A Project of
649 Dayton Avenue St. Paul, MN 55104 USAT:+1.612.436.4800 Email: [email protected]
Websites: http://www.cvt.org http://www.newtactics.org
Exploring Tactics to INTERVENE
in Human Rights Abusesprovided by
Nancy L. Pearson, M.S.W., L.I.S.W.New Tactics in Human Rights Project Manager
The Center for Victims of Torture
A Tavaana Webinar
Today’s Webinar Outline:Brief overview and orientation to:
o Using our on-line tools!
o Foundation for Strategic Thinking & Tactical Innovation
o Key Terms
o SIX reasons for the need for “new” tactics
Exploring INTERVENTION Tactics
Take a walk around the neighborhood – using the technology tools
Did you attend the 1st webinar on 27 July on Prevention tactics?
YES
NO
NO, but I did attend the New Tactics course offered by Tavaana
NO, but I did attend a different course offered by Tavaana
C
B
A
D
Foundations forStrategic Thinking and
Tactical Innovation
Strategy without tactics is the slowest
route to victory.
Sun Tzu (over 2,000 years ago)
Strategy without tactics is the slowest
route to victory.
Tactics without strategy is the noise
before defeat.
Sun Tzu (over 2,000 years ago)
KnowYourself
Know
Know
From Sun Tzu—the Art of War
KnowYourself
Know YourOpponent
Know theTerrain
From Sun Tzu—the Art of War
What is STRATEGY?
A joining together of many decisions.
A source of inspiration.
A
B
Strategy requires the joining together of many decisions
Strategy defines what is important to do.
Strategy requires…
Decisions that include key steps and approaches in accomplishing the goal.
Selection of key objectives Appropriate targets Understanding of needed constituencies Resources Decisions on which tactics to use and when
What is a TACTIC?
The purpose toward which an effort is directed.
The means by which a change is made.
A
B
Tactics
Tactics are the means through which a change is made. Tactics are the levers or mechanisms to carry out a strategy.
– A tactic is a specific action or systematic combination of actions taken to affect a given situation.
– Tactics are one of the key building blocks of strategy.
– Tactics are about “the how,” while strategies are about “the what.”
Target
The person, institution, group or segment of society where your tactical action is directed.
Target
The person, institution, group or segment of society where your tactical action is directed.
PERSON• Parliamentarian• Journalist• Religious leader• Teacher• Employer
INSTITUTION
Target
The person, institution, group or segment of society where your tactical action is directed.
PERSON• Parliamentarian• Journalist• Religious leader• Teacher• Employer
INSTITUTION• Parliament• Newspaper• Religious Institution• School• Business
GROUP
Target
The person, institution, group or segment of society where your tactical action is directed.
PERSON• Parliamentarian• Journalist• Religious leader• Teacher• Employer
INSTITUTION• Parliament• Newspaper• Religious Institution• School• Business
GROUP• Policy makers• Bloggers• Council of Elders• Students• Businessmen
What is your vision?
When your only tool is a hammer,
New Tactics in Human Rights – www.newtactics.org
every problem looks like
a nail.
New Tactics in Human Rights – www.newtactics.org
Why the need for
1. What we know how to do influences what we think is possible to do. Tactics help determine strategy.
2. Different tactics are effective against different targets.
3. Different tactics appeal to different constituencies.
4. Tactical flexibility is the source of surprise.
5. Tactics teach participants and observers how to engage in the world.
6. Tactics are the training systems for engaging participants and allies in the organization’s work.
Tactic ideas for hitting your “target”
What important considerationsare needed in making tactical choices?
Important Considerations:Group’s capacitiesTolerance for riskAnalysis of the opponentContext in which the tactics will
be used
INTERVENTION TACTICS
Primary source for today’s examples: • New Tactics in Human Rights: A Resource
for Practitioners (The workbook is available in English, Farsi, Arabic & other languages)
• Additional sources from New Tactics website: http://www.newtactics.org – use quick link “Tactics” and “Workbook”
• See also Tavaana’s website for additional Case Study Examples: http://tavaana.org/casestudies.jsp
Exploring FOUR kinds of INTERVENTION tactics:
Resistance
Disruption
Persuasion
Incentive
INTERVENTION tactics:
Resistance Tactics – demonstrate opposition to on-going abuse or denial of rights.
These tactics serve 2 important purposes…
Make abuse visible
Set the stage for future tactics that can effect change
Anonymous ResistanceTurkey: With the Flick of a Switch(English page 53, Farsi, page 51)
MAIN TARGET: General population of Turkey
GOAL: Stop IMMUNITY for corruption
MEANS: People turning off their lights
Mobilization required: Media, NGO and Unions in alliance and a chain of Faxes (The technology available in 1997)
Anonymous ResistanceTurkey: With the Flick of a Switch
TIMELINE: – Started four weeks before “S-day”– On February 1, 1997, at precisely 9 p.m., the lights started to go
out in Istanbul and other Turkish cities. – The same action was repeated again and again, only more
houses participated and variations emerged (e.g., banging pots and pans).
– By February 15, an estimated 30 million Turkish households throughout the country participated in the biggest public protest against corruption in Turkish history.
RESULTS: • Prosecution trials of prominent people (limited success)• PLUS - unintended collapse of the ruling party • Long term impacts on system (tactic adapted & used again)
Idea Shared in the Tavaana Forum
Anonymous Resistance
Visible ResistanceEstonia: Singing Revolution (English page 54, Farsi, page 52)
MAIN TARGET: General Population in Estonia
GOAL: Assert cultural identity to unite and express opposition to an oppressive regime
MEANS:
Collective Singing of Traditional (and banned) Songs
Source: http://www.tallinn-life.com/tallinn/estonian-singing-revolution
Visible ResistanceEstonia: Singing Revolution
TIMELINE: 1987 – 1991• Summer 1987
10,000 people gathered in the Tallinn Song Festival Grounds.
• September 1988
300,000 Estonians gathered; first public demand for independence.
RESULTS: • Similar festivals took place in Latvia and Lithuania• August 1989: Baltic Chain - approximately two million people joined their hands to
form a human chain spanning over 600 kilometres.• August 1991 – All three Baltic states moved toward independence from the Soviet
Union
Source: http://www.tallinn-life.com/tallinn/estonian-singing-revolution
Visible Resistance
The Otpor! student movement in Serbia used humor to successfully spread its message of resistance.
MAIN TARGET: General population – via YOUTH
GOAL: Remove people’s fear to express their desire for an end to the Milošević regime
MEANS: Otpor! countered a government initiative with its own satire on the “collection barrel” called “Dinar za Smenu” (Dinar for a Change).
Source: Otpor! – A collection “BARREL” Posted in the New Tactics Searchable On-
line Tactics Database
Serbia: Using Humor and satire (Website Tactic - Also see New Tactics on-line dialogue – Tactics that Tickle All the Way to the Win)
Visible ResistanceSerbia: Using Humor and satire
TIMELINE: • 1998:
Founding of the Otpor! Student Movement
• July 2000: Election rules for president changed
• July to October 2000: Otpor mobilizations including the "Dinar for a Change" barrels
RESULTS:
• Helped population overcome their fear of expressing their dislike for the regime
• Culmination of MANY tactics and mobilizations - 5 October 2000: Overthrow of Milošević
Source: Otpor! – A collection “BARREL” Posted in the New Tactics Searchable On-
line Tactics Database
What observations do you have from these different examples?
INTERVENTION tactics:
Disruption Tactics – that use direct action to influence a perpetrator to end the abuse.
Step in physically to end the abuse
Risk of physical danger
Disruption Tactics India: Throwing Open the Doors – Rescuing child laborers(English page 66, Farsi, page 64)
MAIN TARGET:
Specific identified business that tended to employ children
GOAL:
Free children held in bondage and provide them with opportunities for education and training
Source: http://www.bba.org.in/childlabour&trafficking/katfl.php
MEANS:
Planned raids at business sites – which required extensive research and participation from organizations in the community
Disruption Tactics India: Throwing Open the Doors – Rescuing child laborers
TIMELINE:– 1989 began building a coalition made up
of over 400 human rights groups and building allies within police
– Raids continue to the presentSource:
http://www.bba.org.in/childlabour&trafficking/katfl.php
RESULTS: (Note – there is direct danger to those conducting the raids)
– Since 1989, the South Asian Coalition on Child Servitude (SACCS) has liberated over 65,000 children from slavery through “Direct Action Rescue” operations.
– Once factories and businesses are exposed it is harder for the government to remain complicit in the slavery of children
What kinds of disruption tactics do you know about or have you used?
INTERVENTION tactics:
Persuasion Tactics – that engage respected leaders or non-confrontational mechanisms.
Non-adversarial
Strive for collaboration
Persuasion Tactics Ghana: Enlisting Local Leaders toend harmful customs (English page 70, Farsi, page 67)
MAIN TARGET: Community Leaders – particularly chiefs, queen mothers and temple priests
GOAL: End the harmful customary practice of Trokosi (a system in which women and young girls are kept in fetish shrines without their consent)
MEANS: Engage respected leaders in the communities where the practice is prevalent to persuade others to change their practice
Source: New Tactics tactical notebook - Mama Adokua Asigble IV, Queen Mother from Tefle, and priests
Persuasion Tactics Ghana: Enlisting Local Leaders toend harmful customs
TIMELINE and RESULTS:• 1990 - First consultation with chiefs and queen mothers deliberating and
opposing the practice
• 1991 - Committee of chiefs and priest create a report condemning the practice
• 1995 - First national workshop on the practice
• 1996 - First group of women liberated
• 1998 - 1,000 women liberated & passage of law prohibiting the practice
• 2003 - 3,000 women liberated and negotiations underway to liberate 20,000 women from 19 shrines
Source: New Tactics tactical notebook - Mama Adokua Asigble IV, Queen Mother from Tefle, and priests
What is your vision?
1990 - First consultation to raise the issue with leaders
1991 - Committee of Leaders Condemn the practice
1995 - First national workshop on the practice
1996 - First group of women liberated
1998 – 1,000 women liberated & LAW preventing practice
INTERVENTION tactics:
Incentive Tactics – that provide alternatives to human rights abuse.
Financial incentives
Other powerful motivators: recognition, prestige
Incentive Tactics REVERSE financial incentives – boycotts
Example:
Anti-Apartheid movement, South Africa
MAIN TARGET: Black Consumers
GOAL: Development of a national democratic struggle to end the system of apartheid
MEANS: (0ne tactic used to build first-level grassroots organization)
Leveraging black economic power through rent boycotts, consumer boycotts of businesses owned by whites or black apartheid collaborators
Source: A Force More Powerful website:http://www.aforcemorepowerful.org
Incentive Tactics REVERSE financial incentives – boycotts
Example – Anti-Apartheid movement, South Africa
TIMELINE: The case study on Tavaana's website provides a more comprehensive timeline and a variety of the tactics used.
RESULTS: The consumer boycott was a particularly effective tactic.• Decimated profits of businesses
• Drove a wedge between business and government as white store owners put pressure on the government to change policy
• Tactic was immune to government oppression – you cannot arrest people for not buying products
Source: A Force More Powerful website:http://www.aforcemorepowerful.org
What kinds of incentive tactics do you know about or have you used?
The Center for Victims of Torture – New Tactics in Human Rights Project649 Dayton Avenue St. Paul, MN 55104 USAT:+1.612.436.4800 Email: [email protected]
Websites: http://www.cvt.org http://www.newtactics.org
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Upcoming Webinar Dates:
Wednesday, 24 August – Restorative Tactics
Wednesday, 14 September – Promotion Tactics (Building Human Rights Cultures and Institutions)