Civil resistance, which has occurred in various forms throughout history, has become particularly prominent in the past hundred years. Three great overlapping causes—decolonization, democratization, and racial equality—have been ad-vanced by campaigns of civil resistance characterized by extensive use of non-violent action. So have many other causes: workers’ rights, protection of the environment, gender equality, religious and indigenous rights, defence of national cultures and political systems against foreign encroachments, and opposition to wars and weaponry. Civil resistance was one factor in the ending of communist party rule in many countries in 1989–91, and hence in ending the Cold War. The world today has been shaped signiWcantly by this mode of political action. However, understanding exactly how civil resistance has shaped the world is a challenge. The explorations in this book are based on two core propositions. First, that civil resistance cannot be considered in isolation from all the other factors of power, domestic and foreign, civil and military, which help to determine out-comes.