4 Ahimsa Nonviolence, Vol. XII, No.1, Jan. - Apr.

, 2016

Which Way Lies Hope? Opening a Dialogue With Richard

Gregg.
A Gandhian Retrospective on the Nationhood of India.
- Paul Schwartzentruber

A Critical Introduction
If we want a better world, we must be
prepared to do some careful thinking. It is time we
stopped being sketchy on a matter which really
touches us all so closely. For in reality this matter
of handling conflict constructively is of immediate
interest to everyone who has ever been angry or
afraid, resentful, revengeful or bitter; who has
ever taken part in a fight, mob-violence or war;
or who has been the object of anger, hatred,
exploitation or oppression. It touches all who are
troubled lest the great economic, political and
social questions which are pressing upon all
nations will issue in appalling violence and
increased insecurity for everyone. It is also
important to those who hope that somehow the
ideals and conduct of mankind can be
harmonized, and ideals be made practical.
Richard B. Gregg, Preface,
The Power of Nonviolence
All social theory must be held tentatively
and experimentally.
Richard B. Gregg,
Which Way Lies Hope?
A Race to the Futureor, the path
of Dialogue?
We live in a time when the future is
our greatest concern. This future comes
toward us in two very

different and contradictory forms: it is a

future of endless innovation and exciting
new possibilities of experience and, at the
same time, it is a future where dark clouds
of danger threaten our ways of life and our
very existence as a species. The future has
always been uncertain for human beings,
of course. In our time, however, because
the threats seem so enormous and
unconquerable, we turn more and more
toward a hope to control the future
through our own abilities and ingenuity.
And so we rush forward toward it.
Scientific and technological advances of
recent time encourage us to do this, to
think that, by our efforts,we can discover
and make technical solutions to all our
problems. At the same time, the global
market economy works non-stop to supply
us with a constantly changing stream of
technological tools and devices, along with
new
forms
of
communication
and
interactionall of which only enhance our
hope to control the future and our
destiny1. It is no wonder, then, that we feel
both empowered and anxious, for we are in
an exciting and desperate race toward the
future. In reality, however, we are racing
against ourselves: Will we discover the tools
and technologies that will guarantee our
survival before we exhaust the resources
of our planet and make it uninhabitable?
Thus a new question arises: What is our
hope really based on?
In this desperate race to the future
many
importantcrucialthings
have

fallen by the wayside. One such thing

is a vision of the whole:
1

Hal Niedzwiecki, Trees on Mars. Our Obsession with the Future, Seven Stories Press, Ny, 2015: Consider what
these now de facto statements regarding the race to the future take as a given. First, theres the notion that
tomorrow is now almost entirely under human control. As such, the future is no longer a collective, allencompassing unknowable that governs the fate of all creatures on Earth; instead its a looming time to come
that we can moderate more or less at will. Furthermore, we have somehow come to agree that this shapeable,
attainable future is something we have to compete with each other to own (loc 48).

Which Way Lies Hope? Opening a Dialogue With Richard Gregg 5

what is the human role in this world?

Where do we fit within it and how should
we live here together with all other beings
as we shape our destiny toward the
unknown future? In our haste, we forget to
think of ourselves as human beings on the
earth and of our relationship with other
human beings. Such thinkingselfreflectioncannot happen on the run. Nor
can it happen if we only look toward the
future through the lens of our skills and
powers. It can only happen when we turn
toward each other, sit together for some
time, when we begin a dialogue among
ourselves about ourselves. Thus, we must
first learn to dwell together peacefully in the
present, and to begin a dialogue among
ourselves, if we wish to shape a truly
human future with the truly human means
at our disposal.
Another important thing that falls
by the wayside in our technological race
to the future is the knowledge of where we
have come from. I do not mean just retelling interesting stories from the past: I
mean recovering and reflecting on the
long traditions of human knowledge and
accumulated wisdom. The past does not
just entertain, it may also give us an
orientation in the present and that informs
the future. Imagine a ship in the middle of
the ocean. In order to determine which
way to sail, it needs something fixed to set
its course by, otherwise it will simply turn
in circles. It may sight the stars in order to
see where it is but then, to go forward, it
must plot a course according to where it
has come from in the past. Human beings
can only set their bearings toward the
future by first looking back carefully at the
past. In fact, a deep reflection on the past is what
can show us exactly where we are in the present as
well. We can see ourselves most clearly, as
one writer (Ivan Illich) said , in the mirror
of the past. In part, this is because the
present is so familiar to us that we
overlook many aspects of it. The past
shows us what we were (that is, how different
we were) and therefore also what we really

are and what we might become. We do not have

to stay in the past, to repeat it again and
again, but we must know it and reflect on it
so that we can move forward wisely.
All the great

6 Paul Schwartzentruber
religious and philosophical traditions have
believed that knowing ourselves begins
by looking back to the past, by beginning
a dialogue with its traditions and by
setting our course from it toward the
future.
This reflection takes up both of
these important tasks which have fallen
by the wayside in our race to the future:
it takes up the dialogue with the past and
takes up the dialogue of common and
mutual self- reflection. Both of these
dialogues together will give us an
orienting vision of the whole that is our
present and then allow us to turn toward
the future with some clear and real hope
to
shape
human
destiny.
More
importantly they will remind us again
what the human future is in reality. The
future is our still undetermined destiny as
human beings. In that sense, it is not a
what that we can manufacture or
discover rather it is a way that we can
chose to find and walk upon. The real
question then is which way forward lies hope?
Richard B. Greggs Which Way
lies Hope? in Context

The inspiration for this reflection was

a seed planted at a particular moment in
the past, at the crossroads of different
civilizations and different ways of walking
toward the future. In 1952, Richard B
Gregg, an American who had spent many
years living and working in India with
Mohandas Gandhi, wrote a book called
Which way lies Hope? An Examination of
Capitalism, Communism, Socialism and Gandhijis
Programme. Greggs work stood at a
historical crossroads in world history and
had a very deep and unique vantage on
the
political,
economic
and
social
undercurrents that were then reshaping the
world, both west and east. Although it is
now over 65 years old, a span of time in
which many things have changed and
many new realities have arisen, Gregg is
still an important dialogue partner for us
today as we shall see. He reminds of
many things that have been forgotten
and suggests insights about how to reorient ourselves in our time.
There are several reasons for this. As
a westerner by birth and culture, he came
to a deep and unique

understanding of Gandhis vision. As a true

searcher by nature, he came to a clear
sense of global problems and of the
ethical issues that were at stake for
individuals and for human destiny as a
whole. Finally, as a deeply self-reflective
individual, Gregg realized, along with
Gandhi himself, that our future is shaped
by the ethical, political and social choices
that we make now, choices that arise from
deep within each of us. He understood the
meaning of the path that leads to
hope.There are many other important
insights in Greggs work that I will try to
develop as I proceed but this wholistic
vision that he achieved is primarily what
makes a dialogue with him important. In
taking up a dialogue with Gregg I want to
both develop his insights critically in the
new and present context and also allow
them to challenge us in ways we may
have lost sight of in our time. The ultimate
challenge here is that of Gandhi himself of
course, but Gregg gives us a very unique
access to him and also bridges many gaps
that might prevent us from experiencing
that challenge. Gregg was an American
who began a dialogue with Gandhi, a truly
deeper engagement between cultures,
religious traditions and ways of life. In that
way too, he becomes a crucial point of
encounter. For Gandhian tradition is not
simply about repeating the past without
change, but rather about a critical and
transforming dialogue between the past
and the present.
It is worthwhile to briefly recall the
historical context of Greggs work. At that
time, in the middle of the last century,
both India and China in the east as well as
many of the Western countries were faced
with troubling new beginnings. India had
just shaken off several hundred years of
colonial
exploitation
and
repression.
Inspired by Gandhi and his satyagraha
movement, Indians had achieved their
political freedom through a nonviolent
and democratic movement of resistance.

And yet at that very moment the country

was beset by widespread communal and
inter-religious
violence.
Competing
visions
of
economic
and
social
development fought for dominance in
the new country. Gandhi himself was

assassinated and his inspiring vision for a

new way of life was left at the roadside.
The country led by Nehru turned toward
different economic and military models
and followed a very different path than
the one Gandhi had dreamed of. Profound
social and political changes (often violent
and uncontrolled) began to reverberate
throughout India. They would continue for
the rest of the century as it struggled to
find a vision adequate to its new and
growing reality and the dream of
nationhood.
At the same time, the western
nations (England, Europe and America)
had just emerged victorious from a long
struggle with Fascism. The world wars
had killed millions and in the process
generated a vast amount of new wealth
and industrial power in the United
States. It had also created powerful new
dictatorships with enormous collective
power in the Soviet Union and China. A
new struggle quickly gripped the socalled developed world. The struggle
took the form of a cold war between
competing visions of the future

capitalism, communism and socialism. It

was a war that was fought by threat and
massive escalation of nuclear weapons,
economic competition and proxy struggles.
India and its neighbours were gradually
drawn into this struggle as the new
market economy of the industrialized
west slowly became more and more
global. This Cold War would last for some
thirty more years. In the west, by then,
the shift from colonial domination to the
domination of an industrialized market
economy had taken place, however, and
it would slowly extend its sway over the
former colonies and ultimately the whole
world. The stalemate was slowly reduced
into
its
common
denominator
of
materialism: the market simply made all of
us consumers.
I have said that Gregg came to a
deep understanding or wholistic vision of
the issues of his time. This is because of
the path he chose to walk as a seeker, a
moral individual and a person open to
cross- cultural and inter-religious learning.
Let me say a little more about that path of
his life.

Richard Bartlett Gregg (1885-1974)

was born in Colorado, USA.2 He attended
Harvard College and then graduated from
Harvard Law School and set up a practice
in Boston and later Chicago. He was drawn
to work in the area of industrial relations
and later of union activities. From 1918 to
1924 he worked on the National War
Labor Board and then became involved in
mediating major strikes in the steel
industry and the railway industry. During
this period, he read of Gandhis work in
South Africa and decided to travel to India
(for the second time) in order to meet him.
He was 40 years old at the time. He wrote
to his family explaining his reasons for
leaving the US and traveling to India:
I
am
opposed
to
our
government and to most existing
governments.
Government
is
founded on and exists by violence. I
am opposed to machine industry and
commercialism I am opposed to
capitalismUnions accomplish little
for they simply work within the
existing order You see these
beliefs do not fit into modern
America. They do not fit into any
place at all but I think more of them
may fit into India than to any other
place (in Richardgregg.org).
Clearly Gregg was already radicalized
about the issues of capitalism, structural
violence and social order by his work in
the labor struggles in the US and was
searching for a different approach. It was
this radical insight and search which he
brought him to India and to Gandhiji. He
lived with Gandhi in the Ahmedabad,
Sabarmati Ashram from 1925 (and then off
and on until 1929) becoming quite
intimate with him (Gandhi gave him the
Indian name, Govind) while learning about
his methods (see My Memories of
Gandhi). He also travelled to see
handspinning and khadi work (writing a
book about it) as well as teaching school in
a hill station. During a brief return to US

(1929-30), he married, and then reunited

with Gandhi again in 1930. He then wrote
two works published in the US, Gandhi and
Socialism (an

early

version of Which way Lies Hope) and the

work for which he is most well- known,
The Power of Nonviolence (1935, later
republished with an introduction by
Martin Luther King, Jr on whom he had a
significant influence).

Gregg lived until 1974 continuing

to be engaged with his work in India. I
will return to discuss his later life and
work further in the Afterword below.

After his time in India, Gregg spent

many years working with Quakers in the
US and Great Britain on the issues of
pacifism, organic farming and simple
living. He seems to have coined the
phrase voluntary simplicity a set of
values which personally espoused and
published another work with that title in
1936 (The Value of Voluntary Simplicity).. He
worked at various organic farms and in
the training of conscientious objectors
during the Second World War. He also
cared for his wife who was seriously ill.
After the war and then the assassination
of Gandhi in 1948 , he returned to India
to attend the world Pacifist Conference.
It was shortly after this that he worked
on the book, Which way lies Hope, which was
published in 1952and then republished in
1957.

From this brief sketch of historical

and biographical context, it is possible to
make several general points about the
book, Which way Lies Hope by way of an
overview. Greggs analysis can
be
described
as
having
the
following
intentions:

An Overview of Greggs Approach

To turn the stalemate of the Cold war

into a dialogue of real issues.
To develop an account of political
choice that is wholistic and
constructive.
To see all the structural consequences
of a choice in the process of
evaluating it.
To embody a genuine cross-cultural
dialogue rather than a colonial one.

Biographical info is drawn from the Bio and Chronology pages of the site Richardgregg.org published by
John Wooding as well as from Greggs essay, My Memories of Gandhi (c. 1948).

 To articulate a deep and broad

understanding of the India of that
time.
Let me explain in more detail.
First, the immediate context of the
work was the Cold War and the apparent
stalemate in human social and political
development. Greggs first concern is to
break that stalemate open into a dialogue.
At the time, competing political theories of
human society were locked in violent
conflict and opposition on many fronts,
and this would continue for several more
decades. There was a great deal of
propaganda but no real debate. Greggs
book emerged against the backdrop of
this stalemate as an attempt to examine
and weigh the political claims, to begin a
dialogue
on the disputed questions
among them and, finally, to point out the
shortcomings in each of them. This was
not just to be a partisan and superficial
analysis such as was often carried in the
media of the time. Gregg wanted to
unravel the violent conflict on the surface
of modern politics by developing a deeper
dialogue concerning the real issues.
Capitalism, Communism and socialism
each had a long history, with many
philosophical claims supporting them and
so he turned to examine these deeper
views of the world as part of the claims of
the political systems. For example, he
would question in detail the Marxist
assumption that matter is the ultimate
reality (72) as well as the capitalist
assumption that man is the master of
nature (53-54). All along, however, he
was also using the alternative model of
Gandhis political vision to probe and
question, to expand the parameters of the
debate. The result is that this is an indepth and complex analysis of their
competing claims which attempts to
unearth and bring into the open the more
hidden and denied features of such
political
systemsespecially
their
inherent social violence. Thus, finally, it

has the positive aim of developing a

deeper and broader understanding of social
and political goals in the modern context. In
this broader sense, Gregg was attempting
to radically reopen and expand the debate
about politics and political vision which,
since Machiavelli, had been bound in very
narrow frame of realpolitik.

Second,
Greggs
analysis
is
constructive and wholistic in several
ways. Not only does it want to propose an
alternative model for social-political hope,
(a nonviolent one rooted in the
Gandhian programme), it also wants to
expand the framework of the tradition
political thought to include a whole range
of social, moral and spiritual factors.
These factors are not arbitrary but
correspond to his deep reflection on
human nature, society and cosmology as
well as to the detailed threats to human
social life in modern industrial society. We
shall see in a moment that Gregg frames
his examination of these systems by a
detailed explanation of the global
situation of the modern world and its
great dangers (he identifies seven such
dangers). He then uses this as a
yardstick
to give perspective (5). And this is
a new perspective, indeed, for it
reconnects political discourse to a basic
and wholistic reflection on human needs
and goods. By reframing the political
debate in this way, Gregg takes the
criteria for judging the value of a system
out of the hands of the political
propagandists and opens them to a

dialogue and decision of the common

person. He also develops some [new]
principles
from
this
discussion,
principles which are both quantitative and
qualitative in nature. For example, he
argues that moral laws are as enduring,
powerful
and
ineluctable
as
the
attraction of gravitation (25) This
principle impacts the political realm as
well as the personal he insists, for to
obtain enduring success one must chose
and use means that are in accord with the
end which is desired (25). In the
background of course, one can see clearly
the evidence of the World Wars waged
among the industrialized nations and
their
consequences: violent political
claims emerge from and only reinforce a
violent social orderthat is the
gravity
of violence. Thus, Greggs analysis aims at
opening these deeper dialogues and
leading toward what can only be called a
wholistic vision.
Third, Greggs analysis is structural in
nature: he wants to trace how abstract
political theories cause and bring into
effect concrete human, social, and
environmental consequencesindeed a
complex

network of interrelated effects. By

making this connection between a cause and all its
structural effects, his analysis overturns the
simplistic logic of the politician and raises
up the complex, wholistic view of basic
human experience. Let me give a rather
detailed example. The first serious
danger that Gregg develops is that of soil
erosion and its impact on food production
in a highly populated world (8-16). He
develops the connection between this
erosion and a loss of fertility in the humus
and argues that it is the result of
deforestation, chemical fertilization and
mechanized monocultural farming (11)
Now the logic on the side of this
industrialized agriculture is to see only one
immediate effect: an increase in yield in
relation to effort, food surplus and thus
also profit. But this simply overlooks the
other, long-term effects: the limited nature
of earths arable land as well as the great
increase in erosion and the permanent loss
of such land (10-12). Again, as he argues
later, the simple logic of this mechanized
farming promoted by both capitalism and
communism
is
that
technological
progress is inevitable, good and cannot be
reversed (118). This is irrefutablebut
only if one ignores the many other
consequences. For example, the fact that
the highest yield per acre is actually
produced not by machine cultivation but
by skilled hand labour (110). Thus in a
country like India where arable land is
scarcer, the logic of higher output
through
labour-saving
mechanized
farming guarantees an unsustainable use
of land. Short term profit must be
measured against that effect. When it is, it
becomes quickly evident that change is
not progress at all (119). Gregg then
proposes a truly consequential analysis of
the connection between human, land and
food production: The way to treat living
soils and crops successfully is by skillful,
small-scale
intensive
agriculture
by
peasants who thoroughly know their land
through ownership (125). There are many

other instances of such structural

analysis aimed at developing at a
coherent and wholistic logic of the

structures of socio-political life and they

will be examined further below.
Fourth, Greggs analysis is both
experiential and cross-cultural in a
dialogical sense. Gregg is interested in
addressing a very particular question by
his analytical argument: which way lies
hopefor India. That is to say, he is
weighing all the claims of the various
political systems against his experiential
understanding of the situation in India in
the 1950s, its needs, limits and
possibilities. He wants to determine
what would work there and then, how it
would benefit the vast majority of Indians
given their particular historical and social
situation. This approach to answering the
question of India when taken by a
westerner, of course, creates a rather
complex moral and epistemological
situation: is this a view and account
which is shaped by its origin on the side
of colonial power and knowledge? Does it
express those interests, even indirectly?
It may be acknowledged that for an
3

American, Gregg had a rather deep

experiential knowledge of India, especially
at the grassroots level. This was a
knowledge acquired through commitment,
openness and dialogue. No doubt there
are gaps and blindspots which a native
Indian would recognize immediately (for
example, there is almost no discussion
of caste and its impact on social and
personal life), but there are also, by same
token, insights that only an expatriate
living and working in India might identify
and
appreciate
(for
example,
the
traditional Indian wisdom of emphasizing
the small organizations, the village and
the family and letting the over-all unities
of its great areas be primarily not political
but cultural, 21) . On the whole, although
it must be read critically, it would be
shortsighted to dismiss Greggs view as
simply
colonial.
Gregg
explicitly
repudiated and chose to live outside the
colonial model as well as its forms of
colonized knowledge production.3 He
worked hard to develop his own critical,
intellectual and moral stance

On this see, Walter G. Mignolo, The Idea of Latin America, The logic of coloniality can be understood as
working through four wide domains of human experience: (1) the economic: appropriation of land, exploitation
of labor, and control of finance; (2) the political: control of authority; (3) the civic: control of gender and
sexuality; (4) the epistemic and the subjective/personal: control of knowledge and subjectivity (11).

independent of the western framework

and achieved the status of a true and
lifelong dissenter. Moreover his account of
the positive values of nonviolence,
manual labour, self-suffi ciency, village
life and wholistic knowledge participates7)
in (and in some ways deepens) Gandhis
own deep critique of colonial knowledge
and repudiation of its claims to progress
and development.4 In sum, then, Greggs
moral stance can be judged on its own
merits; his theoretical understanding will
be the subject of a critical analysis and
dialogue in what follows. I am very aware
of its origin since I am also an foreigner
to India. But I have learned enough from
Gandhis own fearless openness to crosscultural
debate
and
inter-religious
understanding to be emboldenedwith
humility to move beyond the narrow
frame of such identity politics.
Fifth and finally, Gregg develops an
insightful analysis of most of the deep
structural issues on which the future of
India would be decidedin the forms, at least,
that they could be seen and understood in the 1950s.
Briefly, we can list the issues he identifies:
large population, predominance of rural
and village residents, predominance of
agricultural (non- industrial) workforce,
relatively small area of arable land for food
production;
widespread
poverty/low
income/subsistence living; social and
political
structures
based
on
exploitation, dominance and structural
violence; and a limited educational system
based on colonial needs. Given those
issues as they were understood at the
time, Gregg then develops a set of pivotal
questions around the possibilities
of
hopeful social, economic and political
development. These questions express Greggs
understanding of issues and his insights into them.
The questions concern respectively 1) the
need for and limit of industrialization; 2)
the focus on and the forms of agriculture;
3) the size of and structures for

governance;
4)
the
distribution
of
power/autonomy and maintenance of local
self-reliance; 5) the establishment of
equitable livelihoods and social justice; 6)
the use of and care for natural resources;
coherence and maintenance of social life
and, underlying all of these, 8) a balanced,
wholistic use of scientific/technological
means
with
traditional/
indigenous
means.
Now, as we noted, both the defining
issues and these pivotal questions arise
from Greggs understanding of the India
of his time. I have already stressed that
that was an experiential, an informed and
a wholistic understanding, but it was also
very much of that time. That datedness
is part of the limitation of Greggs work but
it is also a unique opportunity for our
dialogue with the past. We can learn a
great deal from tracing how the situation
of India has been changing in the last
seven decades, for better or for worse. We
can also learn how the pivotal questions
have changed and must be re-asked in
new ways. In retrospect and respectfully,
then, we must attempt to update these
issues in the light of what has happened in
India and the world in the last 65 years.
Then, in a more dialogical and analytic
mode, we will be able to turn to what
Gregg defined as the pivotal questions for
India and see in what ways the must be
expanded, refocussed or re-defined.
From Then to Now: Outline of a
Critical- Dialogical Approach to
Greggs work In the Contemporary
Context
Gregg defined the pivotal questions
for India in terms of the structures he saw
and experienced in 1952. Our first task
must be to trace how those questions in
general have changed and what the
changes imply for an understanding of the
issues before India now. We can do this
briefly and in broad strokes here.

For an account of this deep critique of psychological colonialism see Ashis Nandy, The Intimate Enemy. Loss and
Recovery of Self under Colonialism, Oxford, UP, 2009. Nandy reads Gandhi as a critical traditionalist who
attempted to justify and defend the innocence which confronted modern Western colonialism and its various
psychological offshoots in India (IX). We will return to this below.

Most of the issues are intertwined

then as now, and the connections
between them can only by unravelled in
sequence. I want to speak of the
following issues questions which Gregg
identified and suggest how they must be
raised again in India today:
Population size, growth and ruralurban dynamics
Industrialization, environment and
sustainability
State power, Social Structures and violence
Science, Technology and Wholistic Values

I. Population size, growth and rural-urban dynamics.

In 1952, Gregg recognized the
centuries old, worldwide acceleration of
population growth and projected that by
1981 the population of India would be 520
million and, by 2000, India and Pakistan
together would have nearly 800 millions.
This was actually
a considerable
underestimation: the population of India
was 1.2 Billion in 2011 (that of Pakistan
was 199 Million). In the 1951 census, the
rural/urban split in India was 82%/17%; in
2011 it was 68%/31%. Even though they
mirror world trends, these are both
dramatic increases. However Indias size
makes these factors proportionately more
serious. Thus, for example, while the US is
now 80% urban and Germany 73% urban,
Indias 31% of urbanites must be also
considered numerically to capture the
reality: there are now almost 400 million urban
dwellers in India and 800 million rural residents.
Population
size
has
been
a
determining factor, usually the primary
one, in almost every issue in India. For
Gregg, this related primarily to food
production (along with soil erosion),
industrialization,
violence,
sustainable
livelihood possibilities and social cohesion.
The predominantly rural population of
India of the time led to his stress on the
need for a primarily agricultural (rather

than industrial) focus in planning and it also

fed into what he saw as the major
questions of village sustainability, local
autonomy and manual labour/livelihood.
Gregg acknowledged and

interpreted the allure of urbanization as a

form of the attraction to power in all
senseselectrical,
financial,
technological and intellectual:
Intellectual power tends to
gather around the places where
physical power is applied. Present
physical power sourcescoal, oil and
electricity are put to work in the
cities. Trade and money of course
come there. The attraction of power
gathers
people,
and
especially
attracts young people away from the
villages to the cities.This impoverishes
the villages (160).
Yet he continued to suggest many
ways to moderate and counterbalance it.
Solar power, as he argued for example,
was essentially decentralized and local in
form (159). The hope, which he shared
with Gandhi was to keep and maintain a
sustainable, primarily rural balance.
Given the rapidity of increase in both
areas, however, that hope now seems
even more difficult to realize and also
more complex; in the last decades it has
become clear that there is something
(probably many things) exponential in the

drive to urbanization. At a minimum, the

complex drive to urbanization is in need of
being re-examined and re-formulated; in
this Greggs insight into attraction to
centres of power is a very good beginning.
Any alternative to continued urbanization
also needs also to be reformulated as
based on traditional culture and as a
legitimate hope and vision.
In general, then, it can now be said
that these issues of population size and
dynamics remain focal indeed have
probably become the central focus in
contemporary India. Taken together, they
create an massive disproportionality with
many effects. For example, despite the
claims of modernizing the country, the
true cost of urbanizing a third of the
population has been very high in several
ways: Indias urban and inter-urban
infrastructure is almost everywhere
inadequate and crumbling. Furthermore,
the rapid unplanned urban construction
(homes, highways, goods and services)
that it did require has left most cities
wanting in the most basic essential
services
(water,
sanitation,
public
transportation) and,

as a result, heavily polluted. By the same

token, village India has been everywhere
doubly abandoned: first, by its residents
and then by the state and national
governments which have everywhere
prioritized the urban. The two thirds of
the population which remains in the rural
areas has thus been left in a kind of limbo
of uncertainty. The attraction of the cities,
as the beacons promising employment,
prosperity
and
development
has
deepened. Even though they seem already
so unsustainable, they are still the primary
image of the future for most of the
country. The journey to the city has
always been an long and ambiguous
mythology in India,5 but now it is become a
dangerous trip with no way back.

II. Industrialization, the environment and a

strategy for sustainable development.
Underlying both this attraction to the
cities and their increasingly unsustainable
forms, is a highly questionable strategy of
development.
The
model
of
industrialization with its emphasis on
centralization, concentration of people
and power, and the unrestricted use of
resources to increase production was the
primary strategy and vision of the Indian
government after independence. By 1957,
as Gregg notes a considerable degree
of
capitalistic
industrialism
[was]
already established, strongly entrenched
and growing (106). This was largely
state-planned
industrialization
under
Nehru and his successors. But it was also
an encompassing vision of development
for not only was it used to urbanize and
modernize on the one hand, it was also
used to modernize and develop agriculture
on an industrial model (107). Gregg
devotes a great deal of space to critiquing
this strategy of industrial development and
especially its application to agriculture
(106-151). For him, It is the main factor in
soil erosion and, in the end, as he argued,
mechanization was more destructive than
constructive (117). Industrialization in the

cities was also a flawed strategy for

development
since
it
created
only
concentrated wealth and the employment

opportunities it produced were very

limited (139), certainly nowhere near
adequate for the vast majority of Indians.
As a result Gregg argues for a strategic
limitation of industrialization (to bring it
it into harmony with nature, 143), a
series of government regulations on it
(161) and also for a different strategy of
development as such, one which is more
wholistic, more respectful of the actual
rural structures of the vast majority of
Indians. Ultimately, he assumed that a
widespread shift in values alone could
create a society that was less violent in
structure and more moral in form.
Moreover, as he argued in his book The
Power of Nonviolence, the power to make
this shift towards a moral society was in
the hands of people themselves:
Deeper than rulership by
political governments, banks, and
classes is the control coming from
ideas and sentiments,a scheme of
values, a set of ideals or activities
which people desire and believe to be
right (Nonviolence, 136).
5

This is a key part of the powerful and

hopeful vision of social transformation that
we wish to develop by examining Greggs
work.
Gregg is certainly correct to see a
looming series of catastrophes resulting
from an unbridled use of the strategy of
industrialization. In the ensuing 60 years,
that strategy of development has not
only accelerated but expanded and
diversified in its effectsboth positive
and negative. In the process it has become
the dominant and also really the only
strategy,
a
policy
of
economic
development which makes all goals
subservient to the growth of the market.
There is, to be sure, still government
support
for
rural
and
indigenous
populations in the form of special status
reservations, food subsidies and makework projects but these seem more and
more to be stopgap measures easing the
way to the new market economy.
Moreover this new form of industrialmarket economy strategy is driven now
toward new forms, for example, a
continual expansion into rural

See Ashis Nandy, An Ambiguous Journey to the City. The Village and other Odd Ruins of the Self in Indian
Imagination. Oxford, India, 2007.

land in the search for cheaper labour and

and access to resources. Territorial
expropriation for industrial and resource
development has dispossessed many rural
communities as well as Adivasi or
indigenous peoples and the lure of earning
offered by industry continues to attract
people away from villages, traditional life
and agriculture.
At the same time, the industrialeconomic strategy has also been applied
to the agricultural sector directly. The
Green Revolution of the 70s and 80s
was a new agricultural strategy that
displaced earlier land reform programmes.
While those programmes were aimed at
sustaining traditional, small-forms of
agriculture
rooted
in
the
rural
communities, the new strategy had its
focus exclusively on technology-driven
increases in yield with no concern for the
impact on the rural communities that
were supported by agricultural work.
Thus, the use of the new dwarf variety
seeds by the architects of the Green
Revolution completely transformed a
large section of the agriculture of the
country (initially the Punjab and Haryana)
along industrial lines. There were indeed
increased yields but the new seeds also
required large inputs of fertilizer, water
and pesticides in order to be effective.
Thus the full cost of the increased outputs
in wheat and rice have only become
evident over time: soil erosion, loss of
plant diversity, drought and high debt.
Farmers
who
borrowed
money
to
industrialize their farms (through tractors,
fertilizers, pesticides) were slowly forced
out of the business (and many into
suicide).6 This new corporate form of
agriculture, modeled on that of the west,
offers little in the way of employment
opportunities
and
squeezes
out
subsistence farming.
A final vector of measurement of this
strategy is in its own claims to wealth
creation and raising living standards.While

there has been a great deal of wealth

generated by the corporate driven
industrializations and market economy,
it is concentrated in a new and elite
oligarchy (0.4% of the population currently
has wealth over 1 million

dollars). Since 1991 when India was

opened
to
world
markets,
the
government has re-focussed its market
strategy on raising a new middle class
of consumers to correspond to the
market economy model (car ownership is
the gold standard of this group it
seems).The facts are that that group
constituted only 30 million in 1991 and,
by 2005, was some 53 million a very
small slice of the total population
between 5% and 7%. Some studies have
claimed that it can grow to close to 50%
by
2025
(McKinsey)
but
these
exaggerated claims ignore the fragility of
this new middle class. In effect, middle
class here means spending from $2 to
$20 dollars per day according
to the
Asian Development Bank.
These
strategies,
first,
of
industrialization and later, of the market
economy
have
been
promoted
consistently and forcefully since Greggs
assessment. They have little to show in
terms of benefits (in the creation of
prosperity or the alleviation of poverty)
and a great deal to hide in terms of real
6

costs to the environment and the

traditional lives of ordinary people. It is
much clearer now that they embody a kind
of false hope for development in India:
they come nowhere near to overcoming
the
discrepancy
between
Indias
population size and the well-being of her
people defined in a wholistic, let alone an
economic sense. Is it still possible to
redefine Indias hope in terms of a limited
industrialization, as Gregg suggested, or
to define local autonomies (swadeshi) for
economic good and the well-being of
people? These are the questions at which
the dialogue must be taken up. In some
way, because of our increasing awareness
of the impact of climate change and other
environmental problems, a stronger case
can be made for the strategic limitation of
industrial
economy
or
for
its
transformation into other more sustainable
forms. In other ways, however it is sadly
clear that, the market economy and the
corporate agenda have become the very
horizon of our thinkingthat which we
seem unable to think or move beyond.
Thus we are less able to see and articulate
viable alternatives.

Vandana Shiva, The Green Revolution in the Punjab, From The Ecologist, Vol. 21, No. 2, March-April 1991.

Here too, touching on Greggs optimism

(and behind it Gandhis) may be a catalyst
of new beginnings. His suggestions for
limitationand
that
means,
limitations to the industrial/market model
as a social development strategyneed to
be examined again and restated in
contemporary terms. Behind this effort,
there is a more urgent general question: to
what extent has India entered into and
given itself over irrevocably to the
encompassing dream of the market as a
model?

III. State power, social structures and violence

One of Greggs earliest insights is
into the intrinsic connection between state
power and violence: Government is
founded and exists by violence, he said
before he left for India. This understanding
of structural violence (though the term
had not been coined yet) was what Gregg
brought to his dialogue with Gandhi from
his experience in the labour movement.
At the same time, he learned about
Gandhis
approach
of
nonviolent
resistance
(satyagraha) and wrote a
powerful account of it in his work, The
Power of Non-violence. In that work, written for
an American audience, Gregg stressed the
technique of nonviolence as an effective
strategy and outlined its psychological
mechanisms. But clearly he continued to
believe that a nonviolent strategy of change was
only part of a much larger constructive project of
creating a nonviolent society in which structural
violence had been displaced.7 In 1953, just
after publishing, Which way Lies Hope , Gregg
wrote another short essay entitled, The
Structures of a Nonviolent Society in
which he attempted to outline this larger,
constructive project.8 Those structures are
essentially the Gandhian ones which he
outlines
in

this work: an emphasis on agriculture;

local economies based on cooperation;
simplicity of life and practical education
(nai talim). Gregg saw the essential link
between the industrial strategy of
exploitation and a violent society and he
proposed to displace this by a model of
self-reliant, autonomous work that was
local and moral in nature, i.e., based on
self-respect and mutuality. It was to be
technologically limited (using simple
familiar tools adapted to the local
environment, (172) in order to be morally
rich and not coercive (184). I will examine
this technological question further below.
All of this, however, meant a society
structured around a local autonomy of cooperation
and consent rather than the politically enforced
structures of coercion and violence
characterized the nation states.

that

There is more to Greggs argument

about violence and the nation state. In
Which Ways lies Hope, he details three (of
seven)
dangers
arising
from
the
structures of a violent state: the
unequal distribution of power (18), the
danger
of
large-scale
political
organizations (20) and finally, the
danger of organizations not obeying
moral laws (25). In each of these three
cases he is describing, essentially, the
violent structures of the modern nation
state. It is here that his most original
and radical thinking emerges. All of
human society suffers when power is
wrongly distributed or wrongly used
(18), he argues, and this distortion
then becomes embodied in a societys
basic symbolsmoney, or religious
images and mantras, or political flags
and slogans, or signs of social standing
and prestige (19) Since the desire for
power is a universal and perverted form
of the

See Kosek, Richard Gregg: Yet for all Greggs language of psychology and strategy, his vision retained a
religious basis. He was explicit about the spiritual imperative at the heart of his rejection of violence. He ended
his books by explaining that nonviolent action was the practical instrument by which we can make very great

progress toward creating the kingdom of God . . . here on earth. With that language, he positioned himself as
an heir to the Social Gospel tradition that sought to usher in the millennium through human progress (1331).
8
See Kosek for a summary of this: He advocated a strong emphasis on agriculture as the most important part of
the life of the nation. Economic life would be marked by cooperative arrangements and simplicity of living,
while a new educational system would teach children through some craft or productive and really useful manual
work. Gregg hoped not merely for non- violent political action; he dreamed of a nonviolent society that would
restore meaning and purpose to modern existence(1347).

desire for life, the only ultimate remedy is

to practise self-control in some direction
(19). That is the essence of the Gandhian
(as opposed to the Marxist) approach.
Both individuals and societies can exercise
such self-control, he argues, for:
desiring to live in and work only
by means of small organizations is like
any other sensible control of the
environment in order to have a good
life (22).
He continues the argument by
praising the east for its preference to
let the over-all unities of its great areas
be primarily not political but cultural
(21) thereby allowing political power to
be more locally based. There is a
need, he says however, for invention
of new ways of correlating local
autonomy and over-all integration(22).
Finally, using the general analogy of an
individual to speak of the quality of the
integrations and relations between
[people] in asociety, he suggests that
the immoral acts of a society will ruin
its character and eventually destroy it,
as surely as if it were a person (26).
This is a very descriptive way to speak of
persistent and structurally embedded
violence. One direct way of resisting this
kind of violence is to devolve power
downward from large organizations and
nations toward the smaller, more local
autonomies where self-discipline and
cooperation rather coercion are more
effective. This does not eliminate the
problem of structural violence only the
individual can do thatbut it may make
it easier to make good choices. I will
examine this complex and powerful
argument regarding the state and the
limitations of its power to preserve
autonomy further below.
We may now ask how the context In
India has changed. At the time Gregg was
writing this, India was a newly formed
nation-state struggling through the de-

formations of Partition and the widespread,

religious violence that caused throughout
the country. In retrospect iIt is much clearer
that the nation itself was also a colonial
creation of British conception (as were the
nations of the Middle East created at the
same time). Its power and status
were being

established over against local or regional

interests. India was thus still very much
caught up in the dynamic of selfdefinition between its many regional and
linguistic bodies of autonomous culture
and the dynamics of the state that the
new nation seemed to require. As that
state defined itself it initially turned
toward the Soviet model of complete
state management struggled with this
model internally for the next two
generations (all the way to Indira
Gandhis Emergency). The shift to a
market- economy model has been a
gradual but determined process also
facilitated and driven by the central
government. It has also put a few large
corporations which have no moral
commitmentsin positions of great
power as well
as influence over the
government. Although there are still in
place numerous regional forces in
different states as well as NGO
movements supporting local projects
and self-reliance, it is difficult to see how
India could now walk back from the nation
state/corporate political model toward
more local powers and autonomies. As
dysfunctional as the national model and

strategy are and continue to be, they

seem to have become psychologically
dominant in Indias self-definition. By the
same token, since the market has tended
to level all other interests except corporate
growth at the expense of consumers , it is
very difficult to foster and support selfreliant, cooperative communities at the
grassroots level.
The shift from India as nation state and
its politics to India as cultural unity which
Gregg recommends is still in many senses
desirable and a viable goal. Given the
ongoing
economic
inequities,
the
widespread
corruption,
influence
of
corporate power and an inability to
function for a truly common good, there
still needs to be dialogue about the
possibility of reshaping the fundamental
model of governance in the interest of the
vast majority of Indians. However the
immediate conditions for such a shift from
a very entrenched capitalism to the fading
ideal of a Gandhian village-centred
economy are less and less present.
Redefining that shift is part of the task
before us; it would also require concerted
local organizing as well as a national
campaign of self-

educationboth parts of the original and

now almost forgotten Gandhian model for
swaraj in India.

IV. Science, Technology and wholistic values

One of the clearest areas of change
in context from Greggs time to our own
can be seen in a dramatic growth in the
use and impact of technologies. These
technologies have expanded from their
original large industrial forms ( industry,
rail transportation, mining etc.,) to the new
digital modes of their consumer forms
(television,
cars,
mobile
phones,
computers); and the nature of their impact
has changed dramatically. In this light we
must ask, how do Greggs insights into the
questions of science and technology in his
day translate into the radically different
context of our experience? Greggs work
contains a detailed and very complex
reflection on technology, the scientific
worldview and their relation to what he
defines as humane and wholistic values.
Although he was thinking at a time when
the development of the electronic
calculator (51) was the cutting edge of
technology, Gregg was very aware of how
traditional and established social order
had been already replaced by an industrial
social order with its capacity for rapid
adaptiveness to change. These continual
changes in the social processes of
modern society followed the course of
technological change but they did so
because the new scientific ways of
thinking were driving that constant
inventiveness of technique, searching
for new modes of manipulation and
control over natural processes. Thus for
Gregg
,changes
in
thinking
and
knowledge
became
embodied
by
technology...[and thus] altered society
(50). For example the new drive for faster
commercial transport of goods between
cities created a new way of thinking of
transportation (by speed and efficiency of
cost) which was then embodied in railways
and this technology in turn, transformed

society completely (as cars and highways

would do later). It is around this
recognition of the social impacts created
by these new forms of knowledge and
practice, that Greggs primary concern with
science and technology is articulated. It is a
concern not about resisting change but
rather about acknowledging the

whole range of its effects and reflecting on

their value from a wholistic perspective.
The starting point for Gregg is the
wholeness of human knowledge. Science
and technology express one mode of experience
and knowledge and as such they should be
integrated in the broader spectrum of human
knowledgenot elevated above it. Thus, while
he does see science as a very positive
development of human knowledge and
regards its extension through the
tools of technology to control the
environment as essentially good
(23), he also recognizes their negative
potential to broadly reshape the human
environment in the service of greed and
a domineering human relationship toward
nature:
In capitalism the alliance of
money, science and technology has
transformed the world. In material,
short-view terms, its success has been
brilliant and highly impressive. Under
it
there has been an immense
development of power and of control
of power for awhile it seemed as if
Capitalism
and
its
allies
had

discovered how to conquer poverty

and remove the threat of starvation
all over the world (34).
What is precarious for Gregg,
however,
is precisely this welding
together of the increased power of
technology and the stance of domination
toward nature. This has led to reckless
and self-destructive exploitation and
consumption, since there is no internal
constraint in this viewpoint to balance
human greed (43). Because there is no
internal constraint, the nation state can
bring it about that science is restricted
and prostituted to the cause of militarism
(56), something which happens quite
naturally under the market economy of
capitalism. In all these cases what is more
important for Gregg is the underlying issue
of a weakened moral principle: progress
in control of the outer world does not
result in greater control of the inner world
of the self (25). From
this point, he is
critical of both Capitalism, Marxism and
Socialism for their materialism, and for
the notion that man is the lord and
master of nature rather than a part of it
(88).

As an antidote to this intrinsic

imbalance in the viewpoint of science and
technology, Gregg proposes two integral
principles of discipline and wisdom:
1) the choice to use only means
(instruments
and
tools)
which
are
commensurate with the human good (both
the good of the end sought and of the one
who uses them, 24-5); and 2) the decision to
re- ground the scientific viewpoint upon
the moral and spiritual foundation which
assumes the unity of all things, including
the human spirit.9 Both of these principles,
Gregg argues, will make for a limited, moral
and wise use of technology and its claims.
On a practical level, they both imply a
critical questioning about the claims to
progress of new technology: because
technology embodies changeit is not
necessarily progress (120). That equation
of new technology with progress as such is
simplistic and ultimately self-destructive.
But it will require discipline and a wider
view in order to resist our deep and almost
endless
human
fascination
with
technological progress.
I will say more below about Greggs
assertion of a wholistic viewwith its
assumption of an inner unity of all things
as the proper context for science. Gregg
considered himself to be primarily a
scientist though in his own redefined
wholistic terms. To recognize this deeper
unity of the spirit uniting the inner and
outer worlds was, Gregg said, thoroughly
scientific and modern (29). Like Gandhi,
Gregg believed deeply in a true countermodernity that could be wholistic and
true to human science. 10 However
because science and technology as they
were practiced have directed the
attention and interest of many people
away from the inner world to the outer
world (27), they have had a very negative
long term impact on society and social
order. The narrowed worldview has
exercised this impact through education

in the form of a shift away from the inner

disciplines which are necessary to human
unity:
self-limitation,
dialogue,
cooperation, and self-reliance. Techniques
have no moral compass. The new (and
very unscientific) assumption here is that
things must generally have a technical fix
or solution, and that science will solve for
us all the difficult problems facing the
human being. In this regard, Greggs view
of science and technology echoes many
other critiques of the time in stressing
their dangerous overreaching in claim and
power, but is most original, I think, for
focusing on the social impacts of that
overreaching.
Based on his wholistic assumptions,
Gregg was searching for a context in
which to integrate and discipline the
techno-scientific powers and claims to the
end of human social and natural good.
He saw this as an intrinsic part of the
self- critical discipline that should be (but most
often was not) part of the scientific
viewpoint itself. In the light of the virtually
unquestioned status that has been
accorded to both science and technology
in the current context, as well as the
alliance with large corporate interests on
many fronts, it is difficult to see how we
might begin to walk back toward a more
limited form of scientific claim or a
technology disciplined by the human
moral good. The assertion of the powerful
claim of science and technology is now
echoed in concert with the claims of the
market to its need for continued growth and
innovation. Together this assertion of
unlimited
growth
continues
to
overshadow and overwhelm the claims for
a moral and wholistic approach to human
endeavour and the use of the earths
goods.
That which alone can and will limit
these assertions of growth and the power
to pursue it is now very clearly visible in
our generation: the carrying

Since spirit is in the world of outer Nature as well as within man, religion is need to make man reverence Nature
and hence limit and control his predatory habits against Nature. This is, true religion, as well as intelligence is
the sustained of a healthy and adequate soil (32).
10
Kosek: He believed that Gandhi was developing a comprehensive counter- modernity, a more humane
alternative to Western civilization that would use modern scientific knowledge to create a simplified,
decentralized, peaceful, and ecologically balanced culture (1320).
9

capacity of the earth itself has become

clear to us and, along with it, our rush
toward the tipping point of
its
sustainability. This has become visible in
large part because of scientific and
technological overreaching (in alliance
with human greed) but also through the
scientific and technological window of
understanding. The defect that allows
science and technology to be used
manipulatively is its self-imposed and
shortsighted isolation from a wholistic
view. But this short-sightedness exists
alongside a crucial and critical insight that
it has to offer to the human being. Climate
change, exhaustion of crucial rainforests,
extinction of species, and widespread
pollution of earth, air and waterthese are
all scientific insights. But they are also
scientific-technological
effects
of
an
assertion of that power undisciplined by an
ethical reflection on true human needs or
the good of the planet as a whole. In this
sense, too, Greggs careful critique and
nuanced appreciation of science and
technology are an important starting
point for dialogue and reflection.
Conclusion: Re-connecting with
the Radical Character of Greggs
Project
Throughout the arguments about
these
complex issues, it becomes
apparent that Greggs project in this work
is not only about analyzing and advocating
for the best socio-political system for
India; it is also about proposing a deeper
view of human participation in social and
political life. That deeper view may be
described with the reference to a set of
basic human principles: informed selfreliance,
ethical
autonomy,
selfdisciplined co-operation. Greggs point
(again echoing Gandhi) is that only a new
way of human understanding and practice
can create a genuinely good human
political order. This approach may be
described as wholistic or, in Greggs

terminology, moral. This, for example, is

how he describes Gandhis programme:
The major emphasis and effect of
this programme is moral; persuasive
and not coercive, and applies and is
fruitful immediately to all men and
women and families who adopt it. Its
progress is material also, but that
result,
while

important and indispensable, is

secondary, especially at the start.
(185-6)
What Gregg means by moral is the
creation of a political order based directly
on individual self- discipline (what Gandhi
called swaraj). That self- discipline alone is
what can create true autonomy in moral
choices and transform people from
their subservience to a coercive and
violent state into a new form of selfreliance in which they can cooperate with
each other from the bottom up. Gregg
believes that this path includes the
abandon[ing] violence as a way of
settling conflict (79) and the giving up
the mistaken notion of the nature of the
self(17) as essentially competitive. That
path alone can lay the foundation for a
new
form
of
government,
selfgovernment. It is worthwhile to stress
that
all
of
Greggs
constructive
arguments which we have reviewed
above are made on the assumption that
this moral and spiritual transformation
of human action through self-discipline is
possible and viable at least on a local
scale.

At the end
of work,
Gregg
addresses the objective that Gandhi
advocated
a very
unrevolutionary
return
to
traditional
models
of
development and community, as well as
the older out- of-date technologies of
manual labour and self- discipline. By the
yardstick of progress as continual
technological innovation that may appear
to be true Gregg notes, but in a world
which has forgotten the inner worlds of
self-transformation, the real revolution
in fact lies in hands of the one who is
willing to take the first step:
The
follower
of
Gandhijis
programme does not have to wait for
a large-scale revolution; he starts one
inside him [her-] self and carries it out
with [her] his own handsThe Spirit
has power. Along this way lies hope
(206).
In the modern context in which
Gregg was writing this turn inward was
indeed revolutionary. It is just as
revolutionary in the post-modern context
in which we find ourselves. It is
revolutionary, Gregg argues,

 to be carefully selective with regard to

technology, to take and use only what in
the long run will surely help to exalt
humanity, not just the body but also the
spirit;
to assert that the interest of
civilization are paramount over those
of science, technology and money
profit;
to take actual practical measures to
assure the only means of reviving
that spontaneous co- operation
(205).
In each of these areas, it is safe to
say that we, post-moderns, find ourselves
under greater threat than the people of
Greggs time: technology is expanding and
encompassing human life almost without
control;
the
interests
of
science,
technology
and
the
market
now
overshadow all other human interests; and
the means of reviving that spontaneous
co-operation among ourselves are more
and more threatened by the powers that
be. For all of these reasons, it be behooves
us to return to Greggs revolutionary step
and to begin our dialogue with it again.
Abridged
Version
of
Greggs
Which Way Lies Hope?, with
Critical
Commentary
And
Dialogue
In what follows I offer my own critically
abridged version of Greggs work, based on the
1957 second edition by Navajivan Press,
Ahmedabad. I am adding my own comments in
italics at the end of major sections. My intention is
to provide a running critical commentary, an
updating of Greggs text and also to take up a
dialogue with it. I also intend this to be an opening
space in which the reader to enter into the open
dialogue as well.
I begin with the very clear statement of Greggs
intentions that is the Preface to the 1957, 2nd edition.
Preface, 1957

As everyone knows, modern science

and
technology,
wrapped
up
in
industrialism and large- scale commerce
are now intruding rapidly and in a

big way into the countries of Asia and

Africa. In the cultures and nations of those
continents there are, as a result, great
confusions and conflicts of values,
beliefs, assumptions, customs and
institutions as between the old ways and
new ways. Everywhere changes of all
kinds are very swift. There is a great urge
to create a better world. Often old ways
crumble before new good ways can be
built up to take their place. India is now in
the midst of this kaleidoscopic whirl.
As one who has lived amidst, and
studied,
modern
Western
science,
technology and industrialism, who has
also lived for awhile in the India of thirty
years ago and is now witnessing some of
the present changes, I, who love India,
offer this book of reflections in the hope
that it may help.
Richard B. Gregg
Kodaikanal,
Madras State,
India. May, 1957

Which Way Lies Hope? An Examination

of Capitalism, Communism, Socialism and
Gandhis Programme
Chapter I. Introductory
Like all countries, India has many
people, young and old, who love their
motherland. They want to serve it, to end
injustice and create a prosperous, happy,
noble and enduring society. And like many
countries, India is today faced with a
number of great problems and dangers.
For these difficulties various solutions have
been proposed. Those who care for Bharat
(India) must make a choice between the
various proposals, or work out new
solutions, perhaps containing elements of
various schemes.

To make wise choices, clear principles and goals

are necessary
In making such choices we do not
start from scratch. Some choices have
already been made by those in power and
certain processes and tendencies are
already at work. But affairs are changing
rapidly and

fresh choices have to be made every day.

To make wise choices one must have
certain principles and goals as well as the
immediate desires of the moment; one
must have a sense of direction . . . .

Ways of living in ordering society

To carry-on society and to
avert
danger, various ways of living have been
developed. These are ways of obtaining
and using the necessary food, shelter,
clothing, tools, machinery and intangible
satisfactions of life. Also they are ways of
ordering and controlling society for these
purposes. They may be listed thus:
1. Capitalist controlled, competitive
industrialism, commerce, science
and technology.
2. Communist
centrally
controlled
industrialism, commerce, science
and technology.
3. Socialist
centrally
or
locally
controlled
industrialism,
commerce,
science
and
technology.
4. Gandhijis
program
of
decentralized democratic village
economy, based on agriculture,
with a minimum of big industry and
of heavy technology and that
controlled for the benefi t of all;
and
all
political
government
subject to the consent of the
governed; refusal of consent to be
made effective in the last resort by
mass Satyagraha.
5. A combination of elements from
some or all of the foregoing, with
or without other reforms.
India is fortunate in having at least
one more possible solution with implied
combinations than other countries have.
Thereby her choices of a successful
solution are at least statistically greater.

Before we examine and compare

these ways of living, working and ordering
society we should establish some sort of
yardstick for measuring and evaluating the
different
proposals.
Cultures
and
civilizations are complex affairs and involve
far more

than food, clothing and shelter. There

rapid change is bewildering unless we have
some principles and a clear goal.
are many intangibles, such as beauty and
order and self-respect, that the human
Seven Great Dangers
being is hungry for and needs as much as
they do the material things. To judge
The greatest dangers which India
what ways of living we should choose we
faces are, I think, seven:
need some standards more than the
quantitative measure of how much food, 1. The combination, on the one hand, of soil
erosion, destruction of humus and
clothing and housing a certain method
leaching out of minerals from the soil,
of production will accomplish.
and on the other hand, increasing
Because the last fifty years have
overpopulation. This combination, if not
seen so much destruction and rapid
checked, can result only in vaster
change of social order in all nations, and
starvation and impoverishment than has
humankind is so insecure, fearful and
ever yet been experienced.
unhappy, we will choose as our yardstick a set of
2. Violence, including both war and civil
social dangers and consider them briefly so
strife, political violence and violence by
as to give us perspective in our main
economic, political, social, or religious
discussion, and a guide by which to steer
oppression.
in the currents of change. The system
which best avoids the dangers and also 3. Grossly unequal distribution of power as
provides the tangible and intangible
between classes, castes, groups and
necessities would probably be the best to
individuals, between city and country.
choose. Discussion of the dangers will
of
great
size
in
illustrate some principles. Even though 4. Overvaluation
organizations, especially in the realms of
some changes may be necessary to get
politics, finance, industry and commerce.
rid of harmful accretions, nevertheless

5. Failure, among leaders especially, to

realize that in every room of activity, the
means chosen to reach a given end must,
if success is desired, be consistent with
the end desired.
6. The
especially,
corporations
organizations
recognized as

idea,
among
leaders
that
governments
or
or
other
large
need not obey moral laws
applicable to an individual.

7. The loss, among leaders and book

educated people, of faith in the existence
and supreme power of spiritual unity.
\The seven great dangers are all
interrelated and go deep into the
foundations and processes of society. Only
the first three are generally considered
dangerous. In varying degrees they
confront every nation.
Reflection and Dialogue (1):
Greggs chosen starting points are very
formative for what will follow, so it is worthwhile
to reflect on them from the outset.

Wholistic Goals and Principles:

Gregg begins by making a clear case for first
establishing goals and then principles before
beginning the discussion of social order. The goals
are to be wholistic in nature, as he stressesnot
simply quantitative and material ( e.g., food,
clothing, shelter) but also qualitative and spiritual
(e.g., beauty, order, self-respect). The principles will
follow in the same pattern as we shall see. However,
Gregg does not turn directly to these goals and
principles. Rather he makes the interesting decision
to develop his account of needs and to define his
principles in the light of the dangers present to a
modern social order. By doing this, Gregg intends
his goals to be not only wholistic and idealistic but
also realistic. He will induce them, then, by
identifying and reflecting on
11

these real and immediate dangers and then seeing

how they should best be faced. This decision to
reflect on these dangers also reflects Greggs belief
that the social and political situation of the
modern, or post-modern human being is a very
precarious one as an old worldview and its
assumptions are giving way to a new worldview..11

The Dangers
Before turning to each of the dangers in
particular, it will be worthwhile to understand the
kind of framework for analysis which they provide.
In this sense, they can be described as both
structural dangers and ethical or spiritual
dangers. Both kinds of dangers have a social form,
however, and that is what gives Greggs approach
its unique character.
Gregg himself notes that the first three
dangerssoil erosion/overpopulation, socialpolitical/religious violence and the unequal
distribution of powerare common to all modern
societies and constitute the gravest or most
immediate threats to the human well-being. This is
to say that they are all structural issues, i.e.,they are
built into the social order itself and given a large
degree of acceptability because of that. As Gregg
says, they are all inter-related and go deep into
the foundations and processes of society. They
are also hidden (part of the common sense and
banality of daily life) and thus justified by
ideological claims of the society as a whole, for
example, by the claims of a highly productive
agricultural policy, or good order with its
hierarchy and stability (which requires violence
and repression), and finally, a successful economy
(geared to ever increasing production and thus
unequal wealth and power). Although it is possible
and important to update Greggs account of the
dangers, it is most valuable to recognize that their
structural character traces the danger directly back
to their roots within

See The Self Beyond Yourself: One of the reasons for the anxiety and dismay that prevails so widely in the
modern Western world is that a fair number of assumptions which have been held for centuries are now being

upset and shown to be invalid..The experience of changes n those assumptions and the groping for deeper and
sounder assumptions to replace them is profoundly disturbing (31).

the kind of social order we have chosen in the modern

world: a society with an unrestrained focus on
economic expansion will necessarily create the
dangers of soil erosion, social violence and
inequities. At minimum this suggests that facing
these structural dangers in fact will require
fundamental social transformation.

highlights dangers which are human-made

consequences of concrete social and political
choices, and he shows impact of the operating
principles/ axioms of a society as ethical decisions
with far- reaching social and political results. We
can now return to Greggs account of each of the
seven dangers and then reflect on them in turn.

The second set of four dangersthe

preference for large organizational size; the
indifference to the means to an end; exempting
large organizations from moral laws; and the loss of
faith in any spiritual unityrefer to the underlying
social principles (Gregg calls them axioms) that
have in fact shaped modern societies. We can
recognize them more easily perhaps if we give them
the names with which they are presented as
positive principles of the modern social order:
centralization, efficiency, the corporatism of the
market economy and technocratic secularism.
Gregg will argue against each of these social
principles or axioms as being in fact flawed and
unworkable in themselves: they simply reflect
an incomplete understanding of world and the
human being. Yet what he is arguing for are in
fact a different set of principles in political society
which are ethical or spiritual in nature: i.e., local
autonomy; a principled (selective) choice of means; a
priority of culture over politics and, a wholistic
view of the underlying unity of nature and human
life. Behind these of course we can hear the echoes
of the ethical-social principles of Gandhi, namely,
swadeshi, ahimsa, swaraj, and satyagraha. The
last danger, namely, the loss of belief in the unity of
spirit, is more properly what has traditionally
been called, religious or at the spiritual. Although
it is important enough to be treated separately
from the three ethical principles, it also shares their
ethical flavour as we shall see. It might be called
Greggs fundamental social axiom or principle, for
it defines the entire world-view of a wholistic
approach to political life and by doing so sets it off
in critical distinction from what can be called the
scientific- technological world-view/axiom.

[First Danger:] Soil Erosion [food production]

and Population Growth

In identifying all seven of these dangers,

Greggs approach again shows its wholistic form: he

First, as to soil erosion, loss of humus

(colloidal organic matter) and leaching of
essential minerals from the soil. This
danger is but slightly realized by city
people or the book-educated classes. In
reality all life on the land, vegetation,
trees, insects, animals, and human beings,
depends on the existence and healthy
condition of only about 8 inches of topsoil,
the part that contains the soil bacteria,
fungi another microscopic forms of life
and earthworms.
In the state of nature, the roots of
grasses, shrubs and trees hold down the
soil and keep it from being washed away
or blown away. The leaves and dead or
decaying vegetation protect the sale from
the washing of heavy rains and also
absorb and hold, like a sponge, vast
amounts of water. But if the forests are
destroyed by fire or over cutting, and if the
grasses and shrubs and young trees are
overgrazed by sheep and goats, or if the
land is improperly cultivated, then the
topsoil gets washed away, blown away by
wind storms, covered with sand and
floods, or badly dried out, and the result is
deserts.
In its present degree, speed and
wide- spreadness, soil erosion is relatively
new in human history; only about 250
years old. There have, of course, been
instances of rapid soil erosion in small
areas during the entire history of this
planet. But during the past 250 years, we
are told by the best soil experts, there has

been more erosion of topsoil than in all

the history of the world put together.

This erosion is operative on the vast

scale in China, Africa, Australia, most of
the countries around the Mediterranean,
all of West Asia, North and South

America and in a big way also in India.

One third
of the arable topsoil of the
United States has been washed into the
sea, and further erosion is proceeding
much faster than the existing conservation
work can we reclaim or stop. If erosion
were to continue at its present rate, the
experts say that by the end of the present
century over three quarters of its fertile
soil would be lost
Not only is soil washed away; its
fertility is destroyed by unwise or
excessive cultivation. Humus is oxidized
and burned up but up by sunshine, and
essential soluble minerals are washed
away by rainfall. Cultivation of land where
rainfall is too little or too unreliable has
resulted in the blowing away a vast
amounts of topsoil.The destruction of
forests by fires in by the inroads of
industrialism for timber, pulp and paper
causes, of course, fearful floods and more
soil erosion. Largely as a result of such
forest exploitation, fires are bigger and
more frequent in United States almost
every decade.
Nearly every empire throughout
history has ended in deserts. North
Africa, Sicily, Italy, Syria Palestine,
Arabia, Persia, Greece are but a few
examples. The three empires of modern
times, British, French and Dutch have not
yet produced deserts but they have
done much to help exhaust and despoil
the soils and mineral resources of
Asia,Africa, New Zealand and North
America.
It is true that by excessive use of
chemical fertilizers, government subsidies
to farmers especially in the United States,
and by mechanized monoculture there
have been a surprising number of food
surpluses in North and South America and
even in Europe. But because of price
controls, export controls and other
governmental and monetary interferences,
the surpluses have usually not been
allowed to go to hungry peoples. The

people who rely on science to solve the

world food problem, forget that science
does no cure human greed, pride, lack of
imagination, mental laziness, inertia or
overvaluation of money and of money
processes. So soil erosion is destroying our
food resources as fast or faster than
changes take place in the minds, hearts
and habits of humankind.

Along with the steady shrinkage of

food supplies (for that is the result of soil
erosion), we now have a rapid increase of
world population. This also has been
greatly accelerated during the past 250
years. For the first time in the history of
the world there are more people in the
world than can be fed from the existing
land capable of raising food, even with no
obstacles of transportation tariff laws or
finances. It is a question of the
proportional relationships between
arable land and food requirements. The
generally accepted computation is that 2
acres are required to provide a
minimum adequate diet for each person,
by current western standards. On the
vegetarian diet it is been estimated that
one and a half acres per head may
provide enough. The reason for this
differences that animals raised for meat
eating purposes require from 9 to 15
times more land than is necessary to
raise an equivalent amount of nutrition in
the form of grains, vegetables and fruit
for human consumption.

Population growth itself continues to

accelerate. [If we understand that
population growth is exponential then]
even if acceleration were to stop in world
as a whole, and the present rate were to
continue, the world population would be
more than doubled in seventy-five years.
The rate in India with its already high
population size will also continue to
accelerate.
All that needs to be made clear now
is that the relation between population
and food supply faces not only India, but
the world as a whole. Because the
situation has never before existed for the
world as a whole, and because its
implications are so grim, people are very
reluctant to recognize it and admit it. We
dislike unpleasant facts; we are reluctant
to think; we hate to change our ways. But
nature and death and birth are more
powerful than human inertia. I am not
what is called a neo-Malthusian;; I do not
believe that there is nothing ahead but
disaster; but I believe the problem is the
most
difficult
and
complex
that
humankind has yet faced.

Reflection and Dialogue (2):

Greggs foresight in understanding the
intrinsic connections between soil erosion, food
production and population growth really ought
to be commended. The issues are still very relevant
though as I will argue in a now much broader
context. Gregg also gives us the historical-political
context for this overexploitation of the earth by
seeing
the
link
between
empire
and
desertification. That also continues as the now
militarily powerful but agriculturally weak
nations of the first world turn to an exploitation of the
southern hemispheres land and resources under the
aegis of globalization. Finally, the danger of
population growth has even exceeded Greggs
alarmed account of exponential growth into the 21
century; and it continues to be shadowed by famines,
political violence and environmental disasters. What
he saw as then the most difficult and complex
problem that humankind has yet faced, can only be
seen to be more difficult and complex from todays
vantage. Let me now turn to an updating of his
insights.
Gregg was certainly correct to identify by
anticipation the global proportions of this
environmental danger. Indeed, his whole
description of the first danger of soil erosion would
now be naturally included within a broader,
and global recognition of the (irreversible)
environment damage to habitat, species and the
natural balances. We are now aware of the longterm environmental effects of industrialism (in the
forms of pollution, waste and species devastation)
and at the same time of the way they have been
magnified by the production and consumption
forces in modern/post-modern market economies.
The shift from industrial to consumer society has
not only intensified this damage, then, it has also
shifted it from the primarily agricultural context
of Greggs time to encompass the growing
dominance of urban settings in modern society. It
has also shifted the entire ecological discussion
from a primarily national context to a global one.
In our time, climate change has become the focal

point for this damage rather than soil erosion, and it

suggests

the broader, global reach of the damage and its

danger to the environment. In the light of that shift
we must also revise Greggs account of basic
material needs. For example, water, particularly
clean water, should be added to the list of basic
material needs; the problem of post-industrial
pollution which has become evident in the last sixty
years, has made potable water as crucial as arable
soil. There may well be other revisions to that list.
By recognizing the intrinsic connections between
soil erosion, population growth and agricultural
techniques, however, Gregg laid a foundation for the
necessary and wholistic critique of our time.

[Second:] Dangers of Violence

It is hardly necessary to discuss the
devastating effects of modern war and
civil strife.The last forty years have
shown
its
poisonous
power.
The
civilization of Europe and America was
thereby brought to the brink of
destructionPerhaps the worst effect of
war is its destruction of soils, forests,
irrigation canals and soil conservation
practices. Other bad effects are the
slaughter of the best young minds and

the moral deterioration of the bonds of

society. The increase of power of modern
weapons vastly increases the speed and
extent of disaster. Perhaps this folly will
continue as long as [the human being]
maintains the present prevailing mistaken
notion of the nature of the self, upon
which he bases his correspondingly
mistaken notion of self-defence.
Of course the use of atom and H
bombs may destroy the entire human
species, though I think we will escape this
fate by a very narrow margin. Yet even if a
third world shooting war is avoided, a
substitute cold war of different modes of
violence would make life everywhere
miserably impoverished, unhappy and
desperate affair.

[Third:] Dangers of Power

As of formerly politically and
economically subject country, India as a
whole has experienced the bitterness of
unequal distribution of power. And within
India, both in the past and present,
Dalits,

aboriginal tribes, industrial workers and

peasants also know the evils of unfairly
distributed power. Morally, mentally and
spiritually
the
powerful
individuals,
groups and castes have also suffered,
even though they may have been unaware
of the harm to themselves.
Lord Actons saying is true: Power
tends to corrupt, absolute power corrupts
absolutely. He did not say that power
again inevitably and necessarily corrupts,
but that it has that tendency. History and
careful daily observation show, however,
that exceedingly few people have ever
been able to withstand that tendency. In
some degree, it affects little people as well
as big ones, you and I as well as very
important people. The corruption need
not be financial or political. It may be
corruption of motive, of imagination, of
sensitiveness, of mind, of morals, or the
heart. The power maybe financial,
industrial,
commercial,
political,
educational, ecclesiastical or of land
ownership. All of human society suffers
when power is wrongly distributed or
wrongly used.
Ambition for power has built and
destroyed all the empires, it is the major
cause of the present titanic struggles
between the Communist bloc in the
Western capitalist bloc. All nations,
including India, are now endangered by
grossly unequal distribution of power
within themselves.
It is true that in every human society
there is necessarily power, and that it will
and must be used. No matter what form of
organization there may be, solar energy
continues to descend upon the earth at
the average rate of about 1.6 hp per
square yard. Hence, whoever controls the
use of that energy, be he peasant
proprietor, landlord, church, monastery or
state, as economic and political power and
will use it or abuse it. Similarly in regard to
control of access to and use of water. And

since the human being is the symbol

creating and simple using animal and
symbols a rose and guide him in energy,
the manipulation of symbols is another
source of power. There will always be some
persons who are especially skilled in the
manipulation of certain symbols. The
symbols may be money or religious images
in mantras, or political flags

and slogans, or signs of social standing

and prestige. Therefore, in every human
society, whatever its modes of values and
meanings, there will always be some who
are, in respect to prevailing values in
meetings, relatively rich and some who
are relatively poor.
The desire for great power and
increasing power is in almost universal
human weakness. It is probably a
perverted form of the desire for life. It is,
therefore, very difficult to control. But
people, both individuals and groups, have
learned to practice self-control in some
direction. For example, susceptibility to
malaria or yellow fever is a common
human
weakness.
Now
that
we
understand what causes those diseases,
it is possible for many individuals to sleep
under mosquito nets, or for their
government or municipality to spray
boiler
chemicals
in
places
where
mosquitoes breed, and thus avoid these
diseases. Tuberculosis has in the west
also been almost eliminated by properly
designed individual and social measures
of
prevention.
The
evils
from
intemperance in the use of alcohol or
also controllable. Islam has done this by

absolute religious prohibition. Western

nations have established partial control
but legal restrictions. People with weak
hearts wisely avoid living in the high
mountains. One can think of other
examples.
Similarly, if we will be honest with
ourselves, the moral, economic and
political diseases resulting from the excess
of power can also be reduced by
intelligent means. History has taught us
many of its causes and modes of
operation. It is possible to distribute land,
water, education, legal justice, accessto
electric and other energies, and other
opportunities so that there will be few
gross unfairnesses and the spirit in every
person may then have full opportunity for
development. The rich or powerful can
always act as trustees for the common
welfare. If they refuse to act fairly as
trustees, satyagraha, may be used as a
control in the last resort.
Reflection and Dialogue (3)
Greggs second and third dangersviolence
and powerare obviously very closely related and
can best

be treated together here. He has at hand a great deal

of evidence for the destructive consequences of
violence among nation-states in the recent world wars
and the cold war. Indeed, there is a strong sense that
there is a still impending danger for the world as
whole. His insight into the root problem of war is
very clear and very ethical in form (thus, Gandhian):
namely the mistaken notion of the nature of
the self, upon which [the human being]
bases [their] correspondingly mistaken
notion of self-defence. If the self of one nation
sees the self of another nation as essentially being an
enemy to it then violence is virtually inevitable.
Clearly for all our current awareness of state
violence we have not advanced beyond this insight in
our understanding of the causes of war. In fact, we
continue to try to fix international violence as if it
were a structural problem between nations who are
enemies rather than as an ethical one between human
beings of different nations: a great deal of energy has
been put since then into diplomacy, international
relations and armed intervention into conflict with
little success to show for it except further escalation
(witness the current situation throughout the Middle
East). Cases where longstanding conflict has in fact
ended peacefully have almost always been the work of
individual grassroots effort and the appeal to a
broader notion of the self or identity as human being
(as for example in Northern Ireland).
It may be said that we have grown more aware
since Greggs time of the constructed nature of
identity and correspondingly to the new ways that it
is subject to manipulation and coercion by forces
within the nation sate. Identity has become more of a
human project than a simply given role in modern
societies and yet despite having a new degree of
freedom, it has also become subject in new ways to
powerful social forces. This structural violence within
the state what Gregg identifies with the third danger
of unequal distribution of power and its abusesis
largely exercised with economic levers, although as
he insightfully noted such economic power is based
ultimately on control of energy (land, resources or
water) as the true capital of the powerful. Gregg

insightfully recognizes the essential role of

symbols (religious, political, national or
social) in the manipulation of power. All of
this, we have come to understand under
the notion of ideology or propaganda and
also to see as an ever present part of the
deep socialization process in any culture.
Thus there is also a growing general
awareness of the problems of structural
violence and coercion which is embedded
in social values and moresfor example,
patriarchy with all its consequences for
thegender roles of both women and men. Most
people are now aware of this because of the
struggles of movements for rights of marginalized
social groups (for example, women, the LGBT
community, minorities and indigenous peoples)
however the inequities of power persist in
oppressing people in so-called developed
countries and globally. Meanwhile, through
what is now called identity- politics (namely the
use of constructed political social or religious
identities to exclude and/or scapegoat others),
violent relations continues to shape
structurallyboth the broad geo-political world
and most modern nation states. Finally,
postmodern societies, where intensive competition
for limited resources has become the norm as a
result of the dominance of the market economy,
embody intensive forms of structural violence and
often resemble what Thomas Hobbes long ago
called the war of all against all.
In light of all of this intensification of
structural violence and power, it would seem more
difficult to accept Greggs argument that such abuses
can be rectified to some degree by self-control
in individuals and groups. This ideal of ethical selfrestraint is the key pivot in hisand in Gandhis
social-political programme as we shall see. We will
have to question this possibility of individual ethical
resistance more closely now precisely because of the
systematized and internalized nature of the
dominance and control exercised over individual
freedom by the market economy and consumer
cultures. This must be a key pointperhaps the
key pointin the dialogue with Gregg.

In the light of this dialogue on social violence

and power in the market economy, we might again
revise Greggs account of basic material needs
further by recognizing that as work has come
almost completely under the dictates of the market,

its status as rightfully chosen human labour has often

been put at risk. Thus we should also add
employment in meaningful work or alternatively,
the possibility of establishing a sustainable livelihood
as primary human

needs. Also, in light of the forced migrations and

loss of traditional lands that have happened
because of industrialism and the continual wars of
nation states,, we should also speak of the human
need for rootedness in a place and connection to a
particular land. This is the case not just for
indigenous peoples but for everyone. We can now
turn to the three ethical dangers which Gregg
identifies.

[Four:] Danger from Large Scale Organization

A great many people in India, no
more than ever before, or becoming aware
of
the
slowness,
waste,
frequent
irresponsibility
and
corruptions
of
bureaucracy. These defects or not the fault
of any particular individual or of any
particular political party. They are due to
the immense size of the national political
organization. If the party in power or the
present officeholders were changed, this
evil would still be present. It exists in
every nation, irrespective of race or
general political ideas. It is not so great an
evil in a relatively small nation by Great
Britain as in a large nation like the United
States or Russia. It is perhaps less in an
homogeneous,
politically
long
disciplined people then in a new nation
whose population comes from many
scattered places such as in the United
States. It is less in a large industrial
organization such as the Standard Oil
Company than in a political organization,
because operations with money and
materials are far more measurable, exact
andcapable of definition and control then
our operations with people and subject to
political interference.
The worship of the large size goes
along with and stimulates greed and
ambition and desire for power. Along with
that there is usually found another
mistake, the idea that the overall human
unity of any considerable geographical
area must be political. Ancient Asia,
including
India,
was,
I
believe,
profoundly wise by laying stress on the

importance of two small organizations, the

village and the family, and letting the
overall unities of its great areas be
primarily not political but cultural. Asia
did occasionally have large political
organizations, but for the most part Asiatic
large political organizations were

relatively weak.In India if Im not

mistaken, the primary activity of the
Kshatriyas (traditional warrior caste) was
not fighting but ruling and ruling was
mostly of small areas. The west, of
course, believes that overall unities must
be primarily political. Except in regard to
conservation of natural resources and a
few other instances discussed later, I
think that is a mistake. Such largeness of
organization is inevitable as a result of
adopting
modern
technology
and
industrialism.
Most
of
the
difficulties
and
weaknesses of political democracy in
modern states are not in inherent in
democracy but are due to the large size
and great numbers of people in them, to
organization and so larger scale. Most
people have to spend most of their time
and energy earning daily bread for
themselves and their families. They
simply do not have time to learn all the
facts necessary to make wise decisions
on public affairs of a large population,
even if it were possible to get all the
facts, undistorted by conflicting and
selfish interests. So in large matters

people must delegate decisions to a

relatively few representatives. But this
concentration of power in the hands of a
few is dangerous; in come is the
temptation and tendency to corruption by
power. But given small enough skill, as in
the village for example, people are willing,
have time, and are able to think out their
local problems intelligently and register
their decisions effectively. The problems of
a smaller area are also less complex.
Some risks, of course, must be taken in
practical life. But it is also practical
wisdom to keep risks as low as possible.
Voluntary or legal restriction in size in
most organizations would greatly help in
this respect.
Deciding to live in and work only by means
of small organizations is like any other sensible
control of environment in order to have a good
life. There is need for invention of new ways of
correlating local autonomy and overall
integration (emphasis mine, Ed.).
If modern transport, modern means
of communication, the psychology of
propaganda and

modern weapons make control of large

numbers of people easier than before,
they also enhance the psychological
and
moral
risks
of
large-scale
organization. Big organizations in any
realm inevitably create concentration of
power
with
its
almost
inevitable
tendency to corruption. It is, therefore, a
great danger to modern society.

[5:] Danger if Means are not Consistent with

Ends
Wisdom
operates
largely
with
intangibles, assumptions, ideas, beliefs,
understandings,
moral
and
mental
attitudes, relations between people. One
of these ideas or understandings, not yet
widespread or firm, is that in any activity
success can be had only if the means used
are adopted to and in harmony with the
end sought. This is true of quality as well
as quantity. You cannot make a watch
with a sledgehammer and a crowbar. You
could not make an Ajanta painting by
means of the paint spray gun. Frequent
beatings do not create happiness or
emotional poise in the child nor in the
adult who grows out of that child. A longenduring human unity is not built up by a
preponderant spirit of competition. A
long-enduring nation is not made by
reliance on violence.
Darwinian studies prove that all
creatures, including the human being, are
inevitably influenced by their environment.
Human beings invented tools. They began
as ideas in the human mind. With this in
mind, hands and eyes, the human being
objectified them, fashioned them into
exterior things and then used them.
Humans also objectify other intangible
means
that
they
use,
such
as
organizations or ideas in the shape of
advertisements and propaganda. These
things, whether tangible or intangible, that
the human being puts outside themselves
and uses, become a part of the human
environment. Everyone recognizes that

material tools and machines are part of the

human environment. As a part of this
environment they influence the human
being. The character of the means we use
influence our character. If we use moral means,
such as violence or dishonesty, they
harm our character. If we use honesty,
truth, trust and gentle

persuasion, these help our character.

Ends which are sought in human affairs
are matters of growth, and inevitably
absorb and embody the means which are
used to produce them, just as a plant
observes water, minerals in the energy of
the sunshine enjoy the means of its
group. When violence is used to create
or maintain a state, that state has a
character that is significantly violent.
It is easy to be shortsighted. One
often sees a man flamboyantly enjoying
power, money or land which he has
acquired by dishonest or unfair means.
One is tempted to be dishonest or unfair
and also thereby get power and wealth,
hoping that maybe I can get away with
it. But watch that man for a long time.
What becomes of his character, his inner
poise, his happiness, his children, his
family life, his wealth
? You cannot tell the quality of the tree
until you see and taste its fruit. So also
of a man and an idea. And the fruit is
often slow in coming and ripening.
When confronted with the historical
examples of the corruptions of power or
the disasters that come from the use of

mistaken means, youth of today are apt to

feel, But in those days they did not have
airplanes, radio, electricity, chemistry,
psychology, cars and all the other things
that give us control over our environment.
We know so much more now so I wont get
caught the old fellows did. I can escape
with the good things that trapped them.
But progress in control of the underworld does
not result in greater control of the inner world.
Despite the advances of science, essential
human nature remains the same, in both
its strengths and weaknesses. Despite
modern suavities for hiding or distorting
the essential meanings of actions, Hitler,
Stalin, Winston Churchill and FD Roosevelt
are just as subject to the poisons of power,
just as apt to use wrong means, as we are
Genghis Khan, Alexander or Julius Caesar.
Moral laws may be slow in action but they
are just as enduring, powerful and
ineluctable as is the attraction of
gravitation. It is a subtle and unobtrusive
law, but just as sure as any of the quick
and dramatic ones, that to obtain enduring
success one must choose and use means
that are in harmony the end which is
desired. Furthermore, if

any end is morally valuable, it is possible

to find and use a means that is in harmony
with it. That is because, so far as human affairs
are concerned, we live in a moral universe. To
disregard this harmony of means and end
is dangerous for any individual, for any
cause and for any nation.

[6:] Danger of Organizations Not Obeying

Moral Laws
Then there is the danger of the notion
that in public affairs, private morality can
be disregarded or fudged. We see this in
the administration of political affairs in
many countries, perhaps most; we see it
in the affairs of large industrial and
commercial organizations. It is certainly
prevalent in the bigger countries, the
United States, Russia, Argentina, Brazil;
and it is found also in smaller countries.
Politicians and diplomats fairly often lie or
tell half-truths or suppress the truth
because they think the interests of the
nation or State are ore important than the
truth, or because time is too short, or
some other reason.But it is interesting to
see how their influence wanes or how
often they have to retire from public life
after their immorality is fully disclosed.
People forgive and even trust a man who
publicly admits that he made an honest
mistake, but if he lied or cheated and
knew it and tried to hide it, on discovery
he is discredited.
It is true that the integrations and
relations between men in a group or
society are not so close, so thorough, so
sensitively poised and so delicate as are
the
mental,
moral
and
physical
elements in an individual human being.
Society is not yet a real organism. As an
abstract entity, society does not have a
conscience. A corporation does not have
a soul. But the immoral acts of a society will ruin
its character and, if continued,eventually destroy it,
as surely as if it were a person. Hence, if
society is ever to improve, it is all the
more important that the leaders, when

acting on behalf of their group and of

society, should be all the more scrupulous
and particular to act sensitively and
closely to all moral laws. A conflict in the
heart of and mind of a leader in regard to
loyalties between personal morality and
group interests creates

in him a schizophrenia that may even in

some cases lead to a mental breakdown.
It is true that in group action there are
often complex and conflicting interests.
To see ones way clearly is often
exceedingly difficult, and mistakes will be
made. But spiritual and moral principles
have been known a long while and are
fairly simple. It is the clutter of
compromises and evil inheritances from
the past which make the greatest
difficulty. If history teaches anything, it is
that moral failures by the leaders of
groups are a grave danger to society.
Reflection and Dialogue (4):
Greggs next three dangers are ethical in
nature as I suggested because they articulate a set of
ethical principles with far-reaching sociopolitical consequences. Greggs principles stand in
contrast to the dangerous principles around which
modern society has been constructed. It is valuable
to see his principlesautonomy, proportionality,
and ethical- political consistencyin contrast to

these dangerous principles of centralization, efficiency,

and secularity.
In the first place, the dangerous idealization of
large scale organization is presented as a direct result
of the key modern principle of centralization of
power and control. Centralizing power and
control has created vast networks of efficiency and
productivity to be surebut at the cost of the loss of
both diversity and local control or autonomy. For
Gregg, this principle of centralization shows its
negative effects most clearly when applied to the
political realm. It does this
by constructing
centralized systems of control and powernationstatesand repressing the natural/organic unities
of cultural communities which exist at the local level.
It also elevates the productivity of quantitative
sameness over the qualitative uniqueness and
efficiency that only a local autonomy can provide
(when it is based on a true understanding of the
unique local problem and resources, for example).
Clearly there are many things to be gained by the
modern approach but the society it creates, as Gregg
notes, becomes by default a dependent and dominated
one in which the political and economic

elite easily maintain control.

Finally, it must be noted that centralization has
also entered a new phase entirely in the digital era:
everywhere the digitizing of information as data creates
a new kind of centralizing and it remains to be seen
whether it will also bes a form in which information
and power are shared among smaller more autonomous
centres. This does not remove the danger of
centralization which is intrinsic to technology (as
Gregg notes) but it may provide a counterbalance to
it. If that happens it could provide a form for what
Gregg calls inventing new ways of correlating local
autonomy and over-all integration. We will discuss
this further below under the heading of technology
and science.
Second, there is the dangerous indifference to
the character of the process or use means (of
production) in order to maximize the efficiency of
the results or product. Whatever works is the maxim
of this principle and it can be applied to business,
politics or cultural life. The result, Gregg insists, is
disastrous: art or craft or goodness and
uniqueness are all abandoned for the sake of mere
commodities, practicalities and efficiencies. But the
consequence is grave for human society as well, for
the tools we use in turn shape our environment and,
as Gregg argues, and so they inevitably reshape us,
re-make us into creatures who simply accept and
consume what is effectively, the bottom line in place
of all the qualities that make us truly human. Gregg
ends this reflection by noting that science cannot
insulate us from this dangerin some technical way
because it cannot address the inner, moral
dimension of human choice. And so we end up doing,
whatever is in our power to do and overlooking the
moral universe in which we live as human beings.
Here too we must acknowledge the
tremendous impact of digitization and the
evolution of the Internet since Greggs time. In
one important sense this magnifies the role of the
systems and subsystems within which we act and
make choices about means. Most of our daily life
now occurs within these systems

in which our relations to other people and objects are

virtually defined. In many senses, the system always
provides its own means (and excludes others)in
accord with its structures and thus connects our
actions with the actions of many others. In such maze
it is much more difficult to speak of moral choice and
appropriate means. We will also return to this
discussion below. Both centralization and efficiency
lead directly to the third danger, namely the principle
of secularitythe idea that the socio-political realm
should be run, in a Machiavellian way, as if it were a
realm of efficiencies and outcomes rather than a moral
universe where means and autonomy
mattered. Large organizations, whether businesses
or governments think themselves exempt from such
moral laws, since they claim to be serving a series of
more immediate goals (e.g., the economy, the market,
wealth, stability etc.). However the neglect of taking
into account the ultimate and real goods of human
community in the drive for immediate goals is the
very essence a politics of practicality. And that
inevitably has its consequences: But the
immoral acts of a society will ruin its
character and, if continued,eventually
destroy it, as surely as if it were a person,
as Gregg argues. This is simply to see from a
wholistic perspective that the considered use of
means/tools and the respect for autonomy and
uniqueness also applies to the socio- political order. It
cannot, without great cost, operate outside the
human, moral universe.
We shall see more clearly what Gregg means
by moral and ethical here when we turn to his
account of the seventh danger and he speaks of the
spiritual unity of the universe for it provides the
justification for the claim that we live in a moral
universe. But it seems enough to say at this point
that the principles of autonomy, proportionality (of
means and ends), and ethical-political consistency of
choice are all indisputably good social and political
ideals especially in contrast to these dangerous
principles of centralization, efficiency, and secularity.
The lapse of time has done nothing but shown more
clearly how dangerous the latter principles are
socially, politically and environmentally. This is all
the more

the case when they are complemented by a

technological power which is much greater and evergrowing. The only real question isare Greggs
counter-principles realizable ideals? Is it realistically
possible to construct a social order on these
principles? Is it still possible in our post-modern,
technologically dense and system-laden cultures? In
order to address these questions we must turn to the
seventh danger and Greggs account of the kind of
unity that actually exists in the universe.

[7:] Danger of Loss of Belief in Unity of Spirit

The last danger in the above list is the
loss among leaders, educated and
articulate people, of faith in the existence
and supreme power of spiritual unity.
Not
only
the
Marxists
and
communists, but many other thoughtful
people deny the reality of spirit and
consider the word spirit and its
connotations
as
being
completely
outmoded
by
modern
scientific
knowledge. Some of them are skeptical;
some are agnostic; some are atheistic.
Others are scornful or contemptuous
about religion. Marx referred to religion
as the opiate of the people, and
communists
follow
that
lead.
The
foundations of religion seem to many to
have been destroyed by technology and
science. Science and technology have
certainly directed the attention and
interest of people away from the Inner
world to the outer world. For many people,
indeed, the inner world seems no longer
valid.
Inasmuch as mathematics is often
called the queen of the sciences or the
mother of the sciences, let us see where
she may lead us. Each branch of
mathematics, it is now realized, logically
begins with and rests upon a set of
assumptions.. All who have studied plane
geometry
will
remember
the
assumptions (axioms of postulates) of
Euclid,such ideas as straight line can be
drawn joining any two points, and

parallel lines never meet.These axioms

cannot by logic be proved to be either true
or false. That attempt has gone on for
about two thousand years. It is now
realized that the human mind in every realm
has to start somewhere. It makes its own

beginnings. Each of us unconsciously

assumes to themselves, for example, that
I exist. Even Marx unconsciously made
that assumption. The I in question is
not the body. It is that intangible entity
with which each of us is familiar. It has
been present to us during all our
conscious life. No one of us can really
prove to another person, by logic or
scientific instrument or process, the
existence of that intimate I. Yet everyone
of us proceeds quite sure that I exist. It
is only an assumption, but our whole life
to depends upon it. Well, where does this
take us?
If we are persistent and careful and
honest and in our thinking, we will all
realize that we make another deeper
assumption.
We
assume
that
underneath all the phenomena and forces
of the outer world there is a subtle unity.
It ties together the facts of astronomy
with those of geology, physics and
chemistry. It underlies the trues of
chemistry, biology, physiology, and
psychology.
It
unites
psychology,
anthropology and ethnology. It undergirds
the
forces
of
gravity,
electricity,

magnetism and the energies of every

atom. It is because of this all-embracing
unity that we speak of our universe. Along
with this goes another assumption as the
the uniformity of natural law.
And if we ponder still further we
recognize that we also assume that there
is a still deeper unity then bridges and ties
together all these forces of nature with the
intangible, invisible, subtle and inner world
of ourselves, the world of thoughts,
feelings, sentiments, fears, hopes and
aspirations.
This deepest of those unities and
of all assumptions is unprovable, but we
rest upon it our lives and our actions and
beliefs. It is been recognized by thoughtful
people of every race and
all through
history. They have felt that it is
significant and important to all people,
that we should all consciously relate our
lives to it. It is what we call spirit. Some
people make the further assumption that
this deepest unity is impersonal; others
assume that it is personal. Neither of these
assumptions
can
be
approved
or
disapproved.
The
search
for
understanding and

experience of spirit and the explicit

recognition of it in our lives is what is
known as religion or metaphysical
tradition. To recognize the existence of
assumptions, to accept the assumption
which gives most meaning to life and
explains most problems is then thoroughly
scientific and modern.
It is true everywhere that many
people who have specialized in and
devoted all their time to understanding
and attempted explanation of this basic
unity have got proud of themselves and
their knowledge and become selfish,
greedy and tyrannical. That kind of
mistake is common among professional
men of all kindsteachers, physicists,
lawyers, engineers, career diplomats etc.
But the pride, greed or malpractice of the
position or even of many physicians does
not destroy the value in reality of the
healing art. The narrowness and the
arrogance of many teachers does not
lessen the importance of true education.
The pride, intolerance, tyranny, greed or
dishonesty
of
many
priests
and
professional religious people, even if they
werent majority, does not destroy the
importance, value and reality of the spirit
and of true religion or true metaphysics.
It may well be that corrupt
religious institutions, entangled in wealth
and property rights, has long been an
opium of the people. But we must
distinguish
between
religious
organizations or institutions and that
end, the spirit, for which they were
originally only a means. And we must
distinguish between corrupt and true
religion just as we distinguish between
medical quacks and true physicians.
Religion itself is not an opium.
Assumptions have immense and
enduring power. Consider for example,
the long continued power of the
assumptions of their respective cultural
superiority made by Jews, by the Chinese

and by the English respectively. Look at the

appalling devastation all over the world
from the assumption of the white man that
he is the superior to the coloured races.
Look at the effects of the prevailing
assumption that money is the most
important measure of value, and that the
control of society ought to be in the hands
of wealthy

people. Look at the immense and

enduring cultural effects of the different
assumptions as to reality and spirit in the
traditions of Hinduism, Buddhism, Islam
and Christianity. Consider in Gandhis
case the power of the assumption that
God is present and effectively guiding in
all human affairs. The point need not be
further argued.
We all realize that for society to
endure against dangers from within and
without it must have unity and
coherence. The outer world and the inner
world, of human assumptions, thoughts,
sentiments, hopes and emotions are both
of them subtle, complex, wide- ranging
and profound. The recent discoveries of
nuclear
physics
show
that
the
movements of energy quanta inside the
atom are governed by factors that lie
beyond space and time. In view of all of
these facts, an effective unity which will
hold together all the elements and factors
of a given human society must itself
include all the elements and factors. That
is, it must be wholly in tangible and even
transcend space and time. The only
thing which satisfies these conditions is

what has been called spirit. Therefore the

search for experience and understanding
of spirit, i.e., religion or a metaphysical
tradition, is essential to the life of a
nation. Despite all their superficial
diversities, and whether they like it or not,
human beings constitute a distinct
species, a biological unity. This unity
should be enhanced by the recognition of
the deeper and more comprehensive
spiritual unity. This recognition and its
cultivation make possible that only
tolerance but an appreciation and
enjoyment of diversities within the
transcending unity.
Since his spirit is in the world of outer
nature as well as within the human being,
religion is needed to make a human being
reverence nature and limit and control
their predatory habits against nature. That
is, true religion, as well as intelligence is
the sustainer of a healthy and adequate
soil. Science may lead one to respect
nature but not revere and love her.
Religion, thus, is needed for an enduring
food supply for the human being and for a
sound ecological relation between the
human being and the earth and all its

other creatures. Remember than I am

not talking about religious institutions,
but about religion.
Reflection and Dialogue (5):
Gregg has devoted the most extensive
argument to the seventh danger, the loss of belief in
underlying spiritual unity. It clearly underpins his
arguments made earlier. It is worth noting that Gregg
published a book length study on this problem (and
his solution to it) at almost the same time1956. The
book was entitled A Compass for Civilization (in
India), Self- Transcendence (in England) and The
Self Beyond Yourself (in America) respectively. In
the choice of these different titles we can see the
essential argument Gregg wanted to make: it was to
link together his unique account of spirituality as
self-transcendence with his arguments about sociopolitical order and the modern psychological selfunderstanding. By building an account of
transcending the self-as-ego to realize the Self-asSpirit, Gregg drew on central insights of many of the
classical, religious traditions. He then very skillfully
wove those into contemporary psychological language
and analogies.12 What resulted was a religious
understanding of spirit or simply, a spirituality that
was not bound by attachment to any religious
tradition or institution. Very much in the spirit of
Gandhis own insights then, Greggs spirituality
was a self-governing (swaraj), ethical act of the
individual. And because it was ethical, it was
necessarily also socio-political:
The essence and joy of life does not lie in
separateness and individuality but in order,
inclusiveness, and integration of more and
more subtle forces into delicate balances, cooperations and mutualities. . . .The moral or
spiritual truth or law is that all [humans]
have a common

spiritual essence, that we are a single species and

that selfishness, pride, greed and other mistakes
harm the whole species and ourselves ( The Self,
144 and150).
In the section we have just read here, Gregg
looks more closely into the metaphysical context
forsuch a ethical-political-spiritual act.
I have already spoken of his theory of
assumptions (developed at length in The Self, 1137). The human mind makes its own beginnings
this simple statement embodies Greggs quite complex
epistemology. There are three fundamental and
interrelated assumptions as Gregg argues: not only is
the I assumed as the basis for all our acts and
thoughts (i.e., an ethical unity) but so also is
underlying unity of all reality, of the universe (the
basis of all wholistic views). There is a still deeper
unity, however, and that is revealed by the
assumption that bridges and ties together the
natural world and the inner world of ourselves.
This last unitywhich makes possible all knowledge,
truth and meaningful human action in the world
is the assumption that Gregg calls spirit.13 For
Gregg the understanding of this unity is what
constitutes the essence of religion in any of its forms
and yet it is not captured by the particular
understanding of any tradition exclusively. Indeed, it
can be understood in a non-religious sense as Gregg
suggests as that which give most meaning to life and
explains most problems; it is thereby also thoroughly
scientific and modern. This is a non-traditional (but
not simply secular) form of religion or spirituality
which also supports and acknowledges the intrinsic
sciences in all of their proper claims but it does so
within its own claim to being their wholistic
foundation.

People would not be so reluctant to try to transcend the self (a cluster of pairs of opposites) if they could realize
the similarity of this transcending to that of marriage. Nor do we dread the loss of self and of sense of
separateness which comes when we witness great drama or listen to great music or find ourselves absorbed in the
excitement of a good story or a game or go to sleep (The Self, 128).
13
It might be noted that this is a statement of counter-modernity when contrasted with Descartes cogito ergo
sum: assumptions cannot be proven and prove nothing but they are essential to a meaningful human
interaction within the universe.
12

Gregg is takes pains to distinguish this form of

wholistic spirituality from the distorted forms religion
has often taken historical: they are expressions of
human corruption of the ideal rather than its essence.
The work to bind the individual to a particular system
while true religion liberates the individual to act in
harmony with the whole. As a fundamental
assumption, Gregg notes the fact that spirituality has
an immense and enduring power in the real world
of society and its politics. In its ideal form it points
to the true spiritual unity of all human beings as
enhancing their biological unity. It is that
transcendental unity, he insists, which makes
possible the appreciation and enjoyment of
diversities. This implies not only toleration but
cooperation, respect of the other, and mutuality. This
human cooperation is what has historically made
possible the survival of the species. It is an ethic
which should limit and control the human
predatory habits against Nature and thus provide a
sound ecological relation between man and earth all
its other creatures. In his larger study The Self
Beyond Yourself, Gregg suggests that the essential
ritual of this spirituality is the conduct of moral
action exercise to control the chaotic forces within
the minds and hearts of human beings.14
Along with providing an account of the
wholistic view he holds, Gregg has also developed a
spirituality of conduct to address the fundamental
problem of human motivation, namely, the
willingness to change self-destructive human
behaviour. He argues for religion or spirituality on
the grounds of its ability to motivate and animate
that changesomething that knowledge alone
(even scientific knowledge) cannot do.
It is worth stressing that we remainsome
sixty years later and
considerably more
knowledgeable

scientificallyat precisely the same impasse in regard

to the problem of motivation. If anything, society has
become still more radically secular while religions
have most often retreated from the wholistic vision to
a narrow version of group political identity. The
struggle for authentic, holistic religious vision and
action is not without significant examples in our
timeNelson Mandela, Desmond Tutu,Thich Nhat
Hanh, the Dalai Lama among thembut their
example has not yet taken a lasting socio-political
embodiment. Meanwhile the false conflict between socalled scientific secularism and traditional religious
values continues to preoccupy most people. Thus the
question which underlies Greggs whole discussion is
how and to what extent individual selftransformation (the spiritual life) can reshape
human social and political life.
I think that Gregg is correct to recognize that
the ethical-social values such as local autonomy,
proportionality of means to ends and ethical-political
consistency require a deeper foundation in the
recognition of and attention to the underlying
spiritual unities of the cosmos. I also think this
spirituality can only be rooted in the the minds and
hearts of individuals since it is not a theory but a
concrete vision of the world and our place in it. 15 All
of this only makes clearer the need for that
transforming inspiration to take a socio-political
embodiment, to move into the realm where a real
community and mutuality of view become possible.
This will be the essence of the Gandhian political
program as Gregg understands it. To Greggs account
of basic spiritual needs, then, we must add and
underline community (which is more than good
social order but presupposes it). It is what makes
possible the freedom to establish relationships
personal, social, and sexualin a way that is not
coercive but intentional. We would also

Such a ritual of moral action is not carried out to attain control over outer forces of inanimate Nature but to
control the chaotic forces within the minds and hearts of [human beings](The Self, 208).
15
I consider it reasonably clear that the solution of conflicts, within oneself and in the outer world and also in the
way to wisdom and enlightenment lies in the realms of spirit. The solutions and the wisdom have to come
originally in the minds and hearts of individuals. For social action the insights can be pooled, but even then the
initiative must come from individuals (The Self, 230).
14

stress a fundamental equity in gender roles and division and specialization of labour, 4)
possibilities that would be reflected in a just social ever increasing commerce,
5) urbanization, 6) money valuation and
and economic order.
money control of most things and
What is the relation between this wholistic activities, 7)reliance on
(ethical spiritual) view and the scientifictechnological one which has shaped the modern
world? Gregg insists that they are not truly
contradictory and indeed that they are essentially
complementary. Although that complementary view
must be recovered from the divisions created by the
dirve for progress which forgets the whole. This will
require a process of deep reflection and yet it is
essential to preventing further destruction. A great
deal of what follows will be an attempt to disentangle
claims that emerge from a non-wholistic science
(which is often at the service of economic and political
interests) to revise them and integrate them in a
context that is wholistic. This will yield a
worldview which for Gregg is thoroughly scientific
and modern and it will also be Gandhian.
With these imminent dangers in mind and
also with a sense of the principles needed to meet
them, Gregg now turns to examine Capitalism
and Communism as socio-political systems. His
analysis will be both practical and theoretical; it
will also be critical of what falls short of the
wholistic view.
Chapter II. Capitalism
Main Features of Capitalism
Capitalism is a social and economic
system that has existed so long and under
so many conditions that it is hard to
define. It is well enough known and widely
enough experienced, however, for us to
discuss it without attempting precise
definition. It has many varieties and
degrees. It prevails now in most of the
countries of the world in varying strength
and with various modifications. Some of its
chief characteristics are: 1) and emphasis
on private property and competition,
2)increasing
technology
and
industrialism.
3)
ever
increasing

money-profit motive as the surest and

best stimulus to action, 8) extensive use
of organized violence in the form of
police, armies, navies and air forces, 9)
systems of land distribution and tenure,
land taxation and money interest that
strongly favour industry and commerce
as against agriculture, and favour the
existing legal and social system, and
hence tend to promote poverty and
insecurity among farmers and peasants
and social erosion and loss of soil fertility.
Capitalism has had its greatest growth in
Europe, Great Britain, America and
Japan.
Its Achievements
In capitalism the alliance of money,
science and technology has transformed
the world. In material, short view terms,
its success has been brilliant and highly
impressive. Under it there has been an
immense development of power and of
control of power. The total of material
wealth has increased enormously. The
nations in which capitalism has been
most highly developed have greatly
improved the nourishment, housing and

clothing of the great majority of their

people in both quality and quantity; they
have markedly increased longevity and
greatly reduced all communicable diseases
of their people; they have made literacy
almost universal and higher education
widespread; they have spread wide the
use of mathematics with its emphasis on
rationalism. For a while it seemed as if
capitalism and its allies had discovered
how to conquer poverty and how to
remove the threat of starvation all over
the world, but these hopes are now
tenuous as far as Capitalism is concerned.
There are clear doubts as to how long it
can endure.
Self-defeating Characteristics
Capitalistic industrialism seems to
have some specific results which create
grave threats to its own power and indeed
too its continuing existence. In discussing
these I will choose many examples from
United States, partly because capitalistic
industrialism has developed further there
than anywhere else so it shows most
clearly the tendencies of the process, and

partly because the United States and India

are of comparable continental size, so the
development of industrialism might, in
respect to size, be somewhat the same in
those two countries.

A) Destruction of Forests
Take the matter of destruction of
forests
previously
mentioned.
The
maintenance of a good forest cover on all
mountains, hills and steeply sloping
places is of enormous importance to
the soil conservation, food production and
consequent safety, security, prosperity
and duration of every nation, culture or
civilization. As John Steward Collis wrote,
Trees hold up the mountains. They
cushion the rainstorms. They discipline
the rivers. They control the floods. They
maintain the springs. They foster
the
birds (Triumph of the Tree, 149). They
also moderate air temperatures, help
increase and even up rainfall.. The story of
how the destruction of forests devastated
many great ancient civilizations is told in
Topsoil in Civilization mentioned in
the bibliography.
In the instance of the United States
where the destruction of forests has been
so colossal and so rapid, there is now
plenty of technical understanding of what
the results will be. Nevertheless, the
greed for immediate money profits of
the great lumber companies and beef
cattle and sheep grazing groups together
with the carelessness of small landowners
prevents
the
establishment
and
maintenance of proper care sustained you
do for adequate restrictions on grazing.
The United States shows have unrestricted
capitalistic industrialism destroys the
forest and soil which ensure a countrys
water and food.

B) Soil Erosion
The important point here is that by
far the greatest part of soil erosion
happened in the last 250 years which were

also the years of the emergence and

flowering of modern industrialism. Clearly
capitalistic industrialism with its great
upsurge of population was the cause of this
dreadful soil erosion which is still
proceeding toward disaster.

C) Decreased water supply

Take the matter of water, that
essential of all life. Every gallon of
gasoline takes 7 to 10 gallons of water
for its manufacture. One ton of viscose
rayon demands from 200,000 to
300,000 gallons of water in the process
of making it. To produce a ton of
synthetic rubber takes three times that
amount of water. Each ton of paper
made in modern pulp mills requires
50,000 to 60,000 gallons of water in the
making. At the beginning of World War
II there were about 200 paper-mills in
the United States, making about
10,000,000 tons or more of finished
paper. That means 500,000,000,000
gallons of water. When it comes to
mills, a ton of cotton cloth requires
60,000 gallons of water in the
bleaching and 80,000 tons of water in
the dying process. The manufacture of
one pound of refined white sugar calls
for 7 gallons of water. 160 gallons of
water are needed to make a pound of
aluminum. A ton of soap need 500
gallons of water to make it. When an
airplane engine is tested, the cooling of

it requires from
gallons of water.

50,000

to

125,000

Steel, of course, is a necessary

ingredient of all machinery, tools, large
ridges and railroads. It can be made
without much water in the process. But in
modern methods, 65,000 gallons of fairly
pure water are required to process the
single ton of steel in its finally finished
form. One of the major uses of water in a
modern steel smelter is too cool the big
retorts in their doors in order that they
may endure the heat of the molten steel
and fuel, and so that the employees can
work near the furnaces. For such cooling
150 ton furnace requires nearly 2,800,000
gallons of water a day. Recently the
Bethlehem steel Corporation of Sparrows
Point Maryland was pumping 15,000
gallons of groundwater permitted for
its manufacturing purposes. Of course not
all this water is too polluted by these
processes to make it a total loss, but most
of it becomes unfit for human drinking or
washing
purposes
or
indeed
for
agriculture. In 1950 they were about 700
steam electric plans in the United States,
with a total capacity of 40,250,000 kWh.
These
plants
altogether
required
44,833,000

gallons of water per minute. That is a lot of

water. It is not all consumed for much of it
is used over and over. These figures make
one pause for thought. Water supply is
now a serious industrial problem in the
United States.
Streams are polluted and poisoned
by city sewage by coal mining, oil fields,
food processing, hope mills, steel plans,
all textile industries and
chemical
industries. This pollution kills all fish in the
streams and makes the water on fit and
dangerous for any domestic or agricultural
use.
Industrialism makes big cities. Every
person requires 6 to 8 pints of water ear
day to keep alive. The bigger the city, the
more industries it contains, the greater is
its daily per capita use of water. In the
United States, a big industrial city uses
from 125 to 300 gallons of water per
capita per day. Over 5,000 tons of water
are used to produce the food and drink of
one person in the US per year.
Agriculture also needs tremendous
quantities of water, as shown by
research,
growing
plants
transpire
enormous amounts of water which they
take from the soil. One cornfield in Iowa
transpires enough water during the season
to cover the field to a depth of 12 to 16
inches. The production of 1 ton of dry
alfalfa hay on the Great Plains may
involve the transpiration of 700 tons of
water more or less.
The total amount of available water
has to be shared chiefly between industry
and agriculture. In the United States it has
been reliably estimated that of the total
available water, 48% was used in
agriculture, 43% directly by industry and
9% by households. In a country like India
where rainfall is irregular in amount
from year to year and concentrated into
only three or four months per year, where
the population is pressing so desperately
on the land for food, it would be a

dangerous thing to go in very heavily for

industrialism. Food is more important than
industrial products. The government will
have to allocate both surface and
groundwater
very
carefully
between
agriculture and industry.

D)Squandering of Other Natural Resources

Capitalist
industrialism
is
consuming coal, petroleum and minerals
of all kinds at a prodigious, profligate and
increasing rate. The remaining coal
seams of Great Britain are now at so
great a depth and are so narrow that the
extraction
of
coal
is
becoming
increasingly difficult and expensive.
Britain
know
depends
for
fuel
predominantly an oil from the Middle
East. She has to import almost all the
required materials for industry.
The United States has less than
10% of the non- Communist population
of the world and only 8% of the nonCommunist area, but it consumed more
than half of 1950s total world supply of
such fundamental right materials as
petroleum,
rubber,
iron
ore,
manganese and zinc. It has been
reliably estimated that between 1950
and 1975 the demand of the US for raw
materials will probably rises as follows:
for minerals as a whole, including
metals, fuels and nonmetals, about

90%
or
almost
double.
For
all
agricultural products, about 40% for
industrial water, about 170%. These
increases are much greater than the
expected increase in the US population
during that period. Since 1939 the US
has imported more raw materials that it
produced and the deficit is set to rise.
These figures not only show the
insatiable
appetite
and
reckless
consumption of raw materials by the most
highly industrialized nation, illustrating the
tendency of capitalism; but they also show
that there is no limiting principal in capitalism,
no self- restraint. The doctrine of an ever expanding
market is inherent in capitalism. Capitalistic
industrialism is using up natural resources
so fast that it can be fairly said to be
parasitic
on
the
fortunes
of
our
descendants and of the weaker nations
and peoples, robbing them of the
materials for a good life.
In theory, such a lack of self-restraint
would not seem to be a necessary element
of capitalism. But in practice the hunger of
the financiers and industrial managers for
power, the prevailing money standards

of success, the desires of most people of

all classes for extreme comfort and
conveniences and diversions from the
drab mechanical routine of urban life, all
these take control. These motives
dominate the newspapers, magazines,
radio,
television,
cinemas,
sports,
education, legislatures and politics, so that
almost everyone fails to see the direction
in which such a civilization is going and
the price which it is paying for its choice.
The American high standard of living is
mostly a high standard of wasting.
It is probable that capitalistic
industrialism is destroying itself. It seems
to be another instance of Lord Actons
dictum that power tends to corrupt. The
corruption in this instance seems to be of
the imagination, foresight, judgment and
self-control.

E) Harming Health
There is yet another weakness
appearing. Though we do not have solid
statistics as to comparative overall
health or disease in industrialized as
against non-industrialized societies, it
seems probable that there is less
infectious or communicable disease in
industrialized nations. The expectation of
life at birth is higher in
highly
industrialized societies than in less
industrialized societies. But the group of
so-called degenerative diseasescancer,
heart
disease,
circulatory
diseases,
diabetes, and kidney diseaseis higher in
the industrialized nations than elsewhere.
If you wonder how health can be
blamed on capitalistic industrialism, one
answer is that the soil erosion and
impoverishment and loss of soil minerals
already discussed results in food crops
which are lower in proteins, in minerals
and vitamins. Industrialism causes the soil
losses and hence is partly responsible for
the ill health of those who have to
consume the inadequate food.

Another reason why industrialism is

responsible
for
ill
health
is
that
urbanization
resulting
from
industry
separates the producer of foods from the
consumer. City ways of living plus
advertising and mechanization make most
people unwilling or unable to grind their
own flour. For the sake of making more

money, the millers in grinding the flour,

extract by sifting all the bran and germ of
the wheat which contain the mineral
elements, essential to human health,
most of the protein and vitamin B. The
devitalized flour does not get rancid as
whole wheat flour would soon do, and
does not attract weevils or worms. Thus
devitalized, the flour can be transported
long distances and sit on the grocers
shelves for months and still be saleable
to human beings who lack the wisdom of
the weevils. Furthermore the foolish
human consumers persuade themselves
that bread made from white flour is more
aristocratic than common grey flour. The
same holds true for polished rice and
white refined sugar.
In summary, Capitalism causes large
cities, and the food of city dwellers comes
mostly from afar off and is stale and
devitalized. In recent years many harmful
chemical food preservatives are added to
the tinned, bottle or packaged foods.
Vegetables are sprayed with insecticides
and fungicides such as lead, soulful,
arsenic or DDT. Most of them cannot be
washed off and some of them sink into

the plant tissues. The food processing

industries have largely caused the laws for
protecting
the
consumers
to
be
emasculated by ambiguous wording of the
laws or by persuading the legislatures
to deprive the administrators of the laws
of sufficient funds.

F) Crippling Education
Just as in the case of forest
distraction, theres no reason necessarily
inherent in capitalistic industrialism
why education should suffer. But the fact is
that in two of the most highly
industrialized countries, the US and Great
Britain there is a great shortage of school
buildings and teachers for grammar
schools, high schools and colleges. The
social status and pay of teachers is far
below that of industrial executives, and
indeed in the US often lower than that of a
good carpenter, plumber or skilled
mechanic. In the US many thousands of
teachers every year are leaving the
profession going into other occupations
word to use a living. The difficulties in
education in the US will steadily grow
more severe because of the growth of
population.

G) Corruption of Consumers

both the world wars, once the initial

reluctance was overcome.

In a capitalistic industrialism so much

money has been invested in machinery I) Too Rapid Change
that, if possible, people must be kept
In an industrial society the social order
buying the products of the machines. As
has ceased to be traditional or established,
automation increases, this pressure on
and instead
consumers will greatly increase. The
it rests upon rapid adaptiveness to
people are deluged with advertisements in
change.
Changes in social processes are
newspapers, magazines, roadside stands,
radio, television and Cinemas. There is a currently caused chiefly by changes in
speed
of
transportation,
tremendous
amount
of
buying
on the
communication
and
other
technological
installments, paying a little every month,
thus mortgaging future income of the changes. The ultimate cause is, of course,
consumer. Sometimes the products are changes in thinking and knowledge, but
deliberately made poor in quality so that not until these have become embodied by
they will wear out soon and thus compel technology do they alter society. These
in
transportation
and
more purchasing. There is much false changes
ostentation and silly desire to improve communications
are
constantly
ones social status by means of ownership accelerating, and all social, economic and
and display of many and more and more political processes are also changing faster
expensive things. The consumers are and faster.
corrupted.
Now we have the development of
H)Boredom
electronic calculators which are capable
of
rapidly
solving
exceedingly
Industrialism provides only a drab,
complicated mathematical problems and
dull life for the millions of employees. They
have lost the serenity, security and beauty of exercising certain types of judgment
of a traditional mode of life. Their lives are and control. They have already displaced
mechanized and standardized by the considerable numbers of not only manual
machines and mass production. As city but also clerical and white collar workers,
dwellers their lives are so artificial that making many mills, factories, oil refineries
they have but little reality or beauty. They in chemical plants almost completely
are alienated from true values and from automatic. This automation requires very
each other. To them their lives feel complete analysis and integration of
insignificant; they are bored and unhappy. every business that undertakes it and also
They need to take to alcohol or drugs or requires a market that fluctuates very little
gambling to escape from their boredom. and is constantly growing. The social
The five countries with the highest effects of it will probably be not so much
unemployment
as
a
suicide rates per 100,000 of population permanent
as of 1951 are Denmark, Switzerland, tremendous demand for much more
Finland, Sweden and the United States. highly educated and skilled employees
Three of these are highly industrialized. In to service such machines. This will
England gambling in horse races, football increase the crisis of education in the US.
and cricket matches is prodigious. There But on a mission will undoubtedly cause
are more alcoholics per 100,000 in many
other
important
and
rapid
population in the US then in any other changes.It may constitute a second
country. One sign of the boredom in the industrial revolution.
United States, I think, was the enthusiasm
The rate of social, economic and
with which people of all classes went into
political changes in modern industrialized

nations
raises
some
very
serious
problems and doubts. As Sir Geoffrey
Vickers said,
We may argue whether this
change or that is good or bad. We
seldom recognize that the rate of
change may itself be crucial. Let us
suppose that human kind is infinitely

adaptable. Even if
it is, its
adaptability must be largely a function
of the rate at which one generation
replaces another. What each of us can
learn is limited but each generation
starts from a new datum. Social as well
as biological changes are phased to
the number

of generations, not mere years. Quick

changes demand quickly changing
generations. But the generations are
not changing more quickly. Though
all other changes are being speeded,
human life is getting longer and the
influence of each generation is felt for
longer than it used to be. While this is
so, the capacity of one generation for
change must set a limit which
cannot transgressed with impunity.
Suppose, for example, that things
come to change so fast that what each
generation learns about life by 30 is
useless to guide its children or even to
guide itself during its remaining 30 or
40 years. Such a situation would be
self-defeating; we should have made a
world in which we were clueless. Is the
possibility remote? I wish I were sure
that it is not with us now
We are involved in an economic
system in which multiplying goods,
multiplying wants, and multiplying
populations endlessly excited one
another. The economic problem of
humankind
is not whether we can
continue to prosper and whether we
can make the mutual relations of the
human being in nature sufficiently
stable to provide an acceptable basis
for human life. We face this problem
with a fundamental handicap. We
recognize vaguely that the well-being
we desire is a wider concept than the
prosperity we pursue. We dimly sense
that our well-being demands other
conditions
beside
prosperity,
conditions which our power to prosper
can serve both to create and to
destroy. But we cannot discern these
conditions clearly enough to make
prosperity their servant, even within
the limited measure of control that we
have.( On BBC, The Listener, Sept
29, 1955)

J) Undermining the Cohesion of Society

Industrialism and urbanization are

gravely
weakening
family
life
and
consequently the basis of morals and the
cohesion of society. As Elton Mayo pointed
out, Our theory of civilization acts on
the

assumption that if technical and material

advancement is maintained, human
cooperation will somehow be inevitable.
But collaboration in an industrial society
cannot be left to chance. Constant, rapid
change in industrial processes has
deprived workers of long continuing
constant working relationships through
which effective communication and
collaboration were secured.
Modern civilization has done nothing
to extend an develop human cooperative
capacities, and indeed in the sacred
name of the sciences of material
development has unwittingly done
much to discourage teamwork and the
development of social skills. Active
spontaneous cooperation by all in the
work of the world is vital to civilized
ordering of activity. Social life resembles
biological in at least one aspect; when
normal processes cease , pathological
growth begins. We are technically
competent as no other agent in history
has been; and we combined this with our
social incompetence. One is compelled to

remember Christs saying, By their fruits

you shall know them.

K) Attack on Nature
One
of
the
assumptions
of
capitalistic industrialism is that nature is
only an obstacle to be overcome and an
endless source of raw materials for the
human being to use or squander as they
see fit, and that the human being is the
master of nature. Both aspects of the
assumption are gravely mistaken. The
human being is the product and portion of
nature but not her master. Humans are
able to lay waste her treasures and have
done so with exhilarating speed, but
nature is stronger and will exact her price.
It will be heavy and bitter. This assumption
of capitalism is
a dreadful ecological
mistake.
The
human
being
can
permanently be at best only a humble,
reverent and subordinate partner of
nature. In fact all processes, including the
destruction of natural resources, are
constantly speeding up in capitalistic
industrialism so there is little time left in
which to make the necessary great
changes in attitudes.

L) Violation of one of its Own Principles

I want to bring out the principles and
meaning of some of the earlier statements
in order to show their destructive
inconsistency.
Capitalism prides itself on the
development
of
skillful
accounting
practices. Accounting provides accurate
quality control of any business. No
business can be operated without careful
and thorough accounts. Both the banks
which loan money and the government
which license and tax businesses insist on
complete accounts. One of the principles
of good accounting and financial wisdom is
that no person or organization should
consume its own capital resources in living
and operations. The running expenses can
be allowed to consume only the income
from the capital but not the capital itself.
If that rule is violated, sooner or later that
person or business becomes bankrupt.
Capitalistic industrialism is violating
that rule;
it his daily consuming its
capital resources of coal, oil, minerals, soil
and
other
natural
resources,
also
destroying the education and cohesion of
its own people. A considerable part of
what it calls income is really depreciation
and depletion. The account with nature is
most of the time completely disregarded
and even when it is looked at is incorrectly
stated. There is no rich uncle to leave
another estate to the young spendthrift
and enable him to carry on his folly.

M)

Militarism

Among the seven dangers to all

nations mentioned in that introduction
was that of violence. But among
capitalistic industrial countries there is
another feature added to violence, I
mean the continuing preparation for
further wars. When spread over the entire
society as it is now is in the west this is
militarism, and it has more constant and

somewhat different effects than those of

overt violence.
These
preparations
are
not
constructive,
but
for
purposes
of
destruction. And with H bombs the
destruction would not merely be of ones
enemies but

of ones own nation and oneself but also

of the whole human race. It is now a mass
insanity and the result would be mass
suicide. The budget of the US for 1957
allots
two
thirds
of
the
entire
governmental income for expenditures
for war. Most of the countries of the
west are consuming from 25 to 66% of
their income is in this way. The
governments constantly frighten their
peoples about the dangers of a possible
war and say that military preparations are
the only defence, so that peoples
representatives in the legislatures will
vote for these budgets. A large part of the
metals produced go into the military and
naval weapons and equipment. Now in
the US the whole economy is geared
toward military preparations. If these
were stopped there would be a terrible
economic depression.
This militarism invades and harms
all aspects of the nations life. The young
men are conscripted for one or two years
military service at the time when they
should be starting to go to work and
getting married. Their minds are dulled by
military drills. They are taught dislike or

hatred of other nations; they are deprived

of initiative; they are told that they should
not think for themselves but obey blindly.
Military men and veterans are given
special medical, economic and educational
advantages; they become a privileged
class. Society is deprived of their creative
work; they are a great economic burden.
Both high school and university education
are warped into militarism. Science is
restricted and prostituted to the cause of
militarism. The whole social and political
life is filled with secrecy, evasion and
suspicion. The causes of freedom and
democracy and a great part of the foreignpolicy of the government is dominated by
military considerations. The judgment of
leaders is corrupted.
What dreadful folly it all is! It is
perhaps
the
crowning
folly
of
industrialism and is doing much to destroy
Western industrial culture. To me it seems
a vast and dramatic example of Buddhas
saying that anger is like spitting against
the wind; it always comes back on you.
That is true of other divisive emotions
fear, suspicion, pride and so on. He that
takes the

sword shall perish by the sword. Gandhis

method of handling conflict is the only
safe and practical way.

N) Summary
Let me enumerate again these
thirteen harmful results of capitalistic
industrialism: distraction of forests, using
up
water
supplies,
soil
erosion,
squandering about their natural resources,
harming health, crippling education,
corruption of consumers, boredom of city
and factory life, too rapid changes,
undermining the cohesion of society,
attacking Nature, violation of accounting
principles, and militarism. None of these
are sentimental yearnings for a simpler
Golden age of long ago; they are present
factual dangers, largely material.

Competition
Competition is one of the essential
principles of capitalism. In the later stages
of capitalism there is much merging of
small
competitive
units
into
big
monopolistic
corporations,
trust,
cartels
and
associations, but the
competition between
these
groups
becomes fiercer than that of the
proceeding small groups or individuals, as
is shown by the increase of wars.

Other Dangers
Of all the seven dangers for India
mentioned at the beginning of this essay,
capitalism created the first and it has
increased all the others, especially
military violence, the world over.

Capitalisms erosion of religion

Capitalism renders lip service to
religion and upholds its shell of ritual,
perhaps partly deliberately in order to
maintain the status quo, but also
unconsciously because in all ages, even
before capitalism a ruling oligarchy
becomes conservative and devoted to
forms. But in practice capitalism violates all

religious principles and repudiates all religious

assumptions. By the fruits of Capitalism you
may know it. In theory and largely in its
practice, capitalism is quite as materialist
as Communism is accused of

being. That is one reason why the efforts

of capitalist nations in the court of ideas
are so ineffective. Neither technological
nor
high
finance
production
or
efficiency necessarily produce good
morality or wisdom. Witness the Nazis.

Subject to Law of Diminishing Returns

The successes of capitalism have
now encountered the law of diminishing
returns. The successes were largely due
to the opening of America, Australia and
New Zealand to settlement and
exploitation, and to the exploitation of
Asia and Africa by Europe in Great
Britain, and to the advances of science
and technology. No there are no more
empty fertile lands. The growth of
industrialism outside of Europe and Great
Britain together with political changes
and the impoverishment due to wars, has
shrunk the markets everywhere. Soil
erosion everywhere except Europe and
England steadily decreases the basis for
food
production.
Power
becomes
concentrated in fewer and fewer hands;
the rivalries between different groups
grow more intense; the corruption of

power increases; the ruthlessness of

competition waxes; wars increase in
frequency, size and destructiveness. The
exploitation does not merely act against
people but against soil in forest, and hence
again supplies of food and water. It might
almost be said that the revolts of the
peasantry of Asia, Indonesia, Asia minor in
Europe, and the gathering storm clouds in
Africa are really revolts of the exploited
soils and outraged nature, for which the
peasants are the most the instrument.
The
fl owering
of
capitalistic
industrialism has lasted about 250 years.
In the history of civilizations that is but a
short time.

Suicidal character
Capitalism makes money and power
its God, and sacrifices almost everything
to that God. It has gravely injured all
cultures and religions and is now,
I
believe, destroying itself. It rests upon
many relative assumptions which not logic
but history seems to be improving false,
including the ideas that human progress
consists of amassing material things; the
idea

of that competition is the necessary and

soundest relationship between human
beings; the
idea that markets are
indefinitely expansible; The idea that
money is the only ultimately valid
measure of all values; and that the
manipulation of political and economic
power is the highest human activity.
No; unrestricted capitalism can no
longer be trusted or endured. When
young
it
probably
contributed to
humankind much that was valuable. The
science and technology that it used are
great,
valuable
and
enduring
achievements of humankind. But now
everywhere curbs are being put upon
capitalism. In principle, it is suicidal. It is, I
believe, incapable of deep reform. It has
no principle of self- control or selflimitation. Those who supported it are not
to be considered by that fact wicked; they
are merely shortsighted and profoundly
mistaken. There is no need to waste
energy in violent fighting against it,
because it is steadily and now indeed
rapidly crumbling by reason of its own
inherent defects. It is a psychological,
moral and political mistake even to be
angry against it. Instead, build something
better. The best material power of the
United States hides very grave innermost
weaknesses which will show themselves in
only a few more years. The United States
still has some reserve natural resources
which the people feel they can continue to
waste. India has none that she can afford
to raise. On balance, the virtues of
capitalism are outweighed by its faults.
India cannot afford to trust its future to
the way of capitalistic industrialism. A
small
amount
of
capitalistic
industrialism may be wise. A way to limit
it will be considered in the last two
chapters.
Reflection
Capitalism

and

Dialogue

(6):

Greggs discussion of capitalism from the past

may at least bring back into focus something which
has virtually disappeared for most of us in the
twenty- first century: the underlying form and
features of the market economy in which we have
become enclosed. For that is the most recent
embodiment of what he calls capitalism. For Gregg,
capitalism still appeared

as a choice or rather a series of choices about a way

In the light of these subsequent developments
of life. In that light its features could be enumerated
of capitalism, then, our first reaction may be to point
and its consequences surveyed and critiqued. Even
out how wrong Gregg was to speak of the suicidal
in his time, however it was growing almost beyond
character of capitalism. It was suicidal, he argued,
measure, driven by relentless developments of
because it was incapable of deep reform. Moreover,
science and technology and also by a series of
it was steadily and now indeed rapidly crumbling by
immediate successes in the immense development
reason of its own inherent defects. In retrospect, we
of power and the control of power (i.e., increased
may admit readily that capitalism has indeed proven
longevity, freedom from illnesses and illiteracy,
itself capable of reform both in the sense of complex
multiple improvements in material comforts). As
internal modifications and also in a moderation of its
we know all too well, that growth continued
social effects on people.The capitalism of our postunabated since Greggs time, easily vanquishing
modern consumer culture seems more humanized
all alternatives (among them communism),
(i.e., it coexists with regulatory laws and human
broadening and deepening into a global market
rights) and it has transformed itself into the
economy that has now completely transformed life
productive font of all that we feel we need. But
and ways of living the world over. Some have
does this transformation change the essential
pointed to the hyper-adaptivism of this later
structure and character of capitalism as Gregg
form of capitalism and others have called it a
defined it? We shall have to assess whether these
system without an outside.16 However dissatisfied
reformations reach to the level of the deep reform
we may be with various aspects of the life it has
of which Gregg was speaking (i.e., reform of
created, we now have great difficulty to gain a
fundamental principles) and thus whether his
perspective on that system as such.
determination of the suicidal
16
See https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Criticism_of_capitalism consulted March 4,2016.

character of capitalism has truly been left behind in

its new forms of humanization and sustainability. It
is important to realize that we have the possibility of
doing this, however, precisely because Gregg has posed
the question of capitalism as such again, and thereby
has suggested that there were and may still be
alternatives to it. By doing this he has also refocused
our eyes on its fundamental principles which have
often been obscured by its spectacular achievements.
In dialogue with Gregg we may see that the deeper
problem of capitalism cannot be addressed by such
ad hoc reforms and modifications to ensure the
survival of the system, but is rather a question about
whether the system is sustainable as suchgiven the
nature of the world and the human place in it. Should
human energy continue be put into reforming what
is essentially self destructive? That is the question
Gregg poses for us.
First let me address the ways in which
capitalism has been reformed and transformed since
Greggs analysis. Gregg is taking capitalist
industrialism as his main focus and using its 250
year unfolding in the United States as the prime
example of this system and its consequences. It is
clear that that industrialism which Gregg
experienced first hand has now passed through
several subsequent changes on its way to become
the capitalism of the global market economy. After
the war and the collapse of colonial structures, the
primary economic shift was guided by the
metaphor of development. Throughout the sixties
and seventies, development (along with
underdevelopment)
provided
a
face
and
justification for the continued exportation of
western technologies and economic structures to
the global south and this, in turn, warranted the
development of the material resources of those
countries. Oil in the Middle East was the primary
commodity to be so developed as the primary
staple for western economies but the development
of other staples (sugar, coffee, bananas, cooking oil,
etc) followed closely behind. The result was an
economic boom in the west along with a
westernization of segments of the rest of the
world. Both of these things, however, could only be
sustained

by an increased military presence and several proxy

wars in the developing countries (from Algeria to
Vietnam to Cuba and Central America). Thus
technologically sophisticated weaponry became the
most important economic byproduct of development.
This led in turn, to many more technological byproductsamong them, the Internet which led to
the next manifestation of Capitalism.
By the 1980s development was being
replaced by a new metaphor, globalization. This
metaphor obviously still implied that the western
model of economic development was the
undisputed goal but suggested that now the
expansion of the market would naturally
transform undeveloped countries by using their
cheap labour force and dispersing consumer
products among them. Along the way, the allure of
westernization in the forms of education, health
care, business and the technologies of
communication and entertainment was implanted
and flourished throughout the global south while
the exploitation of resources continued
unabated. Resistance to this westernization was
marginalized by these new forms of technological
colonization as the structures of traditional
cultures began to fall apart. But this resistance a
result re-emerged in the form of a new religious
extremism (in the Islamic world) or an indigenous
counterculture (in North and Latin America).
This global market economy is the currently
dominant new form of Capitalism. It has been
refocussed on producing goods and services for
mass consumption. It exploits developing and
global markets of consumers and cheap labour
rather than fixed industrial complexes and heavy
machinery. The heavy industry that remains is
often of a military (weaponry, jets etc) or paramilitary nature and has been re-conceived around
design criteria, specialized materials and digital
technologies. The social order itself was
transformed by the market in new ways. What
before were professions driven by skills, for
example, medicine and education have also now

become service industries populated by

professional technicians who employ sophisticated
equipment to provide monetized health care and
educational training. At the same time,
governments of nation states increasingly found
themselves transformed into partners with corporate
interests since this is the only way to sustain
tolerable levels of employment and consumer
needs. Their policy was most often reduced to
finding a way of sustaining the flow of goods to
and from the market to their consumers.
Technologies (in the form of devices) have
increasing become the personalized carriers of this
form of the economy, spreading and sustaining its
services, absorbing all previous forms of goods and
services into their sphere of communication and
interaction. In fact, it is difficult to think of any
area of postmodern life that has escaped this
technologized process of commodification and
monetizing. Meanwhile, behind the backdrop of
this intensified consumer culture replete with
every imaginable item, the process of resource
extraction (minerals, oil and power) has become a
desperate, global hunt for what remains and
requires ever more complex technologies of
extractionand waste disposal.
Capitalism in postmodern times, then, is still
very accurately described as the alliance of money,
science and technology. Its essential form is still
bound up with the process of a virtually unrestrained
and continual exploitation of natural resources of the
earth and its people. Consequently, it is still
intrinsically tied to methods of violence and coercion
where power becomes concentrated in fewer and
fewer hands. As a market economy it is still
reductive of all other human values and meanings by
virtue of its dynamism of commodification and
monetization. Finally, it still shows itself to have no
intrinsic principle of self-control or self-limitation.
What has changed is the manner in which and the
degree to which human beings are co-opted to
become participants in its system and structures.
Gregg anticipates this outcome with his very
insightful account of the urbanization caused by
capitalism, its emptiness
in
relation
to
traditional life and the

consequent boredom and dissatisfaction which leads

to a wide range of negative,escapist behaviours. The
gateway to this new form of capitalism was the
refashioning of the human being as consumer. And
this socialization of human beings under late
capitalism lead to an intensification of coercion and
submission to its systemic structures now in the form
of psychological manipulation of human desires.
This manipulation of desires evident in the
new form of capitalism shows itself throughout the
realm of consumer goods in the form of its elements
of style or brand marketing. As Baudrillard (The
System of Objects) has demonstrated at length
such style, which dominates and permeates the realm
of consumer products, is really an abstracted form of
signs, signs of human desires, projects, demands
and passions and all relationships. As signs all of
these abstract human realities can be rendered into
objects to be bought and consumed (an iPhone, a
Gucci shoe or a romantic vacation in Las Vegas)
(219). This new kind of consumption is never
ending because it is not based on human needs but
rather on the endlessness of our desires and fears.
Consumption becomes, thus, an all- important
ritual of social self-defi nition and selfidentification and the human being is reduced to a
consumer and collector of signs of affluence just as
culture is reduced to the pop culture of these empty
but profitable signs of meaning. Most recently, we
have moved into the newest phase of this culture of
consuming signsfor the digital identities that we
construct in the so-called social media are a pastiche
of images, values, opinions and experiences to which
we aspire, a virtual identity, as it were, that allows us
replace the fearful concrete realities of our existence
with a pleasurable set of desires. Far more effective
than gambling or alcohol but not without profit.
Along with this one may also identify the
deeper conversion of desires (and fears) into needs
which Ivan Illich has described (Needs). In this
process of deep socialization a wide range of human
desires are simply re-identified as needswhat no
one can really do withoutthe needs in turn can
then be met by various institutionalized forms of
service, for

example, the need for education (which supplants

the natural or familial learning process) and can
then only properly be fulfilled by a compulsory
national school system and its curriculae. The fact
that such education is in reality very partial,
uncritical toward political/ economic reality and
heavily laden with dominant values (of science and
technology and business) is obscured by the fact
that it meets the need that has been so defined.
The cycle is complete and we should feel satisfied,
even if there is no true satisfaction. Such educated
literacy looks good and is good as far as it goes, but
it does not go far for it is without an ethical
compass. Above all, it reproduces the human being
as consumer. Again, few areas of contemporary life
still exist outside the systemic reach of this kind of
new economic charter of the market.
Given this new form of capitalism as a system
without an outside, we will have a much greater
difficulty achieving any critical purchase on it as a
system that has been chosen. It is primarily the
given, that which must be accepted. We will also have
a more difficult time finding the way to a true ethical
choice within itsince the system with its
predetermined forms will often predetermine all our
possible forms of choice. Any degree of intellectual
dissent will be possible only as it is built upon some
practical dissent in forms of life and ways of living.
This is precisely the possibility of self-restraint and
self-limitation which both Gandhi and Gregg will
advocate as an ethical-political act.
I have already suggested that most of the
elements of Greggs critique of capitalism are still
valid for the capitalism of the global market. What
about his argument concerning its self-destructive or
suicidal character? Is that still valid? Is it still true
to say that there is no need to waste energy in
violent fighting against it and that it is a
psychological, moral and political mistake even to be
angry against it? Above all, is it still possible to
build something better?
Clearly the continued exploitation of earths
limited resources which Gregg identified as a suicidal
sign of capitalism has continued is now already past

its tipping point. The soil erosion, destruction of

forests, decreased water supply and squandering of
natural resources, which Gregg notes as endemic to
capitalism must now be seen as mere factors within
the greater global catastrophes of climate change,
species extinction and degradation of human habitat.
Precisely because Capitalism is naturally driven to
continual exploitation of such resources and also
because it has no principle of self-limitation, it is still
true to say, and perhaps truer, that capitalism is a
dreadful ecological mistake (54). No amount of
flexibility or technical know-how can avert the
complete exhaustion of resourcesand habitat if
we continue in this direction. And we know that. It
is undeniable, and suicidal. A similar situation exists
with regard to the inherent violence and militarism
endemic to the self-destructive character of capitalism.
Most western or westernized nations are riven by
violence, the violence of the competitive market, of
the competition for more and more limited resources,
of the rich against the poor in the form of a constant
repressive and structural violence legitimized by the
state against the underclasses, the minorities, the
outsiders in their midst. All of this internal violence
naturally expresses itself outward finally, in the
military violence wielded against other nations who
threaten our resources or hold out against our needs
of them. New forms of colonization and
exploitation of resources continue and expand. All
these forms of violence are endemic to the ethic of
capitalism and explain why militarism, weapons and
larger and larger weapons industries are everywhere
flourishing still. The cycle of this violence spawns
paramilitary police forces and high security prisons
and they, predictably, simply expand the scope of
violence, and make it the status quo.
In short, both signs of capitalisms suicidal
character remainits heedless consumption of
limited resources and its unbridled violence in
pursuit of those resources.There has indeed been a
rather extensive series of efforts to establish some
kind of limiting principle in the face of these
realities. The lengthy debates on universal human
rights and then later, in

the face the continuing poverty of millions in the

global south , the millennium principles, have been
one such effort. Another effort has been shaped around
developing a criterion of sustainability in the face of
the mounting environmental crisis. Both of these,
however, remain wistful afterthoughts which have had
very little actual limiting effect on the engine of
capitalism. It is incapable of deep reform as Gregg
suggested precisely because it is based on an
unlimited desire to produce, consume and profit. This
is the same as saying it is imbalanced as such.
One effort to reform and replace this engine of
capitalism was the communist/Marxist movement of
the last century. We can now turn to Greggs account
of it as an alternative to the capitalist system.
Chapter III. Communism
Why does Communism Appeal to
Some?
There are many reasons for the
strong appeal of Communism.
1. There is in it a clear and strong
realization of the evils done by
capitalism, contrasted with the
justice and fairness promised by
communism.
2. A sensitive and humble middle-class
person often has a sense of social
and personal guilt for having
enjoyed comforts and privileges at
the expense of weaker and poorer
people.
3. The communist interpretation of
history seems to give a sense of
scientific sureness and truth and
right.
4. The communist theory as a whole
apparently provides one with a
feeling of understanding reality,
human beings, what has happened
and is now happening in the world,
and ability to predict what will surely
happen in the future. The desire for
understanding and foresight with its
implied hope of ability to control life

is a deep and rightful hunger

among all people. Any system
that offers these elements is
strongly attractive.

5. To the peasants and city manual

workers Communism asserts that
the ancient wrongs can be righted,
and it promises a substantial
increase in the standard of living
and more justice.
6. To the unemployed, whether city
workers,
peasants
or
intelligentsia
Communism
promises continuous employment
and is a return of self-respect,
sense of human worth and dignity.
The hunger for those intangibles is
very deep, strong and permanent,
and accounts much for communist
zeal,
intensity,
bitterness
and
persistence.
7. The first Communist-controlled
country, Russia, made very rapid
progress in industrialization and
widespread education of its people,
so for countries which do not have
but greatly desire those things,
Communism might be the way to
obtain them.
8. Communism involves a revolt
against the past with its evils. It
has the thrill of a new adventure.

9. It provides three ideas that are

so full of meaning as to be
excitingthe idea that society is
more
important
than
the
individual, that ends are more
important than means, and that
environment is more important
than ideas.
10.
Joining
the
communist
party give one a feeling of
becoming a part of a supremely
important cause, of having a
definite and significant role to
play in society and in great
historical process, of feeling the
thrill of spiritual unity with ones
fellows and acting in accordance
with it. It provides for strenuous
action
and
exercise
of
courage,fortitude and daring. It
provides a common discipline
and sense of order and selfintegration.
11.
Joining
the communist
party promises to give the relief
and happiness of complete
commitment to a great cause,
free from the burden of having
to continue making

superficial choices. The burning of

bridges involved in it means that
one is free from the burdens of
freedom.
12.
Many people today are so
disgusted with the equivocations
and inconsistencies of organized
religion that they cannot bear to use
any words or phrases with even a
moral implication. Yet they have
plenty of humane impulses. Marxism
enables them to satisfy those
impulses but disguises them as
science and impersonal historical
processes, just as Marx himself did.
Evaluation of Communism
Now
let
us
try
to
evaluate
communism in detail. Its professed aims,
of decreasing poverty and exploitation
and creating universal social justice, are
superb. The means it proposes must now
be examined. We will first discuss
communist theory, then how it has worked
out in practice.
Philosophy
Capitalism grew up a bit at a time, by
helter- skelter opportunism. But socialism
and communism came out of theory as
worked out by Marx, Engels, Lenin and
Stalin. Their writings are undoubtedly
highly influential documents. To answer
our questions and make a wise choice we
must examine this theory. We cannot
understand communism or its power until
we also understand its underlying, closely
articulated
theory
or
doctrine
philosophic, historic, economic, political
and social.
Communism is a description of
human nature in the world. It is an
explanation of past history, of present
events and a positive prediction of the
future. It is a promise of control of nature
and of human events; also a promise of
human welfare and universal justice. How

far are its descriptions and explanations

true? To what extent has it kept its
promises? Since the peasants and most of
the city manual workers are inarticulate
and unorganized, no great social,
economic or political changes can take
place
without
educated
middle-class
initiative and leadership. It is

therefore important for such leaders to

examine the theory of communism very
carefully.
Communist Theory
Marxs entire theory rest upon
two points:
(1) his conception of the relation between
mind and matter; (2) what he called
dialectical materialism.
In regard to the first point, Marx and
Engels stated their theory of perception,
and on the basis of that theory they
argued that primary reality is matter, and
that mind is a byproduct or a resultant of
matter.
This
idea
is
known
as
philosophical materialism. From the idea
that matter produced mind he argued
that
human
tools
and
productive
apparatus were the cause of all other
human activities and that economic
forces determined all historical events.
Therefore
those
who
control
the
productive machinery control everything
else too.
Is is Scientific?

Marx believed that this particular

relationship of mind to matter is the
reason why we can have knowledge of the
material world, and hence why we can
have science.
Marx claimed that all of this theories
were scientific. His system is scientific in
manner in so far as it is a series of
deductions from a set of axioms or
assumptions.That is the case with all
science and mathematics the queen of the
sciences. That is one reason why his
system has appealed so widely to many
people. But his system is unscientific in
its basic assumptions, as we shall see,
and also highly unscientific in the appeal
to a dogmatic claim to be a final and
complete revolution and guide to truth. In
science there is no final truth.
Marxs and Lenins concept of matter
was based on Newtonss laws and ideas
of mass and on Euclidean geometry.
But modern physics has abandoned
Newtons concepts in favour of those of
Einstein, and Euclids geocentric no longer
gives an accurate picture of the operation
of the physical laws of the realm of either
the very large or the very small.

A system which claims to explain all

events must include all physical realms.
Marxist Theory of Perception
The theory of Marx and Engels
about perception was that our sense
perceptions give us an exact copy,
reflection or image of physical things and
objective reality, and also that these
things aw we see them actually exist
outside of us and independently of us.
Because our perceptions are exact copies
of things in the outside world, they said,
we know accurately the world of outer
reality. It actually is what it seems to be.
But more recent science and the
philosophy based on that recent science
tells
us
that
although
there
are
independent
outer
realities
which
stimulate our senses and initiate our
perceptions, it is impossible for us ever to
know exactly what those outer realities
are. Our perceptions of any particular
physical object or not copies or images or
reflections of such objects but are really
interpretations of the meaning of a
stimulus.
These
interpretations
are
determined, the demonstration shows,
almost entirely by two human intangibles:
our assumptions and our purposes. Sense
perceptions are not verified by what Lenin
called practice, but the probability of
their validity is tested by action. The result
of research on perception, then, gives
primary importance not to matter, but to
the mind which interprets our sensations.
Limits of the Senses
Our senses are not suffi ciently
accurate instruments to give us the
truth.
Unprovable
assumptions,
mathematics, logic, experiment and
observation are all necessary, and there is
no end to the quest. Our senses tell us for
example, that the sun goes around the
earth,
but
astronomy
in
the
mathematics
of
Copernicus,
Kepler,
Newton and Einstein tell us the contrary.

Classical physics upon which Marx, Engels,

and Lenin, relied holds true for only the
unaided senses. But when we aid the sense
by cameras, microscopes, fog chambers,
cyclotrons and other instruments, we come
into the realm of the nuclei

of atomsprotons, electrons, neutrons,

etc.,and there the laws of classical
physics no longer are valid.The forces
which control the emission of quanta of
energy from those particles are beyond
the realm of time.
The Modern Conception of Matter
Marx, Engels, Lenin and Stalin all
insisted on the overwhelming importance
of science and scientific method. If so,
Marxist theory must follow the findings
of modern science and its analysis of
matter.
Nuclear physics shows that so-called
matter, perceivable by the senses, is a
statistical concept, and abstraction, the
result of the probable behaviour of vast
numbers of the atoms, composed in turn
of electrons, protons and neutrons.
Electrons, protons and neutrons are
apparently
centers
of
energy
characterized by the presence or absence
of the charges of electricity and they
behave sometimes like particles and
sometimes
like
waves.
What
differentiates one element of a kind of

matter from another is the number and

arrangement or pattern of protons,
electrons and other nuclear particles in the
atoms of the respective elements.
The exact behaviour of these ultimate
particles or waves cannot be described by
words or explained by mechanical models
of any kind because the laws that
determine their action or demonstrably
beyond or outside of space and time as we
know them. This behaviour can be
described
only
by
complex
mathematical formula which do not have
in them components of space or time. Such
mathematics
which
enabled
the
manufacture of atom bombs, would have
censored Marxand Lenins theory as
idealistic and therefore invalid. Our senses
are too crude to give us a true or accurate
copy of so-called matter. Marx and Lenin
are simply mistaken and their theories are
no longer scientific.
Mind and Matter are both kinds of
Energy
One of the physical elements,
uranium, which we usually think of as
matter has been transformed

into energy as predicted by Einsteins

famous equation and demonstrated by the
atom bomb. Vice versa, energy has been
transformed, in the cyclotron, into matter.
Modern physiology and psychology has
shown that thought is accompanied by or
evidenced by currents of energies in the
brain and is also a mood and pattern of
energy, and apparently transmissible
through space. This pair of findings makes
it probable that mind and matter are not a
pair of contraries but only two different
aspects of fundamental reality. If so, this
casts doubt on Marxs and Lenins claim
that ultimate reality is matter. Ultimate
reality, instead of being described as
matter might just as well be described as
energy; which of our senses gives us a
copy or representation of energy as such?
Matter is not the source of Mind
It is true that in mind can be and
sometimes is greatly hampered or put out
of action by breakdowns of some part or
all of the human body, but that does not
prove that matter is superior to mind. Nor
does the apparent evolution of mind in
the gradual historical development of
organisms prove that mind was resultant
of matter. The physicist, E. Schrodinger
shows that what determines the form of
each new living organism is not the atoms
or molecules in the genes of the sperm
and ovum of the parents but the intangible
pattern
or
arrangement
of
those
molecules. In the life of an organism the
molecules that form its tissues are
constantly coming in and going out of the
organism: it is the intangible patterns or
arrangement of those molecules in the cell
that begin and keeps that organism in the
form peculiar to its species. It is not matter
which controls the structure of the living
body but an intangible pattern. Similarly, it
is not protons or electrons which make
lead, for example, different from copper,
but the number and pattern
of the
electrons and protons in the atoms of each
metal. The pattern is intangible it is not

perceived by the unaided senses. Only the

mind can grasp it.
All of these considerations throw grave
doubt on the validity of philosophical
materialism, the doctrine that the primary
reality is matter, and that

mind is a byproduct and the resultant of

matter. If matter is an outmoded
abstraction, that is, an old- fashioned
mental product, how can it be the source
of mind? Personally I think that this
Marxist doctrine cannot stand the test of
facts, science or logic.
Historical
Materialism

and

Dialectical

By postulating the primacy of

matter, Marx arrived at (but did not
prove) his theory that environment is
superior to ideas and hence that all
changes in human history are the result
of changes in the modes or instruments
of economic production. But he seems to
have overlooked the fact that it was
human thinking that invented new tools
and machines and hence altered the
means of production. Changes
in
economic production though always
very important, are not the sole or
ultimate or even always the most
important factor in human history. There
is no one factor that is always ultimate
or most important. Life and the world are
too complex and changing to permit that
state of affairs.

Beyond that materialism, Marx

following Hegel stated that all change in
thought proceeds by a dialectic process.
That is, first there is a statement; then a
contradictory statement; then a struggle
between the two ideas out of which
evolves a third statement which allegedly
discards the mistakes of both the
preceding ideas and embodies their
respective truths. This third statement
is said to be an improvement on both
prior statements. These three stages
Hegel called thesis, antithesis and
synthesis. As soon as a synthesis is
attained, it becomes a new thesis, and the
process is repeated again and goes on
endlessly. Marx adopted this intellectual
process as being superior to the older
forms of logic. He also claimed that all
human affairs and history also proceed by
the same process. He called this
dialectical materialism, and stated that it
was the fundamental law of history. In his
thinking dialectical materialism rests upon
and is indissolubly linked with
philosophical materialism.
This theory that all history is a
dialectical process led to the idea that all
change is progress and that

progress is inevitable. Also implied that all

conflict, including violence, is good. Also,
of course, that all change induced by
Communists is good.
Marx and Engels, Lenin and Stalin all
thought
then
once
you
accept
philosophical materialism, the truth of
dialectical
materialism
is
perfectly
obvious. Rather, the connection is only
wishful thinking. There is no logical
connection and one
is not a valid
deduction from the other.
As Bertrand Russell pointed out,
philosophical materialism and dialectical
materialism
and
are
not
mutually
dependent or necessarily related at all.
Each is logically irrelevant to the other. If
philosophical materialism were true, that
would not prove that economic causes are
fundamental in politics. In any historical
event the decisive factor might be, for
example climate, or geography, all of
them materialistic but not economic.
Behind the operation of economic causes
lie the desires of men and women for
possession and power; yet it might be
possible to explain fully those desires
mostly not in materialistic terms but in
intellectual and emotional terms. Not all
desires are biological in origin or purpose.
They were yet other doubts as to the
validity of dialectical materialism. Its
definition of contraries is ambiguous,
varying, fuzzy and sometimes entirely
lacking. Marx and his followers often
assert that certain instances are contrary
to each other when really theyre only
different. They frequently assert that what
is merely change is really progress. A
given synthesis may, in relation to a thesis
or antithesis be a change but not
necessarily progress. Progress is a term
that is not scientific; it is moralistic. It
implies more than mere accumulation.
Some
social
changes
are
mere
compromises and not true synthesis at all.
No conflict is truly solved at its original

level. For real solution, it must be lifted to

a higher level of meaning.
Dialectical materialism as applied to
history assumes that change is constant
and never-ending. If so, and if historical
processes were at some time to bring us
to a classless society, would that be the

end of history? Would change cease to

operate? Would that condition be a static
heav
Historical materialism is a form of
determinism based on science as it
supporters say. But modern science has
abandoned rigid determinism. Scientific
laws are no longer regarded as fixed and
immutable; theyre only statements of
strong probability. At best, then, the
Marxist theory could only be an estimate
of historical possibilities. There is no
inevitability in historical developments.
The Claims of Theory and Logic
Marxists often feel that their theory
of history is profound and true. The
seeming
but
illusory
depth
and
inclusiveness of the theory promises to
satisfy their hunger for understanding in
control of events, and so is immensely
attractive. It convinces them that what
the theory says will happen, must
happen. It makes them utterly sure of
themselves and their judgments and
ideas. They become dogmatically sure

that theyre always wholy right and that

everyone else who does not accept their
doctrine is utter and wickedly wrong. I
believe this is a profound mistake. Marx
did a great service to the study of history
by showing, not by theory, but by careful
examination and explanation of events,
that economic forces play an important
role in the processes of history. But he
overstated his case and made a
considerable number of deductions that
are incorrect. If neither philosophical
materialism nor historical materialism is
true and if they are not connected then
communism does not give a wholly valid
interpretation of history or afford a sound
basis for predicting the future.
Marx assumes that by logic and
reasoning we can come to the whole of
reality. But he overlooks the fact that not
only in mathematics but in all realms the
mind makes and cannot help making
assumptions which cannot be proven by
logic or signs to be either true or false.
These assumptions are
the beginning
points of all our thinking. They are prelogical and

are arrived at by intuition. Even Marx

assumed, for instance, that he existed, but
he could not have proven by his ten
senses, by logic or scientific instrument
that this inner intangible self which
thought and felt and hoped and feared
really existed . Yet Marx certainly believed
his own existence to be real. Hence, even
Marxist reasoning does not present us with
a complete, perfect and indubitable
picture of reality.
The Assumptions of Communism
Communism, like Capitalism, makes
certain assumptions which it has not
proven and cannot prove. These are
matters of faith. Some of them are:
1. That the temporal processes of
history
repeats
the
logical
development of the dialectic.
2. That dialectical material processes
always results in progress.
3. That human beings always act solely
out of their class interests.
4. That a classless society will ultimately
be achieved by the Communist Party.
5. That when the classless society is
established the state will wither away
and then violence will cease.
(My own assumption is that the state
will not wither away until after humankind
has abandoned violence as a way of
settling conflicts.)
Since all human beings have their
assumption and therefore have to live
partly by faith, and the validity of
assumptions cannot be proved by logic or
force of arms, the Communists and Marxist
can neither assume that their assumptions
are more valid than those of other people
nor can they change human temperament
or intuition and cause all assumptions to
be the same. Other people must permit
Marxists to make their assumptions, and

they must permit other people to make

different assumptions. Tolerance is an
honest and scientific recognition of the
nature of assumptions and of people.

Is the Society or the Individual

more important?
Both communists and socialists
insist that society is more important than
the individual, and since the state or the
government is now usually the largest
organization, the practical form of this
belief is that the state is more important
than the individual. This riddle he
becomes worship of the state. As a
corollary of this idea, Marxists usually
allege
that
capitalism
exults
the
individual over society, and that this
believe is false and evil.
The question as to the relative
importance of the society or the
individual is in part allied to the other
biological question as to which is more
influential: environment or heredity. As
to that, competent biologists state the
ratio as probably about 50/50. No sensible
person tries to deny the importance of
either element. If either is overstressed,
the results produce trouble.
The question whether society or the
individual is more important reminds me

a little bit of the foolish classical question,

which came first the hen or the egg?
Nobody has ever seen or heard of only a
single individual without ever any family
or group around them. Society is made up
of individuals. Each is necessary to the
other; neither has ever existed without the
other. Probably the wisest way to handle
the problem is to follow the example of the
physicist in their theory of the true nature
of light. Under some circumstances light
behaves as if it were waves of energy;
under other circumstances it behaves as
if it were particles of energy. So the
physicists have ceased to insist that light
must be either waves or particles; it is
both or either according to how you look
at it or use it on a particular occasion. So
sometimes the individual will rightly be
considered more important; at another
time or for another purpose it will be more
sound and wise to consider society more
important. In the conduct of civilization
both theories will be used, each for its
appropriate occasion or purpose. For
example, in regard to initiative in both
thought and action, the individual seems
more important; for

purposes of consent and community,

society is more important.
Finally, ideas originate in the minds of
individuals and are propagated by
individuals. Almost all modern orthodoxies
in politics, economics, art, religion and
other realms were originally heresies of
individuals.
Individuals
are
living
organisms and are more completely,
closely and insensitively integrated than
society. That is one important reason for
the superior initiative and thinking power
of the individual.
I do not mean to imply that any
assembly of human behaviour or any large
theory of human society is free from
logical inconsistencies, or that the
presence of logical inconsistencies is
necessarily a valid reason for discarding
such a mode of life or such a theory of
society. But some inconsistencies may be
its very weakness, and all inconsistencies
should at least be a reason for curbing
dogmatism and fanaticism. All social
theory must be held tentatively and
experimentally.
Communism in Practice
So much for the theory of
Communism. Let us now see how it has
worked out in practice.
Just as we tried to understand the
defects as well as the virtues of capitalism,
we must also analyze communism with
equal thoroughness. We noted nine
characteristics of Capitalism: 1) and
emphasis on private property and
competition, 2) increasing technology
and industrialism. 3) ever increasing
division and specialization of labour, 4)
everincreasing
commerce,
5)
urbanization, 6) money valuation and
money control of most things and
activities, 7) reliance on money-profit
motive as the surest and best stimulus to
action, 8) extensive use of organized
violence in the form of police, armies,

navies and air forces, 9) systems of land

distribution and tenure, land taxation and
money interest that strongly favour
industry
and
commerce
as
against
agriculture, and favour the existing legal
and social system, and hence tend to
promote poverty and insecurity among

farmers and peasants and social erosion

and loss of soil fertility.
Communism in practice retains all of
these except private property. It may be
fairly said that the abolition of private
party is the only one of the original aims
of communism that has been fully
realized in Russia. Communism uses
violence and fear as a means of control of
society more constantly and openly than
does capitalism. Communism stresses
competition and money profit motive less
than does capitalism but it still uses
them. One may say, of course that what
is now called communism is only
socialism, and that communism will be
attained only at some time in the
indefi nite future. But since these
factors of competition and money profit
motive are now actually in operation in
Russia,
China,
Poland,
Hungary,
Bulgaria, East Germany, Yugoslavia
and Czechoslovakia, we may expect
them to produce their usual results. Both
communism
and
capitalism
are
materialistic. As industrialism develops
further in Russia I would expect it to
produce the same thirteen harmful results

described in the chapter on capitalism, for

communist
industrialism
is
like
industrialism under Capitalism in having
no principle of limitation or self-restraint.
Similarity of Communism and
Capitalism
It appears, then, that communism
and capitalism and practice are far more
similar than many people realize, and
might therefore be expected to produce
much the same results. Soviet experience
has proven that an industrial society can
exist without private property in the
means of production. But the shift of
property ownership from private hands to
the state would probably result in state
capitalism. Some critics of the present
Russian regime believe that the existing
system there is in fact only state
capitalism. Of course with the means of
production entirely in the hands of the
state, the results would be different from
those of private capitalism. However one
may question whether the long-term
results of state capitalism would be
morally superior or produce greater total
justice that exist now
in capitalist

countries. Undoubtedly the initial intent

would
be for universal and equitable
sharing of production, to each according
to his needs. And in fact, in Russia the
workers have unemployment, sickness
and disability benefits on the scale never
before reached in any other country. There
are said to be no disabilities on the
grounds of sex, race, or place of birth.
Education is universal. There has been a
great humanization of social life. There
has been a slight rise in the food but
according
to
many
reports
little
improvement in the housing conditions of
the masses. There is however still great
poverty, produced probably to a large
degree by the diversion of productive
efforts into armaments.
Danger of the Concentration of
Power
But historical experience indicates
probable trouble from the poisonous and
corrupting effect of the concentration of
power into the hands of a bureaucracy or
still more into the hands of a small
central executive committee of the
communist party. Since communists so
emphasize the importance of history, they
and those who are attracted to them,
should remember the ages of evidence
for the conclusion that power tends to
corrupt those who wield it. Also I fear the
results of the rigid dogma. Again, I fear
that the uniformity of thought enforced by
communism will eventually severely
limit all creativeness in the realms of art,
literature and science.
Contrary to the professed ideal of a
classless society, there is already in Russia
a social and political hierarchy in the new
class of managers and technicians. Also
there is a great differences in and financial
pay, the managers receiving much more
than the rank-and- file.
Economic Exploitation

Whether, on balance, there has been

in Russia a total lessening of economic
exploitation of the workers, as compared
with capitalism, is difficult to say. There are
no objective criteria by which exploitation
can be accurately measured. If there is
exploitation and Russia, it is done by the
state. And

for purposes of the valuation and choice,

one may want to put into the skills such
other items as self- reliance, initiative,
freedom of speech, of thought, of the
press, of religion, of association, of
coercion. And how do economic freedom
and political coercion or vice versa, or
intellectual coercion and economic
freedom, or any other combination of
such factors balance each other off?
Ones choices, if one has a choice, are
governed not by objective criteria but by
subjective and differing
evaluations,
assumptions and purposes.
In the course of time I would expect
the results of such concentration of
power to wipe out entirely any benefits of
the change of ownership from private
hands to the state. Under such
conditions, the state would I think cease
to represent truly the needs and hopes
of the mass of people. That is a lesson of
history. Both communism and complete
socialism would, I think, weeaken
initiative, self-reliance, imagination and
intellectual freedom of the individual, and
hence the adaptability of that society to
changes.

Violence against the People

The
dogmatism,
zeal
and
impatience of communism has produced
immense pressure for swift change.
Because human habits of thought and
action have always been slow to change,
but have their own organic rate of
development,
the
hurry
of
the
communists has resulted in vast civil
coercion and violence in every country
which has come under their control. The
reluctance to change has not been merely
due to deliberate nefarious opposition by
reactionary classes, even though we admit
that they want to retain power. Most of it is
due just to the inertia of human nature
and tradition of any sort. Part of the
slowness is because of the deep need of
society for order, together with the
slowness of people to recognize and trust
a proposal for a new kind of order. People
want to move only one step at a time and
that only a little step, waiting then to see
the results before taking another step.
It is possible that many communists
are willing to use violence not because
their goal requires it but

because their view of human nature is too

small and does not trust it nor recognize its
finer potentialities.
All of this civil violence in Russia has
caused extreme suffering. How do we
know that the results are going to be
worth the price? The answer to this
question has not yet been proven valid by
history; it is sheer prophecy.
Communism and the Seven Great
Dangers
Recalling the seven dangers outlined
at the beginning, it could be said that
Communism is perhaps in a better
position than is capitalism to handle the
fi rst,
namely
soil
erosion
plus
overpopulation.
But
Marxists
like
Capitalists are fascinated by the idea that
man is lord and master of Nature. Like the
capitalists, therefore, the communists will
probably make great ecological mistakes
whose consequences may take many
years to show up as mistakes. Communism
has not yet tackled the problem of overpopulation, though there are some birth
control clinics. Russian communism has
perhaps made the distribution of money
and wealth less grossly unfair than it is in
capitalist countries, but it has officially
abandoned earlier promises in that
respect. In Russia, power operates less
through money and more through politics
and state coercion and I see nothing to
prevent the corruption of power from
eventually wiping out all gains in this
respect.
In regard to violence there is
undoubtedly more toward its own people
in Soviet Russia, for example, than in the
United States. Both engaged in World War
II. Both are threatening another war , but
of the two I would say that the United
States is the more belligerent in fact if
not in manner. Fortunately the atom
bomb seems to deter both countries from
war against each other. As yet there are no
no concentration camps and open slave

labor in the United States as in Russia. The

US government has not yet deliberately
starved millions of farmers or indeed any.
The pressure of communism to make
profound social and economic changes
rapidly, leads inevitably to coercion and
violence. But capitalism

has also been guilty of violence especially

against the coloured races and nations.
The votaries of communism worship
great size of organization as much as do
the capitalists. Communism officially
sneers at the idea that means should
harmonize with the ends desired.
Communist Morality
Communist morality is in a class by
itself and not at all related to the moral
principles recognized in the world now
and long before there was capitalism and
industrialism. Morality is what serves to
destroy the old exploiting society and to
unite all the toilers around
the
proletariat that
is creating the new
communist society, as Lenin said. For
us, morality is subordinated completely
to the interests of the class struggle of
the proletariat.
This destruction of the validity of
promises and statements would seem to
me to destroy human trust and willing cooperation, both of which are necessary to
an enduring society. It would result in an

endless intrigue, insecurity, fear and very

dangerous struggles for power within the
government. It is a complete negation of
all Indian culture and of the teaching of
Buddha and Gandhi.
But harsh things can also be said of
capitalism. Capitalist governments and
peoples as a whole have used violence
and
deceit, broken their promises
hundreds of times, exploited the weaker
peoples as long as possible,have preached
democracy and Christianity but practiced
toward other races autocracy, tyranny and
considerable cruelty and flavoured it all
with contempt or condescension.
The fact is that power tends to
corrupt both Capitalists and communists.
All human beings are subject to the poison
of power.
As for faith in spiritual unity,
communism calls religion the opium of
the people. Its conception of history is
materialist. It aims to render all religious
institutions subservient to itself and to
undermine or destroy belief in the spirit.

Marxism plus the ideas of Lenin and

Stalin is certainly a philosophy of life and
the universe. It purports to explain all life
and human nature and the processes of
history, just as many religions do. It is a
worldview. That is one reason why it
attracts so many people, especially those
who
have
given
up
the
older
religions.Communism is to its believers a
religion. It may be called a secular religion
without any belief in an intangible or
spiritual unity. I think its assumptions are
no so deep and its ritual perhaps not yet
so effective as that of the older religions.
While communism might perhaps be
able to deal with the first of the great
dangers that confront India, it seems
unable to deal with the others much better
than
capitalism.
Like
capitalism,
communism has so self-limiting principle.
Its
additional
dangers
seem
to
counterbalance
its
advantages.
Communism
is
not
sufficiently
revolutionary to solve the problems of the
modern world. Compared to prior systems,
it has created national societies with a
different flavour but not a different
essence.
Communism, Industrialization, the
Land and the Peasants
In Russia the communists came into
power on wave of peasant discontent,
after promising to give land to the
peasants.They
did
dispossess
the
landlords and gave the peasants the
land.Then after they were secure in power
they took the land away from the peasants
by force and imposed collective farming.
This was in accordance with Marxist
theory. Both Marx and Lenin despised
small-scale organization and peasant
ways of living and were sure that farming
must be industrialized. Marx wrote of the
idiocy of rural life. City mentality such
as theirs cannot understand that the soil
is an assemblage of living organisms and
that
living
creatures
cannot
be

successfully managed by mechanized

processes and machines. Soil so treated
deteriorates and will eventually fail to
produce good food in adequate amounts.
Consequently there was a severe struggle
over this and the government deliberately
starved to death about two million of
the more prosperous

peasants before the new policy of

collectivization was established.
It is true that Communism in
Russia has industrialized that country
with astonishing speed, and seems to be
doing likewise in China. But because most
of the development has been in heavy
industry which does not immediately
help the ultimate consumers, the
benefits to the great mass of people in
terms of increased food, clothing and
housing have been relatively slight. The
benefits to the masses have been chiefly
in terms of better medical care, sickness,
security
against
unemployment,
education and other social services. But
the present benefits to the masses have
been attained at a cost of monstrous
cruelty, numerous severe production
failures especially in agriculture, vast
slave labour, drains and tensions which
threaten the whole economy, and the loss
of moral prestige among the people of
other nations.There will be other costs to
be paid in the future.
Would Communism bring about
Rapid Industrialization in India?

Those who are not in power in India

want to industrialize the country in a hurry.
That is understandable. Would the
adoption of communism, despite its faults,
be the best way to accomplish this?
The West took 250 years or more
to industrialize; Russia did most of it in
about 40 years. The reason for the
slowness in the west was not capitalism
but because machines and processes had
to be invented and science had first to
advance. Russia could do it rapidly largely
because she took over the machines and
processes that had already been invented
and developed with the same science.
Another
essential
factor
in
industrialization that takes time is the
education and training of scientists and
engineers, chemists and technicians. I
think it highly probable that India now
has
far
more
trained
scientists,
engineers and chemists than Russia had
when
she
began
high
pressured
industrialization in 1917. For these reasons
I think that India can make a speedy
industrialization
without
adopting
communism.

I think India can attain most of the

desired benefits at the same speed with
far less suffering, financial expense and
social disruption. Already in the first nine
years of her independence India has
developed the will and power to overcome
indolence and obstructive custom. She has
made great qualitative advances in
education. She has taken some steps to
reform land laws and actual land
ownership. India has shown the ability to
mobilize society, especially her younger
people for constructive tasks. There have
been plenty of failures and faults, ad the
pace, to many, does not seems fast
enough, but those defects occur in any
system of society.
The Indian people, by staying on the
path marked out by Gandhi, will, I think,
develop greater self-respect and command
greater respect from all other peoples
than if she were to adopt either undiluted
capitalism or communism.
Evaluation of Communism
History since 1917 has shown that
communism in Russia is, at least up to
1957, is a viable political and economic
system. But the fact that it proved viable
in Russia where the population had not
caught up with food production, where
forest reserve were so great and where
they had always been harsh autocratic
rule would not prove that the system
would be permanently viable elsewhere.
In
certain
directions
as
I
noted,
communism has made great advances. In
other directions, such as large-scale
coercion and violence against its own
people it has gone dreadfully backward.
In some respects it is no better and no
worse than capitalism. Both capitalism
and communism assume that the
production and consumption of material
things is the most important aim of life
and of civilization. Whether communism
can endure as long as capitalism has
endured, nobody can say.

The similarities of communism to

capitalism are so great that I think it is as
great a danger to the continuance of
civilization and culture as capitalism is.
From a long-range view of the human race
and

human culture, both capitalism and

communism seem to be vast mistakes.
Therefore I think that an intelligent
Indian, if faced by a choice between the
two, would wisely reject bothfor
there are alternatives.
Note. Since the treatment of Socialism is
very brief and much the same as the account of
Communism it is best to reflection and dialogue
on them together.
Chapter IV: Socialism
The theoretical distinction between
communism and socialism is not clear
cut. Both are chiefly concerned with
politics, economics and social process.
They were worked out by the thinking of
many Europeans, but the clearest and
most thorough expression of the doctrine
was first in the writings of Marx and
Engels.
The common understanding of the
difference is that communists believe that
violence must be used in a social
revolution, and that deceit and treachery
and further large-scale violence by the

revolutionary government are not only

permissible but inevitable and necessary.
Socialists on the hand, believe that
fundamental social and economic changes
can and should be made by peaceful
persuasion. The prime aim of both is the
establishment of a classless society and
for the socialists the primary means is the
peaceful transfer of ownership of the
means of production to the state.
Gandhi also believed that whatever
large industries are necessary they should
be owned and operated by the state not
for private profit but for the benefit of all
the people. Both Gandhi and Marx were
deeply moved by the injustice and
suffering of the poor. Marx reacted with
indignation, anger and hatred of those in
power. Gandhi reacted with compassion
and love of all people. Marx was an angry
man; Gandhi was a loving man. Marx
advocated violence to right the wrongs;
Gandhi
advocated
and
practised
nonviolent
resistance
and
loving
persuasion. Gandhi accomplished more in
his lifetime, I think, than Marx did in his.
And I think the fruit of Gandhis

ideas and practice will in the future be

greater and of more
blessing to
humankind than
the fruit of Marxs
thinking.
In so far as socialism means largescale, indeed nationwide organization of
resources and means of production, I fear
the tendency of corrupting effects of such
concentration of power, and the blighting
wastes of bureaucracymore people
riding on the backs of the poor. And while I
realize the necessity of planning if largescale industry is to be developed and
operated by the state, nevertheless the
crowding of life into a uniform mould
designed only by a a few men at the top
can be stifling to the human mind and
spirit.
Wise Applications of

Socialism

The items to which state ownership,

management or control could wisely be
applied are:
1. Conservation and control of all water
supplies and sources.
2. Supervision of management of forests
and forest industries.
3. Conservation of soil
4. Arboriculture
5. Railroads
6. Roads
7. Energy management.
8. Telegraph,
systems.

telephone

and

postal

9. Measures pertaining to public health.

Most of the subjects for state
ownership and control are matters that
are,
by
their
very
nature,
monopolistic.They cannot be efficiently
handled except on a very large scale. It is
true that in the United States, railroads,
telephones, coal and petroleum, electric

power generation are owned and operated

by private companies, and operation is
done with efficiency but often at great
social cost. The private

fortunes that are made at the expense of

two primary characteristics of communism are 1) its
the public are scandalous. Just because it
idealistic vision of social justice as a goal that can
is possible to have technically efficient
be achieved and
private monopolies is not a good reason 2) its confidence in a true scientific understanding of
for India to adopt them.
human history that is leading toward a better future.
Communism, in both senses, is a theory, a different
Dialogue
and
Reflection
(7):
way of looking at and explaining what has and will
Communism and Socialism
happen in human historyit is a theoretical
The appearance and rise to prominence of
certainty: social justice can be achievedit is
communism on the world stage is something that
inevitable. Gregg will spend a great deal of time
requires detailed and clear explanation as Gregg
analyzing the theory behind these claims, the
recognizes. In our time, the same thing must be said
philosophical viewpoint of communism.
of its dramatic and almost complete disappearance.
The philosophy of communism is
In both cases, there may be more involved than meets
materialisticbut it is materialistic in a way that
the eyeor, was suggested by the propagandists of
overturns or reverses the essential materialism of the
the time.
capitalist position. As he notes there are three key
Gregg begins by trying to explain the appeal
ideas that reflect this reversal: the priority of the social
and attraction of communism as a historical
over the individual; the priority of ends over means;
movement and his first insight is that it is primarily
and the priority of material conditions (the
a reaction to Capitalism. It is a reaction to the
environment) over ideas or theory. Capitalism is in
inherent injustices of capitalism; it is also a
fact just the oppositethe elevation of the individual,
reaction the indifference (laissez-faire) toward the
the primary
future that characterizes Capitalism. Thus the

focus on means/technique and the belief that ideas

(innovations) can reshape material reality. Thus,
as Gregg will note, capitalism and communism are
really mirror images of each other, both arising
from the same narrow materialistic assumptions
about the world and human beings. He not only
wants to show the inadequacy of these political
systems, he also wants to trace this back to the fact
that they both make inadequate, narrow,
materialistic assumptions about reality.
Gregg begins by analyzing the essential claims
of communism in relation to its own materialistic
assumptions. For example, he notes that its theory
claims to be a total scientific and systemic
explanation of everything. So Gregg judges that claim
against the materialist assumption in the Marxist
theory of perceptionnamely, that we perceive
matter objectively as it truly is.
Clearly this is not the case, Gregg insists, for
even in common sense terms there are always
elements of interpretation in our perceptions and
these are subjective and variable. It also not the case,
however, when set in the context of modern science
where human perception has been radically reshaped
by technology. In fact, modern science has radically
revised the classical understanding of matter to reflect
the fact that it is far more complex than what can be
perceived by the senses. One consequence of that, is
that matter cannot be the source of the reality of mind
in any simplistic causal sense; for consciousness and
thought and not materialistic products but another
aspect of a very complex reality. Modern science has
abandoned static conceptions of matter by
recognizing matter as an atomic and sub-atomic
pattern, and so Marxist materialism is simply an
not accurate assumption about material reality any
longer. It is certainly not adequate to form a theory
capable of explaining all of reality.
The same is true about the Marxist
assumptions about history, namely: 1) that is it is
shaped by the material forces of production and 2)
that it is an inevitable
dialectical
process
(thesis antithesis-

synthesis). As Gregg notes these assumptions lead to

a further series of false claims that 1) all change is
progress and 2) that since progress is inevitable, any
means are justified, and finally 3) that the individual
is expendable in the creation of the classless society.
All of this amounts to denying the force of human
individuality in history and therefore denying the role
ethical choice and responsibility in history. It makes a
neat and tidy theory of progress of course, but only
by using an extremely narrow and therefore
dangerous focus.
What Greggs analysis clarifies, then, is the
deep-seated contrast between such a progressive
materialist view of human history (essentially shared
by both communism and capitalism) on the one hand,
and the ethical-political view of Gandhi where true
progress begins in individual resolve and ripples
outward from there toward a transformed social order.
It is important to see the drift of his underlying
argument. No amount of (materialistic) technological
progress and no amount of (materialistic) structural
re-alignment of social forces is able to achieve human
well-being or social justice. When the individual and
the reality of ethical choice and responsibility are
bracketed out of the equation, as they are in such
materialism, what remains are simply abstract
forces, the forces of the market or the forces of
progress. This apparent objectivity is built on false
assumption and so yields a completely partial and
inadequate view of reality. Trying to make such
theories (as communism or capitalism) work means
enforcing a continuing denial of the value and
significance of the individual, the ethical, and the
spiritual. That can only be done with violence and
coercion. Its consequences can only be catastrophic
for the earth and for human beings.
In this sense, although the analysis of Marxism
is now rather dated, the analysis of the materialism
behind italong with its denial of the individual and
its intrinsic violenceis still very relevant to our
situation. Greggs comments on the morality of
communism and that of capitalism identifies the way
in which the corruption of power thrives in both
systems because both are based on the same essential

lie: the production and consumption of material

things is the most important aim of human life and
civilization.
There has been a considerable softening and
humanizing of both capitalism and communism
since Greggs analysis and certainly the cold war
between them has dissolved. In a certain way, as I
noted, both strident political versions of this
materialism have disappeared from view or at least
receded into the background. Socialism continues
to carry the banner of an ideal of social justice and
in many concrete ways it has had an impact on
capitalism from within, especially in Europe. And
yet as recent eventse.g., the so-called
immigration crisishave shown, a deep current of
xenophobia and violent assertion of the rights to
material possession (the fruits of capitalism) is just
beneath the surface in the socialized west. It is
probably more accurate to say, then, that the
problem of an underlying materialism and its false
assumptions has in fact been growing and
becoming much stronger, much more deeply
embedded in individuals and the social order all
along. The materialistic claims continue to be
asserted both socially and through the unbridled
power of science and technologywithout the
dressing of a political theory. The west, the
industrialized world, the world where the power of
science and technology dominate, continues to
dominate, to exploit, to employ violence within and
without to defend itself, to maintain its hold on
power. Even as it becomes a fortress attempting
exclude the dispossessed of the world it continues
to attract and allure those who wish to be inside its
walls. The allure of this materialism for human
beings should never be underestimated.
The relation between the individualas an
ethical, autonomous and responsible beingand the
state has not been harmoniously balanced or resolved
in either of these modern political systems. In fact it
has been denied and exacerbated in ways that sacrifice
the individual for abstract ideas like progress or
enslave them in the webs of materialism . In contrast,
we shall see that the Gandhian proposal takes a

radically different
revolutionary but

approach,

and

indeed

is

in a different way: for it suggests that natural and

organic context in which the individual can thrive is
primarily a local community or social group with
common intentions. In the drive to centralize, to
urbanize and to expand technologically, all forms of
modern politics turned away from the traditional
communities and indeed, undermined them. Yet,
Gandhi realized, such communities provide a
bulwark against the powers of the nation state and
also the market economy and can preserve the
autonomy of the individuals ethical life. In
traditional societies like the India of the day, the
archetype of that community was the village. For
all its flaws of narrowness, casteism and patriarchy,
to Gandhi it was still a more amenable form for
individual well-being and also held out the
possibility of a truly ethical social-political life.
As we turn now to examine, first the account
of the Indian Governments Programme and then
The Gandhian Programme in Greggs book, we shall
see that the primary issue shifts toward finding a
local, communitarian balance point within the
modern nation state. This also involves a shift

away from and a decentralizing of the market

economy which has been made so key to modern
political life. It is still a factor in the weighing of
political systems but it is not the only or even the
central one. This underlines the fact that we are also
leaving the confines of materialism and turning in a
different philosophical direction.
Chapter
V/VI
The
Governments Programme

Indian

We are not starting with a clean slate.

There is now in 1957 in India a
considerable
degree
of
capitalist
industrialism already established, strongly
entrenched and growing. There is also a
large sector of governmentally created
and owned, operated or controlled and
supervised industry, transportation, dams,
electrical power plants, irrigation works
and other projects in operation and being
planned. Before we take up Gandhis
programme,
let
us
consider
the
programme of the Indian government. It
is an interesting mixture of capitalism,
socialism, and a part

of Gandhis programme. It is a strong and

courageous effort.

transportation, comforts and

conveniences of the people;

This programme can be summarized

as follows:

e) Provide goods for export to pay

for
imports
of
food
and
machinery from other countries.

1. Raise
means of

agricultural

a) big
dams
works;

production
and

by

irrigation

b) and also using tractors and

other
heavy
agricultural
machinery
wherever
possible;
c) increasing
fertilizers;

use

of

chemical

d) better seed selection;

e) Promoting crop rotation;
f) Promoting composting;
g) Erosion control;
h) Better cattle breeding
feeding and improved
supply;

and
mil

i) Reform of land tenure, land

distribution and and land
taxation by legislation.
2. Large scale
order to:

industrialization

in

a) Relieve rural unemployment

and
underemployment
by
attracting people from villages
to factories and mills, and thus
reduce
the
pressure
of
population on the land;
b) Provide
employment
educated youth;

for

c) Increase the purchasing power

of the masses;
d) Increase
clothing,

the
available
housing,
food,

3. Develop
Hydro-electric
power
industry, railways and lighting.

for

4. Import what food is needed, over and

above Indias own food production.
5. Promote birth control or family planning
to help relieve the pressure of people on
the land and make undernourishment
disappear.
6. Improve
care.

sanitation

and

medical

(In the following section there is a detailed

analysis of the status of Indias development under
the government program. I will provide only brief
excerpts of that and concentrate on the two
arguments Gregg makes in this section: 1)
technology and progress and 2) industrialization.
A dialogue will follow at the end.)
Big dams have helped irrigation
problems but risk increasing soil erosion.
As is well known, Gandhi was chiefly
interested in relieving the poverty of the
peasants. Aside from the matter of

methods and priorities of emphasis he

would have favoured, and his followers
would be wise to support, those efforts of
the government or private organizations
which will surely and permanently
enhance agricultural production whether
of food or fibre, provided it is done by
working not for the villagers but with them.,
and provided the villagers are helped to
help themselves, and as much as possible
by indigenous (swadeshi) tools within the
purchasing power of the peasants. I
therefore believe that the following
activities deserve support by followers of
Gandhi: improved seed selection, better
crop rotation, mush more and more skillful
composting, promoting practices to control
soil erosion, better cattle breeding and
feeding including prevention of breeding
by very inferior castles, promoting
diversified farming so far as possible.
The emphasis should be not so
much on increasing output per worker by
help of machinery as on increasing output
per acre by intensive farming. Agricultural
statistics from all over the world show

that the largest amount of food per acre is

produced not by machine cultivation but by
skilled hand labour. It is high production
per acre that India must have because
that produces the greatest possible total
yield.
More emphasis should be placed
upon the promotion of skilled composting
with its emphasis
on swadeshi or
increased wealth out of indigenous
resources.
Mechanized farming
During the last thirty year North
America has greatly increased its use of
heavy agricultural machinery. It produces
vast amounts of grain, more indeed than it
people can consume.
There are major disadvantages to this
machine farming in India however, where
the amount of land is much more limited.
It is costly, and not effective for small
farmers. Tractors consume fuel at a high
rate and do not produce dung as do
bullocks. Heavy tractors compact the soil
and make it less fertile. They also plough
too deeply which kills the nutrients in the
humus. They make diversified farming
more
difficult.
They
create
unemployment
where
India
needs
employment. For general and prolonged
use in India this mechanized farming
would be unsuitable and dangerous,
socially and economically as well as
ecologically. It would not, I believe, feed
the people of India for many years nor
maintain a permanent civilization
in
India.
I hear someone say that not using
farm tractors would be like most of the
Gandhis program going backward
centuries, and that we cannot go back. My
answer is that the program which is going
back is not Gandhis but that of capitalistic
industrialism
and
technology
and
mechanized
farming
.
Capitalistic
technology as was shown in the foregoing

chapter, is destroying the topsoils of all

the continents and putting the world back
toward poverty, starvation and deserts,
toward ages before there was any topsoil
forward, before there was any technology
or any human being.

Change can go in all directions. Not

all change is progress. Knowledge cannot
only be accumulated; it can be lost.
Wisdom also can decrease as well as
increase. If by the phrase we cannot go
back we mean that we do not want to
lose our machines or even change our
technology, then I readily agree. But the
march of history and the using up of
natural resources may nevertheless
convince us. Of course the time process
is
irreversible, but the thinking of
humankind is not irreversible. Change is
one thing; progress is another.
Ancient bits of technology are still
useful; irrigation, for example, brickmaking, the hammer the axe which date
back to the Stone Age. The wheel, so
great a part of modern machinery, was
invented many thousands of years ago.
There are good reasons to believe that
Gandhis
whole
programhandspinning,
Village
industries
basic
education and all is not going backward
even in the technological sense but is
conserving what is desirable both
technologically and morally.

Both the use of chemical fertilizers

and collectivized farming as practiced in
Russia and China do not seem suitable for
India, where peasants farmers on small
holdings are already established. The way
to treat living soils and crops successfully
is by skillful, small-scale intensive
agriculture by peasants who thoroughly
know their land through ownership. By all
means let the peasants learn and use
science, but a science not of mechanical or
inorganic processes but of living forces.
So farming cannot successfully
and permanently be mechanized and
industrialized. Highly specialized and
subdivided factory work requires little
intelligence or a least a narrow mechanical
intelligence. But the peasant farmer, has
to
have a flexible wide- ranging
imaginative
intelligence
for
living
organisms
are
the
most
complex
materials under the sun and weather
conditions are constantly changing. Once
the soil is recognized as an aggregate of
highly complex living organisms in vast
and varied number, farming comes to
have a highly intellectual content. India
has the

human power for intensive agriculture,

what the farmers need is support and
education.
Finally, in the present state of
increasing population and land hunger of
the peasants, reforms of land tenure and
land
distribution
are
f
enormous
importance for India as for all countries in
all continents.
Industrialization
One of the chief purposes of
industrialization
is to attract into the
cities, mills and factories, villagers were no
unemployed or underemployed and thus
at the same time relieve the existing
unemployment and underemployment and
relieve the pressure of people on the
length. Wholly aside from the rural
unemployment, the industrialists and their
economists believe that it is inefficient to
have a large number of people working on
the land.They think that farming like all
other productive enterprises, is a business
and should be run on business lines and
therefore to increase production per
worker by means of farm machinery. Thus
to have many workers on the land is
inefficient and destructive of
moneyprofit.
The cluster of ideas grew up among
the economists and industrialists of
England which,
in the early days of
industrialism, could easily buy all the food
it needed from other lands end in the
United States where there was far more
food than people there could eat. The
background, basis and assumptions of the
reasoning that industrialization will surely
help the total economic situation of any
country are fading away. Such a reasoning
as now applied to India may therefore not
be as should and may have to be
qualified.
For example, there is a food shortage
in India which cannot be met by importing
food in sufficient quantities. But neither

does industrialized farming solve the

problem. Moreover, under hand labour, the
average production per acre steadily
increases. Moving people off the land and
trying to replace them with machines
simply makes no actual sense in terms of
food
production.
Nor
does
industrialization in the

sense of moving labourers into factories

or manual labours of other kinds actually
alleviate poverty or low education. What
is needed is better education and better
kinds of employment. Any society that
continually maintains a poor, exploited
and unhappy peasantry is inviting
communism or other revolutionary
trouble. Failing to furnish good quality
employment however, means depriving
people of self- respect and dignity and
creates a resentment very deep, long
enduring
and
when
linked
with
intelligence, very powerful. India has this
problem now and prolonging it will bring
grave trouble in the future.
The industrial program of the
government of India is trying to promote
industrial employment for the graduates
of the universities. But industry can offer
such employment only to trained
technologists and slowly at that. It takes
time to build factories and more time to
train the technologist. The vast majority
of the people could not thereby benefit
either from the education or the
economic benefits. Basic education is
wiser, and industrialists for their own

protection should
everywhere.

help

to

promote

I see no value to the nation in simply

enlarging commerce into a feverish
activity. A few people would make money
thereby, at the cost of the masses and of
the life of Indian culture. I think it would
be wise to go slowly on industrialization,
and press Gandhis programme far more
strongly. Finally, the governments
program
of
industrialization
leads
directly toward the thirteen grave
dangers of industrialism described above.
I am not urging no industrialism for India.
But I am urging definite, strong limitations
on it; a direction for it that will bring it into
harmony with nature I would like to see a
strict prevention of pollution of streams by
chemicals, dyes and waste products of
factories, mills and industrial processes.
Because
of
the
terrifying
consequence of an utterly new situation
in the worldsoil erosion, together with a
vast upsurge in populationwe are,
despite our reluctance, compelled now to
do some hard thinking about population
control. If we want to

reduce poverty and have peace, we can no

longer dodge that relationship between
food and material production on the
hand and population on the other. Now
that men and women have overpopulated
the planet, they must begin to control
their own reproduction. They must
manage themselves somewhat as they
have managed nature. Having learned so
much about control the life of the outer
world, they must know learn equally to
control their own inner lifeand its
processes. As a means of reducing
population some kind of family- planning
her birth control is better than vast and
continuous famine, malnutrition and
disease with all their consequent poverty,
degradation,
despair
and
eventual
disappearance of culture and civilization.
To solve the problems of Indias poverty
will probably require the widespread use of
both direct and indirect methods of birth
control. Altogether the problems of India
are
exceedingly difficult; the solutions
can only be gradual; there will be more
suffering to head; but the problems can
and will be solved.
Solar Energy: Recommendation
for a wiser Industrialism
In 1927, in my book, The Economics of
Khaddar, I explained how the making of
khadi is a sound ineffi cient engineering
and economic proposition partly because
it is a way of transforming solar energy
into something useful for human beings. I
explained how vast is our annual income
of radiant energy from the sun. I
suggested that the wise civilizations are
those which live chiefly on the annual
income of solar energy rather than on
coal and petroleum, the stored up capital
of solar energy from past ages.
Much can also be said for the new
uses that are found for wood. In
approximately the last 30 years there have
been wonderful developments in the
chemistry of wood so that no it is possible

to make out of wood fibre a vast number of

products extremely useful to human kind.
Besides ordinary beans and boards and
paper, wood can be made into cellulose
and textiles such as rayon, plastic be
moulded into all sorts of

shapes and with many kinds of properties

(such as hardness, flexibility, resistance
to breaking, elasticity, insulation for
electricity. Many articles made of
plastics are excellent substitutes for
metal
articles.
By
adopting
this
technology India could provide textiles to
help clothe city people and for export,
could produce excellent large sheets of
weather resistant synthetic wood to help
solve housing and building problems,
special roof tiles, plastic water pipes, food
for cattle, and effective substitute for
petrol and many other useful things. All
these things come from the current
amount of solar energy. Thus from the
sunshine of India, now so largely wasted,
vast wealth could be made. Of course
unless modern methods of forest
cultivation in lumbering are used, the
forest products industries would soon
destroy the Indian forest, creating a
permanent disaster and catastrophe.
All this will take time, for trees do not
become mature overnight and training
foresters and getting the forest into a
sustained yield basis also takes time.

If living off the annual income of solar

energy is implied in Gandhis program
from the start, we can now make this
principle explicit and clear-cut. It would
supply the limitation and
self-restraint
which
capitalistic
industrialism
has
hitherto lacked. If adopted and put into
effect, the development of such a forest
products industry would be a bridge
between industrialism as so far practiced
and Gandhis principles. It would provide a
direction in which industry could wisely
move. Despite the recent development of
atomic radiation power countries will come
to realize its limitation eventually that the
amount of uranium in the world is limited
and radiation is very dangerous. At the
rate at which industrialized nations are
now consuming fuel and raw materials
they probably have to shift over to what I
am here proposing within a century.
The changeover to reliance on solar
energy would be the way by which
industrialism, without loss of face or
abandonment of technology, could finally
come into harmony and equilibrium with
nature. Intellectual power tends to gather
together around the

places where physical power is applied.

Present physical power sources, coal, oil
and electricity, are put to work in the
cities. Trade and money of course come
there. The attraction of power gathers
people, and especially attracts young
people away from the villages to the cities.
This impoverishes the villages.
If India develops wood products in
this way, her people will come to realize
more vividly the vastness of solar energy.
The chief converters of India solar energy
would be the forest and farms, and
articulate people would come to realize
this. The significance of living would come
to center in the forest, forest products
industries, in the villages where the
farmers live and work. The keenest young
people would probably tend to gather in
those places. And many other occupations
would derive from this. Thus there would
tend to come about a sounder balance
between city and country, between
industrialism and agriculture. Indeed such
industrialism would realize its kinship with
agriculture, through their common source
of
energy.
There would grow
up
everywhere a sounder appreciation of the
value of peasants work and life.
(Reflection and Dialogue 8: Models of
Development)
Gregg is very aware that India is not a blank
slate. In the midst of the process of independence the
country finds itself caught up in a dynamic of
modernization and westernization in which many
forces are already in play. Most notably, of course,
the forces of industrialization and agricultural
development. It feels these forces under the great
pressure of a growing population, high levels of
illiteracy, poverty and dispossession (of land and
livelihood) and a very small market economy in which
few of its citizens participate. The question becomes
howby what methodsto alleviate these pressures.
In fact, how to develop, given the traditional
civilization and structures. In this sense, the modern/
western forms of developmentindustrialization
increasing agricultural production and market

economymust be critically examined and impact of

adopting them in India, carefully considered.

Nehrus strategy was a compromise, of

course, leaning toward the socialist model of
development on the one hand, and maintaining some
traditional structures by means of the low level
development or constructive work recommended by
Gandhi on the other. Gregg levels a very critical eye
at the features of this compromise and then
develops his own suggestiona solar-centred
economic model of growth.
His critique of the model of agricultural
development is worth highlighting first. Working
from the notions of swaraj and swadeshi, he
argues that a large scale shift toward
industrialized, mechanized farming is wrong
for India in principle and also very dangerous in
long-term consequences. It is a bad approach to
development when one considers both the land
itself ecologically and the people themselves, the
small scale tenant and peasant farmers. It will
give a short term increase in yield but at the cost
of ecological exhaustion of the soil and
impoverishment in debt of the small farmer. In
fact, Greggs critique anticipates some of the

disastrous consequences of the green revolution

which continue to the present. He poses the very
Gandhian question about the the real value of
technologies which promise progress by asking
about their human and moral consequences (again,
think of the high level of farmer suicides). But even
in practical terms, he insists, a better yield and a
more stable structure is provided by small scale
intensive agriculture by farmers who thoroughly
know their land through ownership. Only that
kind of skill can properly correspond to the soil and
its complex living organisms.
Greggs critique of industrialization as a model
of development is also very insightful. He argues that
the industrialization process does not in fact create
jobs of high quality with corresponding education
except for a very small number of technologists. In
effect it excludes the vast majority of India from the
outset. There is no industrial market large enough to
employ those people. As far as wealth creation goes,
the industrialization process which Gregg describes
has done just what he predicted: created vast wealth

for a very small number of people. At the same

time it has ravaged the traditional social structures
and left millions helpless victims of a market
economy to which they have become indebted and
indentured
labourers.
The
completely
unrestrained commitment to the mechanics of the
market and its development which now dominates
the India economy and society, was something
neither Gandhi nor Gregg could have imagined.
Greggs own alternative proposal is a
creative extension of the Gandhian vision namely
a solar economy, structured around the careful use
of forest resources and technologiesbut limited
by the available solar power. That, he suggests
coupled with significant family planning initiatives
will modernize and actually elevate the social
order without destruction of the environment.
This questioning and critical reflection on the true
meaning of development as applied to a complex
socio-political order is carried forward into the next
and last section of the book. Gregg has begun to
suggest that the answer lies not simply in a
selective economics of growth and GDP, but in the
whole network of ethical, ecological and human
values which underlies and supports any
economia.
Chapter VII Gandhis Programme
Those who have studied economics
through books and all supporters of
industrialism believe that although Gandhi
was a great saint and statesman, he was
sadly mistaken on all matters of
economics. They point to the immense
wealth and high standards of living in all
the long industrialized countries and the
great success of industrialism in Japan
prior to the second world war as complete
and irresistible proof of the necessity of
further industrialization in India. They all
insist that in every country having a dense
population the only economic salvation is
to increase industrial production, to attract
people away from agriculture and into
industry.
They
show
how
modern
technology, a partner of industrialism, has
greatly increased agricultural production

and at the same time reduced the need for

so many people to work in the fields.

But this opinion from some years

of raw materials of which much come from
ago, now seems doubtful because in
lands in the global south. In the past that
1957, the world faces a very different
exploitation was possible because of the
economic, political and social situation
use of force and violence. But it is possible
than when this theory fi rst arose or
that there will now have to be a more just
even when industrialization began. Let
sharing of the resources of the earth.
me list six developments that in this
4.This means that the nations of the global
context seem significant:
south will now rise to have more political
1.World population exceeds the present
importance.
world resources of food for adequate
5.Social, economic, political and educational
human nutrition and the population is
changes are right now occurring rapidly,
growing faster than the development of
and the minds and hearts of people
new food sources. Many millions of
everywhere are now eager to obtain
people are now on the edge of
justice and opportunity and self-respect
starvation.
and human dignity.
2.Hence agriculture is now more important
6.India is different from the western nations
than industry since food is more
not only because her peasantry is so large
important than clothing or more houses
a proportion of her population, but
certainly more important than mere
because they are so dreadfully poor, so
comforts and conveniences.
lacking in health, energy, initiative, selfrespect, self-confidence and hope.
3.The nuclear stalemate of the Cold War
means
that
the
domination
and
These six factors, at least, call for a
exploitation of poor, non- industrialized
revision of the social and economic
nations
will
be
lessened
(sic).
strategy and tactics used in the west.
Industrialism depends on the exploitation

An Outline of the

Program

Let me first list the elements of

Gandhis programme. At first glance they
may seem simple and elementary in
relation to the complex problems that we
face.
1. Hand-spinning and weaving of handspun yarn;
2. Village industries;
3. Basic education;
4. Welfare and uplift of

Untouchables;

5. Village sanitation;
6. Peasant welfare;
7. Education in hygiene and

health;

8.Communal unity as between people of

different religions
9. Womens welfare;
10. Industrial
organization;

labour

welfare

and

11. Respect for all religions;

12. Adult education;
13. Promotion of the national language
(Hindi);
14. Development of ones own provincial
language;
15. Student welfare;
16. Liquor prohibition;
17. Cow protection and welfare;
18. Service of aboriginal
tribes; To these were
later added,
19. Service
of
people
epidemics and famines;
20. Service of lepers;

in

floods,

21. Bhoodan and Gramadan, the land-gift

mission of Acharya Vinoba Bhave.

The Population and village

character of India
In 1951 the population of India was
about 357 million population. Experts
estimate that as of 1956 there was about
390 million. That 1951 census indicated
that about 83% of the population lived in
villages. There are about 558,000 villages
and nearly 96% of them have less than
2000 in habitants each. Most of the
villagers work on the land, but a good
many
are
engaged
in
village
industries,
carpenters,weavers,
basketmakers, potters, oil pressers dealers
etc.
The vast mass of the villagers are
extremely poor. For centuries theyve
been exploited by those in power both
foreign and Indian. Poverty, ignorance,
debt, disease and oppression have taken
the energy, heart and self-respect out of
them. The majority of them are nearly
completely discouraged.Their condition is
not quite so bad as when Gandhi began
his reforms, but it is still very bad.

Gandhi felt that there was a vast

reservoir of goodness and possibility of all
kinds. Merely to help them was not
enough. They had to be shown how to
help themselves, and out of their own
slender resources. Because of the weight
of their traditions, the deepness of their
discouragement and apathy, their feeble
initiative, energy and self-confidence, they
could not be aroused to any but tiny
efforts, taking very little steps ahead. Their
ignorance,
poverty,
suspicion
of
government and weight of tradition were
such that they could not use any but
familiar indigenous village implements.
Perhaps
because
of the tropical
environment, their apathy is greater than
that of peasants in China. When hundreds
of millions of people are in such a
pathological condition the question of
mere mechanical inefficiency of tools is
irrelevant.
Gandhi realized that what they most
needed was self-respect and hope and a
vision of how they may progress by their
own efforts. Foreign tools and methods
would not appeal to them. They were in
the

same psychological condition of despair

as some patients in mental hospitals.
Psychiatrists have learned that such
patients can be greatly benefitted by
simple
manual
work,
so
called
occupational therapy. From the beginning
of human evolution human hands have
played a large and organically close part
in the development of human mind and
character. In the poverty of India, it is
possible by manual labour to make articles
of real important economic value with very
simple tools.
Clothing, for example, for the really
poor people of India consists of simple
pieces of cloth without any tailoring or
fashioning at all, the dhoti for a man, the
sari for a woman. The expense of clothing
is at least 10% of the family budget. If
people are unemployed or underemployed
and so have time to spend spin, they can
at a very small expense make enough yarn
to clothe themselves. Cotton grows in
every province of India. Such handmade
clothing is equivalent to a 10% increase in
the family income. The cost of a spinning
wheel is only four or five rupees. Poor
people on the edge of starvation such an
increase of income is important. Similar
reasoning applies to all the village
handicrafts.
But the important result of such effort
is moral. When a person can make
something economically valuable by their
own skill and persistent effort, they gain
self-respect, self-confidence, self-reliance,
courage, hope, initiative and energy. They
become willing to try something more
difficult, something which may involve
working cooperatively with others. If
others alongside are doing likewise, they
gain in collective courage and hope.
This is no mere theory. For over 30
years peasants all over India, under the
inspiration end guidance of Gandhi have
been making such things with their own
simple tools and building their own

character and moral strength at the same

time. The growth of khadi in those 30 years
is astonishing. In the days of the
noncooperation struggle against British
rule, the districts which were most
courageous, most successful in
their
nonviolent resistance against

oppression were the districts where handspinning, hand-weaving and other items
of village uplift had been in operation for
some years.
In basic education, the pupil begins
by learning some skill, say spinning,
basketmaking, carpentry or pottery. Out
of the necessities for measurements in
the
work
they
begin
to
learn
mathematics. From information as to the
source of the materials they learn
geography. From instruction in the origin
they learn the elements of history. From
having to read instructions and keep
records they learn reading and writing. If
they buy materials or sell products they
start in the subject of economics. Each
subject has a basis in concrete, daily
reality and value. Learning is all
integrated with life. Manual labour is
dignified and enriched. The character of
the pupil grows with their learning. They
learn to work with others. They develop
good work and personal skills. All of this
applies to girls as well as boys.
The other items of the constructive
program, when developed, tend to knit

the village, the state in the nation

together into at harmonious mutually
helpful, mutually trusting unity. They lift
the masses of the people to a higher
economic, intellectual, social, religious
and political level. They help greatly to
remove age old conflicts, resentments,
prejudices, and other social disunities and
evils.
With this brief explanation of the
program, let us develop the comparisons
between it and the other systems we have
previously considered. Let us look at it not
from the point of view of the ruling groups
of the world but from the underside, the
point of view of the poor people who are
the majority of the world.
Contrast
Systems

with

Other

Political

All of these systems, including

Gandhis Constructive Program, profess to
help and enrich everyone, both materially,
mentally and moral. On the end and aims
of their efforts and of society, they all
agree. Where they differ is as to the
means. In this respect we will see an
application of the principle that

in order to obtain success the means

chosen must be consistent with the end
desired.
Capitalism and Communism both
create big pools of capital wealth and
power and manipulate them chiefly, in
practice, for the purposes of those at the
top, letting some wealth and power seep
down in order that the masses may
effectively operate the machines that
make the wealth. Both of these systems
use violence, open or disguised, when
necessary to keep control over supplies of
fuel and raw materials and to keep people
working.
Gandhis programme in operation
also makes wealth and power but in terms
of the products of village industries, basic
education, health and mutual respect and
kindness to all. The production is primarily
not for distant sale. But for immediate
local consumption, and first of all by the
person or family producing the stuff.
Hence the programme keeps those little
bits of wealth where they are made, widely
distributed in little units, instead of
gathered into big pools for manipulation
by the powerful few. Such village activities
keep wealth widely and more evenly
distributed.
The spirit of capitalist industrialism is
to first enrich the powerful by means of
technology, then after the wealth is
created and the machines and processes
kept running smoothly and efficiently, to
let enough of it seep down to the masses.
But in practice, because of the weakness
of human nature, only enough wealth and
education seep down to keep the machines
running efficiently. Gandhi recognized the
social value of the skills of the
businessmen. He himself was a very
skillful organizer, administrator and social
inventor.
But
he
believed
that
businessmen should exercise their skills as
trustees for society. He himself did that.
Gandhi thought that they were capable of

rising higher in the moral scale than was

expected in capitalism.
Communism says in effect that the
party leaders will fairly enrich everybody by
technology that they manage. But as the
select few also work from the top down,
they too get caught in the means and are
subject

to the temptations of power, and the

masses obtain security and wealth only
partly, and the spirit of people in that
regimes is put in chains for the sake of
power at the top.
Gandhis constructive programme
works
democratically
from
below
enriching the vast mass of poor people by
self-made clothing, village industries,
basic
education,
sanitation,
health,
mutual help , soils improved by compost,
and better agriculture. It uses simple,
familiar tools, adapted to the local
environment, that are so inexpensive to
make and repair that they are within the
economic means of the peasants. The
wealth that this programme produces is
immediate and sticks in every peasant
family that uses the programme. The
tolerance, kindness and mutual respect
created by the rest of the programme
have immense moral value.
It
might
be
claimed
that
industrialism makes more wealth and
makes it faster than does Gandhis
programme. Much of the wealth from
industrialism however, is really depletion

and depreciation of resources. Gandhis

programme in all areas creates actual
wealth without depleting essential resources
and builds up the community while doing
it. This moral benefi t of Gandhis
programme should be highlighted. If put
into effect this programme would develop
in every household a fund of self-respect,
self- confidence, self reliance, dignity,
energy, initiative, courage, persistence
and happiness that would exalt the nation
and thrill the world. When added to the
villagers natural religious feeling, there
would be a vast upsurge of moral and
spiritual energy.
Gandhi was not talking about a
simple redistribution of existing wealth.
Rather he was urging that the masses
should be given the opportunity to create
wealth in their little bits and keep it all for
themselves; that they should not have to
work for the benefit of others. Gandhis
programme does not treat men and
women as means for the purposes of
others; it treats them as ends in
themselves. It does not say that labour is
a commodity or a cost of production; it
says that the profits of all enterprises,

big or small, should go as much or more to

those who do the work as to those who
furnish the means. And in Gandhis
programme the labourer and the man who
furnishes the means are one and the
same.
Use of Technology
Each of the political systems uses
technology to raise humankind out of
povertyincluding
Gandhis.
The
technology of Western origin used by
capitalism
and
communismpartly
because it uses such great amounts of
energycompels the workers to adjust
themselves and indeed their whole lives to
the speed and mechanical preciseness of
the machines. The great mass of ordinary
workers become nurses and servants,
sometimes almost slaves, of the machines.
Materially such machines and processes
create great amounts of things but these
machines
and
processes
are
not
psychologically and morally adapted to the
human bing. The manager of the mill or
factory may come nearer to thinking that
the machines are his servants, but even
he is bound and tied to the machines and
their pace and their necessities. For the
great majority of employees, however, the
machine does not feel like their servant
but like their master. Really their master is
not just the machine but the whole
complex of assumptions, motives,
reasoning,
thoughts,
sentiment,
discoveries, inventions and habits which
made Western culture as well as the
machines. Many of the assumptions on
which that culture is based are now losing
their validity.
The technology of the Gandhian plan
is such that it does far more than add to
material wealth.This is because the
implements are closely adapted to the
Indian peasants powers, their present
physical,
intellectual,
moral
and
psychological conditions. This simple
technology shows the majority of people

how to help themselves and actually

enables them to do so. Gandhian
technology can grow endlessly but it should
be kept at the village level. What it may
become in the future, after the villagers
have regained self- respect and selfconfidence and discipline, remains to be
seen. But now, first things should be put
first.

The technology of the other

systems, capitalism and communism,
impose from the top an industrial pattern
on all the people and compel them by
economic pressure to change their ways
(both the ways that are sound as well as
those that are unsound). The person
compelled to operate a big machine does
not feel any such creative impulse, does
not develop the self-reliance, self-respect
and independence of mind and spirit that
comes to the worker in the Gandhian
programme.
The benefits of the technologies of
capitalism and communism are, for the
mass of people, primarily physical; the
benefits of the Gandhian programme are
also physical but primarily moral. For any
society the development of the moral
character of its people is more important
than
any refinement of industrial
efficiency. Because of the susceptibility of
almost all people to the poisons of great
power, the benefits of the other systems
in practice work out to the top few; but in
the Gandhian programme, because the
benefits are made by the many and stay
in their bits distributed among the many,

such benefits come to and stay with the

many.
Those who are impressed with
Western technology laugh at or are
contemptuous
of
the
indigenous
implements of Indian villages. They insist
that such things are inefficient and
unscientific. But they overlook the way
that
industrialism
and
industrial
technology are weighted in favour of the
wealthy. The powers of science and
engineering should stop being devoted to
the service of the wealthy and of the
militaries and become developed to the
service of the poor, the great majority of
humankind.
Wealth is essentially the product of
useful or available energy. Although to
everyone except an engineer or physicist,
energy seems to be quite a minor item in
the production of wealth, if we concern
ourselves with what is used up in the
process of creating wealth, it is the largest
and most important item. This viewpoint
should radically alter our perception of
western technologies and their claims to
efficiency.

The Inner and the Outer Worlds

It
should
be
noted
that
in
industrialism
under
any
auspices
whatever, the great emphasis on science
and technology takes attention and
interest away from the inner life of man
and concentrates a steadily increased
amount of attention, time and energy on
the excitingly interesting world of things.
At first that emphasis dulls and eventually
it nearly smothers the sense of the
validity, reality and importance of the
inner world of the imagination, feelings,
intellect and spirit. There develops, as can
be seen in the long- industrialized nations
of the west, a satiety, a sense of an
emptiness of life, a loss of human worth
and dignity, a loss of sense of direction
for both the individual and society.
The earth is limited. The mind and
spirit of the human being are without
limit.
To
constrict
the
mass
of
humankind to material, physical things
is a denial of their true human nature.
It ends in competition for the limited
materials. Then conflict and eventually
the destruction of resources and
civilizations.
We can say a final word on planning.
All of
the other systems plan from the
top, assuming a superior wisdom of the
few. Some of the planning is both valid and
inescapable, because of the large-scale
operations, but it must be strictly limited.
For this, however, the life of a civilization
and of its myriads of individuals are too
complex and too swiftly changing. Such
planning, if complete, promotes injustice.
Management must be as far as possible
decentralized into small village units. They
will be more manageable and solvable.
Self government is more important than
efficient government.
Additions to Gandhis Program
Before we turn to a more detailed
analysis of Gandhis programme we should

note several ways in which the original

programme should be expanded. One area
is the Bhoodan and Gramadan program
undertaken by Acharaya Vinoba Bhave, one
of Gandhis most important disciples.
This program

involves a collection of gift-land to be

families who adopt it. Its Progress is
redistributed from wealthy landowners.
material also, but that results, while
Acharaya Vinoba has walked all over
important
and
indispensable,
is
India, asking for these land grant
secondary, especially at the start.
donations and has so far transferred four
2. In Gandhis programme the means used
and a quarter million acres of land to
are harmonious with its ends. This is not
peasants. The Gramadan program
the case in the other programmes we have
creates common land for use by
discussed.
communities. It has also been very
successful. It is probably true to say that 3. Since the greatness of any country is most
such programs could only succeed in a
enduringly and clearly based on the
deeply spiritual country like India. There
numbers and kinds of its great gifts to
are also important advances in soil
universal human civilization, and since we
composting and agriculture that should
can never tell from what parents genius
be added to the programme. Gandhis
will arise, the country which desires to
protection of cows is also very important
help all humanity as much as possibly
in this regard for the health of soil life.
must provide food, shelter, opportunities,
education and freedoms to the largest
Superiority
of
Gandhis
possible number of people. Then there will
Programme
be the best and most chances for genius
to emerge and not be destroyed in infancy
Let me now list some more of the
or crushed or stupefied by dreadful
specific
superiorities
of
Gandhis
poverty or rigid controls of thought and
programme as enlarged:
feeling.
1. The major emphasis and effect of the
program is moral; persuasive and not 4. More than any other programme, that of
Gandhi is in harmony and ecological
coercive,
and
applies
is
fruitful
balance with nature. Hence it could endure
immediately to all men and women and
longer than the others.

5. The programme lives not primarily on the

limited resources of metals and fossil fuels
but on the vast and constantly renewed
annual income of solar energy.
6. The Gandhian programme will enable the
poorer people of world to build up their
wealth, self- reliance, self-confidence,
dignity, health, energy and initiative.
7. The Gandhian programme may reduce the
competitive tension and distrust between
India and Pakistan.The Gandhian way is
the more nonviolent and kind.
8. This programme in action reduces the
moral degradation and economic burden
of unemployment and under-employment.
The further the programme is adopted and
made effective, the greater will these
benefits be.
9. If put into the wildest and most intensive
operation, this programme would avoid
the present heavy taxation for rapid
industrial development and expense of a
very large bureaucratic government staff.
It would permit more freedom from central
planning. It would avoid the present strain
on government finances. It would help
reduce the national debt and decrease the
danger of currency inflation.
10.
The Gandhian programme would
reduce all the seven dangers mentioned in
the first chapter.
11.
It would reduce the thirteen
dangers of capitalism described in the
second chapter.
12.
It has for troubled people seven of
the twelve appeals of communism of the
third chapter. The other five are illusory.
13. More than any other plan,
system or programme, Gandhis is
compassionate and filled with the sense of
the spiritual unity of all humankind.
There are several other points which
should also be considered in order to bring

the full meaning

programme.

and

values

of

this

City vs. Country

In a large country with money as the
medium of exchange, food has to be
carried long distances from the farms to
the cities. It goes through many hands
assemblers,
railways,
carters,
wholesalers, marketers, brokers, retailers
and each one charges something for his
services. Often there are also food
processors such as flour mills, rice mills,
sugar mills, canners and so forth. All of
these charges put economic pressure on
both the producers and ultimate
consumers. The farmers are individual
and weak in the bargaining and unable to
charge enough to pay their full costs. The
cost of food to the ultimate consumers in
the cities steadily rises year after year.
They too are helpless.The difference is
absorbed y the host of middlemen. The
larger
the
cities,
the
more
the
middlemen. Sometimes the middlemen
take advantage of their position and
exact too high a tribute for their services,
but no always.
The consumers in the cities blame
the farmers for the high prices; the

farmers think the city people are gouging

them. Thus ill feeling arises between city
and country. Nobody, on the whole, is
deliberately
at fault. All are helpless;
caught in the system of organization. The
harm is caused in the system of
organization. The harm is caused not by
any one person or group who is
consciously greedy but by the bigness of
scale of operations and desire for power
and money which makes the growth of
cities and the intricate and large-scale
marketing operations easy. Thus people
pay the penalty for their desires.
Since the city workers are close
together they organize easily into unions
and use their political power to cause the
exploitation to shift agains the peasants.
So the peasants are further impoverished
and eventually the soil also. In America the
farmers have become organized and by
their consequent political power they
have compelled the government to
subsidize them. This results in over
production and crop surpluses. The people
as a whole pay for this through taxes.

Gandhis
ideal
of
self-sufficient
villages and a minimum on the side and
number of cities would put a brake on all
this process and save the soils and
ultimately prolong civilization and Indian
culture. His approach is built not on the
division of labour but rather by securing
spontaneous cooperation on a wide scale.
Relieving

Rural

Unemployment

The
rural
unemployment
and
underemployment in India is stupendous.
Much of it is caused by the climate; the
long, hot, dry season creates conditions
the soil so that the peasants cannot do
any work on the land. It makes a dreadful
economic and moral burden. We saw that
one of the purposes of industrialism is to
attract into the factories and mills villagers
who are now unemployed and thus to
relieve
rural
unemployment
and
underemployment and the pressure of
people on the land. But work in city
factories undermines family life and thus
harms civilization.
Gandhis programme, if ardently
pursued by those who have the power and
knowledge in and out of Government,
would relieve rural unemployment by
means of village industry work. The
implements would all be indigenous
(swadeshi) and far less expensive than
the big factories and their machinery. The
villagers would gain enormously in selfconfidence
and
hope
by
their
unemployment
in
making
of
the
implements and in their use .
It is said that industrialism will raise
the living standards of the people, will
provide more clothing and housing,
comforts and conveniences. Gandhis
programme will provide the clothing
quicker, I believe, than the other will do,
and certainly will enhance the self-respect
of the workers faster than industrialism
would do. With the improvements in
agriculture, the quality and quantity of
food for the peasants will greatly increase

and as soon as by the industrial road. On

agricultural improvements I think the
Gandhians should work together with the
government, except for the qualifications
noted.

Requisites for Economic Growth

Let me quote from an article by
Peter Drucker and American economist
and industrial consultant.
Economic
development
is
not
exclusively maybe not even primarily
an economic process; it also involves a
deep cultural and social changea
change in values, habits, knowledge,
attitudes, ways of life, social ideals and
aspirations. This is true whether the
economic development is by means of
industrialization
or
of
Gandhis
programme.
This
means
a
vast
educational effort and its completion will
take time, very likely two or three
generations . It is part of the evolution of
humanity.

effective even in the case of foreign armed

invasion.
The use of satyagrahamass
action campaignsis the only way by
which the temptation and corruption of
power, so strong and omnipresent
everywhere throughout the ages, can be
managed. It is the only way of generating
spiritual power than can be used purely
for the general welfare.
True
democracy
depends
upon
tolerance and nonviolence and small-scale
organization; not upon force or coercion
but upon peaceful persuasion and
consent.

Relation of Gandhis Program to

the Seven Dangers

Alone of all the systems here

discussed Gandhis programme stressed
small organizations. It makes the village
and family and small associations of
manual workers the basis of civilization.

In need hardly be said that in

relation to violence this programme is
better and more practical than any other
in the world. Its success in expelling
British imperialism from India is proof
enough of its power. I believe it would be

Alone of all these systems, this

program insists that moral laws apply to
all human organizations and that the spirit
exists and is supremely powerful. As to the
last point, I am suggesting that religion be
made

into a political instrument. I believe that

the state should be wholly secular and
separate from religion. I am trying to
follow Gandhi in urging that politics
become an expression, not of religious
organization, but of spirit.
Conclusion: India Can Combine the
best of the East and West
Altogether is seems reasonably clear
that this programme is not only the best
for averting all the dangers mentioned in
chapter 1 and avoiding all the thirteen
harmful factors of industrialism, but it
holds also the promise of promoting a still
greater and more beneficial culture than
India has so far produced. India is capable
of synthesizing the best elements of the
East andWest and of producing the wisest
culture in all the world. But it will require
tremendous and prolonged and sustained
effort for at least a century.
In all the foregoing discussion I have
dwelt mostly on those items of Gandhis
constructive programme that are most
clearly economic in effect, for those are
the parts about which there has been the
most adverse criticism. But great and
continuing emphasis must be placed on
the moral and spiritual aspects of the
programme. Vinoba is supplying this
emphasis.
Aside from his efforts India has fallen
away sadly in this respect from Gandhis
ideals and practice. If India were to devote
her energies almost entirely to the
material occupations of the west, she too,
would follow the western nations over the
precipice to catastrophe.
Gandhis programme, much better
than any mode of industrialism will
promote the ancient ideal of Indian culture
(Sanskriti) whose essential qualities are
truth (Satya), austerity (tapasya), knowledge
(Jnana), nonviolence
(Ahimsa),
respect
toward those who have wisdom (Vidwat
Snmana), good manners (Sushila). The

austerity would lie not only in simplicity of

living but in the limitation of used power to
the annual income of solar energy.

The True Revolution

If you want to be a revolutionary, the
use of true mass Satyagraha is the
greatest revolution in many thousands of
years. But, you may protest, it is not
revolutionary to advocate and use handspinning,
hand-weaving
and
other
manual, human powered skills
in
villages; that is very old fashioned
technology. However, it is revolutionary
to advocate that technology shall not be
allowed to run wild any further, that it
must
be
subordinated
to
sound
ecological relations with Nature and
natural resources, to the annual income
of solar energy energy, to human nature
and to cultural necessities of developing
and maintaining spontaneous, happy
human cooperation. If worst comes to
worst, great famines would not be as bad
for India as would the loss of spontaneous
cooperation between individuals and
groups such a s is now taking place in the
industrialized west. It is revolutionary to
be carefully selective in regard to
technology, to take and use only what in
the long run will surely help to exalt
humanity, not just the body but also the

spirit. It is revolutionary in this age to

assert that the interests of civilization are
paramount over those
of science,
technology and money profit. And it is still
more
revolutionary
to take actual
practical measures to assure the only
means of reviving that spontaneous
cooperation. It is revolutionary to say
that technology should be restrained
until human beings have learned to control
their lust for power and to work toward
that end.
The follower of Gandhis programme
does not have to wait for a large-scale
revolution; that person starts one inside
themselves and carries it out with their
own hands. Such a person immediately
starts controlling their share of the means
of production for the public good. They
immediately start to serve the masses and
by their life help to bring an ideal India
nearer to being.
Any very great widespread change of
ideas or of heart takes usually at least
three generations. The generation in which
the new idea is propounded is startled,
often repelled and opposes it out of
habit,

inertia, prejudice and reluctance to

think
new
thoughts.
The
second
generation has become more familiar
with the new idea, has watched it longer in
action
and
probably
accepts
it
intellectually but is still hampered by
unconscious inherited attitudes. Only the
third generation is free from these
prejudices and biases, has fully realized
the values of the new idea and is willing to
explore all its probabilities. From there on
the new idea really begins to show its
power. We may therefore expect very
great
developments
of
Gandhis
programme. The Spirit has power. Along
this way lies hope.
Concluding
Dialogue:

Response

and

I said above that there was a shift in this

concluding section of Greggs work, namely, that the
primary issue itself shifts to the goal of identifying a
local, communitarian point of balance within the
modern nation state. Such a point of balance involves
turning away from the market economy and therefore
a decentralizing of the market as the balance point of
modern political life. To dethrone materialism and
attempt to re-conceive society from a different form
of the common good may now seem very idealistic,
so idealistic in fact as to be fantastic and fictional.
Gregg insists that the vertigo we may feel with such a
shift is actually the opening of the vista of true
revolution, a moment of enlightenment and a
breaking free from the ideology that has enslaved us
throughout the modern erathe ideology of
technology, capital accumulation and progress. What
follows is a kind of transvaulation of values, then, a
recognition that the true wealth lies in the human
person (the vast reservoir of goodness and
possibility) and in the building up of a network of
relations based on moral and spiritual values.
Greggs hopefulness about the Gandhian model
might be tempered today by what we have come to
know about the persistence of economic-industrial
model of the market and indeed its expansion around
the globe. All the while it has grown entwined in

consort with the lowest common denominators of

human reality: greed, fear and violence. Although the

power of those lower energies seems inexhaustible,

their embodiment in socio-political life in the
market economy has thereby revealed itself to be
more and more destructive and less and less
sustainable. This is the case despite the fact that a
myriad of technological marvels derived from
those drives, have been created. We wander
among them in search of something of deeper and
sustainable value. Greggs argument about the
alternative, Gandhian model is that it is both
morally sound (in expressing the best of human
reality) and economically sound as a model of
social relations. The question then is which view
of human life and human potential will we
choose?
That leads directly to a second question, can
we limit our technological drive and reachas
well as it products? And this means in effect can
we accept the limitations of the planet itself, and
of the energy available here as limits to our drive
to create, conquer and dominate nature to our
will? This has the feeling a retreat, as Greg notes,
a going backward from the place of unrestrained

development that we have reached. But that is

only because of our incomplete view. We need to
recognize that the technological development of the
western industrial world has been distorted in
several ways1) it works for the benefit of the
wealthiest few and 2) works to enslave in debt and
unseemly, mechanical labour the many, 3) which
results in a social order based on coercion and
violence and 4) leaves the vast majority of
people disempowered and dispirited. The marvels
of our technology have come at a high price and
have produced no sustainable human community.
It is interesting for us to see the way in which
Gregg characterizes the pathological state of the
mass of Indian people at the timethe deepness of
discouragement and apathy, their feeble initiative,
energy and self-confidenceand to contrast it with
the state of postmodern people who exist at the
apparent height of technological knowledge and
achievement. For most of us there is a similar
disempowerment, apathy, lack of initiative, energy
and self-confidence precisely in relation to the
systems of

controleconomic, political and socialwhich have

been created by the industrial-technological order.
While Gandhi was counseling that the traditional
society not enter into such a whirlpool in the first
place, we find ourselves trapped within it. An
alternative course of development lay in the model of
participation and cooperation, in a use of technology
which grew organically from the labour of the human
hand and then led to the development of mind and
character. As Gregg illustrates with his account of
hand-spinning and basic education, this was a
concrete and practical approach which taught skills,
self-reliance and a wide participation from below in
all of the tools and techniques of development. Rather
than being a technology which takes attention and
interest away from the inner life, this model would
create an upsurge of moral and spiritual energy.
India now finds itself much further along the
road of industrial development and much more
caught within the whirlpool of modernization than
it was in Greggs day of course. There are still many
villages where the constructive program has taken
root and continues to develop, but there are also many
villages ravished by the industrial system and its
extensions. The power of the cities continues to
exercise a devastating drain on youth in search of new
possibilities. While at the same time, the cities
themselves become less and less habitable, less
amenable to the human being and spirit. The search
for a balance point between local community and the
nation state, which inspired both Gregg and Gandhi,
has become mired in a corrupt system of party politics
that uses caste, religion and class indifferently to stir
emotions and preserve its power. India has produced
a small but successful middle class and an elite cadre
of highly trained specialists in a variety of areas, but
the economy and the educational system still only work
for the few, and the vast majority are left to their
own devices with a failing infrastructure. Even the
hope that the economy and the GDP will raise the
ship for more people in India is now met with
cynicism. Meanwhile in many small pockets, the
traditional society of India survives and even thrives
and with the help of dedicated activist groups searches

for a new path forward and a new point of balance

despite the indifference of the nation state.
We might ask whether Gandhis alternative,
constructive program as detailed here has an
application outside the context for which it was
developed, namely, rural India with its particular
conditions and possibilities. Certainly since that time,
many people in the west have sought to develop and
transplant the program or at least elements of it into
the industrialized world. Most notable, perhaps is the
work of E.F. Schumacher, in Small is Beautiful:
Economics as if People Mattered. It has
continued to inspire activists around the developed
world, as have many of the Gandhian principles
nonviolence, local autonomy, self-reliance. There is a
still strong cadre of activists committed to organic
farming and small- scale, local food production. A
movement pioneered by Richard B Gregg. There is
also a movement of voluntary simplicity of which
Gregg was also the pioneer. Finally there is a
global ecological- environmental movement
awakened by the crisis of climate change and species
devastation. It has had some significant impact even
among those who manage the market economy. We
all await the outcome of this struggle with vital
interest. All of these movementsalong with
social activist movements within Indiahave been
greatly enhanced through being connected via
digital communications systems. Those systems, in
many fundamental ways have begun to revise the
meanings of and relations between local, national and
international. It remains to be seen whether this new
network of international concern and activism will be
able to lead the way in the search for a radically
different socio-political order. Equally pressing as is
the way toward a new sociopolitical order, is the
need to conceive it, to re- conceive an authentically
human way of life on the planet. In that regard,
Gandhis programme and Greggs restatement of it
remain a significant starting- point.
It is perhaps appropriate to end by echoing
again Greggs clear vision of the path laid out for
the Gandhian activist:

The follower of Gandhis programme

does not have to wait for a large-scale
revolution; that person starts one inside
themselves and carries it out with their
own hands. Such a person immediately
starts controlling their share of the means
of production for the public good. They
immediately start to serve the masses and
by their life help to bring an ideal India
nearer to being.
Afterword: The Hidden Heritage of
Richard
B. Gregg
Richard B Gregg was a pioneer in
many ways, deep and thoughtful ways,
ways which involved the slow and
authentic path of experience and selftransformation. In a minor key, it could be
said that he echoed the more dramatic
path of Gandhi, and that his life was his
work. His thoughtful and very critical
account of the political forms of the world
shows at each step the confidence and
clarity of a man who has found his path,
who knows his way along it and who
concerns himself to light a way for others.
Gregg found that path with some intense
personal
effort
and
self-discipline,
through the trial of separating himself
from his world of privilege and venturing,
alone, into another culture, another world
in the midst of its own maelstrom of
self-transformation. At each step, he
showed himself to be open and willing to
learn in the deepest sense, while also
concerned to walk with others, to share
their hopes and possibilities, to work
together for a human future that would
include everyone. This deeply-rooted
practical idealism, was also an echo of
what he found in Gandhi, it seems to me
and it made him something more than a
disciple, something more like a companion
from another world and another time.
Gregg
spent
his
later
years
attempting to develop this practical
idealism, and to fi nd companionship in

it. His attempt led to further explorations,

and further steps with those who were
trying to take first steps in the direction of
another kind of life. There was his lifelong
commitment to
the new notion of
organic farming, for example,

something inspired by his time in India

with Gandhi and then reinvented in
the context of North Americawhich
was at the time beginning its long
attachment to processed foods. Gregg
spent several years with his friends
Helen and Scott Nearing learning to do
this kind of farming and one of his last
written works (1966) was a book on
the
art
of
companion
planting
(Companion Plants and How to Use Them (with
Helen Philbrick, The Devin-Adair Company,
Publisher). He also continued to travel to
India after Gandhis death, attending
the world pacifist conference there in
1949 and then, after he had left the
farm in 1956, when he went to teach
Gandhian Economics in South India at a
training center for Indian social workers
(the school of G. Ramachandran) .
When he returned to the US, he became
involved in the newly evolving movement
for civil rights for black people, led by
Martin Luther King Jr. Gregg met King in
February at a War Resisters League
Annual Dinner. King spoke at the event,
his speech largely paraphrasing Greggs
arguments from The Power of Non-Violence.

King left for India the next day with a list

of people to visit provided by Gregg. He
was a participant in Kings later effort to
teach nonviolent resistance to people in
his movement at the First Southwide
Institute on Nonviolent Resistance to
Segregation, at Spelman College in
Atlanta.
Still
later
he
became
involved in the beginnings of the
peace movement that would develop
in the US around the Viet Nam war. He
continued to write, to attempt to expand
and expound his ideas of Gandhian
activism right up unto his death in 1974.
Gregg was a self-taught man in many
senses (despite his law degree from
Harvard). He ventured into thinking on his
own (along with reading widely) in the new
areas to which his commitments led him.
In doing so, he often showed a quality of
self-reliance and conviction that would
have baffled the professional. As he said
himself, The highly specialized training
and firmly established habits of thought of
professional people often stunt their
imagination and blind them to existing
possibilities.

and[often] the thinking of the experts and

leaders has not been valid (The Self, 12).
This quality can be described as a
beginners mind as one Zen master
called it (Shunryu Suzuki). It was in this
spirit that Gregg set out to articulate his
own broad vision of a wholistic spiritual
life, one which he believed was in
fundamental accord with the deeper
meaning of both science and modernity.
He did this, not with the indifference of
the charlatan, but rather with the passion
of one who believed that the ideas and
ideologies of the world as it was were
being used to exploit and enslave people.
His passion was a true measure of his
compassion just as his idealism was the
measure of his thinking. It is uplifting to
dialogue with such a being, to discover his
hidden heritage.
List of Works Cited
Gregg, Richard B. The Self Beyond the
Lippincott, NY, 1956.

Yourself.

______________. My Memories of Gandhi. 1948.

Typewritten available at Thoreau Institute
online at Walden.org.
. The Value of Voluntary
Simplicity, 1936. Available at DuaneElgin.com.

_____________. Which Way Lies Hope? An

Examination of Capitalism, Communism,
Socialism and Gandhijis Programme. Navijivan
Publishing House, Ahmedabad. 1956.
. The Power of Nonviolence. Pierides
Press, 2008. Kindle Edition, 2013.
Kosek, Joseph Kip. Richard Gregg, Mohandas
Gandhi and the Struggle of Nonviolence
Journal of American History. March 2005,
1318-1348.
Mignolo, Walter. The Idea of Latin America.
Blackwell Publishing, 2005.
Nandy, Ashis. The Intimate Enemy. Loss and
Recovery of Self Under Colonialism. Oxford,
UP, 2008.
________ . Ambiguous Journey to the City. The
Village and other Odd Ruins of Self in Indian
Imagination, Oxford, India, 2007.
Niedzwiecki, Hal. Trees on Mars. Our Obsession
with the Future, Seven Stories Press, Ny, 2015.
Shiva, Vandana, The Green Revolution in
Punjab in The Ecologist, Vol 21, 1991.
Wooding, John, Richardgregg.org. Consulted JanMarch, 2016.

centralization, efficiency, and

secularity?
6. What three elements make up the
spiritual for
7. Gregg? Contrast this idea with the
idea of religion.
From Capitalism

Questions for Discussion:

From A Critical Introduction
1. What is the alternative to a
technological rush to the future?
2. What four personal qualities did
Gregg bring to his study of India?
3. Why is dialogue with the past
important?
4. What made Greggs approach
wholistic?
5. Describe the four main political
issues identified in Greggs
approach.
6. Why was the nation state connected
to violence and structural violence?
And what was Greggs alternative to
it?
7. How did Gregg see science fitting in
to a wholistic perspective?
8. What made the Gandhian approach
to politics revolutionary?
From Introduction: Seven Dangers
1. Explain Greggs Seven Dangers in
your own words. What dangers
would you add to this list from your
time?
2. What is the difference between the
firs three dangers and the last four?
3. What context would we use to
describe the dangers of soil erosion
and overpopulation now?
4. How does Gregg explain the
relations between the problems of
violence and unequal power and the
modern nation state?
5. What principles does Gregg oppose
to the the modern principles of

1. Capitalism is the alliance of what

three things?
2. Capitalism is self-defeating because it
lacks a certain kind of principlewhat
is that?
3. What kind of social order is created by
Capitalism? Give five characteristics.
4. What are the effects of militarism?
5. Explain Greggs account of the
suicidal character of capitalism.
6. What reforms have occurred in
capitalism since Greggs time?

7. Explain the role of consumption and

needs in Capitalism.
From Communism
1. Name three exciting new ideas
proposed by Ccommunism.
2. How does Communism replace the
role of religion?
3. Why is Marxs theory of perception
and matter no longer scientific?
4. Explain the idea of dialectical
materials applied to human history.
5. Why is violence an essential part of
Communism?
From Socialism
1. What is the difference between
socialism and Communism?
2. What is the difference in the role of
the individual in Communism and
Socialism on the one hand, and
Gandhis approach on the other?
From The Indian Governments Proposal
1. What is wrong with mechanized
farming?
2. Why should industrialization be
limited?

3. Explain the limiting functions of solar

energy?
From Gandhis Proposal
1. What new factors in Indias history is
Gandhis economic programmer
intended to address?
2. Gregg lists 21 elements in Gandhis
constructive programme. Are all
these elements still important in
India today?
3. How does Gandhis programme
address the village/rural character of
India?
4. Explain the essential difference
between Gandhi's programme and
the programmes of capitalism and
communism.
5. Why does Gandhi take the view of
technology that he does? What are
the dangers of technology?
6. How does Gandhi's programme
make the inner world and morality
important to political life?
7. When does the revolution of the
Gandhian programme begin and
how?

From Afterword
1. How has Gandhis constructive
programme been influential in the
west?
2. Why is being self-taught and an
independent thinker important?