Related Papers
GANDHI’S PHILOSOPHY OF NON-VIOLENCE: A CRITIQUE
SMART M O V E S J O U R N A L IJELLH
The present paper discusses the philosophy of ‘nonviolence’ (ahimsa) of Mahatma Gandhi, which he devised as a weapon to fight the brute forces of violence and hatred, hailing it as the only way to peace. Gandhi based his philosophy of nonviolence on the principle of love for all and hatred for none. He thought violence as an act caused to a person directly or indirectly, denying him his legitimate rights in the society by force, injury or deception. Gandhi’s nonviolence means avoiding violent means to achieve one’s end, howsoever, lofty it might be, as he firmly believed that the use of violence, even if in the name of achieving a justifiable end was not good, as it would bring more violence. He firmly adhered to the philosophy of Gita that preaches to follow the rightful path, remaining oblivious of its outcome. Gandhi used nonviolence in both his personal and political life and used it first in South Africa effectively and back home he applied it in India against the British with far more astounding success, as it proved supremely useful and efficacious in liberating the country from the British servitude. However, he never tried to use it as a political tactic to embarrass the opponent or to take undue
Gandhi and his non-violence
Dwaipayan Sen
Political and social movements in South Africa, the United States of America, Germany, Myanmar, India, and elsewhere, have drawn inspiration from the non-violent political techniques advocated by Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi during his leadership of the anti-colonial struggle for Indian freedom from British colonial rule. This course charts a global history of Gandhi's thought about non-violence and its expression in civil disobedience and resistance movements both in India and the world. Organized in three modules, the first situates Gandhi through consideration of the diverse sources of his own historical and ideological formation; the second examines the historical contexts and practices through which non-violence acquired meaning for him and considers important critiques; the third explores the various afterlives of Gandhian politics in movements throughout the world. We will examine autobiography and biography, Gandhi's collected works, various types of primary source, political, social, and intellectual history, and audiovisual materials. In addition to widely disseminated narratives of Gandhi as a symbol of non-violence, the course will closely attend to the deep contradictions concerning race, caste, gender, and class that characterized his thought and action. By unsettling conventional accounts of his significance, we will grapple with the problem of how to make sense of his troubled legacy.
The Normative Ethics of Gandhian Nonviolence
2013 •
Jacob N . Bauer
MAHATMA GANDHI’S PHILOSOPHY ON NON-VIOLENCE
IJAR Indexing
This paper demonstrates that the political theory of Mahatma Gandhi provides us a novel way to understand and arbitrate the conflict among moral projects. Gandhi offers us a vision of political action that insists on the viability of the search for truth and the implicit possibility of adjudicating among competing claims to truth. His vision also presents a more complex and realistic understanding, than some other contemporary pluralists, of political philosophy and of political life itself. In an increasingly multicultural world, political theory is presented with perhaps it’s most vigorous challenge yet. As radically different moral projects confront one another, the problem of competing claims of truth arising from particular views of the human good remains crucial for political philosophy and political action. Recent events have demonstrated that the problem is far from being solved and that its implications are more far-reaching than the domestic politics of industrialized nations. As the problem of violence has also become coterminous with issues of pluralism, many have advocated the banishing of truth claims from politics altogether. Political theorists have struggled to confront this problem through a variety of conceptual lenses. Debates pertaining to the politics of multiculturalism, tolerance, or recognition have all been concerned with the question of pluralism as one of the most urgent facts of political life, in need of both theoretical and practical illumination.
History in Flux
Inspired by Gandhi: Mahatma Gandhi's Influence on Significant Leaders of Nonviolence
2020 •
Anna Aklan
The leader of the Indian independence movement, Mahatma Gandhi, left an invaluable legacy: he proved to the world that it was possible to achieve political aims without the use of violence. He was the first political activist to develop strategies of nonviolent mass resistance based on a solid philosophical and uniquely religious foundation. Since Gandhi’s death in 1948, in many parts of the world, this legacy has been received and continued by others facing oppression, inequality, or a lack of human rights. This article is a tribute to five of the most faithful followers of Gandhi who have acknowledged his inspiration for their political activities and in choosing nonviolence as a political method and way of life: Khan Abdul Ghaffar Khan, Martin Luther King, Louis Massignon, the Dalai Lama, and Malala Yousafzai. This article describes their formative leadership and their significance and impact on regional and global politics and history.
Gandhian Nonviolence as a Response to Epistemological Violence
Peter Cox
In an important but often overlooked 1988 paper, Vandana Shiva described the impact of dominant forms of reductionist models of scientific knowledge as ‘epistemological violence’. The impact of the application of such approaches as the basis of social change, particularly in the case of development programmes, was highlighted as socially divisive and culturally destructive. In the intervening years, the impact of global capitalism and the development of more novel forms of social and cultural imperialism have only exacerbated the condition that Shiva identified. Whilst Gandhian methods of nonviolence are comfortably aligned with processes of reconciliation and harmonisation in the aims of reducing conflict, it is all too easily overlooked that they derive from a process designed to confront and to remove imperial rule, and to challenge the underpinning conceptualisation which divides the world into the ruler and the potential subject. In the context of the hegemony of contemporary global capital, therefore, it is important to reinterpret the significance of Gandhian nonviolence as a means by which the reductionist epistemology of global capital, whereby ultimate value and meaning are reduced to economic units, can be also be challenged and confronted. A further impact of this utilitarian arbitration of values is that it reshapes other consideration of the good life except insofar as it conforms to the dominant rationality. This paper, therefore looks towards the development of Gandhian nonviolence not simply as technique or means (although these are by no means unimportant), but as an emancipatory praxis - a critical process of emancipation. Reductionist epistemologies, whether scientific, political or economic imply conditions of subordination, where dominant knowledges are able to reproduce themselves by denying the validity of alternative experience, explanation and valuation. Nonviolence as theory and practice is hereby read as a transformative framework that refutes the subordination of any social ‘other’.
Profound Revolution: Towards an Integrated Understanding of Nonviolence
Saskia L E Van Goelst Meijer
This dissertation studies nonviolence in the context of Humanistic Studies, a multi-disciplinary academic field that criticallly explores issues of (existential) meaning and humanization; the personal and social aspects of 'good living'. From this background this study focusses on contemporary nonviolence, using this term not only to point to the absence of violence, but to that which can take its place. Nonviolence is thus understood as a substantive method to create societal and interpersonal change, and even as a paradigm. The aim of the study is twofold. Firstly to descern if it is possible to understand nonviolence a concept independent from specific cultural, religious or practical context. Secondly to see if from such an independent notion it is possible to develop a framework for analysis and practice. The Gandhian understanding of nonviolence is the startingpoint ot this study. However, many developments in nonviolence theory and practice have taken place after Gandhi. This dissertation studies the way Gandhian concepts have caried over, and are changed and expanded by other thinkers and practitioners and what remains the same. From this search it is concluded that five basic elements form the core of contemporary nonviolence: satya (truthseeking), ahimsa (non-harming), tapasya (self-suffering), sarvodaya (the welfare of all) and swadeshi/swaraj (relational autonomy). Together they point to a specific way of wielding power called integrative power, which lies at the heart of nonviolence.
The New Nonviolence — Remembering the Spirit of Gandhi
Harry C Boyte
This is a version of The New Nonviolence talk at the State Capitol of Minnesota, October 7, published in Huffington Post
Violence and Non-violence today—How Gandhian Principles can help in reducing Violence
Professor Ravi P Bhatia
There are serious problems of deprivation, poverty, lack of educational and health facilities, marginalization and victimization of millions of people in many parts of the world including India where a vast majority of the population are adversely affected. Although many sections of this population suffer silently, occasionally they rise in protest and commit violence on the state and others individuals. We discuss the nature of different forms of violence and the principal factors leading to conflict and violence. Examples of these diverse forms of violence as well as the violence usually termed as Maoist or Naxal violence witnessed in certain tribal or indigenous areas of India, are also considered. Mahatma Gandhi emphasized truth, non-violence and peace and advocated a people-centred approach to development. He also proposed suitable education and economic development programmes and action that would help in reduction of disparities and poverty, rural uplift, environmental protection and amity between different religions. He led a simple life and was particular about limiting one’s wants and needs. We discuss the relevance of the Gandhian principles of truth, Satyagraha, non-violence, proper educational system and religious tolerance and argue that these principles can be applied even in the contemporary situation for reduction of conflict and violence by advancing the welfare of deprived sections of people, protection of the environment and by promoting peace and understanding amongst peoples. These principles have universal validity and have been successfully adopted by several countries and peoples.
THE ROAD TO THE CULTURE OF NONVIOLENCE
Vetrickarthick Rajarathinam
