'Stretching the elastic': Anti-war and pacifist activist representations of war, peace and social change

A large body of research has utilised social representations theory (Moscovici, 1961/76) to explore the ways in which people conceptualise and understand war and peace in a variety of contexts (e.g. O‘Dwyer, Lyons & Cohrs, 2016; Sarrica & Contarello, 2004). Meta-representations, defined as the particular understandings which we attribute to others, have been put forward as central to the process of social change (Elcheroth, Doise & Reicher, 2011). This study used interview data with peace activists in the United Kingdom to explore lay understandings of social change. It examined the strategies they used to counter dominant representations of war (e.g. as inevitable or as abstract or impossible to challenge), encourage alternative representations and foster war-critical attitudes among other groups in society.