This list of peace activists includes people who have proactively advocated diplomatic, philosophical, and non-military resolution of major territorial or ideological disputes through nonviolent means and methods. Peace activists usually work with others in the overall anti-war and peace movements to focus the world's attention on the irrationality of violent conflicts, decisions, and actions. They thus initiate and facilitate wide public dialogues intended to nonviolently alter long-standing societal agreements directly relating to, and held in place by, the various irrational, violent, habitual, and historically fearful thought-processes residing at the core of these conflicts, with the intention of peacefully ending the conflicts themselves.
- Jane Addams (1860â€"1935) â€" American, national chairman Woman's Peace Party, president Women's International League for Peace and Freedom
- Eqbal Ahmad (1933/34â€"1999) â€" Pakistani political scientist, activistli>
- Martti Ahtisaari (1937) â€" former president of Finland, active in conflict resolution
- Stew Albert (1939â€"2006) â€" anti-Vietnam war activist, organizer
- Widad Akrawi (1969) â€" Danish-Kurdish peace advocate, organizer
- Suzanne Arms (1945) â€" anti-Vietnam war activist, draft counselor
- Émile Arnaud (1864â€"1921) â€" French peace campaigner, coined the word "Pacifism"
- Vittorio Arrigoni (1975â€"2011) â€" Italian reporter, anti-war activist
- Pat Arrowsmith (1930) â€" British author and peace campaigner
- Joan Baez (1941) â€" prominent American anti-war protester, inspirational singer
- Emily Greene Balch (1867â€"1961) â€" American, a leader of Women's International League for Peace and Freedom
- Ernesto Balducci (1922â€"1992) â€" Italian priest
- Archibald Baxter (1881â€"1970) â€" New Zealand pacifist, socialist, and anti-war activist
- Harry Belafonte (1927) â€" American anti-war protester, performer
- Medea Benjamin (1952) â€" co-founder Code Pink, author, organizer
- Meg Beresford (1937) â€" British activist, European Nuclear Disarmament movement
- Daniel Berrigan (1921) â€" prominent anti-Vietnam war protester
- Philip Berrigan (1923â€"2002) â€" prominent anti-Vietnam war protester
- James Bevel (1936â€"2008) â€" prominent American anti-Vietnam war leader, organizer
- Vinoba Bhave (1895â€"1982) â€" Indian, Gandhian, teacher, author, organizer
- Janet Bloomfield (1953â€"2007) â€" peace and disarmament campaigner, chair of the Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament
- Vera Brittain (1893â€"1970) â€" British writer, pacifist
- Elihu Burritt (1810â€"1879) â€" American diplomat, social activist
- Helen Caldicott (1938) â€" physician, anti-nuclear weapon, initiator
- Andrew Carnegie (1835â€"1919) â€" American industrialist and founder of the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace
- Jimmy Carter (1924) â€" American negotiator and former US President, organizer, international conflict resolution
- Pierre Cérésole (1879â€"1945) - Swiss engineer, founder of Service Civil International (SCI) or International Voluntary Service for Peace (IVSP)
- Cesar Chavez (1927-1993) - American farm worker, labor leader and civil rights activist
- Noam Chomsky - American linguist, philosopher, and activist
- Ramsey Clark (1927) â€" American anti-war and anti-nuclear lawyer, activist
- William Sloane Coffin (1924â€"2006) â€" American cleric, anti-war activist
- James F. Colaianni (1922) â€" author, publisher, first anti-Napalm organizer
- Judy Collins (1939) â€" inspirational American anti-war singer/songwriter, protester
- Tom Cornell â€" American anti-war activist, initiated first anti-Vietnam War protest
- Rachel Corrie (1979â€"2003) â€" American activist for Palestinian human rights
- David Cortright â€" American anti-nuclear weapon leader
- Norman Cousins (1915â€"1990) â€" journalist, author, organizer, initiator
- Frances Crowe (1919) â€" anti-war and anti-nuclear power, draft counselor
- Rennie Davis (1941) â€" American anti-Vietnam war leader, organizer
- Dorothy Day (1897â€"1980) â€" American journalist, social activist, and co-founder of the Catholic Worker
- David Dellinger (1915â€"2004) â€" American pacifist, organizer, prominent anti-war leader
- Lanza del Vasto (1901-1981) - Catholic philosopher, poet, artist, and nonviolent activist
- Michael Denborough AM (1929-2014) - Australian medical researcher who founded the Nuclear Disarmament Party
- Alma Dolens (1876â€"?) â€" Italian pacifist and suffragist
- Phil Donahue - Former talk show host, former television host
- Élie Ducommun (1833â€"1906) â€" Nobel Peace Prize laureate
- Mel Duncan(1950) â€" founding Executive Director of Nonviolent Peaceforce
- Shirin Ebadi (1947) â€" Iranian lawyer, human rights activist
- Albert Einstein (1879-1955) â€" Scientist, Nobel Prize laureate
- Daniel Ellsberg (1931) â€" American anti-war whistleblower, protester
- James Gareth Endicott (1898â€"1993) â€" initiator, organizer, protester
- Amy Goodman - journalist, host of Democracy Now!
- Jodie Evans (1954) â€" co-founder Code Pink, initiator, organizer, filmmaker
- Jane Fonda (1937) â€" American anti-war protester, actress
- Tom Fox (1951â€"2006) â€" American Quaker
- Comfort Freeman â€" Liberian anti-war activist
- Alfred Fried (1864â€"1921) â€" co-founder German peace movement, called for world peace organization
- Arun Gandhi (1934) â€" Indian, organizer, educator, grandson of Mohandas
- Mohandas Gandhi (1869â€"1948) â€" Indian, writer, organizer, protester, lawyer, inspiration to movement leaders
- Leymah Gbowee (1972) - organizer of women's peace movement in Liberia, awarded 2011 Nobel Peace Prize
- Everett Gendler (1928) - Conservative rabbi, peace activist, writer
- Allen Ginsberg (1926â€"1997) â€" American anti-war protester, writer
- Arthur Gish (1939â€"2010) â€" American public speaker
- Danny Glover (1946) â€" American actor and anti-war activist
- Emma Goldman (1869â€"1940) â€" Russian/American activist imprisoned in the U.S. for opposition to World War I
- Mikhail Gorbachev (1931) â€" Russian anti-nuclear activist during and after Soviet presidency
- Dick Gregory (1932) â€" American comedian, anti-war protester
- Woody Guthrie (1912â€"1967) â€" American anti-war protester and musician, inspiration
- Tenzin Gyatso (1935) â€" current Dalai Lama, peace advocate
- Otto Hahn (1879â€"1968) â€" nuclear chemist, Nobel Laureate, pacifist, anti-nuclear weapons and testing advocate
- Judith Hand (1940) â€" anti-war writer, academian
- Thich Nhat Hanh (1926) â€" Vietnamese monk
- G. Simon Harak (1948) â€" American academian
- Keir Hardie (1856â€"1915) â€" Scottish socialist, co-founder of Independent Labour Party and Labour Party
- Václav Havel â€" Czech nonviolent writer, poet, and politician
- Brian Haw â€" British activist, initiated and long time participant of the Parliament Square Peace Campaign
- Abraham Joshua Heschel - (1907-1972) rabbi, professor at Jewish Theological Seminary, civil rights and peace activist
- Sidney Hinkes (1925â€"2006) â€" pacifist, priest in the Church of England
- Emily Hobhouse (1860â€"1926) â€" British welfare campaigner
- Abbie Hoffman â€" American anti-Vietnam war leader, co-founder of Yippies
- Margaret Holmes, AM, (1909â€"2009) â€" Australian activist during the Vietnam War, member Anglican Pacifist Fellowship
- Julia Ward Howe â€" writer, advocate, organizer
- Aldous Huxley (1894-1963) â€" anti-war and anti-conflict writer
- Khawaja Zafar Iqbal â€" Pakistani
- Wilhelm Jerusalem â€" pacifist, philosopher, progressive educationalist, worked at Vienna (Austria)
- Jean Jaurès (1859-1914) â€" French anti-war activist, socialist leader
- Muhammad Ali Jinnah (1876â€"1948) â€" Pakistani, founder of Pakistan, lawyer, organizer, inspiration to movement leaders
- Pope Saint John Paul II â€" Polish Catholic Pope, inspiration, advocate
- Helen John â€" first full-time member of the Greenham Common peace camp
- Helen Keller â€" deafblind writer, speech "Strike Against The War" Carnegie Hall, New York 1916
- Kathy Kelly (1952) â€" American peace and anti-war activist, arrested over 60 times during protests. Member and organizer of international peace teams.
- Khan Abdul Gaffar Khan- Pakistani, called "Frontier Gandhi" by the Indians
- Steve Killelea â€" initiated Global Peace Index and Institute for Economics and Peace
- Adam Kokesh (1982) â€" American activist, Iraq Veterans Against the War
- Martin Luther King, Jr. (1929-1968) â€" prominent American anti-Vietnam war protester, speaker, inspiration
- Ron Kovic â€" American Vietnam war veteran, war protestor
- Paul Krassner â€" American anti-Vietnam war organizer, writer, Yippie co-founder
- Henri La Fontaine â€" initiator, organizer, Nobel Peace Prize winner
- William Ladd (1778â€"1841) â€" early American activist, initiator, first president of the American Peace Society
- Bernard Lafayette â€" American organizer, educator, initiator
- Grigoris Lambrakis â€" Greek athlete, physician, politician, activist
- George Lansbury
- André Larivière â€" ecologist and anti-nuclear activist
- Bryan Law â€" Australian non-violent activist.
- John Lennon â€" British singer/songwriter, anti-war protestor
- Sidney Lens â€" American anti-Vietnam war leader
- Bertie Lewis (1920â€"2010) â€" RAF airman who went on to become a U.K. peace campaigner
- Thomas Lewis (1940â€"2008) â€" American artist, anti-war activist with (Baltimore Four and Catonsville Nine)
- James Loney â€" peace worker, kidnap victim
- Staughton Lynd â€" American anti-Vietnam war leader
- Bradford Lyttle (1927) â€" prominent American pacifist, writer, presidential candidate, and organizer with the Committee for Non-Violent Action
- Norman Mailer â€" American anti-war writer, war protestor
- Nelson Mandela (1918â€"2013) â€" South African statesman, leader in anti-apartheid movement and post-apartheid reconciliation, founder of The Elders, inspiration
- Mairead Corrigan Maguire â€" Northern Ireland peace movement, Nobel Prize winner
- Bob Marley â€" Jamaican, inspirational anti-war singer/songwriter, inspiration
- Eugene McCarthy â€" U.S. presidential candidate, ran on an anti-Vietnam war agenda
- John McConnell (1915â€"2012) â€" founder Earth Day, and U.N peace proclamation
- George McGovern â€" U.S. Senator, presidential candidate, anti-Vietnam war agenda
- David McTaggart (1932â€"2001) â€" Canadian anti-nuclear testing activist, co-founder Greenpeace International
- Rigoberta Menchú (1959) â€" Guatemalan indigenous rights, anti-war, co-founder Nobel Women's Initiative
- Chico Mendes (1944â€"1988) â€" Brazilian environmentalist and human rights advocate of peasants and indigenous peoples
- Thomas Merton (1915-1968) â€" monk and poet, inspirational writer, philosopher
- Barry Mitcalfe (1930â€"1986) â€" a leader of the New Zealand movement against the Vietnam War and the New Zealand anti-nuclear movement
- Alaa Murabit â€" Libyan Canadian physician and human rights advocate for inclusive peace and security
- A.J. Muste â€" American pacifist, organizer, anti-Vietnam War leader
- Abie Nathan (1927â€"2008) â€" Israeli humanitarian, founded Voice of Peace radio, met with all sides of a conflict
- Paul Newman â€" American anti-war protestor, inspiration
- Georg Friedrich Nicolai â€" German professor, famous or the book "The Biology of War"
- Sari Nusseibeh â€" Palestinian activist
- Phil Ochs â€" American anti-Vietnam war singer/songwriter, initiated protest events
- Yoko Ono â€" Japanese anti-Vietnam war campaigner in America and Europe
- Laurence Overmire â€" poet, author, theorist
- Olof Palme â€" Swedish prime minister, diplomat
- Frédéric Passy (1822-1912) - French economist, peace activist and joint winner (together with Henry Dunant) of the first Nobel Peace Prize (1901)
- Linus Pauling â€" American anti-nuclear testing advocate and leader
- Concepcion Picciotto â€" anti-nuclear and anti-war protestor, White House Peace Vigil
- Peace Pilgrim â€" walked the highways and streets of America promoting peace
- Lindis Percy
- Joseph Polowsky (1916-1983) - American GI, advocate of better relations between the U.S. and Soviet Union between 1955 and 1983.
- Jeannette Rankin
- Marcus Raskin
- Dahlia Ravikovitch
- Henry Richard (1812â€"1888) â€" English minister known as "the Apostle of Peace", was secretary of the Peace Society for forty years (1848â€"84).
- Romain Rolland (1866â€"1944) - French dramatist, novelist, essayist, anti-war activist
- Oscar Romero (1917-1980) â€" Venerable Archbishop of San Salvador
- Arundhati Roy (1961â€") â€" Indian writer, social critic and peace activist
- Jerry Rubin â€" American anti-Vietnam war leader, co-founder of the Yippies
- Bertrand Russell â€" British anti-nuclear bomb activist, philosopher
- Carl Sagan
- Ed Sanders (1939) â€" American poet, organizer, singer, co-founder of anti-war band The Fugs
- Mohamed Sahnoun (1931) - Algerian diplomat, peace activist, UN envoy to Somalia and to the Great Lakes region
- Mark Satin â€" anti-war proponent, draft-resistance organizer, writer, philosopher
- Jonathan Schell (1943â€"2014) â€" American writer and campaigner against nuclear weapons, antiwar activist
- Sophie Scholl
- Albert Schweitzer (1875â€"1965) â€" German/French activist against nuclear weapons and nuclear weapon testing whose speeches were published as Peace or Atomic War. Co-founder of The Committee for a Sane Nuclear Policy.
- Pete Seeger (1919â€"2014) â€" anti-war protestor, inspirational singer/songwriter
- Jeff Sharlet â€" anti-Vietnam war soldier, journalist
- Gene Sharp â€" nonviolent writer and academian
- Cindy Sheehan â€" American anti-Iraq and anti-Afghanistan war leader
- Martin Sheen â€" anti-war and anti-nuclear bomb protestor, inspirational American actor
- Nancy Shelley, OAM, Quaker who represented the Australian peace movement at the UN in 1982.
- Percy Shelley â€" writer, poet, nonviolent philosopher and inspiration
- Dick Sheppard
- Toma Sik
- Jeanmarie Simpson
- Ramjee Singh â€" Indian activist, philosopher and Gandhian
- Samantha Smith â€" young advocate of peace between Soviets and Americans
- Benjamin Spock â€" anti-Vietnam war protestor, writer, inspiration
- Olaf Stapledon
- Cat Stevens
- Bertha von Suttner â€" writer, organizer, Nobel's inspiration for Nobel Peace Prize
- Kathleen Tacchi-Morris â€" founder of Women for World Disarmament
- Tank Man â€" Stood in front of tank during 1989 China protest
- Eve Tetaz
- Thomas (1947â€"2009) â€" initiated, long-time participant, White House peace vigil
- Ellen Thomas â€" long-time participant, White House peace vigil
- Henry David Thoreau â€" American writer, philosopher, inspiration to movement leaders
- Leo Tolstoy â€" Russian writer on nonviolence, inspiration to Gandhi, Bevel, and other movement leaders
- Benjamin Franklin Trueblood â€" 19th century writer, editor, organizer, initiator
- Barbara Grace Tucker â€" Australian born peace activist, long time participant of the Parliament Square Peace Campaign
- Desmond Tutu â€" South African cleric, initiator, anti-apartheid, inspiration
- Jo Vallentine
- Mordechai Vanunu
- Lanza del Vasto â€" Gandhian, anti-war, anti-nuclear
- Sérgio Vieira de Mello
- Stellan Vinthagen (1964) Swedish anti-war and nonviolent resistance scholar-activist
- Kurt Vonnegut â€" American anti-war and anti-nuclear writer and protestor
- John Wallach
- Alyn Ware (1962) â€" New Zealand peace educator and campaigner, Global Coordinator for Parliamentarians for Nuclear Nonproliferation and Disarmament since 2002
- Owen Wilkes â€" New Zealand peace researcher and activist
- Jody Williams â€" American anti-landmine advocate and organizer, Nobel Peace Prize winner
- S. Brian Willson â€" American veteran, peace activist and lawyer
- Lawrence S. Wittner â€" peace historian, researcher, and movement activist
- Walter Wolfgang (1923) â€" German-born British activist
- Peter Yarrow (1938) â€" American singer/songwriter, anti-war activist
- Adam Yauch â€" Musician, Buddhist, advocate for peace
- John Howard Yoder
- Neil Young â€" singer/songwriter, anti-war advocate, other causes
- Edip Yuksel â€" Kurdish-Turkish-American lawyer/author, Islamic peace proponent
- Alfred-Maurice de Zayas
- Howard Zinn â€" historian, writer, peace advocate
See also
References
