간디의 시민불복종

Abstract

In this article I tried to articulate the essence of the Gandhian way of civil disobedience and to examine the feasibility of it in the contemporary Korean society. This article deals with how Gandhi identified unjust laws, how he justified the civil disobedience and then some key features in implementing civil disobedience movement, that is, non-violence, self-suffering and mass-participation. In particular the meanings of non-violence and self-suffering are deeply scrutinized for they are thought to be the most important aspects of Gandhian way of civil disobedience. Non-violence means not only no-harm to others but also a positive love to everyone including those who are practicing unjust laws. In non-violent civil disobedience, the protester does not consider the sinners as enemy, nor coerces them to abolish the unjust law forcefully. Instead he only tries to persuade them to follow the ‘truth’ voluntarily. In addition he commits self-suffering, which is intended to purify and strengthen the protester himself and to disturb the moral balance of the sinner. It is not discussed in this article whether the Gandhian way of civil disobedience is recommendable in any society regardless of its socio-historical context. But it is strongly argued that Gandhian way is very useful to fight unjust laws in societies where the ideology of plurality and democracy is dominating. The Korean society is one of them.