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Social Movements

20 Years Of BDS: Interview With Omar Barghouti, A Movement Co-Founder

July 10, 2025 Michael Arria, Mondoweiss. , , ,
July 9, 2025 marks the 20th anniversary of the Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions (BDS) movement, the nonviolent Palestinian-led campaign aimed at holding Israel accountable under international law. “This day will be remembered in history as the start of a principled, strategic, and creative process that has isolated Israel’s 77-year-old regime of settler-colonialism, apartheid, and military occupation at the grassroots and institutional level,” said the BDS National Committee in a statement. “It has redefined the meaning of solidarity with our struggle as starting with ending the complicity of states, corporations and institutions with this regime.”

Movements Need To Learn To Fly Like Bees And Thread Like Spiders

July 4, 2025 John Paul Lederach, Waging Nonviolence. , , ,
The first months of the Trump administration — with its rapid and sweeping turn toward autocratic rule — have rightly led to calls for collective and national resistance. Leading civil resistance scholars Erica Chenoweth and Zoe Marks have described the need for a “large-scale, multiracial, cross-class, pro-democracy front.” And Maria Stephan, writing for Just Security, called this a critical moment for taking up the “journey from individual angst to collective action, from siloed work to big-tent formations.” Creating such a collective response, however, requires a great deal of creativity and focus, particularly — as these authors suggest — when it comes to relating to different groups and building unexpected connections.

This New Tool Can Help Movements Chart A Path To Victory

June 28, 2025 Joe Worthy, Waging Nonviolence. , , ,
The beginning of 2025 brought a relentless wave of dehumanization and the systemic erosion of democratic institutions — all of which will fundamentally change the trajectory of the U.S. There have been sweeping executive actions from the new Trump administration, such as the dismantling of DEI efforts, attacks on the LGBTQ+ community and increasing deportations. But Americans haven’t accepted these changes without a fight. There has been significant nonviolent resistance to Trump’s agenda on many fronts. In just one of the latest examples, there have been widespread protests against ICE raids in Los Angeles, which Trump responded to by deploying the National Guard and Marines.

Lessons In Courage, Care And Collective Action

June 26, 2025 Moira Birss and Zia Kandler, Waging Nonviolence. , , , ,
As authoritarianism takes hold in the United States and attacks against our movements and communities grow, many U.S.-based organizers and activists are searching for ways to resist, grow and protect ourselves and our communities. Yet, a feeling of overwhelm and hopelessness pervades, especially as this administration deploys tactics aimed at repressing, intimidating and squashing those fighting for change. Rather than despair, we can instead look at the ways movements across the world have responded to authoritarian regimes. After all, for as long as governments have used such tactics, movements, organizations, and individual organizers and activists have cultivated strategies to keep themselves and their communities safe.

50 Years After The Vietnam War, Legacy Of Nonviolent Resistance Lives On

June 25, 2025 Elena Novak, Waging Nonviolence. , , ,
“It was a big show.” That is how Robert Levering described the celebration in Ho Chi Minh City on April 30, marking the 50th anniversary of the end of the war in Vietnam. Levering was attending the celebration as part of a delegation from the Vietnam Peace Commemoration Committee, one of three delegations invited by the Vietnam Union of Friendship Organizations, or VUFO, a non-governmental organization promoting people-to-people diplomacy between Vietnam and countries around the world. The other delegations were from the National Council of Elders and the Fund for Reconciliation and Development, bringing to Vietnam an intergenerational, cross-movement cadre of organizers and activists to commemorate the anniversary of the war’s end.

War, Resistance, And The Reunification Of Nation And State In Iran

June 24, 2025 Nahid Poureisa, Resumen English. , , , ,
Something is Happening in Iran. People are not only supporting the war, but they are getting closer to the state. The concept of “nation” has undergone a shift. In recent days, I have seen things I never could have imagined. One of the most powerful images was a viral video: A young woman in Tehran, without hijab, wearing a koufiyeh, singing a deeply patriotic song under Azadi Tower, the symbolic heart of Tehran. This was not just a moment of performative nationalism; it was a statement, a contradiction of the narrative that pits the Iranian people against their state. Social media, once a battleground of polarizing slogans, has become a platform for national unity.

US Attack On Iran Reaffirms Need For Global Anti-Imperialist Movement

June 23, 2025 US Peace Council. , , ,
The U.S. Peace Council strongly condemns the outrageous, criminal and illegal attack on the sovereign state of Iran by the United States administration of Donald J. Trump. This flagrant violation of the United Nations Charter and the Nuremberg condemnation of wars of choice, should serve as a graphic demonstration that U.S. imperialism continues to operate beyond the boundaries of law, rejecting any accountability or constraints on its behavior. The act of war committed by the U.S. against Iran comes on the heels of its violation of another red line of civilized international behavior by the U.S., when it treacherously pretended to be engaged in a diplomatic process with Iran as a diversionary tactic to facilitate a sneak attack on Iran by Israel.

Getting Out Of The Nonprofit Box

June 16, 2025 Elias Crim, Solidarity Hall. , , ,
About a year ago, Jim invited me to a group conversation and open house at a place called DC Central Kitchen in southwest DC. I really knew nothing about the place beyond the fact that they had found a great way to recycle waste food from area restaurants into a meals program for the homeless. I figured we would be meeting in a cramped little room next to a noisy commercial kitchen at an area church. But as we used to say in my Texas hometown, au contraire. In 2023, DC Central Kitchen relocated to the Klein Center for Jobs and Justice where its team found themselves with a 36,000 sq. ft. bi-level space hosting a large community kitchen, a training facility, and an urban food hub.

Making A Mountain Out Of A Mole Hill, Trump Sends Troops to Los Angeles

June 14, 2025 Jon Jeter, Black Agenda Report. , , ,
While there have mercifully been no fatalities, President Trump’s deployment of military personnel to corral Los Angeles protesters challenging his administration’s federal immigration policies invites comparisons to the May 4, 1970, clash between the Ohio National Guard and anti-war demonstrators that left four Kent State University students fatally wounded and nine others seriously injured. Trump on Monday ordered 700 U.S. Marines to join 4,000 soldiers with California’s National Guard on the ground in Los Angeles to respond to protests against Immigration, Customs and Enforcement (ICE) arrests that turned violent over the weekend.

Trump’s Manufactured Crisis And The Urgency Of Strategic Nonviolence

June 14, 2025 Paul Engler et al, In These Times. , , ,
We can see on the streets now the precarious situation we’ve studied around the world: the need for mass resistance to state violence and assaults on democracy, and the concurrent need to maintain nonviolent discipline in a dire and escalating situation. Following the example of other authoritarians, Donald Trump wants us to burn cars. He wants us to throw rocks. He wants images of chaos — especially violence against police or National Guard troops — to flood the evening news. These are precisely the results he wants: to manufacture chaos as a means of justifying repression and extending his authoritarian raids on our communities.

Attacks With Bombs Shake Colombian Municipalities

June 11, 2025 TeleSUR. , , ,
On Tuesday, Cali Security Secretary Jairo Garcia confirmed that three bomb explosions targeting police stations in the city left at least two people dead and 36 wounded, including three minors. To ensure proper care for the victims, Cali’s Health Department issued a hospital alert across the city’s public and private networks, activating blood banks and special patient transport. One of the bombs, placed on a motorcycle, was detonated in the Melendez neighborhood, another in the Manuela Beltran neighborhood, and a third in the Los Mangos district. “They want to take us back to 1989. We won’t allow it. Long live Colombia!” said Cali Mayor Alejandro Eder.

Locating Ourselves In The Wreckage Of Neoliberalism

June 11, 2025 Daniel Martinez Hosang and Colena Sesanker, The American Prospect. , , ,
This past March, as an unusually warm winter in Connecticut prepared to give way to spring, a morning crowd at the West Indian Social Club in Hartford milled about over blueberry muffins from Costco and cartons of Dunkin’ coffee. “Democracy School” was about to begin. At round banquet tables, nursing home workers nodded intently, listening to community college students describe the budget cuts they were fighting in order to keep their libraries open in the evening, so working students could find time to study. Child care advocates broke bread with Uber drivers, and learned about their efforts to win dignified wage and safety standards. College faculty like ourselves heard stories from renters facing eviction, and from undocumented parents struggling to win health care coverage for their families.

The Revolution Of Light And Korea’s Democratic Triumph

June 8, 2025 Simone Chun, Counter Punch. , , , ,
One of the most consequential missteps in US Korea policy under the Biden administration was the failure to engage with South Korea’s domestic political realities, particularly the widespread public opposition to President Yoon Suk-yeol’s increasingly authoritarian rule. By relentlessly propping up Yoon to serve Washington’s geopolitical agenda and its escalating Cold War posture toward China, the Biden administration not only ignored Korean public sentiment but also fueled domestic unrest. Domestic outrage against Yoon’s regime came to a head with his attempted imposition of martial law on December 3, 2024—a move that exposed the fragility of his position and deeply damaged Washington’s credibility in the region.

Where Is The Artificial Intelligence Safety Movement?

June 8, 2025 Cathy Rogers, Waging Nonviolence. , , ,
Whether or not we realize it, artificial intelligence is reshaping the world with breathtaking speed. Promoted as a panacea to cure diseases, revolutionize industries and tackle the world’s most intractable problems, AI is also quietly displacing workers, amplifying biases and creating surveillance systems pervasive and pernicious enough for any dystopian. As if that weren’t enough, there’s the prospect of super intelligent AI outpacing human control altogether. So where are the humans in all this? Where are the protests, the people out on the streets, the demands for safeguards, for oversight, for input from normal people?
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