what is nonviolence?

Tree of Nonviolence

Dramatising actions, usually symbolic, can be used to reveal the truth of an issue and to draw attention to it. For example, homelessness campaigners in Washington claimed the body of a pauper who froze to death and carried it in a coffin to city hall, thus literally laying it at the door of those responsible.

 

The 'creative disorder' of demonstrations, blockades, marches or invasions attract attention to an issue and can lead to change. Non-cooperation (strikes, boycotts, stay-aways, refusal to follow orders), and intervention (blockades, sit-ins, direct action) create a crisis and can compel necessary change when opponents are unpersuadable. Creating alternative institutions is another way of altering society.

 

Characteristics of a nonviolent campaign:

• respect for the opponent/everyone involved
• care for everyone involved
• refusal to harm, damage or degrade people
• if suffering is inevitable, willingness to take it on yourself rather than inflict it on others
• belief that everyone is capable of change
• appeal to the opponents' humanity
• recognition that no one has a monopoly of truth, so aims to bring together our 'truth' and the opponents' 'truth'
• understanding that the means are the ends in the making, so the means have to be consistent with the end