The Power of Hope

Thoughts on Peace and Human Rights in the Third Millennium

Daisaku Ikeda, Adolfo Perez Esquivel

• Publisher: I.B. Tauris
• Year: 2021
• ISBN:
  9780755606429
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Politics & International Relations
• Subtopic: Human Rights
• Index: Politics & International Relations

Human history has been marked by the great number of people born into conditions of war, violence, oppression and social exclusion. But at the same time, this history has been shaped by the long struggle for human rights and the people who have committed themselves to the practices of solidarity and nonviolence. The Power of Hope: Thoughts on Peace and Human Rights in the Third Millennium is a dialogue between two high-profile activists and thinkers who discuss the concrete ways we can shift to a world that prioritises justice and human dignity. Adolfo Pérez Esquivel - Argentinian human rights activist and winner of the 1980 Nobel Peace Prize - played a vital role in resisting military dictatorship and was arrested and tortured under the Argentine militarist government. Daisaku Ikeda is a peacebuilder, Buddhist philosopher, educator, author and poet as well as being the founding president of Soka Gakkai International (SGI), the world's largest Buddhist lay organisation. Their dialogue intertwines their rich personal experiences in the struggle for human rights with wider reflections on how to make the Third Millennium the millennium of peace. The book combines rich accounts of Latin America under the brutality of the 1970s military regimes; insights from the Buddhist faith on the role of meditation for human rights activists; recognition of the crucial role of women in the practice of nonviolence; thoughts on international geopolitics and the legacies of Hiroshima; and discussion of the perilous role of globalisation in the loss of identities and ethical values.

ONE

The Struggle for Human Rights—A Story of Glorious Triumph

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Bringing an End to the Suffering of the People

Ikeda: I greatly respect people who stand up for the dignity of humanity and strive to reform our times through concrete actions.

You are such a person, and one of the precious treasures of our world.

Refusing to be defeated by the relentless oppression of a military dictatorship, you have remained true to your belief in justice. At the risk of your very life, you have exerted the most strenuous efforts for the sake of peace. Your life sends forth a ray of courage and hope for humanity.

That is why I am delighted to have this opportunity to engage in this dialogue with you.

Esquivel: As am I, President Ikeda. Thank you for this opportunity.

As a reader of your writings, I have looked forward to meeting you in person and feel I have already known you for a long time.

Ikeda: I feel the same. I wholeheartedly applauded your receipt of the Nobel Peace Prize in 1980, at the age of forty-nine.

On that occasion, the Nobel Committee explained their choice, praising you as “an untiring and consistent champion of the principle of nonviolence” who “has lit a light in the dark.”¹

Your nonviolent struggle will shine forever as a triumph of the human spirit in the twentieth and twenty-first centuries.

Esquivel: I thank you for your esteem and words of appreciation.

All human beings are born with equal rights. Thus they have the capability to choose their own way of life, to exercise their freedom, and to select their chosen path. Unfortunately, however, many are denied these fundamental rights. When we examine human history, that is, the actual lives of the ordinary people, we see faces convulsed in suffering.

Great numbers of people are born under a death sentence due to hunger and war; others are born into conditions on a par with slavery, the suffering of poverty, or social exclusion.

These people have no ways out of their situations.

They are in need of friendly hands extended by those around them and the people of the world to support them and move forward with them in solidarity. Millions of people on Earth are clamoring for a more just and humane way of life.

Ikeda: Human history has been too full of misery caused by war, violence, discrimination, and oppression. Yet still these tragedies continue, as if we haven’t undergone enough.

Now in the twenty-first century humanity must look directly at the path it has followed so far and, with a view to the third millennium, blaze the correct path forward. I believe this is the obligatory mission and duty of those of us alive today.

We must build a society based on respect for human dignity. We must make the shift from an age of authoritarian control to one of the autonomy of the people. And we must transition to a society in which the full potential of women is allowed to shine on the stage of history.

All of these are daunting challenges, major transformations of human history. I wish to engage with you, Dr. Esquivel, in the challenge of finding the ways to effect that transformation.

Esquivel: My feelings exactly.

The Long Road of the Resistance Movement

Ikeda: I would like to begin by reviewing your human rights struggle.

In an interview, you once explained the personal philosophical background of your participation in the human rights movement.

First, you said your activism derived from your Christian faith. Second, it came from an awareness of the reality, the needs of the people.

And then, in words that I find unforgettable, you said that, coming from a poor family yourself, you had direct personal experience of the poverty of the people, which motivated you to rise up to make a responsible contribution to the people’s movement.²

I have heard that, born into a poor fishing family, in your youth you sometimes had food one day then went without for three. Experiencing such a life, you saw that poor people often lack the will to demand their just human rights. I understand that when you were twelve or thirteen you decided to get involved in the struggle for human rights by joining Christian groups and populist organizations.

My family produced nori (edible seaweed) products, so we, too, made our living from the sea.

When I was in the second year of primary school, my father became bedridden with rheumatism. This made our situation much worse, but my mother kept her spirits up and often joked that though we might be poor, we were “champion-class poor people.”

In an air raid during World War II, our house was completely destroyed. My brother and I managed to pull a large chest from the fire. Opening it, we found that it contained my younger sister’s traditional Girls’ Day dolls. My mother encouraged us, saying: “Someday, we’ll be able to live in a fine house where we can display these dolls again.”

Her good cheer, optimism, and refusal to accept defeat in times of trouble illuminated our hearts with the light of hope.

People’s lives were incredibly hard in those days. But in any age, the people possess great inner strength and resilience. Battling against adversity, they manage to live out their lives with perseverance, wishing for peace, finding hope, and seeking happiness. That is why we must never lose sight of the great rule: no matter what the situation, fight for the people, communicate with the people, and die with the people.

Esquivel: That is absolutely true. When people work together for the shared objectives of liberty and peace, they can demonstrate extraordinary capabilities. In the early 1970s, as I was busily organizing the Peace and Justice Service (Servicio de Paz y Justicia, SERPAJ) in Latin America, I traveled to different countries, where I met with religious and ecclesiastical communities, agricultural and indigenous leaders, educators’ unions, and representatives of the very poorest sectors of the population.

In spite of their own poverty, many of the men and women I met were able to come together and share their own bread with the needy. This really marvelous experience reconciled us to the capacity of the poor for social, cultural, and spiritual resistance. It rewarded us greatly with strength and hope.

In all parts of Latin America, even in isolated and inhospitable places, we encountered men and women who shared their lives with the people and worked to find ways and alternatives to solve the problems they faced. Many of them had sacrificed their lives for the people.

Ikeda: That is deeply moving testimony. It makes me wish to put my palms together in a gesture of reverence to their dedication. As you say, when people have dedicated their lives to a great purpose, they can tap immeasurable powers.

With the slogan of “Struggle through Nonviolence,” SERPAJ became active in expanding a people’s network throughout all parts of Latin America.

Esquivel: That is correct. It spread throughout Latin America as social resistance and popular struggles took place all over the continent. It was a long struggle.

The Brutality of State Terrorism

Esquivel: A shocking event occurred in 1973, the year before we founded SERPAJ. General Augusto Pinochet (1915–2006) carried out a military coup in Chile. The coup had the support of the Nixon administration in the United States, with Henry Kissinger as the Secretary of State.

Pinochet established a military dictatorship. The human cost to the Chilean people was tremendous. It destroyed the productive capacity of th...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Half-Title Page
• Title Page
• Contents
• Foreword by Daisaku Ikeda
• Foreword by Adolfo Pérez Esquivel
• A Joint Appeal by Adolfo Pérez Esquivel and Daisaku Ikeda
• 1 The Struggle for Human Rights—A Story of Glorious Triumph
• 2 A World United by the Power of the People
• 3 Transmitting the Legacy of Nonviolence
• 4 Women: The Driving Force of a Century of Life
• 5 Youth—The Key to Building a Culture of Peace
• Notes
• Index
• Copyright