The revised framework for interpreting domination proposed in chapter five was accorded the status of a heuristic with hypothetically greater purchase than the approaches discussed in part one of this thesis. An inclusivist trans–disciplinary via media was recommended which sought to steer a course between critical understanding of the realities of modern social structure, purely oppositional critique, and normative commitments, the last being the least developed aspect of the framework.

Five key components in the revised framework were suggested:

The strengths and weaknesses of the revised framework will now be evaluated with reference to nonviolence and the work of the two leading strategists of nonviolence, Gandhi and Sharp, in particular.

Sharp and Gandhi part company as strategists of nonviolence because Sharp is essentially a theorist and historian of nonviolence who has focused on establishing the legitimacy and efficacy of nonviolence as a neglected type of struggle (Sharp, 1973: esp. 71 – 76). More recently, Sharp worked as a policy advocate arguing for nonviolence to be added to national defence strategies (e.g., Sharp, 1985; 1990). Sharp’s later policy advocacy will not be considered here. Nonetheless, it is important to note that Sharp was a peace activist at an earlier stage in his career (e.g., Sharp, 1979: 251 –271). Gandhi, in contrast, was always an activist, developing his theory and practice of Satyagraha in an on–going practical struggle against historically specific and more general individual and social obstacles to the point of human existence: an open–ended seeking after truth (e.g., Gandhi, in Fischer {ed.}, 1962: 320). This foundational tension is constantly present throughout the work of the two strategists of nonviolence.

It is important to disaggregate domination because it clearly consists of at least three possible kinds, structural, actor, and unthematised. Here, attention will focus on actor domination, in which an actor dominating other actors can be detected.

The revised definition of disaggregated actor domination proposed in chapter five was:

The disaggregated approach to actor domination distinguishes between structural domination, domination in which actors doing domination could be identified, and unthematised impersonal domination. The emphasis here is on actor domination biased to an individualistic procedure for identifying actor domination.

In a minimalist sense, Sharp’s conception of what constitutes social oppression could be equated with a general conception of domination, but he lacks the emphasis on the importance of hermeneutic interpretation to focus on specific situations for which the revised definition calls, and which would give added subtlety and purchase for the analysis of nonviolence in those situations. In an essay that goes some way to defining his credo, Sharp argues that, despite many significant gains, humanity is still burdened by four major problems which seem to have no solution: dictatorship, genocide, war, and social oppression (Sharp, 1980: 1 – 5). He chides existing political theory and practice for failing to adequately address solutions to these problems, and, in the light of this failure, argues for nonviolence as a means which could offer a solution because, he maintains, nonviolence offers techniques for controlling the power of those agencies causing the four problems. However, throughout his work, Sharp offers no detailed explication of what can be taken to be one of the underlying factors operating in all four of his unresolved problems: domination. Sharp also deploys a North American, liberal conception of social oppression, and then alleges that this conception also applies to other Western societies, and also "... sometimes to an even larger degree – to other modern large–scale political systems" (Sharp, 1980: 309). The revised definition of actor domination, in contrast, offers sensitivity to a variable hermeneutic lacking in Sharp’s approach.

In the case of Gandhi, the need to apply a hermeneutic interpretation to specific contexts and historically precise local ethical systems and legal orders is crucial. Gandhi clearly saw the British colonial presence as unnecessary for Indian society, but, as the following extract from Young India dated February 2, 1920, indicates, he also believed that many aspects of Indian society itself needed to change. Replying to criticisms of his support for a memorial to those who died in the Amritsar massacre in May, 1919, Gandhi wrote:

Looking at Gandhi’s agenda for swarj and sarvodaya, it is clear that he viewed the caste system, particularly its treatment of the untouchables, whom he renamed Harijans, meaning ‘people of God’ (Hari) as needing reform in a future independent Indian society as disunity between Hindus and Muslims. For example, he wrote in Young India published on February 23, 1921, that:

He also addressed the traditional Indian position of women, arguing for their education as being as important as that of men, and condemning child marriages, prostitution, and, in his more extreme moments, calling for chastity or Brahmacharya as a means whereby self–control could be exercised: "Such a one therefore lives nigh unto God, is Godlike" (in Fischer {ed.}, 1962: 243). He also railed against the abuse of alcohol, again because it demonstrated a lack of self–control.

Applying the revised definition of actor domination to Gandhi highlights his rootedness in traditional Indian society and its beliefs and values. Gandhi’s approach can be seen to embrace structural and existential critiques of, and potentially achievable alternatives to, the domination which riddled his society, though, with respect to the social and economic position of Harijans, he largely avoided addressing the structural domination of untouchability by attempting to raise the symbolic character of their low–status labour as well as exhorting them to change habits such as meat eating and drinking alcohol which offended higher caste Hindus.

The revised definition of actor domination thus aids in sorting out Gandhi’s diffuseness with respect to what might constitute domination. But it also points to the possibility that Gandhi was attempting to achieve two almost different objectives. On the one hand, he was trying to challenge violence on a number of structural levels – the violence of British colonialism, inter–communal violence predominantly, but not exclusively, between Hindus and Muslims, and the violence of entrenched customs and beliefs in Hindu society such as untouchability, child marriages, and the treatment of women. These phenomena can seen as falling into the sphere of structural domination. On the other hand, Gandhi was also aiming at eradicating violence within the self, and thence between selves, witness his appropriation of the traditional religious and contemporary political meanings of swaraj.

In Young India published on May 21, 1925, Gandhi indicated this universal applicability of Satyagraha:

Almost a year later, in Young India published on May 6, 1926, Gandhi again indicated his views on the relationship between his own search and a universality he maintained was inherent in all people:

The revised definition of actor domination underlines very usefully the problem of multiple hermeneutics both with Gandhi’s own approach and in the different contexts in which he attempted to work. Because Gandhi was operating in a highly pluralistic environment, it is crucial to document how others viewed his activities and pronouncements. As with Gandhi’s views themselves, the relationship between various competing interests constantly shifted. In some regions or towns, alliances of convenience might be formed between Hindus and Muslims, or between Hindus of different castes, or between committed Satyagrahis and more orthodox politicians, while in other regions or towns Gandhi, his campaigns, or supporters might be ignored or even attacked verbally or physically by any of a number of interest groups which elsewhere were co–operating depending on particular hermeneutical circumstances.

For example, on December 29, 1930, a leading Muslim League politician, Sir Muhammad Iqbal, echoing the growing hardening of Muslim political opinion in favour the possibility of post–independence partition, wrote:

Sir Muhammad’s argument represents a more moderate position. The leading Muslim League politician, M. A. Jinnah, who took the League out of Congress in 1920, remained vigorously opposed to Gandhi and Congress’s position, asserting the need for a separate Muslim state, centred on those North Western provinces in which Islam was strongest, in which Muslims enjoyed significant economic and historical power, and which eventually became Pakistan, of which he was Governor–General from 1947 until his death in 1948. To be sure, as histories of the period have noted, Jinnah’s position was, at times as dubiously influential within Muslim politics as Gandhi’s often was within Congress (e.g., Brown, 1977: 6 – 14).

The revised definition of actor domination reveals Gandhi’s own role in determining how Satyagraha was to be interpreted. Gandhi’s followers were not really authorised to form their own interpretations. When others violated what he took to be the principles of Satyagraha, he called off campaigns, criticised participant’s lack of discipline, and fasted, allegedly in personal penance at the violence which erupted, but also to effectively coerce others to return to policies he advocated.

The revised definition of actor domination further alerts us to the fact that much greater attention must be paid to the evidence about how different actors were interpreting what Gandhi and his close followers were advocating or doing. Existing accounts of Gandhi either tend to romanticise his life and work, glossing over crucially important details relevant to a better understanding of what, in fact, was occurring in the complex and shifting Indian situation, or his life and work is mined to produce explanations of his activities and views. They do not emphasise the different hermeneutic interpretations of the actors in sufficient detail. This failure is all the more important when the existing literature is used as a basis for contemporary reinterpretation’s of Gandhi or as guides for contemporary action against domination.

The Indian historian, Sasadhar Sinha, also notes a distinct reluctance on the part of historians to confront the actual complexities of the Indian situation:

Indeed, Gandhi himself wrote:

The revised definition of actor domination is also less than adequate when confronted with the sort of inter–communal violence which caused Gandhi so much anguish. Indeed, while there is ample evidence of both positive and negative modes of nonviolence being used in struggle in a wide range of situations, there is also ample evidence of violence remaining the norm in a wide range of situations. The apparent logic of nonviolence often fails when confronted with real–world situations, as do accounts of nonviolence which avoid confronting real–world evidence. An important additional perspective on this issues is offered when a structural analysis of domination is pursued.

It will now be shown how attention to structural aspects of domination reveals that both leading strategists of nonviolence mishandle the issue of structural domination. Sharp and Gandhi both deal with the relationships between structural domination and nonviolence, and would agree that a given society’s structures play crucial parts in establishing, maintaining, and extending domination. Both would also agree that nonviolence, as a tactic of waging struggle, is often deployed against social structures, or more specifically, functions of particular social structures which oppress individuals or particular social groups. Explicit in both approaches is a rejection of the alleged immutability, impenetrability, and unchangability of social structures. Both strategists of nonviolence also stress the necessity for persistence, discipline, resilience, and the deployment of a multiplicity of nonviolent methods when challenging structural aspects of domination.

Sharp’s view of society stresses the functions of social structures, and not the structures themselves, except where he constantly discusses how those structures can be challenged by interrupting their functions using nonviolent tactics. Changes to structures may occur when their functions are sufficiently interrupted, but his emphasis is almost exclusively on challenging and obstructing some of the specific, and occasionally more general functions structures perform. As a result, his analysis of the structures themselves, and how they act with respect to domination is weak.

He does accept that, through the disciplined and persistent nonviolent actions of the activists, from within the oppressor’s forces unease about the activities, dissent from those activities, defections from the oppressor’s ranks, and even conversions to the activist’s cause could occur, though he emphasises that activists should not place much reliance upon this occurring (Sharp, 1973: 665 – 695). This suggests that he does not entirely accept a monolithic view of the oppressor, but regards an oppressive regime or force as being made up of individuals who may be swayed by the activist’s political and even moral strength and demonstration of purpose. Within the oppressor’s agencies, many tactics which can be deployed which retard or interrupt the expected and routine operations of those agencies, presenting a less than monolithic view of state structures and replacing it with a view which suggests structures are composed of shifting alliances of interest, some antagonistic to and some compliant with a ruler’s aims and orders (e.g., Martin, 1989).

With respect to structural domination, Sharp often presents a stark dichotomy between the ruler and the ruled. He places great emphasis on the consent of the ruled as a decisive factor in maintaining the ruler’s power. He acknowledges that, particularly in Western–type constitutional democracies, checks and balances inherent in such governmental systems necessarily restrict the power of even an autarchicly inclined individual or agency such as a party or even elements within the state’s uniformed forces. But he also emphasises that it is more likely for such entities to seize or steadily gather greater power if other social institutions, or, as he describes them, loci of non–centralised power, are weak or weakened. His major point is that to maintain effective control on rulers, social structures outside of the state must remain, or be encouraged to become strong as a deterrent to the centralisation of power by an actual or possible future ruler. In the event of an internal or external attempt to usurp power, these diffuse yet strong loci of power can mobilise to, needless to add, nonviolently frustrate the designs of the usurper (Sharp, 1980: 21 –67).

The persistent use of the terms ‘ruler’ or ‘oppressor’ throughout his work suggests that Sharp maintains a structurally monolithic view of the opponent of a nonviolent campaign. Similarly, his emphasis on the control of a ruler’s power suggests that he exclusively focuses on the state as the main concentration of power in a society, control of the state and its key institutions being the goal of contending actors and agencies, an emphasis which strongly echoes the views of Max Weber. There is a proto–anarchist tendency in his argument that diffusing and mobilising loci of social power places greater power into the civil society (though he never uses the conception of society consisting of a civil and a formal sphere, e.g., after Habermas et.al.), power which might be manipulated through greater consensus, trust, self–reliance, and self–confidence on the part of the activists (Sharp, 1973: 777 – 817; see also, Bruyn, 1979).

Many nonviolent campaigns tend to focus on reforming existing social structures, and more specifically, at changing particular policies or functions of specific structures or agencies. They tend not to seek to destroy or remove the structures. There are situations, however, in which the establishment of parallel or alternative structures or institutions to state or other institutionalised structures can be attempted, or even becomes necessary, at least for the duration of and shortly subsequent to a campaign. Sharp writes that, especially when a protracted campaign against some structure’s function is waged,

This reinforces Sharp’s emphasis on the functions of structures, as well as strong sense of agency on the part of his grievance group, indicating his strong argument that hitherto dominated individuals will form or join grievance groups and then act together to challenge hitherto apparently unchallengeable structures or institutions, or at least some of their functions. The basis of his theory of power, however, is that power rests on consent, and that individuals and groups can nonviolently withdraw their consent, and maintain their withdrawal even under vigorous reaction from the oppressor.

A further criticism of Sharp raised earlier focused on a feminist approach to nonviolence and the structure of patriarchal domination, in which consent is not often even an issue for women dominated by institutionalised patriarchy. McGuinness points to feminist theories of power which emphasise the notion of ‘placing’, which turns on power being attached to and limited by positions which carry with them particular responsibilities and claims, such as caring for children. In situations in which women are the primary carers of children, and for that matter, the elderly, it seems impossible for these services to be withdrawn. "Generative power is created and satisfied in the life it generates and nurtures. Any threat to that life would be counterproductive" (McGuinness, 1993: 111). To be sure, men are slowly but increasingly taking on caring roles, but this is a long way from completely eradicating the functions of patriarchy throughout a society. This also points to an extended definition of nonviolence discussed in the previous chapter which takes nonviolence well beyond simply being what Sharp takes it to be – a group of sanctions and a technique of struggle that wields power (1980: 219) – but a key component in what has been labelled ‘life politics’ (e.g., Giddens, 1991) with explicit structural, and functional, as well as personal, transformative agendas and goals.

Gandhi’s approach to the structural aspects of domination is also clarified by the revised framework. It is entirely possible to extract sarvodaya and swardeshi from his conception of Satyagraha, and examine the constructive programme purely in terms of a structural analysis of Indian society, and as a strategy for changing structures he often argued were inimical to the achievement of Poorna Swaraj in its narrower political sense. Certainly, he saw British domination of India as a major structural impediment to Indian self–determination and independence. Enormous effort was expended by Congress, the Muslim League, and many other Indian nationalist organisations in making the British presence in India untenable, and in developing constitutional and administrative structures to replace colonial impositions inimical to Indian traditions, politics, and aspirations. Gandhi was a leading participant in this process, but, as even his supporters, such as the Nehrus and many in Congress, and his most vigorous critics in the Muslim League, the Indian Communist Party, or orthodox Hindus, agreed, his agenda was apparently wider than a narrow political one involving the post–Raj seizure and sustainable control of state power (on these differing positions see, e.g., Pandey {ed.}, 1979).

Gandhi’s agenda was finally a metaphysical one, in which, through activity in society according to the tenets of Satyagraha, the individual could approach truth and God. If, in pursuit of this end, structural aspects of domination were challenged or even transformed, this was a positive result, but one not decisively fundamental to the aims of Satyagraha. Scholars who have examined Gandhi’s reform agendas have tended to extract his various policies on issues like economics, education, health reforms, and the emancipation of women from his foundational doctrine of Satyagraha. To simply extract and discuss Gandhi’s views and practice on structural domination and his proposed means to address it would eradicate the admittedly shifting and yet relatively coherent edifice of Satyagraha. Gandhi, though a lawyer by training, and reluctantly though actively a political protagonist in a conventional sense, was not a political or social scientist or an economist. He was simultaneously a traditional and reformist Hindu, had a keen sense of the strengths and weaknesses of traditional Indian society, and was generally suspicious of industrialisation and Western–style development.

Attending to the details of Gandhi’s reaction to structural domination radically clarifies his position, and this demonstrates the value on structural domination in the revised framework in the context of a disaggregation of domination. In Young India published on January 8, 1925, Gandhi wrote that:

A more detailed discussion of what he envisaged for savodaya was published in 1941 and revised in 1945. Entitled Constructive Programme, it contained a detailed outline of Gandhi’s views on many issues he argued needed change at both structural and individual level:

Each of these points clearly required a structural change in one or several Indian institutions. The emphasis was always on a devolution of centralised power into the villages, and parallel empowerment of villagers. This has led to Gandhi being seen as an anarchist (Bondurant, 1965: 182 – 187; Woodcock, 1972: 79 – 89). Gandhi contradicted this impression because he readily acknowledged the need for some centralised authority, such as the state, but wanted to restrict the state’s functions to those absolutely essential for democratic government (e.g., Parekh, 1989: 110 – 141).

Gandhi and his followers certainly established parallel or alternative structures to established structures. The khadi campaign, for example, sought to replace reliance on foreign cloth with self–sufficiency implemented at the most basic village level. His views on changing the structure of education to basic education similarly evidenced the need to educate the masses in alternative ways and using methods different to those of the Raj government’s educational practices. He was also a realist, as the following extract from Young India published on August 18, 1920, demonstrates:

The foregoing activities presuppose withdrawal from state structures in the context of a Satyagraha campaign which would include extensive training and preparation for the practicalities of sustained non–cooperation, including the establishment of at least the framework of necessary parallel structures.

Attention to structural domination also reveals that Gandhi often skirted around the need for structural change. Perhaps his most significant failure involved his campaign to eradicate untouchability. This commenced well before he returned to India from South Africa, and remained a central concern for the rest of his life. Initially, his understanding of the complexity of the issue in India was rather simplistic, but then developed along several lines. The economic role of untouchables was important as they worked in areas essential for Indian society, even if those areas were regarded with distain by higher caste Hindus. In a democratic society, they would be accorded representation irrespective of their caste status. If he went too far in exhorting an improvement of untouchables, he knew he could touch off violence between untouchables and other Indian groups. Religious beliefs also entered the picture, as Hindu doctrines of reincarnation held that adherence to one’s caste position would aid in an improvement in the next reincarnation. Avoidance of pollution and contact with lower castes assisted higher caste members in the same way. What he effectively did was simultaneously exhort orthodox Hindus to change their practices towards untouchables, exhort untouchables to change habits which revolted higher caste Hindus, exalt many of the tasks untouchables performed to transform their status but not their function, personally mixed with untouchables and welcomed them into his ashrams, and reinterpreted Hindu scriptures to reduce the complex caste structure into four varnas which he held not to be superior or inferior to each other. He also criticised many aspects of the caste system, such as the staging of elaborate and expensive festivals and marriages, as a waste of money and resources needed by the poor. (e.g., Brown, 1989: 205 – 210). Not unexpectedly, he was criticised by both orthodox Hindus, and by untouchables who wanted him to advocate a direct change in the economic, political, and social status of their caste, necessarily a major structural change in Indian society. According to Parekh:

But this fails to bring out the role of Gandhi’s evaluation of structural domination in the context of untouchables and how his efforts against untouchability failed because he did not encourage Harijans to join in the struggle for their own liberation.

Brown summarised the lasting effect of Gandhi’s campaign on untouchability:

The approach to structural domination as an element in the revised framework for interpreting domination clearly uncovers weaknesses in the work of both leading nonviolence strategists. But considering their work also suggests ways in which the revised framework for interpreting domination requires amendment because it is necessary to specify how structural domination is to be located, what is needed to contrast structural domination from non–structural domination, and also some methods by which components of structural domination can be more clearly documented by responses to structural domination. In Sharp’s case, the need for further clarification is indicated because Sharp himself confuses interpretation of domination with responses to domination. In Gandhi’s case, the additional distinctions are also useful because it is often difficult to evaluate what is interpretation and what is response. The existing literature suggests that Gandhi had an interpretation of structural domination and then proposed responses. However it may be that Gandhi often articulated responses and then theorised the interpretation in the light of them. At the very least, the revised framework succeeded in drawing attention to issues of structural domination, even if it may need to be recast to solve them.

The specific dialectical phenomenology deployed in the revised framework for interpreting domination is of a specific kind which is designed to foreground relationality. To do so, it emphasises the relational constitution of the actors as opposed to them being construed as separate entities, in particular, where the vocative relationality is a–symmetric. Nonviolent actors tend to propose a vocative relationality but this can be rejected by the opponent. Analysing this a–symmetric relationality foregrounds acceptances and refusals of possible vocative relations relative to the particular multiple hermeneutics operative in specific situations, which themselves require attention. This clearly has implications for the distribution of social power. The voluntary acceptance of suffering by the nonviolent actors can be seen as a means to bridge this a–symmetric relationality and transform a refusal into a recognition of the vocative appeal being made to the opponent as a second person self.

If this dialectical phenomenology is applied to the nonviolent strategies of Sharp and Gandhi the results point to problematic components in their different approaches which signal the need for a revision of aspects of nonviolence theory, and to the interpretation of nonviolence in the context of domination.

In examining nonviolence theory, almost without exception nonviolence theorists and activists prefer the term ‘opponent’ to alternatives such as ‘enemy’, though Sharp often also uses the term ‘oppressor’ to describe actionist’s opponents, congruent with his general Western–liberal view of political action. This preference for ‘opponent’ can be seen to erode the semiology of ‘enemy’, an attempt to at least reduce the stark divisiveness of ‘us’ versus a reified, even dehumanised, ‘enemy’. To typify one’s opponent as a reified ‘enemy’ could lead to assuming that they (it) are a monolithic entity devoid of human characteristics of doubt, fear, or riddled with widely varying degrees of individual or group commitment to the dominator’s cause. In its minimalist form, nonviolence contains an embedded vocative appeal because, unlike some opponents who have no qualms about injuring or killing actors they regard as third person objects, nonviolent actors refuse to injure or kill their opponents.

Beyond this basic acceptance of terms like ‘opponent’, Sharp’s ‘negative’ approach to nonviolence is almost completely devoid of a dialectical phenomenology, except where he discusses the role of activist’s suffering for their cause garnering defections from the opponent’s forces, or galvanising potentially supporting third–party involvement in the struggle (e.g., Sharp, 1973: 707 – 733). His discussion of political jiu–jitsu, which he argues is the tool which many nonviolent actions utilise against an opponent, and specific effects political jiu–jitsu can achieve, such as mobilising uncommitted third parties, sewing dissent in the opponent’s forces, and strengthening the resolve of the, potentially, growing ranks of the actionists, is entirely aimed at understanding, and then exploiting the growing power of the actionists vis a vis the diminishing power of the opponent. He cautions against expecting sudden, widespread, or decisive results from tactics such as voluntarily accepting suffering, especially against opponents deeply inured to believe the actionists are less than human.

He cites the lengthy Vykom Satyagraha of 1924 – 25 as an example of how even almost apparently unbridgeable social distance, in this case between untouchables and Brahmans, was eroded through resolute adherence to nonviolence, including self–suffering on the part of the actionists (Sharp, 1973: 83, 717; Bondurant, 1965: 46 – 52; Pelton, 1974: 222). Indeed, this Satyagraha was one of the most successful, and will be examined in detail below.

Another Satyagraha, the Rowlatt Satyagraha of early 1919, was one of Gandhi’s significant early failures. This campaign will also be examined in detail below. The brutality of reaction against protesters, specifically the details of the Amritsar massacre of April, 1919, and the Dharsana salt works raid of May, 1930, round the account to consider how nonviolent action can provoke violent responses from opponents. The dialectical phenomenological interpretation of Gandhi, and these incidents deployed here facilitates possibly a new reading of Gandhi.

Sharp makes only passing references to the Rowlatt Satyagraha, and almost completely neglects the a–symmetric vocativeness of the activist’s appeals to potential supporters and to the Raj in the context of complex multiple hermeneutics in play throughout India which contributed to the campaign’s failure. More precisely, the significant unevenness of adherence to the hartal, the nation–wide strike called by Gandhi as part of the campaign, and the discipline of Satyagraha throughout India adds to a clearer analysis of how and why Rowlatt failed. Sharp’s treatment of Rowlatt is an example of Gandhi, and the context in which Gandhi operated, being mined to suit particular purposes though, to be fair, Sharp’s approach is more illustrative of the points he wants to make than analytical of the detailed circumstances of each incident.

Sharp first mentions Rowlatt as an example of the use of the hartal as a nonviolent tactic which extends further than a factory strike because businesses and shops are also closed and participants often fast (1973: 277 – 278). The hartal was an ancient Indian, and indeed Celtic custom, the latter called troscad, in which an aggrieved individual would fast against their wrongdoer in order to persuade them of their error. The Indian hartal was traditionally undertaken against a ruler to make them aware of the unpopularity of their actions. Gandhi drew together purificatory fasting, strikes, and business closures in his concept of hartal as well as using it as a tactic to test the resolve of participants and indicate to the opponent the strength of resolve by the satyagrahis. Sharp’s next mention of Rowlatt is in the context of discussing the role of leadership in a nonviolent campaign, especially one in which violence becomes a likely or actual result. A nonviolent movement’s leadership does not have many avenues available for disciplining its members, most of whom would usually be volunteers. When violence erupted in the first days of Rowlatt, Gandhi personally tried to quell the violence where he could, fasted, and then called the Satyagraha off, drawing on his authority as a nonviolent leader to discipline his followers (Sharp, 1973: 466), a tactic he would later repeatedly use, particularly as his stature as a national figure, and then a Mahatma or ‘Great Soul’ imbued him with enormous moral, even religious authority. Sharp’s final reference to Rowlatt is in the context of discussing how nonviolent discipline can be promoted in a campaign or a movement, and he mentions Gandhi’s suspension of the Rowlatt Satyagraha as a recognition that when circumstances were not fully propitious to achieving the campaign’s goals nonviolent activists can suspend their activities (Sharp, 1973: 622).

It is useful to commence examining Gandhi in the light of the dialectical phenomenology proposed here by considering how he approached his opponents, especially when engaged in face to face negotiations. This suggests that Gandhi often sought to dialogically bridge the gulf between himself and his opponents. In summarising Gandhi’s method of negotiating, K. Shridharani wrote that:

This observation indicates the combination of acute personal recognition and the relationality of relations of domination together with a practical means of overcoming the divide of perception and fact between opponents in a struggle. Indeed, some commentators have suggested that Gandhi’s approach was so effective that some opponents refused to meet with him for fear of succumbing to his entreaties and appeals. Bhikhu Parekh summarises the intent of Satyagraha in dialectical phenomenological terms which he writes that:

Practical evidence of this dialogue in action can be gleaned from the following incidents, both involving meetings between Gandhi and British Viceroys. On May 19, 1921, the new British Viceroy, Lord Reading, wrote to the Secretary of State, E.S. Montagu about his first meeting with Gandhi:

On February 14, 1931, Gandhi wrote to the then Viceroy, Lord Irwin, asking for a meeting. Motilal Nehru had died, leaving something of a power vacuum in Congress, and within Congress, factions were vying to fill it, including Gandhi, and Jawaharlal Nehru, the latter taking a more militant position with respect to civil disobedience than Gandhi was then prepared to do. Seeking to meet with the Viceroy, Gandhi wrote, would enable him to personally learn the Viceroy’s views so he could better advise Congress. Brown makes much of the fact that, while Irwin was a Tory and an aristocrat, he was also a devout Anglican, intrigued by and sensitive to Gandhi’s religious views, as well as sympathetic to the political aspirations of Indians and cognisant that the empire could only survive through cooperation and negotiation (Brown, 1977: 178 – 186; 1989: 249 – 250). The Gandhi – Irwin Pact of March 5, 1931, was a better compromise than many observers expected, and Gandhi and Irwin, observes Brown, "... consoled each other that they must have done a good job, as both were being criticised for having ‘sold’ their countries, the Matatma by the tearful bitterness of Jawaharlal, the Viceroy by the parliamentary tirades of Winston Churchill" (Brown, 1989: 250). As the British were finally leaving India, Gandhi enjoyed several meetings with the last Viceroy, Lord Mountbatten, and photographs of the two, and with Lady Mountbatten as well, indicate a genuine mutual recognition between the otherwise largely divided parties (e.g., Brown, 1989: 371; 372; Payne, 1969: 411).

What these incidents indicate is that Gandhi, even when dealing with the most powerful British representatives in India, regarded them as fellow human beings, with similar weaknesses to himself, momentarily divided by a problem which they could solve if they worked together. His vocative appeals in a clearly a–symmetric relationship nevertheless struck a chord which at least partially bridged the gulf between activist and opponent at the highest political level in the Raj. In terms of the dialogical phenomenology deployed here, Gandhi’s evolving practice and understanding of Satyagraha indicates that interpreting his actions as attempts to reconstitute the a–symmetry of relations of domination into a relationality of domination, and exploit that relationality to vocatively transform the situation into one of dialogue rather than deep division. Gandhi’s approach to nonviolence maybe seen to exelempify data which can be theorised in this way. Nevertheless, examining the specific details of Gandhi’s campaigns show that Gandhi’s explicitly vocative appeals were disastrous in a wider context.

Returning to the Vykom Satyagraha, as an example of how Satyagraha was apparently successfully deployed to bridge a significant gulf between the opponents and satyagrahis, it is hardly mentioned in some of the major Western literature on Gandhi. The best known biography, by Louis Fischer, does not mention it (Fischer, 1982), nor does Robert Payne (Payne, 1969). Judith Brown’s detailed histories omit the period between 1922 and 1927 (Brown, 1972; 1977), and it only receives a few lines in her biography of Gandhi (Brown, 1989: 206). Judith Brown places Vykom in the wider context of Gandhi’s campaign against untouchability, indicating his reluctance to seriously challenge it at a structural level:

The specific issue at stake at Vykom, a village in the Southern Indian state of Travancore, was whether or not untouchables could travel on a road which ran past an orthodox Brahman temple. Local Brahmans refused to allow this, forcing the untouchables to detour around the area to reach their quarter of the village, an inconvenience which had persisted for centuries. The situation was thus burdened with a long history and legitimated by reference to deeply held religious beliefs central to the perceived identity and social position of the protagonists.

The Vykom Satyagraha was comparatively small, involving, at most, a few hundred people (though this is unclear), mostly local untouchable and a minority of caste Hindus, and emphasised strict adherence to Gandhi’s ideals of Satyagraha. The opponents were local Brahmans, the Travancore provincial government, and their police force deployed against the satyagrahis.

Nevertheless, what Gandhi made of the Vykom Satyagraha illustrates that something more was in train than just committed and disciplined nonviolent activists wearing down the opponent’s resolve through persistence and acceptance of self–suffering, and a final conversion of the opponent to the satyagrahi’s cause. Gandhi supported this Satyagraha from the start, though he did not travel to Vykom until the early part of 1925. Interestingly, support for this Satyagraha also initially came from Punjabi Sikhs, who set up a kitchen to feed satyagrahis but they were replaced by local Hindus after Gandhi advised that support should come locally lest local orthodox Hindus be offended. The opponents of the Satyagraha were largely high caste Hindus, especially Brahmans, an orthodox Hindu society, the Savarna Mahajana Sabha, state police from Travancore, and the majority of the Travancore Legislative Council. The satyagrahis were beaten by opponents, and were arrested in such numbers that local prisons became overcrowded, which led to a cessation of arrests. Organisers were ostracised and threatened with the removal of family property and with being labelled out–caste. The police built a barricade across the road, which was later removed when Gandhi negotiated concessions from the state authorities in April, 1925. But when the barricade was removed, the satyagrahis did not proceed down the road as their opponents expected, but held their ground, continuing to pray that the Brahman opposition would grant access to the road. By the autumn of 1925, this occurred.

Gandhi wrote in Young India published on May 1, 1924, as the Vykom Satyagraha was commencing, that the opposition must be won over through strict adherence to the disciplines of Satyagraha:

Clearly, the outcome at Vykom would have implications for Gandhi’s national campaign against untouchability (e.g., Gandhi, 1961: 196). But, as he wrote in Young India published on March 19, 1925:

A more explicit statement of a dialectical phenomenology in practice one could hardly find. Unpacking Gandhi’s statement, quite a pragmatic and straightforward goal was sought which would ease the lot of the village’s most dominated inhabitants, a goal which, especially if achieved, could have potentially national implications for the emancipation of many more Harijans. Gandhi saw this emancipation as integral to the wider political goal of swarj, though he was very sensitive to the strong religious legitimation undergirding the opponent’s position. Disciplined Satyagraha, in and of itself, would draw satyagrahis and their opponents together, remove the dualism of ‘self’ and ‘other’ leading, as Gandhi saw it, to a vocative recognition of ‘selves’ all engaged in their own ‘experiments with truth’ free from unnecessary strictures of socially imposed constraints. It also indicates a consistency of approach, one which would influence the most powerful representatives of the Raj and local protagonists at a village level.

He also wrote in Young India in September, 1926, that:

Almost twenty years later, in the replacement of the by then banned Young India weekly newsletter he started in February, 1933, named Harijan in honour of the untouchables whose liberation he always sought, Gandhi wrote:

If, however, the dialectical phenomenology of the revised framework of domination is applied to Gandhi’s failures, the results are different.

The Rowlatt Satyagraha was perhaps the most significant early failure by Gandhi in India. It lasted from April 6, 1919 to April 18, 1919, though related actions, such as in Delhi, commenced at the end of March, and subsequent isolated actions occurred until well into the year. The history of the Rowlatt Satyagraha is well documented (e.g., Bondurant, 1965: 73 – 88; Kumar {ed.}, 1971; Brown, 1972: 160 – 189; Fischer, 1982: 224 – 235; Brown, 1989: 127 – 136).

If Vykom, four years later, was successful because it was primarily focused on a local issue with, to be sure, national implications particularly for Hindus and most especially for Harijans, involved comparatively few people, and was highly disciplined, then the earlier Rowlatt Satyagraha indicates the potentially disastrous consequences of attempting something like Satyagraha on a national scale involving vastly more complex groups, each with their own agendas, on an issue which did not directly affect the majority of Indians, be they Muslims, Hindus, or the many other actually or potentially antagonistic grassroots interests. Essentially, Rowlatt was a symbol of British imperialism attempting to exert greater domination of Indian affairs through legislating against political activities deemed subversive. As the majority of Indians were not especially aware of political issues beyond their immediate experiences, nor were politically active, especially against the Raj, the Rowlatt Bills, and the Act proclaimed on March, 21 1919, did not directly affect their daily lives.

What was significant about the Rowlatt Satyagraha was Gandhi’s recognition of how he had miscalculated on the discipline of many Indians in maintaining a nonviolent stance, and explains why he called off the Satyagraha after only a few weeks. This suggests the necessity on the part of nonviolent actors to be acutely sensitive to the phenomenological dynamics in play, or soon to be in play, as they prepare for and engage in nonviolent action across a–symmetric vocative and power relations.

In the immediate context, the planned Satyagraha against the Rowlatt Act was complicated by escalating Muslim agitation on the Khilafat issue, British duplicity on this issue being seized upon by both Hindu and Muslim activists as evidence that Britain had to be forced to quit India because promises and undertakings regarding the post–war disposition of Turkey and the Kaliph, and thence regarding India, could be readily reversed. This suggests that the gulf between the likely and actual protagonists in the Satyagraha would be even wider and harder to vocatively bridge, especially in areas with significant Muslim populations.

After justifying her assessment of the Rowlatt Satyagraha as properly adhering to the tenets of Satyagraha, Joan Bondurant summarises the reasons for the failure of the Satyagraha in these terms:

Gandhi admitted as much in a letter to the Viceroy’s Private Secretary, J.L. Maffey, dated April 14, 1919, in which he wrote: "I see that I over–calculated the measure of permeation of satyagraha amongst the people. I underrated the power of hatred and ill will" (in Brown, 1972: 176; 1989: 132). Brown goes on to suggest that, in a letter to Sir Stanley Reed the following day, Gandhi blamed public distrust at forthcoming reforms, resentment at the Rowlatt bills, and Muslim agitation on the Khilafat issue as matters conducive to violence which satyagraha could not contain. She further suggests that Gandhi decided to restrict Satyagraha to situations in which he could exercise direct control (Brown, 1972: 177 – 178; 1989: 132 – 133). Gandhi maintained his public explanation for the eruption of violence in his Autobiography:

Reflection on Rowlatt, even as the last vestiges of adherence to even minimal Satyagraha were petering out, convinced Gandhi that he should become even more active in nationalist politics. But, as Brown notes, he remained far more concerned with producing "... a mental revolution in his compatriots which would bring in true Swaraj, and to this end he urged on them swadeshi" (Brown, 1972: 189). Brown’s detailed history of Rowlatt points to the yawning unevenness of adherence to Satyagraha and observance of the early April, 1919, hartal Gandhi called throughout the country.

Looking more closely at Rowlatt, for example in the Punjab centre of Lahore, on April 11, 1919, a day after British police had fired on and killed or wounded over twenty demonstrators, just after the noon nimaz at the Badshahi Mosque, some 35,000 people gathered for a peaceful meeting which demonstrated how the Rowlatt Satyagraha had, at least temporarily, drawn a wide cross–section of the population of the city together. R Kumar writes that:

What Kumar’s analysis of Lahore’s involvement with the Rowlatt Satyagraha indicates is the importance of keeping a close focus on local events to clearly discern what was motivating each of the participating groups. A complex mix of religious, caste, economic, class, and political interests, some largely antagonistic, coupled with maladroit provincial British administration, and local economic conditions which were eroding the livelihoods of Hindus and Muslims alike contributed to the pre–conditions for an unprecedented display of Hindu – Muslim unity against the British. It remains unclear why Muslims joined the movement, but Kumar hints that the Khilafat issue was not far from their minds, though local Muslim demagoguery was probably also a factor (Kumar, 1971: 297). But within a week of the Badshahi Mosque meeting, and the establishment of a People’s Committee comprising leaders from Hindu and Muslim communities, another British–led massacre had occurred, martial law had been proclaimed, and the majority of the Committee’s leaders had been arrested. What calling in the army demonstrated, however,

Interestingly, Kumar makes no mention of the role of Sikhs in the events in Punjab or even Lahore. Punjab was a Sikh stronghold, and it may have been expected that Sikhs would have been involved in the Satyagraha. But Brown cites newspaper reports from the middle of 1916 and 1917 which suggest that, at the time, Sikhs tended to regard political participation as akin to religious heresy (Brown, 1972: 19 – 21).

Louis Fischer writes more generally about the effect of the Rowlatt Satyagraha in the Punjab, quoting from the later Hunter Commission of Inquiry into the Jallianwallah Bagh massacre at Amritsar on April 13, 1919, to indicate that momentary Hindu – Muslim unity was demonstrated through widespread and nonviolent observance of the hartal in Amritsar on March 13, and again on April 6. Two days later, on the day of the Hindu festival Ram Naumi, and after one Hindu and one Muslim Congress leader had been arrested, Muslims joined in celebrating Ram Naumi and were reported to have shouted "Mahatma Gandhi ki jai (Long Live Mahatma Gandhi)", "Hindu – Mussalman ki jai (Long Live Hindu – Muslim unity)" and "drinking out of the same cups publicly by way of demonstration" (Fischer, 1982: 229 – 230). If April 9 was the high point of this activity, the afternoon of April 13 at Jallianwallah Bagh marked the nadir of British – Indian relations.

The significance of the Amritsar massacre lies in the fact that it can be interpreted as an example of what can happen when a vocatively inflected dialectical phenomenology encounters evidence of instances in which the gulf between opponents and nonviolent actors reaches an unbridgeable depth. The Amritsar massacre is a graphic example of the reverse of the import of a dialectical phenomenology being deployed here. If the ideal of Satyagraha in practice is the reconciliation between activist and opponent, a recognition that they share more than a momentary disagreement over some problem, then its antithesis is the killing of opponents which destroys any possibility of reconciliation. The relationality of domination remains a constant, manifested in reconciliation or bullets, but the positive relationality dies with the activists. It also indicates the limits of the suspensive element in the phenomenology, for simply examining the massacre in isolation neglects its consequences for all the actors involved.

The Amritsar massacre, which was graphically recreated in Richard Attenborough’s film Gandhi, demonstrates what can happen when a vocative appeal made across grossly a–symmetric power relations and profoundly divergent hermeneutics on the part of protagonists is met with absolutely no recognition whatsoever from the opponent’s side, save extreme violence. The Hunter Committee’s Report, and the parallel Congress Party’s investigation, both condemned the military’s actions, the incident had enormous impact on Indian opinion with respect to British domination, and added strength to subsequent vocative appeals made by Gandhi and other politicians to the Raj and British domestic leaders, largely, but not universally, shaken and even ashamed by the massacre carried out by their own forces.

With martial law declared in Amritsar, and unrest widespread but diminishing, the commander of the Jullunder brigade, Brigadier – General Reginald Dyer, was ordered to Amritsar, and on April 12, 1919, issued a proclamation banning processions and meetings. He left publication of this order to the local police, and on the morning of April 13, went through the city reading the proclamation. However, as the Hunter Report later said, the route taken by Dyer mitigated against the proclamation being widely known. For Sikhs, April 13, the first of Baisakh, was also the birth anniversary of Khalsa, and many came to Amritsar to celebrate at the Golden Temple (Singh, 1966: 163 – 167). Many who had come from outlying villages gathered at Jallianwalla Bagh for the day to cool before they went home. Meanwhile, Dyer learned that a large meeting was being planned for 4.30 pm that afternoon and about 1.00 pm, he went to the location, Jallianwalla Bagh, were a large crowd estimated at between ten and twenty thousand people was already gathering. Believing the crowd was in breach of his proclamation, Dyer ordered his troops to open fire on them. The Bagh effectively boxed the crowd in, with the troops commanding the major exit. Over 1,500 rounds were fired into the crowd, almost 380 people were killed, and 1,137 people injured.

It is important to note that Brigadier – General Dyer’s troops that day consisted of Ghurkhas from Nepal and Baluchis from Baluchistan (Fischer, 1982: 231 – 232), only the latter being even remotely likely to have any empathy with or knowledge of their Muslim cousins crowded into the Bagh, along side many Hindus. The troops were garrisoned well outside Amritsar, and had been in the city for only two days, no doubt insulated from any contact with locals. The consequences of denying a shared humanness with others leads to events such as the Amritsar massacre, and Brigadier – General Dyer’s earlier infamous ‘crawling order’ (Brown, 1972: 241; Fischer, 1982: 234). After a British woman had been assaulted by a mob, Dyer had ordered that all Indians literally crawl past the place where the woman had been attacked (Payne, 1969: 340).

The Hunter Report cited one General Drake – Brockman of Delhi who asserted: "Force is the only thing that an Asiatic has any respect for" (in Fischer, 1982: 233). In his report to his superior, Dyer wrote: "I fired and continued to fire until the crowd dispersed and I consider this the least amount of firing which could produce the necessary effect it was my duty to produce if I was to justify my action. It was no longer a question of merely dispersing the crowd, but one of producing a sufficient moral effect from a military point of view not only on those who were present, but more especially throughout the Punjab. There could be no question of undue severity" (in Fischer, 1982: 232 – 233; emphasis in original). In cross–examination before the Hunter Committee, Dyer said, "Yes, I think it quite possible that I could have dispersed them perhaps without firing" but "I was going to punish them. My idea from a military point of view was to make a wide impression" (in Fischer, 1982: 234 – 235; on British domestic reaction to the Hunter Report, see, Brown, 1972: 243 – 244; Payne, 1969: 341).

Another example of Satyagraha actually eliciting a viscous response from the opponent’s forces occurred when some 2,500 Congress members attempted a nonviolent ‘raid’ on the salt works at Dharsana, some 150 miles north of Bombay, on May 21, 1930. The point to be drawn from this example is that, when outnumbered by Satyagrahis, the police reacted in quite the opposite of how the voluntary acceptance of suffering by their opponents was supposed to make them react. Instead of converting or uplifting them, the Satyagrahi’s action provoked them to ferocious reaction.

Gandhi had been jailed on May 5, so the ‘raid’ was led by Sorojini Naidu, a noted Indian poet. Gandhi had earlier written to the Viceroy, informing him about the ‘raid’. As was re–enacted in one of the most harrowing scenes in Attenborough’s film Gandhi, the Satyagrahis advanced towards the salt works, which was guarded by a force of some 400 Indian police, six British officers, and twenty–five Indian riflemen. The police not only relentlessly beat the non–resisting Satyagrahis with their metal tipped lathis, as more protesters approached the works and were beaten, some were kicked in the abdomen, had sticks thrust up their anuses, and, while lying wounded, had their testicles squeezed. One of the witnesses of the action was experienced American journalist, Webb Miller, who later described the scene as the most harrowing he had ever experienced in eighteen years of reporting in twenty–two countries. Vallabhbhai Patel, arriving as the action was dying down, was reported to have said:

But even here, the reaction was, according to Webb Miller, not uniformly brutal: "Must of the time the stolid native Surat police seemed reluctant to strike. It was noticeable that when the officers were occupied on other parts of the line the police slackened, only to resume threatening and beating when the officers appeared again" (in Sharp, 1973: 330).In a letter to King George V, the Viceroy, Lord Irwin, described the incident as ‘amusing’ and expressed a perverse happiness at the fact that ‘the police had obliged the protesters with a few honourable bruises they had begged for’ (in Payne, 1969: 398; see also, Fischer, 1982: 342 – 345).

Another incident was reported by another American journalist, Negley Farson. A police sergeant had been beating a Sikh, who fell from a heavy blow. He was assisted by Congress first aid volunteers, and stood up again. The police officer drew back his arm for a final swing, and then dropped his hands by his side, reportedly saying, "It’s no use. You can’t hit a bugger when he stands up to you like that". The police officer gave the Sikh a mock salute and walked off (in Bondurant, 1965: 96). Two interpretations of this incident are possible. A satyagrahi would argue that this is indicative of the vocative power of nonviolence bridging the shared humanity of the Sikh and the police officer. Alternatively, assuming that the incident occurred in the midst of a larger demonstration, the police officer simply gave up, possibly disgusted, degraded, or exasperated by having to beat the Sikh (Parekh, 1989: 168 – 169).

A dialectical phenomenological approach not only leads to a new reading of Gandhian nonviolence and incidents such as Rowlatt, or Dharsana, it also facilitates a different understanding Gandhi’s use of secrecy. This issue, apparently of largely tactical importance, actually goes into the operations of the relationality implicit in a dialectical phenomenology being deployed here. Given the vocatively dialogic components in practical dialectical phenomenology, deliberately withholding information from an opponent is a violation of the intent of bridging the gulf between opponent and activist.

Turning to secrecy, Gandhi is adamant that secrecy, and deliberately withholding information from the opponent to gain tactical advantage over them, has no part in Satyagraha . As he wrote in a section called ‘A Question Box’ published in Harijan on April 13, 1940:

At an August 8, 1942, Congress Party meeting, Gandhi asserted bluntly that:

Almost four years later, in addressing sabotage and secrecy as an issue for Satyagrahis, he wrote in Harijan published on February 10, 1946:

Because nonviolent activists influenced by Gandhi, or engaging in struggle from a moral grounding, place great stress on openness and abhor secrecy, Sharp devotes some attention to the issue, stressing that: "We are not here concerned with moral imperatives to openness and truthfulness, but with the psychological, social and political effects of such behaviour" (Sharp, 1973: 482).

Gandhi rejects secrecy for moral reasons, whereas Sharp concludes that secrecy should be very carefully considered, and probably rejected, because keeping secrets from the opponent could have counterproductive effects on the nonviolent movement and the struggle’s conclusion. Secrecy can erode the potential of crucial third–party support being attracted to the struggle, prevent the opponent from recognising the sincerity and strength of the opposition, and contribute to eroding vital trust and confidence within the campaign’s membership. An opponent equipped with surveillance devices and using agents provocateurs to infiltrate the campaign will probably be able to extract required information anyway.

Associated with secrecy is the tactic of informing the opponent about what one is going to do before one does it. Gandhi would do so out of courtesy, consistent with the rejection of secrecy, and congruent with the centrality of truth to Satyagraha. Sharp would alert an opponent prior to what the campaign is going to do as part of a continuing tactic of impressing the opponent about the campaign’s sincerity, strength of purpose, and extent of popular support. When campaigners and opponents actually meet in conflict, the opponent knowing what the campaign is planning to do beforehand could also reduce casualties caused by the opponent’s forces overreacting because of surprise or fear. Sharp concludes by warning that openness might not bring initial gains, because the opponent may interpret the admission of the campaign’s plans as a sign of weakness or ineptness to be fully exploited. Even though Gandhi informed the authorities of the forthcoming Dharasana salt works ‘raid’, the violence which ensued was significant, if not entirely uniform.

Another reason for eschewing secrecy in a nonviolent campaign is that secrecy contributes to both paranoia and arrogance, and thence to the divisions between activist and opponent which is a major phenomenon nonviolence often explicitly seeks to erode. If one side does not know what the other is planning or is likely to do, the ignorant side can become decidedly apprehensive, even paranoid, about what their opponents might be plotting. Paranoia can contribute to fear, and fear can contribute to over-reactions and escalating dehumanisation of the other side. Not knowing what they might be or indeed actually are capable of doing enables the ignorant side to create all sorts of fantasies which can multiply unless checked by sincerity and openness. Equally eroding of the essential solidarity between activist and opponent can be arrogance on the part of those keeping secrets from the other side in that they can grow to believe they are superior because only they really know what plots are being hatched. They can come to believe they are superior beings to their opponents, such arrogance hardly being efficacious to opening and extending lines of communication between parties to a conflict.

In contexts less complex and smaller than India, in which there are fewer and weaker themes and currents than the many languages, ethnicities, religions, political and economic interests crammed together in thousands of Indian cities and villages, a dialectical phenomenology of the kind deployed here would clearly indicate how a multiplicity of interests interact in a flow of events and perceptions, thus shedding light on the dynamics at work in a particular nonviolent campaign. A dialectical phenomenology deployed to analyse even a single campaign in even a single locale, such as Lahore or Vykom, indicates the need to find, tease out, and analyse the various interests and perceptions, both complicating the usual picture, but adding greater insight and scope for more detailed analysis. Such an approach, however, of itself, does not aid in addressing is why, for example, momentary unity between Lahore or Amritsar’s Hindus and Muslims was, and probably remains, unsustainable. More research might indicate why Punjab’s some five million Sikhs seemed so reticent to participate in the Rowlatt Satyagraha. It is also clear that, even when Gandhi was able to quell or diffuse violence, his personal charisma, and thence his moral authority, only extended a little beyond his physical presence, and his staunchest followers were only less able to exert authority over a Satyagraha which got out of control.

At this level of analysis, it is simplistic to dismiss Satyagraha as ineffective because campaigns such as Rowlatt erupted into violence, apparently contributed to the brutality at Dharasana, or that Satyagraha works because the Brahmans at Vykom finally allowed the Harijans to pass their temple. At the same time, Gandhi’s explanations that ‘the masses were not ready to use it’ appear either self–serving, naive, or idealistic, especially given his amply demonstrated and escalating awareness of the complexities of India. What Gandhi did demonstrate, especially with Rowlatt, was a self–correcting function in Satyagraha, which enabled the campaign to be suspended, mostly more than less, once it became clear that the campaign was out of control. Vykom, and even momentary instances of inter–communal accord, indicate that something was at work which overcame deep–seated distrust and hatred between former antagonists. Gandhi’s personal methods of negotiating across a wide range of social divisions also point to the effects of reducing mistrust and recognising, and then acting upon an essential humanity shared by all parties to a conflict (see, for example, Pelton, 1974: 210 – 249). The renunciation of secrecy, and its inherent dangers of self–aggrandisement, paranoia, and encouraging an opponent to over–react, as well as violating the principles of Satyagraha, is one important example of how practitioners of ‘negative’ and ‘positive’ mode nonviolence can agree, but, as expected, for different reasons given their widely differing vocative positions.

With respect to deploying a dialectical phenomenology as part of a revised framework for interpreting domination, Gandhi’s own theory of Satyagraha appears to embed a transformative relationality of domination into his theory, and attempts to carry that through into his praxis, though it would appear that this only extended into situations in which he or his closest followers were present. Evidence can be found to suggest that a vocative relationality contains its own contradictions in which there can be no guarantee that the other side in the relation will respond as expected, even when the satyagrahis adhere to their own discipline. Account must then be taken of all operative factors in an on–going encounter, and not just suspend one encounter, though a phenomenology of the kind suggested here appears to offer some analytic purchase when encounters are suspended from the experiential flow of events. This suggests that a structural analysis needs to be coupled with a dialectical phenomenology and the two approaches held in creative tension to facilitate more efficacious analysis.

There appears to be ample scope for further investigation of nonviolent incidents and campaigns using a carefully limited dialectical phenomenological approach deployed as a component in a revised framework for interpreting domination. The approach is by no means sufficiently adequate to give a complete analysis of nonviolent actions, or other issues of concern to peace research, but it would appear to give added, if limited, insights into specific incidents.

As has been suggested in chapter five, the existential effects of domination require attention because they arguably distort the personalities, and affect the behaviour of the dominated, preventing consideration of their dominated condition, and retarding any possible efforts to achieve liberation. The neglected existential effects of being a dominator also need attention, not only to round out the analysis, but also to be congruent with some of the implications of the forgoing dialectical phenomenological approach.

Applying the revised framework for interpreting domination to the work of Sharp brings out several ambivalences. He fully acknowledges the importance of the existential effects of being dominated but in his work he appears to gloss over them. Obviously, Sharp is aware of the many effects of being oppressed. His focus is on extreme instances of what can interpreted as domination in practice: his four unsolved political problems of dictatorship, war, genocide, and social oppression (Sharp, 1980). His detailed and extensive historical examples of nonviolent tactics in practice range across the most historically vivid examples of oppression, such as the Holocaust, through to seemingly fairly trivial, yet in their own way significant, instances of oppression. Given that his foundational axiom is that oppressors are allowed to get away with their activities because people let them, he goes on to focus on why people obey. His explanations for this largely follow Weber’s explanations of why people accord legitimacy to domination: habit, fear of sanctions, self–interest, moral obligation. He goes on to consider what can be interpreted as mimesis in practice, psychological identification with the ruler, zones of indifference, and absence of self confidence among subjects (Sharp, 1973: 16 –25; 1980: 23 – 44).

With respect to mimetic identification with the ruler, which is not limited to any political system, Sharp writes:

An adroit dominator would be expected to establish and/or exploit social divisions, in part, to ensure that different social groups regarded each other with indifference, even distain, particularly when the dominator sought to directly oppress one group, such as Jews, blacks, or untouchables. This is Sharp’s ‘zone of indifference’: "How wide this zone is will vary, depending on a number of social and political conditions and the inducements offered for obedience" (Sharp, 1973: 23). A more severe development on this phenomenon is for the dominator to pit different dominated groups against each other on the basis that it is more efficacious for their domination to have their thralls fighting each other than united to struggle against the dominator. In India, for example, the British often used inter–communal violence and suspicion to buttress their domination of the indigenous population as a whole.

Another significant effect of domination is the erosion of self–confidence among the dominated. Especially in the context of a removal of a shared value system or sense of identity, dominated people may come to believe that their dominators really do have greater knowledge, skills, and capacities for making decisions. Some people may retreat from the responsibility and risk of making decisions, preferring their rulers to make them on their behalf. "Even where subjects wish to alter the established order," Sharp writes, "they may remain submissive because they lack confidence in their ability to act effectively in bringing about the desired changes. As long as people lack self–confidence they are unlikely to do anything other than obey, cooperate with, and submit to their rulers" (Sharp, 1973: 24). Brigadier – General Dyer’s ‘crawling order’, mentioned in the previous section, can be interpreted as a crude means of achieving this effect (Payne, 1969: 340).

Sharp does not focus much on the existential effects of being an oppressor, beyond fragmentary references to ‘self–aggrandisement’ or their ‘need for power’. While by no means suggesting that rulers are monolithic, personalised, and operate out of an actually or potentially realised total domination, and hold power simply through superior firepower or a supremely effective police force, Sharp almost exclusively consigns the ruler to the role of a rather disembodied entity against which nonviolent action is deployed. "As the opponent’s first point of reference is himself, he must keep a favourable self–image. His justification for the policy at issue and his dismissal of the grievance group as nonhuman or outside the common moral order may have helped him to do this" (Sharp, 1973: 724). Even when the oppressor’s agents defect from their ranks and join the opposition, or sustained, disciplined, and persistent nonviolent action leads to at least unease among some elements of the oppressing agency, Sharp is cautious about the effectiveness of such results which may, or may not, lead to genuine conversion of the opponent (Sharp, 1973: 707 – 733).

Attention to the effects of being a dominator suggests that, from their point of view and depending on their legitimation system or ideology, the masses live in the best of all possible worlds so they would have to be genuinely insane were they to rebel, the masses are in need of constant guidance and discipline so that they may one day join the civilised world (but hopefully not for quite a while yet), the masses are closer to animals than humans and therefore require constant firm treatment and control, or, they are sub–human, polluting, corrupting, and must be exterminated (e.g., Pelton, 1974: 199 – 204; see also, Parekh’s summation of general British paternalistic and imperialistic attitudes to India and Indians, 1989: 12 – 15).

Sharp is also aware of the benefits which waging conflict nonviolently can bring to the activists, in addition to actually ameliorating the specific or more general instances of oppression against which their campaigns are aimed. In summary, he writes:

Sharp is decidedly weak, however, on the question of why people would withdraw their consent or obedience. This is more a question for a social ontology, to be sure, and will be addressed in the next section. His discussion of why people obey is, in the main, quite straightforward. But Sharp’s emphasis on the ways in which obedience or consent have been, can be, and could be much more effectively withdrawn nonviolently begs the question as to why people would put themselves through the process of rebellion in the first place. That they do, and often do so violently, and as Sharp demonstrates, also do so nonviolently more often than is usually recognised, is not at issue. From the normatively informed perspective of the revised framework for interpreting domination suggested in this thesis, the question is relevant because gaining greater purchase on why people would rebel would point to ways in which they could rebel, preferably nonviolently, more often, more effectively, and perhaps with greater possibility of sustainably improving their conditions.

Sharp summarises Gandhi on this point, which is about as close as he gets to addressing this crucial question of why people would rebel, or more precisely, how they might be induced to rebel:

While he is cognisant of what can be reinterpreted as some of the existential components of being dominated, and some of the apparent benefits of struggling against domination, some of those benefits also adhere to violent conflict. Indeed, military training, in addition to re–socialising civilians into soldiers, tends to instil or result in strong bonding between soldiers, emphasising mutual reliance on one’s comrades. There seems nothing unique in nonviolence to achieve these results. Sharp’s discussion does not explore the existential effects of domination with sufficient precision.

Gandhi’s views of the causes and existential effects of being dominated, as well as being a dominator, are summarised in the following extract from Young India published on November 24, 1920:

The roots of Gandhi’s views of the causes of oppression lay in his acknowledgment of Hindu doctrines of the oneness of all humanity and the unity of life. If humanity dominated itself, then it also violated one of the fundamental laws of the Hindu view of the cosmos, which was the cosmic spirit needing actualisation in human actions. Humans dominating other humans violated what Gandhi took to be a fundamental interest of all beings in becoming one with the cosmos, and so the dominators were damaging themselves as much as they were damaging their thralls (Parekh, 1989: 86 – 95).

While aware of specific instances of oppression in his own society, he was also aware of the effects of oppression on the individual’s search for truth, and, more mundanely though nonetheless importantly, the effects of that oppression manifesting in a wide range of social ills: uncleanliness leading to disease and demonstrable of a wider lack of self–respect, dehumanisation of lower and out–caste groups, oppression of women, or substance abuse. In his 1941 booklet entitled Constructive Program, Gandhi wrote:

Substance abuse can be interpreted as another ‘escape attempt’ from domination. In Young India published on March 3, 1927, Gandhi wrote on prohibition, which he felt could not work unless the reasons why people abused alcohol were addressed:

Commenting on a book entitled Mother India by one Katherine Mayo, which drew attention to widespread insanitation in India, Gandhi wrote in Young India published on September 15, 1927:

The year later, Gandhi asserted:

Gandhi, as indicated by Sharp above, suggested that the route to freedom began with a mental recognition that one no longer had to be a slave. In Young India published on February 4, 1926, he wrote:

Once somebody has resolved no longer to be dominated, Gandhi would assert that the repertoire of practices embraced by proper Satyagraha would strengthen resolve, even against brutal reaction, as well as enable the person to commence on their own ‘experiments with truth’.

Very early on August 8, 1942, Gandhi told a gathering of several hundred Congress Party leaders that:

In February, 1946, Gandhi met with a group of university – educated Negro soldiers from West Africa. His remarks were later published in Harijan on February 24, 1946:

Once again, it is crucial to consider some of the evidence on the ground to see whether or not Satyagraha did address any of the existential effects of being dominated. One of the rather neglected facets of Gandhi’s life and practice, at least in most major Western histories and biographies, is what transpired at the several ashrams he established. While maintaining the focus on India, it must not be neglected that he established two ashrams in South Africa, the first outside Durban called Phoenix Estate in 1904, and the second called Tolstoy Farm, near Johannesburg in 1910. Both ashrams were established for essentially two reasons, pragmatic and idealistic. The pragmatic reasons involved the necessity to provide an economically sustainable base for Gandhi and his follower’s political activities, Phoenix initially established to house the press for Indian Opinion, and Tolstoy established when Gandhi’s political activities took him to the Transvaal, he and his followers needing a base cheaper and closer to their main areas of activity. The idealistic reasons can be found in Gandhi’s evolving ideas on Satyagraha, especially when grounded in practical activities such as self–reliance in food production, close attention to sanitation, and demonstrable inter–communal harmony, as residents of both ashrams were from Hindu, Muslim, Parsi, and Christian Indo–South African communities (Brown, 1989: 42 – 43; Fischer, 1982: 90 – 154). The two reasons can be summarised in these quotes from Gandhi’s Satyagraha in South Africa:

In the middle of 1936, Gandhi moved to a remote village in the centre of India, Sevagram, where he established his fourth ashram. The village was deliberately chosen because it was small, with a predominantly Harijan population, isolated, disease–ridden, and poor. In comparison to his first Indian ashram, at Sabarmati, there was little organisation at Sevagram, but Gandhi nevertheless used it as an example of what he held to be necessary for village, and thence Indian development, by seeking to demonstrate the benefits of self–sufficiency, cleanliness, a proper diet, indigenous medical treatments, and educational reforms. The last item was of national importance when, in late October, 1937, a meeting of Education Ministers of the Congress provincial governments and others adopted Gandhi’s plan for major, practically–oriented, educational reforms (Brown, 1989: 302 – 303).

Writing in Harijan published on August 4, 1940, Gandhi connected his activities at Sevagram with the effect a single satyagrahi might have in such a situation:

Brown writes of Gandhi at Sevagram that: "One senses that a sight of this frail, laughing, but grimly determined old man, tramping the muddy village lanes, reasoning with and demonstrating to his village neighbours, would give a truer impression of the deepest in Gandhi than the political campaigns or the negotiations with those in power which generated the bulk of the written historical records of his life" (Brown, 1989: 302).

Given the relative paucity of detail on what actually occurred on a daily basis at Sevagram, an incident in August, 1938, is illuminating. A group of Harijans arrived and demanded that Gandhi appoint a Harijan to the Indian cabinet, something which, of course, he had no power to do. They responded that Gandhi could usually get what he wanted by fasting, so they would do the same. They also wanted the same treatment Gandhi received when in jail. A few days later, they left the village, but Gandhi was apparently shaken by having at least some of his tactics used against him (Payne, 1969: 481; Payne is incorrect when he describes this as a ‘satyagraha’ campaign in the sense understood and advocated by Gandhi).

Sharp’s discussion of what can be interpreted as the existential effects of being dominated is, typically, oriented at indicating the obstacles to be overcome once people take the crucial step of deciding to rebel. He assumes that people will rebel, and will recognise that their domination is largely brought about by their own submission, at least according to his theory of power. A more analytic approach to the social–psychological dynamics of domination would point to what is occurring when people take the potentially awesome step of overcoming the internal, and structural, obstacles to rebellion,

What Gandhi and Sharp agree upon is the open–ended process of empowerment, involving a large range of changing perceptions, beliefs, and actions which, over an equally variable time frame, could lead to, for Sharp, greater social and political freedom, and for Gandhi, a continuing search for truth.

In a theoretic–practical sense, Gandhi’s ideals can be seen to be directly aimed at addressing many of the existential effects of being dominated, and of being a dominator. The multiple hermeneutics embedded in his activities requires that the perceptions and actions of all the actors in each situation be fully examined. Indeed, each component in Satyagraha in practice can be seen to be aimed at a specific effect but with a ricochet to other effects, as demonstrated by attention to Harijan cleanliness improving health, raising self–confidence, indicating self–respect, and challenging an objective basis for higher caste ostracism of untouchables. More work to disclose the sustainable efficacy of Gandhi’s ideas in practice would serve to further illuminate the specific, and possibly wider utility of Satyagraha to address the existential effects of being dominated, and of being a dominator. It would be interesting, for example, to examine Sevagram several years after Gandhi’s assassination to see if there were any lasting effects of this small–scale ‘experiment with truth’ initiated by the Mahatma.

The five existential components of being dominated listed in chapter five appear to be partially addressed by both Gandhi and Sharp, though in different ways. The strongest purchase is found in addressing the passivity of dominated actors, self–explanation of the dominated’s situation by reference to immutable laws, ‘fate’ or the will of a God, and mimesis, or the mimicry of the dominator by the dominated. Gandhi, particularly, sought to address these, and some escape attempts from domination through substance abuse, while Sharp implies that greater self–respect gained by the dominated would address other effects of being dominated. Sharp does not address the attempt by the dominated to alter their physical appearance, and Gandhi’s kadhi campaign and his adoption of traditional dress can be interpreted as transforming this effect in a positive direction by replacing Western–type appearance with Indian appearance.

One effect of being dominated not mentioned in chapter five, but which needs attention and appears to have been at least partially addressed by Gandhi, is the propensity by dominated groups to fight among themselves rather than unite to struggle against their main dominator. This effect can be exploited by the dominator to ‘divide and rule’ their opponents. But this effect only partially explains endemic inter–communal violence, one of Gandhi’s major continuing problems which he only momentarily was able to solve.

There is therefore considerable scope for future research examining the existential components of domination from the dominator’s and the dominated’s perspective, both at a theoretic and an empirical level. These components in the revised framework for interpreting domination can be mediated through positive attention being given to further explicating how people can be induced to, or even spontaneously, make the steps from passivity to action. The revised framework for interpreting domination, in particular attention being given to the existential components of domination, would also be strengthened by research conducted along these lines.

The revised framework for interpreting domination, taking account of the slippery conception of social ontology noted in chapter five, nevertheless includes the hypothesis that a specifically vocative social ontology may have greater purchase for interpreting domination, especially when actors are challenging domination.

In the case of nonviolence, the specific social ontology proposed in the revised framework for interpreting domination has a methodological purchase because of the dialogical nature of the exchange of action frames involved. The emphasis here is on the concrete processes of social constitution which could transform a dominated ‘other’ into a potentially aware ‘self’.

Sharp’s view of social ontology, derived from his consistent stress upon the oppressed empowering themselves to challenge the oppressor nonviolently, while superficially attractive due to its foundational simplicity, does not take account of the profound relationality of domination, or how that relationality can be replaced with an emancipatory relationality which considers both structural and existential elements at work in situations of domination, and situations in which domination can be, or actually is being, challenged.

Sharp’s strong sense of the role of agency is relevant here. While he does recognise that fear may prevent people from resisting an oppressor, and mentions a range of psychological factors which prevent people from recognising their potential power manifested in nonviolence, throughout his work, he stresses the fact that, in his view, finally an oppressor is allowed to oppress people because they continue to obey the oppressor’s commands. This strong sense of agency is asserted, for example, in the context of Sharp’s discussion of the preparations which he argues must be made for nonviolent action:

Sharp elsewhere does address the issue of human needs, and, though he does not cite this work, appears to accept much of the literature on human needs theory by Maslow, Kohlberg, and Loevinger, especially the ‘lower’ levels of their respective hierarchies to do with physical, belonging, and self–authentication needs. Part of this last ‘need’, for Sharp is the "... capacity for power to determine how we shall live. We need power to control our lives, to withstand the forces that would mould us, harm us, or destroy us, a capacity to shape our lives and futures, even in the face of hostile forces" (Sharp, 1980: 311). He goes on to call for both physical and non–physical needs such as this need for power, to be simultaneously addressed. In summation, Sharp’s strong sense of agency is indicated when he asserts: "It is weakness in people’s determination and ability to act which makes possible their continued oppression and submission. Change that, and they can never again be oppressed. Such self–liberation can only be done through the strengthening of the subordinates by their own efforts" (Sharp, 1980: 339).

A subtle patriarchal ontology embedded in Sharp’s approach has already been mentioned, especially when his strong sense of agency is coupled with a feminist analysis of power (McGuinness, 1993). "Sharp is able to maintain his view steadfastly because the choices that confront individuals ultimately rest on abstract concepts – consent and power – which are removed from the circumstances, relationships, and lives involved" (McGuinness, 1993: 109). The theory of needs has also been critiqued from a feminist perspective, the argument being that women tend to make moral judgements from an ethic of care, which implies a mutuality of responsibility, whereas men tend to make moral judgements from an ethic of justice, which implies a consideration of rights and claims. In the former, the self is defined in relation to the other, while in the latter, the self is defined as separated from the other, emphasising individual empowerment and separation from the other (e.g., Gilligan, 1982: 138 – 156).

It is universally admitted that there is a quasi–metaphysical dimension to Gandhi’s Satyagraha, but this should not be interpreted to mean that Gandhi clarified his ontological ideas. Gandhi argued that the individual’s search for truth would lead them to realise God, which he took to be Truth. The renunciation of v