Beyond just war and pacifism: nonviolent struggle toward justice, freedom and peace

Ecumenical Review, The, April, 1996 by Gene Sharp

Nonviolent struggle as a realistic option

Although major advances have been made, the world is still a long way from achievement of justice, freedom and peace. A major political and moral issue is how those goals may be achieved. This article first explores briefly the potential role of nonviolent struggle in advancing those goals, then surveys official statements by several Christian churches and ecumenical bodies on the potential contributions of nonviolent action to achieve those objectives. Together, this exploration and these statements have implications for a reconsideration of the current relevance of the traditional just war and pacifist contending positions. They also have implications for constructive action to develop the consideration and application of nonviolent struggle.

This discussion is based on the following assumptions:

-- It is desirable for religious believers to deal responsibly with the issue

of how to

apply their principles to meet the problems of people who live in a very

imperfect

world and who face violations of justice, freedom and peace. -- We all share a responsibility to help people to achieve those goals

themselves, to

lift their oppression and to prevent and defeat violence and aggression

against

them. -- It is necessary and desirable to work with people with differing convictions

who

share a commitment to justice, freedom and peace and a willingness to act

in ways

which are compatible with moral principles and which respect human dignity.

We are using the terms justice", "freedom" and "peace" in the following senses:

Social justice is a condition in which all people are treated fairly and with respect, without domination, exploitation or oppression. The achievement of social justice is likely to require both means of struggle for popular empowerment and also means of constructing a more just society.

Freedom includes democratic participation in decision-making, personal and civil liberties and respect for others. It is always imperfectly achieved. New dangers to freedoms may arise from unexpected sources. Even in the best of democracies, there are often restrictions on civil liberties, manipulative controls may be applied and threats to democratic structures may arise from coups d'etat and expansionist regimes. These require effective countermeasures. We also need potent programmes to prevent the rise of new dictatorships and to disintegrate existing ones.

Peace, as defined here, is the absence of or the ending of military hostilities between contending states or other fighting units (as in a civil war). A society at peace will be imperfect and usually will encompass internal conflicts and efforts to improve the society while preserving its meritorious qualities.

Peace does not always come to those who are peaceful. Peace is far from assured, despite the end of the cold war. Frequently peace is violated by military aggression, coups d'etat, civil wars, bloodbaths and mass slaughters. Continuing threats to peace are posed by massive accumulations of military weaponry and the spread of nuclear, chemical and biological weapons.

Defence is needed against violations of peace. Important questions are: (1) How can defence be achieved without contributing to massive slaughters and violating religious and humane barriers against massive violence? and (2) How can attacks be prevented and defeated and peace be restored which is compatible with justice and freedom?

The goals of justice, freedom and peace are generally recognized to be good. The problems mostly concern how to achieve and preserve them. If people are not passively to submit to oppression and attacks, they must have effective means of wielding power. It is usually assumed that against great evil it is necessary to wage military struggle, perhaps with certain restrictions on the means used (jus in bello).

People have usually considered that alternative means of effective struggle without violence are unavailable. Violence has been perceived as the means of last resort, assumed almost axiomatically to be the most powerful means of struggle-that can be used. Conflicts will clearly continue to exist in the future. In acute conflicts, if people see violence to be their most effective option, they will continue to choose violence to wage their struggle. That choice has repeatedly had its own catastrophic consequences.

However, if we see only violence as available to wage powerful struggle, we will fail to notice a major sign of hope for humanity: the growth and significance of another type of conflict, "the other ultimate sanction" -- nonviolent struggle. It is sometimes also called people power, political defiance, nonviolent action, non-cooperation or civil resistance.

We should remember well the "people power" revolution in the Philippines in 1986, the ten-year nonviolent struggle in Poland which ended with the collapse of the communist system, the East German revolution and the Velvet Revolution in Czechoslovakia in 1989, the defeat of the hard-line coup in the Soviet Union in 1991. These struggles in recent years were of world significance; yet many people have already forgotten them or explained them away.