Wellness Domain: Personal

“Implicit in recent scholarly debates about the efficacy of methods of warfare is the assumption that the most effective means of waging political struggle entails violence. Among political scientists, the prevailing view is that opposition movements select violent methods because such means are more effective than nonviolent strategies at achieving policy goals. Despite these assumptions, from 2000 to 2006 organized civilian populations successfully employed nonviolent methods including boycotts, strikes, protests, and organized noncooperation to challenge entrenched power and exact political concessions in Serbia (2000), Madagascar (2002), Georgia (2003) and Ukraine (2004–05), Lebanon (2005), and Nepal (2006). The success of these nonviolent campaigns—especially in light of the enduring violent insurgencies occurring in some of the same countries—begs systematic investigation.” 38 page pdf

“Black bloc tactics have received much praise in recent weeks, but there are many valid questions about their effectiveness that we ignore at our own peril…I believe we can build such a movement. One that is grounded in nonviolence, but is just as powerful and militant as violence. That, however, requires work, strategy and training. Violence is easier, faster and more natural to us. Its dynamics are simpler to understand. “I make you suffer until you give in.” But now is not the time to get seduced by the short-term. We need to continue to train and grow, to have the humility to be self-critical, and to objectively evaluate our tactics and strategies. We need to continue to build a movement to transform violence.”

“It took years for King to understand nonviolence not merely as a moral force, but as an effective strategy for leveraging political change. Yet his embrace of that idea allowed him to shape history. Few are aware that Martin Luther King, Jr. once applied for a permit to carry a concealed handgun…To not merely adopt pacifism as a personal philosophy, but rather to stake your career and your organization’s future on a belief in the power of nonviolence as a political force, requires tremendous determination. It took years of deliberation and delay for Martin Luther King to take such a step. But when he finally did, the result was decisive: King went from being someone who had been repeatedly swept up in the saga of civil rights — a reluctant protagonist in the battle against American apartheid — to being a shaper of history.”