Learning from Gandhi: Towards a nonviolent world order

The Satyagraha Centenary: New Delhi, 29-30 January 2007

Today 59 years ago a bullet put an end to the physical life of that genius grown out of Indian soil. A spiritual earthquake shook us all. And far away from Birla Gardens, in Norway, a 17 year old boy, almost ignorant of Gandhi, was weeping, something he rarely did. The boy was me, and that was my spiritual birth. I became a Gandhi scholar, a peace researcher and peace worker, and the comments on our session’s topics is a mini-payback.

Gandhi gave us that invaluable gift, satyagraha, to cling to satya. For Gandhi satya was an essence bridging the concepts of God, Love and Truth, uniting the spiritual, the emotional and the cognitive–not putting them in separate compartments as we do in the West, banning the first two from research and science. How can this guide us to the essence of satyagraha?

Spiritually it spells anchoring in the unity and sacredness of life, also of that Other with whom we may share a conflict. Life connects Other and me/us. But this is not the egocentrism of “if I hit Other I hit myself” but rather “I hit us”. Hence, nonviolence, in action, in speech and–if possible–in thought.
Emotionally it spells empathy and compassion, I suffer the suffering of Other, I enjoy her joy and will not cause suffering but contribute to Other’s fulfillment. It also spells optimism as humans gradually see their togetherness as a key to progress.

Cognitively it spells Experiments with Truth, for spiritual and emotional ends. One finding is that means must be not only compatible with the ends, but embody them. Another is to focus the struggle on the issue, not on the persons, turning acts of commission into omission by non-cooperation with evil, and acts of omission into commission through positive work, also for Other.

Standing on the shoulders of that giant it is our privilege to explore the Satyalandia he discovered and created. However, we do not honor him by repeating his truths and eternalizing him as “Father of the Nation”, but by moving, guided by his wisdom, perhaps also beyond him. Thus, Gandhi said “there is no way to peace–peace is the way”, “take care of the means and the ends take care of themselves”. They do not, in my experience, even when the parties relate nonviolently to each other. Why?

Because a conflict so often makes people see Other, not also Self, as problematic, nor the Self-Other relation as such. That makes them eager to contain, change Other. A shift toward nonviolence may make them more critical of Self, as happened to the English (I say on purpose not “British”; the Scots, now on the way out of the UK, were also colonized, before India). Both parties may improve their action, speech and thought, but fail to create new realities, to better accommodate their relations.

That step, from actor- to relation-orientation, is not easy as the Self-Other relation has to be changed since that is where the conflict is located. The space of possibilities is for most people limited by deep culture and unprocessed past experiences to “I win, you win, compromise”.

There is little or no opening for any new reality where all parties can be accommodated. There may be nonviolence and empathy, like in a Gandhi, but little or no creativity, and, hence, no transcendence into a new reality.

What we propose in TRANSCEND, an NGO network for peace and development, is mediation, on a one-on-one basis, with dialogue:

– mapping the conflict: the parties, their goals, the clashes;

– legitimizing: finding legitimate goals worthy of pursuit; and

– bridging: a new reality that reasonably accommodates legitimate goals, and yields something extra beyond what the parties pursue.

Behind this pursuit is a simple, quite forceful hypothesis: Acts of violence, including that relatively minor atrocity known as 9/11, are monuments over unsolved or untransformed conflicts. We have to identify those conflicts.

Action perpetrated by young Arabs against US sites of economic and military penetration point clearly to 1945 and 1916, to Anglo-American/Arab relations that went very wrong. There is causality at work, and if we do not like the effects, then remove the causes. If we want more 9/11’s, then leave the cause unattended, but do not be surprised if the effect continues, even reinforced. And that was the story of 9/11. And of Iraq. And of Afghanistan. And soon Iran?

Or, Kashmir? Being no angel I have no fear entering where angels fear to thread. In this session we are also deliberating “a nuclear weapons-free world”. Nuclear arms embody the threat of mega-violence, so according to the hypothesis above there should be a mega-conflict somewhere. Kashmir is part of the mega-conflict underlying nuclearization of the sub-continent, now possibly spreading to Iran with four nuclear powers in the neighborhood + the ubiquitous USA Empire, close to its end.

Let us try a conflict map with three parties: India arguing the right of accession, Pakistan arguing self-determination, and Kashmir arguing Kashmir, all three for legitimate reasons (even if denied by the others). So, imagine a new reality with Azad-Kashmir as part of Pakistan, Ladakh and Jammu as parts of India, LoC as de facto reality, the Valley as an Indo-Pak condominium heading for very high autonomy, and all parts of Kashmir woven together in a confederation with Kashmir on their passports, a KAFTA, Kashmir Free Trade Association, and the Saichin glacier as a human heritage monument dedicated to peace (see Appendix 1 below).

There is a particular reason for this focus on Kashmir: the other topic of our session, “nonviolent world order”.

There are strong forces at work in today’s world. An order, or disorder, is declining, even dying; another is emerging. In 1980 I predicted the fall of the Berlin Wall by 1990 with the Soviet Empire following suit, their demoralized elites facing six synchronizing, synergizing contradictions. In 2000 I predicted the decline and fall of the US Empire by 2020 with 15 contradictions (like US economic growth vs distribution, state terrorism vs terrorism, USA versus the Third World, judeo-christianity vs islam). The Anglo-American hegemony is coming to an end, and Gandhi was among the primary causes.

Empires come and go. On February 15, 2003, 12-15 million in 600 places said NO! to the US/UK invasion of Iraq. It was the voice of the People. Maybe countries professing democracy should have listened?

But what comes in the Empire’s place? Let us not fall into the Anglo-American trap of seeing the strongest country “on the continent” as a born enemy. China never had universalistic aspirations of global hegemony. Their concern is China; buying anything, building political regions like Shanghai Cooperation Organization, but, unlike the USA will not follow up militarily unless attacked, nor culturally. They will move very carefully.

A more likely successor is another region, the European Union. Eleven of its 27 members are old colonial powers, high on universalism, and trained in four-pronged economic-military-political-cultural approaches. 9/11, incidentally, was directed against the first two fangs, WTO for economic, and Pentagon for military power. Imperialism incurs risks. The 11 countries know that, and they are now up against regions, not only countries.

Hypothesis: the successor system to the US Empire (with the UK as little helper) will be neither a hegemony run by one big actor, nor globalization run by the Big and the TNCs (with the UN as little helper), but a world of regions, with currencies.

Four regions have crystallized: the European Union (EU, 27 countries), the African Union (AU, 53 countries), the South Asian Area for Regional Cooperation (SAARC, 7 countries) and the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN, 10 countries).

Three areas seem to be in the process of regionalization: Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO, 6 members, 3 observers), Latin America (LA, 20 countries ), Organization of the Islamic Community (OIC, as a deepening of the present OIC where C stands for Conference, with 56 countries, from Morocco to Mindanao).

Why this regionalization? Because quick transportation and real time communication transcend state borders, and because cultural vicinities and affinities block globalization with one state, the world, and one nation, humanity. That will come.

Defense against the US has been one reason for grouping together, but equally so, with no veto power, like in the UN. In this there is a warning to possible USA successors like the EU.

Five countries are not clearly included in these processes:
UK, an archipelago, sending settlers to the following three;
USA, bi-oceanic and walled, settler colonialist, God-chosen;
Israel, mono-oceanic and walled, settler colonialist, God-chosen;
Australia, an island, settler colonialist;
Japan, an archipelago, God-chosen.

Will they one day regionalize? Or, will younger people in the UK prefer EU, in Japan the SCO, in Israel some Middle Eastern Community, and in Australia the SCO? Leaving the USA in splendid isolation, with Canada for comfort? Or, with Russia, also left out, reminiscing good, old, superpower days?

Of these regions EU, LA, OIC and SAARC are relatively mono-civilizational, albeit with huge minorities, and AU, ASEAN and SCO are poly-civilizational, eclectic. They mirror the next system, a globalized world, and prepare their citizens better. Moreover, having other regions built in may dampen conflicts.

From the premise that the US empire was interventionist (240 since the start under Thomas Jefferson) and killing (maybe 13-17 million in overt and 6 million+ in covert operations in the 70 interventions since the Second world war) follows neither that a successor system is peaceful, nor the opposite.

With seven regions we have seven relations within, and 21 bilateral relations between the regions, altogether 28. Let us have a look, with “0” meaning no relation, “OK” meaning that, “?”
that there are problems and “!!!” that there are gross problems:

Of course all this is speculative, but some conclusions follow. Thus, this regional, multilateral, world does not look that bad, with 7 “0”, 14 “OK”, 6 “?” (like EU penetrating AU and LA, intra-region problems) and only 1 “!!!” (SAARC-OIC). This is what this Table shows:

The most isolated region is LA; the region relating best to all the others is SCO, closely followed by ASEAN and EU; the region with most problems with others is AU (lack of stability within, structural violence from EU and direct violence from OIC) and the worst problem in the whole configuration (leaving out USA-UK residual imperialism) is between SAARC and OIC. Why?

It has been singled out because India stands at the crossroad between 1.3 billion Muslims West-East when their ummah takes political shape as a region, OIC, and about the same number of Hindus North-South in a region already shaping up. The 160 million or so Muslims inside India are caught in the middle. And it is hard to see how the West can deny the ummah the old khalifat institution when the West has its own papacy.

Several options, none of them satisfactory, may be tried.

India could become the seat of the khalifat, by invitation; after all, only Indonesia has more Muslims. The Hindu tradition of accommodating all, as Mother of religions, could be useful.

Islam and Hinduism could come closer together, as Islamo-Hinduism, countering Judeo-Christianity (and its fundamentalist branch, Christian Zionism) from the West; possibly solving the SAARC-OIC problem at the expense of creating a larger one.

In due time this could be the basis for a joint region, based on the ecumenical nature of both religions; possibly leading to a similar move between EU and LA and USA.

There could also be mutual avoidance, traffic being organized like two highways crossing at two levels.
But, however this is done, what the SAARC-OIC multi-region needs is a peaceful, transformed, Kashmir, not a powder-keg fuse. Time has come for moving forward at a less glacial speed.

Evidently a regionalized world needs a truly globalized UN to help mitigate their relations, with all regions members of a very different Peace and Security Council (taking the name from the African Union); without that feudal relic, the veto power.

And, equally evidently, much has to be the regions’ own job, bilaterally and multilaterally. As the lights of Anglo-America are fading quickly time is coming for ex oriente lux, and more particularly from China and India, Chindia–with Russia 40% of humanity, and the core of SCO. Two of the oldest civilizations on earth, with continuities of thousands of years, as opposed to the rather recent UK and its progeny of yesterday, the USA.

In the richness of oriental light some spectral lines stand out, illuminating a world hoping for better guidance than one killing intervention after the other:
– the gandhism of India, hoping that India will also be ever more inspired by one of the greatest humans ever, their own;
– the daoism of China, hoping that China will also be ever more inspired by some of the greatest insights ever, their own;
– the Panchsheel of them both, the Five Principles (mutual respect for territorial integrity and sovereignty, mutual non-aggression, mutual non-interference, equality and mutual benefit, peaceful co-existence), as world guidelines, but also:
– the panca sila of Indonesia (one nation, humanitarianism, democracy and consent, social prosperity, one god–meaning faith, guidance), as domestic guidelines.

Nonviolence, sophistication, world, and domestic traffic rules as opposed to endless interventionism for whatever purpose. May the current Asian blend of age-old wisdom and youthful energy inspire a world filled with pessimism and fear.

Appendix 1

KASHMIR: A TRANSCEND PERSPECTIVE

Prepared by the TRANSCEND mission to New Delhi May 2006

There are strong forces in the world today; such as an Anglo-American led economic globalization, military globalization by state terrorist and terrorist means, and regionalization; partly in response to these globalizations.

One such regionalization is SAARC, not very dynamic but filled with such potentials as a South Asian Free Trade Area, SAFTA. Another is an Islamic region, potentially from Casablanca to Mindanao, including an Islamic economic globalization to counteract the other three.

Running West-East, and SAARC North-South in Asia, the conflict potential is considerable. So is the solution potential, like SAARC and an Islamic Community joining forces within a South-South and a global context. We are talking about 1.3-1.5 billion humans – twice. With another 1.3 billion Chinese very close.

In the center of all this is the problematic India-Pakistan nucleus of the subcontinent. The relation is not “neither peace nor war” but “some peace, some war”. The relation cries for a normalization which, if brought about in an equitable manner, could be immensely popular with the populations in both countries. The issues, such as Kashmir, divided Punjab, divided Bengal, and others, mainly derive from the 1947 division of the subcontinent 60 years ago. Normalization, given the strong forces impinging upon India-Pakistan, becomes mandatory.

And there is no military solution between two nuclear powers, only a stalemate. The fact that it is not really mutually hurtful should not be taken as an excuse for inaction. The world is catching up with India-Pakistan. One problem is Kashmir as an issue that may ignite powder kegs beyond India-Pakistan. But Kashmir could also be seen more positively, in terms of the enormous creative forces, economically, politically, culturally, that would be released if these obstacles could be removed.

Sixty years of unstable equilibrium have taught us that the Kashmir problem does not go away by itself. And yet it is hard to believe that a reasonable settlement could not be arrived at that could actually give the parties–Kashmiris, Pakistanis and Indians–even more than some of them are demanding separately, with a little flexibility, and some out-of-the-box thinking.

The land and possibly sea connections opening up are already significant steps in that direction, but more has to follow for those promising openings not to become sources of frustration rather than gratification.

How about a KAFTA, a Kashmir Free Trade Area, an increasingly borderless area modeled after EFTA in Europe, with free flow of persons, goods/services and ideas across borders dwindling in significance. With a Steering Committee of, say, 10 persons, three Kashmiris, three Pakistanis, three Indians, and one from SAARC?

In due course of time KAFTA could become a part of SAFTA, as a precursor or as a consequence. But given the urgency of the Kashmir problem sooner rather than later.

A KAFTA could be a part of a settlement that could cover all seven zones, and give all residents the right of free passage, like, for instance in the Nordic Community. A common identity card for the area in addition to passports might take the process one step further. The rights of investment and settlement might be included or, perhaps better, follow later. An assembly giving legitimacy to the Steering Committee should not be excluded–in due course of time.

With SAARC as an, admittedly weak, umbrella for KAFTA, and KAFTA as an umbrella for a possible Kashmiri Community, some disaggregation could take place more easily, given this type of assurance that what belongs geographically and historically together could nevertheless also grow together. Jammu and Ladakh are today parts of India, and Azad-Kashmir is de facto a part of Pakistan.

These facts, possibly with some minor revisions, should be recognized by all parties concerned. To give the LoC de jure status may then follow after a trial period of X years for any settlement. The only positive outcome derived from 60 years of quarrel might actually be that in the course of events both countries somehow have gotten used to accepting what to both, or all three, parties was unacceptable, making the LoC a part of the solution, not of the problem.

What remains is, of course, The Valley. Several formulas are available. They might all include Srinigar as the seat of an increasingly beneficial KAFTA that would have to prove itself as a lynch-pin in a settlement. The current Indian sovereignty (in Pakistan referred to as “occupation”, the term used in India for the Pakistani control of Azad-Kashmir) could gradually yield to a joint security authority with Pakistani and Indian–and increasingly Kashmiri–forces (by and large with the same military culture) doing the job together.
Whether as a part of India or as some kind of condominium The Valley would have a high level of autonomy, gradually developing its own institutions.

How about making Saichin a peace park, off limits to army? A place to be celebrated as a symbol of peace rather than deplored as an outcome of war? With all parties cooperating in making it attractive as one more part of the tremendous tourism opportunities offered by this highly attractive part of the common human heritage?

This is not a question of taking some problematic first steps; they have already been taken. It is a question of follow-up, at a pace better adjusted to the magnitude not only of the problems but also of the promises that would follow in the wake of normalization. Energy supply would meet energy demand as it should between neighbors, so would water, so would a host of commodities and products–and human ties, as amply testified by what happens when the two Punjabs come closer together. Keep going. The sky is the limit.

Appendix 2
THE MISSING NOBEL PEACE PRIZES AND HOW DO WE EXPLAIN THEM?

Nobel’s peace prize criteria were army reduction, understanding among nations, and peace conferences. The first two criteria are top relevant. But Gandhi, so priceless, not only reducing but negating violence, and improving understanding across conflict borders, died prizeless.

The then Nobel Peace Prize Committee consultant, Jacob Worm Müller, told this author in 1953 that Gandhi was not a real pacifist, and fought the British Empire, a gift to civilization.

The following is a short list of some other non-laureates:

1. Jose Figueres, president of Costa Rica, for abolishing the army.

2. Monnet-Schuman, for creating peace by making former Nazi Germany a “member of the family”, in the European Community.

3. Soekarno-Nasser-Tito, for Bandoeng in 1955, and then again in Beograd 1961, for the Nonaligned Movement, the refusal to be members of two blocs on a potentially disastrous collision course.

4. Nehru-Zhou Enlai for panchsheel, five pillars of peaceful co-existence, maintaining peace between the world’s largest countries.

5. Urho Kekkonen, president of Finland, for the CSCE 1972-1975.

6. Olof Palme, prime minister of Sweden, for the Five countries initiative for denuclearization.

7. The churches in Leipzig, particularly Nikolai-Kirche, for the Montags-Demonstrationen 1989 that ended the Cold War on 9/11 1989.

8. Pope John Paul II for untiring work on reconciliation through apology and dialogue across religious borders–also in history.

9. Hans Küng for his work for a global ethic bridging religions.

Like Gandhi they compare favorably with most of the 94 persons and 19 organizations that got the prize. What do Gandhi and these cases have in common? Incompatibility with Norway’s foreign policy. Aligned with the USA – that most violent country in modern history – three US presidents and five US secretaries of state got the prize.

Nobel’s criteria for peace are still relevant. Candidates are numerous. Human rights, environment and development should also be praised, but not at the expense of peace prizes in Nobel’s spirit.