More and more people around the world are protesting to defend
their rights, resist injustice or oppose undemocratic rule. In this
book, April Carter debates the nature and meaning of such protest
and discusses the relationship between direct action and
people's claims for greater democratic control, not only
against repressive regimes but also in liberal parliamentary
states.

The book begins by looking at non-violent direct action in
historical context, tracing its evolution from the end of the
Second World War to the present day. It examines the association
between direct action and the social movements of recent decades
and charts its role in the new global movement against neo-liberal
economic policies. The second part of the book relates direct
action to political theory to ascertain how it fits with theories
of liberal, republican and deliberative democracy. It goes on to
consider socialist and cosmopolitan approaches to democracy and
popular resistance and concludes by looking at the implications of
protest politics for current democratic thinking and contemporary
world events.

This book will be a valuable resource for students and scholars
of international politics and political theory.