Covert political organizing is a vital means by which subordinate groups express grievances against authorities or elites. This article develops an understanding of the process of covert organizing to show how the selection of an organizational structure is a strategic decision. Using original, archival data from the Mattachine Society, a homosexual organization founded in 1950, and the affiliated Mattachine Foundation, I show how the structure of the organizations enabled leaders to segment their audiences and adapt to challenges from outside and inside the group. In particular, I use the concept of a loosely coupled system, emphasizing relations between organizations, to show how organizations can work with varying degrees of discretion. Moreover, building off analytically similar cases in the literature, I demonstrate that a loosely coupled system enables both organizational flexibility and covert political action.

中文翻译：

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隐藏在众目睽睽之下：Mattachine Society 使用松散耦合作为秘密政治行动的策略

隐蔽的政治组织是下属团体表达对权威或精英的不满的重要手段。本文通过对隐蔽组织过程的理解来展示组织结构的选择如何成为一项战略决策。使用来自于 1950 年成立的同性恋组织 Mattachine Society 和附属的 Mattachine 基金会的原始档案数据，我展示了这些组织的结构如何使领导者能够细分受众并适应来自团体内外的挑战。特别是，我使用松散耦合系统的概念，强调组织之间的关系，来展示组织如何以不同程度的自由裁量权工作。此外，在文献中分析相似的案例的基础上，