“An armed conflict between nations horrifies us. But the economic war is no better than an armed conflict. This is like a surgical operation. An economic war is prolonged torture. And its ravages are no less terrible than those depicted in the literature on war property so called. We think nothing of the other because we are used to its deadly effects .... The movement against war is sound. I pray for its success. But I cannot help the gnawing fear that the movement will fail if it does not touch the root of all evil-human greed.”
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Source: Harijan/Young India, reproduced in Non-violence in Peace and War 1942-49; also listed on Wikiquote.
About this quote
Slow economic violence rarely horrifies us the way bombs do, yet grinding people down through exploitation and want inflicts damage just as real, only stretched out until we stop seeing it. Any serious effort to end conflict has to reach the greed underneath, or it treats symptoms while the cause keeps working.
When to use it
- A factory paying wages too low to live on, quietly wrecking families in a way an open dispute never would.
- A lender trapping borrowers in fees that compound until a household loses its home.
- A large chain slashing prices to starve out the small shops, then raising them once the street is empty.