I think we need to talk about the #Chenoweth 3.5% thing a bit, because it's kind of important right now.
I'm not an academic & haven't crunched the study, but with that caveat I don't see EC talking about being nonviolent at any cost. My read is non-violent strategy = protests & strikes vs. violent strategy = guns & bombs.
Tactics can get violent, e.g. in self-defense or if Bad Guys™️ have occupied a locale & have to be routed by force, but this does not equal a violent uprising.
OK?
On Thursday, I, along with some 4,500 others, tuned in to one of Indivisible’s weekly Zoom meetings led by Indivisible founders
#Ezra #Levin and
#Leah #Greenberg. There are about 1,600 local Indivisible groups scattered around the country
-- and more are springing up each day.
“Throughout history,” said Levin, “there has been no solution to creeping authoritarianism other than all of us — mass, broad-based organizing from people all over the country, from all walks life.”
“If your ideas are popular and you have a mandate for change,” Greenberg said
“you do not hide from your constituents.
We are the ones who are out there,
who are unafraid and organizing and showing up in public because our ideas are popular.
When people hear what we have to say, they want that, not them.”
The April 5 protests are meant to be a show of strength.
“‘Hands Off,’” said Greenberg, “is a message about everything that is happening, right?
It’s hands off Medicaid,
hands off our democracy,
hands off Social Security,
hands off our environment,
hands off veterans benefits.”
Now, for those who think that firebombing Tesla dealerships is a better tactic than nonviolent protests,
I would remind you of the world-changing work of Gandhi and the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr.
And I would also tell you about the work of Harvard political scientist #Erica #Chenoweth and her colleagues.
To Chenoweth’s surprise — shock, actually — she discovered that over time, nonviolent protests are far more successful than violent ones.
Between 1900 and 2006, she says, campaigns of nonviolent civil resistance were twice as successful as violent campaigns.
She also came up with the so-called 3.5% rule:
No government can withstand a challenge from around 3.5% of its population without accommodating the movement.
Die immer schon große Wirksamkeit gewaltfreien Widerstands geht in letzter Zeit zurück. Erica #Chenoweth macht dafür u.a. die zunehmende Nutzung nichtföderaler sozialer Medien verantwortlich: "Die zunehmende Abhängigkeit der Aktivisten vom Internet erleichtert es, das Entstehen des Widerstands frühzeitig zu entdecken, wichtige Teilnehmer und Organisatoren zu identifizieren, diese Netzwerke zu stören und sie daran zu hindern, sich erfolgreich zu organisieren."
https://www.telepolis.de/features/Revolution-ohne-Blut-Warum-Gewaltlosigkeit-der-wahre-Gamechanger-ist-10309425.html
Interesting read, this #BBC article that, based on research by Erica #Chenoweth (Harvard), states that:
- civil disobedience is not only the moral choice; it is also the most powerful way of shaping world #politics – by a long way.
- it takes (only) around 3.5% of the population actively participating to ensure serious political change.
- #nonviolent campaigns led to political change 53% of the time compared to 26% for violent #protests.
https://www.bbc.com/future/article/20190513-it-only-takes-35-of-people-to-change-the-world
Thanks @jwcph, for the link.
> Chenoweth is a hugely influential scholar of nonviolent social change, best known for their empirical research that not only documents what makes civil resistance work but demonstrates that it works, often extremely effectively. They direct the Nonviolent Action Lab, which studies how people have built movements and developed strategies to resist authoritarianism successfully ..
#Chenoweth #Solnit #NonviolentSocialChange #Nonviolence
@bsmall2@writing.exchange
Kadootje voor jullie.
Omdat Kristin #Chenoweth hilarisch is, en omdat ze waanzinnig zingt en omdat dit nummer briljant is.
En omdat ik eraan moest denken in deze chaotische tijden met #Twitvluchtelingen en de verwarring die dit soms geeft met alle verschillende uhm… communicatiestijlen.
Enjoy!
