Author: Joseph

Manifesto for a Nonviolent Revolutionary Movement
by Francois de Lucy
Editor’s Preface: Francois de Lucy's "Manifesto" was first published in French, in issue No. 3 of the French Canadian, Montreal journal, Noir et Rouge, October 1970. The police seized the issue, as the article and the journal were thought to be encouraging the radical, Quebec independence movement, Free Quebec. Below are two extracts relating to nonviolent revolutionary change, from War Resistance: Journal of the War Resisters, issue 40, 1972. Please note the archive reference information and acknowledgments at the end. JG
We feel that all individuals who share revolutionary aims but reject the use of violence as a means of expressing their convictions and as a means of action should be brought together in a broad movement to ensure that their ideal will triumph.
A revolutionary defines himself in terms of his determination to radically change the existing order and replace it with a new order he believes to be superior.
A nonviolent person defines himself in terms of his rejection of violence, regardless of the pretext, and especially as a means of changing an established system in order to replace it by another to be established and defended on the same principle.
Thus a nonviolent revolutionary defines himself in terms of both a determination to change the existing order and a rejection of violence.
But the will to change could be destroyed by a rejection of violence if it were not activated by a total commitment, not only to the truth of its objectives but also to the justice and effectiveness of the means chosen to achieve them.
There are many such means, which can be supremely effective, if properly used, both from a strategic and from a tactical viewpoint. But before being translated into action, these nonviolent means must rest on a foundation of strength.
"Strength is the only valid expression of nonviolence." For it must be made clear from the outset that nonviolence has nothing to do with passivity or resignation. Nonviolent revolution has nothing in common with the so-called "quiet revolution".
Nonviolence is not a means of defense. On the contrary it is a method of provocation and combat.
Strength implies numbers. In isolation we can do nothing. According to Gandhi individual nonviolence is the dignified response of the man who refuses to become angry even in the face of aggression. It is the sign of absolute self-possession and great nobility of heart. But, isolated in a hostile or indifferent environment, where he cannot join a party whose aims, ideas and methods of action conform to his ideal, overwhelmed by the immensity of the task to be accomplished, the nonviolent individual is in danger of becoming engulfed by discouragement and skepticism.
That is why it is vital for us to recognize one another and join together.
For it is not easy to be both nonviolent and revolutionary. Nonviolent revolutionary action demands exceptional courage, patience and fearlessness. It also requires a greater spirit of sacrifice and discipline, greater imagination and intelligence than violent action. These qualities can only be acquired through practice and by example. It is easier to teach a terrorist sabotage than to provide the psychological preparation for a nonviolent leadership, and to train them in the methods of nonviolent action.
"The nonviolent revolutionary can be certain of victory if he has conquered his own fear," said Gandhi.
That is one of the reasons why most of the young leaders and activists of today's revolutionary movements (Black Power, Free Quebec) began by being nonviolent but were unable to remain so. They naturally attempt to justify their abandonment of nonviolence in terms of the ineffectiveness of the nonviolent direct method of action, its slowness and the limited nature of the results obtained through its use. But they never applied it in depth.
In reality these men were never convinced practitioners of nonviolence. Nor was their aim revolution but rather seizure of power. They were interested in changing the hierarchical form of society rather than its actual structure.
Nonviolence was never an end for them, but only a means: a means which they saw fit to use in certain specific tactical circumstances but which formed no part of their strategy, their aims or their deepest convictions.
From the point of view of tactics, the aim of many revolutionary actions is the conquest and maintenance of power; for us, on the other hand, from the strategic viewpoint, the ultimate objective being the radical transformation of the established order, it is not a question of seizing the State as a means of transforming society but of transforming society so that it may eventually do without the State.
A violent revolution can only set up an even more violent order than that which it overthrows. It can only maintain itself by increased violence and repression. Violence can never be conquered by means of violence since it continuously feeds on itself . . .
The time has come for man to free himself from the religious and social sophisms, which chain him down and to find the real meaning of life and human values.
The time has come for man to finally take up the way of liberation, the enlightened way of nonviolence.
This is the only way by which man will one day be able to free himself from his instincts of possession, domination, and violence, which may tomorrow lead to his total self-destruction.
This is the only way in which the new humanism of Peace, Freedom, Love and Brotherhood, which we passionately seek, can be achieved.
We are convinced that it will be thanks to nonviolence that one day the sun will rise on a world without racism, without frontiers, without slaves and masters, without anger and hatred, on the truly socialist world for which we are struggling.
It is to this great combat that we call you. If you feel that it is a valid struggle and you feel strong enough to join in it,
RISE UP AND COME JOIN US!
Reference: IISG/WRI Archive Box 122: Folder 2, Subfolder 2. We are grateful to WRI/London and their director Christine Schweitzer for their cooperation in our WRI project.
https://www.wri-irg.org/
Caption
Poster illustration courtesy ustpaul.ca/