Prof. Michael Nagler, a scholar of principled nonviolence, points to person power as the core energy at the heart of any nonviolent social movement. Nonviolence begins with an individual’s conversion of a negative drive to a positive drive. When one person transforms fear, anger, and aggression, into universal love, compassion, and resilience, nonviolence is born. Even though two million people were in the streets of Manila during the Philippines People Power movement, it was “two million individual decisions” according to Cardinal Jaime Sin. Scholars of strategic nonviolence such as Gene Sharpe tend to think about people power as the key factor – get enough people together on the streets and anything is possible. (And a lack of discipline can result in an unhelpful mob mentality known as the effervescence of the crowd.) Person power is contrasted with – and often stands in opposition to – state power.