Announcement of Organizational Transition

Announcement of Organizational Transition

Announcement of Organizational Transition

March 29, 2021

For nearly 20 years, ICNC’s programs have played a pivotal role in developing civil resistance study and practice worldwide. The last decade has seen significant growth in scholars doing cutting-edge research and academic programs dedicated to this subject. Meanwhile, other areas of urgent and unfulfilled demand have emerged that ICNC is uniquely qualified to address now.

ICNC has decided to shift our emphasis from research and academic initiatives to focus on three core priorities:

1. Education and training of dissidents internationally, building on our current network and scaling it multiple times.

2. Outreach to the democracy promotion and foreign policy communities about the significance of civil resistance and best practices for external support of pro-democracy activists.

3. Expansion of ICNC’s website, which is already a worldwide resource, to reach and serve new constituencies.

ICNC will advance these goals in consultation with a group of advisors that initially will include Hardy Merriman, Maciej Bartkowski, and Cara McCormick. Hardy and Maciej are already well-known in the civil resistance community. McCormick is a leader in the political reform movement in the United States who has worked with Ackerman for over a decade.

With authoritarianism rising for 15 consecutive years worldwide and the number of new civil resistance campaigns increasing by over 50 percent in the last decade, demand for education and training for dissidents and pro-democracy activists is more urgent than ever. We must meet that demand.

At the same time, authoritarians increasingly coordinate to repress civil resistance movements outside of their countries. It is therefore vital and right to engage in outreach to the policy community and advance an international doctrine of a “Right to Assist” (R2A) civil resistance movements.

Finally, ICNC’s website is an established clearinghouse of information globally, with downloadable resources available in over 70 languages and dialects. ICNC will grow our website as a catalyst for our work with dissidents and the policy community.

ICNC is proud of the work of every member of its staff whose contributions have made a significant impact in the world and will continue to ripple outward. Their recent efforts will result in the publication and promotion of an expected 17 new ICNC publications in 2021. We look forward to following through on the launch and promotion of these publications through 2021. This list includes:

• Glossary of Civil Resistance: A Resource for Study and Translation of Key Terms
by Hardy Merriman and Nicola Barrach-Yousefi

• The Role of External Support in Nonviolent Campaigns: Poisoned Chalice or Holy Grail?
by Erica Chenoweth and Maria J. Stephan

• A Step-by-Step Guide to Planning Nonviolent Campaigns, Second Edition
by Ivan Marovic

• Civil Resistance Tactics in the 21st Century
by Michael Beer

• Chronicling Civil Resistance: A Journalist’s Guide to Unraveling and Reporting Nonviolent Struggles for Rights, Freedom and Justice
by The International Center on Nonviolent Conflict

• Role of Civil Resistance in the Sudanese Uprising and Political Transition 
by Stephen Zunes

• The Nonviolent Campaign of the Pashtun Protection Movement in Pakistan 
by Qamar Jafri

• How to Win Well: Civil Resistance Breakthroughs and the Path to Democracy 
by Jonathan Pinckney

• Social Movements and Material Resources in Northwest Mexico 
by Chris Allan and Scott DuPree

• From the Hills to the Streets to the Table: Civil Resistance and Peacebuilding in the Transformation of Nepal’s Maoist Conflict
by Ches Thurber and Subindra Bogati

• Liberia: Resisting Marginalization and Promoting Peace through Civic Advocacy
by Janel B. Galvanek and James Suah Shilue

• Material Resources Mobilization and Palestinian Nonviolent Popular Resistance Campaigns in Area C1 
by Mahmoud Soliman