On tax day, April 15, 2010, hundreds of thousands of Americans demonstrated with signs demanding lower taxes on the richest one percent. Where do protest movements like this come from? Rich people are an unpopular minority with plenty of political influence. Why would rich people need to demonstrate in the streets to demand lower taxes-and why would anyone who wasn't rich join in the protest on their behalf? Such rich people's movements are hardy perennials of American politics. Ever since the ratification of the Sixteenth Amendment in 1913, they have emerged whenever public policies are perceived to threaten the property rights of rich people. The protesters on behalf of the rich have picked up the protest tactics of the poor and powerless because they have been organized and led by activists who have acquired their skills and protest techniques from other social movements, from the Populists and Progressives of the early twentieth century to the feminists and anti-war activists of the mid-twentieth century. At times when conservative Republicans are in power, rich people's movements have helped to bring about some of the biggest tax cuts for the rich in American history. This is the untold story of the tax clubs and Tea Parties that have shaped American politics and policy for the last hundred years.

A brilliant awakening to our vast shared potential and creative energy for change, from the beloved social media curator Stephen Ellcock. Featuring 240 reproductions of art, photography and objects, selected from cultures through history and across the globe, as well as from living artists such as Zanele Muholi, Kara Walker, Carrie Mae Weems, Ellen Gallagher, Shirin Neshat and Gillian Wearing, this is an extraordinary collection of powerfully inspiring imagery on the nature of challenge and change. 'Perfect for our time.' Adrian Searle, Guardian 'In compiling The Book of Change my aim was to combine fragments of the visual culture of the past - drawing upon as many different traditions, geographical locations and eras as possible - with work by contemporary artists and photographers and illustrators, extracting inspiration from the raw material of the world to create a unique patchwork that attempts to reimagine existence. 'By reassembling, repurposing and repositioning fragments of the past and combining them with new visions and fresh ways of seeing, a collage of unfamiliar, unspoiled possibilities can emerge, exorcizing the ghosts of struggles, failures and traumas past, providing glimpses of a better world, of overgrown paths in the clearing, of potential routes out of crisis into a brighter, bolder future.' 'Itinerant image-scavenging art-fugitive Stephen Ellcock returns with a new book revealing that beneath his acerbic, feral and rarefied exterior lies a large, kind and generous heart. When you get right down to it, in life and art, love is the message, and The Book of Change brings forth the codes, keys and surreal visions leading to brighter days.' Simon Armstrong, Tate Modern 'Stephen Ellcock brightens our dark world.' Kara Walker, artist

This book centers on one fundamental question: is it possible to imagine a progressive sense of nation? Rooted in historic and contemporary social struggles, the chapters in this collection examine what a progressive sense of nation might look like, with authors exploring the theory and practice of the nation beyond nationalism. The book is written against the background of rising authoritarian-nationalist movements globally over the last few decades, where many countries have witnessed the dramatic escalation of ethnic-nationalist parties impacting and changing mainstream politics and normalizing anti-immigration, anti-democratic and Islamophobic discourse. This volume discusses viable alternatives for nationalism, which is inherently exclusionary, exploring the possibility of a type of nation-based politics which does not follow the principles of nationalism. With its focus on nationalism, politics and social struggles, this book will be of great interest to students and scholars of political and social sciences.

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.

The non-violent protests of civil rights activists and anti-nuclear campaigners during the 1960s helped to redefine Western politics. But where did they come from? Sean Scalmer uncovers their history in an earlier generation's intense struggles to understand and emulate the activities of Mahatma Gandhi. He shows how Gandhi's non-violent protests were the subject of widespread discussion and debate in the USA and UK for several decades. Though at first misrepresented by Western newspapers, they were patiently described and clarified by a devoted group of cosmopolitan advocates. Small groups of Westerners experimented with Gandhian techniques in virtual anonymity and then, on the cusp of the 1960s, brought these methods to a wider audience. The swelling protests of later years increasingly abandoned the spirit of non-violence, and the central significance of Gandhi and his supporters has therefore been forgotten. This book recovers this tradition, charts its transformation, and ponders its abiding significance.

Contemporary protest, often presented in media forms as a dramatic ritual played out in an iconic public space has provided a potent symbol of the widespread economic and social discontent that is a feature of European life under the rule of "austerity." Yet, beneath this surface activity, which provides the headlines and images familiar from mainstream news coverage, lies a whole array of deeper structures, modes of behavior, and forms of human affiliation. Contemporary Protest and the Legacy of Dissent offers a vibrant and insightful overview of modern protest movements, ideologies, and events. Written by academics and activists familiar with the strategies, values, and arguments of those groups and individuals responsible for shaping the modern landscape of protest, it reveals the inside story of a number of campaigns and events. It analyzes the various manifestations of dissent-on and offline, visible and obscure, progressive and reactionary-through the work of a number of commentators and dedicated "academic activists," while reassessing the standard explanatory frameworks supplied by contemporary theorists. In doing so, it offers a coherent account of the range of academic and theoretical approaches to the study of protest and social movements. Contributions by: David Bates, Mark Bergfeld, Vincent Campbell, Claire English, Ingrid M. Hoofd, Soeren Keil, Matthew Ogilvie, Stuart Price, Anandi Ramamurthy, Ruth Sanz Sabido, Lee Salter, Cassian Sparkes-Vian, and Thomas Swann.

The first of four volumes, this book provides a unique insight into the career of one of Britain's leading nineteenth-century politicians. Richard Cobden (1804-1865) moved rapidly from business success in Manchester into the worlds of local, national and international politics, providing a case study in social mobility in the Industrial Revolution. He traveled extensively, visiting the United States, the Near East, and the continent writing influential pamphlets, before undertaking the campaign against the British Corn Laws for which he remains best known.
Drawing on material from Britain, Europe, and the United States, the letters are accompanied by notes and an introduction by Anthony Howe, explaining the unusual history of the letters and re-assessing Cobden's importance in their light. But the letters reveal not only Cobden the anti-corn law crusader, but provide us with a greater understanding of wider aspects of middle class politics and culture in their formative period in Britain and Europe. Together, these four volumes provide a unique source on British liberalism in its European and international contexts, throwing new light on issues such as the repeal of the Corn Laws, the British radical movements, the Crimean War, the Indian Mutiny, and the American Civil War.

The defeat of Apartheid and triumph of non-racial democracy in South Africa was not the work of just a few individuals. Ultimately, it came about through the actions – large and small – of many principled, courageous people from all walks of life and backgrounds.

Some of these activists achieved enduring fame and recognition and their names today loom large in the annals of the anti-apartheid struggle. Others were engaged in a range of practical, hands-on activities outside of the public eye. These were the loyal foot soldiers of the liberation Struggle, the unsung workers at the coal face who, largely behind the scenes, made a difference on the ground and helped to bring about meaningful change.

Even though Apartheid was aimed at entrenching white power and privilege, a number of whites rejected that system and instead joined their fellow South Africans in opposing it. Of these, a noteworthy proportion came from the Jewish community.

Mensches in the Trenches tells the hitherto unrecorded stories of some of these activists and the essential, if seldom publicised role that they and others like them played in bringing freedom and justice to their country.

Routledge Library Editions: Revolution in England examines the turbulent times that led to the English revolution and civil war as new political and religious ideas led to the overthrow of the king and establishment of a republic. Modern ideas of democracy were established then, and are analysed here in a series of books that look at the various radical sects such as the Nonjurors and Levellers that espoused new political thought and ways of living.

The 1986 Chernobyl catastrophe was not only a human and ecological disaster, but also a political-ideological one, severely discrediting Soviet governance and galvanizing dissidents in the Eastern Bloc. In the case of Poland, what began as isolated protests against the Soviet nuclear site grew to encompass domestic nuclear projects in general, and in the process spread across the country and attracted new segments of society. This innovative study, combining scholarly analysis with oral histories and other accounts from participants, traces the growth and development of the Polish anti-nuclear movement, showing how it exemplified the broader generational and cultural changes in the nation's opposition movements during the waning days of the state socialist era.

In the past decade the Asia-Pacific region has become a focus of international politics and military strategies. Due to China's rising economic and military strength, North Korea's nuclear tests and missile launches, tense international disputes over small island groups in the seas around Asia, and the United States pivoting a majority of its military forces to the region, the islands of the western Pacific have increasingly become the center of global attention. While the Pacific is a cur- rent hotbed of geopolitical rivalry and intense militarization, the region is also something else: a homeland to the hundreds of millions of people that inhabit it.
Based on a decade of research in the region, "The Empires' Edge" examines the tremendous damage the militarization of the Pacific has wrought on its people and environments. Furthermore, Davis details how contemporary social movements in this region are affecting global geopolitics by challenging the military use of Pacific islands and by developing a demilitarized view of security based on affinity, mutual aid, and international solidarity. Through an examination of "sacrificed" is- lands from across the region--including Bikini Atoll, Okinawa, Hawai'i, and Guam--"The Empires' Edge" makes the case that the great political contest of the twenty-first century is not about which country gets hegemony in a global system but rather about the choice be- tween perpetuating a system of international relations based on domination or pursuing a more egalitarian and cooperative future.

Hong Kong society is often regarded as politically apathetic. Yet throughout its history, Hong Kong experienced periodic waves of social movement activity. In part, the perception of an apathetic populace stems from the colonial government's laissez-faire policies, the society's concentration on economic development, the maintenance of traditional Chinese culture, and a consensus that Hong Kong would revert to Chinese sovereignty. Since Hong Kong was a colony, instead of evolving into a democratic government, Great Britain instituted a system of elite consultation and absorption of the masses' political problems through indirect participation. Butenhoff addresses the question of why social movements emerged and how they influenced the process of political reform. Her study presents and analyzes the activities of social movements so that a clearer picture of civil society and political change from below emerges.

Butenhoff integrates the literature on Hong Kong, civil society, and social movements into an integrated approach to analyze social movement influence in Hong Kong politics. Her three case studies: the independent labor movement, the nontraditional Christian movement, and the democracy movement are analyzed using a social movement framework. She evaluates the forces that drive and sustain social movements and argues that while the Chinese and British governments debated the fate of democratic Hong Kong, the Hong Kong people have been overlooked throughout the process. And, as a result, Hong Kong social movements play an essential role in raising the awareness of the people and bringing to light the voices from below.

The on-going struggle in New Poland is not confined to the daunting questions of economic transformation, though these certainly have been seized center stage. Most troubling to the dreams of Polish democracy is the recent splintering of Solidarnosc, the party, and its estrangement from Lech Walesa, the man who led it to institutional power. This book affords the opportunity to ponder this paradox of change. By discussing social change and movements in general, as well as the situation in Poland in particular, the reader gains insight into how a social movement is born, how it achieves its goals, and how it is transformed.

The waves of protest ignited by the self-immolation of Muhammad Bouazizi in Tunisia in late 2010 highlighted for an international audience the importance of contentious politics in the Middle East and North Africa. John Chalcraft's ground-breaking account of popular protest emphasizes the revolutionary modern history of the entire region. Challenging top-down views of Middle Eastern politics, he looks at how commoners, subjects and citizens have long mobilised in defiance of authorities. Chalcraft takes examples from a wide variety of protest movements from Morocco to Iran. He forges a new narrative of change over time, creating a truly comparative framework rooted in the dynamics of hegemonic contestation. Beginning with movements under the Ottomans, which challenged corruption and oppression under the banners of religion, justice, rights and custom, this book goes on to discuss the impact of constitutional movements, armed struggles, nationalism and independence, revolution and Islamism. A work of unprecedented range and depth, this volume will be welcomed by undergraduates and graduates studying protest in the region and beyond.

'Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere.' This landmark missive from one of the greatest activists in history calls for direct, non-violent resistance in the fight against racism, and reflects on the healing power of love. Penguin Modern: fifty new books celebrating the pioneering spirit of the iconic Penguin Modern Classics series, with each one offering a concentrated hit of its contemporary, international flavour. Here are authors ranging from Kathy Acker to James Baldwin, Truman Capote to Stanislaw Lem and George Orwell to Shirley Jackson; essays radical and inspiring; poems moving and disturbing; stories surreal and fabulous; taking us from the deep South to modern Japan, New York's underground scene to the farthest reaches of outer space.

Between 1900 and 1914, the British and American suffrage movements were characterized by interaction among suffragists, their organizations, and their publications on a much broader scale than has been generally recognized or acknowledged. This study isolates and examines the various connecting links ranging from personal relationships to the emphasis on a common cause. Women participated in one another's organizations and activities, including speaking tours and visits, and each group used the experience of the other to stimulate its own progress. In addition to the prominent figures of the day, Harrison includes information about lesser-known suffragists whose names and actions have been largely lost to history. The interaction between the British and American movements began in the 1870s when a network of suffrage friendships and relationships started to take shape, and cooperation escalated in the last two decades of the century. Connections expanded and peaked between 1900 and 1914, but, with the outbreak of war in August 1914, the extensive interaction came to an abrupt end. Harrison provides a history and comparison of the two movements to give the reader context and a background against which to study the international suffrage campaign. She assesses correspondence, diaries, journals, memoirs, pamphlets, articles, and coverage within the suffrage press itself.

In the first ever theoretical treatment of the environmental justice movement, David Schlosberg demonstrates the development of a new form of `critical' pluralism, in both theory and practice. Taking into account the evolution of environmentalism and pluralism over the course of the century, the author argues that the environmental justice movement and new pluralist theories now represent a considerable challenge to both conventional pluralist thought and the practices of the major groups in the US environmental movement. Much of recent political theory has been aimed at how to acknowledge and recognize, rather than deny, the diversity inherent in contemporary life. In practice, the myriad ways people define and experience the `environment' has given credence to a form of environmentalism that takes difference seriously. The environmental justice movement, with its base in diversity, its networked structure, and its communicative practices and demands, exemplifies the attempt to design political practices beyond those one would expect from a standard interest group in the conventional pluralist model.

This pioneering examination of the nuclear threat, written for both the interested general reader and the student of war and peace issues, blends broad philosophical/theoretical themes and themes in the peace and conflict literature with the results of the authors' extensive survey research in the United States and Europe. While never losing sight of the threat of a nuclear holocaust, authors Lisl Goodman and Lee Ann Hoff argue that it is possible to turn the tide of aggression and destruction and, in the process, create an utterly different human society. They challenge the myth of innate aggression which sees war as inevitable; present a critical examination of the psychodynamic, sociocultural, and political-economic factors which have led to current inaction in the face of the nuclear threat; and investigate the link between the insecurities of life in the nuclear age and the increasing rate of youth suicide, apathy, disengagement, and the general devaluation of life without a secure future.

Divided into three parts, the book begins by analyzing how we got to where we are today. The authors show that clinging to the outdated notion that aggression and violence are inevitable responses to human conflict has led to an abdication of individual responsibility and placed the fate of the planet in the hands of very few individuals. This abdication has led to feelings of powerlessness and desensitization as well as to a denial of the nuclear threat, a syndrome the authors label omnicidal. In Part Two, the authors present findings from several studies conducted in North America and Europe which reveal the pervasiveness of fear, denial, a fatalistic world view, and omnicidal personality patterns. The final section presents social change strategies that can be adopted at the individual, family, and sociopolitical levels to promote peace. The authors place particular emphasis on the pivotal role of childrearing and education patterns that emphasize cooperative behavior and critical thinking about global issues.

For the first time in a single volume, the growing field of network analysis is systematically explored and assessed in terms of its ability to throw light on individual behaviour, social movements and political processes.

In "The Last Crusade, " Gerald McKnight examines the Poor People's Campaign, the last large-scale demonstration of civil rights-era America, and the systematic efforts of FBI director J. Edgar Hoover and his executive officers to subvert King's ambitious effort to force the federal government to live up to its promises of a Great Society. The book also looks at King's last days as he helped Memphis sanitation workers in their labor-cum-civil rights struggle with a recalcitrant and racist city government. Although there is no persuasive evidence that the FBI and the Memphis police conspired to assassinate King, McKnight marshals evidence to show that neither agency was blameless.The conventional view of the Poor People's Campaign is that it was a self-inflicted failure. The blame rested squarely on the shoulders of the second-raters of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference who failed to fill the leadership vacuum after King's assassination. But, as McKnight shows, there was a hidden, dark counterpoint to the accepted version--namely, the triumph of the 1960s American surveillance state and its repressive power and flagrant violation of protected freedoms. In fact, whatever the FBI wanted to do to disrupt the Campaign, it did, aided and abetted by local police agencies and elements of the federal government, including military intelligence.

In virtually all corners of the Western world, 1968 witnessed a highly unusual sequence of popular rebellions. In Italy, France, Spain, Vietnam, the United States, West Germany, Czechoslovakia, Mexico, and elsewhere, millions of individuals took matters into their own hands to counter imperialism, capitalism, autocracy, bureaucracy, and all forms of hierarchical thinking. Recent reinterpretations have sought to play down any real challenge to the socio-political status quo in these events, but Gerd-Rainer Horn's book offers a spirited counterblast. 1968, he argues, opened up the possibility that economic and political elites on both sides of the Iron Curtain could be toppled from their position of unnatural superiority to make way for a new society where everyday people could, for the first time, become masters of their own destiny. Furthermore, Horn contends, the moment of crisis and opportunity culminating in 1968 must be seen as part of a larger period of experimentation and revolt. The ten years between 1956 and 1966, characterised above all by the flourishing of iconoclastic cultural rebellions, can be regarded as a preparatory period which set the stage for the non-conformist cum political revolts of the subsequent 'red' decade (1966-1976). Horn's geographic centres of attention are Western Europe, including the first full examination of Mediterranean revolts, and North America. He placed particular emphasis on cultural nonconformity, the student movement, working class rebellions, the changing contours of the Left, and the meaning of participatory democracy. His book will make fascinating reading for anyone interested in this turbulent period and the fundamental changes that were wrought upon societies either side of the Atlantic.

Impassioned social protest writers inspire readers to relive injustice, empathize with its victims, and take action. The more than 450 entries in this volume survey the most important protest works of our time as well as the classics of the past. Social Protest Literature discusses the lives and concerns of more than 100 writers; analyzes each work's themes, content, and targeted social problems; provides plot synopses and character sketches; demonstrates how major literary creations represent specific ideologies; and explores key social protest concepts in the context of historical events and social and cultural milieus. This beautifully illustrated encyclopedia focuses on recent works that look at environmentalism, labor issues, civil rights for such marginalized groups as gays and lesbians and racial and ethnic minorities, the role of art under repressive regimes, and other timely issues. Extensive cross-references direct readers to other works with similar themes and a comprehensive bibliography suggests further reading.

Dispelling the myth that women became involved in partisan politics only after they obtained the vote, this study uses contemporary newspaper sources to show that women were active in the party struggle long before 1920. Although their role was initially limited to attending rallies and hosting picnics, they gradually began to use their pens and voices to support party tickets. By the late 19th century, women spoke at party functions and organized all-female groups to help canvass neighborhoods and get out the vote. In the early suffrage states of the West, they voted in increasing numbers and even held a few offices. Women were particularly active, this book shows, in the minor reformist parties--Populist, Prohibitionist, Socialist, and Progressive--but eventually came to play a role in the major parties as well. Prominent suffrage leaders, such as Elizabeth Cady Stanton and Susan B. Anthony, entered the partisan arena in order to promote their cause. By the time the suffrage amendment was ratified, women were deeply involved in the mainstream political process.

Cleary examines the origins, spread, and results of human rights movements in Latin America, and he analyzes the mark such movements have made in world politics. He shows the enormous difficulties encountered by fledgling grassroots groups which first challenged military dictatorships over the disappeared, detention, torture, and pervasive repression. He chronicles the amazingly dynamic growth of human rights organizations, affecting democratic processes in Latin America and foreign policy in the United States. This book is particularly important because it establishes, for the first time, a record of why, how, where, and when the concept of human rights-not long ago absent as a practical concept-generates so powerful a Latin American response. The alliances so formed are shown to evoke continued popular support and to effect on-going fundamental changes in Latin America. An important survey to all scholars, researchers, and students of human rights and political affairs in Latin America.

The persuasive strategies employed by the Moral Majority in the early 1980s reassured and calmed a segment of the American population left confused and uncertain by recent national events. David Snowball analyzes this powerful movement, how its rhetoric energized its supporters, the positions it endorsed and causes it championed, and its response to political and media critics. By examining the fundamental messages, the tactics used, and the personalities involved, the study reveals that, while the basic message of the Moral Majority remained constant, its changing popular image and maturing rhetoric, which initially added momentum to its rapid rise, may also have been at the root of its swift decline by the end of the decade. While tracing the movement's origins, Snowball investigates in-depth the American people's reaction to the influence of the Moral Majority. He subsequently reviews its founding tenets and the language typically used to encourage its disciples. A look at the specific issues which polarized critics and followers exposes the reasons for the movement's collapse and poses questions regarding its future. Although the primary focus of this study is the history of the Moral Majority, the analysis also provides valuable insight into the nature of the American political system's response to religiously-motivated movements in general.