Most Americans can recite the names of famous generals and historic battles. Some can also name champions of nonviolence like Martin Luther King Jr., or recall the struggles for peace and justice that run like a thread through U.S. history. But little attention is paid to the intellectual tradition of nonviolence. Ira Chernus surveys the evolution of this powerful idea from the Colonial Era up to today, focusing on representative movements (Anabaptists, Quakers, Anarchists, Progressives) and key individuals (Thoreau, Reinhold Niebuhr, Dorothy Day, A.J. Muste, King, Barbara Deming), including non-Americans like Mohandas Gandhi and Thich Nhat Hanh, who have helped form the idea of nonviolence in the United States. American Nonviolence offers an essential guide for both students and activists. -- Provided by publisher

It includes classics such as Henry David Thoreau's "Civil Disobedience," William James's "The Moral Equivalent of War," and Martin Luther King, Jr.'s "Letter from Birmingham City Jail." A section is devoted to what the Lynds call "New Catholicism" and includes selections by Dorothy Day, Thomas Merton, and Jim and Shelley Douglass.

A persuasive account of the philosophy and power of nonviolence organizing, and a resource for building and sustaining effective social movements. Despite the rich history of nonviolent philosophy, many people today are unfamiliar with the basic principles and practices of nonviolence––even as these concepts have guided so many direct-action movements to overturn forms of racial apartheid, military and police violence, and dictatorships around the world. Revolutionary Nonviolence is a crucial resource on the long history of nonviolent philosophy through the teachings of Rev. James M. Lawson Jr., one of the great practitioners of revolution through deliberate and sustained nonviolence. His ongoing work demonstrates how we can overcome violence and oppression through organized direct action, presenting a powerful roadmap for a new generation of activists. Rev. Lawson’s work as a theologian, pastor, and social-change activist has inspired hope and liberation for more than sixty years. To hear and see him speak is to experience the power of the prophetic tradition in the African American and social gospel. In Revolutionary Nonviolence, Michael K. Honey and Kent Wong reflect on Rev. Lawson's talks and dialogues, from his speeches at the Nashville sit-in movement in 1960 to his lectures in the current UCLA curriculum. This volume provides a comprehensive introduction to Rev. Lawson's teachings on how to center nonviolence in successfully organizing for change.

In response to the massive bloodshed that defined the twentieth century, American religious radicals developed a modern form of nonviolent protest, one that combined Christian principles with new uses of mass media. Greatly influenced by the ideas of Mohandas Gandhi, these "acts of conscience" included sit-ins, boycotts, labor strikes, and conscientious objection to war. Beginning with World War I and ending with the ascendance of Martin Luther King Jr., Joseph Kip Kosek traces the impact of A. J. Muste, Richard Gregg, and other radical Christian pacifists on American democratic theory and practice. These dissenters found little hope in the secular ideologies of Wilsonian Progressivism, revolutionary Marxism, and Cold War liberalism, all of which embraced organized killing at one time or another. The example of Jesus, they believed, demonstrated the immorality and futility of such violence under any circumstance and for any cause. Yet the theories of Christian nonviolence are anything but fixed. For decades, followers have actively reinterpreted the nonviolent tradition, keeping pace with developments in politics, technology, and culture. Tracing the rise of militant nonviolence across a century of industrial conflict, imperialism, racial terror, and international warfare, Kosek recovers radical Christians' remarkable stance against the use of deadly force, even during World War II and other seemingly just causes. His research sheds new light on an interracial and transnational movement that posed a fundamental, and still relevant, challenge to the American political and religious mainstream.

Several well known scholars present social and psychological perspectives on nonviolence. Contents: Toward a Theory of the Psychology of Nonviolence, V.K. Kool; Psychological Obstacles to Peace, Michael Wessells; Nuclear War Fears Across the Life Cycle, Stephen McConnell, Barry Duncan, Debra Merrifield; What Moves the Peace Movement: Psychosocial Factors in Historical Perspective, Milton Schwebel; The Differential Psychological Effects of Positive and Negative Approaches to Peace, Richard V. Wagner; Moral Exclusion and Nonviolence: The Japanese American Internment, Donna Nagata; A Social Psychology of Rules of War, Jeffrey Mann; Children as Peacemakers, Jill Alexander, Stephen McConnell; Resiliency and its Relationship to Productivity and Nonviolence, Joanne Joseph; Transforming Myths of War to Create a Legacy of Peace, Michael Britton; Nonviolence: An Empirical Study in India, Manisha Sen; Peace Psychology, Herbert Blumberg; Gandhi's Concept of Love, Ian M. Harris; Nonviolence in the 21st Century, Kenneth E. Boulding; Feminist Debates about Nonviolence, Lynn M. Woehrle; The Center for Nonviolence, Richard L. Johnson; Protective Accompaniment, Patrick G. Coy; Hannah Arendt on Nonviolence and Political Action, Gail M. Presbey; Teaching Human Rights in the Social Sciences, Joseph Wronka; and Exercises in Nonviolent Action, Theodore Herman.