Nonviolence as Contentious Interaction

            When people think about social movement’s uprisings, people often picture violent scenes, rebels, weapons, and so on. Doug McAdam and Sidney Tarrow, in their piece “Nonviolence as Contentious Interaction,” present us a different strategy of social movements.

            McAdam and Tarrow give different examples of when nonviolence has been a successful way out for different social movements, i.e. Martin Luther King Jr. and the Civil Rights Movements. Through nonviolent strategies, groups seek dialogue with the oppositions and in some ways try to find sympathy from society in order to reach their goals.

            Nowadays, with social networks, and brand new technologies, nonviolence protests are more possible. The ability to reach out for people, from around the world, to join a cause, plays an important part in the awareness to many different issues that people would not have known about before. Through social media, dialogue and the constant yearn for social change; a new, better, society could be possible.

M.A.