Product Description

The conventional history of nations, even continents, is a history of warfare. According to this view, all the important ideas and significant changes of humankind occurred as part of an effort to win one violent, bloody conflict or another. This approach to history is only one of many examples of how societies promote warfare and glorify violence. But there have always been a few who have refused to fight. Governments have long regarded this minority as a danger to society and have imprisoned and abused them and encouraged their persecution. This was true of those who refused Europe's wars, who refused to fight for their king, who refused to fight for Napoleon as well as against him. It was true of Virginia Woolf's sister Vanessa and her husband Clive Bell - outcasts in rural Sussex because they opposed World War I at a time when the British socialist movement described a bayonet as a weapon with a worker on each end. It was true of the first American draft dodger, a Menonite who believed in American independence but believed it was wrong to use violence and rejected the call of his local militia. It was true of the many abolitionists who had dedicated their lives to stopping slavery but refused to fight in the Civil War. Judaism, Islam, Christianity, Hinduism, Buddhism and, most impressively, the Menonites and the Quakers - all have passages in their major teachings rejecting warfare as immoral. In this brilliant exploration of pacifism, these points of view are discussed alongside such diverse non-violence theorists as Tolstoy, Shelley, Gandhi, Martin Luther King, Aldous Huxley, Erasmus, Confucius and Lao Tse to show how many modern ideas - such as a united Europe, the United Nations, and the abolition of slavery - originated in such non-violence movements.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #74556 in Books
• Published on: 2007-11-01
• Original language: English
• Binding: Paperback
• 224 pages

The Observer
'A pervasive and heartening thesis'

Scotland on Sunday
`an early contender for your Christmas list... Non-violence is a
vibrant and thought-provoking book'

The Independent
`My Secret Life...'

Customer Reviews

Another excellent book by Mr. Kurlansky
'Nonviolence' discusses the concept of non-violence as an alternative to Pacificism and violent action.

In this book Kurlansky attacks the totems of the pro-war/violence movements and examines the validity of their examples (such as the US Civil War, WWII and the Holocaust). In doing so he forms a very compelling argument for non-violent activties to bring about social change.

This book is a very easy read and should be required reading for everyone above the age of 12. Five easily earned stars!

If only we all thought like this
Like many powerful books, Non-violence is a slim volume that states a single point and states it clearly. Mark Kurlansky retells world history from the point of view of those who tried to resist their oppressors non-violently.

Kurlansky carefully disects the idea of a 'just war', the predicate of so many conflicts for hundreds of years, rendering it meaningless and unworthy. He then tries to expose the myth that non-violent protest is doomed to failure. He persuasively argues that an aggressor's main chance of defeating non-violent resistence is to force those resisting to abandon their principles and take up arms. He suggests that if the non-violent remain so, they are unassailable. This is a clearly written and well researched polemic, which should be compulsory reading for anybody considering becoming a head of state. Perhaps if more did so the world would be a happier, less violent place.

fails the lithmus test
This is a very good book and an easy read on non-violence. My main problem is with Kurlanski's discussion of the Israeli/Palestinian conflict - a conflict most consider to be at the root of the Middle East troubles. Kurlanski devotes a scant two pages to the conflict, fails to refer to a single Palestinian individual, quotes extensively from one Israeli source (ex-military), and doesn't use the word "occupation" once. If non-violence has anything positive to offer this very violent ongoing tragedy then surely a clear and unambiguous acknowledgement of the root cause, the Israeli military occupation, would seem essential. Mr. Kurlanski, do not be afraid to follow Jimmy Carter's admirable example, this is the obvious starting point toward ending violence.