"Yes, nonviolence is a noble ideal, but do you really think it would stop a Hitler?" Or a street thug, a dictator, a death squad?

Pacifists are long accustomed to these questions, mostly thrown up by self-proclaimed realists. And they get the put-down message: Nonviolence is a creed only slightly less trifling than hippies sticking flowers in soldiers' gun barrels.

Readers whose minds are open to another view will be rewarded by A Force More Powerful: A Century of Nonviolent Conflict. It is a comprehensive and lucidly written addition to the literature of peace. Its worthiness puts the authors, Peter Ackerman and Jack DuVall, in the high company of Gene Sharp of the Albert Einstein Institution in Boston, Michael True of Assumption College and Richard Deats of the Fellowship of Reconciliation--all scholars of mettle who bring before the public the many historical examples where the force of organized, nonviolent resistance defeated oppression.

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