As a researcher, activist, and professor of sociology, Stellan Vinthagen believes that researchers ought to avidly apply their work out on the field. 
Being active in many social movements—participating in more than 30 non-violent civil disobedience actions worldwide, even serving prison time—Vinthagen looks at the application of nonviolent means in political and strategic ways. While focusing specifically on unarmed forms of resistance, nonviolent actions can contribute to social change against brutal regimes and dictators.
Hosted by the Center for Peace, Democracy, and Development at the University of Massachusetts Boston, Vinthagen was on campus to give a lecture about the benefits and possibilities of civil resistance. 
Recently, Vinthagen was appointed as the first Endowed Chair in the study of Nonviolent Direct Action and Civil Resistance at the University of Massachusetts Amherst.
His latest book, “A Theory of Nonviolent Action: How Civil Resistance Works,” develops the theory of nonviolent action while using historical and modern examples as case studies. 
Civil resistance is often misinterpreted as no action at all. For Vinthagen, quite the opposite is true. The studies of civil resistance trace back to the workings of Martin Luther King Jr in the Civil Rights Movements and Mahatma Ghandi’s anti-colonial struggle in India.  Both movements actively challenged the system in power by organizing peaceful and nonviolent actions.
This understanding of “nonviolent action” stems from an approach developed by Gene Sharp in 1973 in his text titled “Politics of Nonviolent Action.” Sharp highlights 198 different methods where unarmed political strategies that have successfully prevailed in power struggles.
Since Sharp’s book, research on civil resistance has been relatively small compared to other fields. One of Vinthagen’s aims is to inspire other social sciences to study nonviolent theory in order for it to develop and branch out. 
According to Vinthagen, studies show that civil resistance campaigns are ten times more likely to create democratization and civil peace. The more nonviolent these resistance movements are, the more likely that democratization will last. 
Vinthagen’s extensive study of Brazil’s Movimento dos Trabalhadores Rurais Sem-Terra (Landless Rural Workers’ Movement [MST]) illustrates this effective and long-lasting democratization that nonviolent movements can create. 
The MST nonviolently occupies unproductive lands in Brazil, often in harsh conditions, living in tents for years on end until they can get legal claims to the land. 
Vinthagen stresses how social movements like the MST must be highly skilled in showing clearly what the problem is while also presenting an attainable solution. 
Having followed these guidelines since the 1980s, the MST has won land titles in over 2,000 settlements, mobilizing 1.5 million people as a result of nonviolent land occupations. 
The MST’s form of democracy is the purest kind—direct democracy. Having no authoritarian tendencies, direct democracy evenly distributes power to all people. The MST sets this up through a multilayer elected government with accountability built at each level.
Over 2.5 million Brazilians now control their own farming, economy, education, and legal system, all through means of nonviolent action. 
The removal of problems like inequality, hunger, landlessness, oppression, and social inclusion is possible. Nonviolent solutions are achievable, as proven by the MST.
Although studies of civil resistance are still scarce, Vinthagen’s research provides hope and encouragement to further study and advance the field of nonviolent direct action and civil resistance, helping to democratize oppressive countries around the world.
To learn more about Vinthagen’s work, please visit umass.edu/resistancestudies.