Monday, March 08, 2010

Gandhi's tactics: use media, the law, Christianity and British fairness to aid India's cause

Gandhi attacked his various causes - Home Rule, the caste system, poverty, Muslim-Hindu conflict - with a variety of approaches:

1. He used the world media quite well. NYTimes reporters frequently covered his activities and movie news cameras found him a good subject. He knew that world opinion mostly favored the underdog.

2. With his background as a lawyer trained in London, Gandhi knew how to use the British legal system to his advantage.

3. The principles of Christianity called for fair treatment of minorities, he realized.

4. The British sense of democracy and general fairness could be applied to the plight of the people of India.

Later these tactics would be used by Both Martin Luther King, Jr, in the US Civil Rights protest and by Nelson Mandela in the struggle for indigenous people's rights in South Africa.