Gandhi

What was Gandhi’s role in South Africa?

* Gandhi worked as a solicitor in British-controlled South Africa, challenging discrimination against Indians there.
* Despite this, he initially supported the violent British suppression of the 1906 Zulu Uprising, even joining the British military (albeit as a medic).
* The great violence Gandhi came to witness inflicted on the Zulu community came to appal him, however, with the ‘true face’ of imperialism being revealed to him through political violence.
* This change is seen in his 1909 work *Hind Swaraj* (Indian Home Rule) which represented a turn towards non-violent anticolonialism.

What are the four meanings of Gandhi’s self-rule?

* **National Independence** - Freedom from foreign rule.
* **Political Freedom** - A belief in individual rights, and freedom from oppression.
* **Economic Freedom** - Gandhi advocated *Sarvodaya*, or welfare for all. He endorsed freedom from need as well as the previously mentioned freedom from oppression. His freedom can thus be seen in negative and positive terms.
* **Spiritual Freedom** - For Gandhi, this is characterised by self-restraint and internal discipline, and occurs within individuals.

Why did Gandhi initially view Indian civilisation as superior to British civilisation?

He argued that:

* **British Society** was characterised by secular values of domination, control and violence.
* **Indian Society** was characterised by spiritual values of truth, righteousness and compassion.

He argued that these foreign British values which had since taken root in India denigrated the Indian people, and encouraged subservient attitudes. British values must therefore be excluded from India.

He claims that other Indian advocates for independence replicated British ways of thinking, and merely wished to replace British-made oppressive institutions with Indian ones.

What did Gandhi primarily argue in *Hind Swaraj*?

* British rule in India is a symptom of modern secular civilisation, founded on brute force and exploitation.
* Indian civilisation is superior because it’s based on *love-force*, and spiritual values.
* *Swaraj* (self-rule) must arise from spiritual and moral empowerment. It must also be non-violent, to embody the spiritual values of Indian civilisation.
* Gandhi advocated *Sarvodaya,* the welfare of all, and *Swadeshi*, a community-based democratically-organised form of economics, which concerns prioritising the needs of one’s neighbours.
* He popularised the image of the *Chakra* to represent Indian home-spun cloth, a symbol of opposition to British imports.

How did the 1919 Amritsar Massacre influence Gandhi’s thoughts?

The Amritsar Massacre of 1919 saw the British Army open fire on peaceful protestors in India. It led Gandhi to increasingly become aware of the mutual relationship between British colonisers and Indian subjects.

He came to develop a movement less based on Indian superiority, but which understands that both British and Indian are oppressed in a system of colonialism. This new movement contained many British people outraged by the Amritsar Massacre.

What is *Satyagraha*?

This term applies to non-violent forms of existence.

Despite this, Gandhi rejected outright pacifism, arguing there are times when self-defence is necessary, and also rejected passive resistance, embracing active forms.

Ultimately, he advocated a radical transformation of the social system grounded in a radical transformation of the self.

What two forms of power did Gandhi believe in?

* ***Himsa*** is the power of violence, domination, and exploitation. It is power over others.
* ***Ahimsa*** is the power of nonviolence. It is power with others, and sustains all forms of life through relationships of interdependence and mutual aid.

*Ahimsa* is manifest *Satyagraha* spiritually, then through both *Swaraj* and *Swadeshi* politically.

How did Gandhi relate truth to spirituality?

Gandhi argues God to be the most real dimension in existence, and to know God is to encounter the truth about existence. As God is immaterial, to experience truth is also immaterial - it is spiritual.

Not one person, community or religion is able to experience the whole truth, and here Gandhi separates ‘absolute truth’ from ‘relative truth’. The abundance of relative truths is the reason for social conflict, and politics is concerned with responding to the problem of a ‘plurality of relative truths’.

How does Gandhi relate truth to non-violence?

* If truth is relative, there’s no reason to violently assert any particular relative truth on others.
* Attempting to coerce others into a particular relative truth is a political expression of an attempt to push a relative truth on a completely different context.
* Gandhi argues British colonialism to be an example of this, and this helps him to both delegitimise imperialism and the use of violence in politics.
* His ideas of *Ahimsa* see him oppose violence, to renounce it as a force in our lives, political or otherwise.
* This requires a person to develop non-violent ways of behaving and thinking through a thorough reordering of values, thoughts and habits.

What were the limits of non-violence from Gandhi’s perspective?

Gandhi defended the violent resistance of the Palestinians in their struggle against Israeli settler-colonialism.

In addition to truth, Gandhi sees the values of chastity, poverty, and courage as essential for non-violence. If one lacks the strength of will to use these values, it is difficult to resist non-violently.

It is better to use violence in response to violence in some cases than to not resist at all.

How did Gandhi use violence as a means and an end?

Gandhi argued the aim of anticolonial resistance is neither to defeat the enemy or impose a new institutional power structure, but to end all conflict over justice.

This argument doesn’t mean politics ends, but that the energy lost in violence should be integrated into a non-violent search for creative solutions to political disagreements.

Said solutions don’t appear as viable options until all participants engage in non-violent critical exchange.