Introduction

This introductory chapter sets up the central focus on debates over nonviolence in history, as well as a historiography about the past scholarly examination of nonviolent campaigns, a theoretical overview of the three areas most examined by the book (European labor, Indian independence, and Black liberation), and concludes with a chapter overview. The most important point is the issue of significant interactions between advocates of violence and nonviolence through dynamics including the radical flank effect (Haines) and political jiu-jitsu (Sharp). In existing works, campaigns tend to be examined in isolation rather than within a more robust historical context that includes contemporary violent parallels to the nonviolent movements.