- Anti-War Protesters to Blockade Buildings, Businesses (February 27, 2003)
...gs and disrupt major business districts with large protests and nonviolent civil disobedience. Many organizers have kept their intentions under wraps so police and... - Demonstrators Stage Civil Disobedience (January 20, 2003)
...vists said that they planned to go to the White House to carry out acts of civil disobedience to show their opposition to a war with Iraq. "We're doing this because... - Anti-War Leaders Expand Tactics (March 3, 2003)
...d. "But you'll see more people doing sit-ins and other forms of nonviolent civil disobedience." Some of the civil disobedience plans are fluid, and could intensify w... - World War IV (March 1, 2004)
...can stop us. To get the ball rolling, we initiate persistent, low level civil disobedience on all fronts. A pissed-off global population can force capital to retreat... - Swarthmore Groups Told to Nix Links to Memos (October 23, 2003)
...l with a history of passive resistance, is drawing the line at "electronic civil disobedience." Yesterday, the Delaware County school's dean, Robert Gross, asked a p... - Many Called to March, Few Chosen for Arrest (January 20, 2003)
... House. One group included many older people, some with long experience in civil disobedience. A younger and louder group joined the the older protesters. The groups... - West Coast Erupts in Second Day of War Protests (March 21, 2003)
...,300 demonstrators were detained in the city at the start of a campaign of civil disobedience launched to protest the US-led war in the Middle East. They also coinci... - Denver to Halt 'Spy Files' on Peaceful Organizers (April 17, 2003)
...erious criminal activity and not on people who are suspected of nonviolent civil disobedience that amounts to a misdemeanor. The agreement was reached after a hearin... - Swarthmore Shuts Down Web Sites of Students Publicizing Company's Voting-Machine Memos (October 27, 2003)
... commercial electronic-voting system. Calling their exploits an act of civil disobedience, the two have inspired students at four other institutions to help dissemi... - Taking it To London's Streets (September 30, 2002)
...ntinue. And when the bombs begin to drop there will be acts of non-violent civil disobedience all over the country. We need the same in the United States. Tariq... - Palestinians Must Reject Separate State and Change Israel (May 17, 2002)
...o much more violent than the first? Today, working within Israel, using civil disobedience and not suicide bombs, a non-violent Palestinian struggle for freedom migh... - Nobel Laureate in Economics Calls US Budget 'A Form of Looting' (August 3, 2003)
...s is not normal government policy. Now is the time for people to engage in civil disobedience. SPIEGEL ONLINE: Of what kind? Akerlof: I don't know yet. But I th... - FBI Scrutinizes Anti-War Rallies (November 23, 2003)
...American Civil Liberties Union. "The line between terrorism and legitimate civil disobedience is blurred, and I have a serious concern about whether we're going back to... - A20: DC Protest Organizers Take On New Cause (April 14, 2002)
...t by School of the Americas-trained soldiers throughout Latin America." Civil Disobedience Urged The A22 Collective, a D.C.-based anti-capitalist group, is ca... - Chicago Anti-War Demonstration Shuts Down City (March 21, 2003)
...r protesters swiftly answered the onset of war with a national campaign of civil disobedience, including a seemingly spontaneous march by an estimated 10,000 people tha... -
Civil disobedience
(Redirected from Civil Disobedience)
The term "civil disobedience" characterises the active refusal to obey certain laws, demands and commands of a government or of an occupying power without resorting to physical violence.
Civil disobedience was practise in Ireland in the fight against British colonisation.
The American author Henry David Thoreau pioneered the modern theory behind this practice in his 1849 essay, originally titled "Resistance to Civil Government", and later retitled "Civil Disobedience". This essay has had a wide influence on many later practitioners of civil disobedience. In the essay, Thoreau explained his reasons for having refused to pay his taxes as an act of protest against slavery and against the Mexican War.
Civil disobedience has served as a major tactic of nationalist movements in former colonies in Africa and Asia prior to their gaining independence. Most notably Mohandas Gandhi developed civil disobedience as an anti-colonialist tool. Martin Luther King, a leader of the US civil rights movement in the United States in the 1960s also adopted civil disobedience techniques, and antiwar activists both during and after the Vietnam War have done likewise. More recently, in the 2000s, people have used civil disobedience to protest the war on Iraq and the Digital Millennium Copyright Act.
Civil disobedience has served as a tactic of Polish opposition against communists. (See: Solidarity)
Many who practise civil disobedience do so out of religious faith, and clergy often participate in or lead actions of civil disobedience. The Berrigan brothers in the United States, for example, are priests who have been arrested dozens of times in acts of civil disobedience in antiwar protests.
In seeking an active form of resistance, those who practise civil disobedience may choose to deliberately break certain laws, such as by forming a peaceful blockade or occupying a facility illegally. Protesters do so with the expectation that they will be arrested, or even attacked or beaten by the authorities. Protesters often undergo training in advance on how to react to arrest or to attack, so that they will do so in a manner that quietly or limply resists without threatening the authorities. For example, Mohandas Gandhi outlined the following rules:
- A satyagrahi, i.e., a civil resister, will harbour no anger.
- He will suffer the anger of the opponent.
- In so doing he will put up with assaults from the opponent, never retaliate; but he will not submit, out of fear of punishment or the like, to any order given in anger.
- When any person in authority seeks to arrest a civil resister, he will voluntarily submit to the arrest, and he will not resist the attachment or removal of his own property, if any, when it is sought to be confiscated by authorities.
- If a civil resister has any property in his possession as a trustee, he will refuse to surrender it, even though in defending it he might lose his life. He will, however, never retaliate.
- Non-retaliation includes swearing and cursing.
- Therefore a civil resister will never insult his opponent, and therefore also not take part in many of the newly coined cries which are contrary to the spirit of ahimsa.
- A civil resister will not salute the Union Jack, nor will he insult it or officials, English or Indian.
- In the course of the struggle if anyone insults an official or commits an assault upon him, a civil resister will protect such official or officials from the insult or attack even at the risk of his life.
(Note that Mohandas Gandhi wanted to make a distinction between his idea of Satyagraha and the passive resistance of the west.)
- See also: dissent, non-violence, non-violent resistance, pacifism, activism, demonstration, satyagraha, Civil and social disobedience, direct action, non-violent direct action, electronic civil disobedience, Solidarity
External links
- Direct Action on Nonviolence.org