Hi!
I appreciate your thoughts and concerns about The Saners and their approach. These objections are quite familiar to me—and to social scientists who have studied movements extensively over the last 20 or so years.
But we have actual evidence of what's doable, what tends to work and what more often fails. These studies do not mesh with the old "common wisdom", with the concerns you offer.
Now, don't get me wrong. The kind of change I propose is challenging, and not guaranteed. (Nothing, of course, is guaranteed.)
But here's what the studies say:
Nonviolent noncooperation succeeds about twice as often a violent movements.
When they succeed, nonviolent noncooperation takes (on average) 3 years; successful violent movements take an average of 9.
The most important factor for the success of a nonviolent movement is the strength of its strategy, the execution of tactics, and the maintenance of discipline—commitment to nonviolence.
Other factors exist, of course, but they are less decisive.
In recent years, nonviolent movements have increased in number. The newest danger—more important than the ones you cite—is that dictators and other abusers of power are more aware of the power of nonviolence, and they are better at countering it.
The challenge for nonviolent movements today is to be smarter than their opponents. This is not necessarily easy, but todays leaders are also distracted, overconfident, and so isolated that they tend to lose touch with reality.
But what really drives The Saners is Nature Herself—we are running out of time. Had we started a quarter century ago, perhaps under the Gore administration (has the Supreme Court not overruled the majority of American voters), we MIGHT have made the proper efforts while there was still time for an incremental approach.
The consolidation of power by elites (all kinds of elites, everywhere) has grown and so we aren't going to protect the climate through protest and legislation. We must disempower the systems that are responsible for climate abuse.
The time for working through the system is gone. Since 2000, CO2 emissions have grown substantially and climate collapse is upon us. It is incremental change which is unrealistic and, I might add, has much less chance of success. Because we would be working through a system designed to NOT respond to us, designed to protect elites—whether those elites are plutocrats, communist parties, dictators, or whoever.
Oh, regarding the Serbian movement, Otpor!, you underestimate the brilliance of those 5 college students who defeated Milosevic. First of all, Milosevic was brutal and thoroughly entrenched in power. Nobody believed that he could be dislodged. Furthermore, it wasn't a simple thing—merely having clear goals. A solid movement needs to be smart and flexible and take advantage of unexpected opportunities. Otpor! did not only remove Milosevic—which would alone have been an astounding accomplishment. They also replaced him with a representative government. They did this in 3 years without firing a shot.
Movements are underestimated by both "powerful people" and the public. What they intend to do seems impossible. Until they do it. And then the accomplishment is explained away as some kind of exception.
I cite Gandhi and King because they are the only names most people know. But because of their ground-breaking work, including their mistakes, we have a framework for successful nonviolent action. And that's why we don't need brilliant charismatic leaders. We just need people with passion and an understanding of the framework and imagination.
We can succeed starting with a couple of college students. Or even just a Ray Katz. Or perhaps someone like you.
