Community Defense/Resistance

The idea of community defense is linked to the notion of nonviolent community resistance where some connections are made between the grassroots orientation to social defense and strands within community development. In order to pursue possible connections with community-level action, a community relies on popular action in a variety of forms, including petitions, rallies, strikes, boycotts, sit-ins, fasts, and alternative institutions.

Community defense is also known as nonviolent defense, civilian defense, and civilian-based defense. For example, the processes of invasion, conquest, genocide, slavery, and colonization have profoundly shaped indigenous women's lives in North America, and consequently, women have developed complex and diverse strategies for challenging oppression by organizing community-level actions. Another example of women community defense and resistance can be seen in the Women in Black ...