Reviews for Unarmed Insurrections: People Power Movements in Nondemocracies

The average rating for Unarmed Insurrections: People Power Movements in Nondemocracies based on 2 reviews is 4 stars.

Review # 1 was written on 2016-12-20 00:00:00 Mike Craig Short theoretical volume on how opposition movements that primarily rely on nonviolent methods can succeed or fail in opposing autocratic political systems. Draws on case studies from South Africa, the Philippines, Burma, China, Thailand, and Nepal. The nonviolent action in focus here is the use of protests, strikes, and other "non-institutional" political actions, as distinct from opposition groups that participate in the formal political system. The book suggests that while some groups can do both, the Burmese protest movement in the early 1990s lost its ability to pressure the state when it adopted an electoral strategy - would be worth digging in more on the potential tensions between these strategies to see how divergent they may or may not be. The author identifies decentralized organizations and networks are being more effective at surviving efforts at state repression than more hierarchical ones, but the book also notes the importance of umbrella coordinating organizations (and cites the absence of such groups as a factor in the collapse of the Tiananmen movement). Ultimately, these movements succeed when they split ruling elite coalitions, withhold cooperation that the regime relies upon, and form coalitions with third parties (usually external to the country) upon which the regime relies. Lots of potential connections here to other works (Sinno, Bueno de Mesquita, Wickham).

Review # 2 was written on 2015-12-29 00:00:00 Kim Cook As a course text, this gives a strong and solid foundation. The various authors have kept to a structure that is easy to follow, and the book builds in a logical order through the steps one would follow to actually conduct a qualitative study. The book also explains connections to, and divergences from, the sometimes dominant paradigm of quantative research. Key points and terms are reiterated. Over all, this book is both quite easy to read, and highly useful to learners.