THE RISE AND FALL OF ARYAN NATIONS: A RESOURCE MOBILIZATION PERSPECTIVE

This paper uses McCarthy and Zald's (1977) resource mobilization perspective to explain the rise and fall of Aryan Nations (AN), an Idaho-based, white separatist organization that disintegrated upon the death of its founder, Richard Butler. Primary data were collected through 1) participant-observation at the group's annual World Congress and Aryan Youth Assembly, 1991 through 2004, and 2) interviews with former members about AN's social organization during its peak years in the early eighties. AN's Congress and Youth Assembly are analyzed as frame alignment strategies (Snow et al. 1986), using Goffman's (1959) dramaturgical model. The data suggest that AN's initial success can be attributed to internal organizational strengths and a benign external environment. However, an exodus of core members in the mid-eighties, triggered by adverse external developments, severely weakened the organization. Disintegration accelerated during the nineties, making it increasingly difficult for the group to mobilize the internal resources necessary for its frame alignment efforts to be effective. Although AN's demise has been attributed to a lawsuit that bankrupted the organization, the data reveal that AN had been on the verge of collapse for many years before the suit was filed.