Writing
Small Acts of Resistance
Reviews of the book: Small Acts of Resistance
"Powerful, uplifting, mischievous, fascinating." - Mia Farrow, actress and campaigner
"At its simplest this is a series of uplifting accounts of the sheer power of the human spirit to overwhelm man's inhumanity to man. But it is also a highly readable voyage through a century of struggle across the world - some of which we were hardly aware of, and too many of which, we are in danger of forgetting". - Jon Snow, Channel 4 News
“Too often, people talk of what is unachievable. As this book makes clear, we need to be reminded about what is achievable, too. Small Acts of Resistance is inspiring—and real.” - Shirin Ebadi, Nobel-prize winning Iranian activist and lawyer
“Small Acts of Resistance pays tribute to those who have sought to live in truth, and the impact that can have.” - From the preface by Václav Havel, former dissident and President of the Czech Republic
"Mr Crawshaw and Mr Jackson detail example after example of the way in which governments which deny people their freedom have been brought down by people who are determined to speak and act as though they are free." John Simpson, World Affairs Editor, BBC
"Encouraging us not to be complacent or defeatist, but to recognise how often change appeared impossible, then happened… Powerful…Uplifting." - Hugh Williamson, Financial Times
"Essential Reading" - Economist.com
Book Synopsis
Small Acts of Resistance (How Courage, Tenacity and Ingenuity Can Change the World), is a book by Steve Crawshaw and John Jackson, published by Sterling Publishing (Oct 2010). The book contains over 80 true stories from 60 countries exploring people’s ability to resist injustice and change the world around them. The preface is written by Vaclav Havel, former President of the Czech Republic.
Big changes often start with acts that looked pointless at the time: small acts of resistance, bold acts of defiance, subtle acts of subversion, even witty acts of disobedience. The ‘small’ acts range from famous struggles such as those against Nazism and Communism and for Civil Rights to ones that have been ignored by the media or are still continuing.
The protagonists range from a few icons to, mainly, people who have been unjustly forgotten or have remained anonymous. Telling the stories of more than eighty acts of resistance, spanning the world and the 20th and 21st centuries, this book pays homage to the groups and individuals that treat the impossible as the possible that just hasn’t happened yet. Small Acts of Resistance celebrates the awe-inspiring ingenuity and courage of the human spirit and pays tribute to those who have been standing up to say “no”.
It has been published in Arabic, Danish, English, French, Farsi, Hungarian, Bahasa Indonesian, Czech, Russian and Tibetan.
Selection of Articles
Immigration: We Need That Other Story of Britain (Huffington Post)
Three Million Syrians Go Hungry as UN Waits (Huffington Post)
America's Illusive Dream (Times of India)
Could we 'Have' Less and 'Be' More (Huffington)
How to be Subversively Funny (The Guardian)
Kicking the 'Race' Habit (Huffington Post)
A Toast to the Bravery and Sacrifice of Whistleblowers (Huffington Post)
The Dirty Tricks Dictators Play (Huffington Post)
The Professors of Protest (Huffington Post)
Playing With The Enemy (Huffington Post)