Title: How did Gandhi win? - Waging Nonviolence | Waging Nonviolence
Headings: How did Gandhi win?
How did Gandhi win?
Mark Engler
Paul Engler

Content: The hope is that, over time, small gains will add up to substantial reforms. Slowly and steadily, social change is achieved. The symbolic turn
For momentum-driven mass mobilizations, including the Salt March, campaigns function differently. Activists in mass movements must design actions and choose demands that tap into broader principles, creating a narrative about the moral significance of their struggle. Here, the most important thing about a demand is not its potential policy impact or winnability at the bargaining table. Most critical are its symbolic properties — how well a demand serves to dramatize for the public the urgent need to remedy an injustice. Like conventional politicians and structure-based organizers, those trying to build protest movements also have strategic goals, and they might seek to address specific grievances as part of their campaigns. But their overall approach is more indirect. These activists are not necessarily focused on reforms that can be feasibly obtained in an existing political context. Instead, momentum-driven movements aim to alter the political climate as a whole, changing perceptions of what is possible and realistic.