Sociology of Discourse takes the perspective that collective actors like social movements are capable of creating social change from below by creating new institutions through alternative discourses. Institutionalization becomes a process of moving away from existing institutions towards creating new ones. While discourses entail openness and enable the questioning of what is instituted, institutions offer continuity and stability to social mobilizations. This dual movement of openness and stabilization explains how social struggles ensure their continuity, without completely assuming the logic of the dominant order. The book proposes an analytical model of social change, which is unfolded through three intertwined areas: discourse, communication, and institution. Collective experiences of social change, from the anti-globalization movement to Occupy, illustrate the main theoretical points and concepts. Through the example of the Platform for People Affected by Mortgages, the book concludes by analyzing how social change from below is possible.

Giuseppe Cocco, Federal University of Rio de Janeiro:
One of the main goals of this book is to ask how social movements ensure continuity. Óscar García Agustín proposes to find the answer to this question in the theoretical problematization of the relations between discourse and institutionalization. Now, the constituent processes of anti-globalization and occupy movements also have a book, a sociological reflection of adequate impetus to the analysis of the different components of the movement. The end of the book could not be happier, by introducing the case of the PAH, being both about social unionism and municipalism and from which we can immediately learn about the constituent role of discursive practices. The constituent process is not a fixation of social change but rather its affirmation, always remaining open. It is not the measure of change in terms of success or failure that is interesting, but the renewed dynamics of the constituent power.