Satyagraha - WikiHQ

thumb|[[Mahatma Gandhi leading the famous 1930 Salt March, a notable example of satyagraha.]]

Satyāgraha, or "truth force", is a particular form of nonviolent resistance or civil resistance. Someone who practises satyagraha is a satyagrahi.

The term satyagraha was coined and developed by Mahatma Gandhi (1869–1948) as early as 1919.

Gandhi practised satyagraha as part of the Indian independence movement and also during his earlier struggles in South Africa for Indian rights. Satyagraha theory influenced Martin Luther King Jr.'s and James Bevel's campaigns during the Civil Rights Movement in the United States, as well as Nelson Mandela's struggle against apartheid in South Africa and many other social-justice and similar movements.

Principles

Gandhi envisioned satyagraha as not only a tactic to be used in acute political struggle but as a universal solvent for injustice and harm.

He founded the Sabarmati Ashram to teach satyagraha. He asked satyagrahis to follow the following principles

Nonviolence (ahimsa)
Truth – this includes honesty, but goes beyond it to mean living fully in accord with and in devotion to that which is true
Not stealing
Non-possession (not the same as poverty)
Body-labour or bread-labour
Control of desires (gluttony)
Fearlessness
Equal respect for all religions
Economic strategy such as boycotts of imported goods (swadeshi)

On another occasion, he listed these rules as "essential for every Satyagrahi in India":

Must have a living faith in God
Must be leading a chaste life and be willing to die or lose all his possessions
Must be a habitual khadi weaver and spinner
Must abstain from alcohol and other intoxicants

Rules for campaigns

Gandhi proposed a series of rules for satyagrahis to follow in a resistance campaign:

For Gandhi, satyagraha went far beyond mere "passive resistance" and became strength in practising non-violent methods. In his words:

In September 1935, in a letter to P. Kodanda Rao, Servants of India Society, Gandhi disputed the proposition that his idea of civil disobedience was adapted from the writings of Henry David Thoreau, especially the essay Civil Disobedience published in 1849.

Gandhi described it as follows:

Contrast to "passive resistance"

Gandhi distinguished between satyagraha and passive resistance in the following letter:

Relation to ahimsa

There is a connection between ahimsa and satyagraha. Satyagraha is sometimes used to refer to the whole principle of nonviolence, where it is essentially the same as ahimsa, and sometimes used in a "marked" meaning to refer specifically to direct action that is largely obstructive, for example in the form of civil disobedience.

Gandhi says:

Defining success

Assessing the extent to which Gandhi's ideas of satyagraha were or were not successful in the Indian independence struggle is a complex task. Judith Brown has suggested that "this is a political strategy and technique which, for its outcomes, depends greatly on historical specificities." The view taken by Gandhi differs from the idea that the goal in any conflict is necessarily to defeat the opponent or frustrate the opponent's objectives, or to meet one's own objectives despite the efforts of the opponent to obstruct these. In satyagraha, by contrast, "The Satyagrahi's object is to convert, not to coerce, the wrong-doer." The opponent must be converted, at least as far as to stop obstructing the just end, for this cooperation to take place. There are cases, to be sure, when an opponent, e.g. a dictator, has to be unseated and one cannot wait to convert him. The satyagrahi would count this a partial success.

Means and ends

The theory of satyagraha sees means and ends as inseparable. The means to obtain an end are wrapped up in and attached to that end. Therefore, it is contradictory to try to use unjust means to obtain justice or to try to use violence to obtain peace. As Gandhi wrote: "They say, 'means are, after all, means'. I would say, 'means are, after all, everything'. As the means so the end. Separating means and ends would ultimately amount to introducing a form of duality and inconsistency at the core of Gandhi's non-dual (Advaitic) conception.

Gandhi used an example to explain this: "If I want to deprive you of your watch, I shall certainly have to fight for it; if I want to buy your watch, I shall have to pay for it; and if I want a gift, I shall have to plead for it; and, according to the means I employ, the watch is stolen property, my own property, or a donation."

Gandhi rejected the idea that injustice should, or even could, be fought against "by any means necessary"—if you use violent, coercive, unjust means, whatever ends you produce will necessarily embed that injustice. However, in Hind Swaraj Gandhi admits that even though his book argues that machinery is bad, it was produced by machinery, which he says can do nothing good. Thus, he says, "sometimes poison is used to kill poison" and for that reason as long as machinery is viewed as bad it can be used to undo itself. This implies that sometimes, bad means can achieve positive ends.

Versus duragraha

The essence of satyagraha is that it seeks to eliminate antagonisms without harming the antagonists themselves, as opposed to violent resistance, which is meant to cause harm to the antagonist. A satyagrahi therefore does not seek to end or destroy the relationship with the antagonist, but instead seeks to transform or "purify" it to a higher level. A euphemism sometimes used for satyagraha is that it is a "silent force" or a "soul force" (a term also used by Martin Luther King Jr. during his famous "I Have a Dream" speech). It arms the individual with moral power rather than physical power. Satyagraha is also termed a "universal force," as it essentially "makes no distinction between kinsmen and strangers, young and old, man and woman, friend and foe."

Gandhi contrasted satyagraha (holding on to truth) with "duragraha" (holding on by force), as in protest meant more to harass than enlighten opponents. He wrote: "There must be no impatience, no barbarity, no insolence, no undue pressure. If we want to cultivate a true spirit of democracy, we cannot afford to be intolerant. Intolerance betrays want of faith in one's cause."

Civil disobedience and non-cooperation as practised under satyagraha are based on the "law of suffering", a doctrine that the endurance of suffering is a means to an end. This end usually implies a moral uplift or progress of an individual or society. Therefore, the non-cooperation of satyagraha is in fact a means to secure the cooperation of the opponent that is consistent with truth and justice.

Large-scale usage

When using satyagraha in a large-scale political conflict involving civil disobedience, Gandhi believed that the satyagrahis must undergo training to ensure discipline. He wrote that it is "only when people have proved their active loyalty by obeying the many laws of the State that they acquire the right of Civil Disobedience."

This obedience has to be not merely grudging but extraordinary:

American Civil Rights Movement

Satyagraha theory also influenced many other movements of nonviolence and civil resistance. For example, Martin Luther King Jr. wrote about Gandhi's influence on his developing ideas regarding the Civil Rights Movement in the United States:

In relation to genocide

In view of the Nazi persecution of the Jews in Germany, Gandhi offered satyagraha as a method of combating oppression and genocide, stating:

When Gandhi was criticized for these statements, he responded in another article entitled "Some Questions Answered":

In a similar vein, anticipating a possible attack on India by Japan during World War II, Gandhi recommended satyagraha as a means of national defense (what is now sometimes called "civilian-based defense" (CBD) or "social defence"):

References

External links

'Satyagraha 100 Years Later' – a retrospective with Arun Gandhi from Democracy Now!
The Story of Satyagraha by Dr. Jyotsna Kamat
GandhiPoetics.com – a site that analyzes and previews the poetry associated with Gandhi's Satyagraha movement.
Satyagraha in South Africa