
Information and Educational Resources on Nonviolence
Welcome to the online repository for information and educational resources on nonviolence. This material was collected by The World House Project in conjunction with the seminar on Nonviolence Organizing in Theory and Practice: Building the Beloved Community and Effective Social Justice Movements , presented by the Harvard Radcliffe Institute.
On March 24 and 25 2022, Prof. Michael Honey brought together over twenty scholars, educators, and activists involved with educating and organizing for social and economic justice for all. The starting point for the discussions was James Lawson's recently published book, Revolutionary Nonviolence, Organizing for Freedom. The participants drew on the models of social change and theories and practices of nonviolence from Gandhi to Martin Luther King, Jr., James Lawson, and others. They discussed how to expand networks of educators and activists to help create a roadmap at this critical juncture, especially for young social movement activists, many of whom may not know of the tactics and strategies of nonviolent direct action and the larger philosophy that in the past produced many movement victories. The material collected for and presented at the seminar is now available on this webpage.
Building the Beloved Community and Effective Social Justice Movements. Exploratory, virtual seminar, March 24-25, 2022,
Find below more information about the seminar's purpose, program, and participants.
"Love and Solidarity: James Lawson and Nonviolence in the Search for Workers Rights"
LOVE & SOLIDARITY is an exploration of nonviolence and organizing through the life and teachings of Rev. James Lawson. Lawson provided crucial strategic guidance while working with Martin Luther King, Jr., in southern freedom struggles and the Memphis sanitation strike of 1968. Moving to Los Angeles in 1974, Lawson continued his nonviolence organizing in multi-racial community and worker coalitions that have helped to remake the LA labor movement.
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Episode 1 — India, Nashville, and South Africa
A Force More Powerful is a documentary series on one of the 20th century’s most important and least-known stories: how nonviolent power overcame oppression and authoritarian rule. It includes six cases of movements, and each case is approximately 30 minutes long.
India — begins at 02:15
In India in the 1930s, after Gandhi had returned from South Africa, he and his followers adopted a strategy of refusing to cooperate with British rule. Through civil disobedience and boycotts, they successfully loosened their oppressors’ grip on power and set India on the path to freedom.
USA — begins at 26:17
In the 1960s, Gandhi’s nonviolent weapons were taken up by black college students in Nashville, Tennessee. Disciplined and strictly nonviolent, they successfully desegregated Nashville’s downtown lunch counters in five months, becoming a model for the entire civil rights movement.
South Africa — begins at 51:14
In 1985, a young South African named Mkhuseli Jack led a movement against the legalized discrimination known as apartheid. Their campaign of nonviolent mass action, and a powerful consumer boycott in the Eastern Cape province, awakened whites to black grievances and fatally weakened business support for apartheid.
A Force More Powerful Episode 2 — Denmark, Poland, Chile
Denmark — begins at 02:12
In April, 1940, German Deutsch military forces invaded Denmark. Danish leaders adopted a strategy of “resistance disguised as collaboration”—undermining German Deutsch objectives by negotiating, delaying, and obstructing Nazi demands. Underground resistance organized sabotage and strikes, and rescued all but a handful of Denmark’s seven thousand Jews.
Poland — begins at 26:55
In 1980, striking workers in Poland demanded independent unions. Using their leverage to negotiate unprecedented rights in a system where there was no power separate from the Communist Party, they created a union called “Solidarity”. Driven underground by a government crackdown in 1981, Solidarity re-emerged in 1989 as Poland’s governing political party.
Chile — begins at 51:52
In 1983, Chilean workers initiated a wave of nonviolent protests against the military dictatorship of General Augusto Pinochet. Severe repression failed to stop the protests, and violent opposition failed to dislodge the dictatorship—until the democratic opposition organized to defeat Pinochet in a 1988 referendum.