Tom H. Hastings
Nonviolent Response to Terrorism
Jefferson, NC: McFarland & Co., Inc., 2004
$39.95. 244 pp. ISBN 0786418745
This imminently readable, informed, and well-documented survey of the best thinking about nonviolent responses to terrorism combines the concrete experience of an activist and the theoretical knowledge of a scholar. It emphasizes the intimate connection between developing and using nonviolent structures and between short-term and long-term responses. In four chapters devoted to immediate nonviolent response, it describes the strengths and limitations of smart sanctions, meditation, law, and nonviolent resistance, including nonviolent interposition. Similarly, the final four chapters discuss long-term nonviolent response, such as halting the arms race, building sustainable economies, educating about peace cultures, and repatriating refugees.
The author indicates how recent experience and research around the globe have increased activists‚ skills in international negotiation, mediation, and adjudication. Three insightful reflections on terrorism, in an appendix, along with appropriate references and a detail index, make this book an ideal introduction to recent movements for social change throughout the world. An invaluable contribution to various disciplines associated with peace and conflict studies, it relies on essential scholarship on nonviolence theory and strategy along the way.
