Understanding Civil Society Through Legalize Marijuana Organizations

¶ … Civil Society Through "Legalize Marijuana" Organizations

As microcosms of civil society, collective action groups operate with processes used by civil society but with uniquely tailored processes and results. The National Organization for Reform of Marijuana Laws (NORML) is one example of a collective action group that has used these processes to establish itself, grow, survive and currently flourish. Through intelligent framing, effective resource mobilization and wise use of political opportunity, NORML's 40+year history has resulted in growth from an idea supported by a few people to a well-funded and assertive national movement. This work will attempt to show NORML'S accurate reflection of successful civil society by reviewing research on civil society and collective action groups, reviewing NORML's history, and applying the research to NORML.

Analysis:

Collective Action Group as a Microcosm of Civil Society

Framing processes are a central dynamic, along with resource mobilization and political opportunity processes, for understanding civil society and social movements as a microcosm of civil society (Benford & Snow, 2000, p. 612). "Frames help to render events or occurrences meaningful and thereby function to organize experience and guide action" (Benford & Snow, 2000, p. 614). Flowing from that definition, "collective action frames are action-oriented sets of beliefs and meanings that inspire and legitimate the activities and campaigns of a social movement organization (SMO)" (Benford & Snow, 2000, p. 614). In studying frames, experts have found that collective action frames are the result of: action, because "something is being done"; process, because it is a "dynamic, evolving process"; agency, because the work of movement organizations or activists is evolving; contentious, because the process creates frames that are different from and may challenge existing frames (Benford & Snow, 2000, p. 614). Collective action frames have two characteristics: core framing tasks and discursive processes. Core framing tasks have three components: diagnostic framing, consisting of identifying and attributing problems; prognostic framing, consisting of predicting outcomes and essentially refuting opponents' solutions while supporting the group's solutions; motivational framing, consisting of "rationale for engaging in ameliorative collective action" (Benford & Snow, 2000, pp. 615-617). Discursive processes consist of the members' communications about their activities (Benford & Snow, 2000, p. 623), and their specific components are: frame articulation and frame amplification or punctuation (Benford & Snow, 2000, p. 623). Frame articulation involves connecting events and experience so they are unified and compelling; the uniqueness of a collective action frame's articulation is that it gives a new vision, viewpoint and interpretation of events and experience (Benford & Snow, 2000, p. 623). Frame amplification/punctuation consists of the emphasis of issues, events or beliefs, often by slogans (Benford & Snow, 2000, p. 623).

Experts have also found that "frames are developed, generated, and elaborated on & #8230;also by way of three sets of overlapping processes that can be conceptualized as discursive, strategic, and contested" (Benford & Snow, 2000, p. 623). As mentioned above, discursive processes are communications by members about their activities by frame articulation and frame punctuation. Strategic processes are utilitarian processes directed at achieving specific purposes, such as gaining new members or funding (Benford & Snow, 2000, p. 624), by "frame alignment processes" that link the group's interests and frames with the interests and frames of the target groups, such as prospective members and/or prospective benefactors (Benford & Snow, 2000, p. 624). There are four basic frame alignment processes: frame bridging, which connects the two groups' frames; frame amplification, which involves the "idealization, embellishment, clarification or invigoration" of the group's beliefs; frame extension, which consists of presenting the group's interests and frames as though they include issues and concerns of the target group; and frame transformation, which consists of changing old meanings and creating new ones (Benford & Snow, 2000, pp. 624-625). Contested processes are the "development, generation and elaboration" of a collective action group's frames. The group must face a number of challenges, which are usually presented by: "counterframing" by outsiders, such as opponents, observers and media, who publicly challenge the group's frame; frame disputes within the group when there are internal disagreements about diagnoses and/or prognoses; conflict between the group's frames and events which may contradict and/or undercut those frames (Benford & Snow, 2000, pp. 625-626). Frame diffusion, or the spread of one movement's ideas, frames and practices to another movement or culture, occurs through: strategic selection, in which the receiving movement or culture acts as an agent for the diffusion and selects and adapts an element of the first movement's ideas, frames and/or practices; strategic fitting, in which the transferor acts as an agent for the diffusion by selecting and adapting an element of its ideas, frames and/or practices into the new movement (Benford & Snow, 2000, p. 627).

Frames for a viable group, including a viable collective action group, are constantly undergoing changes. This dynamic process is attributed to 3 forces: political opportunity, which is based on the structure/restructure and "informal relations" of a political system and can facilitate or constrain the collective action group; cultural opportunities and constraints, which are based on a cultural "tool kit" of "meanings, beliefs, ideologies, practices, values, myths, narratives and the like" from which the collective action group draws meaning and creates new meaning as the culture and the collective action group's frames continually interact and alter each other; audience effects, in which the collective action group alters its action frames to communicate effectively with a target audience, which can facilitate or constrain the collective action group's frame. (Benford & Snow, 2000, pp. 629-630). A collective action group's framing activity also affects its other processes and outcomes in three aspects: political opportunities, in that collective action framing suggests that there are opportunities for change, that the individual has power to change his/her history, and that pro-opportunity framing can actually create political opportunity in a "self-fulfilling prophecy"; individual and collective identity, in that the participant's personal identity can be enlarged and fulfilled by participation in the collective identity and framing; specific-movement outcomes, in that "that for some movements, framing processes are critical to the attainment of desired outcomes" (Benford & Snow, 2000, pp. 631-632).

Resource mobilization, which is also a central dynamic of civil society and of collective action groups as a microcosm of civil society. Resource mobilization involves the "dynamics and tactics of social movement growth, decline, and change" (McCarthy & Zald, May 1977, p. 1213). Emphasizing both society's support and constraint of social movements, resource mobilization focuses on the resources that must be mobilized, connections among social movements and groups, the group's dependence on external support, and authorities' tactics to manage or absorb the group (McCarthy & Zald, May 1977, p. 1213). The support base for such groups are not necessarily based on the hardship of the supposed beneficiaries and at times the providers of resources such as money, facilities and labor do not necessarily share the group's values. (McCarthy & Zald, May 1977, p. 1216). The tactics used by groups for mobilizing resources may include encouraging cooperating within the group, energizing its supporters, neutralizing opposition, transforming the public into sympathizers and measurable achievement of goals (McCarthy & Zald, May 1977, p. 1217). In relation to larger society, the group uses the society's infrastructures -- such as media and social networks -- to mobilize resources (McCarthy & Zald, May 1977, p. 1223).

A Brief History of NORML

The National Organization for Reform of Marijuana Laws (NORML) was founded in Washington, D.C. In 1970 by an attorney named Keith Stroup (Sinclair, 2010) and initially had a somewhat conservative, lawyerly approach of decriminalizing the use of marijuana (Sinclair, 2010). In that same year, "Amorphia: The Cannabis Cooperative," a California-based collective action group, was reportedly formed by Blair Newman (Sinclair, 2010). It appears that Amorphia, a more free-wheeling organization with the slogan of "Let it Grow!" And the objective of "free legal backyard marijuana," was initially the stronger of the two organizations. Amorphia certainly operated on the belief that the liberalization of systems helps 'resurrect civil society'" (Arat, 1994, p. 242). Soon joined by Michael Aldrich (NORML and The NORML Foundation, 2008) and by Frank Richards, Amorphia was dedicated to a marijuana legalization and decriminalization movement (Newman, Aldrich, & Richards, 1971). Funded by the sale of Acapulco Golf brand rolling papers, Amorphia used "media campaign, a news service, a speakers' bureau, court tests of pot laws, and funding expert witnesses to appear before state legislatures to lobby for legalization," intending to serve the public by legalizing Marijuana and serve its own members by dipping into the estimated $3 billion/year marijuana industry that would surely arrive by 1980 (Sinclair, 2010). Amorphia estimated that it would gross $500 million/year and devote $30 million/year to "social action."

Amorphia joined forces with two college professors named Leo Paoli and John Kaplan to create the California Marijuana Initiative, which led to California's first Proposition 19 in 1972. This first Proposition 19 was aimed at removing the criminal penalties for personal use of marijuana. Using a grass roots, all-volunteer force, and with the assistance of NORML, the 1972 Proposition 19 failed but did manage to garner 33% of the vote (Sinclair, 2010). From 1972 -- 1974, Amorphia began to founder, reportedly due to "trying to develop the first hemp rolling papers for U.S. distribution, a proposition that eventually swallowed up all available funds and sent Amorphia's legalization activities into a tailspin" (Sinclair, 2010). As Amorphia was failing, NORML was gathering strength, and in 1973 California NORML successfully lobbied for passage of the Moscone Act, eventually passed in 1975, and "decriminalizing" marijuana possession by reducing the criminal offense of possessing marijuana from a felony to a misdemeanor and imposing a maximum fine of $100 for possession of up to 1 ounce (Sinclair, 2010). Meanwhile, Amorphia's fortunes continued to drop and the organization was defunct and/or swallowed up by NORML in 1974 (Sinclair, 2010). Nevertheless, encouraged by the Moscone Act and by the election of Jimmy Carter to the U.S. Presidency in 1976, NORML continued to grow. Unfortunately, NORML and the entire movement endured a major blow when NORML's founder (Stroup) and Peter Bourne, the Carter Administration's drug policy director, were reported to have regularly snorted cocaine at White House parties (Sinclair, 2010). Widely spread by the media, the story is deemed to have set back the "legalize marijuana" movement and NORML for approximately 20 years because the hard drug image clashed with NORML's conservative, lawyerly approach to decriminalization and its portrayal of marijuana use as normal (Sinclair, 2010). During that relatively dormant period, NORML essentially referred people charged with marijuana possession to lawyers who could plea bargain for lesser pleas and punishments (Sinclair, 2010).

In 1996, the Medical Marijuana movement was born in California. Organized around the principle that medical patients who benefited from using marijuana should not be punished, Dennis Perrone in San Francisco and Scott Isler in Los Angeles mobilized AIDS patients and other medicinal marijuana users and led to the successful exemption of this population segment from prosecution and/or civil penalties for marijuana possession and use (Sinclair, 2010). NORML assisted in this effort and with the success came renewed vigor for NORML, which has since developed into chapters and lawyers in every State (NORML and The NORML Foundation, 2012). Energized by the success of the Medical Marijuana movement, NORML once again worked toward putting the legalization of marijuana on the California ballot. In 2010, California's 2nd Proposition 19 was on the ballot. Reportedly primarily bankrolled by Richard Lee, a medical marijuana seller in Oakland, CA, the 2010 Proposition 19 was aimed at legalizing recreational marijuana (Sanchez, 2010) and was defeated by a vote of 53.5% to 46.5% (California Choices, 2010). Despite the loss, the movement is encouraged by the millions of Californians who voted for Proposition 19 and has continued to mobilize resources and supporters in every State to eventually decriminalize the recreational use of marijuana (NORML and The NORML Foundation, 2012).

Application of Research to NORML

This work applies concepts of civil society and of a collective action group as a microcosm of civil society to NORML, an organization dedicated to the legalization of Marijuana in the United States. Applying civil society collective action group concepts to a specific organization "from the outside looking in" is difficult because groups are not necessarily transparent enough for complete review by a nonmember. Nevertheless, at least some of the concepts of civil society and collection action group dynamics can be applied to the "Legalize Marijuana" movement and NORML. Applying sociological group concepts to NORML, the group is clearly on the rise at this point in its history, has significantly contributed to social capital through its successful association with medical marijuana groups, for example, and accurately reflects accepted research on collective action frames. Though neither of California's Prop 19's passed, NORML has effectively "worked" the community and garnered millions of supporters who will form a basis for NORM's inevitable third California Prop 19.

NORML's history and current status dovetail with collective action framing and frames, one of the three central group dynamics, because it uses: action, by educating, funding, lobbying and legally promoting; process, because it has evolved from essentially one or more attorney's based in Washington, D.C. To a nationwide movement with chapters and attorneys in every State; agency, because its work as evolved from a conservative "decriminalization" organization to a nationwide movement that has supported the use of medical marijuana and recreational marijuana; contentious because it has consistently challenged the existing frame that marijuana use is abnormal and harmful. NORML's frames are action-oriented meanings and beliefs in the benefits of legalized marijuana, which have legitimized its efforts to legalize marijuana in every State. In supporting marijuana's legalization through its frame articulation, NORML has given new vision, viewpoint and interpretation of the marijuana and the legalization movement. Furthermore, NORML's frame amplification has emphasized the issues, events or beliefs regarding marijuana while generating, elaborating and diffusing its frames by: discursive processes, in that its members widely communicate through the website and publications, about its history and efforts to legalize marijuana; strategic processes by continually seeking through its website and publications to gain new members and funding; contested processes, by facing conflicts internally (for example, with the cocaine scandal involving its founder and devastating its power for 2 decades), and externally against "No-to-19" groups that opposed both of California's Proposition 19's. NORML has also engaged in frame diffusion throughout its history, both by strategic selection in teaming with Amorphia for California's first Proposition 19, and by strategic fitting in the multi-state balloting initiatives it sponsors.