Peace Movements: International Protest and World Politics Since 1945


Book Description

There is a long tradition of opposition to war and organized peace campaigns date from 1815. Since 1945, however, modern weapons technology has threatened world wide destruction and has stimulated widespread protests. This book sketches in the background of thinking about peace and resistance to war before 1945, and then examines how public opposition to nuclear weapons and testing grew in the 1950s and early 1960s. Later chapters cover the major ressurgence of nuclear disarmament campaigns in the 1980s. The book also looks at how peace protest has spread from its origins in North America and North West Europe to embrace many parts of the world; opposition to nuclear testing has indeed been particularly strong in Japan, Australia, New Zealand and the Pacific islands. The period 1945 to 1990 was dominated by the Cold War between the USA and USSR, and the role of the Soviet-sponsored World Peace Council caused difficulties for indeptendent peace groups in the West. During the 1980s the emergence of autonomous peace activity in a number of East European countries, and even on a very small scale in the USSR itself, transformed the possibilities for East-West co-operation between citizens to urge disarmament and political change. A chapter examines these developments. Opposition to all forms of militarism has spread in the last 30 years. This book charts the struggles to extend the right to conscientious objection to military service, and draft resistance to particular wars - for example in Southern Africa and Israel. It also looks in some detail at the growing opposition to the war in the Vietnam. The recent protests against the Gulf War are surveyed briefly in an epilogue.




Peace Movements Worldwide


Book Description

This three-volume anthology is a comprehensive overview of how the human yearning for peace has played out, and is playing out, on this planet. Peace Movements Worldwide is quite simply the most comprehensive work of its kind on this important subject. In its three volumes, experts document the history and growth of the peace movement, why it is important, who gets involved, and how it can succeed. Organized by major themes and issues, the work examines every facet of human striving for peace, from the global to the personal. The first volume, History and Vitality of Peace Movements, explores the meaning of peace—its historical, philosophical, and biological foundations and related spiritual, gender, social, and economic viewpoints. The second volume, Players and Practices in Resistance to War, discusses control over weapons, efforts to prevent and end violent conflict, and efforts to heal the traumatic aftereffects of violence. The third volume, Peace Efforts That Work and Why, looks at how mankind can build a new world order by building communities with a sustainable culture of peace.




From Anger to Action


Book Description

From Anger to Action tells the stories of the citizens' movements charting new paths to tackle the big global challenges that lie behind the political upheavals of our times. Drawing on candid insights from citizens, activists, and innovators, and their own experiences as leaders of internationally recognized advocacy organizations, the authors give an insider account of the battle for change and how it can be won – as well as trenchant criticism of where traditional civil society has lost its way and needs renewal. While unflinching on the dangers of the current political crises, the book offers hard-edged hope and a vision for citizen-led change to reshape our fractured politics. We meet communities in economically-battered towns welcoming refugees and Syrian peacebuilders reaching across impossible divides, go behind the scenes with Fairtrade banana farmers and hear of frenzied climate campaigners pushing divestment from oil companies and using social media to drive change. Lamb and Jackson explore how citizens’ movements are transforming our global politics, refashioning internationalism and fighting back against narrow nationalism. The book analyses why some movements secure lasting change – and others fail. And they show how these insights could shape a wider strategy for grassroots-up transformation. From Anger to Action will be of interest to social activists and anyone interested in social movements, global change, and civil society.




Transnational Social Movements and Global Politics


Book Description

"Transnational Social Movements and Global Social Politics examines a cast of global actors left out of the traditional studies of international politics. It generates a theoretically informed view of the relationships between an emerging global civil society - partly manifested in transnational social movements - and international political institutions. This book consists of fifteen essays, all written by experts in the field. The first three parts analyze the rise of transnational social movements in the context of broad twentieth-century trends. A fourth part builds a theoretical framework from which organizations influencing global governance can be viewed."--




Antimilitarism


Book Description

A lively, first hand account of the ideas and activities of women and men in anti-war, anti-militarist and peace movements. The author looks at the tensions and divergences in and between organizations, and their potential for cohering into a powerful worldwide counter-hegemonic movement for violence reduction.




Peace


Book Description

Very Short Introductions: Brilliant, Sharp, Inspiring The concept of peace has always attracted radical thought, action, and practices. It has been taken to mean merely an absence of overt violence or war, but in the contemporary era it is often used interchangeably with 'peacemaking', 'peacebuilding', 'conflict resolution', and 'statebuilding'. The modern concept of peace has therefore broadened from the mere absence of violence to something much more complicated. In this Very Short Introduction, Oliver Richmond explores the evolution of peace in practice and in theory, exploring our modern assumptions about peace and the various different interpretations of its applications. This second edition has been theoretically and empirically updated and introduces a new framework to understand the overall evolution of the international peace architecture. ABOUT THE SERIES: The Very Short Introductions series from Oxford University Press contains hundreds of titles in almost every subject area. These pocket-sized books are the perfect way to get ahead in a new subject quickly. Our expert authors combine facts, analysis, perspective, new ideas, and enthusiasm to make interesting and challenging topics highly readable.




Transitioning to Peace


Book Description

This edited volume highlights how individuals, communities and nations are addressing a history of protracted violence in the transition to peace. This path is not linear or straightforward. The volume integrates research from peace processes and practices spanning over 20 countries. Four thematic areas unite these contributions: formal transitional justice mechanisms, social movements and collective action, community-driven processes, and future-oriented initiatives focused on children and youth. Across these chapters, the volume offers critical insight, new methods, conceptual models, and valuable cross-cultural research. The chapters in this volume balance locally-situated realties of peace, as well as cross-cutting similarities across contexts. This book will be of particular interest to those working for peace on the frontlines, as well as global policymakers aiming to learn from other cases. Academics in the fields of psychology, sociology, education, peace studies, communication, community development, youth studies, and behavioral economics may be particularly interested in this volume.




Waging Peace


Book Description

David Hartsough knows how to get in the way. He has used his body to block Navy ships headed for Vietnam and trains loaded with munitions on their way to El Salvador and Nicaragua. He has crossed borders to meet “the enemy” in East Berlin, Castro’s Cuba, and present-day Iran. He has marched with mothers confronting a violent regime in Guatemala and stood with refugees threatened by death squads in the Philippines. Waging Peace is a testament to the difference one person can make. Hartsough’s stories inspire, educate, and encourage readers to find ways to work for a more just and peaceful world. Inspired by the examples of Mahatma Gandhi and Martin Luther King Jr., Hartsough has spent his life experimenting with the power of active nonviolence. It is the story of one man’s effort to live as though we were all brothers and sisters. Engaging stories on every page provide a peace activist’s eyewitness account of many of the major historical events of the past sixty years, including the Civil Rights and anti–Vietnam War movements in the United States and the little-known but equally significant nonviolent efforts in the Soviet Union, Kosovo, Palestine, Sri Lanka, and the Philippines. Hartsough’s story demonstrates the power and effectiveness of organized nonviolent action. But Waging Peace is more than one man’s memoir. Hartsough shows how this struggle is waged all over the world by ordinary people committed to ending the spiral of violence and war.




War and Gender


Book Description

Gender roles are nowhere more prominent than in war. Yet contentious debates, and the scattering of scholarship across academic disciplines, have obscured understanding of how gender affects war and vice versa. In this authoritative and lively review of our state of knowledge, Joshua Goldstein assesses the possible explanations for the near-total exclusion of women from combat forces, through history and across cultures. Topics covered include the history of women who did fight and fought well, the complex role of testosterone in men's social behaviours, and the construction of masculinity and femininity in the shadow of war. Goldstein concludes that killing in war does not come naturally for either gender, and that gender norms often shape men, women, and children to the needs of the war system. lllustrated with photographs, drawings, and graphics, and drawing from scholarship spanning six academic disciplines, this book provides a unique study of a fascinating issue.




"The Truest Form of Patriotism"


Book Description

This text explores the pervasive influence of pacifism on Victorian feminism. Drawing on previously unused source material, it provides an account of Victorian women who campaigned for peace and the many feminists who incorporated pacifist ideas into their writing on women and women's work. It explores feminists' ideas about the role of women within the empire, their eligibility for citizenship and their ability to act as moral guardians in public life. Brown shows that such ideas made use - in varying ways - of gendered understandings of the role of force and the relevance of arbitration and other pacifist strategies. organizations, from well-known feminists such as Lydia Becker, Josephine Butler and Milicent Garrett Fawcett, to lesser-known figures such as the Quaker pacifists Ellen Robinson and Priscilla Peckover. Women's work within male-dominated organizations, such as the Peace Society and the International Arbitration and Peace Association, is covered alongside single-sex organizations, such as the International Council of Women. Also reviewed are the arguments put forward in feminist journals like the Englishwoman's Review and the Women's Penny Paper. Brown uncovers a wide range of pacifist, internationalist and anti-imperialist strands in Victorian feminist thought, focusing on how these ideas developed within the political and organizational context of the time. movements and to those with an interest in the history of British feminism.