As I promised several posts ago, today starts the first of a series of posts I would like to write as a study guide and commentary on a key text on strategic nonviolent resistance. Today also seems to be the first day in which Blogger won't have their legacy posting interface available, so I hope I can make it through this post without too much pain and suffering on my part.
The text I want to walk us through is From Dictatorship to Democracy by Gene Sharp. It can be downloaded for free from the Albert Einstein Institution, or you can download it by clicking on the link in the first sentence of this paragraph. If you're too busy to be able to spend a lot of time reading, you can download a free audio recording here.
Today we'll focus on the first chapter, titled, "Facing Dictatorships Realistically." And it is important to note that the first edition of this book was published in 2002, while the fourth edition was published in 2010. The period from 1989 to 2011 was indeed marked by a number of impressive victories for those who were struggling for democracy in many autocratic regimes which existed during that time frame. However, as many scholars have noted, the period from 2011 to the present has been characterized by a period of intense democratic backsliding, defined by one source as "a...decline in the quality of democracy...caused by the State-led weakening of political institutions that sustain the democratic system." It is important to note that democratic backsliding does not originate only from the obvious members of a State government. When capitalism is allowed to run unchecked, private interests can become powerful enough to buy off governments. This is called regulatory capture, and it is a game that the world's richest people can play with ease. (You may not know this, but the world's 26 richest people "own" (or lay claim to) as much wealth as 50 percent of the world's population.)
Therefore it is quite likely that if you're an ordinary stiff like me, you either have awakened, are awakening, or will one day soon awaken to a nation and a world which you didn't sign up for, a world or a nation ruled by people who think you would look good barbecued and stuck between two pieces of bread. You may also discover that you are a member of an entire people who have been designated for exploitation by the wealthy and powerful. The question then becomes what to do.
Scholars of strategic nonviolent resistance have a general answer to that question, yet they realize that much of the world's population has been conditioned by myths of redemptive violence to see violence as a means of righteous and effective social change. (For examples of this myth in action, just watch a week of American television.) In severe cases of injustice and oppression, the oppressed may come to see violence as the only effective answer to the oppression. Therefore, in Chapter 1 of From Dictatorship to Democracy (shortened in this series of posts to "From D to D"), Gene Sharp takes us through an exploration of the various options available to ordinary people who find themselves victims to ruling powers who want to exploit them.
Sharp examines four possible responses to repression:
- Hoping for change via the intervention of another rival power (or, hoping for "foreign saviors" to intervene)
- Hoping for change through elections and other seemingly democratic tools
- Hoping for change by forming an armed militia to achieve regime change by killing a bunch of your opponents
- Strategic nonviolent resistance (which Gene Sharp called "political defiance" in his book)
Let's focus on response #3 for a moment. As a Christian, I am forbidden to advocate or choose violence as a means of liberation. However, there are people who might look at such a prohibition as unrealistic moralizing, just as such people, if they were kids, might have called me a "Momma's boy" when I was a kid because I brushed my teeth three times a day or because I looked both ways before I crossed the street. To such people I would answer that people who refuse to brush their teeth or who refuse to look before trying to cross busy streets on foot sooner or later learn that their parents had very good reasons for admonishing us kids the way they did. And the reasons for refusing to use violence for political or economic liberation have been very well documented by social scientists such as Erica Chenoweth and Maria Stephan in books such as Why Civil Resistance Works: The Strategic Logic of Nonviolent Conflict.
But in case there are people who are not convinced, let's try a little thought experiment. Say that you are a member of a historically marginalized group in the United States, and you chafe against an environment in which the President of the U.S., the members of many law enforcement agencies, and a number of redneck militias are trying to target you because of the color of your skin or your language of birth. Say moreover that you have decided that a violent response is your only chance of changing your situation. Immediately you run into a problem, namely, that in order to apply violence, you'll need weapons. Given the current state of armaments among belligerents, you'll need at the least a good assault rifle. A decent assault rifle costs around $1,000. So you'll need to smash your piggy bank (and maybe a few other people's piggy banks) and eat ramen noodles for a few months if you just want to equip yourself.
Now violence is more effective at achieving political change when a number of violent actors join forces and pool their resources. But if you are just starting from scratch, equipping a decent force with assault rifles will quickly get rather "spendy" as they say where I live. For instance, equipping a 1,000 man force will require you to spend a million dollars. And that's not counting the cost of ammunition. Ammo will in fact be a recurring cost, because you'll need to practice regularly with your weapons in order to get good at using them. Where will you get the money for all of that?
(Wanna be insurgent goes to bank to take out a loan. Insurgent to loan officer: "Uh, I need some money..." Loan officer to insurgent: "How much do you need?" Insurgent: "Uh, a million and some change..." Loan officer: "What do you have for collateral?" Insurgent: "A two-bed, one bath house, a 25 year old car, and a German Shepherd who's missing a few teeth." Loan officer: "Ohhh,... and what are you going to do with the money???" Insurgent: "Uh, make some noise...?")
A further problem arises when you actually start your "revolution", namely, the very much non-zero probability that you or your compatriots will get shot. If that happens, you lose your $1,000 per rifle!
But it gets even better. Your opponent will have much more than 1,000 men to match your 1,000-man force. For starters, he will have other things besides assault rifles. Take mechanized infantry fighting vehicles such as the M2 Bradley. Do you want to match your opponent's capability here? You too can have an M2...for around $3.2 million. Try taking out a loan for one of those! Note also that many police forces in this country have similar vehicles at their disposal. And if you somehow manage to scrape together enough for a (very small) fleet of M2s, you've still got to deal with attack aircraft ($46.3 million for an A-10, $94 million for a budget version of the F-35, $4 million for a combat drone). In other words, if you're trying regime change through violence, the violent option is very, very spendy!
Moreover, the violent option is no guarantor of righteous, effective change, even in countries whose militaries are not anywhere near as capable as the Unites States military. In weaker countries, low-level guerilla war very often degenerates into decades-long "conflict traps" which lower the quality of life for all citizens while leaving ruling elites still firmly in power Far too many of these guerilla uprisings end in failure. Just ask the Zapatistas.
Next post (God willing): Chapter 2, "The Dangers of Negotiations." Feel free to read ahead.
