| |
| |
You are here: Frontpage > Issues > 2445 >
|
|
Prison and nonviolent Struggle
Editor
Timed to coincide with the annual Prisoners for
Peace list and associated articles, Peace News takes a look at
prison and nonviolent struggle.
Not only because nonviolent activists and war resisters frequently end up in prison—and have to
continue their struggle while inside - but also because the core issues of
prison poses many conceptual
challenges to nonviolence, challenges which we also feel we have failed to address adequately in this
issue.
What is in there then? So, having lowered your expectations,
let's have a look at what is inside - perhaps we sold ourselves short! In
the cover story Simo Hellsten looks at a specific symbolic action
to liberate an imprisoned total objector from a Finnish prison (p27). This
is one of the many and varied ways nonviolent activists, both in and out
of prison can deal with their - or their comrades - imprisonment. Do we
accept the prison sentence and try to change the "oppressors" by
reaching their heart, as Gandhi suggested? Or do we highlight the
injustice of our imprisonment, through a wide range of actions, and try to
continue our resistance in prison?
Taking action in prison
Jyotibhai Desai, a Gandhian activist from India, looks at the
positive aspects of prison and shows
examples of Gandhians being imprisoned and of working with prisoners, with a touching tale of things
coming full cycle in Indian prisons (p26). Angie Zelter (p28) tells
empowering stories of continuing
resistance in prison, both at home (in Britain) and abroad - not just of
resisting the prison system, but
of continuing to struggle for the cause that lead to imprisonment in the first place. And Janet Kilburn
asks, how much should and do we contribute to our own incarceration? In contributing to the
functioning of the prison system, through working in prison, or complying with the often ludicrous and
bureaucratic prison system - a system designed to dis-empower - how much
do we expand the prison
into our own mind, how much do we remain in control of our situation?
The psychological impact
Turkish activist Coskun Üsterzi was imprisoned for almost 12 years
in Turkey, and later supported the
Turkish conscientious objector, Osman Murat Ülke, when he was imprisoned. Andreas Speck talks
with him about his experiences of prison, taking solidarity actions, the Turkish hunger strike, and his
personal path to nonviolence (p20). Continuing the theme of the psychological impact of prison - on
both the individual and society - Roberta Bacic looks at the difficult and complex relationships
between torturer and victim, and the public acceptance of torture within society (p30).
Matt Meyer links the issue of political prisoners in the United States with the attacks of 11 September
(p22). He raises important and difficult questions for peace activists concerning their attitude towards
political prisoners who were not imprisoned for taking nonviolent action. He asks whether we can, or
should, ignore their inhumane treatment at the hands of a violent, militarist state just because they have
not met our ideals of nonviolence (an issue all too important when we consider the Turkish hunger
strike)?
Writing from her US prison cell, Claire Hanrahan provides us with an insight into the realities and
concerns of women prisoners in Federal prison. Their lack of enthusiasm for the war on Afghanistan -
in spite of TV overdoses - should offer us all some hope.
All prisoners are political!
Prisoners don't just find themselves in prison as a result of committing
crime, or because of their
political struggle. Lots of people end up in prison because they are poor, desperate, seeking numbness
from reality through drugs, or whose behaviour consistently sets them outside of what is expected
within their society. Because of this there is a strong case for arguing that all prisoners are political
prisoners.
Prisoners are also used by governments and guerrillas as bargaining tools in conflict. The treatment of
Basque separatists and Irish Republican prisoners offer good examples of how parties to conflict use
the issue of political prisoners/POWs in negotiating settlements or, conversely, maintaining conflict.
Social problems are reflected in prison and often magnified. It is common knowledge that
proportionately more black people end up in prison than whites, and more youths than adults. Pedro
Enrique Polo Soltero from Gais Antimilitaristas looks at the situation of gay prisoners—what he calls
prisoners of homophile conscience - and links the struggle for gay rights
in prison with the broader
struggle against homophobia, and against militarism.
Six months ago, Peace News looked at the economics of militarism. Continuing with a theme
highlighted in that issue, Tikiri now looks at the economics of the prison system, especially the
increasing use of "e;private"e; prisons. No surprise then that
some
of
the companies involved are all too
familiar to nonviolent activists working against the arms trade and in anti-nuclear campaigns.
What's missing?
So, what is missing in this issue? Well, to be honest quite a lot: issues such as race, class and gender
are touched on by most authors, but none in any detail. A discussion of the specific experience of
women in prison, and a comprehensive explanation of why, where, and how some activists -
particularly ploughshares activists - place prison, philosophically, in their strategies are also absent.
Perhaps most importantly the discussion on alternatives to prison is missing and, perhaps even more
specifically, a coherent argument - from an antimilitarist perspective - for the complete abolition of
notions of state or community inflicted punishments. Although Clara Wichmann argued already in
1919 (p34), that prison doesn't do any good, and is no solution to the problem of crime (and is crime
really the problem?), so far it seems that nonviolent movements have failed to come up with any real
alternatives to prison. So, do we ignore the issue? Is it more comfortable for us to comply with a
system that locks people up? Do we believe that through prison reform something like a "nonviolent"
prison could be developed?
The question of what alternatives there may be to prison is closely linked to the question of what we
believe constitutes justice? Do we consider justice to be done when the perpetrator is locked up behind
bars? What can justice mean if we exclude prison from the answers. A famous antimilitarist slogan
goes "if war is the answer, the question must be fucking
stupid". If the same answer is true for prison,
what then would an intelligent question be?
|
|
|
|
