Nonviolent protest is the practice of achieving goal such as social change through symbolic protest, civil disobedience, economic and political non-cooperation, Satyagraha or other methods without using violence. According to Albert Einstein Institution, so far, there are at least 198 methods of nonviolent actions.
The modern form of non-violent protest was popularized by Mahatma Gandhi. Gandhi learned through philosophy of non-violence from American Henry David Thoreau (who spent a night in jail for refusing to pay tax for war) Russian writer, Leo Tolstoy and Hindu scriptures. Recent followers of Gandhi have been Marti Luther King Jr, Vaclav Havel, Andrei Sakharov, Lech Walesa, Gene Sharp, Anna Hazare, Otpor and protestor in Tahrir Square, Egypt.
From 1966 to 1999, nonviolent protest played critical role in 50 of 67 transitions from authoritarianism to non-authoritarianism government (sharp). Recently nonviolent protest led to the Rose Revolution in Georgia, the Orange Revolution in Ukaraine, Jeans Revolution in Belarus, Jasmine Revolution in Tunisia, The Tahrir Square Movement in Egypt and 2012Anti-Corruption Movement by Anna Hazare in India.
Erica Chenoweth and Maria Stephan in their book “Why Civil Resistance Works (2011)” analyzed the success rate of 323 violent and non-violent resistance campaigns around the world between 1900 and 2006. Out of 323 campaigns 100 were violent campaign. Examining the first data set of 323 campaigns they found that non-violent movements worldwide were twice as likely to succeed as violent ones. Further Chenoweth and Stephan observed that over the previous fifty years, non-violent campaign had grown both more numerous and more successful, even under brutal authoritarian rule. Violent insurgencies, meanwhile, had grown increasingly rare and unsuccessful. In 2013, Foreign policy named Chenoweth, one of the year’s “top 100 Global thinkers” for as the magazine put it “Proving Gandhi Right”.
The 3.5% Rule
In their book they found a direct correlation between the success of a campaign and the popular involvement it managed to invite. Among the movement they studied the victorious one uniformly fostered broad based public sympathy. And yet Chenoweth found that the number of supporters who were actively engaged in successful movements could be quite small.
No campaign failed once they achieved the active and sustained participation of just 3.5 per cent of the population and lots of them succeeded with far less than that. Earlier researcher had shown that no government could survive if 5 per cent of its population mobilized against it. Chenoweth proved the earlier researchers wrong and found it to be less than 3.5 per cent rule. However spurring 3.5 per cent of a population to engage in any kind of campaign is not easy.
In a country of 100 million, it will take the active involvement of around 3 million people.
Active public support consists of several components. The first is showing up. A movement’s active supporters are people who take to the streets for marches. Attend teach-ins and staff phone bank. Without them, a movement’s rallies would be empty. Second, in societies that holds elections, active supporters vote with the movement. Third, active supporter persuade others to join. They express their opinion on social media and argue with friends and relatives and persuade them to join. Finally active supporters are the type of people who are moved to act independently to advance on issue with their social and professional spheres influence. This might mean lawyer taking on pro bono work (without payment) for a cause they believe in doctors providing free medical care, musicians holding free concerts.
Methods of non-violent Action
There are three general classes of nonviolent action:
Protest and persuasion: These methods include vigils, petitions, picketing, and walkout. They are largely symbolic in their effect and produce an awareness of the existence of dissent.
Non Cooperation: These methods include social boycotts, economic boycott, labour strikes, and many forms of political noncooperation, including boycotts of government positions, civil disobedience and mutiny.
Intervention: These methods include hunger strikes, sittings nonviolent obstruction, creation or strengthening of alternative institutions and parallel government. They posses some of the qualities of both previous groups.
198 METHODS OF NONVIOLENT ACTION
Practitioners of nonviolent struggle have an entire arsenal of “nonviolent weapons” at their disposal. Listed below are 198 of them, classified into three broad categories: nonviolent protest and persuasion, noncooperation (social, economic, and political), and nonviolent intervention. A description and historical examples of each can be found in volume two of The Politics of Nonviolent Action, by Gene Sharp.
THE METHODS OF NONVIOLENT PROTEST AND PERSUASION
Formal Statements
1. Public Speeches
2. Letters of opposition or support
3. Declarations by organizations and institutions
4. Signed public statements
5. Declarations of indictment and intention
6. Group or mass petitions
Communications with a Wider Audience
7. Slogans, caricatures, and symbols
8. Banners, posters, and displayed communications
9. Leaflets, pamphlets, and books
10. Newspapers and journals
11. Records, radio, and television
12. Skywriting and earthwriting
Group Representations
13. Deputations
14. Mock awards
15. Group lobbying
16. Picketing
17. Mock elections
Symbolic Public Acts
18. Displays of flags and symbolic colors
19. Wearing of symbols
20. Prayer and worship
21. Delivering symbolic objects
22. Protest disrobings
23. Destruction of own property
24. Symbolic lights
25. Displays of portraits
26. Paint as protest
27. New signs and names
28. Symbolic sounds
29. Symbolic reclamations
30. Rude gestures
Pressures on Individuals
31. “Haunting” officials
32. Taunting officials
33. Fraternization
34. Vigils
Drama and Music
35. Humorous skits and pranks
36. Performances of plays and music
37. Singing
Processions
38. Marches
39. Parades
40. Religious processions
41. Pilgrimages
42. Motorcades
Honoring the Dead
43. Political mourning
44. Mock funerals
45. Demonstrative funerals
46. Homage at burial places
Public Assemblies
47. Assemblies of protest or support
48. Protest meetings
49. Camouflaged meetings of protest
50. Teach-ins
Withdrawal and Renunciation
51. Walk-outs
52. Silence
53. Renouncing honors
54. Turning one’s back
THE METHODS OF SOCIAL NONCOOPERATION
Ostracism of Persons
55. Social boycott
56. Selective social boycott
57. Lysistratic nonaction
58. Excommunication
59. Interdict
Noncooperation with Social Events, Customs, and Institutions
60. Suspension of social and sports activities
61. Boycott of social affairs
62. Student strike
63. Social disobedience
64. Withdrawal from social institutions
Withdrawal from the Social System
65. Stay-at-home
66. Total personal noncooperation
67. “Flight” of workers
68. Sanctuary
69. Collective disappearance
70. Protest emigration (hijrat)
THE METHODS OF ECONOMIC NONCOOPERATION: ECONOMIC BOYCOTTS
Actions by Consumers
71. Consumers’ boycott
72. Nonconsumption of boycotted goods
73. Policy of austerity
74. Rent withholding
75. Refusal to rent
76. National consumers’ boycott
77. International consumers’ boycott
Action by Workers and Producers
78. Workmen’s boycott
79. Producers’ boycott
Action by Middlemen
80. Suppliers’ and handlers’ boycott
Action by Owners and Management
81. Traders’ boycott
82. Refusal to let or sell property
83. Lockout
84. Refusal of industrial assistance
85. Merchants’ “general strike”
Action by Holders of Financial Resources
86. Withdrawal of bank deposits
87. Refusal to pay fees, dues, and assessments
88. Refusal to pay debts or interest
89. Severance of funds and credit
90. Revenue refusal
91. Refusal of a government’s money
Action by Governments
92. Domestic embargo
93. Blacklisting of traders
94. International sellers’ embargo
95. International buyers’ embargo
96. International trade embargo
THE METHODS OF ECONOMIC NONCOOPERATION: THE STRIKE
Symbolic Strikes
97. Protest strike
98. Quickie walkout (lightning strike)
Agricultural Strikes
99. Peasant strike
100. Farm Workers’ strike
Strikes by Special Groups
101. Refusal of impressed labor
102. Prisoners’ strike
103. Craft strike
104. Professional strike
Ordinary Industrial Strikes
105. Establishment strike
106. Industry strike
107. Sympathetic strike
Restricted Strikes
108. Detailed strike
109. Bumper strike
110. Slowdown strike
111. Working-to-rule strike
112. Reporting “sick” (sick-in)
113. Strike by resignation
114. Limited strike
115. Selective strike
Multi-Industry Strikes
- Generalized strike
- General strike
Combination of Strikes and Economic Closures
- Hartal
- Economic shutdown
THE METHODS OF POLITICAL NONCOOPERATION
Rejection of Authority
120. Withholding or withdrawal of allegiance
121. Refusal of public support
122. Literature and speeches advocating resistance
Citizens’ Noncooperation with Government
123. Boycott of legislative bodies
124. Boycott of elections
125. Boycott of government employment and positions
126. Boycott of government depts., agencies, and other bodies
127. Withdrawal from government educational institutions
128. Boycott of government-supported organizations
129. Refusal of assistance to enforcement agents
130. Removal of own signs and placemarks
131. Refusal to accept appointed officials
132. Refusal to dissolve existing institutions
Citizens’ Alternatives to Obedience
133. Reluctant and slow compliance
134. Nonobedience in absence of direct supervision
135. Popular nonobedience
136. Disguised disobedience
137. Refusal of an assemblage or meeting to disperse
138. Sitdown
139. Noncooperation with conscription and deportation
140. Hiding, escape, and false identities
141. Civil disobedience of “illegitimate” laws
Action by Government Personnel
142. Selective refusal of assistance by government aides
143. Blocking of lines of command and information
144. Stalling and obstruction
145. General administrative noncooperation
- Judicial noncooperation
147. Deliberate inefficiency and selective noncooperation by enforcement agents
148. Mutiny
Domestic Governmental Action
149. Quasi-legal evasions and delays
150. Noncooperation by constituent governmental units
International Governmental Action
151. Changes in diplomatic and other representations
152. Delay and cancellation of diplomatic events
153. Withholding of diplomatic recognition
154. Severance of diplomatic relations
155. Withdrawal from international organizations
156. Refusal of membership in international bodies
157. Expulsion from international organizations
THE METHODS OF NONVIOLENT INTERVENTION
Psychological Intervention
158. Self-exposure to the elements
159. The fast
a) Fast of moral pressure
b) Hunger strike
c) Satyagrahic fast
160. Reverse trial
161. Nonviolent harassment
Physical Intervention
162. Sit-in
163. Stand-in
164. Ride-in
165. Wade-in
166. Mill-in
167. Pray-in
168. Nonviolent raids
169. Nonviolent air raids
170. Nonviolent invasion
171. Nonviolent interjection
172. Nonviolent obstruction
173. Nonviolent occupation
Social Intervention
174. Establishing new social patterns
175. Overloading of facilities
176. Stall-in
177. Speak-in
178. Guerrilla theater
179. Alternative social institutions
180. Alternative communication system
Economic Intervention
181. Reverse strike
182. Stay-in strike
183. Nonviolent land seizure
184. Defiance of blockades
185. Politically motivated counterfeiting
186. Preclusive purchasing
187. Seizure of assets
188. Dumping
189. Selective patronage
190. Alternative markets
191. Alternative transportation systems
192. Alternative economic institutions
Political Intervention
193. Overloading of administrative systems
194. Disclosing identities of secret agents
195. Seeking imprisonment
196. Civil disobedience of “neutral” laws
197. Work-on without collaboration
198. Dual sovereignty and parallel government
Gene Sharp, stressed that to sustain a long struggle activists cannot display just one tactic rather, they need to create a sequence of actions that builds over time. The goal is to “escalation of disorder without violence.” The track record of what escalation can accomplish is impressive and still is rarely attempted. When confronted with the possibility to escalate, groups (organizers) find too many reasons to play it safe.