Center for Nonviolent Conflict Research

CNCR focuses on how ordinary people wage nonviolent conflict to win rights, freedom and justice.

  • Webinar en español: Nuevo estudio sobre la defensa de la democracia en Guatemala

    Miércoles, 21 de Octubre

    10:00 Guatemala | 11:00 Ecuador, Colombia y Perú | 12:00 Washington D.C.

    ¿Cómo defendió la ciudadanía guatemalteca las elecciones presidenciales?
    Te invitamos a la presentación del libro editado conjuntamente con CNCR “Decidimos: cómo la ciudadanía guatemalteca defendió su elección”, será un espacio para conocer las experiencias y estrategias ciudadanas que permitieron defender el resultado electoral en Guatemala.

    Conversaremos sobre participación ciudadana, democracia y acción noviolenta a partir del libro Decidimos, con la participación de:

    • Carlos Alberto Sarti Castañeda, antropólogo social y director de la Fundación Propaz en Guatemala.
    • Luis Fernando Mack Echeverría, doctor en Ciencia Política y maestro en Ciencias Sociales por FLACSO-México.
    • María Belén Garrido, directora del Instituto Regional para el Estudio y la Práctica de la Acción Noviolenta Estratégica en las Américas, quien moderará el encuentro.
    Regístrate y acompáñanos

  • CNCR Launches People Power Publishers


    For ten years, ICNC Press published the Special Reports and Monographs that scholars, journalists, and practitioners around the world turned to for research on strategic nonviolent resistance. In 2026, that work continues as People Power Publishers, a new nonprofit publishing initiative of the Center for Nonviolent Conflict Research. People Power Publishers is keeping the Special Report series and adding memoirs and other books written by activists, for activists, including books that movements write together through collaborative workshops. Every title is free to download as a PDF, because knowledge about how ordinary people build power shouldn’t sit behind a paywall.

    Visit People Power Publishers

  • Take CNCR’s 2-Week Thematic Courses on Peacebuilding, Climate Action, and Anti-Corruption Movements

    You’ve built the foundation. Now go deeper. CNCR’s Thematic Courses return this fall for graduates of our online courses. Each one focuses on an area where people power is shaping the world right now. You’ll learn from experts, talk live with practitioners and scholars, and work through real campaigns alongside fellow graduates from around the world.

    Building Peace | Nov 2–15
    How nonviolent action helps societies move from conflict to lasting peace by rebuilding trust and making room for everyone at the table.

    Climate Action | Nov 16–29
    How movements are using people power to push for climate justice, change policy, and mobilize communities for environmental change.

    Fighting Corruption | Nov 30–Dec 13
    How ordinary people have taken on corrupt systems, and won, by demanding transparency and accountability.

    Apply by the Friday before each course launches. 

    Apply to Courses

  • New Books:

    Two Movement Memoirs, Two Studies

    The stories behind the headlines. You saw the soup on Van Gogh; Soup Throwers and Super Gluers tells you why young Europeans risked prison to put it there. You saw Tahrir Square on the news, and Going Behind the Sun tells you about the years of organizing that came before it and the price the organizers paid after. You may have missed how Guatemalans saved their democracy in 2023, but Deciders shows how Indigenous leaders and ordinary citizens did it in 106 days. And if you’re watching democracy erode and wondering what’s at stake, Hardy Merriman’s Authoritarianism Is a Systemic Risk gives you the answer. The newest books from People Power Publishers are free to download.

    Download Today

  • For Activists & Organizers

    How Agent Provocateurs Harm Our Movements

    by Steve Chase

    History shows us that peoples’ movements are more likely to suc­ceed when they have unity among supporters, widespread participa­tion, strategic planning, and non­violent discipline. Unsurprisingly, movement opponents use agent provocateurs—fake activists work­ing undercover—to behave in counterproductive ways that undermine these four keys to success.

    Drawing from international exam­ples, and an in-depth case study of the US Black Liberation Movement, this volume explores how agent provocateurs—and agent provoca­teur-like behavior—make movements smaller, weaker, and easier to de­feat. It also offers some ideas for how activists can inoculate their movements against such harms and increase their chances of success.

    • Download

    • Purchase

    • Watch the webinar presentation by the author

    Learn More

  • Second edition of :

    The Path of Most Resistance: A Step-by-Step Guide to Planning Nonviolent Campaigns

    by Ivan Marovic

    The Path of Most Resistance: A Step-by-Step Guide to Planning Nonviolent Campaigns is a practical guide for activists and organizers of all levels, who wish to grow their resistance activities into a more strategic, fixed-term campaign. It guides readers through the campaign planning process, breaking it down into several steps and providing tools and exercises for each step.

    The Second Edition released in March 2021 includes chapters on tactics and running a tactical planning workshop, and a Foreword by Hardy Merriman.

    Free Download:
    • Second edition: English
    • First edition: Catalan | French | Polish | Portuguese (Brazilian) | Spanish | Urdu

    Learn More

  • Visit our full resource library to find hundreds of resources on civil resistance in English and over 70 languages.

    Or, if you are interested in civil resistance and don’t know where to start, we’ve made a list of general introductory resources–many of them short articles–to introduce you to the field. See our list of ten key resources for activists and organizers.

    Visit the Resource Library

  • ICNC Translations Program

    Translating civil resistance literature into diverse languages is one of the most powerful ways to spread knowledge and increase the effectiveness of nonviolent movements struggling for rights, freedom, and justice. Learn more about our translations program or read our glossary of key terms.

    We also currently host resources on civil resistance in over 70 languages and dialects on our website.

    Find Translated Resources

  • For Scholars & Students

     

    The discipline of civil resistance has developed enormously in recent years, driven by new quantitative and qualitative scholarly research, as well as by numerous nonviolent movements around the world.

    ICNC runs a number of grant-supported academic and educational programs to meet the growing demand for cutting edge research, applied knowledge and practical skills in this field. Look at our research, writing, teaching and other educational offerings and review current calls for proposals or applications.

    Learn More

  • Academic Online Curriculum

    ICNC’s Academic Online Curriculum on Civil Resistance (AOC) is an online resource to advance curriculum development, teaching, and research on civil resistance. It offers an extensive and regularly updated set of resources in this field, organized into clearly structured topics and case studies, and drawn in part from content that we and various academic collaborators developed for the ICNC university seminars we’ve led since 2009.

    Anyone can register to use the AOC at any time and it is free to use.

    Topics on the AOC include:

    – Civil Resistance: Nature, Ideas and History
    – Strategic Considerations in Civil Resistance Struggles
    – Types of Civil Resistance Struggles

    And more!

    Register Now!

  • Calls from Academic Initiatives

    Throughout the year, we offer a number of academic opportunities, resources, and support that it  makes available to scholars and students. The field of civil resistance has grown immensely and these academic programs aim to respond to the growing demand for knowledge and skills and contribute to expanding the quality of education, research, and curriculum related to civil resistance. This page includes the current and past calls for educational and research programs, such as learning opportunities, curriculum support, and research grants.

    One of our calls, the Rapid Field Research and Data Collection Program, accepts applications on a rolling basis and interested applicants can apply for the program throughout the year.

    Learn More

  • New from ICNC Press:

    Preventing Mass Atrocities: From a Responsibility to Protect (RtoP) to a Right to Assist (RtoA) Campaigns of Civil Resistance
    by Peter Ackerman and Hardy Merriman
    Available in: English, Arabic, and Spanish

    Events of the last decade demand new approaches to atrocity prevention that are adaptable, innovative and independent of a state-centered doctrine. With the aim of reducing risk factors such as civil war, we argue for a new normative framework called The Right to Assist (RtoA). […]

    See ICNC Press Publications

  • For the Policy Community

    New Publication:

    Fostering a Fourth Democratic Wave:
    A Playbook for Countering the Authoritarian Threat

    Fostering a Fourth Democratic Wave combines insights on civil resistance, democratic waves, autocratization and democratic backsliding, international law, and other disciplines to advance a foreign policy approach that supports and enables pro-democracy and human rights movements. It:

    1. Proposes new approaches and tools to support civil resistance movements

    2. Advances a new international norm — the “Right to Assistance”

    3. Develops strategic and tactical options to constrain authoritarian regimes and drive up the cost of their repression

    Download a Free Copy

  • ICNC Releases Major Study on International Support to Nonviolent Campaigns

    ICNC is proud to present the newest addition to its popular Monograph Series, The Role of External Support in Nonviolent Campaigns: Poisoned Chalice or Holy Grail? by Drs. Erica Chenoweth and Maria J. Stephan, authors of the groundbreaking civil resistance classic, Why Civil Resistance Works.

    Published by ICNC Press, this new report employs original, qualitative, and quantitative data to examine the ways that external assistance impacted the characteristics and success rates of post-2000 revolutionary nonviolent uprisings.

    Download the full monograph for free here.

    Watch the March 3 webinar with the renowned authors here.

    Read More

  • Minds of the Movement Blog

     

    Minds of the Movement is a blog for those interested in the ideas and experiences of people on the front line of civil resistance, and those who seek to understand the art and science of nonviolent struggle.

    Learn More

  • NEW BLOG POST

    Abdourahman Mohamed Guelleh writes: “In 2022, I was personally threatened with arrest, torture, death, and the disappearance of my body. In a telephone conversation between the President of Djibouti and his powerful police chief, the contents of which were leaked to the press, the President ordered my arrest, the falsification of my identity, and my torture, and threatened to shoot me in the head. The feared head of the national police expressed his readiness to carry out the orders, assuring that my body would disappear. […]”

    Read more!

  • Ahmad Helmi writes: “In 2011, Syrians nationwide took to the streets in organic, peaceful protests demanding change, freedom of expression, freedom of the press, freedom of assembly, and justice. Participation by men, women, children, and the elderly was extremely high; for the first six months, it was mostly a nonviolent movement. But the dictatorial regime’s response was brutal from the first weeks. The government’s security forces and army cracked down on people with violence, guns, enforced disappearances, and torture. […]”

    Read more!


  • Lexi Acosta writes: “It started in 1991, when a Blaan tribal council in the Tampakan mountains encountered “white strangers” walking their ancestral land. These were surveyors for an Australian mining company who wanted the treasures beneath the Blaan land. Within months, a local priest brought concerned Blaan tribal leaders to the Diocese of Marbel. An organized resistance was born. […]”

    Read more!

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