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“Violent and nonviolent action may also be differentiated in terms of their relation to a third construct, power. Scholars have traditionally emphasized power over and equate violence with power. However, others emphasize power to or power with and differentiate violence from power. The twentieth-century political theorist Hannah Arendt, for example, suggests that rather than being an extreme manifestation of power, violence is the antithesis of power. Violence, she argues, may destroy power, but cannot create it. From this perspective, the use of violence indicates a lack of power, while voluntary, cooperative, nonviolent action is an essential indicator of power (Arendt 1970).”
–Kurt Schock, Civil Resistance Today, p. 6
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By: Stephanie Van Hook
Stephanie Van Hook is Executive Director of the Metta Center for Nonviolence.
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Regarding the thoughtful comment by Gene Sharp about the inadequacy of actions that don’t bring about their desired ends, I think he makes a very important point: we who espouse nonviolence can easily deceive ourselves. We are content merely to do the right thing because of our need to feel morally superior. Or we misunderstand the wisdom of detachment from the fruits of our action so that the goal of our action and how we might effectively achieve it receives little or no serious attention. Perhaps there are other explanations.
But my main point is that this passage by Sharp might be more useful if it were followed by a contemporary specific example that makes Sharp’s point more understandable.