This is a semi-facetious term made up by (of course) Michael Nagler to describe the very real phenomenon that a small amount of violence can subvert the nonviolent character of a demonstration or, for that matter, a person’s consciousness.  As Nagler states his ‘law:’

NV + V = V.

More seriously, this effect is a serious problem for nonviolent actors today, as witnessed by the disruption by a very small number of ‘Black Block’ anarchists of the large, well-disciplined protestors at the Seattle WTO meetings in 1999, and more recently, as it seems, the few passengers of the Free Gaza flotilla who attacked invading Israeli commandos aboard the Mavi Marmara in May of 2010.  In both cases the disruptive element succeeded in capturing the lion’s share of media attention and thus changing the character of the event in the eyes of much of the public.  The ‘law’ identifies something deeper than just media attention, however: as with other aspects of active nonviolence and Satyagraha, they are like a conversation with opponents, and mixed messages can badly disrupt communication, especially the mixing of, as we say, even a little violence with an otherwise nonviolent movement or event.

A term coined by Michael Nagler to parallel the euphemism ‘collateral damage’ used by the military to refer to (while implicitly denying the tragedy of) the civilians who are killed or injured in increasing numbers in modern armed conflict — even by ’smart’ bombs!  Collateral healing refers to the fact that since nonviolence injects positive energy into a situation it will always produce positive results of some kind somewhere and at some time.  Just as with the destructive counterpart, we cannot always tell what exactly these results will be.  Unlike collateral damage, however we can always count on their being constructive.

When 35,000 Americans sent a message to the White House to “feed your enemy” when there was a severe famine in China during the Korean War there was no reply.  It was revealed much later, however, that those 35,000 messages enabled President Eisenhower to deny a request by the Joint Chiefs of Staff to commence bombing beyond the Yalu river, i.e., in mainland China — an act that might have precipitated World War Three!

During the longstanding nonviolent campaign by the town of Budrus on the West Bank a wonderful harmony among disparate elements of the community came about as a result of the superordinate ideal of nonviolent struggle.  In this case the campaign was also successful for what it set out to achieve (see work vs. “work”).

In other words, whether a nonviolent action ’succeeds’ or ‘fails’ in the short term with respect to explicit goals it always induces positive changes, or ‘collateral healing.’

This ancient Sanskrit term identifies one of the major yama’s or ‘ norms of restraint’ enjoined by the scriptures on spiritual aspirants.  It literally means ‘God-conduct,’ but is normally applied to the vow or practice of celibacy. Gandhi came to feel while still in South Africa (1906) that in order to overcome the tremendous challenges he faced in rousing an entire nation to nonviolent resistance he would have to take this vow, as there was no deeper source of power in the human psyche than the sexual drive.  Mastering it which took him many years, proved to be a source of “a joy and a sense of wonder in the power of nature that [he] had no power to describe.”

Many feel that true nonviolence cannot stop at the human community only, and indeed philosophers in the Ancient world, both Greek and Roman, pointed out that cruelty to animals was only a prelude or enabling factor to cruelty to one’s fellow humans.

Gandhi, who was a vegetarian all his life (with a few adolescent lapses) even felt that “all science based on the shedding of innocent blood was without consequence” ( a theme taken up by many today who would replace, for example, dissection of animals with computer simulation).

For Gandhi, the ‘control of the palate [was] a valuable aid to the control of the mind,’ and indeed advocates of vegetarianism cite issues of cost, ecology (it takes twenty times more protein to get it from an animal than it does to get it directly from a plant) and many others alongside the basic issue of avoidance of cruelty.

Unfortunately, the pursuit of animal rights today is not always carried out by nonviolent means (just as, in India, Gandhi had to decry the killing of Muslims because of their killing of cows).

This term refers to the scientific study of the emotions and states of mind that contribute to human empathy and community, as opposed to the one-sided emphasis on mental illness and dysfunction that have long prevailed in psychology as in many branches of social science.