Social Uplift Foundation   "A nation that continues year after year to spend more money on military defense than on programs of social uplift is approaching spiritual death."
 Martin Luther King 
Home Fair Use Policy   About us   Contact Donations
 
 
Methods of Nonviolent Action
198 Ways To Implement Nonviolent Resistance
From: The Methods of Nonviolent Action, Boston 1973 by Gene Sharp

Methods of Nonviolent Protest And Persuasion
    This is the first article in a series to document and encourage the use of nonviolent methods to resolve conflicts and effect social uplift. The project is an outgrowth of the Foundation's program to distribute
    'A Force More Powerful'.

    Formal Statements
    1. Public Speeches
    2. Letters of opposition or support
    3. Declarations by organizations and institutions
    4. Signed public statements
    5. Declarations of indictment and intention
    6. Group or mass petitions
    Communications with a Wider Audience
    1. Slogans, caricatures, and symbols
    2. Banners, posters, and displayed communications
    3. Leaflets, pamphlets, and books
    4. Newspapers and journals
    5. Records, radio, and television
    6. Skywriting and earthwriting
    Group Representations
    1. Deputations
    2. Mock awards
    3. Group lobbying
    4. Picketing
    5. Mock elections
    Symbolic Public Acts
    1. Displays of flags and symbolic colors
    2. Wearing of symbols
    3. Prayer and worship
    4. Delivering symbolic objects
    5. Protest disrobings
    6. Destruction of own property
    7. Symbolic lights
    8. Displays of portraits
    9. Paint as protest
    10. New signs and names
    11. Symbolic sounds
    12. Symbolic reclamations
    13. Rude gestures

    Pressures on Individuals
    1. "Haunting" officials
    2. Taunting officials
    3. Fraternization
    4. Vigils
    Drama and Music
    1. Humorous skits and pranks
    2. Performances of plays and music
    3. Singing
    Processions
    1. Marches
    2. Parades
    3. Religious processions
    4. Pilgrimages
    5. Motorcades
    Honoring the Dead
    1. Political mourning
    2. Mock funerals
    3. Demonstrative funerals
    4. Homage at burial places
    Public Assemblies
    1. Assemblies of protest or support
    2. Protest meetings
    3. Camouflaged meetings of protest
    4. Teach-ins
    Withdrawal and Renunciation
    1. Walk-outs
    2. Silence
    3. Renouncing honors
    4. Turning one’s back

Methods of Social Noncooperation


    Ostracism of Persons
    1. Social boycott
    2. Selective social boycott
    3. Lysistratic nonaction
    4. Excommunication
    5. Interdict
    Noncooperation with Social Events, Customs, and Institutions
    1. Suspension of social and sports activities
    2. Boycott of social affairs
    3. Student strike
    4. Social disobedience
    5. Withdrawal from social institutions
    Withdrawal from the Social System
    1. Stay-at-home
    2. Total personal noncooperation
    3. "Flight" of workers
    4. Sanctuary
    5. Collective disappearance
    6. Protest emigration (hijrat)

Methods of Economic Noncooperation: Economic Boycotts
    Actions by Consumers
    1. Consumers’ boycott
    2. Nonconsumption of boycotted goods
    3. Policy of austerity
    4. Rent withholding
    5. Refusal to rent
    6. National consumers’ boycott
    7. International consumers’ boycott
    Action by Workers and Producers
    1. Workmen’s boycott
    2. Producers’ boycott
    Action by Middlemen
    1. Suppliers’ and handlers’ boycott
    Action by Owners and Management
    1. Traders’ boycott
    2. Refusal to let or sell property
    3. Lockout
    4. Refusal of industrial assistance
    5. Merchants’ "general strike"
    Action by Holders of Financial Resources
    1. Withdrawal of bank deposits
    2. Refusal to pay fees, dues, and assessments
    3. Refusal to pay debts or interest
    4. Severance of funds and credit
    5. Revenue refusal
    6. Refusal of a government’s money
    Action by Governments
    1. Domestic embargo
    2. Blacklisting of traders
    3. International sellers’ embargo
    4. International buyers’ embargo
    5. International trade embargo

Methods of Economic Noncooperation: The Strike
    Symbolic Strikes
    1. Protest strike
    2. Quickie walkout (lightning strike)
    Agricultural Strikes
    1. Peasant strike
    2. Farm Workers’ strike
    Strikes by Special Groups
    1. Refusal of impressed labor
    2. Prisoners’ strike
    3. Craft strike
    4. Professional strike
    Ordinary Industrial Strikes
    1. Establishment strike
    2. Industry strike
    3. Sympathetic strike
    Restricted Strikes
    1. Detailed strike
    2. Bumper strike
    3. Slowdown strike
    4. Working-to-rule strike
    5. Reporting "sick" (sick-in)
    6. Strike by resignation
    7. Limited strike
    8. Selective strike
    Multi-Industry Strikes
    1. Generalized strike
    2. General strike

    Combination of Strikes and Economic Closures
    1. Hartal
    2. Economic Shutdown

Methods of Political Noncooperation
    Rejection of Authority
    1. Withholding or withdrawal of allegiance
    2. Refusal of public support
    3. Literature and speeches advocating resistance
    Citizens’ Noncooperation with Government
    1. Boycott of legislative bodies
    2. Boycott of elections
    3. Boycott of government employment and positions
    4. Boycott of government departments, agencies, and other bodies
    5. Withdrawal from government educational institutions
    6. Boycott of government-supported organizations
    7. Refusal of assistance to enforcement agents
    8. Removal of own signs and placemarks
    9. Refusal to accept appointed officials
    10. Refusal to dissolve existing institutions
    Citizens’ Alternatives to Obedience
    1. Reluctant and slow compliance
    2. Nonobedience in absence of direct supervision
    3. Popular nonobedience
    4. Disguised disobedience
    5. Refusal of an assemblage or meeting to disperse
    6. Sitdown
    7. Noncooperation with conscription and deportation
    8. Hiding, escape, and false identities
    9. Civil disobedience of "illegitimate" laws
    Action by Government Personnel
    1. Selective refusal of assistance by government aides
    2. Blocking of lines of command and information
    3. Stalling and obstruction
    4. General administrative noncooperation
    5. Judicial noncooperation
    6. Deliberate inefficiency and selective noncooperation by enforcement agents
    7. Mutiny
    Domestic Governmental Action
    1. Quasi-legal evasions and delays
    2. Noncooperation by constituent governmental units
    International Governmental Action
    1. Changes in diplomatic and other representations
    2. Delay and cancellation of diplomatic events
    3. Withholding of diplomatic recognition
    4. Severance of diplomatic relations
    5. Withdrawal from international organizations
    6. Refusal of membership in international bodies
    7. Expulsion from international organizations

The Methods of Nonviolent Intervention: Psychological Intervention
    Psychological Intervention
    1. Self-exposure to the elements
    2. The fast
      a) Fast of moral pressure
      b) Hunger strike
      c) Satyagrahic fast
    3. Reverse trial
    4. Nonviolent harassment
    Physical Intervention
    1. Sit-in
    2. Stand-in
    3. Ride-in
    4. Wade-in
    5. Mill-in
    6. Pray-in
    7. Nonviolent raids
    8. Nonviolent air raids
    9. Nonviolent invasion
    10. Nonviolent interjection
    11. Nonviolent obstruction
    12. Nonviolent occupation
    Social Intervention
    1. Establishing new social patterns
    2. Overloading of facilities
    3. Stall-in
    4. Speak-in
    5. Guerrilla theater
    6. Alternative social institutions
    7. Alternative communication system
    Economic Intervention
    1. Reverse strike
    2. Stay-in strike
    3. Nonviolent land seizure
    4. Defiance of blockades
    5. Politically motivated counterfeiting
    6. Preclusive purchasing
    7. Seizure of assets
    8. Dumping
    9. Selective patronage
    10. Alternative markets
    11. Alternative transportation systems
    12. Alternative economic institutions
    Political Intervention
    1. Overloading of administrative systems
    2. Disclosing identities of secret agents
    3. Seeking imprisonment
    4. Civil disobedience of "neutral" laws
    5. Work-on without collaboration
    6. Dual sovereignty and parallel government