Nonviolent Administration

In our contemporary civilization, social order is maintained because disobedience of the law leads to punishment: fines, prison terms, even capital punishment for serious crimes. This arrangement is not without its drawbacks, however. So long as people think they will not ``get caught'' or punished, they may convince themselves that there is nothing to be lost in breaking the law. Have not even many heads of state and of government in various countries attempted to break the law with impunity? Has today's civilization been able to proclaim victory over drug abuse, forced prostitution, smuggling, or environmental crimes? No sooner are new laws enacted than the ``criminals'' find new loopholes. Indeed, so long as we do not get caught or punished, it pays to commit crimes in our civilization.

Is there not a better method of ensuring social order that is based on the application of nonviolent spiritual principles? Both Gandhi and the Bahá'ís believe that a nonviolent, approach to social order is indeed possible. Gandhi explains:

The principles on which a non-violent organization is based are different from and the reverse of what obtains in a violent organization. For instance, in the orthodox army, there is a clear distinction made between an officer and a private. The latter is subordinate and inferior to the former. In a non-violent army, the general is just the chief servant--first among equals. He claims no privilege over or superiority to the rank and file

The second difference between a military organization and a peace organization is that in the former the rank and file have no part in the choice of their general and their officers. These are imposed upon them and enjoy unrestricted power over them. In a non-violent army, the general and the officers are elected or are as if elected when their authority is moral and rests solely on the willing obedience of the rank and file.[22]

It may interest the reader to note that both these principles can be found put into practice in the Bahá'í community. All administrative authority is vested in elected consultative institutions at the local, national, and international levels. Individual members of such bodies have no authority and do not enjoy extra powers, but rather typically consider themselves fortunate to have been chosen to serve.

Regarding nonviolent law enforcement, Gandhi writes further:

I have concluded that even in a non-violent State a police force may be necessary   The police of my conception will, however, be of a wholly different pattern from the present-day force. Its ranks will be composed of believers in non-violence. They will be servants, not masters, of the people. The people will instinctively render them every help, and through mutual co-operation they will easily deal with the ever-decreasing disturbances. The police force will have some kind of arms, but they will be rarely used, if at all. In fact the policemen will be reformers. Their police work will be confined primarily to robbers and dacoits. Quarrels between labour and capital and strikes will be few and far between in a non-violent state, because the influence of the non-violent majority will be so great as to command the respect of the principal elements in society. Similarly there will be no room for communal disturbances.[23]

`Abdu'l-Bahá also addressed the subject of law enforcement:

communities must punish the oppressor, the murderer, the malefactor, so as to warn and restrain others from committing like crimes. But the most essential thing is that the people must be educated in such a way that no crimes will be committed; for it is possible to educate the masses so effectively that they will avoid and shrink from perpetrating crimes, so that the crime itself will appear to them as the greatest chastisement, the utmost condemnation and torment. Therefore, no crimes which require punishment will be committed  

communities are day and night occupied in making penal laws, and in preparing and organizing instruments and means of punishment. They build prisons, make chains and fetters, arrange places of exile and banishment, and different kinds of hardships and tortures, and think by these means to discipline criminals, whereas, in reality, they are causing destruction of morals and perversion of characters. The community, on the contrary, ought day and night to strive and endeavor with the utmost zeal and effort to accomplish the education of men, to cause them day by day to progress and to increase in science and knowledge, to acquire virtues, to gain good morals and to avoid vices, so that crimes may not occur. At the present time the contrary prevails; the community is always thinking of enforcing the penal laws, and of preparing means of punishment, instruments of death and chastisement, places for imprisonment and banishment; and they expect crimes to be committed. This has a demoralizing effect. But if the community would endeavor to educate the masses, day by day knowledge and sciences would increase, the understanding would be broadened, the sensibilities developed, customs would become good, and morals normal; in one word, in all these classes of perfections there would be progress, and there would be fewer crimes. It has been ascertained that among civilized peoples crime is less frequent than among uncivilized--that is to say, among those who have acquired the true civilization, which is divine civilization--the civilization of those who unite all the spiritual and material perfections. As ignorance is the cause of crimes, the more knowledge and science increases, the more crimes will diminish.[24]

See then how wide is the difference between material civilization and divine. With force and punishments, material civilization seeketh to restrain the people from mischief, from inflicting harm on society and committing crimes. But in a divine civilization, the individual is so conditioned that with no fear of punishment, he shunneth the perpetration of crimes, seeth the crime itself as the severest of torments, and with alacrity and joy, setteth himself to acquiring the virtues of humankind, to furthering human progress, and to spreading light across the world.[25]

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