CHAPTER 7

● Students will be able to identify at least three major

causes of armed conflict and explain how these
causes contribute to violence.

● Students will be able to explain how poverty and

hunger can exacerbate violence and conflict.

● Students will be able to list and describe five

principles of nonviolence, providing examples of how
these principles have been applied in real-world
situations.
in the face of direct or
structural violence, humans
are generally faced with three
response-options: one is to do
nothing about it: another is to
respond with violence and last
is to repond nonviolently.
To do nothing about oppression and
repression encourages the perpetuation
of the oppressive/repressive system. The
failure to act may due to fear,
helplessness or indifference. To respond
with violence perpetuates the cycle of
hostility and carnage. Those who resort
counter-violence say that they are
motivated by the desire to seek justice or
to defend one’s life or dignity.
But at last, violence produces anger
and bitterness on the part of the
victims, setting off a dangerous cycle.
Nonviolence, on the other hand, “ seek
to create a situation that would
liberate victims from silence and
helplessness to understanding and
solidarity. It seeks to create a crises
that would force the adversary to
open the door to negotiation (ML.
King,Jr., 1963, cited in Holmes &
Gan,2005).
Nonviolence or “ahimsa” is the
refusal to do harm to other
humans as life is sacred and is an
absolute value. It is anchored in
the belief that humans have
potential to change .
AKKAPKA or Aksyon para sa
Kapayapaan at Katarungan/ Action
for Peace and Justine (1987) defines
it as “a principle, a way of life or tool
for change that considers the human
person as the highest created value
which must not be destroyed. Its aim
is to seck the truth and produce
justice and the possibility for
solidarity and reconciliation. Its aim
to liberate the oppressed and the
oppressor through moral persuasion,
pressure and forms of nonviolent
direct action.”
Mohandas Gandhi, the man who led the
people of India out of British subjugation
held the following beliefs about
nonviolence:

As long as people accept exploitation,

both exploiter and exploited will be
entangled in injustice but once the
exploited refuse to accept the
relationship, refuse to cooperate with it,
they are already free.
Non-violence and
cowardice do not go
together. Possession of
arms implies an element of
fear, if not cowardice.
A person and his/her
deeds are two distinct
things. Hate the sin but not
the sinner.
An eye for an eye will
make the whole world
blind.
If we fight back, we will
become the vandal and
they (oppressors) will
become the law.
•Non-violence is more powerful for
converting the opponent and
opening his ears which are
otherwise shut to the voice of
reason.

•Non-violence demands that the

means used should be as pure as
the ends sought. Two wrongs will
not make one right.
•Non-violence does not seek to defeat or humiliate
the opponent but to win his friendship and
understanding,

•Non-violence seeks to defeat injustice, not

people.

•Non-violence thrives on love rather than

hatred.
•Non-violence requires willingness to
suffer and amazing discipline in the midst
of provocation.

•Non-violence holds that suffering can

educate and transform.
It is both an ethical and moral choice. Major religious
and philosophical traditions teach about respect for
life. In Jainism, it is taught that a wise person "does not
kill, nor cause others to kill, nor consent to the killings
by others". Lao Tzu, founder of Taoism taught that
"weapons are instruments of evil and not of a good
ruler". In Buddhism, the precept "not to kill" is the
foundation for all Buddhist action. Everyone is be-
lieved to have been born with a Buddha nature so "no
one has the right to take the life of another".
•In Hinduism, "ahimsa" is considered the
greatest gift and the highest teaching.

•In Islam, it is taught that anyone who "takes

one life without justification, it is as if he has
taken the lives of all humanity."

•In Juda-ism, followers are urged "not to envy

a man of violence and not choose any of his
ways".

•Christians are taught that those who use the

sword are sooner or later destroyed by it.
is not the law of bumans (Gandhi, 1931).
Sigmund Freud, in 1920, wrote that aggression
is an innate instinct which should be di- verted
away on to others to protect our intrapsychic
stability. Similarly, Konrad Lorenz, in 1966,
suggested that aggression serves an adaptive
function in the evolutionary development where
the fittest survives. But a group of scientists
and scholars from around the world met in
Seville, Spain in 1986, and wrote a statement
countering the proposition that violence is
inherent in human nature.
War is not inevitable. There are cultures
which have not engaged in wars for
centuries.
Violent behavior is not genetically programmed into our
human nature. Genes provide a developmental potential
that can be actualized only in conjunction with the
ecological and social environment.

Humans do not have a violent brain. There is nothing

in our neuropsychological makeup that compels us to
react violently. How we act is shaped by how we
have been conditioned and socialized.
Biology does not condemn humanity to war. Just
as "wars begin in the minds of men," so does
peace settle there. The same species who
invented war is capable of inventing peace. The
responsibility lies with each of us.
The Seville Statement supports the
theory put forward by Bandura, Ross &
Ross in 1963 that aggression is not
inherent but is learned in the process of
socialization and, thus, may be
unlearned. It is not in human nature to
kill. Humans, under normal
circumstances, prefer cooperation to
aggressiveness (SIPRI-UNESCO, 1997).
is a practical choice. Tools and effects of violence are costly. The Stockholm
International Peace Research Institute (2009) reported that the world's
annual military spending in military programs in 2008 is estimated at more
than 1.5 trillion U.S. dollars. Forty-two percent of this was spent by the United
States of America. In the Year 2000, when the world military expenditures
was estimated at US$800 billion annually, the World Game Institute reported
that the world only needed US$21 billion annually to provide shelter, US$19
billion to eliminate starvation and malnutrition; US$10 billion to provide, safe
and clean water; and US$5 billion to eliminate illiteracy figures that are way
smaller com- pared to the annual world military expenditures to solve the
major con- cerns facing humanity (World Game Institute, as cited by the
United Nations Department of Public Information).
The classic examples of success stories of non-
violent direct action would be those initiated by
Mohandas Gandhi in India that led to the Hindu
people's liberation from British occupation, and by
Martin Luther King, Jr. in the United States of
America that resulted to the adoption of the Civil
Rights Act of 1964 which desegregated public
accommodations everywhere in the nation, and
the adoption of the Vot- ing Rights Act of 1965
which allowed Black people to vote.
In 1986, the Philippines surprised the world with its version
of nonviolent action. People were able to peacefully
overthrow the dictatorial regime of Ferdinand Marcos in a
nonviolent uprising they called "People Power". Nonviolent
direct action activities were similarly employed by the
Filipino people in 2001 to over-throw Joseph Ejercito
Estrada who was perceived to be an immoral and corrupt
president.
In 1988, the people of Chile succeeded in defeating the
"yes" vote for Pinochet who ruled the country under
military dictatorship for 15 years where thousands were
tortured, executed and exiled; ruthless raids were
conducted; citizens' rights were limited; publications were
closed down; and schools were put under surveillance. The
goal of the Church to make Pinochet's crimes known far
and wide, via numerous nonviolent tactics, helped in
gaining international attention to the Chilean peoples'
plight.
The people of South Africa, under the leadership of
Nelson Mandela and Archbishop Desmond Tutu,
succeeded in ending the apartheid policy which was
penned in 1948 to "maintain white supremacy". In 1989,
then President Wilhelm de Klerk lifted ban on opposition
groups, released political prisoners, and ended the state
of emergency and restrictions of the press. In 1994,
Nelson Mandela became the first Black President of South
Africa.
In Central America, Oscar Arias used the power of
dialogue and nonviolent persuasion to convince the
Presidents of Honduras, Guatemala, El Salvador and
Nicaragua to stop receiving military aid from the US and
the USSR, among other things they agreed on as
stipulated in the 1987 Peace Accords. Central America
was the arena of the two superpowers' Cold War. Arias'
nonviolent tactics helped peace to come to Central
America where more than 200,000 casualties, most of
whom were civilians, were killed at the height of the
proxy wars (Arias, 2005).
Gene Sharp (2005) has identified
198 methods of nonviolent action.
Nonviolent action refers to efforts
to persuade with action via
methods. of protest,
noncooperation and intervention
without using physical violence.
Below are some examples of Sharp on these
methods, many of which were used time and
again in various non-violent struggles around the
world.

Non-violent Protest and Persuasion •Petitions

-Seeks to produce
awareness of the dissent
•Banners and Posters •Hunting officials

•Lobbying •Singing
•Marches •Mock funerals

•Prayer Rallies •Vigils

Nonviolent noncooperation

-presents the opponent difficulties in

maintaining the normal operation of the
system
•Consumers boycott
•General Strike Nonviolent intervention
-Challenges the opponent
more directly.

•Sit-ins
•Civil disobedience
•Fasts
MLK, Jr., in his "Letter from Birmingham Jail"
written to eight fellow dergymen from Alabama
in 1963, wrote that nonviolent action seeks to
dramatize the issue (of injustice) to put pressure
on the adversary to confront the issue. He also
wrote that nonviolent direct action seeks to
create a tension/crisis that would force the
adversary to open the door to negotiation.
Additionally, non-violent direct action
seeks to create a situation that would
liberate victims from silence and
helplessness. This was evident, for
example in Chile where people, for
years, suffered in silence. Non-violent
direct action allowed them all men,
women and children to participate in
efforts to overthrow a dictatorial
regime.
Nonviolent direct action also seeks to gain
attention, and consequently, support from
the larger community. People from around
the world, for example, were bothered to
see Hindus whipped to the ground by the
army serving the British government
without the former hitting back. Protests
from the world community hastened the
granting of in- dependence by the British
government to India.
Different groups have different steps to doing
nonviolent direct action. The Martin Luther King, Jr.
Center for Nonviolent Social Change suggests several
steps in doing nonviolent direct action which were
derived from MLK, Jr.'s "Letter from Birmingham Jail".
The initial step is to collect data to ascertain that
injustice exists. Research or the gathering of
information is an important first step to any nonviolent
struggle. The overthrow of former President Estrada in
the Philippines, for example, was largely aided by
revealing reports and photographs of his mansions,
mistresses, and accumulated wealth published by the
Philippine Center for Investigative Journalism.
The second step is to raise consciousness
of people about the issue. Education,
whether, formal or informal, should aim
at making victims understand their plight
and believe that they could get out of
their situation. Raising consciousness of
"adversaries" about the presence of
injustice would also help in getting
sympathy from their ranks or could aid in
their process of conversion.
The third step is to organize constituents and build coalitions.
Knowledge of injustice will translate to change if groups are formed
and prepared for nonviolent struggle. Organizing entails the analysis
of the situation of injustice, making positions, and identifying
responses. Nonviolent struggles in the Philippines saw the formation
of various organizations which names varied from serious to
humorous. Some of the groups formed, for example, to remove
Joseph Estrada from power were TSE (Tsugiin si Erap), PARE
(Peoples' Action to Remove Erap) and CODE RED (Resign Erap Dali).
Coalitions are made up of orga- nizations that have come together to
broaden their reach and intensify their impact (Dionisio, 2005). In
South Africa, for example, the struggle against apartheid intensified
with the formation of the United Demo- cratic Front in 1983.
Normally, the final step to nonviolent struggles would be the em-
ployment of the various methods of nonviolent action. In this stage, the
creativity of organizers is unleashed. Some of the more prominent
methods that Gandhi used were the burning of symbols (passes and
cloth), boycotts, marches and public assemblies. The Civil Rights Move-
ment in then-segregated America became eminent for its lunch counter
sit-ins. Its leader MLK, Jr. used public assemblies to deliver powerful
messages such as the celebrated "I Have a Dream" speech. Civil society
groups in Chile took advantage of the power of television, and created
infomercials to campaign for a "no" when Pinochet scheduled a plebis-
cite. People in the Philippines used the power of prayer to show their
protest against the Marcos dictatorship.
Different groups have different steps to doing nonviolent direct
action. The Martin Luther King, Jr. Center for Nonviolent Social
Change suggests several steps in doing nonviolent direct action
which were derived from MLK, Jr.'s "Letter from Birmingham
Jail". The initial step is to collect data to ascertain that injustice
exists. Research or the gathering of information is an important
first step to any nonviolent struggle. The overthrow of former
President Estrada in the Philippines, for example, was largely
aided by revealing reports and photographs of his mansions,
mistresses, and accumulated wealth published by the Philippine
Center for Investigative Journalism.
Nonviolent direct action also seeks to gain
attention, and conse- quently, support
from the larger community. People from
around the world, for example, were
bothered to see Hindus whipped to the
ground by the army serving the British
government without the former hitting
back. Protests from the world community
hastened the granting of in- dependence
by the British government to India.
1. Conversion the opponent comes around to a
new point of view which embraces the end of
the nonviolent actionists.

2. Accommodation the opponent is not

converted but has concluded that it is best to
agree on some or all of the demands.
3. Non-violent coercion the opponent wants to
continue with the struggle but is unable to do
so because the sources of his power have
been removed.

4. Disintegration the opponent's

power has been simply
dissolved.
Every day, situations of violence negatively impact on individuals.
Increased aggressive behaviour, desensitization to war and conditioning
about war's inevitability are effects of peoples' constant exposure to
violent situations. Those who directly experience violence leave victims
with physical, emotional and psychological trauma that result to anger,
fear, and insecurity.

Teachers can do something to help learners appreciate nonviolence and

promote it as an alternative response to violence. Here are some
suggestions to help raise nonviolent persons:
•Be a good role model. Examine our •Having a hand in its formulation,
own language, expressions and the students will feel more res-
behavior when in frustrating ponsible to abide by them. Put up
situations. Examine our own forms the list in a conspicuous place and
of recreation and kinds of refer to it when a rule is violated.
entertainment. Examine our own
•Encourage more cooperative
attitudes toward war. Learners are
rather than competitive activities
like sponge. They absorb what they
and play. Emphasize the joy of
hear and see. Decide with the
doing a classroom activity rather
students some rules for a
than being rewarded for the
peaceable classroom.
outcome.