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Direct action is a term for economic and political behavior in which participants use agency—for example economic or physical power—to achieve their goals. The aim of direct action is to either obstruct a certain practice (such as a government's laws or actions) or to solve perceived problems (such as social inequality).

Direct action may include activities, often nonviolent but possibly violent, targeting people, groups, institutions, actions, or property that its participants deem objectionable. Nonviolent direct action may include civil disobedience, sit-ins, strikes, and counter-economics. Violent direct action may include political violence, assault, arson, sabotage, and property destruction.

Terminology and definitions

It is not known when the term direct action first appeared. Spanish philosopher José Ortega y Gasset wrote that the term and concept of direct action originated in fin de siècle France. The Industrial Workers of the World union first mentioned the term "direct action" in a publication about the 1910 Chicago strike. American anarchist Voltairine de Cleyre wrote the essay "Direct Action" in 1912, offering historical examples such as the Boston Tea Party and the American anti-slavery movement, and writing that "direct action has always been used, and has the historical sanction of the very people now reprobating it."

In his 1920 book Direct Action, William Mellor categorized direct action with the struggle between worker and employer for economic control. Mellor defined it "as the use of some form of economic power for securing of ends desired by those who possess that power." He considered it a tool of both owners and workers, and for this reason he included lockouts and cartels, as well as strikes and sabotage.

Canadian anarchist Ann Hansen, one of the Squamish Five, wrote in her book Direct Action that "the essence of direct action is people fighting for themselves, rejecting those who claim to represent their true interests, whether they be revolutionaries or government officials".

Activist trainer and author Daniel Hunter states 'Nonviolent direct action are techniques outside of institutionalized behavior for waging conflict using methods of protest, noncooperation, and intervention without the use or threat of injurious force.

History

Anti-globalization activists forced the Seattle WTO Ministerial Conference of 1999 to end early via direct action tactics and prefigurative politics.

On April 28, 2009, Greenpeace activists, including Phil Radford, scaled a crane across the street from the Department of State, calling on world leaders to address climate change. Soon thereafter, they dropped a banner from Mount Rushmore, placing President Obama's face next to other historic presidents. The banner read: "History honors leaders. Stop global warming."

Human rights activists have used direct action in the campaign to close the School of the Americas (SOA). 245 SOA Watch protestors have collectively spent almost 100 years in prison, and more than 50 people have served probation sentences.

In the United States, direct action is increasingly used to oppose the fossil fuel industry, oil drilling, pipelines, and gas power plant projects.

Direct action was taken at arms factories in the United States and the United Kingdom that supplied arms to Israel during the Israel–Hamas war.

Practitioners

Anarchists organize almost exclusively through direct action, which they use due to a rejection of party politics and a refusal to work within hierarchical bureaucratic institutions.

Tactics

Direct action protestors may perform activities such as:

• body block
• linking arms
• lock-ons
• tunneling
• tree sitting
• occupation
• sit-ins
• strikes
• workplace occupation
• street blockades
• hacktivism
• counter-economics
• tax resistance

Some protestors dress in black bloc, wearing black clothing and face coverings to obscure their identities. Ende Gelände protestors wear matching white suits.

One of Greenpeace's tactics is to install banners in trees or at symbolic places like offices, statues, nuclear power plants.

Direct action protestors may also destroy property through actions such as vandalism, theft, breaking and entering, sabotage, tree spiking, arson, bombing, ecotage, or eco-terrorism.

Pranks may also be considered a form of direct action. Examples of direct action pranks include the use of stink, critter, and paint bombs. Protestors may pie their targets. The Yes Men practice nonviolent direct action through pranks.

Some direct action groups form legal teams, addressing interactions with the law enforcement, judges, and courts.

Violent and nonviolent direct action

Definitions

Definitions of what constitutes violent or nonviolent direct action vary. Sociologist Dieter Rucht states that determining if an act is violent falls along a spectrum or gradient—lesser property damage is not violence, injuries to humans are violent, and acts in between could be labelled either way depending on the circumstances. Rucht states that definitions of "violence" vary widely, and cultural perspectives can also color such labels.

American political scientist Gene Sharp defined nonviolent direct action as "those methods of protest, resistance, and intervention without physical violence in which the members of the nonviolent group do, or refuse to do, certain things." American anarchist Voltairine de Cleyre wrote that violent direct action utilizes physical, injurious force against people or, occasionally, property.

Some activist groups, such as Earth Liberation Front and Animal Liberation Front, use property destruction, arson, and sabotage and claim their acts are nonviolent as they believe that violence is harm directed toward living things.

Nonviolent direct action

American civil rights leader Martin Luther King Jr., who used direct action tactics such as boycotts and sit-ins, felt that the goal of nonviolent direct action was to "create such a crisis and foster such a tension" as to demand a response.

Mahatma Gandhi's methods, which he called satyagraha, did not involve confrontation and could be described as "removal of support" without breaking laws besides those explicitly targeted. Examples of targeted laws include the salt tax and the Asiatic Registration Act. His preferred actions were largely symbolic and peaceful, and included "withdrawing membership, participation or attendance in government-operated agencies." Gandhi and American civil rights leader James Bevel were strongly influenced by Leo Tolstoy's 1894 book The Kingdom of God Is Within You, which promotes passive resistance.

Other terms for nonviolent direct action include civil resistance, people power, and positive action.

Violent direct action

Insurrectionary anarchism, a militant variant of anarchist ideology, primarily deals with direct action against governments. Insurrectionist anarchists see countries as inherently controlled by the upper classes, and thereby impossible to reform. While the vast majority of anarchists are not militant and do not engage in militant actions, insurrectionists take violent action against the state and other targets. Most insurrectionary anarchists largely reject mass grassroots organizations created by other anarchists, instead calling for coordinated militant action to be taken by decentralized cell networks.

Fascism emphasizes direct action, including the legitimization of political violence, as a core part of its politics.

Effectiveness

While radical activism has been effective as part of the civil rights movement, forceful or violent environmental sabotage (FVES) can have a "negative impact on voter attitudes toward all environmental organizations", though that effect is contingent on the organizations' prior record.

In polls conducted in the United Kingdom, two thirds of respondents supported non-violent environmental direct action, while a similar percentage believed defacing art or public monuments should be criminalized.

The question of engaging in radical protest is known as the "activist's dilemma": "activists must choose between moderate actions that are largely ignored and more extreme actions that succeed in gaining attention, but may be counterproductive to their aims as they tend to make people think less of the protesters."

See also

• List of civil rights leaders
• List of peace activists
• Praxis (process)
• Rebellion
• Revolution
• Vigilantism

References

1. Sharp, Gene (April 10, 2019). "198 Methods of Nonviolent Action by Gene Sharp". The Commons Social Change Library. Retrieved 2024-08-12.
2. Ortega y Gasset, José (1957). The Revolt of the Masses. W. W. Norton. p. 74. "When the reconstruction of the origins of our epoch is undertaken, it will be observed that the first notes of its special harmony were sounded in those groups of French syndicalists and realists of about 1900, inventors of the method and the name of 'direct action.'"
3. The I.W.W.: Its First Seventy Years, 1905–1975, Fred W. Thompson and Patrick Murfin, 1976, p. 46.
4. ^ de Cleyre, Voltairine (1912). Direct Action  – via Wikisource.
5. Mellor, William (1920). Direct action. London: L. Parsons. pp. 15–16. Retrieved 2024-05-23.
6. Hansen, Ann. Direct Action: Memoirs of an Urban Guerrilla. Toronto: Between the Lines, 2001. ISBN 978-1-902593-48-7, p. 335
7. Hunter, Daniel (June 17, 2024). "Nonviolent Direct Action as Social Parable". The Commons Social Change Library. Retrieved 2024-08-12.
8. Fians, Guilherme (March 18, 2022). "Prefigurative politics". In Stein, Felix (ed.). Open Encyclopedia of Anthropology. doi:10.29164/22prefigpolitics. hdl:10023/25123. S2CID 247729590. Archived from the original on 2023-07-21. Retrieved 2023-01-24.
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35. Gandhi, M. K. "Pre-requisites for Satyagraha" Young India 1 August 1925
36. Gandhi, Mohandas Karamchand (February 24, 1919). "Collected Works of Mahatma Gandhi: Volume 17" (PDF). New Delhi: Publications Division, Government of India. p. 297. Archived (PDF) from the original on 2022-12-05. Retrieved 2022-03-12. in the event of these Bills becoming law and until they are withdrawn, we shall refuse civilly to obey these laws and such other laws as a Committee
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38. Christoyannopoulos, Alexandre (2010). Christian Anarchism: A Political Commentary on the Gospel. Exeter: Imprint Academic. p. 19
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Bibliography

• Barry, Andrew (1999). "Demonstrations: sites and sights of direct action". Economy and Society. 28 (1): 75–94. doi:10.1080/03085149900000025.
• Carter, April (2005). Direct Action and Democracy Today. Polity. ISBN 0-7456-2936-9.
• Dupuis-Déri, Francis (2019). "From the Zapatistas to Seattle: The 'New Anarchists'". In Adams, Matthew S.; Levy, Carl (eds.). The Palgrave Handbook of Anarchism. London: Palgrave Macmillan. pp. 471–488. doi:10.1007/978-3-319-75620-2_27. ISBN 978-3-319-75619-6. S2CID 158569370.
• Franks, Benjamin (2003). "The Direct Action Ethic". Anarchist Studies. 11 (1): 13–41. ISSN 0967-3393. Archived from the original on 2023-01-24. Retrieved 2023-01-24.
• Graeber, David (2009). Direct Action: An Ethnography. AK Press. ISBN 978-1-904859-79-6. LCCN 2007939198.
• Graham, Robert (2019). "Anarchism and the First International". In Adams, Matthew S.; Levy, Carl (eds.). The Palgrave Handbook of Anarchism. London: Palgrave Macmillan. pp. 325–342. doi:10.1007/978-3-319-75620-2_19. ISBN 978-3-319-75619-6. S2CID 158605651.
• Grant, Wyn (2001). "Pressure Politics: From 'Insider' Politics to Direct Action?". Parliamentary Affairs. 54 (2): 337–348. doi:10.1093/parlij/54.2.337.
• Jordan, Tim (2002). Activism!: Direct Action, Hacktivism and the Future of Society. Reaktion Books. ISBN 1-86189-122-9.
• Mattern, Mark (2019). "Anarchism and Art". In Adams, Matthew S.; Levy, Carl (eds.). The Palgrave Handbook of Anarchism. London: Palgrave Macmillan. pp. 589–602. doi:10.1007/978-3-319-75620-2_33. ISBN 978-3-319-75619-6. S2CID 150145676.
• Ordóñez, Vicente (2018). "Direct Action". In Franks, Benjamin; Jun, Nathan; Williams, Leonard (eds.). Anarchism: A Conceptual Approach. pp. 74–85. doi:10.4324/9781315683652. ISBN 9781315683652.
• Sitrin, Marina (2019). "Anarchism and the Newest Social Movements". In Adams, Matthew S.; Levy, Carl (eds.). The Palgrave Handbook of Anarchism. London: Palgrave Macmillan. pp. 659–676. doi:10.1007/978-3-319-75620-2_37. ISBN 978-3-319-75619-6. S2CID 158345658.
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• Williams, Dana M. (2019). "Tactics: Conceptions of Social Change, Revolution, and Anarchist Organisation". In Adams, Matthew S.; Levy, Carl (eds.). The Palgrave Handbook of Anarchism. London: Palgrave Macmillan. pp. 107–124. doi:10.1007/978-3-319-75620-2_6. ISBN 978-3-319-75619-6. S2CID 150249195.
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Further reading

• Epstein, Barbara. Political protest and cultural revolution: Nonviolent direct action in the 1970s and 1980s. Univ of California Press, 1991.
• Graeber, David. Direct action: An ethnography. AK press, 2009.
• Kauffman, Leslie Anne. Direct action: Protest and the reinvention of American radicalism. Verso Books, 2017. ISBN 978-1-78478-409-6
• Hansen, Ann. Direct Action: Memoirs of an Urban Guerrilla. Toronto: Between the Lines, 2001. ISBN 978-1-902593-48-7

v t e Anarchism
Concepts	Anarchy Anarchist Black Cross Anarchist criminology Anationalism Anti-authoritarianism Anti-capitalism Anti-militarism Affinity group Autonomous social center Black bloc Classless society Class struggle Consensus decision-making Conscientious objector Critique of work Decentralization Deep ecology Direct action Free love Freethought Horizontalidad Individualism Law Mutual aid Participatory politics Permanent autonomous zone Prefigurative politics Proletarian internationalism Propaganda of the deed Refusal of work Revolution Rewilding Sabotage Security culture Self-ownership Social ecology Sociocracy Somatherapy Spontaneous order Squatting Temporary autonomous zone Union of egoists Voluntary association Workers' council
Issues	Animal rights Capitalism Education Love and sex Nationalism Religion Violence
Schools of thought	Classical Individualist Egoist Illegalist Naturist Philosophical Mutualist Social Collectivist Communist Magonist Post-classical Feminist Green Primitivist Social ecology Independence Insurrectionary Pacifist Religious Christian Buddhist Jewish Without adjectives Contemporary Black Free-market Postcolonial Post-anarchist Post-left Queer
Types of federation	Affinity group Anarcho-syndicalism Platformism Synthesis anarchism Union of egoists
Economics	Communization Cooperative Cost the limit of price Decentralized planned economy Free association General strike Gift economy Give-away shop Labour voucher Market socialism Mutual bank Mutual credit Social ownership Wage slavery Workers' self-management
Culture	A las Barricadas Anarchist bookfair Anarcho-punk Arts DIY ethic Escuela Moderna Films Freeganism Infoshop Independent Media Center The Internationale Jewish anarchism Lifestylism May Day "No gods, no masters" Popular education "Property is theft!" Radical cheerleading Radical environmentalism Self-managed social center Symbolism
History	French Revolution Revolutions of 1848 Spanish Regional Federation of the IWA Paris Commune Hague Congress Cantonal rebellion Haymarket affair International Conference of Rome Trial of the Thirty International Conference of Rome Ferrer movement Strandzha Commune Congress of Amsterdam Tragic Week High Treason Incident Manifesto of the Sixteen German Revolution of 1918–1919 Bavarian Soviet Republic 1919 United States bombings Biennio Rosso Kronstadt rebellion Makhnovshchina Amakasu Incident Alt Llobregat insurrection Anarchist insurrection of January 1933 Anarchist insurrection of December 1933 Spanish Revolution of 1936 Barcelona May Days Red inverted triangle Labadie Collection Provo May 1968 Kate Sharpley Library Carnival Against Capital 1999 Seattle WTO protests Really Really Free Market Occupy movement
People	Alston Armand Ba Bakunin Berkman Bonanno Bookchin Bourdin Chomsky Cleyre Day Durruti Ellul Ervin Faure Fauset MacDonald Ferrer Feyerabend Giovanni Godwin Goldman González Prada Graeber Guillaume He-Yin Kanno Kōtoku Kropotkin Landauer Liu Magón Makhno Maksimov Malatesta Mett Michel Most Parsons Pi i Margall Pouget Proudhon Raichō Reclus Rocker Santillán Spooner Stirner Thoreau Tolstoy Tucker Volin Ward Warren Yarchuk Zerzan
Lists	Anarcho-punk bands Books Fictional characters Films Jewish anarchists Musicians Periodicals
By region	Africa Albania Algeria Andorra Argentina Armenia Australia Austria Azerbaijan Bangladesh Belarus Belgium Bolivia Bosnia and Herzegovina Brazil Bulgaria Canada Chile China Colombia Costa Rica Croatia Cuba Cyprus Czech Republic Denmark Dominican Republic East Timor Ecuador Egypt El Salvador Estonia Finland France French Guiana Georgia Germany Greece Guatemala Hong Kong Hungary Iceland India Indonesia Iran Ireland Israel Italy Japan Korea Latvia Malaysia Mexico Monaco Mongolia Morocco Netherlands New Zealand Nicaragua Nigeria Norway Panama Paraguay Peru Philippines Poland Portugal Puerto Rico Romania Russia Serbia Singapore South Africa Spain Sweden Switzerland Syria Taiwan Tunisia Turkey Ukraine United Kingdom United States Uruguay Venezuela Vietnam
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v t e Civil rights movement (1954–1968)
Events (timeline)	Prior to 1954 Journey of Reconciliation Executive Order 9981 Murders of Harry and Harriette Moore Sweatt v. Painter (1950) McLaurin v. Oklahoma State Regents (1950) Baton Rouge bus boycott 1954–1959 Brown v. Board of Education Bolling v. Sharpe Briggs v. Elliott Davis v. Prince Edward County Gebhart v. Belton Sarah Keys v. Carolina Coach Company Emmett Till Montgomery bus boycott Browder v. Gayle Tallahassee bus boycott Mansfield school desegregation 1957 Prayer Pilgrimage for Freedom "Give Us the Ballot" Royal Ice Cream sit-in Little Rock Nine Cooper v. Aaron Civil Rights Act of 1957 Ministers' Manifesto Katz Drug Store sit-in Kissing Case Biloxi wade-ins 1960–1963 New Year's Day March Sit-in movement Greensboro sit-ins Nashville sit-ins Sibley Commission Atlanta sit-ins Savannah Protest Movement Greenville Eight Civil Rights Act of 1960 Ax Handle Saturday Gomillion v. Lightfoot Boynton v. Virginia University of Georgia desegregation riot Rock Hill sit-ins Robert F. Kennedy's Law Day Address Freedom Rides Anniston bombing Birmingham attack Garner v. Louisiana Albany Movement Cambridge movement University of Chicago sit-ins "Second Emancipation Proclamation" Meredith enrollment, Ole Miss riot Atlanta's Berlin Wall "Segregation now, segregation forever" Stand in the Schoolhouse Door 1963 Birmingham campaign Letter from Birmingham Jail Children's Crusade Birmingham riot 16th Street Baptist Church bombing John F. Kennedy's speech to the nation on Civil Rights Detroit Walk to Freedom March on Washington "I Have a Dream" Big Six St. Augustine movement 1964–1968 Twenty-fourth Amendment Chester school protests Bloody Tuesday 1964 Monson Motor Lodge protests Freedom Summer workers' murders Civil Rights Act of 1964 Heart of Atlanta Motel, Inc. v. United States Katzenbach v. McClung 1964–1965 Scripto strike 1965 Selma to Montgomery marches "How Long, Not Long" Voting Rights Act of 1965 Harper v. Virginia Board of Elections March Against Fear White House Conference on Civil Rights Chicago Freedom Movement/Chicago open housing movement Loving v. Virginia Memphis sanitation strike King assassination funeral riots Civil Rights Act of 1968 Poor People's Campaign Green v. County School Board of New Kent County Jones v. Alfred H. Mayer Co. 1968 Olympics Black Power salute
Activist groups	Alabama Christian Movement for Human Rights American Friends Service Committee Atlanta Negro Voters League Atlanta Student Movement Black Panther Party Brotherhood of Sleeping Car Porters Congress of Racial Equality (CORE) Committee for Freedom Now Committee on Appeal for Human Rights An Appeal for Human Rights Council for United Civil Rights Leadership Council of Federated Organizations Dallas County Voters League Deacons for Defense and Justice Georgia Council on Human Relations Highlander Folk School Leadership Conference on Civil and Human Rights Lowndes County Freedom Organization Mississippi Freedom Democratic Party Montgomery Improvement Association NAACP Youth Council Nashville Student Movement Nation of Islam Northern Student Movement National Council of Negro Women National Urban League Operation Breadbasket Regional Council of Negro Leadership Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC) Southern Regional Council Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC) The Freedom Singers United Auto Workers (UAW) Wednesdays in Mississippi Women's Political Council
Activists	Ralph Abernathy Victoria Gray Adams Zev Aelony Mathew Ahmann Muhammad Ali William G. Anderson Gwendolyn Armstrong Arnold Aronson Ella Baker James Baldwin Marion Barry Daisy Bates Harry Belafonte James Bevel Claude Black Gloria Blackwell Randolph Blackwell Unita Blackwell Ezell Blair Jr. Joanne Bland Julian Bond Joseph E. Boone William Holmes Borders Amelia Boynton Bruce Boynton Raylawni Branch Stanley Branche Ruby Bridges Aurelia Browder H. Rap Brown Ralph Bunche John H. Calhoun Guy Carawan Stokely Carmichael Johnnie Carr James Chaney J. L. Chestnut Shirley Chisholm Colia Lafayette Clark Ramsey Clark Septima Clark Xernona Clayton Eldridge Cleaver Kathleen Cleaver Josephine Dobbs Clement Charles E. Cobb Jr. Annie Lee Cooper Dorothy Cotton Claudette Colvin Vernon Dahmer Jonathan Daniels Abraham Lincoln Davis Angela Davis Joseph DeLaine Dave Dennis Annie Bell Robinson Devine John Wesley Dobbs Patricia Stephens Due Joseph Ellwanger Charles Evers Medgar Evers Myrlie Evers-Williams Chuck Fager James Farmer Walter Fauntroy James Forman Marie Foster Golden Frinks Andrew Goodman Robert Graetz Fred Gray Jack Greenberg Dick Gregory Lawrence Guyot Prathia Hall Fannie Lou Hamer Fred Hampton William E. Harbour Vincent Harding Dorothy Height Audrey Faye Hendricks Lola Hendricks Aaron Henry Oliver Hill Donald L. Hollowell James Hood Myles Horton Zilphia Horton T. R. M. Howard Ruby Hurley Cecil Ivory Jesse Jackson Jimmie Lee Jackson Richie Jean Jackson T. J. Jemison Esau Jenkins Barbara Rose Johns Vernon Johns Frank Minis Johnson Clarence Jones J. Charles Jones Matthew Jones Vernon Jordan Tom Kahn Clyde Kennard A. D. King C.B. King Coretta Scott King Martin Luther King Jr. Martin Luther King Sr. Bernard Lafayette James Lawson Bernard Lee Sanford R. Leigh Jim Letherer Stanley Levison John Lewis Viola Liuzzo Z. Alexander Looby Joseph Lowery Clara Luper Danny Lyon Malcolm X Mae Mallory Vivian Malone Bob Mants Thurgood Marshall Benjamin Mays Franklin McCain Charles McDew Ralph McGill Floyd McKissick Joseph McNeil James Meredith William Ming Jack Minnis Amzie Moore Cecil B. Moore Douglas E. Moore Harriette Moore Harry T. Moore Queen Mother Moore William Lewis Moore Irene Morgan Bob Moses William Moyer Elijah Muhammad Diane Nash Charles Neblett Huey P. Newton Edgar Nixon Jack O'Dell James Orange Rosa Parks James Peck Charles Person Homer Plessy Adam Clayton Powell Jr. Fay Bellamy Powell Rodney N. Powell Al Raby Lincoln Ragsdale A. Philip Randolph George Raymond George Raymond Jr. Bernice Johnson Reagon Cordell Reagon James Reeb Frederick D. Reese Walter Reuther Gloria Richardson David Richmond Bernice Robinson Jo Ann Robinson Angela Russell Bayard Rustin Bernie Sanders Michael Schwerner Bobby Seale Pete Seeger Cleveland Sellers Charles Sherrod Alexander D. Shimkin Fred Shuttlesworth Modjeska Monteith Simkins Glenn E. Smiley A. Maceo Smith Kelly Miller Smith Mary Louise Smith Maxine Smith Ruby Doris Smith-Robinson Charles Kenzie Steele Hank Thomas Dorothy Tillman A. P. Tureaud Hartman Turnbow Albert Turner C. T. Vivian A. T. Walden Wyatt Tee Walker Hollis Watkins Walter Francis White Roy Wilkins Hosea Williams Kale Williams Robert F. Williams Q. V. Williamson Andrew Young Whitney Young Sammy Younge Jr. Bob Zellner James Zwerg
By region	Omaha, Nebraska South Carolina
Movement songs	"Ain't Gonna Let Nobody Turn Me 'Round" "If You Miss Me at the Back of the Bus" "Kumbaya" "Keep Your Eyes on the Prize" "Oh, Freedom" "This Little Light of Mine" "We Shall Not Be Moved" "We Shall Overcome" "Woke Up This Morning (With My Mind Stayed On Freedom)"
Influences	Nonviolence Padayatra Sermon on the Mount Mahatma Gandhi Ahimsa Satyagraha The Kingdom of God Is Within You Frederick Douglass W. E. B. Du Bois Mary McLeod Bethune
Related	Jim Crow laws Lynching in the United States Plessy v. Ferguson Separate but equal Buchanan v. Warley Hocutt v. Wilson Sweatt v. Painter Hernandez v. Texas Loving v. Virginia African-American women in the movement Jews in the civil rights movement Fifth Circuit Four 16th Street Baptist Church Kelly Ingram Park A.G. Gaston Motel Bethel Baptist Church Brown Chapel Dexter Avenue Baptist Church Holt Street Baptist Church Edmund Pettus Bridge March on Washington Movement African-American churches attacked List of lynching victims in the United States Freedom Schools Freedom songs Spring Mobilization Committee to End the War in Vietnam "Beyond Vietnam: A Time to Break Silence" Voter Education Project 1960s counterculture African American founding fathers of the United States Eyes on the Prize
Legacy	In popular culture Birmingham Civil Rights Institute Birmingham Civil Rights National Monument Civil Rights Memorial Civil Rights Movement Archive Emmett Till and Mamie Till-Mobley National Monument Medgar and Myrlie Evers Home National Monument Freedom Rides Museum Freedom Riders National Monument King Center for Nonviolent Social Change Martin Luther King Jr. Day Martin Luther King Jr. Memorial other King memorials Mississippi Civil Rights Museum National Civil Rights Museum National Voting Rights Museum St. Augustine Foot Soldiers Monument Olympic Black Power Statue
Noted historians	Taylor Branch Clayborne Carson John Dittmer Michael Eric Dyson Chuck Fager Adam Fairclough David Garrow David Halberstam Vincent Harding Steven F. Lawson Doug McAdam Diane McWhorter Charles M. Payne Thomas E. Ricks Timothy Tyson Akinyele Umoja Movement photographers
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