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Pacifism in the Twentieth Century.
Brock, Peter & Young, Nigel
Syracuse University Press: 1999.
435p.

? A true peace movement is aligned with no state ideology; it is autonomous, that is. free to criticize other organizations, parties or governments; and it is committed to nonviolence as a means (though not necessarily on pacifist grounds).?

April Carter, as quoted from her book, ?Peace Movements: International Protest & World Politics Since 1945? Think of a tree: that?s pacifism in the 20th Century: many roots and branches rooting in a out of the fertile foundations of peace and justice.

?Pacifism in the Twentieth Century,? is an update of a classic published in 1970 called ?Twentieth Century Pacifism? (Brock). This book covers all the roots and branches of the many efforts over the years (and wars to actualize the rejection of war, and also the efforts to achieve world peace and understanding.)

The seeds of pacifism in the twentieth century flowered with the outbreak of WW1 in 1914. Subsequent wars have brought concomitant fervor in the movement; however, the seeds are sown, at least in the United States and Britain, the two countries most prominent in numbers of pacifists and pacifist organizations since that time, by five precedents: nonresistance as developed by Anabaptist and Mennonite groups of the Reformation era; the Quaker peace testimony; the conscientious objection of the Bible Students/Jehovahs Witnesses; the institutional approach to peace by these peace societies; and by socialist antimilitarism and the organized labor movement in the last half of the 19th century. From an early religious genesis, pacifism evolved into a social movement after 1914, one linking the evils of war with economic system failures. With the outbreak of WWI, the practice of compulsory conscription increased interest in conscientious objection and pacifism in Britain. The subsequent foment against conscription led to the formation of many groups which brought together a wide range of people, religious and non-religious, and led to renewed interest in established groups like the Religious Society of Friends (Quakers).

The United States, having less liberal attitudes toward pacifists than Great Britain at the time, entered WW1 in April 1917, and in May established the Selective Service Act, requiring all males between ages 21 and 30 years to register for military service. Even the prominent Clarence Darrow, having turned from war resister to warrior, wrote: ?The pacifist speaks with a German accent. Even if his words are not against America, the import of all he says is to aid Germany against America and its allies in the war.? Thus, pacifism was equated with treason, and Americans did not take kindly to the effort to resist war: the number of conscientious objectors in WW1 totaled only some 4,000 our of 3 million United States military members.

Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi, active in the development of alternatives to military service in Britain and South Africa, was to become arguably the most well-known and regarded exemplar of pacifism and non-violent resistance, or civil disobedience. Gandhi was influenced by the economic and social struggles of the people he saw around him, the Indian philosophy he grew up with, and the writing s of Tolstoy. Gandhi believed that non-violent resistance distinguished humans from other creatures, and based on love and faith, was a tool for everyone?s use which could even redeem Mussolini and Hitler.

At least one grop of the many formed to support the pacifist movement, the Fellowship of Reconciliation, believed that the objection to war must be buttressed by an effort to transform society. Yet there was no real or lasting effort to impart insight into what war resistance could mean for a society, or to develop details of positive nonviolent action as a viable military alternative. A proposal by a Gandhian disciple, and by others at different times, for a ?peace army? which would work out problems between powers, ?in some way or other? is an example of a wonderful intention without lasting substance.

In WW11 over one half of the conscientious objectors accepted some form of alternative service, which diminished the clash between war objectors and the law. In the United States, persons with a strong religious conviction were more likely to win their appeal against conscription that those without such convictions. This changed in 1965, however, when a young man named Daniel Seeger won his appeal on non-religious grounds: ?A conscientious objection to participation in war under any circumstance may justly be regarded as a response of the individual mentor, call it conscience or God, that is for many persons at the present time the equivalent of what has always been thought a religious impulse.

The Civil Rights Movement took much of its ideology from the Fellowship of Reconciliation and other peace groups. The belief was that pacifism must have relevance for problems of contemporary society; thus it must work for all the problems of society as fully as it worked to fund a solution to war. Martin Luther King became immersed in the Montgomery bus boycott, giving up his personal gun and developing the practices which made him legendary.

Although the peace movement was hindered by WW11 and the cold war atmosphere which followed, the increasing threat of nuclear war and the search for nonviolent alternatives to nuclear obliteration sustained the movement as it searched for alternatives to war. Pacifists were isolated, though by the general belief in armed preparedness and by the absence of political radicalism of the young. Then in 1957, Britain exploded its first hydrogen bomb and galvanized British pacifists, who founded the Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament and new purpose for the abolition of war.

The fighting in Vietnam gave new vitality to the peace movement. By 1972, in the U.S., there were more conscientious objectors than members of the army, and they were better treated than in both world wars. Vietnam marked a transition in the psyche of the pacifist. Whereas the older, religious-ethical idea was to reject all war, with Vietnam the conscientious objector became engaged in a more secular and selective objection to war. In 1989, before its fall, of the approximately 100 political prisoners in the Soviet union, almost all of them were conscientious objectors. In Israel, where pacifism is difficult in a State highly vigilant and mobilized to maintain its independence, the conflict between Zionism and conscientious objection is palpable. For some, the question is not so much one of bearing arms but of how they would be used. For others, an organization called ?Palestinians and Israelis for Nonviolence? is an answer. In the U.S., war tax resistance has led some to reduce their income to below the taxable level, others to refuse to pay that portion of the tax which would go to support war, or to pay into a peace tax fund.

This scrupulously detailed book ends with a discussion of current issues involving a broadened pacifist response which includes: the manufacture and marketing of war toys, disarmament, protest against missile bases, as well as the use of nonviolent methods of conflict resolution linked to poverty, political, social, gender, and racial injustice, over-population, and environmental and ecological problems, Indeed, Brock and Young conclude, as wars become smaller in terms of those fighting them, pacifism must focus less on war resistance and conscientious objection and more on creative cultural change and collective political non-cooperation with the activities of war-making and war profiteers.

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