regulatory), financial (cash, loans, stocks, bonds), technological (central electric plants and grid), educational (standards and credentials).! Formal power usually takes the form of officiallooking sheets of paper, but paper is ultimately backed by brute force: threats to foreclose, repossess, confiscate, sue, arrest, jail, bomb, disconnect, excommunicate, execute. !!! Informal clout relies instead on voluntary influence.! You've heard the sayings "the power of a good example," "knowledge is power,"! "power in numbers," "spiritual power."! There's also the power of language, of ideas, of music and art, celebrity, health, sex, media, networks (especially the internet), imagination and unity. !!! As well, natural resources! like oil, gold, metals, farmland and water embody powers that cause armies to march, and empires to rise or fall. !!! "Find out just what the people will submit to and you have found out the exact amount of injustice and wrong which will be imposed upon them; and these will continue until they are resisted with either words or blows, or with both. The limits of tyrants are prescribed by the endurance of those whom they oppress." -- Frederick Douglass,
TYPES OF ACTION
!!! Your greatest leverage for change rises from your nonviolent campaign to define orderly change.! That's ideal idealism.! I’ll emphasize legal nonviolent strategies!and plans because killing is permanent, and once killing starts it multiplies. !!! But perhaps you are impatient for power.! When your family or community are about to be crushed, you'll likelier consider the full range of urgent actions; from legal to illegal, from nonviolent to violent. Sometimes you'll need complete immediate revolution-- whereby all power shifts from Them to You, and everything is suddenly entirely different. !!! !The alternative to systematically and nonviolently rebuilding America is not pretty.! When nonviolent protest fails to secure homes, food, health care and jobs, history shows that rebellions take what is needed.! Rather than watch their children die of hunger or disease, the poor sooner or later rebel to survive.! Playgrounds of wealth are invaded by desperate masses seeking food and shelter.! !!! !!! Some will justify violence against property, when that property is about to do great harm.! Violence against humans or other animals is a terrible last resort.! Governments demand a monopoly on violence and punish freelance violence.! But Americans have repeatedly used violence-- to establish the United States, free slaves, gain the 8-hour workday. !!! Since violent acts can backfire badly, it's better to confront a problem earlier, while legal and nonviolent tactics can prevail.! These enable your creative alternative to be enacted. !!! Nonviolent illegal action, like civil disobedience, has a long respected role in social change.! Civil disobedience has been an essential part of gaining civil rights.! It can be used to gain moral force, which adds political leverage. ! ! !People resort to this when they realize that, when they follow the proper channels, they're channeled to dead ends.! Most laws are made in the streets, by outspoken demand, then ratified by legislation. ! !Lawbreaking is sometimes justified by invoking the "Necessity Defense," which asserts the necessity of breaking a law to prevent even greater harm.! For many, obedience to higher laws is superior to uncivil obedience. ! !We Americans have our rights to speak and assemble, to trial by peers, to carry arms, to worship any god any way, to vote and to revolt, because millions have taken these risks.! All current laws began by breaking old laws.! Our Bill of Rights began when English nobles confronted the King to demand
trials by jury, then when jurors risked their lives to defy the King's verdict. !! Then the following happen: armies of police are dispatched to crush endless uprisings.! Civil liberties are extinguished.! Rich and poor alike live in a police state.! Costs of police and prisons rise beyond reach.! Brutal dictators arise to punish dissent.! They drag their nation into foreign wars and civil wars.! Rich and poor die in bombings, kidnappings, famines, epidemics.! Revolution overthrows dictators, then is corrupted.! ! ! !! This historic cycle is so common that wiser cultures ritually balance wealth.! The Kwakiutl Indians of the Pacific Northwest honored the rich only when they threw huge parties to give everything away.! When the rich had nothing left they were fed and honored.! The Bible says that since God owns all land (Leviticus 25:23), a Jubilee is required every 50 years, to return all land and forgive debts (Leviticus 25:10-34). The Bible forbade charging interest to the poor, or selling them food for profit (Leviticus 25:35-37). !!! !!! !Greed will exist as long as some people are fearful they have too little.! Where money is god, greed is infinite.! Those worst afflicted by greed will shove everyone else off the cliff to get their fair share, which is everything.! We can't abolish greed, but teach it better habits.! Greed for beauty, for example, can be good. !!! This book is therefore the best friend both rich and poor have, because its nonviolent proposals will enable some people to be wealthy within a society where everyone has enough. _______________________________________________
THREE BASIC STRATEGIES: !!! 1)! COMMUNITY MAGIC ACT.! Proposing new ways of meeting needs is more powerful than opposing. What’s your idea of a good society? What will it look like? Establish local and regional models that prove humans can work together to make society better rather than worse.! These will show that the public is prepared to use power responsibly-- that we do not need to depend on destructive forces.! This is the high road, essential but not sufficient.! !!! 2) GIVE PEACE A CHANCE.! Without compromising your goals, offer a carrot to authorities.! Show how they can benefit by helping lead or by yielding. This reassures the general public that you are constructive and!reasonable, even when your offer is declined. !!! 3)! THE ART OF THE THREAT.! Most of us prefer to be polite.! It's nicer to be nice.! But it is very impolite to quietly tolerate injustice.!! So wave a stick.! You have more power than you think, when you carry an effective threat.!One can confront individuals politely, while making institutions tremble.! You can legally threaten to nonviolently sink their company or project.
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