Since the beginning of the recent crisis, accounts of the everyday and anti-austerity forms of collective action are presented in a wide variety of approaches within the field of Social Movement Studies and the theory of the Commons. Undeniably, on the one hand, social movement studies’ attention to the external political environment as well as the micro-level of activists and the meso-level of organizational formats offer important insights regarding the context of mobilization and the raise of collective claims. On the other hand, various conceptualizations of the commons setting their locus on the trans-local level, provide a conceptual toolbox to understand bottom-up practices and logics that move beyond the state and market solutions. In this respect, both disciplines highlight loose organizational forms, the construction of alternative communities and collective imaginaries. Nevertheless, by using different explanatory frames, the two literatures seem to remain unconnected and ignore each other. Against this background, a crucial task for this paper, and one that has been largely neglected, is to rethink social movement studies and the theory of the commons in light of one another. This paper aspires to develop a synthetic theoretical perspective focusing on three main aspects. First, our analysis grapples with a set of concepts addressed in both literatures and seeks to highlight how a conceptual synthesis can sharpen and re-politicize the theorization of contemporary collective action at the everyday level. Second, we shed light on the main methodological and conceptual advantages and inconsistencies of the two literatures in shaping the explanation of current organizational formats and repertoires of action. Third, we consider the radical usages and limitations of the two literatures and their relation with respect to institutional and state agents. This theoretical contribution aspires to further assist the study of collective phenomena and minimize the distance that divides the two literatures.
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