A Brief History of the Non Violent Resistance Movement

by Hiram Crespo

During the 1940?s, India was being exploited by its colonial  overlord, Britain, and was fed up.  Tired of being servants in their own land,  they chose a pious Hindu as their revolutionary leader but he did not take up arms.  He believed in Ahimsa, the doctrine of non violence, a pillar of Hindu ethics.  Ahimsa teaches that one should not knowingly generate any kind of unnecessary suffering to other living beings, one should not harm them or kill them for food and one should be kind to all.

Before Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi, hostile groups were used to solving their conflicts through submission or conquest, including genocide, but Gandhi exhibited moral superiority.  He would not  fight the British and he would also not submit to them: he would instead use the boycott as a non-violent tactic to bring his enemy to its knees.

The British empire was based on economic exploitation.  With no participation by the wage slaves, there was no incentive, no production and it was indeed costly to keep the empire.

This way independence was won, not without internal violence – in spite of Gandhi – but much bloodshed was spared.  He encouraged peaceful relations between Hindus, Muslims, Sikhs and Christians by inviting them to occupy the streets and pray together for  independence and freedom following the tradition of Kabir, of Shirdi Sai Baba and others.  He later created a secular state and  abolished the caste system, believing only through secularism could sectarian violence be curbed.

Today, India is the largest democracy on Earth and the title Mahatma, or great soul, is reverently added to Gandhi name because he liberated India and inspired millions by exemplifying the doctrine of non-violence.

A generation later, the whole world knew of  his feats and he was celebrated even on the other side of the globe.  In Bahia, Brasil, a Gandhi brotherhood was created to promote peace and tolerance, and in the sixties another non-violent resistance movement spread: that led by Martin Luther King Jr. whose personal hero happened to be Gandhi.  He fought segregation and racism through the exact same non violent tactics: there was a major boycott of all institutions and businesses that engaged in dehumanizing and racist practices.

Again, there was violence  (and these two particular leaders were killed) but we must make note of a couple of things as we assess the history of the boycott as a revolutionary tactic for social change:

1. that these revolutions could have been much more violent,
2. and that both peaceful revolutions achieved their ultimate purpose: India got its independence and the U.S. got its Civil  Rights Law enacted and was able to turn the page on an embarrassing chapter of its history.

All of this proves that the doctrine of non-violence can and  has been efficiently applied to change an entire society and bring freedom to vast groups of people and that this has historically been accomplished via the tactic of boycotting the perpetrators, usually with the assistance of  religious and community organizations that have the ability to mobilize a large  number of consumers and workers.

We stand on the shoulders of those that came before us. – a Yoruba proverb

OM Times Magazine » syndicated