Despite the frequency with which the word 'solidarity' is invoked the concept itself has rarely been subjected to close scrutiny. In this original and stereotype-busting work, David Featherstone helps redress this imbalance through an innovative combination of archival research, activist testimonies and first-hand involvement with political movements. Presenting a variety of case studies, from anti-slavery and anti-fascist organizing to climate change activism and the boycotts of Coca-Cola, Featherstone unearths international forms of solidarity that are all too often marginalized by nation-centred histories of the left and social movements. Timely and wide-ranging, this is a fascinating investigation of an increasingly vital subject.

Over the last decade the increasing phenomenon of suicide terrorism has raised questions about how it might be rational for individuals to engage in such acts. This book examines a range of different forms of political self-sacrifice, including hunger strikes, self-burning and non-violent martyrdom, all of which have taken place in resistance to foreign interference. Karin Fierke sets out to study the strategic and emotional dynamics that arise from the image of the suffering body, including political contestation surrounding the identification of the victim as a terrorist or martyr, the meaning of the death as suicide or martyrdom and the extent to which this contributes to the reconstruction of community identity. Political Self-Sacrifice offers a counterpoint to rationalist accounts of international terrorism in terrorist and security studies, and is a novel contribution to the growing literature on the role of emotion and trauma in international politics.

In a speech from which Nation of Cowards derives its title, Attorney General Eric Holder argued forcefully that Americans today need to talk more not less about racism. This appeal for candid talk about race exposes the paradox of Barack Obama s historic rise to the US presidency and the ever-increasing social and economic instability of African American communities. David H. Ikard and Martell Lee Teasley maintain that such a conversation can take place only with passionate and organized pressure from black Americans, and that neither Obama nor any political figure is likely to be in the forefront of addressing issues of racial inequality and injustice. The authors caution blacks not to slip into an accommodating and self-defeating "post-racial" political posture, settling for the symbolic capital of a black president instead of demanding structural change. They urge the black community to challenge the social terms on which it copes with oppression, including acts of self-imposed victimization."

What should we make of the culture of the protest movements of the 21st century? From the Arab Spring to the 'indignados' protests in Spain and the Occupy movement, Paolo Gerbaudo examines the relationship between the rise of social media and the emergence of new forms of protest. Gerbaudo argues that activists' use of Twitter and Facebook does not fit with the image of a 'cyberspace' detached from physical reality. Instead, social media is used as part of a project of re-appropriation of public space, which involves the assembling of different groups around 'occupied' places such as Cairo's Tahrir Square or New York's Zuccotti Park. An exciting and invigorating journey through the new politics of dissent, Tweets and the Streets points both to the creative possibilities and to the risks of political evanescence which new media brings to the contemporary protest experience.

This book presents a new explanation of the rise, development, and demise of social movements and cycles of protest in autocracies; the conditions under which protest becomes rebellion; and the impact of protest and rebellion on democratization. Focusing on poor indigenous villages in Mexico's authoritarian regime, the book shows that the spread of U.S. Protestant missionaries and the competition for indigenous souls motivated the Catholic Church to become a major promoter of indigenous movements for land redistribution and indigenous rights. It also shows that the introduction of government-controlled multiparty elections and the spread of competition for indigenous votes led Leftist opposition parties to become major sponsors of indigenous protest and identities. The expansion of electoral competition in some regions eventually led opposition parties to institutionalize protest, but the withdrawal of civil rights and political liberties and the threat of regime reversion in others gave rise to radicalization. The book explains why the outbreak of local rebellions, the transformation of indigenous claims for land into demands for ethnic autonomy and self-determination, and the threat of a generalized social uprising motivated national elites to democratize. Drawing on an original dataset of indigenous collective action and on extensive fieldwork, the empirical analysis of the book combines quantitative evidence with case studies and life histories.

In "The Haj to Utopia," Maia Ramnath tells the dramatic story of Ghadar, the Indian anticolonial movement that attempted overthrow of the British Empire. Founded by South Asian immigrants in California, Ghadar--which is translated as "mutiny"--quickly became a global presence in East Asia, Europe, the Middle East, and East Africa. Ramnath brings this epic struggle to life as she traces Ghadar's origins to the Swadeshi Movement in Bengal, its establishment of headquarters in Berkeley, California, and its fostering by anarchists in London, Paris, and Berlin. Linking Britain's declaration of war on Germany in 1914 to Ghadar's declaration of war on Britain, Ramnath vividly recounts how 8,000 rebels were deployed from around the world to take up the battle in Hindustan. "The Haj to Utopia" demonstrates how far-flung freedom fighters managed to articulate a radical new world order out of seemingly contradictory ideas.

The late 1920s saw an extraordinary protest by an Australian Aboriginal man on the streets of London. Standing outside Australia House, cloaked in tiny skeletons, Anthony Martin Fernando condemned the failure of British rule in his country. Fernando is believed to be the first Aboriginal person to protest conditions in Australia from the streets of Europe. His various forms of action, from pamphlets on the streets of Rome to the famous Speakers' Corner in Hyde Park, distinguish this lone protestor as a unique Aboriginal activist of his time. Drawn from an extensive search in archives from Australia and Europe, this is the first full-length study of Fernando's life and the self-professed mission that lasted half his adult life.

From Alaska to Florida, millions of immigrants and their supporters took to the streets across the United States to rally for immigrant rights in the spring of 2006. The scope and size of their protests, rallies, and boycotts made these the most significant events of political activism in the United States since the 1960s. This accessibly written volume offers the first comprehensive analysis of this historic moment. Perfect for students and general readers, its essays, written by a multidisciplinary group of scholars and grassroots organizers, trace the evolution and legacy of the 2006 protest movement in engaging, theoretically informed discussions. The contributors cover topics including unions, churches, the media, immigrant organizations, and immigrant politics. Today, one in eight U.S. residents was born outside the country, but for many, lack of citizenship makes political voice through the ballot box impossible. This book helps us better understand how immigrants are making their voices heard in other ways.

This work traces the early rise and subsequent decline of politically effective student activism in Malaysia. During the 1970s, the state embarked on a project of "intellectual containment" that both suppressed ongoing mobilization of university students and delegitimized further activism. That project has been notably successful in curbing student protest, erasing a legacy of past engagement, and stemming the production of potentially subversive new ideas. Innovative student proposals for reform that were once sanctioned and even welcomed (within bounds) are now illicit and discouraged, reflecting not only changes in Malaysia's political regime, but changes in the political culture overall. This incisive study sheds new light on the dynamics of mobilization and on the key role of students and universities in postcolonial political development.

This analysis is based on extensive research, including interviews with dozens of past and present student activists and a close study of archives, government reports, firsthand accounts, and student publications extending over decades. Student Activism in Malaysia traces how higher education and student activism have developed and interacted, beginning with the start of tertiary education in early twentieth-century Singapore and extending to present-day Malaysia. In the process, Weiss calls into question the conventional wisdom that Malaysian students and Malaysians overall have become "apathetic." The author demonstrates that this apparent state of apathy is not inevitable, cultural, or natural, but is the outcome of a sustained project of pacification and depoliticization carried out by an ambitiously developmental state."

This work traces the early rise and subsequent decline of politically effective student activism in Malaysia. During the 1970s, the state embarked on a project of "intellectual containment" that both suppressed ongoing mobilization of university students and delegitimized further activism. That project has been notably successful in curbing student protest, erasing a legacy of past engagement, and stemming the production of potentially subversive new ideas. Innovative student proposals for reform that were once sanctioned and even welcomed (within bounds) are now illicit and discouraged, reflecting not only changes in Malaysia's political regime, but changes in the political culture overall. This incisive study sheds new light on the dynamics of mobilization and on the key role of students and universities in postcolonial political development.

This analysis is based on extensive research, including interviews with dozens of past and present student activists and a close study of archives, government reports, firsthand accounts, and student publications extending over decades. Student Activism in Malaysia traces how higher education and student activism have developed and interacted, beginning with the start of tertiary education in early twentieth-century Singapore and extending to present-day Malaysia. In the process, Weiss calls into question the conventional wisdom that Malaysian students and Malaysians overall have become "apathetic." The author demonstrates that this apparent state of apathy is not inevitable, cultural, or natural, but is the outcome of a sustained project of pacification and depoliticization carried out by an ambitiously developmental state."

The 2011 revolution in Egypt was revolutionary far beyond regime change in Cairo. It may be considered our first view of what a civil, egalitarian society in the Middle East might look like in the age of Twitter, YouTube and instant global media. Using international news reports and translations of the social media pages that triggered millions of Egyptians to flood the streets in mass protest rallies, Yale University sociologist Jeff Alexander uncovers the narrative of a revolution that was scripted by its organizers as both a moral and media statement. He explores why the world was so captivated by months of news reports about the perilous uprising and explains the revolution as a theatrical performance, one designed to reveal to the world that the microcosm of Tahrir Square of mostly peaceful civil disobedience was a template for democratic movements internationally. Compelling and effective, the use of digital and social media, the organized protests that sprang from it and the peace and persistence of the demonstrators ultimately, Alexander argues, swayed the Egyptian army to support the movement and brought about regime change. This powerful and insightful book on what is being called the Arab Spring is a must-read for anyone interested in how social media is fundamentally changing global politics.

Mass mobilization is among the most dramatic and inspiring forces for political change. When ordinary citizens take to the streets in large numbers, they can undermine and even topple undemocratic governments, as the recent wave of peaceful uprisings in several postcommunist states has shown. However, investigation into how protests are organized can sometimes reveal that the origins and purpose of "people power" are not as they appear on the surface. In particular, protest can be used as an instrument of elite actors to advance their own interests rather than those of the masses.

Weapons of the Wealthy focuses on the region of post-Soviet Central Asia to investigate the causes of elite-led protest. In nondemocratic states, economic and political opportunities can give rise to elites who are independent of the regime, yet vulnerable to expropriation and harassment from above. In conditions of political uncertainty, elites have an incentive to cultivate support in local communities, which elites can then wield as a "weapon" against a predatory regime. Scott Radnitz builds on his in-depth fieldwork and analysis of the spatial distribution of protests to demonstrate how Kyrgyzstan's post-independence development laid the groundwork for elite-led mobilization, whereas Uzbekistan's did not.

Elites often have the wherewithal and the motivation to trigger protests, as is borne out by Radnitz's more than one hundred interviews with those who participated in, observed, or avoided protests. Even Kyrgyzstan's 2005 "Tulip Revolution," which brought about the first peaceful change of power in Central Asia since independence, should be understood as a strategic action of elites rather than as an expression of the popular will. This interpretation helps account for the undemocratic nature of the successor government and the 2010 uprising that toppled it. It also serves as a warning for scholars to look critically at bottom-up political change.

In "Sitting In and Speaking Out," Jeffrey A. Turner examines student movements in the South to grasp the nature of activism in the region during the turbulent 1960s. Turner argues that the story of student activism is too often focused on national groups like Students for a Democratic Society and events at schools like Columbia University and the University of California at Berkeley. Examining the activism of black and white students, he shows that the South responded to national developments but that the response had its own trajectory--one that was rooted in race. Turner looks at such events as the initial desegregation of campuses; integration's long aftermath, as students learned to share institutions; the Black Power movement; and the antiwar movement. Escalating protest against the Vietnam War tested southern distinctiveness, says Turner. The South's tendency toward hawkishness impeded antiwar activism, but once that activism arrived, it was--as in other parts of the country--oriented toward events at national and global scales. Nevertheless, southern student activism retained some of its core characteristics. Even in the late 1960s, southern protesters' demands tended toward reform, often eschewing calls to revolution increasingly heard elsewhere. Based on primary research at more than twenty public and private institutions in the deep and upper South, including historically black schools, "Sitting In and Speaking Out" is a wide-ranging and sensitive portrait of southern students navigating a remarkably dynamic era.

Hailed as one of the best treatments of the civil rights movement, ""Race and Democracy"" is also one of the most comprehensive and detailed studies of the movement at the state level. This far-reaching and dramatic narrative ranges in time from the founding of the New Orleans branch of the NAACP in 1915 to the beginning of Edwin Edwards' first term as governor in 1972. In his new preface Adam Fairclough brings the narrative up-to-date, demonstrating the persistence of racial inequalities and the continuing importance of race as a factor in politics. When Hurricane Katrina exposed the race issue in a new context, Fairclough argues, political leaders mishandled the disaster. A deep-seated culture of corruption, he concludes, compromises the ability of public officials to tackle intransigent problems of urban poverty and inadequate schools.

This book recounts the story of how a diverse social movement placed sexual harassment on the public agenda in the 1970s and 1980s. The collaboration of women from varying racial, economic, and geographic backgrounds strengthened the movement by representing the experiences and perspectives of a broad range of women, and incorporating their resources and strategies for social change. Black women; middle-class feminists; women breaking into construction, coal mining, and other non-traditional occupations; and women in pink-collar and working-class white-collar jobs all helped to convince governments to adopt public policies against sexual harassment in the United States. Based on interviews and original research, this book shows how the movement against sexual harassment fundamentally changed American life in ways that continue to advance women's opportunities today.

Massive Resistance is a compelling account of the white segregationist opposition to the US civil rights movement from the late 1940s to the mid-1960s. It provides vivid insights into what sparked the confrontations in US society during the run-up to the major civil rights laws that transformed America's social and political landscape. George Lewis has written a comprehensive overview of this controversial era of US history using his own research and interpretation, as well as new work by other experts in the field. The book concentrates on the political complexities of a campaign rooted in the white South that was intent on forestalling the march to racial equality. Themes covered include a white supremacist reading of the Constitution and the Declaration of Independence; regional arguments for a 'distinctive' South; social and political doctrines of racial separatism as the core of southern identity; political oppression for the maintenance of white power; the role of physical intimidation and economic arguments used by the Ku Klux Klan. Lewis's authoritative work on southern segregationists and what drove them to oppose civil rights reform is a valuable resource for students of twentieth century American history.

The dramatic series of protests and political events that unfolded in Ukraine in the fall of 2004 -the "Orange Revolution" -were seminal both for Ukrainian history and the history of democratization. Pro-Western presidential candidate Viktor Yushchenko was poisoned with dioxin, an industrial pollutant that left him weakened and horribly disfigured. When this assassination attempt failed, the Kremlin-backed ruling party resorted to voter intimidation and massive electoral fraud to win the runoff election. Supporters of Yushchenko responded with a series of strikes, sit-ins, and marches throughout Ukraine. Thanks in large part to this peaceful revolution, the election results were annulled. In a second runoff, Yushchenko was elected as the new president. Revolution in Orange seeks to explain why and how this nationwide protest movement occurred. Its effects have already been felt from Kyrgyzstan to Lebanon and are likely to travel even further. Yet few predicted or anticipated such a dramatic democratic breakthrough in Ukraine. This volume attempts to distinguish between necessary and facilitating factors in the success of the Orange Revolution. It also discusses the elements that have been commonly assumed to be critical but, in fact, were not instrumental in the movement. Chapters explore the role of former President Kuchma and the oligarchs, societal attitudes, the role of the political opposition and civil society, the importance of the media, and the roles of Russia and the West. Contributors include Nadia Diuk (National Endowment for Democracy), Adrian Karatnycky (Freedom House), Taras Kuzio (George Washington University), Hrihoriy Nemyria (Taras Shevchenko National University, Kiev), Pavol Demes (German Marshall Fund), Nikolai Petrov and Andrey Ryabov (Carnegie Moscow Center), and Olena Prytula (editor, Ukrainskaya Pravda).

Who can forget the images, telecast worldwide, of brave Chinese students facing down tanks in Tiananmen Square as they took on their Communist government? After a two-week standoff in 1989, military forces suppressed the revolt, killing many students and issuing arrest warrants for top student leaders, including Zhang Boli. After two years as a fugitive, Zhang -- the only leader to elude capture -- knew that he must bid his beloved country, as well as his wife and baby daughter, farewell. Traveling across the frozen terrain of the former Soviet Union, where peasants rescued him, and through the deserted lands of China's precarious borders, Zhang had only his extraordinary will to propel him toward freedom. As told in Escape from China -- a work of great historical resonance -- his story will renew your faith in the human spirit.

More than a quarter-century has now passed since the United States set off the last of three underground atomic blasts in the remote wilderness of the Aleutian islands, off the coast of Alaska. Cannikin, as this third test was called, exploded as planned on November 6, 1971, on Amchitka Island. The first test, Project Long Shot (1965), was designed to determine whether the blast's shock waves could be distinguished from earthquakes. Milrow, the second (1969), and Cannikin were part of the U.S. anti-ballistic missile development program. Amchitka and the Bomb looks at how these nuclear explosions were planned and conducted by the U.S. Department of Defense and the Atomic Energy Commission, in spite of vehement protests by political and civilian groups. In addition to demonstrating the feasibility of a new generation of weapons, the government defended the nuclear tests on Amchitka as providing U.S. presidents, and especially Richard Nixon, with negotiating power to force the Soviet Union to accept a satisfactory arms limitation agreement. Dean Kohlhoff traces the enormous environmental impact of the blasts on the Aleutian wildlife refuge system. He also examines the social and political fallout from the tests on Aleut civilian populations. As the tests inexorably went forward, an emerging environmental movement was galvanized to action. Passionate but ultimately futile attempts to stop the blasts were made by such nascent groups as Greenpeace, Friends of the Earth, and the Wilderness Society. Although Alaskan Aleuts sued to halt Cannikin and environmental groups joined them for an injunction against the test, a split U.S. Supreme Court eventually approved the 5.1-megaton explosion. Amchitka and the Bomb tells a harrowing story of the struggle of private citizens and small environmental groups to counter the weight of the federal government. It adds immeasurably to our understanding of the nuclear history of the United States. Its concise interweaving of the military, scientific, economic, and social implications surrounding the nuclear explosions on Amchitka Island exposes the unpleasant consequences of allowing treasured national values to become victim to political necessity. Kohlhoff has contributed a vital chapter to Alaska's history and to the history of the American environmental movement.

How abolitionism evolved from an elite and conservative movement to a radical, grassroots reform cause; Most accounts date the birth of American abolitionism to 1831, when William Lloyd Garrison began publishing his radical antislavery newspaper, The Liberator. In fact, however, the abolition movement had been born with the American Republic. In the decades following the Revolution, abolitionists worked steadily to eliminate slavery and racial injustice, and their tactics and strategies constantly evolved. Tracing the development of the abolitionist movement from the 1770s to the 1830s, Richard Newman focuses particularly on its transformation from a conservative lobbying effort into a fiery grassroots reform cause. What began in late-eighteenth-century Pennsylvania as an elite movement espousing gradual legal reform began to change in the 1820s as black activists, female reformers, and nonelite whites pushed their way into the antislavery movement. Centered in Massachusetts, these new reformers demanded immediate emancipation, and they revolutionized abolitionist strategies and tactics - lecturing extensively, publishing gripping accounts of life in bondage, and organizing on a grassroots level. Their attitudes and actions made the abolition movement the radical cause we think of it as today.

Naming the Enemy is the first systematic documentation of this international resistance to transnational corporations and globalization that has so recently burst into the public gaze with the street protests in Seattle, Washington, London and Prague. This book is relevant to activists as well as students and scholars of globalization, new social movements and political economy."--BOOK JACKET.

Between loyalty and disobedience; between recognition of the law's authority and realization that the law is not always right: In America, this conflict is historic, with results as glorious as the mass protests of the civil rights movement and as inglorious as the armed violence of the militia movement. In an impassioned defense of dissent, Stephen L. Carter argues for the dialogue that negotiates this conflict and keeps democracy alive. His book portrays an America dying from a refusal to engage in such a dialogue, a polity where everybody speaks, but nobody listens.

"The Dissent of the Governed" is an eloquent diagnosis of what ails the American body politic--the unwillingness of people in power to hear disagreement unless forced to--and a prescription for a new process of response. Carter examines the divided American political character on dissent, with special reference to religion, identifying it in unexpected places, with an eye toward amending it before it destroys our democracy.

At the heart of this work is a rereading of the Declaration of Independence that puts dissent, not consent, at the center of the question of the legitimacy of democratic government. Carter warns that our liberal constitutional ethos--the tendency to assume that the nation must everywhere be morally the same--pressures citizens to be other than themselves when being themselves would lead to disobedience. This tendency, he argues, is particularly hard on religious citizens, whose notion of community may be quite different from that of the sovereign majority of citizens. His book makes a powerful case for the autonomy of communities--especially but not exclusively religious--into whichdemocratic citizens organize themselves as a condition for dissent, dialogue, and independence. With reference to a number of cases, Carter shows how disobedience is sometimes necessary to the heartbeat of our democracy--and how the distinction between challenging accepted norms and challenging the sovereign itself, a distinction crucial to the Declaration of Independence, must be kept alive if Americans are to progress and prosper as a nation.

Harriot Stanton Blatch (1856-1940), daughter of the famous suffragist Elizabeth Cady Stanton, played an essential role in the winning of woman suffrage in the United States. This powerfully written book is both a biography of Harriot Blatch and a new appraisal of the winning and aftermath of the American woman suffrage movement. Harriot Blatch's dedication to the realization of woman suffrage, marked by a concern for social justice and human liberty, closely paralleled that of her mother. However, says Ellen DuBois, Blatch was also very much her own woman. For almost two decades, she put an ocean's distance between her mother and herself, marrying an Englishman, raising a daughter in England, and absorbing the new political currents of Fabian socialism that helped her see the possibilities of a modern women's rights movement. After her mother's death in 1902, Blatch returned to the United States. There she expanded suffragism's class basis, encouraged a more lively activist style, and brought a genuine political sensibility to the movement. And though she devoted herself to enfranchisement, she also envisioned feminism going further to encompass economic power and independence for women as well. DuBois tells the story of Blatch's life and work, in the process reinterpreting the history and politics of the American suffrage movement and the consequences for women's freedom.

Originally published in 1969, The Rise of Massive Resistance was the first scholarly work to deal decisively with the politics of southern resistance to public school integration. Today, it remains one of the most important books on the subject. For this thirtieth anniversary edition, Numan Bartley has included a new preface in which he reflects on his reasons for writing the book and why it has stood the test of time.

Bartley gives a step-by-step account of opposition to school desegregation in each southern state during the 1950s and clarifies the attitudes underlying massive resistance by examining the roles played by such southern leaders as James F. Byrnes, Harry Flood Byrd, James O. Eastland, Orval E. Faubus, Claude Pepper, Estes Kefauver, Richard B. Russell, Herman Talmadge, "Big Jim" Folsom, and Earl K. Long. He also closely analyzes the attitudes of the Eisenhower administration and national leaders toward the South and explores the activities of the Citizens' Councils, the Ku Klux Klan, and other local groups that emerged to defend "the southern way of life". His closing "Critical Essay on Authorities" still forms an excellent guide to primary and secondary sources on opposition to Brown v. Board of Education.

Why has there been an increase in domestic, workplace, and community violence, and how can we prevent it? This book, one in a series sponsored by the National Mental Health Association, helps the reader explore, with the talented contributors, the foundations of violence as well as methods to reduce the incidence of violent behavior in families, workplaces, and communities. The first section provides an overview of this topic and covers: child abuse and neglect from an ecological perspective with a close look at those qualities that place some children at higher risk of abuse; the causes of spousal abuse and interventions to reduce the incidence of this behavior; workplace violence from a definitional, demographic, and theoretical perspective; and, ways to identify the causes of community violence using a public health model. The second section examines environmental factors for violence, including television violence and its impact on youth; stereotypes and its relationships to racial, ethnic, and religious hatred and violence; and, mental illness and violence, particularly how the mentally ill are more often the victim rather than the aggressor. The book concludes with a section that discusses efforts to reduce violent behavior in families, youth, and communities. This book will provide a useful resource to graduate students, to practitioners, and program developers who want a comprehensive overview of violent behavior and who want to identify programs that work to reduce violent behavior in specific settings from families to workplace to communities.