A boy and a book change the world

A young man burns himself to death, the result of bitter frustration and humiliation. A distinguished but little known American scholar writes a book on how to organize a non-violent revolution.

Of themselves, events of no great importance. Taken together, they’ve played a big part in the uprisings now shaking the Arab world.

The death by self-immolation of Mohamed Bouazizi, a fruit and vegetable seller working the streets of the Tunisian town of Sidi Bouzid, was the spark that set off revolt in that country. (The main square in Tunis has been renamed in his honor). The spirit of revolt spread quickly to Egypt, Libya, Yeman and other countries.

But the techniques of many of the leaders of those uprisings have been borrowed from the writings of Gene Sharp, emeritus professor of political science at the University of Massachusetts and founder of the Albert Einstein Institute.

Sharp is the author of numerous books, the most important being From Dictatorship to Democracy, which he wrote for the Burmese democratic movement in 1993. It outlines 198 non-violent methods to bring down an oppressive government, and has been translated into more than thirty languages.

According to filmmaker Ruridh Arow, whose film, Gene Sharp: How to Start a Revolution, will be released this spring, Sharp’s methods of popular non-violent resistance have been put to use in Serbia, the Ukraine, Egypt, Libya, Iran and Burma.

Writing on the BBC World News site,  Ruaridh Arrow says:

His central message is that the power of dictatorships comes from the willing obedience of the people they govern – and that if the people can develop techniques of withholding their consent, a regime will crumble.”

Portions of the book are downloadable here.

PUBLIC OPINION POLLS — OUT OF DATE?

There’s an interesting debate raging — again — over the role of public opinion polls in shaping political views. Michael Adams of the Environics Group weighs in on the subject today in the Globe and Mail.

Adams makes the point that sophisticated pollsters are fully able to factor into their polling the effects of changing demographics. He disagrees, for example, with Alan Gregg who argues that younger voters are not fairly represented in polls. Gregg said on the CBC that people who have abandoned land lines and use only cell phones are being left out of pollsters’ calculations.

All this comes just a day after a new poll showing a big drop in support for the Harper Conservatives. It reminds me that Rex Murphy made a prophetic comment on air last week when he observed that whenever the Harperites nudge into majority territory, they screw up. The latest example, of course, being the Bev Oda saga. Sure enough, that dust-up is being blamed for the drop of a dozen points in support for the Conservative government.