This handbook, CD, and website, produced from a USIP grant, describes proven strategies and tactics for nonviolent political movements. Based on first hand experience in Serbia and Georgia, the resources provide easily accessible lessons and best practices to front-line practitioners engaged in struggles for freedom around the world.
Last week, I had the privilege of meeting 12 female legal professionals from across Ukraine who were visiting Washington. They ranged from a prosecutor with the anti-corruption bureau to a supreme court judge, all eager to rebuild their country, making it stronger than before the war. One participant asked rhetorically: “What is peace? Is it the absence of war? Or is it something more — the prospect for justice? The ability to pursue prosperity?” I’ve been thinking about those words — and their implications for how the world should respond now to the Russian assault on Ukraine as it enters its second, hard winter.
As COP28 continues, it’s estimated that the world needs to invest $5.9 trillion to stave off climate change. “The big question now is … who’s going to pay for all this,” says USIP’s Gordon Peake, adding that “we also need to tamp down the use of fossil fuels” to prevent the bill for growing even more.
On November 17, Maldives inaugurated its new president, Mohamed Muizzu. Muizzu’s election followed a narrow presidential race between him and incumbent president, Ibrahim Mohamed Solih. USIP Visiting Expert Nilanthi Samaranayake weighs in on what to expect in the early days of Muizzu’s presidency, how the new president may navigate ties with China and India, and the implications of his election for Indian Ocean security.
The passing of Henry Kissinger signifies the end of an extraordinary era in world politics and the closing of a momentous chapter in U.S. foreign policy. His life and legacy are being remembered in many countries, but perhaps nowhere as poignantly as China.
A world reeling from the brutal horrors of our current wars will next week mark (or perhaps overlook) the 10th anniversary of the death of a peacemaking icon: South Africa’s liberation leader and former president, Nelson Mandela. Amid continued or escalated wars — Israel-Gaza, Ukraine-Russia, Sudan, Yemen, Afghanistan and others — USIP this month hosted Georgia’s senator, the Reverend Raphael Warnock, in a discussion of Mandela’s legacy and immediate relevance. Another Georgian, Decatur High School history teacher Kristen Embry, introduced Warnock. She spoke about Mandela and her own mission of teaching history and peacebuilding to American students in the 2020s.