Haim Omer is the founder of  NVR (non-violent resistance), as an approach to parents, schools and communities.  He is emeritus professor at the School of Psychological Sciences at Tel-Aviv University. His parents survived the Holocaust and emigrated to Brazil, where Haim was born in 1949. He lives in Israel since 1967. 

 

He is the author of eleven books (translated into 12 languages) and over eighty academic articles.  His best known books are:

- "Non-violent resistance: A new approach to violent and self-destructive children" (Cambridge University Press, 2004) 

- "The new authority: Family, school and community" (Cambridge University Press, 2011)

- "Parental vigilant care: A guide for clinicians and caretakers" (Routledge, 2017)

-  "The psychology of demonization" (with Nahi Alon, Lawrence Erlbaum 2006 – the book was graced with a preface by the Dalai Lama)

- "Treating child and adolescent anxiety: A guide for caregivers" (with Eli Lebowitz, Wiley, 2013). 

 

He has developed the model of Non-Violent Resistance and The New Authority in its application to families, schools and communities.  The model aims at strengthening parents and teachers by strictly non-violent and non-escalating means.  He has published many studies on the method and its applications with parents of children with externalizing disorders, anxiety disorders, juvenile delinquency, teen-drivers, violence against siblings, prevention of computer and smartphone abuse, child-to-parent violence, foster parents and school refusal. There have been five  international conferences devoted to the method (Greenwich, Antwerp, Munich, Malmo and Tel-Aviv; the sixth will be Held at Linz, Austria, in 2020).  Haim is married and has five children: Anat, Yonatan, the author Mike Omer, the painter Noam Omer and Yael.  He dedicated one of his books to "my five children, who taught me all I know about parental helplessness".