Politics, ethics and the self: re-reading Gandhi's Hind Swaraj

Cover -- Half Title -- Title -- Copyright -- Contents -- List of contributors -- Acknowledgements -- Introduction -- Part 1 The truncated ethic of modern civilization -- 1 The originality of Hind Swaraj -- 2 Gandhi and the debate about civilization -- 3 English rule without the Englishman: citizenship, subalternity, and Gandhi's 'reader' -- 4 Reflections on Gandhi's anti-modernism -- 5 Hind Swaraj: a historical necessity -- 6 On the normative structure of Gandhian thought: with special reference to Hind Swaraj -- Part 2 Empire, politics, and violence -- 7 Empire and violence, or the foes in Hind Swaraj -- 8 Political self-rule: Gandhi and the future of democracy -- 9 Politics and violence: Gandhi's ambivalence to democracy -- 10 A nationalism open towards the world -- Part 3 Colonization of minds -- 11 Learning from the South: Gandhi and intercultural translation -- 12 Beyond decolonizing knowledge: revisiting the Svaraj in ideas debate -- 13 Gandhi and political praxis of Educational reconstruction, 1909-1938 -- Part 4 Cultivating self -- 14 Could Hind Swaraj presuppose a theory of judgment? -- 15 Gandhi: calling to non-violence joined by a strong pragmatism -- 16 Afterlife of a text: Hind Swaraj and the Chhattisgarh Mukti Morcha -- 17 Sheherezade and Hind Swaraj -- 18 Gandhi's Twin fasts and the possibility of non-violence -- Part 5 How to read Hind Swaraj -- 19 Reading Hind Swarajya/Swaraj in two languages -- Index.

How do emotions mobilise in politics? How do they frame ideologies? Broadly focusing on these questions, this book explains the role emotions play in Indian politics and the part they played in the aftermath of the 2019 general elections. It traces the consolidation of the Right in India and highlights the reasons for its electoral successes with a focus on the interplay between ethics and emotions such as fear, anxiety, guilt, shame, anger, hatred, betrayal, and violence. At the same time, it traces the changing dynamic in the way we think about politics and analyses the failure of liberal democratic institutions to make space for emotions in politics and political motivations. An accessible and essential guide to understanding contemporary India, this book will be of great interest to scholars and researchers of politics, especially governance and political theory, as well as South Asian studies.

"Hind Swaraj by Mahatma Gandhi is arguably the greatest text to have emerged from the anti-colonial movement in India and the first to seriously challenge the cultural and civilizational premises of the colonizers' mentality. It is also the first text in India that falls within the broad tradition of modern political philosophy, advancing a complex cluster of theses with conceptual sensitivity, analytical precision, and sustained argument. This book critically engages with Hind Swaraj and explores the fascinating and subtle dialogue set up by Gandhi between the characters of the reader and the editor. With essays from leading contemporary thinkers on Gandhi, the volume looks at themes such as Gandhi on epistemic servitude, decolonization and intercultural translation; his complex critique of modern civilization, his views on the empire; democracy, citizenship and violence; the normative structure of Gandhian thought; Gandhi and the political praxis of educational reconstruction and how to read this text. An important intervention in Gandhian studies, this book will be useful for scholars and researchers of peace studies, political philosophy, Indian philosophy, Indian political thought, political sociology, and South Asian studies"--