Generally, much of the research conducted in environmental sociology focuses on the roles of
environmental social movement organizations (ESMOs) in society and their relationships with corporations
and government. This has often focused on the capabilities and selection of tactics in
populations of environmental organizations with a critical eye on the institutionalization and cooptation
of the movement. Mitchell (1979) led the way in focusing on organizations in the U.S.
environmental movement in his analysis of large national organizations making up the environmental
lobby. He focused on the institutional tactics, such as litigation and lobbying, undertaken by
organizations like Natural Resources Defense Council and Sierra Club and their successful use of
mail campaigns. Brulle (2000) identifies the organizational environmental movement using a database
of U.S. environmental organizations (as registered as tax-exempt organizations with the IRS)
to analyze why the U.S. environmental movement has not attained the levels of social change seen
in other nations. He concludes that organizational capacities for social learning as needed for communicative
action are limited by the organizational characteristics found within the environmental
movement: (a) competing and disparate organizational discourses between organizations and a lack
of an unifying frame, (b) movement organization ties to business and foundations that result in
cooptation, and (c) external ties facilitate need for centralized management, professionalization,
and mass mailings that limit democratic participation in organizations. An investigation of these
conclusions in a cross-national comparative perspective, comparing movement organizational characteristics
with environmental policy and environmental outcomes across nations, could strengthen
the case that organizational movement’s characteristics are responsible for the weaker U.S. environmental
policies. These conclusions are supported by Mertig, Dunlap, and Morrison’s (2001) findings
as well. More recently, Brulle and Jenkins have continued this focus on studying environmental
movement organizations in relation to the strength of civil society and the impacts of foundation
funding (Brulle & Jenkins, 2005, 2006).