The Palgrave Handbook of Women’s Political Rights

Editor(s): Susan Franceschet, Mona Lena Krook, and Netina Tan

Palgrave Macmillan, London, 2019, pp. 784

Covers women’s political rights across all major regions of the world, focusing both on women’s right to vote and women’s right to run for political office. The countries explored are Afghanistan, Armenia, Australia, Bolivia, Canada, Cameroon, Chile, China, Colombia, Cuba, Czech Republic, Finland, France, Ghana, India, Indonesia, Israel, Jordan, Kenya, Kuwait, Malaysia, Mauritius, Mexico, Mongolia, Morocco, New Zealand, Myanmar, Niger, Nigeria, Poland, Russia, Rwanda, Slovenia, Sri Lanka, Sweden, South Korea, Slovenia, Switzerland, Taiwan, Tunisia, Turkey, the United States, Uganda, Uruguay, and Zimbabwe.

Black Stats: African-Americans By The Numbers In The Twenty-First Century

Author(s): Monique W. Morris

The New Press, New York and London, 2014, pp. 240, p.b.

In this work, Monique Morris provides a statistical account on the lives of African Americans in the U.S. related to the field of education, environment, sport, health and justice system, military, politics, voting and civic engagement in order to highlight the disparity between racial communities.

Argentina: 6 Indigenous Women at the Heart of Fracking

Author(s): Moreno Pineiro

In: Telesur, 2016

Story of six Maolucho women from the Campo Maripe community in the Argentine Patagonia, who have resisted fracking where they live by chaining themselves to fracking rigs and barricades. Pineiro represents the women as representative of the Latin American wide resistance by indigenous women to oil extraction.

Available online at:

https://www.telesurenglish.net/opinion/Argentina[-6-Indigenous-pWomen-at-Heart-of%20-Fracking-Resistance-20160318-0015.html

A Pacifist Japan Starts to Embrace the Military

Author(s): Motoko Rich

In: New York Times, 2017

Rich discusses whether public attitudes in Japan to maintaining strict constitutional constraints on use of its military 'Self-Defence Forces' are changing. (The postwar constitution includes a clause to renounce war and Japanese policy has been based on a refusal to fight outside its borders, although it is closely allied to the US.) The article notes the consistent pressure from Conservative Prime Minister Abe to strengthen Japanese military power through increasing the budget, and his role in passing new security laws in 2015 that permitted for the first time Japanese troops to take part in combat overseas. It also notes there was strong popular resistance to the new security laws and that there are regular protests against US bases in Okinawa.

See also: 'Stop War': Thousands protest in Japan over military expansion law change', RT World News, 30 June  2014.  

https://www.rt.com/news/169448-japan-protest-military-law/

Women Rising: In and Beyond the Arab Spring

Author(s): Rita Stephan, and Mounira M. Charrad

New York University Press, New York , 2020, pp. 432 (pb)

This comparative study of 16 countries documents women's political resistance during and since 2011, with essays by both activists and scholars.  The book stresses the diversity of the social groups and attitudes of the women involved, and gives a voice to often marginalized groups such as housewives and rural women. After an introductory chapter 'Advancing Women's Rights in the Arab World', the book is divided into five parts: What They Fight For; What They Believe; How They Express Agency; How They Use Space to Mobilize; and How They Organize.

En Legitima Desobediencia

Author(s): Movimiento de Objeción de Conciencia

Proyecto Editorial Traficantes de Sueños, Madrid, 2002, pp. 348

This is the major compilation of declarations, press statements and articles by the protagonists of the insumisión campaign at the time of their disobedience. Therefore it includes accounts of various stages of movement, such as the formation of the first objectors’ groups, and defiance of the Conscientious Objection Act, and the struggle inside the prison in Pamplona. There are also manifestoes, letters of support and internal documents which record these struggles and others that arose out of them: for example the gender issue raised by antimilitarist-feminist women, and the campaign against military expenditure involving tax refusal.

Available online as PDF at:

http://www.antimilitaristas.org/IMG/pdf/LIBRO.pdf

The Quiet Battle: Writings on the Theory and Practice of Nonviolent Resistance

Editor(s): Mulford Q. Sibley

Doubleday, Garden City NJ, 1963, pp. 390

Still useful compilation. Part I ‘Foundations’ includes extracts from ‘ancient religious statements’, Boetie, Godwin and Shelley, Gandhi, Case and Gregg; Part II covers unarmed resistance in classical Roman times, the general strike, Hungary 1849-67, resistance in Norway during the German Occupation and the 1953 Vorkuta (prison camp) strike in the Soviet Union; Part III provides extracts on principled nonviolent power, including colonial Pennsylvania, South African resistance in the 1950s, the US Civil Rights movements, direct action against war preparations and the possibilities of nonviolent national defence.

Voices from the Middle East: The Future of the Hirak Movement in Algeria

Author(s): Muriam Haleh, and Salma Kasmi

In: Middle East Report Online, MERIP (Middle East Research and Information Project), 2020

Discusses the dilemma posed by Covid, which arrived in Algeria in February 2020, for the year-long movement of regular protests against the regime, and the shift by movement networks towards promoting local assistance during the pandemic.  But the authors note that activists are still offering legal help to those arrested and put on trial, and  maintain an online presence for the movement.

See also: Parks, Robert, 'From Protest to Hirak to Algeria's New Revolutionary Moment',  Middle East Report, vol. 292, no.3 (Fall/Winter2019).

Available online at:

https://merip.org/2020/04/voices-from-the-middle-east-the-future-of-the-hirak-movement-in-algeria/

The People of Sudan Don't Want to Share Power with their Military Oppressors

Author(s): Muzan Alneel

In: Jacobin, 2021

This article starts by suggesting the popular resistance in Sudan led the military to make a deal with the civilian politicians they had jailed, but on terms ensuring military control.  It also notes the refusal by the resistance committees that led the 2019 revolution to accept power sharing. Muzan traces the evolution from the 2019 revolution to the coup, stressing that political parties had been dominant in the transition civilian government. He also comments on the economic problems, including very high inflation, which had led to popular unrest, which might have encouraged the coup plotters.

Available online at:

https://jacobinmag.com/2021/11/sudan-revolution-coup-strikes-power-sharing-protests

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