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Katherine Johnson’s mathematical calculations helped guide some of America’s most important early space missions while she confronted the racial and gender barriers faced by Black women in twentieth-century America.
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This is a personal recollection on the Move fire on May 13, 1985
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David Cortright | |
|---|---|
 David Cortright - Professor Emeritus at the Keough School of Global Affairs | |
| Born | November 15, 1946[1] East Stroudsburg, PA[1] |
| Academic work | |
| Institutions | University of Notre Dame |
Notable works | Soldiers in Revolt: GI Resistance During the Vietnam War Waging Peace in Vietnam: U.S. Soldiers and Veterans Who Opposed the War Peace: A History of Movements and Ideas |
David Cortright is an American scholar and peace activist. He is a veteran who is currently professor emeritus and special adviser for policy studies at the Keough School of Global Affairs and Kroc Institute for International Peace Studies at the University of Notre Dame, and the author, co-author, editor or co-editor of 22 books. Cortright has a long history of public advocacy for disarmament and the prevention of war.
Cortright is a 1968 graduate of the University of Notre Dame. In 1970 he received his M.A. from New York University, and completed his doctoral studies in 1975 at the Union Institute in residence at the Institute for Policy Studies in Washington, D.C.[2]
As a soldier during the Vietnam War, Cortright joined with fellow soldiers to speak out against the war as part of the GI peace movement.[3] He was 1 of 1,365 servicemen who signed an antiwar ad in The New York Times published on November 9, 1969 (see image below).[4]
In 1977, Cortright was named the executive director of The Committee for a SANE Nuclear Policy (SANE), which under his direction became the largest disarmament organization in the U.S. Cortright initiated the 1987 merger of SANE and the Nuclear Weapons Freeze Campaign and served for a time as co-director of the merged organization.[5] In 2002 Cortright helped to found the Win Without War coalition in opposition to the U.S. invasion of Iraq.
In 1992 he was named President of the Fourth Freedom Forum, an operating foundation based in Indiana. Cortright worked in cooperation with George A. Lopez at the Kroc Institute to guide the Forum in sponsoring conferences and publications on strategies for enhancing the effectiveness of multilateral economic sanctions and reducing humanitarian harms.
In 2014 he joined with Tom Hayden and others from the anti-Vietnam War movement to demand that the Department of Defense change a "rose-colored portrayal" of the Vietnam War on the government agency's website.[6] Following the 2016 Colombian peace agreement referendum, he served as Director of the Kroc Institute's Peace Accords Matrix to support implementation of the 300-page agreement.[7]
Cortright is widely known for his pioneering scholarship and sustained advocacy in several interconnected areas of peace and conflict studies.[8] Central to his work is the promotion of nonviolent social change and civil resistance as powerful tools for achieving political and social justice.[9] Drawing from his own experiences as a Vietnam-era soldier who actively organized protests within the military, Cortright has emphasized the critical role that grassroots activism plays in shaping broader political movements and influencing public policy.[10] His leadership in the nuclear disarmament movement is particularly notable.[11] Cortright was involved in the nuclear freeze campaign of the 1980s, which mobilized millions of Americans to freeze and reverse the arms race and helped shift public opinion on Cold War arms control.[12]
Beyond disarmament, Cortright has made substantial contributions to understanding and advocating for the strategic use of multilateral sanctions and incentives as effective instruments for international conflict prevention and resolution.[13]
His research, often in collaboration with other experts, has influenced how governments and international organizations apply sanctions not just as punitive measures but as nuanced tools to encourage compliance with peace agreements and international norms.[14] He has provided research services to several foreign ministries, including those of Canada, Sweden, Switzerland, Japan, Germany, Denmark, and The Netherlands, and has advised agencies of the United Nations, the Carnegie Commission on Preventing Deadly Conflict, the International Peace Academy, and the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation.[15][16][17]
He collaborated with George A. Lopez, Alistair Millar and others in analyzing nonmilitary means of countering terrorism and violent extremism.[18]
He worked with civil society organizations to analyze the often harmful impacts of counterterrorism measures on development and peacebuilding activities in affected countries. He co-authored the report Friend Not Foe, with support from the Dutch development agency Cordaid.[19] He was a consultant to Catholic Relief Services on guidelines for improving governance in local communities receiving development and humanitarian assistance.[20]
Cortright's historical analyses of peace movements in the United States, including the Iraq antiwar movement, the Nuclear Freeze movement and the Vietnam antiwar movement, highlight the complex interplay between mass protest, electoral politics, and shifts in government policy.[21] He documents how these movements, driven by diverse coalitions of activists, veterans, students, and faith communities, were instrumental in ending wars and reshaping American attitudes toward military engagement and nuclear policy.[22]
Cortright's work bridges the gap between local grassroots activism and global peace policy, illustrating how participatory and inclusive approaches at the community level can contribute to sustainable peace and governance worldwide.[11]
Cortright's journey as a peace activist began during his service in the U.S. Army amid the Vietnam War.[23] Drafted in 1968 at the height of the conflict, Cortright was initially a non-political young man from a conservative Catholic working-class family.[24] He volunteered for the Army Band to avoid infantry combat, and was stationed at Fort Wadsworth, New York, and later at Ft. Bliss Texas.[25] Early exposure to the realities of the war and conversations with returning veterans deeply challenged the official military narrative he had been taught.[26]
As he immersed himself in studying the history of Vietnam, including reading a biography of Ho Chi Minh, Cortright came to view the Vietnamese struggle as one for independence rather than Communist aggression, likening Ho Chi Minh to a George Washington figure.[27]
Struggling with these realizations, Cortright experienced intense internal conflict about his role in the military and contemplated options such as desertion and conscientious objection but ultimately sought a path of open dissent that would allow him to stay engaged with his family and community.[28] Inspired by early examples of organized opposition within the military such as the American Servicemen's Union at Fort Sill, Oklahoma, he decided to join the growing GI antiwar resistance movement.[29]
Despite the risks, including potential military discipline, Cortright actively organized protests, circulated underground newspapers, and fostered discussions among soldiers opposing the war.[30]
His activism reflected a broader surge of opposition within the ranks that significantly contributed to shifting public opinion and applying pressure on U.S. policymakers.[14]
When Cortright and other soldiers at Ft. Wadsworth faced disciplinary punishments, he and his colleagues filed a lawsuit against the army in federal court, Cortright v Resor. The Eastern District of New York ruled in favor of the plaintiffs, but the Second Circuit Court of Appeals overturned the ruling.[31]
Cortright's experience as an active-duty soldier turned peace activist laid the foundation for his lifelong commitment to nonviolent social change, disarmament, and peace advocacy.[4]
He is the author or co-editor of 22 books:
{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link)
Source: Wikipedia. Article content is retrieved live through the MediaWiki API.
David Cortright is an American scholar and peace activist. He is a veteran who is currently professor emeritus and special adviser for policy studies at the Keough School of Global Affairs and Kroc Institute for International Peace Studies at the University of Notre Dame, and the author, co-author, editor or co-editor of 22 books. Cortright has a long history of public advocacy for disarmament and the prevention of war.
Cortright is a surname of Flemish origin, an English variation is Cartwright. Notable people with the surname include: Elizabeth Monroe Kortright, First lady, wife of President James Monroe 5th President of U.S. David Cortright, American peace activist Edgar Cortright (1923–2014), American scientist and engineer Ion Cortright (1889 - 1961), American football player and coach Petra Cortright (b. 1986), American Internet artist Richard Cortright (1929 - 2009), American cyclist Stephen Cortright (b. 1941), American military officer and attorney Less commonly, Cortright is used as a given name. Cortright McMeel (1971 - 2013), American novelist
A Matter of Conscience: GI Resistance During the Vietnam War is an artist book published in 1992 at the time of the Addison Gallery of American Art exhibition, “A Matter of Conscience” and “Vietnam Revisited.” It contains oral histories of Vietnam era GIs, gathered and edited by Willa Seidenberg and William Short, and 58 photographs by William Short. Each oral history is complemented by a portrait in which the Vietnam veteran holds an object of some significance such as a newspaper clipping, a legal document, a book, or photograph. The large black and white photographs allow readers to see the veteran while reading the brief but moving oral histories to learn why they turned against the Vietnam War. The veterans' stories and portraits were collected over a five-year period and have been exhibited throughout the United States, Vietnam, Japan and Australia. A number of them were also included in the book Waging Peace in Vietnam: U.S. Soldiers and Veterans Who Opposed the War edited by Ron Carver, David Cortright, and Barbara Doherty. It was published in September 2019 by New Village Press. Also, the A Matter of Conscience oral history interviews with GI resisters were turned into an ongoing podcast, which started being in produced in 2025 for the 50th anniversary of the end of the Vietnam War.
Soldiers in Revolt: GI Resistance During the Vietnam War was the first comprehensive exploration of the disaffection, resistance, rebellion and organized opposition to the Vietnam War within the ranks of the U.S. Armed Forces. It was the first book written by David Cortright, a Vietnam veteran who is currently Professor Emeritus and special adviser for policy studies at the Keough School of Global Affairs and Kroc Institute for International Peace Studies at the University of Notre Dame, and the author, co-author, editor or co-editor of 22 books. Originally published as the war was ending in 1975, it was republished in 2005 with an introduction by the well known progressive historian Howard Zinn. Despite being first published 51 years ago, it remains the definitive history of this often ignored subject. The book argues persuasively, with encyclopedic rigor, the still under appreciated fact that by the early 1970s the U.S. armed forces, particularly its ground forces, were essentially breaking down; experiencing a deep crises of moral, discipline and combat effectiveness. Cortright reveals, for example, that in fiscal year 1972, there were more conscientious objectors than draftees, and precipitous declines in both officer enrollments and non-officer enlistments. He also documents "staggering level[s]" of desertions, increasing nearly 400% in the United States Army from 1966 to 1971. Perhaps more importantly, Cortright makes a convincing case for this unraveling being both a product and an integral part of the anti-Vietnam War sentiment and movement widespread within U.S. society and worldwide at the time. He documents hundreds of GI antiwar and antimilitary organizations, thousands of individual and group acts of resistance, hundreds of GI underground newspapers, and highlights the role of Black GIs militantly fighting racism and the war. This is where the book stands alone as the first and most systematic study of the antiwar and dissident movements impact and growth within the U.S. armed forces during the Vietnam War. While other books, articles and studies have examined this subject, none have done it as thoroughly and systematically.
Before the 1921 destruction of Tulsa’s Greenwood District, Black residents had created a remarkable center of business and community life. The district included stores, professional offices, entertainment venues and homes owned by Black citizens. Understanding Greenwood means learning what was built—not only what was burned.
MORE →The Greenwood District.
