 Okay, off we go. Well, hello everyone and welcome to today's event hosted by the US Institute of Peace, entitled from Descent to Democracy, The Promise and Perils of Civil Resistance Transitions. And this also happens to be the title of my colleague, Jonathan Pinkney's new book published by Oxford University Press that we'll be discussing today. And we're really thrilled and grateful to have all of you joining us from around the world and really are looking forward to a great and lively discussion. And just one note that you can follow this event live on Twitter with the hashtag people power for peace. That's people power number four piece. And my name is Maria Stefan, I direct us IPs program on nonviolent action. And really, it's always a great day when a colleague publishes a book, particularly one that's really good and interesting. So this is my story, I had the pleasure of first meeting Jonathan about six years ago when I was a practitioner at residence at the University of Denver, and he was writing his PhD, Erica introduced us, and I remember first being super excited to meet someone so passionate about data coding and clearly really good at it. And then over lunch he was asking me such great questions about the relationship between civil resistance and democratization and I remember not having very good answers to most of those questions. So fast forward a few years we're now colleagues and there is a book, which I know has been a labor of love for Jonathan and probably for his family and for his friends as well so congratulations Jonathan, and really the launch of this book and the discussion today could not be more timely. The nonviolent grassroots movements have historically been major drivers of social political and economic change. As ordinary people have used protest strikes boycott sit ins, and hundreds of other methods of nonviolent action to resist oppression, against justice and hold governments accountable. And here in the US, in the wake of the broadest protests in US history with Black Lives Matter and the movement for Black Lives. We are mourning the loss of Representative John Lewis, who was a great champion of US IP and who dedicated his life to the struggle for justice, democracy and peace, and was a fierce believer in the power of nonviolence and nonviolent action. In the US and around the world there has been a spike in people power over the past few years, at the same time that we've been seeing a decline in the levels of democracy and a rise of authoritarianism. We know that while nonviolent movements themselves have democratizing effects, such as getting people involved in political action and balancing power in society, movements do not always lead to a smooth stable transition to democracy, following the departure of an authoritarian regime. Today, Jonathan will be explaining to us why some transitions driven by movements end in democracy, while others do not. And then we will have a broader discussion on civil resistance and democracy with our esteemed group of panelists, and followed up by a question and answer session with you all. So we'll be taking questions from you. And just a note on that, you all can type your questions using the chat feature which is directly under the video player on the event page that you're on now. So we are really fortunate and grateful to have a truly remarkable group of panelists, civil resistance and social movements, experts, scholars and practitioners who will help animate this morning's conversation, and I'll introduce them now. Erica Chenoweth is the Berthold Bytes Professor in Human Rights and International Affairs at Harvard's Kennedy School. She has conducted extensive research focusing on political violence and its alternatives. She and I wrote a book together a few years ago and have certainly stayed in touch since that time. Erica has a forthcoming book called civil resistance what everyone needs to know. Mariah Mampili is the Marx Endowed Chair of International Affairs at the Marx School of Public and International Affairs at the City University of New York. He is an expert on the politics of both violent and nonviolent resistance. He is the author of Rebel Rulers in Surgeon Governance and Civilian Life During War, and the co-author of Africa Uprising, Popular Protest and Political Change. Hardy Merriman is President and CEO of the International Center on Nonviolent Conflict, which focuses on how movements can build their effectiveness and win rights, freedom and justice. He's worked in the field of civil resistance for over 15 years, and I would note that his organization ICNC has probably done more than any other organization I know of to advance the field of civil resistance and for that I think we're all very grateful. Huda Shafiq is a women's rights activist from Sudan with a decade of experience in women, peace and security. Her work focuses on gender equality and social justice. Huda has held several posts in national and international organizations, including with the United Nations in Sudan and in the region. And she's currently Sudan's program director with Kharama, which is a network of civil society groups and activists across Africa and the Arab world. And finally, Jonathan Pinkney is program officer and research lead for USIP's program on nonviolent action. He is an expert on nonviolent action focusing on the intersection between nonviolent movements, democratization and peace processes, and he's certainly a delightful colleague. So without further ado, I will turn it over to Jonathan. Thank you so much Maria for that incredibly kind introduction. It is my extreme pleasure to be here today. I'm so grateful to all the people who are who are joining us here. And very much looking forward to being able to discuss this work that have been engaged in for the last several years to give me just one moment I will pull up a presentation. Thanks so much. As I was saying before, it's such a pleasure to be here. This is a topic that I have been I have been thinking about and working on for quite some time. Versions of this work I've had discussions with almost almost everyone on this panel about, and it's very exciting to finally be able to share this final product with everyone. And so to begin this, this discussion, I wanted to go back to the moment where in many cases the inspiration for this book began and that's right here in Tahir Square Cairo, February 11 of 2011. And of course, as many of you will remember, this is the moment at which Hosni Mubarak, the president of Egypt, stepped down from power after a three week massive uprising. That was in many ways the peak of the 2011 Arab uprisings in the Middle East. And now of course, this was this moment of incredible hope where people around the world and in the region were optimistic that major political change could happen in a region that had resisted it for quite some time through nonviolent action. And this was supported, of course, because long standing existing research had found that nonviolent resistance had this positive relationship with democratization that when political change happened through nonviolent means, it was much more likely to democratize. But of course, what happened over the following years was that this moment of hope very quickly turned into a moment of frustration as the transition failed to reach its goals. And then ultimately authoritarian backsliding and a return to a regime that was in some ways even more repressive than the regime that had that had come before it. So why did this happen? In particular, this is a crucial question to answer because we know that the uprisings of 2011 weren't the beginning of this kind of political change. Indeed, since World War Two, there have been 78 political transitions that were initiated primarily through nonviolent resistance. And as you can see from the map here, these span every country of the world every decade since then. And as I argue in the book, the pervasiveness of this phenomenon means that if we really want to understand the rise and decline of democracy in the post war era, we really need to understand the impacts of nonviolent resistance on democratic progress. So this was the core question that I wanted to get at in this book. Why do successful nonviolent resistance campaigns sometimes lead to democracy. And why do they sometimes not. And in particular, I was very curious to know if there are if there are ways, if there's anything that can be done about that. Are there factors that impact democratization in transitions brought about through nonviolent resistance that can be changed by during the political dynamics of the transition itself. Or is democracy in these cases just something that's the result of long standing economic or social trends that change only in timescales of decades or centuries. So how did I go about answering that those questions. Well, first, I really wanted to dig in in a very rigorous way to this question of whether that democratizing effective nonviolent resistance actually obtained. So to do that, I did a series of statistical analyses of over 300 transitions of every type, comparing other kinds of transitions with transitions initiated through nonviolent resistance. And then to answer this question of when nonviolent resistance leads to democracy and when it doesn't. I did some further statistical analysis, comparing those 78 civil resistance transitions that I was talking about before. I finally did three most different case studies, talking with activists political leaders, journalists, and others who were particularly familiar with three political transitions that have been initiated primarily through nonviolent resistance transition in Brazil in 1984 Zambia in 1991 and the Paul in 2006. Well, in answer to the first question, I would say that the findings from the work of Erica Maria and others on the democratizing advantages of civil resistance was is indeed very real and very striking. As you can see here, a large majority of transitions that have nonviolent resistance as a key factor in their initiation, and in at least a minimal level of democracy, nearly three times more than transitions that are initiated through any other means. This is one of the most one of the most robust findings in the democratization literature out there. So what explains this 20% or so that failed to do so the key question that that I started the book with. Well, I argue that the key reason has to do with the uncertainty of the transition itself, while nonviolent resistance might incline a transition towards democracy. There is a great amount of uncertainty during the transitional period before a new regime becomes consolidated. In particular, I argue that there are that in the context of a transition initiated through nonviolent resistance. There are two key challenges that systematically affect a country's chances of democratization. The first is the challenge of maintaining mobilization, continuing high levels of civic engagement and continued activism through the transitional period to hold new elites accountable and prevent backsliding by spoilers. For example, we can think about the transition in 2014 2015 in Burkina Faso initiated through massive nonviolent resistance, but the protesters didn't simply go home once the transition started. Instead they stayed mobilized, and thus when factions in the military attempted to derail the transition through a coup, there was a massive popular upswell that foiled the coup and kept that country's transition on track. The second challenge is to avoid maximalism. And this challenge is in many ways the mirror image of the first, a political action focused towards all or nothing maximalist extreme goals, rather than building up the new institutions that are necessary for democracy can create new rail transitions and lead to no no future consolidation. Instead, there's a crucial need for dialogue, moderation and directing civic engagement into building new institutional channels. And one excellent example of this from recent history is the Nobel Peace Prize winning Tunisian national dialogue quartet. When the Tunisian transition was moving in a very maximalist direction, brought the various political forces to the table, focused political action towards the construction of a new constitution, and helped consolidate that country's transition. So that's my argument and some cases just to potentially support it, but what kind of evidence is there to actually actually show that this is the case. Well, statistically speaking, there is a very clear correlation between high mobilization, low maximalism and post transition democracy. As you can see in the figure here. So one of these dots is an individual transition. The yellow transition, the ones that end in democracy cluster at very high levels of mobilization and very low levels of maximalism, while the non democracies tend to cluster in the lower right hand side with very high levels of maximalism and low levels of mobilization. So there's certainly a strong statistical relationship there. But what if this is just, you know, random statistical noise attributable to something else. Well, in the three case studies where I had in depth interviews with people who were involved in these transitions, I find very strong support for the role of mobilization and maximalism in democratization in these kinds of transitions. Very briefly, in Nepal in 2006 was a transition characterized by high levels of mobilization and high levels of maximalism that resulted in a what I call a fractious semi democracy, one where there's a lot of political action, but it tends to be but it tends to not lead to much institutional support and only low levels of democracy. The Xandian transition in 1991 was one characterized by low levels of mobilization and low levels of maximalism, and resulted in what I call an elite semi democracy, one that was dominated by elites, many of whom were part of the old regime that was in power before and started. And finally, the transition in Brazil in the 1980s was one characterized by this combination that I argue is most conducive to democracy, high levels of mobilization and low levels of maximalism, resulting in a for the most highly successful democratic transition. Of course, recent events in Brazil have have maybe put Brazil's democracy in some level of threat. So I'll just emphasize this is about the transition in the 80s. And at that point, Brazil was one of the most robust democracies in Latin America. So, to conclude, I do find indeed supporting the work of others that civil resistance is the most direct road from authoritarianism to democracy, and that addressing these two challenges, maintaining mobilization and avoiding maximalism are key to staying on that road. And finally, I'll say, as I think any any academic must when we're talking about their findings that there is certainly much more to be learned here. My argument isn't that these are the only two things that matter in leading from nonviolent resistance to democracy. Indeed, there's there's much more out there, and much more work to be done in understanding this crucial question of how we get from successful nonviolent resistance to the successful consolidation of democracy. Thank you so much once again for being here, and I'm very excited to begin the discussion with this excellent group of panelists. Great. Well thanks so much Jonathan for that short, sweet and super meaty presentation. I'm now going to turn to our panelists to get their reactions, starting with Erica. So Erica you've recently shown data that, although nonviolent resistance is becoming increasingly common. Other movements seem to be on the rise globally they're also becoming less successful in achieving their goals. So why is this, and what are the implications for the impact of nonviolent resistance on democracy which is of course a central concern of Jonathan's book. Maria and thanks so much Jonathan for that great presentation for writing the book for illuminating the topic so beautifully. I'm convinced by your argument and and I'm really grateful that this piece of great scholarship is now out in the world for others to to learn from as well. So I want to reply quickly to Maria's question but maybe later we can respond a little bit to some of the things that Jonathan brings up to. I think that you know that the main reason why the incidence of nonviolent resistance is increasing is that it has been so visibly effective over the past 60 years on an increasing basis and that that knowledge is now more widely available to people. The reason why I think it's been declining and its effectiveness is more related to the way that movements have started to manifest in more recent years particularly around focus on street demonstrations rather than on building alternative institutions and other forms of non cooperation that are maybe more time consuming and difficult to build. And I think this is related a little bit to modes of digital organizing which tend to privilege short term rapid response rapid mobilization and the ability to draw large numbers and a short amount of time. Without the ability to sort of build long term organizational capacity for transformation and for negotiating the very difficult challenges that Jonathan has laid out with regard to essentially trying to create and invest in the new institutions. While the mobilization is happening or even before mobilization starts. So I think that that's very much related to some of the issues that Jonathan brings up not just with the post civil resistance campaign transition but also how the campaigns are turning out in the in the sort of midst of mass mobilization. Great. Thanks very much, Erica. Turning to Zachariah. You have written about several waves of popular protests in Africa that have often failed to enact a formal democratic change, but have clearly played an important role in in raising collective consciousness in countries. So what would be your evaluation of some of the recent protest waves across the continent such as in Sudan Algeria Zimbabwe and the like. And are we likely to see formal institutional changes in these places. Thank you for the question and thank you for having me on this panel today. Like Erica, I think I really enjoyed Jonathan's books. It's a really nuanced and detailed account of I think some of the more complicated aspects of the connection between nonviolent protest movements and the kind of outcomes that we would like to see around the conversation in particular. And I think I, you know, I would sort of respond to the question by by sort of tying it to some of the stuff that Jonathan is trying to do in his book, and maybe point to one of the sort of, I wouldn't say weaknesses but maybe an area that you could take the research further in the future, which is that, you know, a lot of these questions as your map showed have been debated very vigorously in the African context since the 1980s and 1990s as your map was, I would just guess that the plurality of such transitions that you're pointing to have occurred in the African context as you sort of talk about and as I think many people already know. There was a major upsurge of protest activity in Africa in the late 1980s and early 1990s, one of which you talk about in the book, the Zambian case, which was part of that second wave. And here a really extraordinary moment in which, you know, the start of this protest wave only about three African countries were even mostly democratic in some form. And by the end of it, less than a decade later you had more than 20 African countries that had democratized to some degree. And so that raises the question that I think Maria is getting at which is, if Africa has already gone through this period of democratization in the 80s and 90s, and why would people be taking to the streets and such big numbers over the past, 10 years, again, you know, why protest, if you already have achieved democracy. And actually this is a question that a lot of African intellectuals were really debating strongly in the 1990s because many of them felt that the nature of democracy that had come into being following these civil resistance campaigns was not democracy in any sort of recognizable sense as the rule of the people. And that had been reduced to a very institutional form of the electoral competition. And that in particular opposition parties, which had really benefited from the civil resistance campaigns were not bringing about the kinds of transformative economic and political changes that had motivated people to go out into the streets in the first place. And so if you look at this literature and here I'm thinking about people like Claude Ake, Ernest Wamba Diawamba, which is recently passed, if I am a doomre, one of my favorites, Tandy come kind of weird a in the diaspora pro Robinson was my undergraduate mentor. We're all really in the 90s creating this hybrid literature, debating precisely the question that I think Jonathan is putting forward today, which is why do these massive uprisings that draw in huge numbers of people fail to bring about the types of institutional transformations that people are hoping for and expecting by putting themselves at risk by participating in these uprisings. And I think that in order to understand what has been happening in the African context and I think, perhaps globally, where the fast fast five to 10 years gets it, both a kind of conceptual and a methodological challenge of conducting these kind of studies over what is the meaning of democracy itself, and the book actually has a really nuanced discussion of this. And as we know, most scholars rely very heavily on these types of data sets the data set which I think you use here, but there's many others freedom house and others that tend to emphasize these very institutional dimensions of democratic transition. The right to vote becomes the central indicator of whether a country has achieved something like democracy. And this goes against what you refer to as Robert dolls insights about substantive democracy. What does democracy actually mean is democracy simply the right to vote. I would also think about democracy in relation to say other types of rights like a right to assembly, right to speech, and potentially even more thornier rights like economic rights like a right to housing, or a right to employment. There are all aspects of debate around democratization that unfolded in the 1990s in the African context, but I think all of us globally need to start thinking about more seriously in this moment. Because if you understand what has been happening. Yes, there have been cases like Sudan where you have African protesters really challenging entrenched autocracies but these protests have also been unfolding in countries like Malawi and Senegal which actually had institutional suggesting that what these protests are about is not simply the presence of formal democracy, but also about the very meaning of democracy itself and I think that's where we all collectively need to start thinking about how we can take on this this question in this moment. Okay, thanks so much, Zachary, really helpful points on the importance of the substance of democracy and Sudan as we were discussing before the before the event is just such a fascinating case study where you have a recent mass popular participatory nonviolent movement that has led to the ouster of longtime dictator Omar Bashir and is in this very delicate process of democratic transition right now. So I wanted to turn to hoda. You know, Sudan has just such a rich history of citizen mobilization. So I wanted to just first ask you what you think were the main, the main factors that enabled the movement to trigger a political transition last year, knowing that there had been a wave of protests and other kind of uprisings in Sudan previously so what was it about last year that that drove the transition and what would you say has been the role of movement leaders and participants in that transition. And you know maybe tying together some of the points Erica and Zachariah me what would you say some of the challenges are right now for Sudan's transition and the challenges that the movement leaders are facing in this moment. So a lot of a lot of questions for you hoda. Yeah. So, I think we can divide the reasons or the triggers that led to the pain that happens throughout the last year into like a lot of experiences like over years that of organized resistance that have been happening by like university students groups women's high political parties armed groups. So we have long history of organized resistance but I think they're also set off immediate reasons that actually triggered that kind of mobilization that lasted for almost seven months which was the clear division that has been happening even within the ruling party and the issues of corruption that was coming on the surface and the fact that they were practicing everything that they were denying the people to do so in addition to the collapse in all like aspects like the collapse social and security situation as well that was going like deteriorating in a horrible way so like for example with the economic situation I mean you we saw the lines for everything we had to line up for everything for my greats in front of bakeries for gas for cash money for everything so so the situation that the collapse of the of the government was just so obvious and visible to deny. I think there are also some other lessons that we learned from the region definitely because when 2011 like revolution started in the region we had to 2013 and at the time we like to call it have which is this unique stand storm that Sudan is is known about and it came and it was very strong but it was also faced with a lot of brutality and violence. But we also learned a lot from from that experience we learned that there is a need to not centralize the movement and that was huge within the December revolution it's it didn't start from cartoon it start from outside and it continues there were also very important aspect of political organization coordination and we didn't have that as successful in 2013 as we had it in during starting from December so having actually the the pro change forces from civil society and political parties and armed groups to be committed to non violence movement that was huge achievement so having all of them agreeing to a minimum margin that at least towards change despite their ideological differences that was also viewed and having forming this alliance of forces of freedom and change and having Sudanese professional association SPA as the new ambiguous leaders behind it had also created a lot of trust between leadership and people because of there is also a history of lack of trust between people and political parties for various reasons but that created a trust created leadership but also because it was a joint planning for whatever non violence events that was happening that also created local leadership and it allowed the space for creativity initiative and and it also allowed the space for new organization and structures within the neighborhood to come across the country and this might sound not a big deal but it was a big deal having something that's not centralized and and it's still and and really boosted the movement and the mobilization to continue for like seven almost seven months that was huge and but still this not to to run over my time maybe I would jump to to to the challenges I think there are many challenges that we're facing now starting from the civil military type of government that we're having now that's not everyone is agreeing upon of course that is a very sensitive let's say agreement that the political leaders agreed to the transition military council which is I mean very hard to balance there's of course the economic situation that's still like having baby steps to to improve the security situation as well and the fact that members of the previous regime are still in many like sensitive positions let's say and they're doing they're really organized and they're mobilizing themselves and their members are trying to to to this like having this transition to fail so it's it's it's really critical situation that we're having right now but the continuous of the mobilization just referring to to join us on point is really one of the key points we're having now and I would just conclude by referring to the 30s of June I think the 30s of June was really one of the huge steps we had over the revolution because of the massacre that happened in the city and the lack of on the cut of the complete cut of internet having millions of people marching in the streets with all that we expected a lot of violence and brutality to happen as well but it succeeded and I think that showed the power of the people and they still became a very inspiring day and and preparations we had for us to continue in mobilizing great well thanks Huda for that really fantastic summary of the revolution itself and some of the challenges now in the during the transition period so you know one of the really key lessons from Jonathan's book is the importance of maintaining mobilization during the transition period so I wanted to turn to to Hardy Hardy from your work with movements all around the world what would you say are some of the strategies that have helped movements maintain momentum and mobilization during critical transition periods. Thanks Maria, and I want to echo people's congratulations to Jonathan as well on his fantastic new book. On the question of sustaining mobilization, I think you know we can look at long term sort of more strategic factors and short term tactical factors that we contribute to this and one longer term factor that I think really matters is when movements set expectations with their supporters and participants that they're probably going to be in a multi year struggle. And so, you know I think of the really helpful finding in the from the Navco data set that the average maximalist nonviolent campaign takes three years to conclude, and which means of course some take longer. Now that's three years is remarkable. If you want to achieve major social, political or economic change and you can do it in three years. That's fantastic. But if you're an activist in the middle of it it can seem agonizingly long, particularly if your expectation is that you're supposed that you want to win within three months or six months. And so, setting the expectation that you will be in a multi year struggle most likely. And yes, this doesn't even include what happens after the topic of Jonathan's book. There's sort of a second phase right you've got to defeat what you're against and achieve what you're for. So, so you develop a long term commitment and people you you set the expectation that this is not a sprint but also a marathon there will be moments of sprinting. But there will be moments where we regroup and when I work with activists around strategizing one thing that unlocks the strategic imagination is when we get out of a three to six month time frame and start thinking about two or three years. If you think you have to win it all in three to six months and to be sure there could be circumstances where structurally that needs to happen. But if you have the liberty of thinking about longer time frames, your imagination and creativity and strategy can start to flow because you can think in terms of phases and waves that are going to allow you again to regroup at critical times. I think another key factor would be making sure that a movement has a theory of how it's going to win as a concept of how it's going to win and this this might seem abstract, but I think it's actually really important so so Waging a nonviolent struggle is can feel chaotic can feel overwhelming. There's so many different things to react to. And if you have a theory of, well, this is going to take some time, but here are a few key things that we can identify and track that will show us if we're achieving our goal. Are we more unified now than we were a year ago. Do we have greater nonviolent discipline. How is our recruitment and training capacity. How's our participation look. It focuses you on those things many of which you have some control over, and it frees you up to not necessarily have to react as much to your adversary, who could be pulling you in all kinds of directions and where you out. It also may get you out of going into cycles of protest feeling like we have to keep protesting. We have to keep getting media attention and if protest numbers or media attention drop off, which is inevitable it always sort of wanes at some point. That's not an indicator necessarily that we're losing, or that we need to kind of keep trying to keep that going. Participants may want to take another form for example in a boycott at that point. So I think having this theory and these key indicators of what you identify as your movement winning over time is really key. One last thing I'd say, just in terms of long term is movements are communities they have to serve people's needs if they're going to last. And some of these needs could be economic and you could have parallel institutions that serve people's you know build economic self alliance, but also social and psychological needs are really important. When I think about the US Civil Rights Movement or the United Farm Workers in the 1960s, they incorporated culture incorporated relationship building they incorporated joy and creativity into their actions into their meetings into their events. And so you went and whether you could be a frontline protest or not there was something that could sustain you in that community in those relationships and you could leave also with hope wasn't just politics it was more than that. You know in the short term tactical innovation is key. You have people who will want to give everything to the cause and have the time and risk willingness to do it and they can be leaders and you know do civil disobedience, but then coming up with different tiers of tactics for different levels of participation and risk tolerance is really critical the person has very little to give. In terms of time may be able to participate in a consumer boycott or donate a room in their house for meetings. So lots of different ways for movements to do it and thank you. Great thanks party that was very well said and you know maybe hold up just given that you know Sudan's transition is in in progress right now on this question of maintaining mobilization do you have any thoughts on how movements are thinking about this now in Sudan, how to maintain kind of mobilization momentum during this period. Maybe two examples of what's already happening right now in Sudan is continuous activism and mobilization of the people through the resistance committees that were already established during the revolution but they're still ongoing their work is still ongoing so it's like neighborhood base and then across Sudan and they communicate with each other and they're really powerful structures now that they are very instrumental in like consultation in like dialogue in planning in general. So it's, it's, I see, I see this mobilization as really one of the main support to the PM for example and the cabinet they're not elected the PM is not elected, but the political parties and the movements by the people which are mostly led by the resistance committees have really been instrumental in just providing this power of people which which which has always I mean that they all what they always say is that protest are around the street so if things didn't go as we all planned and owned and and we did for for like freedom justice and and peace where we're always going to come back and having the having them like active that has been really powerful but also that now there are new formed groups on neighborhood and communities base as well which is called service groups which is support the communities in the neighborhood with basic needs as as was just mentioned like especially during the lockdown so having like access to like gas and food and water and just trading awareness for example about the COVID and all of that so they're actually filling a gap and still all these structures especially on the local level and well established and maintained because it has been mostly especially during the previous redeem control and and dominated by by people members of previous three teams so this has been really kind of connecting communities with with leadership and with decision makers so there is no gap as it used to be but we also but also the movements and the political parties civil society and all of that they're also working to as other important tactics as we need to assure like continuous of consultations with people for example when it comes to constitution making or for the ongoing peace process so because you need the ownership that people had for the revolution for other ongoing processes that's happening right now and but also what is very important is how to make sure that we're reforming the institutions in a way that it's reflecting and responding to the people's need like the judiciary system and and yeah low making and and like budgets finalization and the fact that in this transition we're going to have a legislative council that's not also elected but still it's going to be the voices of the people this is also one of the main lesson and that we learn from previous transitions. Thanks so much for Jonathan you highlighted two main challenges in the book during transitions that can facilitate democracy, but of course transitions are often nonlinear they're complex processes and with many different important factors. So are there other things that your research has shown that help to facilitate democracy and transitions that are driven by nonviolent resistance. Thanks Maria, that's a that's a great question and I think there is. There's a lot more work to be done here to to get into a lot of these subtleties and complexities. And as other members of this panel were were bringing up. I think just a couple of things I'll highlight both because they're sort of findings that have come up in my own research, as well as I think connecting to to some of the points that were raised by by hold up by Zachariah and others. So one thing, one thing that I found in other research relates to this question of maintaining mobilization through the creation of more long standing enduring resistance structures similar to the resistance committees that that was talking about. In some work that I've done with Charles butcher and Jessica breakaway. We found that resistance movements that have the participation of organizations that have a reason for existence beyond simply the resistance campaign so things like Labor unions or religious organizations, and other sort of, you know, day to day kind of groups, if they participate in resistance, then that's more likely to lead to more democracy over the long term. And I think it's exactly because these are organizations that have, you know that longer term mindset that party was talking about, or those long standing mobilization structures that that huddle was talking about. So I think that's one, you know that sort of preliminary work at this point but I think it's one really interesting factor to continue to be digging into, you know, who is it exactly who is participating in nonviolent resistance, and how does that affect these longer these longer term issues. And then I think the second thing I'll bring up is just related to the, the role of dialogue and negotiation processes in political transition. This is something that we're working on at US IP right now looking, looking at you know what what does dialogue that can say move away from the kinds of maximalist mobilization that I talked about in the book. What do these kinds of processes actually look like how do they come about. How do people who have been more accustomed to protesting on the streets, come to the negotiation table and come to agreements that can establish new political institutions. That's something that's still sort of preliminary at this point but I think one thing we're seeing is that you know the, the ability of having strong relationships that can that can facilitate these negotiation structures is is something that's quite crucial for for addressing that particular challenge. Much more to dig into but I will I will leave leave that question there. Thanks Jonathan we actually already have questions pouring in from the audience and just a reminder you can use the chat function, which is right underneath the video player on the event page so we already have a couple questions that I might as well start to to inject them right now into the conversation. One is very much related to what you were just talking about how to go away from maximalism so the question from the audience is how does the maximalism mechanism work in practice. How does it lead to failure, and how did you measure this variable. So that, that has your name written all over it Jonathan. Yeah, that's a that's a great question. And I think probably the, the most helpful way to answer it is to go into a particular case. So, you know the the one where I sort of the case where I talked the most about maximalism in the book is the transition in Nepal that began in 2006 and last for several years thereafter. And what you know high levels of maximalism looks like in that particular in that particular case was basically anytime a new political change was sort of proposed for sort of what the new political system might look like, there was a move to basically shut down the country by anyone who happened to be opposed to it. And so there were sort of a back and forth, like, back and forth movements that shut down the country anytime there was sort of a minor political shift one way or another with very little room for very little room for compromise. And the, the result of this was, I mean there were many different, many different impacts of this. One of them is a sort of gradual loss of faith in the potential for democracy, in terms of broad public opinion and within activists as well, because they see that sort of people see that no like a new, new political system is being established, the sort of demand the sort of needs that they wanted met through a new political system that, you know, go well beyond just institutional changes also going to the kinds of economic and social changes that I was talking about are not are also not being met. And so that, you know, gradual loss of faith can lead to a desire in many cases for authoritarian like authoritarian return and open up a space for that to occur. So one particular one particular afternoon, and I would say two consequences new institutions are very hard to establish, and there's open and spaces opened up for authoritarian backsliding. So that's how I measured the variable. I won't go into sort of the, the statistical nitty gritty. It is basically it's a combination of looking at extreme as sort of more extreme tactics, like general strikes, or, or sort of comprehensive electoral boycotts with these sort of fragment measures of the fragmentation of the political system between different parts between between different political forces. And of course there's a lot more a lot more in the in the book about that. Was that the scope of the question. Yes, and there are just to be thinking about maybe for another round is the follow up question was well what types of movements are actually able to move away from maximalism and what allows them to do so so you can maybe think about that but Eric I know you had a particular question for Jonathan related to the book in its findings so go for it. It's actually perfect timing because it's on this exact question, which is, there's sort of attention in the two processes that you're bringing up right if you want to have people maintain collective mobilization but you want to move away from maximalism. It's much easier to maintain collective mobilization around what Mark Beisinger calls a negative coalition, right, where it's like we don't want XYZ, or we want so and so to leave office. But, you know, it's easier slogans, we want justice, we want, you know, we want democracy. During the transition itself it's very hard to sort of translate that and maintain the same enthusiasm to slogans like we want rank choice voting, and we want proportional representation with two rounds of run off that you know that there there sort of is a mismatch between the types of institutionalization processes that have to happen and the level of enthusiasm often attached to that it speaks a little bit to Zacharias concern to about just like, you know, what draws people into mobilization is values. And what has to happen during the transition looks like basically institutionalization elite politics, and another chance for power to be taken away from people, right, even if it's taken away through representative democracy and quote unquote so can you speak a little bit about in the cases where that mobilization was maintained. The enthusiasm around mobilization was maintained, even though it started to become a little bit more technocratic, and how leadership can sort of play a role and and ensuring those things can maintain some connection to one another. Thanks so much Erica that's that's an excellent question and I agree completely this these negative coalitional dynamics are so key to so many of these uprisings and it can be it's, it is a real challenge to shift away from them. I think, you know, again I'll go back to one of the cases in the book which is the transition in Brazil, where I think this, you know this shift was handled quite well by many different segments of the movement. And I recall in, you know, in one of the interviews that that's in that chapter, I was talking with a leader of the of the women's movement there, who talked about how they had more they mobilized for a long time both like leading up to the transition and then, and then afterwards. And one thing that really struck me in how how that particular how that person talked about their mobilization against the Brazil's military regime was saying, we didn't like we didn't see the ouster of the regime as an end in itself, we saw it as a means to an that our long term our long term goal was always gender equity. That's what like that's what we were like that's what we were fighting for. And the military regime was quite, you know, was quite conservative on that on those lines and opposed to that goal. And so we mobilized because we mobilized against the military regime, because they were an obstacle towards that longer term change, not just because you know not just because we didn't, you know, we didn't we hated the military regime, we did hate the military regime, but mobilized against them primarily because they were an obstacle to these longer term goals. And I think that was something you know that's something that characterized, you know, many of the, like, many of the activists across, you know, many different contexts that I've talked to you about this that, you know they see they see a longer term, a longer term set of positive visions for the future that are that are motivating them and they will, you know, they'll join those, they'll join those negative coalitions against a regime that is an obstacle to achieving that. But what's really driving them is this is this longer term vision, and that can kind of and that can keep people both, you know, focused on mobilization during the transition, as well as, you know, once the like once the obstacle is gone, then there's you know they're still focused on those those longer term institutional changes that they've always been interested in. So I think, again, that's certainly not the not the whole picture but I do think that's one that is sort of one important factor in meeting that. Great thanks Jonathan and just strikes me that this huge challenge of shifting away from negative coalition dynamics is just so fundamental and it's also at the heart of the new research project that you're leading at us IP on people power peace processes and democratization so it's a really, really good question. The next question from the audience is for you, Huda. You talked about creating space for creativity and leadership at the local level, which seemed to be a key element of both the Hong Kong and black lives matter protests as well. Can you talk a little bit more about creating that space. Sure. I think it's, I would say it's very much related to the, to the emerging of local leaders and the fact that the design of this non violence act and protest were not an up bottom approach, yet it was like, most of the time bottom of approach or just a joint plan. So just to give examples is that at the beginning we had and I'm, I'm sure you must know that we had our schedule of protest like published and announced at every start of a week so that on like Sunday we're going to have a center protest on like when is Thursday we're going to have a central process at the beginning that was it and then when the local leaders leadership and the neighborhood committees started to to emerge and and they started saying but no maybe on Tuesday we can have a musical night in neighborhoods maybe and then the sector and we think that we're ready, like the doctors union for example we're ready to start a strike then that's it let's have a strike so it, it wasn't just like instructions people came with ideas like a strike like using art like just having night protest, which really exhausted security people because we had like acts going on all the time. So like they protest, they protest night protest strikes using the art and for example we had a train full of people came all the way from one of the states in the north to her tomb to the city and and that was huge it, it, it moved. It took like one day because it kept stopping by different states in the, in the way bringing people so I think the diversity one of the reasons behind it was that the diversity in Sudan also and the eagerness and the ownership of the people made them use their instruments and the symbols of freedom that they have, and the fact that there were a lot of that were like strong communication between these groups, and also the fact that they remain them because the whole time until the step down of the of al-bashir and the previous regime so people would just be communicating it doesn't matter who you are. It's just about security and it's about trust, and then you come with ideas and and that's it it was by everyone. So I would say communication and ownership and just providing local leaders with the tools and the support they need. Okay, thanks very much, Huda. I think the next question is best targeted Zachariah and Hardy, and the question is, is there a role for Western democracies to support democratic transitions. Zachariah you want to take a stab at that one. I think, you know, it's obviously a very important question politically we know the United States and the Western general has played a role in in in democracy promotion both for good and bad for much of the past, say seven decades now. And so we really need to get it right if we're going to interfere in these countries internal politics. We want to be sure that we're on the side of good and I think good in this sense would be promoting democracy in a in a meaningful way in a substantive way. And the only way that that can happen I think this is the great challenge. Is it too much of how we think about our engagement with democratic movements abroad are sort of secondary or tertiary priorities in contrast to say, economic or security policy. You know, most of the time and I think Maria you probably could answer this question as well as anyone. You know the desire for supporting democratic movements is legitimate and I think at the individual level very meaningful, but often gets trumped by other considerations and we are too often and I'm not here just referring to the United States but also Europe, on the other side, our interest in promoting democracy, in favor of say economic agendas. This is a hugely, I think, fractious point in terms of our relations to African social movements in particular, many of which have been really centering the question of in their democratic action and so can you reconcile, say demands for, you know, greater economic redistribution or reduction of inequality with sort of the West traditional support for free markets and capitalism. And of course I think national security I mean if you look at much of the current protests in Africa, in places like Uganda, you know, we have basically agreed that we will continue to support a long running dictatorship in that country, one that has been very very hostile to nonviolent movements such as the one currently led by Bobby Wine, because the Ugandan military plays a very central role in our national security policy and so too often I think with the West I think this actually fuels a tremendous degree of resentment amongst activists in these contexts. We have been willing to put aside our interest in promoting democracy in favor of these economic and security goals and that opens us up to I think their criticisms of hypocrisy and in ways that I think will undermine our long term credibility as a site of liberal democratic values. Thanks very much Zachariah and Hardy, you've done a lot of thinking on this topic, obviously you've recently written a monograph with Peter Ackerman about the right to assist, the right to assist nonviolent campaigns and movements and so curious about your thoughts on the role of western democracies and beyond and external actors maybe in general in supporting democratic transitions. Sure. I want to echo what Zachariah said because I agree with it fully and I thought they were great points. We have to get this question right. We really have to get this question right about how, whether it's western democracies or whether it's NGOs can be better supporters of democracy because with rising authoritarianism documented for over 10 years, depending on which measure you look at 14 years more, it's leading us to a world that really no country is going to be immune to, in terms of the implications of that and the propensity of the world becoming a more violent place. So we can all think of ways that it can be done wrong right, how can we do it right. And for me it starts with asking okay so if movements are one of the most significant drivers of democratic transitions right incomplete as they may be. What makes movement successful. It's not necessarily big grants and it's not necessary. It's probably in fact I'm sort of against the like you throw a lot of money in a movement I'm quite against that I think that's a way that sometimes the government might think and actually that can be destructive to movements. So my read of the growing body of research into movement success points to the fact that skills and strategic choices of movements make a big difference. If that's the case, then shouldn't we think about how we can build better educational infrastructure so that activists can tap into the best insights they can find the best insights available whether it's from top scholarship like yours Maria or Eric or Zachary or practitioners like who to who have great insights to offer from her experience. How can we build as external parties whether we're countries or NGOs, opportunities for activists to get access to the best insights they can from practitioners and scholars, so they can build their skills, develop their own strategies which are not imposed from the outside and increase their chance of success. If we do that well, that will carry over into post transition periods. So what we do pre transition critically affects what will happen post transition. They're deeply related and I think, you know, post transition. We have to understand that's not the time for people to just go home. Okay, thank you very much for your, you know, for your revolution please go home now we'll just do the institution building corruption persists. The old regime doesn't disappear in fact if you want to look at alliances, suddenly they form a negative coalition against the new government because they feel threatened by it and want to get back in. And so there's a need for ongoing mobilization there's a need for external actors to understand it. The last thing I'll say obviously go on but I'll stop is just the importance of incentivizing nonviolent discipline. The one thing that I feel comfortable as an outsider saying it's okay to really draw a line here and impose it and not necessarily listen to the local need would be if people start talking about the need to become violent because there is so much data that shows that if people can remain nonviolent there's no guarantee of success, but the prospects are better and so that's a line that as an external indicator I think really should be held as much as possible to not incentivize people possibly leaving the table and resorting to violent means. Great thanks very much hardy. The next question I think it was for you Jonathan and Zachariah and others may have thoughts as well but you mentioned that there are so as or as mentioned there are several groups working on institutional advocacy because it's easier to measure. How would you recommend that they shift to substantive democratic principles. Yeah, this is a really fascinating question I will offer a couple of thoughts and then and then I will, I will, I will turn it over to Zachariah because I think you will have you will have some thoughts as well. The first thing I would say is that I think in the last 10 years or so, there have been some really, I mean, fascinating from an academic perspective as well as very helpful and practical efforts to gather data and clearly measure these more substantive dimensions of democracy. So, Zachariah mentioned the varieties of democracy project, which I use some of their measures quite extensively in the books research. They not only look at things like you know is there are there free and fair elections are there sort of these formal institutional measures, but have hundreds, even thousands of different measures of these other institutions of democracy as well, getting into, you know how much economic equality is there, such that people can meaningfully participate in politics on a relative on a relatively equal, equal status. How participatory are the institutions there, do people from the grassroots actually have a voice in in making political institutions, beyond just, you know, is there is there does the formal right to vote exist. You know, thinking more critically and using these existing resources more strategically can be one way to get at this issue. And then next I would also I mean just second very briefly I would I would really really emphasize the crucial importance of listening to activists and others at the grassroots in like in these countries that what, you know, substantive democracy or sort of a full fledged represent like full fledged political system that meets the needs and balances the voices of its people. You really have to like to understand what that means in a particular context is going to be different from country to country, and really it's crucial to to understand what that means for ordinary people within those particular particular context. Yeah, so those are a couple of things I would emphasize but I'm very curious to hear Zachariah's thoughts. Sure, I think, for me, you know, one way to sort of start to push beyond our limitations currently and how we talk about democracy is to shift our thinking away from democracy as sort of an outcome or an endpoint, and to really think about democracy as a process and create some fundamental tensions for those of us who are interested in measuring democracy globally right so I'm always very struck by how activists in particular think about these sorts of questions. You know, one of the things if you participate in a protest, you will always hear a very common slogan. This is what democracy looks like this is what democracy looks like. And I think that's actually an important insight into how they are conceptualizing what democracy means they're not saying, you know, let's measure the number of elections that have taken place in recent times and call that democracy they're saying democracy begins when people take to the streets and demand a right to have a say in the political process it's a very simple concept that I think a lot of activists insist is actually the correct way for us to conceptualize it and this creates attention, right because on one side, political as a scientist, we sort of look at a case like United States, almost okay with democracy is in retreat, you know, the Trump administration has implemented a lot of these kind of threats to democracy at institutional level that we should be very very concerned about. I would say, well, you know, it's also a period in which we've had the highest level of mobilization in US history. And so can we reconcile these two things, is it that we are experiencing a massive shift to people power in a way that is literally unheard of in in American essentially global history, or is it that we are going through a democratic different. And a lot of this is contingent on what we think democracy actually means and so for me, I think as scholars because we are social scientists and we like to measure things and we like to believe that we can aggregate these measurements into sort of convincing conclusions. I think we need to be a little bit more cautious and sort of temper that with insights from the activist community and say hey look, you know for activists, you know, they have a fundamentally different conception of what democracy means. It is much more related to democracy as process, and that maybe we should not do away with our sort of institutional metrics, but start to pay more attention to these dimensions right I mean I spent time in Sudan. And one thing that was really extraordinary for me is watching sort of young people. This was like 2014 when the first wave of protests began in that country would live their entire lives under per sheer taking to the streets and realizing for the first time that it doesn't have to be this way. And again this was in 2012 2013 2014 and by our metrics those were failed protests. And I think that once that concept that you know what, even if Bashir retains institutional power. He no longer retains power over our imaginations. Right. It's almost impossible to capture empirically, but I think it is really hugely transformative and so for me the transition so done really began during that period when for the first time. As Huda mentioned, people started to imagine alternatives to Bashir. And so his time ended at that point, right, not simply at the point that he actually steps down but at the moment in which the people no longer believe that he is the soul font of power in that country and I think that's a lesson that that is really hard, but is one that we need to start to bring into our scholarship as well. So those are really good points. Thanks very much Zachariah so we have just over five minutes left and we'll try to get through as many of the remaining questions as possible but there's a really big one here in a meaty one and that's about repression. So the question is, can you speak about the level of capacity of the state and repression and how does this all figure into the story about transitions. So maybe Erica you want to take the first whack at that one. Sure. I'm curious what Jonathan would say to you, but I think that state capacity for repression figures into this to the degree to which the security forces are kind of aligned with or united with the incumbent. So if they are willing agents of repression of police military internal security forces paramilitaries are essentially capable of and willing to sustain repression over a long period, without defecting, muting or questioning, whether that's a good idea and their own interests, it certainly can make it a much more difficult road for for activists. And many contexts where security forces have remained kind of unflinchingly loyal to the regime at least in mass. They have often looked at different pillars of support like economic elites and business elites to try to shift their loyalties, so that they don't have to openly confront security forces and therefore put themselves at risk. An example of this would be in South Africa during the anti apartheid regime which very much the anti apartheid campaign which very much kind of turned toward a strategy of dismantling the economic pillars of apartheid as opposed to the security pillars. But I would say that one of the the issues that arises around repression is its propensity to backfire against nonviolent resistance movements and in fact, many nonviolent resistance movements emerge precisely because of repressive episodes that alienate very large groups within the population that then mobilize against what they perceive to be a brutal injustice and many movements get their start that way and then when police meet those protesters with more violence, the protest can begin in fact to call for maximalist claims like the removal of the regime rather than just the end of police brutality for example so this is a trend we see worldwide. And it doesn't mean that it's always the way it happens but it's more likely to happen than not when when there are incidents of repression against mass nonviolent resistance. Erica Jonathan did you have a quick rejoinder to that before we take the final question. Yeah, I mean I would just say I completely agree with what Erica brought up here those are all sort of really crucial points in the in the story of repression. I think just to, you know, just to reemphasize something that Erica was was talking about you know the state capacity and particularly the capacity of the state for repression is not something that is fully outside of like an outside force impinging on activists this is something that changes over time and changes in the process to particular strategies as well that strategic actions by activists can change that that loyalty of of state security forces and change those repressive dynamics. So yeah I would just add that to the to the points that that Erica was making. Thanks very much Jonathan so I'm there were a lot of great questions we got to most but not all but I want to end on this one because it's something we've been talking a lot about at US IP recently and it's related to coven in the pandemic. So the question is, can you all speak about sustaining mobilization during coven, particularly when governments and armed actors alike are using the pandemic as an excuse to seize power decrease civil liberties and the like so maybe we can get a couple folks thoughts on on that question before we wrap up. I can just say one thing very quickly, which is that you know I think movements have also use cove it as an opportunity to deepen the kinds of activities that they engage in I'll point to something like project south Atlanta Georgia, which was one of the first organizations either governmental or non governmental to provide coven testing in a state in which the governor literally denied the existence it seems to be completely oblivious to how the virus is transmitted. So the project south, which is at the forefront of movement building in the US South, was able to pivot and actually provide those services in ways that deepen their relationships to local communities. We've seen some of the things in the African contracts, the Congolese group lucha, for example, also engage in a variety of educational campaigns to sort of help people understand the significance of coven in rural parts of that country. You know, I think it is a very tough terrain for groups to navigate, but it also presents certain opportunities for them to expand the activities in ways they can actually deepen the substance of their actions. Yeah, I just to build on and kind of second Zacharias point I think one of the, the kind of inadvertent but important outcomes of this is the development of mutual aid associations which have always existed but are now being super charged. And that's exactly the type of organizational capacity that can help to create what Jonathan is talking about, because it creates more routine day to day interactions around real needs that are being expressed in people's neighborhoods and communities. And that does have the sort of procedural and substantive elements of social capital and democracy that that can help to solidify gains after a mass movement. Great thanks Erica well Jonathan since we're celebrating your book launch today I'll give you the last word if you want to address covert or anything else that we've discussed this morning. Yeah, I just, again, I would echo both what Zachariah and and Erica said about movements responses to coven. We're actually I'm with a colleague merend rivers here at us IP I'm just finishing up a paper that's done some survey research on movements responses to COVID, and people are overwhelming, I would say overwhelmingly optimistic activists see this as a challenge, but also as an opportunity to expand their strategic toolkit to pivot to meet needs in the ways that that I was talking about Erica was talking about. And, and I think as a, as an opportunity to push for even more substantive long term change than they were planning to before the pandemic. Great thanks so much Jonathan Jonathan we are unfortunately at the bewitching hour and so I wanted to thank everyone from around the world for tuning in this morning this afternoon this evening. I just wanted to thank the panelists Zachariah hoda Erica hardy Jonathan for their great remarks warm congratulations again to Jonathan for the publication of his book from descent to democracy it's huge. I particularly wanted to thank our AV team, Matt and George for a fine job as always our pack team and in particular Miranda rivers who on the nonviolent action side has been our lead and helping to organize this event so thank you all. And again, thanks everyone for tuning in from around the world and I'm wishing you a wonderful rest of your day.