ABSTRACT
A nation-state, with its defensive mechanisms and economic ambitions, is a force that imposes the tyrannical automatism of violence on us, from which Mahatma K. Gandhi thought we must be liberated. What is of real interest for people understanding of Gandhi, however, is the expression "to know this world as a soul," and then live in personal relationship with it. Gandhi approached the issue of the Hindu-Muslim frictions in the same spirit and was opposed to the partition of India. Gandhi himself fought for such protections both in South Africa and India. Yet what Gandhi had in his heart was a maximalist rather than a minimalist approach. Gandhi was a reluctant politician. Gandhi thought that a change to the better was possible if instead of gigantic and megalomaniac nation-states we focus on more organically integrated social units, such as villages.
