Revolutionary Patterns

[wm]

Not trying to pick a fight, just honestly curious what you folks think....

Would the independence of India under Gandhi's non-violence principles be considered a revolution? If not, then what would it be called?

I think the most expansive definition of a political revolution would be the change of a regime by other than the normally constituted means. For example, most countries do not recognize a military takeover of the goverment, or coup d'etat, as a "constitutional" action. This need not mean that a coup is illegitimate, just not constitutional. If a given instance of a coup is non-constitutional, then that coup is within the class of revolutionary things. (I can imagine states where the coup is the normally accepted way of regime change. In fact, I think that this was the approved way of changing leadership among the Mongols.)

Compare and contrast this with a rebellion. A rebellion is simply an unwillingness to follow the accepted/legitimate authority. Rebellion need not be violent. Rosa Park's refusal to move to the back of the bus is an example of non-violent rebellion, as is the civil disobedience of Thoreau (not paying his taxes) and Gandhi.

When rebellions against state authority succeed, we tend to call them revolutions. When they fail, we continue to denominate them as rebellions, e.g., the Boxer Rebellion in China, the Whiskey Rebellion in the US. Had the forces of George III won the day in the 1770s in North America, we would have had an American Rebelllion, not an American Revolution.

I guess this is a long way around to saying that Gandhi lead a successful rebellion against British authority in India ; hence, his actions constituted a revolution.

[jastay3]

I think the most expansive definition of a political revolution would be the change of a regime by other than the normally constituted means. For example, most countries do not recognize a military takeover of the goverment, or coup d'etat, as a "constitutional" action. This need not mean that a coup is illegitimate, just not constitutional. If a given instance of a coup is non-constitutional, then that coup is within the class of revolutionary things. (I can imagine states where the coup is the normally accepted way of regime change. In fact, I think that this was the approved way of changing leadership among the Mongols.)

Compare and contrast this with a rebellion. A rebellion is simply an unwillingness to follow the accepted/legitimate authority. Rebellion need not be violent. Rosa Park's refusal to move to the back of the bus is an example of non-violent rebellion, as is the civil disobedience of Thoreau (not paying his taxes) and Gandhi.

When rebellions against state authority succeed, we tend to call them revolutions. When they fail, we continue to denominate them as rebellions, e.g., the Boxer Rebellion in China, the Whiskey Rebellion in the US. Had the forces of George III won the day in the 1770s in North America, we would have had an American Rebelllion, not an American Revolution.

I guess this is a long way around to saying that Gandhi lead a successful rebellion against British authority in India ; hence, his actions constituted a revolution.

I'm don't think Ghandi would qualify as "non-violent". He was threatening the disruption of public order and a threat is inately violent(like holding a baseball bat over someone's head but not hitting him is violent).
Besides the Partition Riots were certainly very violent.

[tequila]

Gandhi never incited violence against the British. He did incite civil disobedience. When the "non-cooperation" campaign accelerated and threatened to upsurge into violent resistance against the British in the 1920s, Gandhi cancelled the campaign.

Gandhi was always against Partition and certainly against sectarian violence. He did not attend the Independence celebration because he was attempting to stop another outbreak of such violence in Calcutta. A Hindu nationalist fanatic murdered Gandhi because of his determination in trying to bring India and Pakistan closer together after Partition.