The central importance of Gandhi to nonviolent activism is widely acknowledged. There are also other significant peace-related bodies of knowledge that have gained such popularity in the West in the relatively recent past that they have changed the directions of thought and have been important in encouraging social movements - yet they have not been analysed in terms of antecedents, especially Gandhian ones. The new environmentalism in the form of deep ecology, the discipline of peace research and what has become known as 'Buddhist economics' very closely mirror Gandhi's philosophy. This article analyses the Mahatma's contribution to the intellectual development of three leading figures in these fields: Arne Naess, Johan Galtung and E. F. Schumacher and argues that those who want to make an informed study of deep ecology, peace research or Buddhist economics, and particularly those who are interested in the philosophy of Naess, Galtung or Schumacher, should go back to Gandhi for a fuller picture.

https://www.jstor.org/stable/pdfplus/424698.pdf

Gandhi and the nuclear age

Gandhi, Deep Ecology, Peace Research And Buddhist Economics

The Pollok Free State temporary autonomous zone was established by a core group of resident protesters from June 1994 to the end of 1996 as a rearguard action in a long fought community campaign against the construction of the M77 through the Pollok Estate in Glasgow. This was the first Scottish example of a direct action roads protest movement which has flourished since 1992 in England. The ideological and symbolic challenges posed by the core group, along with their strategy of empowering the local community in extra‐institutional collective direct action, make their strategic orientation best described as embryonic counter‐hegemonic resistance. The single issue was regarded as an end in itself by the core group, but it was also strategically utilised as a battle in a wider struggle. The cutbacks in the ‘Roads to Prosperity’ programme partly instigated by the wider roads protest movement can be characterised as a residue of reform. To the core group such reforms are mere by‐products of their primary goa...

Strategies of resistance at the Pollok free state road protest camp

The sustainable society

Deep ecology arises from the personal intuition that one’s self is part of the world’s environmental wholeness. This awareness may be constructed upon scientific foundations but it is more commonly thought a spiritual concept. Deep ecology pedagogy emerges from its three-step process of ecological Self-realization. This paper traces the roots of the ecological Self through the work of deep ecology’s founder, Arne Naess, and his studies of Gandhian philosophy to its foundations in Gandhi’s Vaisnava religion. These foundations include the Vaisnava goal of Self-realization, and the scriptural three steps of Lord Vishnu and His Vamana avatar. Vaisnava ethics such as humility, non-harming, non-possession, simple living, and devotional service helped inspire the Gandhian political economy of permanence called sarvodaya, which still influences thinking in the environment and peace movements.

background

/pdf/deep-ecology-education-learning-from-its-vaisnava-roots-3jhpmcsolk.pdf

Deep Ecology Education: Learning from Its Vaisnava Roots.

From Maude Royden's 'Peace Army' in the 1930s to the recent Gulf Peace Team, there has been a rich but little known history of attempted unarmed interpositionary peace-keeping. Most of these initiatives have stalled at the proposal stage primarily because of a lack of money and the absence of international organizational and logistical support. The Gulf Peace Team was perhaps the least well thought through attempt; however, it did manage, for the first time, to place a group of peace campaigners between belligerents in a time of war. It would appear that with the passing of time gains have been achieved on the physical plane - the attempts are increasingly getting volunteers closer and closer to the interpositionary ideal. However, the corresponding analytical gains have not been made. It is doubtful whether independent interpositionary peace-keeping ventures will ever be able to command the economic and logistical resources required and, more importantly, raise enough volunteers to achieve a critical mass that would make a difference in terms of preventing or stopping hostilities. It would appear that the most appropriate tasks for those advocating the establishment of such 'forces' are in the realms of peace-keeping limited to non-violent escort duties and the like (that is, small-scale interventionary rather than large-scale interpositionary peace-keeping), and especially peace-making and peace-building, while continuing in their efforts to encourage the establishment of local peace brigades and to interest the United Nations in the creation of a truly non-violent and unarmed peace-keeping force.

Gandhi and the nuclear age

Citations

Gandhi, Deep Ecology, Peace Research And Buddhist Economics

Strategies of resistance at the Pollok free state road protest camp

The sustainable society

Deep Ecology Education: Learning from Its Vaisnava Roots.

From Maude Royden's Peace Army to the Gulf Peace Team: An Assessment of Unarmed Interpositionary Peace Forces:

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