26 Quotes by Gene Sharp

It’s a nonsense assumption that you can get rid of terrorism with war. Terrorism is taking the lives of innocent people to gain your objective. War is basically the same thing on a larger scale.

So, he reasoned, if you can identify the sources of a government’s power – people working in civil service, police and judges, even the army – then you know what a dictatorship depends on for its existence.

Contrary to popular opinion, even totalitarian dictatorships are dependent on the population and the societies they rule.

You have a chance of learning – if you want to and youre not arrogant.

There should be no romanticism that international public opinion or even international diplomatic and economic pressure can defeat a coup without determined and strong defense by the attacked society itself.

Liberation from dictatorships ultimately depends on the people’s ability to liberate themselves.

The common error of past improvised political defiance campaigns is the reliance on only one or two methods, such as strikes and mass demonstrations. In fact, a multitude of methods exist that allow resistance strategists to concentrate and disperse resistance as required.

It is our contention, to be explored later in more detail, that political defiance, or nonviolent struggle, is the most powerful means available to those struggling for freedom.