Gandhi in the West (original) (raw)
Related papers
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 Limits of Gandhian Non-Violence
Countercurrents, 2021
This article is a brief analysis of the conditions under which the strategy of non-violent political protest can be effective, and the consequences of their absence.
Fidelity to Truth: Gandhi and the Genealogy of Civil Disobedience
Political Theory
Mohandas Gandhi is civil disobedience’s most original theorist and most influential mythmaker. As a newspaper editor in South Africa, he chronicled his experiments with satyagraha by drawing parallels to ennobling historical precedents. Most enduring of these were Socrates and Henry David Thoreau. The genealogy Gandhi invented in these years has become a cornerstone of contemporary liberal narratives of civil disobedience as a continuous tradition of conscientious appeal ranging from Socrates to King to Rawls. One consequence of this contemporary canonization of Gandhi’s narrative, however, has been to obscure the radical critique of violence that originally motivated it. This essay draws on Edward Said’s account of travelling theory to unsettle the myth of doctrine that has formed around civil disobedience. By placing Gandhi’s genealogy in the context of his critique of modern civilization, as well as his formative but often-overlooked encounter with the British women’s suffrage movement, it reconstructs Gandhi’s paradoxical notion that sacrificial political action is the fullest expression of self-rule. For Gandhi, Socrates and Thoreau exemplify civil disobedience as a fearless practice of fidelity to truth profoundly at odds with liberal conceptions of disobedience as fidelity to law.
Religions, 2021
This article puts political philosopher Judith Butler in conversation with Gandhi, on the topic of nonviolent resistance. More particularly, we compare them on a systematic philosophical level. Although we focus on Gandhi’s more activist side, by delving into the ontological presuppositions that Butler and Gandhi share, we can do some justice to how his activism is firmly rooted in a faith-based understanding of the world. We discuss four themes in each of which they complement each other: namely, the ontological roots of the nonviolent imperative; their rejection of an instrumental view of violence; nonviolent resistance seen as communicative action; and nonviolence viewed as a way of life. This discussion shows that while they have very different starting points and vocabularies, and while some tensions remain, there is much scope for cooperation, solidarity and alliance between religious and nonreligious practitioners of nonviolent resistance.
Gandhi in the West
Later on, his actions would be famous. Admirers could eventually invoke a catechism of apparent victories: South Africa, Champaran, Vykon, Kotgarh, Kheda, Bardoli. There was a mill strike in Ahmedabad, and a battle for the right to parade in Nagpur. A national campaign of nonco-operation would be remembered as a humiliation for the Prince of Wales and a serious affront to the authority of the Raj. Gandhi's 1923 speech from the dock of the accused would ultimately be celebrated as a 'masterpiece'. His bodily experiments would be picked over by learned scholars, and his fasts would enjoy recognition as genuine victories for the spirit of love. Years after his passing, the Mahatma's march to make salt at Dandi would be hailed as one of the founding events of global media history. 1 But all of this was later, much deferred. Western recognition was horribly belated. At first, there was incomprehension. While the eyes of the Westerner fixed intently on the strange person of Gandhi, his precise activities were long enveloped in a curtain of ignorance and misunderstanding. For years it remained difficult to establish exactly what Gandhi did, why he was so inspired, or what he aimed to achieve. Why so hard? When Indians began to question imperial rule, the British state acted immediately to restrict their freedoms of assembly 2 Gandhism in action
Another Realism: The Politics of Gandhian Nonviolence
American Political Science Review, 2012
Although Gandhi is often taken to be an exemplary moral idealist in politics, this article seeks to demonstrate that Gandhian nonviolence is premised on a form of political realism, specifically a contextual, consequentialist, and moral-psychological analysis of a political world understood to be marked by inherent tendencies toward conflict, domination, and violence. By treating nonviolence as the essential analog and correlative response to a realist theory of politics, one can better register the novelty of satyagraha(nonviolent action) as a practical orientation in politics as opposed to a moral proposition, ethical stance, or standard of judgment. The singularity of satyagraha lays in its self-limiting character as a form of political action that seeks to constrain the negative consequences of politics while working toward progressive social and political reform. Gandhian nonviolence thereby points toward a transformational realism that need not begin and end in conservatism, moral equivocation, or pure instrumentalism.
Inspired by Gandhi: Mahatma Gandhi's Influence on Significant Leaders of Nonviolence
History in Flux, 2020
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.
Nonviolent Resistance: The Legacy of Mahatma Gandhi and Gene Sharp
Journal of Vytapeni , 2023
This study investigates the huge impact of legendary characters, Mahatma Gandhi and Gene Sharp in the domain of nonviolent resistance. Both figures played pivotal role in shaping the ideology and application of nonviolent resistance, leaving an indelible influence on countless movements and inspiring millions across the globe. This research thoroughly examines their distinct contributions to this field, explores the parallels and discrepancies in their ideologies, and evaluates the enduring significance of their concepts within contemporary contexts. Through an analysis of the interplay between Gene Sharp's intellectual contributions and Mahatma Gandhi's pragmatic utilization of nonviolence, this study aims to provide insights into the enduring principles of nonviolent resistance and its transformative potential in the pursuit of social and political change. Keywords- Mahatma Gandhi, Gene Sharp, Nonviolent Resistance, Non-violence, and social change.
Rediscovering Gandhi and Principled Nonviolence: An Imperative for the 21st Century
Thammasat Review, 2015
Violence is the behaviour of someone incapable of imagining other solutions to the problem at hand" Bettelheim "I oppose all violence because the good it does is always temporary but the harm it does is permanent" Gandhi. "Nonviolence is a Weapon of the Strong" Gandhi "Nonviolence is fine as long as it works" Malcolm X "Nonviolence is a flop. The only bigger flop is violence" Joan Baez "To kill one man is to be guilty of a capital crime, to kill ten men is to increase the guilt tenfold , to kill a hundred men is to increase it a hundred-fold. This the rulers of the earth all recognise and yet when it comes to the greatest crime-waging war on another state-they praise it..." Mozi, China 470-391 BC This paper argues that while strategic nonviolence is necessary for the overthrow of repressive regimes it is not sufficient for the social, economic and political transformations that follow. Many of the nonviolent revolutions that have succeeded recently in overthrowing dictators and autocrats have not been successful in initiating short, medium and long term peace dividends for the people nor a radical critique of traditional approaches to governance. This paper argues that these things will only happen if nonviolent leaders and followers have a principled approach to social change. It is this which will enable a strong service oriented social and political compass. Without a deep and principled dedication to care for the welfare of others any tactical political change will founder on the rocks of pragmatic and sectional politics.