NONVIOLENT ACTIVISM

In this course, you will learn the core principles, strategies, and tactics used in successful nonviolent social movements. You will learn how to engage a range of stakeholders and employ diverse tactics to build a campaign’s momentum. You will be challenged to apply these lessons to an issue in your own community, and to design an Action Project to build your own local campaign.

In our first class, we will start discussing the difference between an action, a campaign and a movement. We will also talk about the concept of “people-power,” and how this applies to issues in our own community.

Pre-lesson assignment: Watch this video; Learning to start a movement from “dancing guy.”

In our second class, we will talk about moral and strategic approaches to nonviolence, and discuss some of the compelling reasons activists approach nonviolence from both perspectives. We will discuss why nonviolence is statistically more effective than violence in a social movement, and how nonviolent discipline can create a more welcoming environment for more people to join your movement, while also maintaining the moral high ground.

Pre-lesson assignment: Please read these two articles before class:

-Read “The ‘3.5% rule’: How a small minority can change the world” 

-Read “Why the moral argument for nonviolence matters”

In lesson 3, we will talk about the “pillars of support,” or the institutions that uphold a ruling system or regime. We will talk about the importance of pulling people from these institutions into our movements, rather than just pushing into them in opposition. We will analyze an example from the Black Lives Matter movement, and we will then discuss the pillars that are strongest in our own society.

Pre-lesson assignment: Read this article and write three sentences about an issue in your community that you would like to address through the lessons of our course.  

In today’s class, we will talk about the “spectrum of allies,” and how to reach out to different groups in our society and communities to strengthen a movement and build more supporters. 

Pre-lesson assignment: Please write a list of all the different people who might be impacted by the local issue you talked about today in class, then write down which pillars of support these people belong to. Read this short article to prepare for our discussion on the spectrum of allies.

In our fifth lesson, we will talk about strategic escalation of a nonviolent campaign, and how activists can continue building pressure and momentum by shifting tactics. We will continue to analyze our own campaigns in order to develop a spectrum of allies. 

Pre-lesson assignment: Read this short article and pick 3 tactics from the Beautiful Trouble toolkit that would escalate a campaign if done in chronological order. Then draw your own “spectrum of allies” for the scenario you worked on in class #4. You can draw this either on the computer or on a piece of paper to present during tomorrow’s class.

This class will examine different tactics to advance your nonviolent campaign. Tactics are the tools and actions we use to achieve a certain goal and pressure a specific decisionmaker, but they can also provide a way for us to build our movements by engaging more people in fun and creative ways. We will talk about the difference between tactics of dispersion and concentration, and how some tactics build strategic or tactical power. We will also examine three tactics that can escalate each of your campaigns while maintaining nonviolent discipline, and we will discuss the tactic of “filling the jails” in the Children’s March in Birmingham, Alabama. 

Pre-lesson assignments:

1. Watch as much of this movie as you can: “Mighty Times: The Children’s Crusade.”
2. This film is about the children’s marches against segregation in Birmingham, Alabama during the Civil Rights Movement: https://vimeo.com/248803414. 
3. Please look at the tactics in the Beautiful Trouble toolbox and pick 3 tactics you could use to escalate your campaign strategically, but still keeping nonviolent discipline and building pressure on your decision-maker. Here is the toolbox: https://www.beautifultrouble.org/toolbox/#/tactic
4. 3. Read this short article.

Today’s class will be a review of the past 7 lessons, and we will continue discussing and planning action projects for our final presentations on Friday.

Today’s class will be a chance for us to develop our Action Projects in small groups with input and feedback to strengthen these ideas before our final presentations. We will also hear presentations from two students about their Action Plans. Here is the design for your Action Plan assignment to start preparing for today’s class:

Action Project assignment: These projects should be realistic and strategic, aiming to address an issue in your community, or your society more broadly. You can work with other students or work alone. You can use some of the ideas suggested in the “Allies in Unlikely Places” activity last week but you don’t need to use this. 

You will need to answer the following questions: 

• What is the issue you want to address? 
• Who is the target of your campaign? (The person who can say “yes” to your demand)
• What is your demand or your goal?
• What are three tactics you will use in your campaign, and how do these escalate strategically over time to create more pressure on your target or decision-maker?
• Explain specific details of your tactics: Which groups will the tactic target from your spectrum of allies? How does each tactic weaken a pillar of support? How will one build into the next?
• How can you incorporate art, humor, theater, or other creative tactics into your campaign?
• What is the biggest challenge your campaign will face, and how will you overcome it?

For our final class, we will finish our Action Project presentations and talk about ways to take this work forward in your communities. Please send your Powerpoint or other presentation materials by email before class so we can share these together!