Rebecca Subar

Rebecca Subar taught Peace and Conflict Studies at  West Chester University from 2005 to 2019. She is a senior partner at  Dragonfly, where a multiracial band of consultants supports  organizations that make social change. She has coached leaders of  political advocacy groups large and small on their race consciousness,  their organization’s growth, and their strategy for changing the world.

Learn more about Rebecca and her organization HERE.

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Praise

“Rebecca Subar’s rich personal background and distinguished career advising political negotiators, organization-builders, and movement  strategists have positioned her as one of the world’s leading voices on conflict management. Here Subar combines profound insights from both practitioners and theoreticians, offering her readers invaluable  paradigms on conflict transformation. When to Talk and When to Fight is the book many of us having been waiting for!”
 —Sa’ed Atshan, associate professor of peace and conflict studies, Swarthmore College

“This is an emotionally and intellectually engaging masterpiece about  lovers and fighters. It makes clear that the defining connection  between talking and fighting is that the fight for policy change and  passionate dialogue must both exist to change a narrative of trauma and  injustice. This is a must-read.”
 —Shawanna Vaughn, antiviolence and criminal justice activist with Silent Cry Inc.

“When to Talk and When to Fight brilliantly bridges the  worlds of bargaining-table negotiation and social movement power  building. Rebecca Subar creates an original framework for understanding  why the two approaches are often in tension with one another and  how—when coordinated skillfully—they can be used together. A writer who  is both a ‘peacemaker and provocateur,’ Subar fills her book with  illuminating stories and narrates with a wonderfully engaging personal  voice, making the reading at once absorbing and enlightening.”
 —Mark Engler, coauthor of This Is an Uprising

“Rebecca Subar’s book is a powerful and important exploration of the  tensions between challenging unjust centers of power and negotiating our  terms of victory. This book has forced me to ask tough questions about  both the social justice strategies I am comfortable with—and the  strategies I need to get more comfortable with to be the most effective  human rights advocate possible.”
 —Sunjeev Bery, Executive Director, Freedom Forward

“In When to Talk and When to Fight, Subar argues against  black-and-white binaries and promotes the validity of different  strategies depending on the mix of personal and community styles,  principles and values, structural obstacles and biases, and the power  dynamics between the opposing parties in a constantly churning and  contradictory society. Subar’s style is engaging and challenging, a  smart ‘how-to’ book that is grounded in a deep personal understanding of  social struggle and political advocacy.”
 —Alice Rothchild, author of Condition Critical: Life and Death in Israel/Palestine

“With wit and humor, Rebecca Subar has written a book for aspiring social  change advocates that eases the way into predicaments over whether to  talk or to fight. With a storyteller’s savvy and drawing from deep practical experience, Subar offers nuanced consideration of unsettled questions  on strategies for building social power and sensitively probes the role  of values in political conflict. With new tools and models to face the challenges of our times, When to Talk and When to Fight is both an ideal for book clubs and group study in organizations and a guide for emergent campaigns to dismantle injustices.”
—Mary Elizabeth King, PhD., professor of Peace and Conflict Studies, University for Peace (a UN affiliate), and Distinguished Rothermere American Institute Fellow, University of  Oxford

“A  beautiful, compelling, and timely approach to moving through conflict  and building deep relationship to create change. For today’s  leaders navigating constant conflict, this book is an essential tool to  help reach a future filled with liberation and connection.”
—Rev. Darlene Nipper, CEO, Rockwood Leadership Institute

“As we face growing ecological, economic, and political crises, we need to know how to use all the available tools to create change—resistance and  organizing, as well as dialogue and negotiation. When to Talk and When to Fight provides essential wisdom about how to deploy the right approach at the right time.”
—Mitch Chanin, cofounder of the Jewish Dialogue Group,climate justice organizer with 350 Philly

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Book Events

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Reviews

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Interviews

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Mentions

• The Strategic Art of Ambiguity
• Most Anticipated Small Press Releases: August 2021— The Big Other

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Blog