Civil rights activists at the March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom, 1963

Barricade at the Paris Commune, 1871

Activism consists of intentional efforts to promote, impede or direct social, political, economic, or environmental change. Activism can take a wide range of forms from writing letters to newspapers or politicians, political campaigning, economic activism such as boycotts or preferentially patronizing businesses, rallies, street marches, strikes, sit-ins, and hunger strikes.

Activists can function in roles as public officials, as in judicial activism. Arthur Schlesinger Jr. introduced the term "judicial activism" in a January 1947 Fortune magazine article titled "The Supreme Court: 1947."^[1]

Some activists try to persuade people to change their behavior directly, rather than to persuade governments to change or not to change laws. The cooperative movement seeks to build new institutions which conform to cooperative principles, and generally does not lobby or protest politically, and clergymen often exhort their parishioners to follow a particular moral code or system.

As with those who engage other activities such as singing or running, the term may apply broadly to anyone who engages in it even briefly, or be more narrowly limited to those for whom it is a vocation, habit or characteristic practice. In the narrower sense environmental activists that align themselves with Earth First or Road Protestors would commonly be labelled activists, whilst a local community fighting to stop their park or green being sold off or built on would fit the broader application, due to their using similar means to similarly conservative ends. In short activism is not always an action by Activists.^[2]

Methods[link]

This article mainly consists of lists. The information may be better understood by either replacing or supporting with prose. You can help by consulting the relevant guideline and making appropriate changes or additions. Editing help is available. (February 2012)

The longest running peace vigil in US history, started by activist Thomas in 1981.

• Civil disobedience
• Community building
  • Activism industry
  • Conflict transformation
  • Cooperative movement
  • Craftivism
  • Voluntary simplicity
• Economic activism
  • Boycott
    • Veganism (boycott of animal usage)
    • Vegetarianism (boycott of animal meat usage)
  • Divestment (a.k.a. Disinvestment)
  • Simple living
  • Tax resistance
• Franchise activism
• Lobbying
• Media activism
  • Culture jamming
  • Hacktivism
  • Internet activism
• Nonviolence
• Peace activist and Peace movement
• Political campaigning
• Propaganda
  • Guerrilla communication
• Protest
  • Demonstration
  • Direct action
  • Protest songs
  • Theater for Social Change
• Strike action
• Youth activism
  • Student activism
  • Youth-led media

See also[link]

• Advocacy Evaluation
• Advocacy group
• Agitator
• Community leader
• Feminism
• Master Legend
• Restorationism
• Social engineering (political science)
• Social movement
• Virtual volunteering

References[link]

Further reading[link]

• Paul Rogat Loeb, Soul of a Citizen: Living With Conviction in a Cynical Time (St Martin's Press, 2010). ISBN 978-0-312-59537-1.
• Randy Shaw, The Activist's Handbook: A Primer for the 1990s and Beyond (University of California Press, 1996). ISBN 0-520-20317-8.
• David Walls, The Activist's Almanac: The Concerned Citizen's Guide to the Leading Advocacy Organizations in America (Simon & Schuster/Fireside, 1993). ISBN 0-671-74634-0.
• Victor Gold, Liberwocky (Thomas Nelson, 2004). ISBN 978-0-7852-6057-8.

Medea Benjamin
Born	Susan Benjamin (1952-09-10) September 10, 1952 (age 59) Freeport, New York
Residence	San Francisco, California
Nationality	United States
Education	Tufts University Columbia University New School for Social Research
Occupation	Political activist, author
Spouse	Kevin Danaher
Children	2 daughters
Website
Global Exchange Code Pink

Medea Benjamin (born Susan Benjamin on September 10, 1952) is an American political activist, best known for co-founding Code Pink and, along with her husband, activist and author Kevin Danaher, fair trade advocacy group Global Exchange. Benjamin also was a Green Party candidate in 2000 for the United States Senate.

The Los Angeles Times has described her as "one of the high profile leaders" of the peace movement and in 1999, San Francisco Magazine included her on its "power list" of the "60 Players Who Rule the Bay Area."

Early life[link]

Benjamin grew up in Long Island, New York, a self-described "nice Jewish girl."^[1] During her freshman year at Tufts University, she renamed herself after the Greek mythological character Medea. She received master's degrees in public health from Columbia University and in economics from The New School.

Benjamin worked for 10 years as an economist and nutritionist in Latin America and Africa for the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization, the World Health Organization, the Swedish International Development Agency, and the Institute for Food and Development Policy. She spent four years in Cuba, and has authored three books on the country.

Organizations[link]

In 1988 with Kevin Danaher, her husband, and Kirsten Moller, Benjamin co-founded the San Francisco-based Global Exchange, which advocates fair trade alternatives to what she describes as corporate globalization. She is a co-founder of the left-wing feminist anti-war group Code Pink: Women for Peace, which advocated an end to the Iraq War, the prevention of future wars, and social justice. Benjamin has also been involved with the left-wing anti-war organization United for Peace and Justice.

Politics[link]

In 2000, Benjamin ran for the United States Senate on the Green Party ticket from California, basing her campaign on such issues as a living wage, education, and universal healthcare; she garnered 3 percent of the vote.^[2] Since then she has remained active in the Green Party and has also supported efforts by the Progressive Democrats of America.^{[3] [4]} She is a member of the Liberty Tree Board of Advisers.

Protest actions[link]

Medea Benjamin speaks at a rally during the 2007 State of the Union Address in Washington, D.C.

From 2002 to 2009, Benjamin engaged in numerous protest actions in which she shouted slogans, displayed banners, or both during events involving U.S. Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld; U.S. President George W. Bush; U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice; and Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki, among others. Benjamin engaged in similar protest actions at the 2004 Democratic National Convention and the 2004 Republican National Convention.^[5] On December 4, 2007, she was arrested by plainclothes police in Lahore, Pakistan, detained by the ISI for eight hours, and deported after protesting the house arrest of lawyers (including Aitzaz Ahsan).^[6][7] In 2009, Benjamin joined the steering committee for the Gaza Freedom March.^[8] In February 2012 Benjamin was arrested and deported^[9] for illegal entry to Bahrain and participating in an illegal protest^[10].

Controversy[link]

Benjamin has been criticized from both the left and the right.

Support for Cuba[link]

For example, Benjamin has drawn conservative criticism for her support of Hugo Chavez and her attacks on the U.S. embargo of Fidel Castro's Cuba. David Horowitz's FrontPageMag attacked her as "a long-time Castro acolyte," and wrote:

WTO protest violence[link]

Benjamin is unpopular among some in the anti-globalization movement due to remarks during 1999's anti-WTO demonstrations in Seattle. The remarks seemed to suggest that "anarchists" who engaged in property destruction should have been arrested by the police. Benjamin says that this is not the correct interpretation:

Anybody But Bush[link]

Benjamin has been criticized by some Greens for her support for "Anybody But Bush" in 2004. Explaining why she supported this movement, she said:

Todd Chretien, a leading member of the International Socialist Organization, responded:

Marla Ruzicka[link]

Benjamin had a falling out with her former close friend, San Francisco Bay Area activist Marla Ruzicka, later killed in Iraq in a widely-publicized suicide bombing, over Ruzicka's decision to work with the U.S. military to secure compensation for the peoples of Iraq and Afghanistan. Benjamin said:

Views on US involvement in Middle East[link]

Benjamin writes in the Huffington Post that the United States never had any "justification for invading Iraq", that there is no "justification for continuing the war in Afghanistan", and that in Pakistan, the US "drone attacks are only fueling the violence and creating more Osama Bin Ladens." Regarding the killing of bin Laden, she says "Let us not sink into a false sense of triumphalism in the wake of Bin Laden's passing."^[17]

Books[link]

• Benedita Da Silva: An Afro-Brazilian Woman's Story of Politics and Love (1997). With Benedita da Silva and Maisa Mendonca. Institute for Food and Development Policy. ISBN 0-935028-70-6
• Bridging the Global Gap: A Handbook to Linking Citizens of the First and Third Worlds (1989). With Andrea Freedman. Global Exchange Seven Locks Press. ISBN 0-932020-73-9
• Cuba: Talking About Revolution: Conversations with Juan Antonio Blanco (1996). With Juan Antonio Blanco. Inner Ocean Publishing. ISBN 1-875284-97-4
• Don't Be Afraid, Gringo: A Honduran Woman Speaks From The Heart: The Story of Elvia Alvarado (1989). Harper Perennial. ISBN 0-06-097205-X
• Greening of the Revolution: Cuba's Experiment with Organic Agriculture (1995). With Peter Rossett. Ocean Press. ISBN 1-875284-80-X
• How to Stop the Next War Now: Effective Responses to Violence and Terrorism (2005). As editor, with Jodie Evans. Inner Ocean Publishing. ISBN 1-930722-49-4
• I, senator: How, together, we transformed the state of California and the United States (2000). Green Press.
• No Free Lunch: Food and Revolution in Cuba Today (1989). With Joseph Collins and Michael Scott. Princeton University Press. ISBN 0-935028-52-8
• The Peace Corps and More: 175 Ways to Work, Study and Travel at Home & Abroad (1997). With Miya Rodolfo-Sioson. Global Exchange Seven Locks Press. ISBN 0-929765-04-4

See also[link]

• Global Exchange
• Code Pink
• United for Peace and Justice
• Progressive Democrats of America

References[link]

External links[link]

Wikimedia Commons has media related to: Medea Benjamin

• Works by or about Medea Benjamin in libraries (WorldCat catalog)
• Global Exchange biographical page
• Code Pink biographical page
• Common Ground profile
• Bio from 2000 CA Senate campaign
• I, Senator, book from 2000 CA Senate campaign and Bay Guardian coverage at archive.org

Chut Wutty
Born	Kandal, Cambodia
Died	26 April 2012 Koh Kong Province, Cambodia
Cause of death	Homicide
Nationality	Cambodian
Education	Masters in Military Studies
Occupation	Founder and Director
Employer	Natural Resource Protection Group

This article contains Khmer text. Without proper rendering support, you may see question marks, boxes, or other symbols instead of Khmer script.

Chut Wutty (Khmer: ឈុត វុទ្ធី; died – 26 April 2012) was the Founder and Director of the Natural Resource Protection Group (NRPG). He was a Cambodian environmental activist best known as the country’s most vocal critic of the military's alleged role in illegal logging conducted by companies granted land concessions in protected forests and related government corruption.

Life[link]

Wutty was born in Svay Meas village, Vihear Sour commune, Kchlach Kandal district, Kandal, Cambodia. Chut Wutty obtained a Masters Degree in Military Studies from Russia in 1992. After his graduation, Wutty worked for the Cambodian Mine Action Centre (CMAC) and as a military trainer at the Ministry of National Defense. In 2003, he was a Deputy Director of Global Witness in Cambodia who acted as a watchdog on the illegal logging all over the country. After the expulsion of Global Witness by the Cambodian government, Wutty founded an organization namely the Natural Resource Protection Group (NRPG) with financial support from Germany with the focus on the protection of the forest and natural resources in Cambodia.^[1]

Death[link]

On 26 April 2012, Wutty was shot dead while escorting two Cambodia Daily journalists near a protected forest in Koh Kong province, where he had repeatedly attempted to expose illegal logging rackets that include military officials. He was 48 years old.^[1] The human rights group Licadho immediately dispatched investigators, and the organisation’s Koh Kong provincial coordinator, In Kong Chet, said that after talking to ballistics police, he had established that Chut Wutty was shot as he tried to drive away from the military police. Wutty is survived by his wife, two daughters, and a son.

References[link]

External links[link]

Wikiquote has a collection of quotations related to: Chut Wutty

• "Family, Activists Vow To Continue Work of Slain Conservationist" at Voice of America
• "Environmental activist Chut Wutty shot dead" at Phnom Penh Post
• Profile at Radio Free Asia

Keith Stroup is an attorney and founder of the National Organization for the Reform of Marijuana Laws.

Biography[link]

After graduating from the University of Illinois in 1965, he enrolled in Georgetown Law School and worked in the office of Illinois Senator Everett Dirksen. Graduated from law school in 1968, he subsequently got married and began working for the federal Consumer Product Safety Commission, a job that put him in contact with consumer activist Ralph Nader. Nader's work inspired Stroup to create a consumer group for cannabis users.

Using $5,000 in seed money from the Playboy Foundation, Stroup founded NORML in 1970. He served as executive director until 1979, during which time 11 states adopted marijuana decriminalization laws. However, his directorship was cut short by a serious blunder. The administration of President Jimmy Carter had favored marijuana reform; however, Peter Bourne, Carter's drug adviser, disagreed with Stroup on ending the spraying of Mexican marijuana fields with the herbicide paraquat. In retaliation, Stroup acknowledged to a reporter that Bourne had snorted cocaine at NORML's 1977 Christmas party. Bourne was subsequently fired. Stroup eventually lost his job too; "The folks at NORML didn't like snitches and eased him out the door."^[1]

Stroup worked as a lobbyist for family farmers for a few years in Washington, DC, and he lobbied for artists in Boston, MA, before being hired as the executive director of the National Association for Criminal Defense Lawyers (NACDL), the specialized bar association for criminal lawyers, also in Washington, DC, where he worked from 1989 through 1994.

In 1994, Stroup was invited to return to the NORML board of directors, and in 1995, when then Executive Director Richard Cowan stepped aside, Stroup was rehired as executive director of NORML, where he worked for the next 10 years, serving as the primary spokesperson for marijuana smokers in America. In January 2005, he announced he was stepping aside as executive director, citing the need for a younger crop of activists to take over the organization, with a fresh perspective and new ideas. Stroup remains active with NORML, serving as legal counsel, giving college lectures, and working on a book. To this day, Stroup remains the most recognizable figure in marijuana policy.

In 2005, Stroup endorsed the Free State Project.^[2]

References[link]