Indian-Nordic Encounters 1917-2006 - Det danske Fredsakademi

such popular based public spaces as Folket i Bild soon had great economic difficulties and
was sold to the commercial publisher Bonniers who turned it into a magazine with half
pornographic content. The new horizontal action group organisation had yet not received any
wider support and in the pacifist magazine there was a warning for using this kind of method
to receive attention.
In this climate Swedish politicians took the lead in recognising the right for colonialised
peoples to liberate themselves in the case of Algeria. But so far it was only in words. The
World citizen movement was also involved but more directly. Inge Oskarsson went to Alger
and smuggled 52 French deserters out of Algeria at great risks. New forms of organisation
emerged of self-selected intellectuals that excluded communists for tactical reasons and even
liberals who had participated in international Peace committee manifestations, which to a high
degree were under communist influence. 1958 the Action group against Swedish Atomic
bomb presented itself to the public. Its two goals were to prevent Swedish defence to include
atomic weapons and to discuss ”the possibilities of using the resources, which now is being
used for military purposes, for constructive purposes.” This new form released a lot of
political potential during two years and paved together with the Social democratic women the
way for a Swedish no to the atomic bomb thus becoming the first country with the potential of
getting the bomb and abstaining from it.
In Denmark there lacked the kind of small but crucial activist movement that used all of the
Gandhian methods and perspectives. Instead the interest was separated in different fragments.
Sara Mathai Stinus from India felt that people could come up to her in the street and admiring
her for coming from the country of Gandhi, but it was in an almost exotic fashion among
followers of the once pacifist Radical Left Party, a non-socialist liberal party were Ellen
Hørup and her writings in Politiken had made strong impressions once upon a time. Political
action to address current themes was not the issue here. To some the liberation of Algeria was
an important issue among people feeling that something had to be done. But in Denmark in
contrast to Sweden this resulted in a trotskyist socialist organisation setting up a weapon
factory to support the liberation front with some key material for their military struggle. The
strongest link to political action was within the pacifist movement and especially the radical
pacifist movement Aldrig mere krig (Never more war) with many consciousness objectors in
their ranks. But the dominating philosophy here was rather the individualistic appeal to the
individual moral by Tolstoy who also once inspired Gandhi. This rather than the Gandhian
mass movement opposing imperialism in its different forms was the main current among the
most radical core of the pacifist movement contrary to Sweden were a constructive
programme to end starvation and support development in the third world by abolishing
military expenditure was the strategy.
Four Gandhian and Indian influences changing Nordic countries
What would bring mass participation to new popular movements in all Nordic countries were
four Gandhian and Indian inspirations simultaneously being introduced in a large scale. These
inspirations came directly or through African liberation movements often using the same kind
of liberation methods and inspired by Gandhi and the Indian liberation movement. Especially
ANC in South Africa and the liberation movements in Ghana and Northern Rhodesia/Zambia
used mass civil disobedience and nonviolence in their struggle for freedom.
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