PERSISTENT PACIFISM - HOW ACTIVIST COMMITMENT IS DEVELOPED AND SUSTAINED

How and why do activists persist in their commitment to a social movem ent beyond its initial mobilization phase! How do they manage their co mmitments! What role does creativity play in helping them keep their p eace commitment intact over the long term? These are questions explore d in this study. Based on extensive interviews with thirty persistent peace activists, a theory of sustained commitment is developed. It enc ompasses how people become available for peace activism and how politi cal and social contexts affect their willingness to join and stay. It also identifies important social and personal factors that help to sus tain commitment. These include creating an activist identity, integrat ing peace work into everyday life, holding beliefs that sustain activi sm, feeling bonded to a peace group, cultivating opportunities for act ion, sharing a peace vision with other activists, and managing respons ibilities, criticism, and burnout. Persistent peace activists are rati onal in selecting courses of action, bur also creative in the way they fashion their lives, manage their commitments, avoid burnout, and des ign and carry out projects. This creativity is an important. factor co ntributing to pacifist persistence, yet it is a topic that has been la rgely neglected in collective action research. The authors argue for a stronger emphasis on 'creative action' in future research about activ ists and how they sustain their commitment in the face of many odds.