The Limitations of Strategic Nonviolence

One of the great human achievements of the twentieth century was the refinement of civilian resistance. As generally understood, this means the organization of sustained mass nonviolent actions -- protest, noncooperation, disobedience, and intervention -- to force political change, usually at the national level. In some remarkable cases, campaigns of noncooperation and civil disobedience ousted entrenched and repressive dictatorships in a matter of days. Other nonviolent resistance movements succeeded after years of struggle, and some failed in their attempts to depose unwanted regimes. The achievement, though, was cumulative, as activists and scholars learned from the successes and failures of previous movements so that, by century's end, a body of knowledge was available to resistance leaders who no longer had to 'reinvent the wheel'; nonviolent campaigns now included careful strategizing and training, not simply spontaneous uprisings. The limitations of successful civilian resistance movements are, however, often overlooked. Adapted from the source document.