Many-Sided Wisdom

Subtitled 'a new politics of the spirit' this book introduces the Jain concept of anekant, translated as many-sidedness - a philosophy that can be applied to the politics of our time and which acknowledges that there are many paths to the one true. This is not a form of relativism, since it is based on a search for truth, which is counter-cultural in the sense that it eschews the usual power structures and material ambitions. Ecologically, it announces a message of balance with nature based on restraint and nonviolence. It goes beyond both narrow individualism and socialist collectivism, preferring instead a holistic view of the self as part of a larger process. All this issues in careful thought and careful action in the context of a highly interdependent world.