Gandhi's Way:

A Handbook of Conflict Resolution, Updated with a New Preface and New Case
Study
 by Mark Jurgensmeyer

Mahatma Gandhi, or Mohandas

Karamchand Gandhi. Born on October
2, 1869, in Porbandar, India, and died
on January 30, 1948, in Delhi. He was
an Indian lawyer, interested in politics,
and a social activist who became the
figurehead of the Indian independence
movement against the British colony.
Gandhi is universally known for his
teaching of non-violence resistance
notion also known as “Satyagraha.”
In the first section of the book, the
writer explains the basic idea of
Gandhian method in solving conflicts
in what it is like to be called”
SATYAGRAHA” or "the truth force.”
The word satyagraha itself is a
combination of two words:” Satya”
which means the truth, and” Agraha”
which means clinging or holding on to.
In other words, it means holding on to
the truth. According to Gandhi:
SATYAGRAHA is the idea of solving
struggles and conflicts with no
violence and no force using only
persuading following these steps: recognizing the truthful and untruthful elements in
each side, putting the truthful elements from each side together, forming a new side and
adopting it while struggling with your opponent, then ending the struggle only when both
sides agree to occupy the same side.
The second section of the book shows a lot of case study examples; for instance, the
first case study was about endangered employees in which the struggle was the effect
that an organizational change will have on employees; it ended with the agreement of
the owner to let the workers restructure the place wanted by the owner. Moreover, the
second one was about the political future of Northern Ireland concerning the Catholics
and the protestants to determine the political and religious identity of the country; it
ended in a peaceful way thanks to the Good Friday agreement, which established an
end to the Irish terrorism, and protected both opponent's interests.
The closing section of the book puts in contrast both Gandhi and other thinkers and
scholars by putting them to the test in answering some issues such as: the first issue
was “Can violence ever be justified? “, in which Gandhi was disagreeing with the
famous economist Karl Marx who defends violence as the engine of history; in other
meaning, to continue the cycle of history, violence should be involved whereas Gandhi
defends the idea of non-violence as the key to all the problems. In addition, the second
issue was “Can anger be true? “, which is where Gandhi challenges the famous
psychologist Sigmund Freud who supports the idea that anger is like any feeling or
emotion when in fact Gandhi upholds to the non-violence idea since the feeling of anger
leads to violence.