William Moyer

For the American journalist and politician, seeBill Moyers.

Bill Moyer(September 17, 1933 – October 21, 2002) was aUnited Statessocial change activist who was a principal organizer in the 1966Chicago Open Housing Movement.He was an author, and a founding member of theMovement for a New Society.

Chicago Open Housing Movement

Initially trained as an engineer, Moyer was introduced to the philosophy and practice ofnonviolencebyQuakerfriends, and completed a degree in social work. He became involved in campaigns forcivil rightsand open housingintegration,working and organizing in the early and mid-1960s with the Chicago branch of the Quaker-basedAmerican Friends Service Committeealong with Kale Williams, civil rights activistBernard Lafayette,and others. Then, in 1966, he joined withJames Bevel,Martin Luther King Jr.and the other leaders of theSouthern Christian Leadership Conference(SCLC) during theChicago Movement.

James Bevel, who strategized and directed that action, credits Moyer with influencing him to center the Chicago Movement on open housing.

Further social movements

Over the next decade, Moyer was involved in the SCLC's 1969Poor People's CampaigninWashington, D.C.,nonviolent blockades of arms shipments toBangladesh(1971) and toVietnam(1972), support for theAmerican Indian Movementoccupation atWounded Knee,South Dakota(1973), and a nuclear power plant blockade atSeabrook, New Hampshire(1977).

It was during the nonviolent blockade of theSeabrook Station Nuclear Power Plant,which involved the arrest of 1,414 individuals (most charges were later dropped),that Moyer recognised the need for social change activists to understand the dynamics behind movement success. In particular, the need to openly address the contradiction that activists often perceive the normal signs of campaign progress as signs of failure.

Moyer developed theMovement Action Plan(MAP) to achieve this end.Since its development it has been used to train hundreds of activists, most notably in theUnited States,Australia,CanadaandEurope.

After the fall of theBerlin wallin 1989, Moyer participated in many workshops inEastern Europeabout nonviolence and social change. In the mid-1980s, he moved toSan Francisco, California,where he began to exploreTranspersonal psychologyand continued his participation in the Friends meeting there. He also developed a workshop called "Creating Peaceful Relationships" based on his realizations regardingdominator cultures.

Moyer's bookDoing Democracy(New Society Publishers), co-authored byJoAnn McAllister,Mary Lou FinleyandSteven Soifer,summarises his theories of social change with case studies from theCivil Rights Movement,anti-nuclear,gay and lesbian,breast cancerandGlobal Justicemovements.

External links

• "Doing Democracy In the 21st Century"
• Doing Democracy
• The Movement Action Plan
• The Movement Action Plan
• Memorial Statement