Reddit reviews Why Civil Resistance Works: The Strategic Logic of Nonviolent Conflict (Columbia Studies in Terrorism and Irregular Warfare)

Egypt, Tunisia, Iran, Poland, East-Germany, Romania, Portugal, more broadly you can read this if you're curious about it

>"I collected data on all major nonviolent and violent campaigns for the overthrow of a government or a territorial liberation since 1900," she says -- hundreds of cases. "The data blew me away."

>Here's her chart, which pretty clearly suggests that nonviolent movements are much likelier to work:

https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/worldviews/wp/2013/11/05/peaceful-protest-is-much-more-effective-than-violence-in-toppling-dictators/

https://www.amazon.com/Why-Civil-Resistance-Works-Nonviolent-ebook/dp/B005SZEEXQ/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1383657922&sr=8-1&keywords=chenoweth+and+stephan

Here. Watch this.

http://youtu.be/XO1t4Fif2c0

It's a documentary about Gene Sharp and his incredibly powerful (and proven) methods of non-violent revolution.

Stuff like orbital weapons platforms might make for fun Hollywood movies, but a) things will never be allowed by the vast majority of human civilization to reach that point, and b) we already know non-violent means work even better.

> Why Civil Resistance Works: The Strategic Logic of Nonviolent Conflict by Erica Chenoweth and Maria J. Stephan uses graphs, charts, sociological research and statistical analysis to show how in the last century, nonviolent movements were far better at mobilizing supporters, resisting regime crackdowns, creating new initiatives, defeating repressive regimes and establishing lasting democracies. Their evidence points to the conclusion that nonviolent resistance is more effective than armed resistance in overturning oppressive and repressive regimes and in leading to more democratic societies. -Source

Hmmm, I believe this researcher used the US Civil Rights Movement as an example of a non-violent success. This ignores numerous race riots and the actions of more militant groups.

Not to take a shit on all her research though. I'll give Why Civil Resistance Works a read before I draw any conclusions. All I can say now is that the projects might not account for all variables per each event.

Research shows that non-violent resistance has twice the chance of success compared to violent resistance. This is not something that I make up from a moral perspective, if you truly want to political change in face of violent oppression and is willing to put in the work and sacrifice, from a cold amoral perspective, non-violent resistance is more likely to work (still most fail of course). Most likely this will mean breaking the law, creating great disruption in society and putting yourself at risk. The idea of some kind of friction-less resistance would work is fantasy. The best work on this is:
https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B005SZEEXQ/ref=kinw_myk_ro_title

Note that the research covers regimes far more suppressive and violent than HK. Even if you still want to go for violence, I still recommend reading the work above since it will make you think clearer about when and why to use violence.
If you are going to do something that will put you and your friends at risk of imprisonment, dying and will take up years of your life, it makes sense to learn as much as possible about the process, what has worked in the past, what has not and why. Something that is missing here in HK and will ultimately cause it to fail with nasty consequences.
Very often people want violence for other means and those might feel more important than the end goal - even worth giving up the end goal for - but it's important in such a serious situation as HK is in to be clear about these things and now why you are doing what.

http://www.bbc.com/future/story/20190513-it-only-takes-35-of-people-to-change-the-world Here is a better article.

https://www.amazon.com/dp/B005SZEEXQ/ref=dp-kindle-redirect?_encoding=UTF8&btkr=1 Here is the book if you are actually interested in the subject.

Violence is a shitty alternative. Those revolutions you listed? The French revolution involved the slaughter of political dissidents by revolutionary governments, ended in a dictatorship, then the restoration of the monarchy. France didn't get a long lasting Republic until 80 years later, after decades of political instability. The communist revolutions ended in brutal regimes being installed into power. Haiti ended in two genocides.

Nonviolent revolutions? Philippine people power revolution, Taiwan, South Korea, Color revolutions, Arab Spring, decolonization of India, end of Apartheid, goes on. Perfect? No. But a much better record than violent revolution.