A webinar with Benjamin Naimark-Rowse and Tom Perriello
September 13, 2022
Webinar Presentation
Introduction of Speaker: 00:00 – 08:23
Presentation: 08:24 – 37:37
Respondent: 37:38 – 46:23
Questions and Answers: 46:24 – 1:08:51
Additional Questions and Answers
Webinar Details
More people than ever before are using nonviolent collective action for rights, justice, and democracy around the world. Research shows that nonviolent action has been twice as effective as violence at achieving revolutionary movement goals. And political transitions initiated through nonviolent action have been three times as likely to lead to democracy as political transitions initiated through all other means. Yet, from 2011 to 2018, public charities and private foundations gave only three percent of their total human rights funding to support nonviolent collective action.
Drawing from his ICNC special report, Dollars and Dissent, in this webinar Benjamin Naimark-Rowse outlines trends in donor support in the 2010s, and details how donors’ values, organizational structures, and perceptions of risk affect their support for grassroots organizers and nonviolent social movements.
Former Congressman Tom Perriello, who is currently Executive Director of Open Society-US, offers remarks as respondent.
This event is co-sponsored by the International Center on Nonviolent Conflict (ICNC) and Human Rights Funders Network (HRFN).
Download Special Report
About the Presenter and Author
Benjamin Naimark-Rowse is the Topol Fellow in Nonviolent Resistance and a PhD candidate at Tufts University’s Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy. He is a Term Member in the Council on Foreign Relations and a Truman National Security Fellow. Ben’s expertise in social movements and resourcing of movements draws on two decades of experience in the donor, NGO, and academic worlds. He has served as a Program Officer with the Open Society Foundations, an electoral observer with The Carter Center, a board member of the University of Chicago’s Human Rights Program, and an advisory committee member of the Leading Change Network. His publications include “Liberating the ‘Enemy’,” “Nonviolent Resistance,” “Darfurian Voices,” “Surviving Success: Nonviolent Rebellion in Sudan,” and “The Founding Myth of the United States of America.” Ben holds a M.P.A. from the Princeton School of Public and International Affairs and a B.A. with honors from the University of Chicago. His research has been supported by a Harvard Program on Negotiation Graduate Research Fellowship and as a USIP-Minerva Peace and Security Scholar. He is married to Nadia Marzouki. They are the parents of twin girls.
About the Respondent
Tom Perriello is a former Congressman (VA-05), diplomat (State Department) and advocate for human rights and democracy within the United States and around the world. Tom currently serves as the Executive Director of Open Society Foundations for the United States (OSUS), a philanthropy dedicated to supporting open, inclusive, democratic societies. During his time in Congress, Tom voted in favor of the landmark legislation for healthcare reform, climate change, immigration, antitrust, and economic recovery. During the Obama Administration, he served as the Special Envoy to the African Great Lakes region and authored the second Quadrennial Diplomacy and Development Review. Tom also served as the President of Center for American Progress Action, and Senior Counselor to CAP, as well as co-founder of Avaaz.org and Faithful America. Tom’s writing has been published in the New York Times, Washington Post, Atlantic, Democracy Journal, The Hill, CNN.com, Slate.com, and Politico.