Please actually read Chenoweth’s papers, especially the recent ones. Important points as I recall them from last year when this factoid first popped up:
- For these purposes, nonviolent does not equal either compliant or even physically passive. Importantly, this point is about the movement being primarily nonviolent. Her actual papers get into this more thoroughly. If you can’t find them, try scihub. :)
- Nonviolent does not equal not destroying property nor does it mean obeying the law.
- Her subsequent research has found that this is far from an ironclad rule and sometimes authoritarians remain in power despite folks following this playbook
From the paper quoted by the linked article: “The rule is derived from—and therefore applies to—
only a specific kind of campaign. The movements
on which it was based were maximalist ones, i.e.
overthrowing a government or achieving territorial
independence.They were not reformist in nature, and
they had discrete political outcomes they were trying
to achieve that culminated in the peak mobilization
that I counted. Because of this, we cannot necessarily extrapolate these findings to other kinds of reform or
resistance movements that don’t have the same kinds of goals as those in the NAVCO dataset…” (emphasis mine).
Yes, we need a mass mobilization to resist these fascist fuckheads. But please take on a real understanding of what this research does and doesn’t indicate. More importantly, don’t use this as an excuse or justification to police the behavior of others.
For our movement to succeed, we need solidarity between all people who oppose this regime and a diversity of tactics is a strength rather than a weakness.
It seems like you are conflating leadership with hierarchy. Where I am, I see plenty of leaders who step up when needed, organizing efforts on the ground. If anything, I think the current situation of the regime points to the danger of coalescing behind a central leader.
With respect to countering this specific empire, decentralized structures are more difficult to counter and have a history of prevailing against even overwhelming force from the US (Vietnam and Afghanistan come to mind). As for signing people up on any list, particularly large ones, that seems like a massive mistake given the surveillance capabilities and budgets commanded by the regime and the average person’s understanding of proper security practices.