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But there is more in Nelson: he doesn't resort to violence or weapons but he just opposes government's stupidity with his intelligence. Here he is really great! Because when governments apply "strong means" it shows only weakness, its inability to support the comparison towards others while closed in its intellectual and moral insufficiency (or, if you like, imbecility!). I think that Nelson Mandela is this: simply an intelligence that understands other's limits, make limits obvious in order to get over them and has the will to stretch out an helping hand towards those who need it. In this way politics comes second, but only to be a means to overcome an oppressive and racist model realising that this model hides someone's concern to maintain his status. So Mandela has never frightened his enemy with threatening speeches or by praising violence and in this way is evidently similar to Gandhi. In fact he explained his Defiance Campaign while maintaining dialog with the government. He would have accepted a gradual admittance of black people in public institutions, in order to protect grants and rights of white community because, as himself writes: "The Gandhian influence dominated freedom struggles on the African continent right up to the 1960s because of the power it generated and the unity it forged among the apparently powerless. ... I followed the Gandhian strategy for as long as I could, but then there came a point in our struggle when the brute force of the oppressor could no longer be countered through passive resistance alone ... " Well, I do not have the words for this great man I send surfers to his autobiography in AFC's site; linked to this page you will find his Gandhi's biography that contains Mandela's thought about peace and non violence.The liberator of South Africa looks at the seminal work of the liberator of India |
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