No name
An informative and detailed account of how the proposal for an Arms Trade Treaty to set international standards and controls upon the sale of arms, promoted in the 1990s by NGOs (such as Oxfam and Amnesty International) and by prominent individuals, for example Nobel Peace laureates, gained governmental support. The goal was not to stop all arms exports, but the more limited one of setting international standards for controlling sale of arms to strengthen national rules and to prevent weapons from intensifying conflicts or worsening human rights abuses. The Treaty was agreed at the UN General Assembly in April 2013 by 157 states, including the US under President Obama.
See also: Campaign Against the Arms Trade, 'Issues - Arms Trade Treaty'
https://www.caat.org.uk/issues/att
CAAT notes that the Arms Trade Treaty came into force in December 2014 when ratified by 50 states (including the UK), but explains their scepticism about the concept of a 'responsible' arms trade. CAAT claims the UK approves licenses which contravene the approved guidelines. and it should stop promoting arms sales A number of other sources sceptical about the Treaty are listed.
See also: 'Canada, ‘Canada joins the Arms Trade Treaty while still selling arms to Saudi Arabia’, Oxfam, 16 May 2019
Oxfam comments that whilst Canadian eventual accession to the Treaty is a major victory for civil society, the government has not made moves to cancel its $15 billion arms deal with Saudi Arabia, despite the Saudi record on human rights (denounced by the Trudeau government) and the Saudi role in the war in Yemen.
See also: Pecquet, Julian, ‘UN Approval of Arms Trade Treaty sets up Obama, Senate Showdown’, The Hill, 2 April 2013
Commentary on the domestic political context of Obama’s decision to back the Arms Trade Treaty, opposed by 53 Senators and the National Rifle Association. In the light of domestic opposition the Obama Administration had delayed support for the UN treaty in the run-up to the November 2012 election. Pecquet also notes that the treaty passed with 154 votes; three countries opposed – North Korea, Syria and Iran – and 23 abstained.
Part 3 of a trilogy. Episodes extracted from this readable narrative have been compiled into one volume – Taylor Branch, The King Years: Historic Moments in the Civil Rights Movement, New York, Simon and Schuster, pp. 256.
Leading theorist of social movements explores research into opinions of ordinary members of Solidarity, and examines strategic decisions.
Places the Orange Revolution in a sequence of ‘velvet revolutions’ based on strict nonviolence.
Includes chapters on local social movements, and on the role of strikes in promoting popular unrest and encouraging move to elections.
Useful summary analysis including brief case studies of corporate misuse of water and resistance to them (and further references): Nestle in US, Vivendi and Suez in Mexico, Bechtel in Bolivia and Coca Cola in India.
Feminist peace activist provides her theoretical perspective on cross-national case studies including UK peace movement, War Resisters’ International, anti-militarist campaigns in Spain, Korea and Japan, and the anti-NATO demonstrations in Strasbourg 2009.
Includes chapter by Alix Holt, ‘The First Soviet Feminists’ on Leningrad group associated with The Almanach: ‘Women and Russia’ and their club ‘Maria’.
This long article touches on the development of the anti-mafia movement and distinguishes within it civic anti-mafia and social anti-mafia. It delineates the developments that took place in three different periods of time in Italy: 1950s, that saw the birth of the nonviolent anti-mafia movement; the 1960s and 1970s, when socio-political-cultural aspects of the anti-mafia movement started to develop organically; up to the 1980s-1990s, a period that saw the development of the pacifist movement rising against the US militarisation of the Italian island of Sicily that paralleled the reinforcement of the anti-mafia movement and a stronger participation of organisations within it alongside individuals. It touches also on the growth of the anti-mafia movement outside the confines of Sicily, and its extension to the entire Italian peninsula, mainly because of the activity of teachers and students that facilitated the adoption of the first set of anti-mafia legislation and led to the removal from public offices of staff involved with the mafia organisation. It also establishes a conceptual distinction between the anti-mafia movement and social movements as traditionally considered, and stresses the peculiar nature of the first as being pro-system and anti-system, simultaneously. Finally, it highlights the weak points that undermine the continuity and cohesiveness of the anti-mafia movements.
Retrievable also at: http://www.centroimpastato.com/voci-per-il-dizionario-di-mafia-e-di-antimafia-di-narcomafie-2/
This article studies post-2000 Chinese feminist activism from a generational perspective. It operationalises three notions of generation - 1) generation as an age cohort; 2) generation as a historical cohort; and 3) "political generation" - to shed light on the question of generation and generational change in post-socialist Chinese feminism. The study shows how the younger generation of women have come to the forefront of feminist protest in China and how the historical conditions they live in have shaped their feminist outlook. In parallel, it examines how a "political generation" emerges when feminists of different ages are drawn together by a shared political awakening and collaborate across age.
Elfstrom analyzes data from 2003-2012 on strikes and other worker protests, and concludes that the state has responded both with greater repression (illustrated by higher spending on the People's Armed Police) and greater responsiveness (illustrated by pro-worker or split decisions in mediation, arbitration and court judgements). The article concludes by analyzing the implications of changes in policy since the accession of Xi Jinping.
See also: Elfstrom, Manfred, 'A Tale of Two Deltas: Labour Politics in Jiangsu and Guangdong', British Journal of Industrial Relations, vol.57 no.2 (2019), pp.247-74. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1111/bjir.12467
Especially chapters 10 and 11.
Stresses the role of voluntary associations in Benin.
The author, an Iranian journalist living abroad, provides lively analysis of the Green Movement and current Iranian politics. See also: Hooman Majd, Think Again: Iran’s Green Movement. It’s a Civil Rights Movement, not a Revolution, Washington DC, Foreign Policy, 2010 , online at http://foreignpolicy.com/2010/01/06/think-again-irans-green-movement/.
Focuses on conflicts over urban space, resources and housing in Cambodia, India, Nepal, Pakistan and Sri Lanka, and includes accounts of resistance in squatter settlements, e.g. in Kathmandu.
Covers range of environmental campaigns in different parts of the world, including Ireland, France, Israel, Japan, India and Indonesia.
Detailed and well researched account. Final chapter by Charles Chatfield analyses the strengths and weaknesses of the movement and influence on US policy. Concludes that anti-war activists contributed to the growth of public disaffection with the war, but could not harness it, but that both Johnson and Nixon Administrations adapted their policies in response to pressure from dissenters.
Divided into sections on 1. Campaigns against homo/transphobia; 2.Law and change; 3. Health and wellbeing; and 4. Community and diversity (covering Pride, representation in the media and LGBT communities and spaces). Includes coverage of policing, Section 28, civil partnerships and HIV/AIDS and mental health issues.
This article offers a critical overview of the Brazilian legal framework for confronting domestic violence. Intimate partner homicides are epidemic in Brazil: there are four deaths of women per day. In 2006, the Maria da Penha Law (MPL) introduced integrated polices and transformed criminal procedures to deal with the complexities of gender violence. Reforms included the establishment of The House of Brazilian Women, women‐only police stations, specialised courts, intervention orders, interdisciplinary experts, and perpetrator programs. In 2015, a new law established the crime of femicide and was designed to prevent ‘honour killings’ defences in cases of intimate partner homicides and to avoid impunity. Despite the legal reforms, the structure and articulation of the networks of services remains a challenge. The MPL led to great social change in Brazil by raising awareness of violence against women, and facilitating a broader discussion about gender equality.
The article analyses the language used by the Polish nationalist right in relation to LGBT communities and women’s right to abortion. The authors show links between the language of Church officials hierarchs and right-wing columnists. The attack on gender uses the same methods of political mobilisation and power management as the campaign against refugees and immigrants. The anti-gender discourse may strengthen the narrative against the ‘liberal EU’ and create substitute ‘scapegoats’ inside Poland. The dispersed anti-gender discourse does have a real impact on social attitudes – on the one hand, it polarises social sympathies and, on the other hand, it strengthens right-wing attitudes. The analysis is based on right-wing press articles, Church officials’ statements, videos on YouTube and a parliamentary debate about the right to abortion.
The online version of Vol. 1 of the bibliography was made possible due to the generous support of the 
The online version of Vol. 2 of the bibliography was made possible due to the generous support of