The law professor Michelle Alexander, author of
The New Jim Crow: Mass Incarceration in the Age of Colorblindness
, argues that we have created a criminal “caste system.” This caste system controls the lives of not only the 2.3 million people who are incarcerated but the 4.8 million people on probation or parole. 26 Millions more people are forced into “permanent second-class citizenship” by their criminal records, which make employment, higher education, and public assistance difficult or impossible. 27
A Department of Defense program known as “1033,” begun in the 1990s and authorized by the National Defense Authorization Act, and federal homeland security grants to the states have provided a total of $4.3 billion in military equipment to local police forces, either for free or on permanent loan, the magazine
Mother Jones
reported. The militarization of the police, which includes outfitting police departments with heavy machine guns, magazines, night vision equipment, aircraft, and armored vehicles, has effectively turned urban police, and increasingly rural police as well, into quasi-military forces of occupation. “Policeconduct up to 80,000 SWAT raids a year in the US, up from 3,000 a year in the early ’80s,” writes Hanqing Chen, the magazine’s reporter. The American Civil Liberties Union, cited in the article, found that “almost 80 percent of SWAT team raids are linked to search warrants to investigate potential criminal suspects, not for high-stakes ‘hostage, barricade, or active shooter scenarios.’ The ACLU also noted that SWAT tactics are used disproportionately against people of color.” 28
The urban poor are already in chains. These chains are being readied for the rest of us.
Maria J. Stephan and Erica Chenoweth examine 100 years of violent and nonviolent resistance movements in their 2008 article “Why Civil Resistance Works: The Strategic Logic of Nonviolent Conflict.” They conclude that nonviolent movements succeed twice as often as violent uprisings. Nonviolent movements appeal to those employed within the power structure, especially the police and civil servants, who are cognizant of the corruption and decadence of the power elite and are willing to abandon them. And, the authors point out, with as little as 3.5 percent of the population who are organized and disciplined, it is possible to bring down even the most ruthless totalitarian structures.
While governments “easily justify violent counterattacks against armed insurgents, regime violence against nonviolent movements is more likely to backfire against the regime,” Stephan and Chenoweth write. “Potentially sympathetic publics perceive violent militants as having maximalist or extremist goals beyond accommodation, but they perceive nonviolent resistance groups as less extreme, thereby enhancing their appeal and facilitating the extraction of concessions through bargaining.” 29
The ability to draw those within the systems of power into the movement creates paralysis and crippling divisions within the ruling elite. And this is fundamental to all successful revolts. “Internally, members of a regime—including civil servants, security forces, and members of the judiciary—are more likely to shift loyalty toward nonviolent opposition groups than toward violent opposition groups,” they write.
The coercive power of any resistance campaign is enhanced by its tendency to prompt disobedience and defections by members of the opponent’s security forces, who are more likely to consider the negativepolitical and personal consequences of using repressive violence against unarmed demonstrators than against armed insurgents. Divisions are more likely to result among erstwhile regime supporters, who are not as prepared to deal with mass civil resistance as they are with armed insurgents. Regime repression can also backfire through increased public mobilization. Actively involving a relatively larger number of people in the
The New Jim Crow: Mass Incarceration in the Age of Colorblindness
, argues that we have created a criminal “caste system.” This caste system controls the lives of not only the 2.3 million people who are incarcerated but the 4.8 million people on probation or parole. 26 Millions more people are forced into “permanent second-class citizenship” by their criminal records, which make employment, higher education, and public assistance difficult or impossible. 27
A Department of Defense program known as “1033,” begun in the 1990s and authorized by the National Defense Authorization Act, and federal homeland security grants to the states have provided a total of $4.3 billion in military equipment to local police forces, either for free or on permanent loan, the magazine
Mother Jones
reported. The militarization of the police, which includes outfitting police departments with heavy machine guns, magazines, night vision equipment, aircraft, and armored vehicles, has effectively turned urban police, and increasingly rural police as well, into quasi-military forces of occupation. “Policeconduct up to 80,000 SWAT raids a year in the US, up from 3,000 a year in the early ’80s,” writes Hanqing Chen, the magazine’s reporter. The American Civil Liberties Union, cited in the article, found that “almost 80 percent of SWAT team raids are linked to search warrants to investigate potential criminal suspects, not for high-stakes ‘hostage, barricade, or active shooter scenarios.’ The ACLU also noted that SWAT tactics are used disproportionately against people of color.” 28
The urban poor are already in chains. These chains are being readied for the rest of us.
Maria J. Stephan and Erica Chenoweth examine 100 years of violent and nonviolent resistance movements in their 2008 article “Why Civil Resistance Works: The Strategic Logic of Nonviolent Conflict.” They conclude that nonviolent movements succeed twice as often as violent uprisings. Nonviolent movements appeal to those employed within the power structure, especially the police and civil servants, who are cognizant of the corruption and decadence of the power elite and are willing to abandon them. And, the authors point out, with as little as 3.5 percent of the population who are organized and disciplined, it is possible to bring down even the most ruthless totalitarian structures.
While governments “easily justify violent counterattacks against armed insurgents, regime violence against nonviolent movements is more likely to backfire against the regime,” Stephan and Chenoweth write. “Potentially sympathetic publics perceive violent militants as having maximalist or extremist goals beyond accommodation, but they perceive nonviolent resistance groups as less extreme, thereby enhancing their appeal and facilitating the extraction of concessions through bargaining.” 29
The ability to draw those within the systems of power into the movement creates paralysis and crippling divisions within the ruling elite. And this is fundamental to all successful revolts. “Internally, members of a regime—including civil servants, security forces, and members of the judiciary—are more likely to shift loyalty toward nonviolent opposition groups than toward violent opposition groups,” they write.
The coercive power of any resistance campaign is enhanced by its tendency to prompt disobedience and defections by members of the opponent’s security forces, who are more likely to consider the negativepolitical and personal consequences of using repressive violence against unarmed demonstrators than against armed insurgents. Divisions are more likely to result among erstwhile regime supporters, who are not as prepared to deal with mass civil resistance as they are with armed insurgents. Regime repression can also backfire through increased public mobilization. Actively involving a relatively larger number of people in the
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