THOREAU AND THE RELEVANCE OF CIVIL DISOBEDIENCE

Abstract

David H. Thoreau died in May 1862. The United States was in the second year of the War of Secession. He didn't live long enough to see what David Griffith would call in the 20th century, The Birth of a Nation (1915); that is, the hegemonic economic and military power on the continent, unified around industrial capitalism and imperialism. With the end of the civil war, abolition and industrialization, the expansion of the railroads and the conquest of the west and south, expanding its territorial extension, the country advanced until it consolidated itself after the Great War as a military and industrial power, established on the foundations of imperialist capital and the “Monroe” and “Manifest Destiny” doctrines. The work of the pacifist, libertarian and naturalist philosopher, however, will serve as an inspiration against imperialism, colonialism, militarism and authoritarianism in the 20th century and to this day. Thus, based on the historical materialist method, the following article seeks to unveil the historical context in which "civil disobedience" was conceived, highlighting its relevance as a form of resistance to arbitrariness and oppression in the context of capital imperialism.