Ayse Kadioglu, Eurozine, June 11, 2013

People who have joined these protests come from very different ideological backgrounds. Some of them were not even on speaking terms with one another. Yet, they found themselves united in a common cause. They do not think that democracy is all about elections. There is no doubt that elections are a very necessary component of democratic regimes but they alone are not sufficient. These protests can be read as a sign that people demand more than "representative democracy." They demand "participatory democracy."

Robert Mackey, NY Times, June 13, 2013

In the last hours of the brief, tightly controlled presidential election campaign in Iran, the first since the disputed outcome in 2009, the name of the detained opposition leader who claimed to have won the last contest, Mir Hussein Moussavi, was once again chanted at public rallies. Moussavi has been under house arrest for more than two years. Citing sources close to the families of both men, Reuters reported this week that they currently live “an intensely lonely existence with virtually no contact with the outside world and all their activities controlled by security forces.”

Theory Talks, June 5, 2013

Nonviolent resistance remains by and large a marginal topic to international relations. Yet it constitutes an influential idea among social movements and non-Western populations alike, one that has moved to the center stage in recent events in the Middle East. In this talk, Mary King—who has spent over 40 years promoting nonviolence—elaborates on, amongst others, the women’s movement, nonviolence, and civil action more broadly.

Anthony Barnett, openDemocracy, June 11, 2013

The recent protests in Turkey are undoubtedly a turning point for the country - and therefore for both the Middle East and Europe, whose directions will be shaped by this uniquely important and influential country. Istanbul's youth have joined the city-centre occupations of Tahrir Square with Madrid, Athens and New York, and a generation has linked up to the fearless protests, at once highly political yet rejecting traditional political parties, that have erupted from Santiago to Delhi.

Natalie Kitroeff, NY Times, June 11, 2013 Elaine Díaz is a leader of a group of Cubans who are opening a new avenue for criticism in a country that, for the last 50 years, has offered its citizens only two options: with us or against us. That has not stopped her from writing publicly and with disarming directness about the challenges of daily life in Cuba on her blog, La Polémica Digital, for the last five years. She is young, progressive and fiercely loyal to the Cuban government. But she says she is also determined to reform a socialist system that no longer works as well as it used to for the common man.

Myles Burke, Telegraph, June 12, 2013

West Papuan independence leader Benny Wenda tells Foreign Affairs Correspondent Damien McElroy how he is leading his people's fight for freedom from his base in Oxford. Mr Wenda is now pushing for his Free West Papua campaign to go global as its 'the only way to educate the world" of the situation in his homeland.

This article discusses the shortcomings of violent social struggles - their relative exclusivity, vulnerability to foreign manipulation for geostrategic goals, and their likelihood (if successful) to establish similarly repressive and violent regimes to the ones they seek to overthrow. These are then juxtaposed with the relative merits of nonviolent struggles - their inclusivity, self-sufficiency, and compatibility with democratic structures of governance.

Kerem Oktem, The Guardian, June 9, 2013,p> The failure to cover the initial events around Taksim, where tens of thousands of youth and political activists engaged in street battles with police indiscriminately firing teargas bombs, was one of the triggers of public outcry and solidarity among Istanbulites. But how come the news did not get out even though all major media outlets had live transmission vehicles on the ground, and reporters were trying to do their job – being tear-gassed and subjected to police violence in the process? The answer lies in the ownership structure of the main media companies and government interference with editorial policy.

Twitter, Facebook or Tumblr, appear to be playing a prominent role in the coordination of the still ongoing protests in Turkey. Social networking has played an important role especially in the absence of coverage by traditional media [1] to recruit and mobilize protesters, [2] to coordinate the movement without the infrastructure of formal organizations, and [3] to draw the attention and support of the international community.

Ben Hubbard, NY Times, June 8, 2013,p> The Arab monarchies of the Persian Gulf have long used petrodollars to placate calls for political change, and are once again relying on the threat of prison to silence dissent. The case in the Emirates is perhaps the most sweeping, where the government is trying to quash calls for change among Islamists and others. The government has recently charged 94 members of the Islamist group "Islah" including prominent jurists, academics, even relatives of one of this country’s royal families, who say they were not looking to overthrow the leadership, but asking for democratic reform and a more Islamic government.