stony Brook, USA DAVID A. SNOW Professor of Sociology, University of Arizona, USA SIDNEY TARROW Maxwell M. Upson Professor of Government, Cornell University, USA MARGA DE WEERD Phd student of applied social psychology, Free University, Amsterdam, the Netherlands.