Mantena, Karuna. "Another Realism: The Politics of Gandhian Nonviolence". The American Political Science Review, Vol.106, No.2 (2012): 455-470.

Mantena, Karuna. "Another Realism: The Politics of Gandhian Nonviolence". The American Political Science Review, Vol.106, No.2 (2012): 455-470.

• Political realism typically entails a belief that politics intrinsically contains violence and conflict, and that theories which do not recognize and account for these factors are naive and idealistic. This perception has created two strands of realist thought, the brutal realpolitik which embraces violence, and the sober realism of Hobbes and Burke, which still contains morals and hope, but has balanced these by accounting for  a depressing view of human nature (455).
• The author believes that Gandhi's perceptions of the role of violence within politics falls within this tradition of moderating realism, because it too views political violence as a negative phenomenon, yet tries to create change through the prevention of harms, rather than the promotion of ideals (455).
• Dr. Mantena believes that this paper is published at a time when a call for a new form of realism is growing stronger in academic, as critiques are raised not only against impractical idealism in general, but also that the contemporary idealism defined by Rawls views political philosophy as an extension of moral philosophy to the degree that information about political realities is ignored or superseded by theory (456).
• Huge source mine on page 456 of scores of academics carping about the threat of the ivory tower and the about how modern philosophy and political theory entirely ignores or evades communication with politics.
• Dr. Mantena suggests that Gandhi's writing on political non-violence provides a solution to the present issue facing academic political theory because it combines a recognition of human tendencies towards conflict and political violence, a theory of action -- satyagraha -- that attempts to mitigate these negative attributes, and transcends the traditional conservative narratives associated with moderating realism (457).
• Gandhi differed significantly from other moralist thinkers because he focuses not on the ideal end results of political action, but on the perfection and improvement of the methods of political action (457). This focus saves Gandhian philosophy from both the outbreak of coercion and violence in implementation -- as occurred to achieve the idealism of Marx -- and the polarization that results from ends-based idealism (458).
• Gandhi's philosophy avoids some of the pitfalls in other idealist work, namely because, unlike other idealists who ignore political processes and how implementation may affect their theories, Gandhi accounts for the violence and conflict and politics and specifically created his means-based theory to alleviate these dangers (459).
• The traditional understandings of himsa and ahimsa within Hindu, Buddhist, and Jain tradition is focused on preventing loss of life through inaction. The most committed Jains will not only strain their water to prevent killing microscopic organisms, but try to limit their action and impact on the world in general (459).
• Gandhi totally upended these traditional interpretation of ahimsa as a passive philosophy, by essentially creating his own philosophical interpretation an an outwardly directed ahimsa (459). This new version of ahimsa was inspired by a broad of reading of himsa to include structural violence which he believed to be institutionalized within the Western state, meaning that ahimsa was the opposite of this intrinsically violent and coercive form of politics (460).
• To Gandhi, violence was both a poor tool for accomplishing change and demonstrated a profound hubris on the part of those who used it. Firstly, violence -- even in minor forms like legal coercion -- incited negative feelings in those subjected to it, leaving the way open for a cycle of violence to continue. Secondly, the permanent nature of violence means that one needs absolute belief in rightness to perpetrate it, something Gandhi believes to be impossible (460).
• The procedures of political action affect the attitudes of others towards it, meaning that violent or oppressive actions breed violent responses and negative societal attitudes, leading to a tendency for conflict to escalate rather than resolve. Gandhi believes that attachment to principles or ideologies exacerbates this antagonism and thus argues for the centrality of compromise and calm in political action (461). 
• The solution for this danger as provided by Gandhi is the centrality of satyagraha in all political actions. This concept frames politics as a search for truth, which one can never be absolutely certain of realizing, meaning that humility and recognition of the possibility of other 'truths' are important elements of just political action (463).
• All political action, even organization with nonviolent intentions, is prone to violence and escalation (461). Gandhi was aware of this danger, especially represented by the threat of a nonviolent mass transforming into a violent mob and escalating the situation. His theory specifically establishes measures to avoid these scenarios (462).
• The emphasis on humility, self-doubt, and willingness to suffer for one's beliefs without inflicting harm on others effectively counter the potential pitfalls which Gandhi observes in modern politics, because it resists escalation by placing any harm on oneself and allows for reasoning with other viewpoints (463).
• Contrary to the author's framing on the issue, Gandhi rejected the dichotomy of focus between means and ends. While his philosophy is dominated by stress on the proper conduct in the means of political action, Gandhi believed that truly positive ends could only result from just methods, and thus argued that a world with only just political methods would also be the perfect outcome of those methods (462). 
• Gandhi believed that his political method of satyagraha was more effective than other forms of political action because it did not only work on a rhetorical level, but an emotional level. Rather than seeking to prove the correctness of a viewpoint, the practice of satyagraha is intended to covert someone to your point of view by a display of your willingness to suffer for what you believe to be right (463).
• "These moral virtues [...] functioned as distinctly political dispositions on which the success (and not just the moral legitimacy) of nonviolent action depended. That is, the imperative for detached and disciplined action was not just a way to assert the legitimacy or authenticity of the political act nor a sign of the ethical purity of the actor but also a key determinant of the anticipated efficacy of nonviolent action. [...] In the context of the theory and practice of nonviolence, the formulation and defense of purity and selflessness, as well as suffering, detachment, humility, and discipline, were avowedly political" (464).
• The central content of a realist position of politics is that context is an essential and determinative starting point for any political judgement, whereas idealism may often ignore or subordinate context to moral theoretical parameters. Whereas others have used this argument of context to justify moral relativism, Gandhi creates moral parameters to be applied to various contexts, through the development of satyagraha as a method of political action (464).
• Gandhi himself provides for two separate versions of satyagraha which could be applied to different political scenarios: destructive and constructive. Destructive satyagraha revolves around civil disobedience and placing oneself in an antagonistic position towards the existing authorities to demonstrate conviction, whereas constructive satyagraha was the institution of new systems of existence and governance based on swaraj and expressive of one's beliefs -- these included both home-spun cloth campaigns to promote autonomy and friendship between castes and faiths (465).
• The acts entailed in constructive satyagraha were the expression of the new systems of non-oppressive, non-coercive, and non-violent governance which Gandhi sought to promote. They were the implementation of one's beliefs and stressed the same forms of voluntary conduct -- represented by Gandhi's suggestion that religious unity should be begun by individual acts of respect without expectation of reciprocation from the other group, such as Muslims unilaterally banning cow slaughter as a good will gesture (466).
• Although the mass work stoppages and civil disobedience which Gandhi recommended his followers practice did exert economic and social pressure on colonial authorities, Gandhi argued that these actions were not coercive because they did not act against the colonist. Rather than working against the occupier, Gandhi described these actions as simply refusing to assist in the oppressive systems -- hopefully impressing and converting the oppressor in the process (467).
• The most coercive tool of Gandhi's acceptable methods of political action was the fast, which he only sought to use at last resort, but did indeed use in a political manner. Importantly, Gandhi never fasted against the British Empire or in a coercive way to force a change in British policy, rather he said that his fasts were to remind his disloyal followers of sympathy and compassion by guilt-tripping them (468).
• All realist theory to some extent looks at the actual interactions between people in the real world and the psychology of politics, including Gandhi's focus on how selfishness, fear, and pride shape current modes of political action. Separate from previous realist thinkers, however, Gandhi's rejection of institutional reform and focus on moral and behavioral changes which can allow for improved political outcomes diverges from the conservatism of most realist thinkers and thus allows for new conceptions of political morality to compete with contemporary liberalism (468).