The Future Is At Stake

History is littered with stories of failed revolutions. Revolutionaries have to overcome their oppressors, but the next step can be harder: to transform psychologically from being tyrannized and oppressed to being in power.?

This is a massive endeavor whose chances of success are slim. Often, the revolutionary forces are deeply divided by ideologies or ethnicities, united only by sharing a common enemy to fight. Once freedom is achieved, those divides can balloon into civil war.??

Second, the desire for revenge is huge. Many revolutionary armies want to punish and exact revenge on their former oppressors, sometimes leading to decades of purges and massacres at great cost to civilian life. Finally, the transition from liberation fighter to President or Minister is a profound shift in mindset, which is why many of the revolutionary leaders become dictators and tyrants.?

The sad truth is that most liberation movements don’t really liberate. Except…

Consider This

Fran?ois-Dominique Toussaint Louverture was a Haitian general and the most prominent leader of the Haitian Revolution, the only successful slave revolution in history.?

How did he do it? He focused not on the enemy but on his own army: on creating a culture of loyalty and discipline. He focused not on vanquishing the oppressor’s culture, but on integrating it, not on revenge and destruction but on preserving the economy. He knew that pillaging and plundering would destroy the economy and ultimately be the undoing of his revolution.?

He incorporated the defeated armies of the Spanish and the British into his own, making them officers. He even made peace with the slave masters of the island and allowed plantation owners, who had fled during the rebellion, to return.?

Louverture achieved the unthinkable, something utterly remarkable. He had dozens of rules for his army, but the one principle guiding them all was this: the revolution was more than overcoming the oppressor. It was about establishing a new and thriving culture.?

Putting it into Play

Just think how hard it is to make peace with a friend who betrayed you.

To reach across a political divide and try to compromise with your opponent.?

To forgive your enemy who had injured, oppressed, even tortured you.?

It is too much to ask anyone, and perhaps the hardest thing we humans ever do.?

The challenge is to do what Toussaint Louverture did: think about who you want to become. Instead of thinking of your enemy, think of yourself. Think of your future. Think of the world you want to inhabit once this is all over. The person you want to be and live with for the rest of your life.?

That is the way to deliver yourself from oppression that Louverture modeled - to act with future generations in mind, with your future needs, not just your momentary ones for revenge and retribution.

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