[movimenti.bicocca] Rediscovering Nonviolent History. Civil …

Delete this message

Reply to this message
Autore: Tommaso Vitale
Data:  
To: ML movimenti Bicocca
Oggetto: [movimenti.bicocca] Rediscovering Nonviolent History. Civil Resistance Beneath Eulogized Violence

Inizio messaggio inoltrato:

> Da: Maciej Bartkowski <mbartkowski@???>
> Data: 24 settembre 2009 17:13:31 GMT+02:00
> A: "amsoc@???" <amsoc@???>
> Oggetto: Call for Chapter Contributions
>
> Dear All,
> I am looking for scholars who may be interested in contributing a
> case study/chapter to a book project “Rediscovering Nonviolent
> History. Civil Resistance Beneath Eulogized Violence" in
> independence struggles (see below this message for a book outline).
> This proposal is part of the book series on civic resistance that
> the International Center on Nonviolent Conflict (ICNC) is currently
> preparing for submission to Palgrave Macmillan. More information
> about ICNC is included below this message.
>
> We have already a couple of authors committed to writing about
> specific cases but I am still looking for more contributions. I am
> specifically interested in cases of independence struggles and
> nonviolent civil resistance in Estonia, or Ireland, Egypt, Algeria,
> Iran, Western Sahara, Korea, Burma, Cuba, Zambia, Zimbabwe. I am
> also open to include other case studies that have not been listed in
> the outline below (e.g. Tibet, Kashmir, East Timor, West Papua) but
> fit within a book’s framework. First drafts of chapters/case studies
> would be expected by February. We could however extend this deadline
> if needed. Ideally, we would like to submit this manuscript to a
> publisher sometime at the end of spring/beginning of summer next year.
>
> ICNC will offer a modest stipend for the authors and free access to
> books and academic materials on the subject matter. The authors are
> expected to become familiar with the scholarly literature on civil
> resistance/nonviolent conflict before they begin working on their
> particular chapters. If you are interested in this study and would
> like to receive more information please contact me at mbartkowski@???
> . Feel free to share it with your colleagues who might also be
> interested in this project.
>
> Best, Maciej
>
> -----
> Maciej Bartkowski, Ph.D.
> Senior Director for Research and Education
> International Center on Nonviolent Conflict
> 1775 Pennsylvania Ave, NW, Suite 1200
> Washington, DC 20006
> Tel. 202 416 4726
> Fax 202 466 5918
> E-mail: mbartkowski@???
> http://www.nonviolent-conflict.org
> “Rediscovering Nonviolent History: Civil Resistance Beneath
> Eulogized Violence”
> (of Independence Movements)
>
> On June 4, 2009, at Cairo University, US President Barack Obama gave
> a speech detailing the futility of violence in the Palestinian fight
> for statehood. He contrasted the failures of violent struggle with
> the success of non-violent resistance in different parts of the
> world, starting with the US Civil Rights Movement and ending with
> regime changes and democratization in South Africa, South Asia,
> South East Asia and Eastern Europe. In response, critics noted a
> contradiction between the President’s categorical statements about
> the immorality and ineffectiveness of violence in the struggle for
> national self-determination and the United States’ own history of a
> violent independence struggle against the British. What the critics
> failed to acknowledge, or simply did not realize, is that the United
> States’ successful road to independence was paved not just through
> armed struggle but equally (if not more significantly) through
> nonviolent civil resistance of the American colonialists against the
> British monarchy. The above criticism is an example of a common
> overestimation of the force of violence and the omission of the
> contribution that nonviolent civil resistance has made over the
> years towards struggles for independence. The history of many
> independence movements has been written with a strongly embedded
> national belief in the determinative role of armed struggle in a
> national awakening, liberation and claim of independence. At times,
> external conditions, such as a changing geopolitical constellation
> that weakened a dominant oppressor, or external military, political
> or economic assistance to independence movements from friendly third
> parties, have also been recognized as playing an important role. In
> contrast, seldom do the stories of nonviolent resistance become part
> of the national discourse, commemorations or reflections on a
> country’s road to its independence. Intentionally and
> unintentionally, these stories are often misinterpreted or erased
> altogether from collective historical memory, buried beneath
> nationally romanticized violent insurrections, glorifications of
> death, and repeated rituals of remembrance of those who have fallen
> during armed resistance against an oppressor. The fact that some
> struggles for independence privileged physically stronger,
> belligerent males who conspired in small, secretive circles of
> committed plotters where a machismo culture and violent bravery were
> venerated could hardly help in recognizing the importance of
> nonviolent alternatives—or later in remembering and acknowledging
> (in history books written predominantly by male historians and in
> domestic politics shaped and dominated by males) that such types of
> nonviolent struggles had even existed. Therefore, the first goal of
> this book is to uncover stories of nonviolent resistance in
> independence struggles, to bring to light spontaneous and more
> organized acts of nonviolent struggle that have been forgotten by
> the historical annals, and to acknowledge their presence and
> recognize their role and importance in historic fights for national
> self-determination. The second goal of this book is to use under-
> researched studies of civil resistance to explain four themes
> indentified below that cut across different cases and a number of
> analytical and empirical queries assigned to each of them:
>
> I. Nonviolent resistance and the emergence of nation states
> -          What was the impact of civil resistance on the formation  
> of national consciousness and collective identities?
> -          How did civil resistance influence collective issue  
> framing in independence struggles?
> -          Whether and how civil resistance contributed to a  
> successful national liberation?

>
> II. Nonviolent resistance and its long-term impact
> -          How did the use of civil resistance and past experiences  
> and tacit stories of nonviolent civil resistance during an  
> independent struggle (underrated and faded as they may be) impact  
> the structure and political culture of a state once that state has  
> become independent or/and account for certain but important  
> political, economic or social developments in the country years or  
> decades later?

>
> III. Nonviolent resistance and eulogized violence
> -          How did eulogized stories and memories of violence, death  
> and sacrifice in armed insurrections enter and persist in education,  
> history books, public discourse and national consciousness?
> -          How did narratives and memories of armed insurrection  
> suppress no less important and heroic stories of nonviolent,  
> pragmatic, positivistic forms of resistance toward occupation?   
> Furthermore, was such suppression deliberate or incidental among  
> those who shape public discourse and historical perception?
> -          What was the role of literary publications and/or media  
> coverage in contributing to the perception that violence was  
> decisive in independence struggles while nonviolent action was  
> either underplayed or disregarded altogether?

>
> IV. Nonviolent resistance and strategy
> -          How did the nonviolent resistance emerge and what were  
> its strategies and tactics?
> -          Why did nonviolent resistance succeed or fail? Were there  
> any tangible advantages of civil resistance relative to violence in  
> achieving tactical or long-term strategic objectives in self- 
> determination struggles?
> -          How did nonviolent independence movements try to  
> internationalize their struggles and use third parties against  
> foreign occupiers to advance the movement’s objectives?
> -          Whether and if so how was the nonviolent independence  
> movement constrained or empowered by particular structural  
> conditionalities, both domestic and international, and how the  
> tactics and strategies of nonviolent resistance were developed or  
> evolved in relation to these conditionalities? Given the  
> conditionalities what kind of opportunity structures did nonviolent  
> movement create and how?
> -          Where there has been a competition between violent and  
> nonviolent elements in an independence struggle, how was the  
> competition waged and how and why did the use of one form of  
> struggle ultimately prevail over the other?
> List of possible case studies:
> American war of independence: XVIIIth century; Poland’s independence  
> struggle: XIXth century-1914; Estonia’s ‘national singing  
> resistance’- XIX-XXth century;Ireland; Cuba’s independence struggle:  
> XIXth century; Namibia’s road to independence: 1970s-1990; Egyptian  
> rising against the monarchy in 1919; Algeria; Pakistan’s  
> independence movement in the 1940s / Pashtun campaign against the  
> British Empire; Bangladesh/East Pakistan; East Timorese struggle for  
> independence;Kosovo; Libya’s resistance against Italians in the  
> 1920s; Zambia; Zimbabwe; Sudan; Palestine; Iran in XIX/XXth century  
> (against British/Russians/monarchy)
> ------
> The International Center on Nonviolent Conflict (ICNC) which I  
> represent is a Washington DC-based nonprofit educational foundation  
> dedicated to developing and disseminating knowledge about the  
> dynamics, power and importance of civil resistance in halting  
> political oppression, promoting human rights, and facilitating  
> democratic transitions and good governance. ICNC is involved in a  
> number of academic initiatives related to teaching and researching  
> on civil resistance, including among others:
> 1.The Oxford Project on Civil Resistance and Power Politics, which  
> has entailed a major conference at Oxford University in March 2007,  
> plus two forthcoming books published by Oxford University Press and  
> edited by Adam Roberts and Timothy Garton Ash on the subject of  
> civil resistance:  http://ukcatalogue.oup.com/product/9780199552016.do
> 2. The Fletcher Summer Institute in the Advanced Study of Nonviolent  
> Conflict, conducted annually at Tufts University since 2006:  http://fletcher.tufts.edu/summerinstitute/
> 3. Annual presentations on nonviolent conflict to the summer fellows  
> program of the Center for Development, Democracy and the Rule of Law  
> at Stanford University
> 4. Production and distribution of three documentary films on the  
> history of nonviolent movements: A Force More Powerful: http://www.aforcemorepowerful.org/ 
> ; Orange Revolution and Brining Down a Dictator. The companion book  
> to a Force More Powerful has become the basic university-level  
> textbook worldwide on the history of nonviolent struggle in the 20th  
> century.
> 5. Ambassadors Mark Palmer and Jeremy Kinsman's A Diplomat’s  
> Handbook for Democracy Development Support:http://www.diplomatshandbook.org/_history.html
> http://www.diplomatshandbook.org/pdf/Diplomat's%20Handbook.pdf
> 6. Writing a Book Series with Palgrave Macmillan on Civil Resistance
> 7. This coming Fall, ICNC together with  the United States Institute  
> for Peace conducts a two-month long academic module on “Civil  
> Resistance and the Dynamics of Nonviolent Conflict”:
> http://www.usip.org/education-training/courses/civil-resistance-and-power-politics
> http://www.usip.org/files/Civil%20Resistance%20Course%20Flyer-1.pdf
> 8. The report on Nonviolent Civic Action in support of Human Rights  
> and Democracy prepared for the European Parliament
> http://www.europarl.europa.eu/activities/committees/studies/download.do?language=en&file=25679