The theory, doctrine, or practice of peaceful resistance to a government by fasting or refusing to cooperate.
the policy of pursuing political goals through peaceful protests involving large numbers of people. Nonviolence as a weapon of protest has been been advocated by the great Russian writer, Leo Tolstoy, and was put into action by Mahatma Gandhi (1869-1948) and his followers in India in their campaign for independence from Britain. Nonviolence, coupled with civil disobedience, was also a main plank of the American civil rights movement in the 1950s and 1960s, led by Martin Luther King Jr. (1929-68). Nonviolence can be effective because it carries a moral authority that violence does not, and so can often win widespread sympathy for the protesters. See also civil disobedience.
Not using physical force, fighting, or violence in the farmworkers strike as a matter of principle, either moral or tactical, or both.
Either, (1) The behavior of people who in a conflict refrain from violent acts. Or, (2) Any of several belief systems that reject violence on principle, not just as impractical. Otherwise, the term is best not used, since it often contributes to ambiguity and confusion. To describe specific actions or movements, the recommended terms are: "nonviolent action," "nonviolent resistance," or "nonviolent struggle."
Rejection of all forms of violence, even in response to the use of violence by one's adversaries. Many civil rights demonstrators pledged to respond nonviolently, and many were trained in nonviolence principles.
Nonviolence (or non-violence) can be both a political strategy or moral philosophy that rejects the use of violence in efforts to attain social or political change. As an alternative to both passive acquiessance and armed struggle, nonviolence proclaims other means of popular struggle such as civil disobedience, nonviolent resistance or the power of nonco-operation combined with persuasion. While frequently used as a synonym for pacifism, since the mid 20th century the term nonviolence or nonviolent resistance has come to embody a diversity of techniques for waging for social change without the use of violence, as well as the underlying political and philosophical rationale for the use of these techniques.