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>Recent research suggests that nonviolent civil resistance is far more successful in creating broad-based change than violent campaigns are, a somewhat surprisi

>Recent research suggests that nonviolent civil resistance is far more successful in creating broad-based change than violent campaigns are, a somewhat surprising finding with a story behind it. https://news.harvard.edu/gazette/story/2019/02/why-nonviolent-resistance-beats-violent-force-in-effecting-social-political-change/ https://news.harvard.edu/gazette/story/2019/02/why-nonviolen...

salawat 2y ago
>The second thing is that [the movement] needs to elicit loyalty shifts among security forces in particular, but also other elites. Security forces are important because they ultimately are the agents of repression, and their actions largely decide how violent the confrontation with — and reaction to — the nonviolent campaign is going to be in the end. But there are other security elites, economic and business elites, state media. Get the violent ones on your side to ultinately win. Got it. I don't think she's making the point she thinks she's making. And yes, I read the rest of the article. It focused primarily on events taking place in places where, lets face it, there's not quite the ah... oomph in gen pop that exists in the U.S. It's ulitimately a nice thought. It's absolutely accurate in that things like generalized striking and boycotts are great preambles as well. They're also considered illegal in the U.S. to coordinate btw, because of previous run ins with said efficacy during wartime in WWII. Secondary striking was outlawed. So formal unions can't use that as a tactic. You can thank the Taft-Hartley act for that. So... Yeah. Might want to meditate on that one a bit harder.
vouaobrasil 2y ago
1) The changes there are changes _within_ the system. That narrative only covers changes that are compatible with the industrial capitalist system. Indeed, the author focuses only on "transition to democracy". But I'd argue that nonviolent push for capitalism already has capitalism as a foregone conclusion because it is also more efficient, so even "doing nothing" can often bring it about. 2) Therefore, one could say that nonviolent action is most effective and bringing about the current corporate-controlled system. Of course, that makes sense. But let's say you want to take down a corporate-controlled system. Then violence is likely to be much more effective.
- 0xDEAFBEAD 2y ago
  You haven't explained why the effectiveness of violence should differ depending on the change that's desired.
  - vouaobrasil 2y ago
    The change to democracy doesn't happen in a vacuum. It's the most likely system to come about due to an advance in technology. So people advocating for it are already swimming with the tide. Also, if a large majority want democracy, then it's more likely to happen, especially due to pressure from other countries who are also democratic and have a vested interest in democracy. If you want to make a change where the majority (or at list the rich majority) don't want, then violence will be much more effective. For example, I think it's likely that this one killing will do more to cause a renewed vigor in revamping America's health care than any nonviolent protest, because the richest capitalists and shareowners are against it.
    - 0xDEAFBEAD 2y ago
      >If you want to make a change where the majority (or at list the rich majority) don't want, then violence will be much more effective. So you're saying violence is a morally acceptable way for a minority to force its will on a majority? This just sounds like an argument for dictatorship. - - - I think whatever argument you make in favor of violence, you should anticipate that your political opponents will make the exact same argument to excuse their violence. So whatever argument you make -- be sure it's an argument you are OK with your political opponents using. A social contract regarding the times and places where it's acceptable to use violence is actually a really valuable thing. Confucius was actually on to something.
      - jstanley 2y ago
        I think you're confusing an argument about violence's effectiveness with one about its morality.
      - hnfong 2y ago
anigbrowl 2y ago
There's a lot of flaws with Chenoweth & Steph's widely-lauded study; in many respects it tells a certain class of people what they want to hear. https://roarmag.org/essays/chenoweth-stephan-nonviolence-myth/ https://roarmag.org/essays/chenoweth-stephan-nonviolence-myt... Chenoweth's own subsequent research indicates the issue is far more nuanced, and that states have to some extended adapted to/exploited the strategic challenges posed by nonviolent resistance. https://www.annualreviews.org/content/journals/10.1146/annurev-polisci-051421-124128 https://www.annualreviews.org/content/journals/10.1146/annur... https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1177/00223433221092938 https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1177/002234332210929... (paywalled, sorry)
- 0xDEAFBEAD 2y ago
  >in many respects it tells a certain class of people what they want to hear. I'm no health plutocrat. In fact, I've been unemployed for the past several years due to a chronic health condition. I'm currently getting private health coverage through Medicaid. Recall that Chenoweth started out believing that violence was more effective, then changed her mind after looking at the data. The internet's response to the CEO shooting has revealed that there is a huge appetite for violence. People with an appetite for violence appear to vastly outnumber those without on sites such as reddit. I'm seeing a lot of arguments in favor of violence, and nearly all of them strike me as quite shoddy. I wish I had the time and energy to respond to all of the bad arguments, but I don't have it. I started reading your roarmag article (found through the internet archive), and it doesn't seem very compelling. * The author starts from the premise that BLM succeeded through violence, which seems dubious. * He seems to assume that "a counterhegemonic and politically radical viewpoint became perplexingly commonsensical overnight" due to violence, and doesn't seem to understand that correlation isn't the same as causation. * He points out various issues with the study, which weaken the strength of its conclusion, but also seem sort of inescapable when doing this kind of research. I stopped reading when it became clear to me the author was "telling the audience what they wanted to hear", to use your phrasing. ("ROAR was an online journal of the radical imagination...") As long as we're going to assume that correlation is causation, I notice that your second link states that "the success rate of nonviolent resistance campaigns has declined since 2001" and also "incidental violence by dissidents has become a more common feature of contemporary nonviolent campaigns compared with earlier cases" Wonder if those facts are related? Nonviolence isn't what it used to be, and also it's now become less effective? >states have to some extended adapted to/exploited the strategic challenges posed by nonviolent resistance. Sure -- and they've adapted to the strategic challenges posed by violent resistance as well, I'd argue.

salawat 2y ago

>The second thing is that [the movement] needs to elicit loyalty shifts among security forces in particular, but also other elites. Security forces are important because they ultimately are the agents of repression, and their actions largely decide how violent the confrontation with — and reaction to — the nonviolent campaign is going to be in the end. But there are other security elites, economic and business elites, state media. Get the violent ones on your side to ultinately win. Got it. I don't think she's making the point she thinks she's making. And yes, I read the rest of the article. It focused primarily on events taking place in places where, lets face it, there's not quite the ah... oomph in gen pop that exists in the U.S. It's ulitimately a nice thought. It's absolutely accurate in that things like generalized striking and boycotts are great preambles as well. They're also considered illegal in the U.S. to coordinate btw, because of previous run ins with said efficacy during wartime in WWII. Secondary striking was outlawed. So formal unions can't use that as a tactic. You can thank the Taft-Hartley act for that. So... Yeah. Might want to meditate on that one a bit harder.

vouaobrasil 2y ago

1) The changes there are changes _within_ the system. That narrative only covers changes that are compatible with the industrial capitalist system. Indeed, the author focuses only on "transition to democracy". But I'd argue that nonviolent push for capitalism already has capitalism as a foregone conclusion because it is also more efficient, so even "doing nothing" can often bring it about. 2) Therefore, one could say that nonviolent action is most effective and bringing about the current corporate-controlled system. Of course, that makes sense. But let's say you want to take down a corporate-controlled system. Then violence is likely to be much more effective.

0xDEAFBEAD 2y ago
You haven't explained why the effectiveness of violence should differ depending on the change that's desired.
- vouaobrasil 2y ago
  The change to democracy doesn't happen in a vacuum. It's the most likely system to come about due to an advance in technology. So people advocating for it are already swimming with the tide. Also, if a large majority want democracy, then it's more likely to happen, especially due to pressure from other countries who are also democratic and have a vested interest in democracy. If you want to make a change where the majority (or at list the rich majority) don't want, then violence will be much more effective. For example, I think it's likely that this one killing will do more to cause a renewed vigor in revamping America's health care than any nonviolent protest, because the richest capitalists and shareowners are against it.
  - 0xDEAFBEAD 2y ago
    >If you want to make a change where the majority (or at list the rich majority) don't want, then violence will be much more effective. So you're saying violence is a morally acceptable way for a minority to force its will on a majority? This just sounds like an argument for dictatorship. - - - I think whatever argument you make in favor of violence, you should anticipate that your political opponents will make the exact same argument to excuse their violence. So whatever argument you make -- be sure it's an argument you are OK with your political opponents using. A social contract regarding the times and places where it's acceptable to use violence is actually a really valuable thing. Confucius was actually on to something.
    - jstanley 2y ago
      I think you're confusing an argument about violence's effectiveness with one about its morality.
    - hnfong 2y ago

anigbrowl 2y ago

There's a lot of flaws with Chenoweth & Steph's widely-lauded study; in many respects it tells a certain class of people what they want to hear. https://roarmag.org/essays/chenoweth-stephan-nonviolence-myth/ https://roarmag.org/essays/chenoweth-stephan-nonviolence-myt... Chenoweth's own subsequent research indicates the issue is far more nuanced, and that states have to some extended adapted to/exploited the strategic challenges posed by nonviolent resistance. https://www.annualreviews.org/content/journals/10.1146/annurev-polisci-051421-124128 https://www.annualreviews.org/content/journals/10.1146/annur... https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1177/00223433221092938 https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1177/002234332210929... (paywalled, sorry)

0xDEAFBEAD 2y ago
>in many respects it tells a certain class of people what they want to hear. I'm no health plutocrat. In fact, I've been unemployed for the past several years due to a chronic health condition. I'm currently getting private health coverage through Medicaid. Recall that Chenoweth started out believing that violence was more effective, then changed her mind after looking at the data. The internet's response to the CEO shooting has revealed that there is a huge appetite for violence. People with an appetite for violence appear to vastly outnumber those without on sites such as reddit. I'm seeing a lot of arguments in favor of violence, and nearly all of them strike me as quite shoddy. I wish I had the time and energy to respond to all of the bad arguments, but I don't have it. I started reading your roarmag article (found through the internet archive), and it doesn't seem very compelling. * The author starts from the premise that BLM succeeded through violence, which seems dubious. * He seems to assume that "a counterhegemonic and politically radical viewpoint became perplexingly commonsensical overnight" due to violence, and doesn't seem to understand that correlation isn't the same as causation. * He points out various issues with the study, which weaken the strength of its conclusion, but also seem sort of inescapable when doing this kind of research. I stopped reading when it became clear to me the author was "telling the audience what they wanted to hear", to use your phrasing. ("ROAR was an online journal of the radical imagination...") As long as we're going to assume that correlation is causation, I notice that your second link states that "the success rate of nonviolent resistance campaigns has declined since 2001" and also "incidental violence by dissidents has become a more common feature of contemporary nonviolent campaigns compared with earlier cases" Wonder if those facts are related? Nonviolence isn't what it used to be, and also it's now become less effective? >states have to some extended adapted to/exploited the strategic challenges posed by nonviolent resistance. Sure -- and they've adapted to the strategic challenges posed by violent resistance as well, I'd argue.