Dear People Whom God Loves,
I found this editorial in the March 7, 2011 issue of “America” to be very thought provoking. I encourage you to reflect on it.
Arab Nonviolence
The self-absorbed media have identified Facebook and Twitter as the giant-slayers in the revolutions spreading across North Africa and the Middle East. But in one front-page news story, based on in-depth reporting, David D. Kirkpatrick and David E. Sanger of The New York Times (2/14) explained how the ouster of dictators in Tunisia and Egypt was achieved by activists of the April 6 Youth Movement, who had planned together for two years. Just as important, the two reporters explained what no one else had even managed to note: how the popular demonstrations came to sustain their disciplined nonviolence for more than two weeks.
Cadres in both countries had been coached by the Qatar-based Academy for Change, an institute focused on nonviolent democratic change inspired by Gene Sharp, the American theorist of nonviolence. Professor Sharp’s ideas on civilian-based defense inspired the Baltic countries in their separation from the Soviet Union. His text From Dictatorship to Democracy shaped nonviolent resistance in Georgia, Ukraine, and Kyrgystan, as well as a popular movement in Serbia and now the Arab Revolution of 2011. With all respect to Ahmed Maher and the members of April 6 for their extraordinary achievement, if ever there was a change agent who deserved the Nobel Peace Prize, it is Mr. Sharp.
It will be far more difficult for peaceful change to come to countries like Yemen, Bahrain and Libya, where extended planning for popular resistance and the training and staffing necessary for disciplined nonviolence are absent. But the youthful rebels in Egypt and Tunisia have shown the Arab world that a genuine alternative to violence in politics can work. No group can be more dismayed at that than Al Qaeda, except perhaps those militarists in our midst whose hostile identities or profiteering depends on having enemies abroad.
Smile, God Loves You,
Father Clay
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