Our online forum was rich with the sharing of information throughout the term. Most notably, were exchanges between Pat and Mark on the means to achieve social change. As a group we encouraged them to write out a conversation regarding their different perspectives on the impact violence and nonviolence has on making the world a just place. The result is in this collaborative blog post.

Mark: For me the question of violence and nonviolence as it relates to social change is complicated, and it comes down to a question of our “theories of change.” Theories of change are implicit in all of our teaching and activism. An analogy that helps me to understand oppressive social structures is that of a machine that needs material inputs to produce material outputs. I believe that one goal of social change activism must be to make that machine so inefficient and unprofitable that it makes more sense for those in power to abandon it. In that gap lies the possibility for people to create something new; I guess this underlies my own “theory of change.” One way of doing this can be the cutting of fuel and materials as inputs for this machine. Some historical examples might include boycotts (like buses in Birmingham, or indigo and weaving in India, or general strikes) or refusals to obey the rules (like protests, sit-ins, and marches). However, I also think that sabotaging the infrastructure of a machine by putting sand in the gears, cutting off fuel supply lines, and breaking some of its component parts can also be effective components in the mix of tactics. Some historical examples might include violent resistance to foreign occupation, like in Vietnam or Algeria, where the cost of resources and lives to maintain these colonial possessions was eventually deemed not worth the benefits by the empires seeking to maintain them; other examples might include acts of resistance like African slaves destroying farm equipment, or poisoning their plantation owners on North America (Turtle Island).

Ultimately, I am not sure that we should uniquely think of the use of violence and nonviolence in moral terms, but rather we should consider the strategic impact of the use of violence and nonviolence in a mix of tactics. When this analysis is brought in, I think we would find that the use of violence is rarely strategically beneficial, mostly because of the disproportionate response by the repressive state apparatus (i.e. military, police) which holds a monopoly on “legitimate” (read: legal) uses of violence.

Pat: You are explaining well the “power-breaking” dynamic of nonviolent resistance. As you suggest, nonviolent activists would advocate a diversity of tactics, and whether this might include some forms of sabotage against property is a continuous subject of debate. One can certainly make the case that, as long as efforts were made to ensure nobody was injured or killed, such acts would be nonviolent. A distinction though should be made between targeting a large corporation engaged in major human rights abuses, a weapon of war, or a transportation network central to the maintenance of a system of exploitation and attacking a small family business or institution serving the community’s well-being.

Your perspective on nonviolence fits perfectly with the power-breaking focus of nonviolent strategist Gene Sharp. In contrast to Gandhi or Martin Luther King, he similarly argues that moral issues about violence and nonviolence should be excluded, and the choice of nonviolence seen simply as a tactical choice, which for Sharp was always the better one. Interestingly, the history of nonviolence is also a history of states seeking to infiltrate nonviolent movements to shift them towards violence. For example, during the period of the nonviolent campaign against Assad, the Syrian regime gave its allied militia groups license to commit massive abuses against civilians, while also reportedly leaving stockpiles of weapons in opposition strongholds (see for example Bartkowski and Kahf’s postings – Part 1 and Part 2 – on the OpenDemocracy website). This is because once violence begins to be used, even by groups not tied to the nonviolent movement, it becomes increasingly easy to justify a violent crackdown by the authorities. But I also think that the ability of nonviolence to be used not only as a tool to challenge an unjust system, but also to delegitimize the acts of violence used to maintain it, points to the value of seeing nonviolence as both a tactical and ethical choice.

Mark: Yes, I agree that nonviolent actions are certainly preferable, both in terms of tactics and ethics, especially when seen as individual acts. However, it is when violence (or the threat of violence) is used as one component of a mix of tactics that things get a bit less clear for me.

But, just to take a step back for a moment, if one were to strictly question the efficacy of violence to achieve ends, history teaches us that violence is extremely effective. Just looking at the past 500 years of colonialism and capitalist entrenchment, we can see that violence has been a necessary (and continuing) component to ensure that the subjects of states conform to the economic interests of those who govern those states, even in “democracies” like Canada. It is impossible to understand the history (and therefore the present) of Turtle Island, without understanding the consistent and continued attempts at the genocide against Indigenous peoples in the theft of their land and resources for capital accumulation, and the forced displacement of over 12 million Africans against their will to work those lands. It is, I think, indisputable that the accumulation of wealth on Turtle Island finds its roots in these twin thefts: land and resources stolen from Indigenous peoples, and labour stolen from Africans. Whatever wealth we have as a society today is directly founded in this primitive accumulation, and it ought not be ignored. The persistent and continued harm done to Indigenous and Black people on these lands today (by state institutions like police, schools, military, border officers, etc…) is also directly founded in these historical relationships.

The disproportionalities we see today for Black and Indigenous people across Turtle Island include: rates of incarceration, poverty and homelessness, children being removed from families and put into foster care, victimization (often fatal) at the hands of police or white civilians, lack of justice system support in the investigation and prosecution of cases involving Black and Indigenous victims, and the list goes on and on. In a conversation about the efficacy of violence as a strategy for social movements, I think it would be irresponsible to ignore this simple fact: Our society is founded in and is maintained by violence, and it is carried out with great effectiveness.

Pat: I agree with almost all of this. Western society, Canada, and more generally the modern state was founded through and is backed up by violence. History, thus, shows us that violence can succeed, at least to serve the interests of an elite, as it’s the masses who bear most of the costs. But state violence has never been an efficient use of a people’s resources, but rather a massive drain in human lives, money and natural resources (check out Brown University’s Costs of War Project). Yes, colonialism and slavery gave the western world its economic advantages, making it possible for a large white middle class to prosper, but the devastating human, economic and social impacts of this history of violence lies at the roots of today’s interconnected global crises which affect us all (although to be sure the more privileged will always be impacted less).

Moreover, state violence against internal and external enemies is far less effective today. While earlier military powers were able to commit atrocities with few outsiders watching, in our age of instant communication, this is rarely possible, thereby increasing substantially the political risks of using violence against civilians. And, while great asymmetries in the capacity for violence continue to exist, cheap weapons, home-made IEDs, for example, can cause real problems for even the largest military powers, to the extent that support for war can quickly wane and victory – whatever that may mean — is never guaranteed. But a loss of popular support and the declining probability of success rarely bring wars to quick ends. The psychological (and cultural) trauma, and subsequent political impact, of military losses are so devastating that few governments are willing to acknowledge that a war is lost, setting the stage for either a long fruitless struggle or a preparation for the next one where deaths will supposedly be avenged and victory finally gained.

Mark: While you may be right that, in this age of instant communication, it is more likely that atrocities committed by military powers will be seen by outsiders, I’m not sure that these witnessings are actually leading to a reduction in the use of repressive state violence. If we expand our understanding of military power to police forces that are increasingly used to subdue domestic populations, there is ample evidence of the role of military-equipped police forces across Turtle Island killing Black people, as well as Indigenous folks, people of colour, LGBTQ+ and two spirit folks, and people who experience mental health struggles.

I think what complicates our collective narratives around violence is that in our complex society, which liberal people love to dogmatically refer to as a democracy, the state’s monopoly on the use of violence is paired with a near-monopoly on the control of information as well. The propaganda that is effectively disseminated to label acts of vandalism as violence finds itself in alignment with the maintenance of state structures. As Pierre Elliott Trudeau stated during the October Crisis, it is the elected government’s mandate to eliminate, by any means necessary (including the abrogation of civil liberties), any parallel power that is threatening the existence of the state.

Indeed, I think it would be a mistake to underestimate the lengths to which these governing structures would go to maintain themselves. I just finished reading a book on the Paris Commune of 1871, when working class Parisians collectively tried to create a more equitable world after the Franco-Prussian War. Their attempt at collective liberation was addressed with unmitigated violence set upon them by French soldiers, who were returning home from a defeat at the hands of the Prussians! Paris saw street fighting house-to-house, with Commune supporters executed systematically by firing squads – over 20,000 Parisians were murdered by French troops. The victims of this mass killing were men, women, children, and the elderly – whether or not they were belligerents was immaterial, if they were poor, they were assumed to be sympathizers. The authoritarian French government was ruthless in its use of violence against these poor Parisians. This is an illustrative example of the degree to which states (even those that proclaim themselves as models of democracy) will resort to violence to maintain themselves.

In a more contemporary context, the disproportionate use of state violence to suppress the uprisings we see across cities in the United States today in protest of the police killing of George Floyd shows the persistence of the facility with which institutional powers can use violence against (mostly) peaceful demonstrators – much like Ferguson (2014), and Oakland (2009), and Cincinnati (2001), and LA (1992), and Miami (1980), and Detroit (1967), and Watts (1965), and so on, and so on. Those protestors who break a shop window or loot store merchandise are framed as “turning to violence” by the media and by state institutions who then use this framing to justify the disproportionate use of police violence to suppress the broader movement for justice, with the state-sanctioned violence enacted against (for the most part) the poor. So, historical evidence (as well as an understanding of present situations) shows us that violence is extremely successful at governing “unruly” populations that question the legitimacy of state structures.

One additional problem to consider is that these state structures have gotten pretty effective at neutralizing nonviolent resistance as well. Political marches are not what they used to be – how can they be when, in Montreal for example, groups of 50 or more protesters must give their march route to the police or face fines in the tens of thousands of dollars! Finding methods to successfully engage in political expression and resistance despite the neutralizing tendencies of state structures becomes so crucial. This is precisely where the Resist Violence pedagogy of arts-based nonviolent practice becomes so relevant – I see this kind of activism as playing a vital role in speaking truth to power and educating the masses (i.e. as a parallel line of information to compete with mass media representations; or, in other words, as resistance in the interstices of hegemonic culture).

Pat: You have brought up important points here. The state, including democratic ones, can be ruthless in cracking down on protestors, and uses the term “violence” very liberally to create the justifications it needs. The liberal democratic features of the western state, however insufficient in practice, provide enormous legitimacy to a status quo that harms many. Violations of human rights are primarily seen as a result of the actions of individuals, rather than signs of fundamental flaws in our political, economic and social institutions themselves.

Nonviolent theorists would not though say that the democratic state has a near-monopoly on the control of information or indeed that it has full control over their instruments of coercion, as it relies on individual members of the police force or military to carry out arrests or attack protestors. Rather its ability to rule rests on our cooperation or, as Stellan Vinthagen prefers, our subordination, often willing, sometimes coerced and frequently routinized and given without our awareness. Surprising to many is that nonviolent movements have had more success confronting authoritarian regimes than they have democratic ones: the blunt power of the former feel so coercive and the lies of the government-controlled media so much more obvious that they provoke resistance. In contrast, the building of support for systems of structural violence in democratic societies is more subtle, but effective nonetheless, influencing our ideas, feelings and actions, including our forms of resistance.

This brings us to one of the key insights of nonviolent theorists. Gandhi, Martin Luther King, Gene Sharp, Nelson Mandela, and the many other proponents of nonviolent action, have never underestimated the potential brutality that could be inflicted by the oppressor. Whether or not we are seeing a global reduction in repressive state violence today is an interesting question, but the central issue for me is whether the effectiveness of violence is decreasing. As noted, I do think new media technologies make state violations more visible and thus more politically risky. The challenge for those of us engaged in the work of social change then is to reinforce this trend by working to delegitimize violence. An interesting component to this is that in doing so we are potentially at the same time working to undercut the stability of all interlocking oppressive systems that rely on violence to sustain them. I am under no illusions: in a world where our media and entertainment culture is saturated with violence, where our police forces have become increasingly militarized, and where for those living far from battlefields, real war can even be “enjoyed” as “a spectacle,” this is an enormous task. But surely this requires us to rethink the role of violence in all aspects of our lives, including in our forms of resistance.

Nonviolent theorists argue that an essential part of this delegitimization is for us to recognize that we have mistakenly identified the capacity of violence to destroy, or as Elaine Scarry so powerfully expressed it, “to unmake the world,” with real power. Yes, violence may be effective in some situations, but there are real limits to the power of violence. The US could have destroyed Vietnam entirely, the French, Algeria, the Soviets, Afghanistan, and so on, but to do so would not have given them what they sought. Arguably the power of violence lies more in the threat implied, and, yes, that threat – and occasional demonstrations to remind individuals of the pain that violence can inflict — can silence a population for generations (although the effectiveness of deterrence itself can also be debated).

But when the population’s rage and sense of injustice finally boils over, their resorts to violence can usually be quite easily controlled, while their nonviolent power can bring down a regime. Yes, governments can be ruthless in their efforts to suppress popular opposition, but the violence used is always politically risky and thus less than would be if the resisters turned to violence or are successfully represented as doing so (hence the danger of mixing tactics). Popular resistance – both violent and nonviolent – will not always work and demand much personal sacrifice and commitment, but, paraphrasing Robert Holmes, nonviolent power always increases in proportion to the nonviolent actions of individuals. As you point out, political marches are not what they used to be; but perhaps this is simply a call for more creativity, diversity and persistence in our nonviolent methods of resistance.

Mark: In conversations like these about tactics and strategies, I do think it’s important to position ourselves. As a privileged, white, male, cis-gendered, straight settler I would never argue that the Kanien’kehá:ka were wrong to bear arms during the Oka Standoff; or that the Algerians and Vietnamese resistance should not have resorted to violence in their resistance against the French, Japanese, and American Empires; or that the Black Panthers should not have carried weapons in self-defense from a militarized LAPD (and later municipal police forces across the US); or that Jews should not have engaged in the Warsaw uprising; or that Sitting Bull should not have led the Sioux and Crow in a war against General Custer; or that African slaves should not have poisoned their masters; or that Haitians should not have burned down the plantations and manorial estates that enslaved them. I fully recognize that the end results of all of these examples of violent resistance have been far less than ideal, but I also think that these acts have inspired a sense of strength and cohesion in oppressed groups to resist hegemonic powers that seemed so insurmountable. I think that this is particularly true when acts of nonviolence cannot be guaranteed to incite a moral sense of justice in some unnamed audience that we hope to see intervene in some way – as was the case for MLK and Gandhi. What intangible effects did the Oka Standoff have on the imaginations of the Standing Rock water protectors? What effects did Wounded Knee (1973) have on the Kanien’kehá:ka during the Oka Standoff?

Ultimately, I feel that Frantz Fanon was right to point out that modelling resistance movements (or parallel contenders for state power) on the colonizer would only lead to the same kinds of historical atrocities that have continued to repeat themselves as we stumble through centuries. To arrive at structures of governance without following a pathway that includes violence, war, enslavement, theft, genocide – in essence, alternative modernities – those of us who are privileged by the social structures in place (and who hope to play a role in dismantling those unjust structures) will need to support a wide range of alternative and emergent social movements, including some that we might disagree with in principle.

In this messy work of revolutionary strategy, and because of the contingency of history, the ways that these diverse tactics make one another more or less viable when implemented simultaneously may be impossible to determine, even in retrospect. In fact, this might be especially impossible to determine in retrospect, when narratives are imposed by the victors to ensure that no new parallel powers attempt to displace them.

Pat: As humans, we cannot help but be moved by those who risk their lives in a fight against injustice. Even Gandhi wrote that violence is preferable to impotence: “There is hope for a violent man to become nonviolent. There is no such hope for the impotent” (Kurlansky 2006). Indeed, violent acts can spark an oppressed people to free themselves from the psychological prisons that crush them and find their sense of agency, but one can say this as well for nonviolent actions, although this is made more difficult as so much of the rich global history of nonviolence has been largely forgotten or marginalized. What we find powerful about resistance – both violent and nonviolent — is the willingness of those involved to, despite all the odds, fight for what they believe in, and in that sense, all actions against oppression carry moral weight, and gain support as a result.

But, the injustice of the status quo becomes even more evident when those who oppose it do so without violence. We see this over and over in our desire to do something when we see unarmed protesters in other countries being attacked by their state’s military or police forces; unfortunately this typically becomes a call for armed intervention or the transfer of weaponry, which leads so often to disastrous results, such as we saw in Libya and Syria. We also see this in the divisions that often develop among those who are ordered to use violence against unarmed protestors. In retrospect, such moments are often pivotal in the success or failure of nonviolent struggles, but at the time their potential impact is not always discernable. Are we witnessing something significant developing with individual police officers taking the knee in front of Black Lives Matter protesters? Only time will tell, but one thing is certain: an increased use of violence by activists tends to strengthen those in authority at the expense of those campaigning for social justice.

I agree with Stellan Vinthagen, who building on the insights of Gandhi, argues that we dilute nonviolence of much of its power when we see it simply as a means of struggle. Nonviolence has far more potential than violence to incite a collective’s sense of outrage, but this is never easy to do when the oppressed have for decades been devalued and portrayed as dangerous or inferior people, when long-standing systems of privilege are being challenged, and when the injustice has become so normalized that it is rarely noticed. Indeed, as you say, this is where artistic forms of nonviolence – or constructive actions that, as Vinthagen says, are simultaneously without, against and beyond violence – become so necessary.

Mark: Yes, artistic interventions can be such powerful forms of resistance. That said, in valuing this form of activism, it remains unclear how the multiple vectors of resistance tactics might reinforce one another, even in ways that are unknown or unforeseeable by the actors themselves. Perhaps we have had enough historical distance now to determine how the words and work of Malcolm X made the work of MLK Jr. far more palatable to a liberal – and racist – American population. Would the Civil Rights Movement have been supported by the power structure without a more terrifying alternative waiting in the wings? While the Civil Rights Act certainly could be seen as progress, it also allowed for so much of the governing structure to remain in place; in a sense, its passage preserved the governing structure, leading to a reproduction of social inequalities for future generations to have to contend with.

This I think also relates to the example you provided above of contemporary police officers taking a knee in front of Black Lives Matter demonstrators. This gesture is illustrative of the techniques that will be employed by state structures to undergird their “legitimacy” (and, therefore, longevity) when their maintenance is being threatened. There is a lot being written online about the “performativity” of this particular gesture, especially with some of these very same police officers being recorded as tear-gassing demonstrators an hour after their much-lauded knee performance. The Black Lives Matter demonstrators are asking for the defunding and demilitarization of police forces – for many, this knee gesture is seen as an empty symbolic substitute for the material changes that are being demanded. This is especially true if the outcome ends up being the maintenance of police forces with little change to their funding or operations. It is also important, I think, to critically analyze this symbolic gesture itself, keeping in mind that George Floyd was murdered by a police officer taking a knee on his neck.

That said, for individual actors to work collectively to dismantle and rebuild state structures, there is a need for a wide-ranging production of creative interventions – interventions that come from a multitude of vectors, and that are sometimes at cross-purposes with one another. Interventions that we support whole-heartedly, and others that we may not totally agree with. The most successful of those creative interventions (or, perhaps, relationships between interventions) will go much further than addressing the particular contingent injustices that they hope to shed light on, they will redefine what is possible in the collective imagination. Indeed, the first step toward remaking the world is reimagining it. In doing this collective work, it is so critically important to center the voices of those who have been most systematically oppressed and harmed by the social structures that we are seeking to supplant.

Pat : You are right that there are many intangibles in any political struggle. Some of the police officers going on their knees today are expressing genuine solidarity with the Black Lives Matter protestors, and these may prove to be an important sign of divisions opening up within our overly militarized police forces. Symbolic acts are not necessarily empty and can be rich with meaning that engages us and opens up unexpected possibilities. But, as Mark cautions, they can be re-appropriated to send very different messages, and can never replace the difficult, messy, and lengthy work of reconstructing harmful institutions and relationships, and nonviolent activists should remain vigilant.

Authorities do try to silence their critics by seeking to negotiate with more moderate ones. Sometimes this is simply for show, but often they have been forced by the strength of the opposition to recognize that change is needed. In the case of the Civil Rights Movement, the militancy of Malcolm X and fear of a wider armed uprising increased the pressure on the US government to act on the demands for equality and justice. But an opposite effect is also very common, with the presence of an armed challenge causing the regime’s supporters to unify against the threat without making a distinction between the violent and nonviolent opposition (See, for example, Sharp 1973 and Chenoweth and Stephan 2011).

It is the sheer brutality on display when unthreatening people are being abused that has the power to break our compliance with systems of injustice, as we are seeing with the worldwide response to the video of George Floyd’s last minutes. Similarly, it was the vicious repression of courageous and disciplined nonviolent activists that led many whites to shift away from their support of segregation. Before we accept the use of violence within a larger nonviolent struggle, we need to give much consideration to the following: the extent to which a violent crackdown can be rendered palatable to large segments of the public when those resisting engage in violence; the frequency of individuals, sometimes in complicity with the authorities, joining protests to provoke them into violence; and the extent to which acts of violence, however limited, can reinforce widespread social attitudes that represent those long marginalized as dangerous people who cannot be reasoned with.

The problem of violence of course is that once it begins, it is difficult to control, and once violent struggles against injustice begin to indiscriminately take human lives, they deserve to be strongly condemned. If we want to create new forms of governance that do not simply create new systems of injustice, we need to use means that are consistent with our ends; this is another core idea of nonviolence theory. While I think that sometimes, with tight constraints, violence might be necessary, I resist the idea that violence can be ethical. This idea has simply served, and continues, to legitimize so much human suffering. I am also unwilling though to condemn all who attempt to use violence for moral goals, particularly when they can see no real alternative. I think we can distinguish between the individual and their actions. We can recognize the legitimate rage of those whose resistance devolves into rioting; we can loudly reject efforts to draw parallels between the extreme harm inflicted by militarized police forces with the more limited violent responses of individuals who have long endured them. But, at the same time, we can also oppose the form their resistance is taking.

I agree that we need to work on multiple vectors, but these need to be mutually reinforcing, not working at cross-purposes. While we tend to think mostly of protests and demonstrations when we think of nonviolent movements, there are a diversity of options available, including strategies of power-breaking, along with others that work to expose the injustice of the status quo, reveal the full humanity of those long devalued and inspire us with the possibility of alternative social institutions built on mutual respect and care. I have seen all of these at play in the Black Lives Matter movement, which is so exciting. But this moment in our history is also a dangerous one. Fostering real social change is difficult, and violent acts tend to produce fear, however exaggerated, among many; fear fuels the desire for stability and order, rather than a willingness to embrace change and uncertainty. Change happens when a large number of us refuse to tolerate the status quo and the lies that keep it in place, when we come to see a transformation as not only necessary but the only morally acceptable choice. For this, we need to give nonviolence a much deeper consideration and, on this, I think we can agree.