Joan Bondurant

Joan Bondurant
Born	(1918-12-18)December 18, 1918 Great Bend, Kansas
Died	Tucson, Arizona
Citizenship	American
Fields	Political science, civil resistance, nonviolent revolution
Institutions	University of California, Berkeley, University of the Pacific
Alma mater	University of Michigan
Influences	Mohandas K. Gandhi

Joan Valerie Bondurant (1918–2006) was an American political scientist and former spy for the Office of Strategic Services (OSS) during World War II. She is best known as the author of Conquest of Violence (1958), a book on Gandhian political philosophy.

Early life and intelligence work

Bondurant was born on 16 December 1918 in Great Bend, Kansas. She was gifted in the piano, and graduated from the University of Michigan with a degree in music.

When WWII broke out, she learned Japanese, and was sent to work for the OSS in India, arriving in New Delhi in May, 1944.

Scholarly career and later life

While in India, she met Mahatma Gandhi, and became interested in his nonviolent approach to politics. Returning to the US, Bondurant obtained a doctoral degree in political science at the University of California, Berkeley (1952). She then published Conquest of Violence (1958), a widely reviewed and influential book on Gandhian politics.

Later, she took a job teaching at University of the Pacific.

See also

• Gene Sharp

External links

• Sketches of India (autobiographical work of first India trip, with many photos)
• At Bondurant family website