In class last week we talked about how surprisingly effective nonviolent protest actually is. When the discussion came up, my mind immediately jumped to my research on the 1981 Irish Hunger Strike.
The IRA (an Irish Republican Paramilitary) that was active in Northern Ireland since the 70s had several of it's members imprisoned by the British government. These men were being treated as common criminals rather than political prisoners. And so, to attempt to gain the status as political prisoners, they attempted a hunger strike.
The IRA was always known for it's violent tactics, yet they never seemed effective in promoting Irish Republicanism or their political wing, Sinn Fein. However, after the deaths of 10 IRA hunger strikers, things started to change. Sinn Fein members were elected to several political seats across the U.K. and Northern Ireland and public opinion changed drastically.
In summation, I just find it fascinating how a short few month long hunger strike was infinitely more effective than years of murders, bombings and sporadic violence by the IRA.
I agree, it is incredible how much more provocative non-violence can be compared to violence.
ReplyDeleteI took a couple social movement classes at Keene State College and we studied the IRA briefly. We had actually compared it to the violence of the Weather Underground. They, unlike the IRA, did not change their ways and thus disintegrated because the news media had suppressed much of their efforts.
To be fair to the Weathermen, they bombed only empty buildings. Some of them were planning a terrorist attack intended to kill people, and when that went bad (the bomb went off while they were assembling it), the rest of the group repudiated the initiative and pulled back. You're quite right, though, that they never really developed a nonviolent approach that furthered their ends effectively.
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ReplyDeleteI don't necessarily think the hunger strike was effective. I think the radical change from killing others to killing themselves that did it. I don't think it had to be something as noble as a hunger strike to get attention, killing themselves in any way would be just as effective.
ReplyDeleteI actually think that the manner they went about the hunger strike did make a difference. Harming themselves and others is different than a hunger strike. I think that possibly the nobility of a hunger strike may have shown onlookers that the IRA was going through a serious change in the way they protest. It strikes me the same way the young man in Tunisia killed himself via self-immolation, in sheer desperation from economic corruption inherent in certain city officials. I think in that way, the sheer desperation in lighting oneself on fire, in front of the capital building, conveyed a certain message that other methods could not.
ReplyDeleteWe should also observe, however, that though Bobby Sands and the other hunger strikers did create a dramatic turning point for the conflict, the IRA hardly renounced military violence or terrorism at the time. Another turning point seemed to come after 9/11, when terrorism on a new scale seemed to frighten both sides in the conflict into more serious negotiations and accommodation.
ReplyDeleteI'd have to disagree with the idea that merely nonviolence was the reason for the success of the hunger strike. We need to understand that Ireland has a tradition of hunger striking as a form of protest. Furthermore, Ireland being a Catholic country is a huge component.
ReplyDeleteThe hunger strikers saw themselves as martyrs for a cause, and one book I read while writing the paper on this topic suggested that they saw themselves akin to the early Christian martyrs and even people such as the Virgin Mary, Jesus and Sts. Patrick and Colomba.