Source: Bahá'í Library Online (bahai-library.com), curated by Jonah Winters. Used by permission of the curator. Original citation: Moojan Momen, Power and the Baha'i community, bahai-library.com.
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Power and the Bahá’í community
Moojan Momen
Bahá’ís frequently claim that the Bahá’í teachings have the ability
to create a new social order, a new way of organising human society
such that individuals could develop themselves physically, mentally
and spiritually to the utmost of their capability. When trying to
explain what this new social order is, they present the list of social
teachings that was enunciated by ‘Abdu’l-Bahá during his journeys to
the West a hundred years ago: the oneness of humanity, the equality
of women and men, the need for harmony and balance between
religion and science, the importance of education and so on. While
these social teachings may have sounded new and exciting a century
ago, that is no longer the case today. Even in the middle of the last
century, in 1949, Shoghi Effendi was making this point:
The world has — at least the thinking world — caught up by
now with all the great and universal principles enunciated by
Bahá’u’lláh over 70 years ago, and so of course it does not
sound “new” to them.1
Many other groups are now promoting these social teachings that
‘Abdu’l-Bahá spoke about a century ago. The majority of thinking
people accept them. The problem for humanity now is not accepting
these teachings, but how to implement them. Most people have
accepted the need for the eradication of poverty, for the equality of
women and men, for the removal of racial and other prejudices, and
so on, but despite the fact that this has been well accepted for many
decades, there has been little success in implementing these aims: the
gap between the rich and poor is not closing, women are still unable
210 Lights of Irfán vol. 19
to progress in society as easily as men, racism still exists in all areas
of social life.
So the problem the world faces is not in the principles that would
lead to a better society but in the application. In its 1985 statement,
The Promise of World Peace, the Universal House of Justice offered
up the Bahá’í community as a model for the world to examine:
The experience of the Bahá’í community may be seen as an
example of this enlarging unity. It is a community of some
three to four million people drawn from many nations,
cultures, classes and creeds, engaged in a wide range of
activities serving the spiritual, social and economic needs of
the peoples of many lands. It is a single social organism,
representative of the diversity of the human family,
conducting its affairs through a system of commonly
accepted consultative principles, and cherishing equally all
the great outpourings of divine guidance in human history.
Its existence is yet another convincing proof of the
practicality of its Founder's vision of a united world, another
evidence that humanity can live as one global society, equal
to whatever challenges its coming of age may entail. If the
Bahá’í experience can contribute in whatever measure to
reinforcing hope in the unity of the human race, we are
happy to offer it as a model for study.
In this passage, the Universal House of Justice is holding up the
Bahá’í community as a model of a new society for study. So the
question arises: in what way is the functioning of the Bahá’í
community as a solution to the problems that society now faces?
What aspects of Bahá’í community life are answers to these
problems? What we need to do is to look at our present society and
try to determine what are the root causes of the problems that it
faces and then to see in what practical ways the functioning of the
Bahá’í community tackles these problems. I am going to deal mainly
with Western societies since these are the only ones about which I
feel I can speak, but what I say may well be also true of other
societies since the conditions I will be describing are by no means
confined to the West and, in any case, the problems the West faces
are gradually seeping out to other parts of the world.
There are of course many problems that the world is facing but I
am going to focus on two partly inter-related problems: first the fact
Power and the Bahá’í Community 211
that a large proportion of people in our societies feel that they are
excluded because they have no power within society or that they are
unable to participate fully in society because barriers exist that
prevent this. They feel unable to develop fully on account of this and
feel a sense of injustice and consequent resentment. The second
problem is that the balance between individual freedom and central
authority in society has not been satisfactorily resolved. While
authoritarian regimes have been overthrown and democracy
established in many parts of the world, many are now saying that the
balance has shifted too far towards individualism and a lack of
central authority, that the rampant freedom of the capitalist market
has led to a danger of falling into a situation of the 'rule of the
jungle', where the wealthiest and most powerful have free reign to do
what they like. The same situation prevails within religions where
fundamentalists and liberals are locked in conflict over the question
of whether society should be subservient to the authority of
traditional religious forms or whether religion should change and
adapt to accommodate social realities.
Hierarchical, Hegemonic, Patriarchal Society
Returning to the first of these two problems that society faces,
the fact that a large number of people feel excluded from society to
some extent, so pervasive is this that in fact, in most societies, the
majority of people find that they face barriers of one sort or another.
These may be barriers of gender, race, social class or even such things
as the accent with which one speaks. But in all, it means that the
majority of every society faces barriers to some degree, which mean
that they are not treated equally, cannot advance in their occupation,
cannot obtain the same services, cannot live in the same areas and
cannot join in some activities in society. The barriers that are put up
can be minor, such as just having to wait longer than others for the
same service or they can be major such as finding that one’s chosen
occupation is barred to one.
Although there is lip service to equality in many Western societies,
the reality that most people experience is one of constantly coming
up against these barriers. Thus for example, in most Western nations,
the principle of the equality between men and women has been
acknowledged for almost a century and yet women say that they
212 Lights of Irfán vol. 19
experience what has been called a “glass ceiling” as they develop
professionally and try to advance in their careers. They reach a point
at which further progress seems to be denied them despite their
having the qualifications for it. They see male colleagues with less
experience and perhaps even fewer qualifications being promoted
ahead of them.
This same experience of facing barriers to progress is also
experienced by people from racial and ethnic minorities, from the
lower social classes and by many other groups. In fact the only people
who do not experience this and who therefore obtain the full benefits
of society are, in Western societies, educated white males from the
upper strata of society. It is usually these people who are in positions
where they are analysing their society in an authoritative manner and
initiating change. Thus the social structure is hierarchical and highly
competitive. That which is given the highest value in such societies
are power, authority, control, victory, ownership, courage, strength.
The main interactions are power struggles and competition. The ends
justify the means. Results are expressed in terms of victory or defeat.
There are only rewards for the winners in such a society, none for the
runners-ups. It is epitomised by tradition, institutions, civilisation,
law, and control over the natural world. Those who have power and
wealth are valued, considered important, are consulted about major
decisions and are listened to when they protest. Those who have no
power or wealth are not valued, not considered important, are not
consulted on major decisions and not listened to when they protest.
As a result of having their ideas disparaged and discounted as they
grow up, they often cease to have ideas of their own and merely
repeat what the newspapers and political demagogues tell them is
true. Decisions in such societies are made by just one man or a small
group of men and are then handed down to be carried out. The social
structures in these societies are pyramidal with one or a few people at
the top and increasing numbers as one goes down. This is what is
meant by a hierarchical society.
The fundamental problem underlying this situation is the fact that
we live in societies that are patriarchal or hegemonic. The word
patriarchy means ‘rule by men’ and implies a domination of society
by men. The majority of positions of power and authority whether
this be in government, business, professional or even in recreational
and informal groups and societies are held by men. The concept of a
patriarchal society goes, however, beyond just the fact of the gender
Power and the Bahá’í Community 213
of those in authority. For example Britain went through a period of
almost two decades when there was a female sovereign and female
Prime Minister, but this did not change the fact that Britain was a
patriarchal society. If a woman wants to reach the higher echelons of
society, she must masculinize herself, become competitive and
aggressive, become more male than the men. There is considerable
evidence that girls are inherently less competitive and more co-
operative than boys. Therefore in any society where power is the
highest value and there are no other constraints, girls/women will
usually be dominated by boys/men. In modern Western societies
where almost all positions of power are awarded on the basis of
competitiveness (either in the form of outright competition for the
post or through interviews where competitiveness is given the highest
value), the inevitable result is that men dominate most positions of
power in the society. This is the patriarchal society.2
One might think that the sorts of totalitarian regimes that existed
in Europe in the inter-war years of the twentieth century or which
exist today in many parts of the world are the only remaining
hierarchical societies and that democratic Western societies are not
hierarchical but there is just as much of a hidden hierarchy in
Western societies as in any totalitarian state. The relatively small
number of people at the top of the hierarchy in Western states
control the political process, the newspapers and other media, the
education system, the justice system and all other important areas of
life. Through this control, they also control the discourse of society.
It is their opinions that are heard on the television, read in the
newspapers and put into the textbooks studied at schools and
universities; theirs is the only discourse that gets publicity and is thus
regarded as the norm for the society; they have a hegemony over the
norms, values and discourses of society. The voices of those lower
down the hierarchy are ignored, considered unimportant and
marginal; their experiences of social barriers and prejudice are
regarded as the “rumblings of social malcontents”. This is the
hegemonic society.
Thus our modern societies, no matter where we live in the world,
are hierarchical, patriarchal hegemonic societies. In the West, there
may not be tanks in the streets enforcing the hierarchy, but all such
societies depend upon force to maintain the pyramid of power. In the
West, this compulsion is maintained through the law and the police
force. This situation is not one that is easy to change. Those with
214 Lights of Irfán vol. 19
authority and power control the communications media and
education. They therefore are in a position to impose their worldview
on others. Women and other groups low down the hierarchy have one
of two alternatives in this situation. They can accept the system and
continue to hold a lower place in society. If they wish to try to beat
the system can only do so by competing with those already in power.
Power is thus corrosive and subversive. Even in a democratic
process, the attempt to gain power is itself corrosive. If a group
wants to bring about social justice and a more egalitarian society, it
has to gain power in order to bring this about. It thinks that if it
gains power, it will control the state and then it can use the state to
achieve its goals of social justice and a more egalitarian society. It
forms a political party and starts to campaign to gain votes. But in
this process, it is being diverted from its goal of achieving social
justice and a more egalitarian society and its goal is now achieving
power. Everything becomes subordinated to this goal. Achieving
power now becomes the main goal of the group and other goals such
as social justice become secondary. What happens in practice is that
once the party is successful and has achieved power, the hierarchy
remains the same B remaining in power has the highest priority. To
this priority the lower goals such as social justice and a more
egalitarian society are readily sacrificed. The people who voted for
the party feel betrayed as they see the party chasing after those who
wield influence and have social power and failing to implement
anything that benefits them.3
Thus the values of the patriarchal, hierarchical hegemonic society
are subversive; they subvert those that try to defeat them. This has
been what successive revolutions from the 18th century onwards have
found. The French Revolution and the various Communist
Revolutions that have occurred have all been in the name of creating
a more egalitarian society, where power is no longer the highest value.
Those that led these revolutions were however forced to seize power
and in doing so found their initial values subverted. The result was a
society that was just as hierarchical as before, but with merely a
different set of people in power.4
All groups that are low in the social hierarchy, whether women,
racial and ethnic minorities or people of lower social class or status
face much the same sorts of barriers and problems. Indeed if one
considers that half of society is women and then adds in the various
Power and the Bahá’í Community 215
ethnic and class groups who are also dominated by the white upper
and middle class males who are at the top of the social hierarchy, one
can see that in Western societies where we are all supposed to be equal,
it is only a small percentage who have full access to the benefits and
opportunities and the majority are a good deal less “equal” than them.
A further fact that makes it difficult to achieve any change is that
in patriarchal societies, it is very difficult to even gain an
acknowledgement of the fact that a problem exists. It is men from
the dominant group who control the communications media and the
education system; it they who are the journalists, the newspaper
editors, the social analysts, the professors of social sciences and these
men experience no barriers and therefore see no problem. The
rhetoric coming from these leaders of society is that their societies
are fair and democratic with equal opportunities for all. These
individuals at the top of the hierarchy have not experienced life in the
lower levels of the hierarchy, they have not come across any social
barriers or obstacles in their careers or faced prejudice and injustice.
They therefore can truthfully say that “ours is an open society; people
get to the top through merit alone” — and therefore there is no need
for any change.
The Bahá’í Answer to the Hierarchical,
Hegemonic, Patriarchal Society
It can be seen that because of its unseen barriers and subversive
nature, it is not a very easy matter to contemplate changing such a
society. The question then arises as to whether the Bahá’í Faith has
any answers to this difficult situation. Since the Bahá’í Faith aims for
equality between men and women and to bring into being a more
egalitarian society, how does the Bahá’í Faith seek to resolve this
problem? It can be seen from the above that a very radical change is
needed and furthermore it must be a change that does not inherently
find itself subverted.
Firstly of course, a set of values is needed that does not place
power and wealth at the highest level; but this is perhaps the easiest
part of the process. Most religions offer a set of values that
emphasise the importance of values such as love, service, humility
etc. and indeed most religions teach that wealth can be a barrier to
spiritual progress. The Bahá’í Faith has similar teachings. There are a
216 Lights of Irfán vol. 19
large number of quotations from the Bahá’í scriptures asserting the
equality of all human beings, for example, and others that assert the
equality of men and women.
Even in the earliest stages of its history, the Bábí and Bahá’í Faiths
have been engaged in overturning the power structures that formed
the foundations of society. When the Báb praised a simple sifter of
wheat for having discerned the truth and recognized him before all of
the learned class of Isfahan, when the Báb and Bahá’u’lláh asserted
that understanding religious truth did not depend on the years of
book learning that the Islamic learned classes engaged upon at their
religious colleges but rather on purity and spiritual discernment that
could be cultivated by anyone, they were in effect laying an axe to
the foundations of the hegemonic social structure that prized the
book learning of the religious class and gave them authority and
privileges on account of that.
In a letter written on 14 March 1927 to the Spiritual Assembly of
the Bahá’ís of Istanbul, the Guardian's Secretary explained, on his
behalf, the principle in the Cause of action by majority vote. He
pointed out how, in the past, it was certain individuals who
“accounted themselves as superior in knowledge and elevated in
position” who caused division, and that it was those “who pretended
to be the most distinguished of all” who “always proved themselves to
be the source of contention.” “But praise be to God,” he continued,
“that the Pen of Glory has done away with the unyielding and
dictatorial views of the learned and the wise, dismissed the assertions
of individuals as an authoritative criterion, even though they were
recognized as the most accomplished and learned among men and
ordained that all matters be referred to authorized centres and specified
Assemblies. Even so, no Assembly has been invested with the absolute
authority to deal with such general matters as affect the interests of
nations. Nay rather, He has brought all the assemblies together under
the shadow of one House of Justice, one divinely appointed Centre,
so that there would be only one Centre and all the rest integrated into
a single body, revolving around one expressly designated Pivot, thus
making them all proof against schism and division.”5
‘Abdu’l-Bahá carried this process forward defining some of the
words associated with the hegemonic push towards competitiveness
in such a way as to subvert their meanings. Thus for example,
Power and the Bahá’í Community 217
regarding the word “victory”, ‘Abdu’l-Bahá writes that for the Bahá’í
Cause: “its victory is to submit and yield” [SWAB 256] and he quotes
Bahá’u’lláh as stating: “Therefore, today, `victory' neither hath been,
nor will be opposition to anyone, nor strife with any person; but
rather what is well-pleasing—this is, that the cities of men's hearts,
which are under the dominion of the hosts of selfishness and lust,
should be subdued by the sword of the Word of Wisdom, and of
Exhortation.”6 Similarly, ‘Abdu’l-Bahá subverts the concept of
competition from its usual role in a masculine society, that of gaining
power, and instead promotes it as an approach in the arena of
service: “Vie ye with each other in the service of God and of His
Cause. This is indeed what profiteth you in this world, and in that
which is to come” [qtd in ADJ 83]. The goal of personal ambition and
the source of greatest glory do not belong, in ‘Abdu’l-Bahá’s
estimation, to the person who seizes power but to the person who
excels in service to “human uplift and betterment” [PUP 353] and to
“the cause of the Most Great Peace” [PUP 123].
It is all very well to have egalitarian values and to subvert the
foundations of the hegemonic society, but the question remains of
what you put in its place. Many individuals and groups have had these
principles but have not been able to transform them into practice
because of the subversive nature of power. What is needed is to have
some way to get these values prevalent in society without having
them subverted. How does one set up a community that is more
egalitarian? The Bahá’í community in fact provides a model for just
such a social system.
First, the Bahá’í community does not contend for power. Those
who have wanted to change society have always thought that the way
to do this is to seize control of the state and that it would then be
possible to use the power of the state to change society. They have
therefore either taken the revolutionary road to power (as in the
French Revolution and the various communist revolutions) or they
have tried the democratic route, as with various democratic socialist
parties. Apart from the pitfall of the subversion of their egalitarian
values which has been discussed above and which they all suffered,
what they have failed to appreciate is that the power of the state is
largely illusionary. The state is but one element in a nexus of actors and
by itself, it has only a limited ability to make changes. It cannot by itself
218 Lights of Irfán vol. 19
change the social structure, for example, since it is the social structure
that is supporting the state and to try to change it risks destabilizing
the state itself. The Bahá’í community eschews the route to power as
a means of effecting a change in society. It refrains from all
involvement in partisan politics, recognising that any such involvement
risks subverting its values and ultimately frustrating its goals.
Second, in the Bahá’í community power does not rest with
individuals. There are no priests or any other religious professionals
with any special power or authority by virtue of their position.
Authority rests with institutions acting as institutions. It is true of
course that individuals are elected onto these institutions but these
individuals hold no power or authority in their own right. Even the
chairman of a National Spiritual Assembly, the national governing
body of the Bahá’ís in an area, has no individual authority. A member
of the National Spiritual Assembly is still subject to the authority of
the local governing board, the Local Spiritual Assembly, in the area
where he or she lives. All authority rests with the institutions making
decisions as a body. There are individual appointments made to
positions such as the Boards of Counsellors and the Auxiliary Board,
but these appointees play only an exhortatory and advisory role. They
hold no authority or power.
Third, decisions are made in the Bahá’í community through
consultation. The Bahá’í process of consultation is one which
encourages all those taking part to participate. This helps to draw out
members of minority groups and races as well as lower social classes
who do not feel confident enough to speak in group settings. The
Bahá’í ideal of consultation provides a safe and encouraging
environment for such people to express their views. Indeed, just as
men are better at competition, women are inherently better in the co-
operative environment produced by the consultation process. In such
an environment, they therefore feel comfortable in putting forward
their views (which is not the case in a highly competitive
environment) and they are able to play a major role in Bahá’í
community life.
There are also other provisions in Bahá’í community life which are
aimed at encouraging minorities. The Bahá’í Faith has been spread
through planned action. In these plans, a deliberate effort has been
made to bring into the community every type of minority living in a
Power and the Bahá’í Community 219
particular area. This has been assisted by having, as part of these same
plans, Bahá’í literature translated into as many languages as possible.
Another example is the fact that, in Bahá’í elections, if there is a tied
vote, then if one of those tied is from a minority, that person is
automatically declared the winner of the tie.
A Practical Path to a Different Society
It is however, in the last two decades that the Bahá’í community
has produced a practical path forward that all, whether Bahá’í or not,
can follow in creating a more egalitarian society. Since about 1996,
the Bahá’í community has been engaged in a programme of action
that works to mitigate and counter many of the worst features of the
hierarchical society. The central feature of this programme is a course
of participatory learning designed to develop the human resources
within a community. The course encourages people, especially those
at the base of the power pyramid who have been used to having their
ideas disparaged and discounted and have ceased to think for
themselves, to start to think, to develop ideas, and, in the protected
consultative environment of the course, to start to have the
confidence to express those ideas. Furthermore, the course focuses
on the spiritual aspects of the human being, encouraging the growth
of a spirit of selflessness and service. As a result, people are
encouraged to engage in acts of service. They are initially trained to
do such service as organising children’s moral education classes,
junior youth empowerment programmes, devotional meetings, home
visits and accompanying others in their path of service. These acts of
service then enable participants to have ideas about the needs of the
community and how to address these. Thus participants in the courses
are trained not only to develop their own ideas and have the
confidence to express them but also, through acts of service, they
begin to see the reality around them and to have thoughts about how
to address the problems of their community.
All of this is then brought to the cluster reflection meetings where
those attending reflect on what has occurred previously and with
input from Bahá’í administrative bodies and from ideas arising from
their own study groups and service projects, they consult upon the
needs of the area and how these can be addressed realistically with the
resources available. These study courses and reflection meetings are
220 Lights of Irfán vol. 19
not confined to Bahá’ís. Anyone interested can engage with this
process, can take part in the study courses, can carry out the acts of
service and can participate in the reflection meetings. In this way, the
power to change their own community is devolved down in a
meaningful way to the members of that community.
If we were to create in this way more egalitarian societies, this
would not just solve the problem that large numbers of people feel
alienated and unjustly treated by the structures of the hierarchical
society, it would help towards resolving other social problems as well.
To reduce the competitiveness and aggressiveness associated with the
patriarchal, hegemonic society would also be a major step towards
world peace since this competitiveness and aggressiveness also feeds
across from a society's internal affairs into its external foreign
affairs and results in undue aggressiveness and lack of co-operation
at the international level. A higher value being placed on co-
operation within our societies would result in a higher level of co-
operation in global affairs and in resolving global problems. The
greater involvement of women in social affairs would in itself also be
conducive to world peace according to the Bahá’í teachings.
The competitiveness of the business world is a major contributor
to pollution and environmental degradation. The competitiveness
that the patriarchal society demands results in an inexorable pressure
to reduce costs often with the result of increased pollution. If local
environmental regulations prevent this pollution then modern
business instead of accepting this as a price worth paying moves its
factories to elsewhere in the world where the environmental
regulations are not so strict. Unfortunately although the
environmental regulations are local in their effects, the pollution
caused by these companies respects no borders and is world-wide in
its effects. A society that is not so driven by the urge to be
competitive would also be inherently less polluting.
Thus to produce more egalitarian less hierarchical societies would
help in the resolution of many of the problems that the world faces
from the alienation and sense of injustice that breeds civil unrest,
vandalism and violence to global problems such as war and
environmental pollution.
Power and the Bahá’í Community 221
Individualism and Authority
A second area that is causing a deal of turmoil for many because it
is a problem that has not been successfully resolved in any society is
the balance between individuality and authority in society and the
associated problem of how to maintain a balance between centralised
national or international authority and local initiative and
independence. The balance between these has not been successfully
achieved in any society. In those societies that have swung too far
towards individuality, the cult of the individual threatens the
cohesion and moral order of society. Using the pretext of personal
freedom, some individuals are subjecting others to virtual slavery
(driving the poor into financial debt that makes them virtual slaves of
the owners of their debts), sexual abuse, and the physical and sexual
abuse of children. The opposite extreme is that of the sort of
collectivism seen in communist societies, where the individual is
suppressed completely, supposedly for the benefit of the community.
Neither extreme allows either full human development or human
prosperity. Of course, all human beings are individuals and must be
given the freedom to develop their talents and potential, but to allow
that freedom to go to excess, where human beings are given the
freedom to sink to the level of animal behaviour and to oppress
others stunts human development and causes society to fall apart in
corruption and moral decadence. Similarly excessive centralized
control stifles human initiative and leads to loss of morale and
enthusiasm for projects because people do not feel involved in the
decisions that affect their lives.
These two extremes of excessive individualism and excessive
control can be seen operating in many situations in the world.
Broadly speaking, the United States of America leans towards the
extreme of individualism and rights to liberty in all areas. In practice,
this means that those with money and power use this liberty to
control the communications media and the political process to their
advantage and in order to impose their aims on society. Thus
paradoxically, in precisely those societies where the most freedom is
given to the individual, the result is that the individual is most
manipulated by commercial and other interests. Western Europe has,
on the other hand, moved towards centralized control and many
aspects of daily life are regulated by the centralized authority of the
222 Lights of Irfán vol. 19
European Union. The result is that people feel remote from the
decision-making process and therefore feel increasingly justified in
rebelling against it or ignoring it. There are of course many areas of
the world where centralized authoritarian political regimes go much
further than Europe and these regimes suppress individual initiative
even more and result in a loss of morale and initiative in their populations.
These extremes are not confined to political structures however.
Matters such as international aid have swung across the pendulum
from a strict centralised control of methods and means of deploying
international aid — often leading to inappropriate aid being given
because the people at the centre do not know what is appropriate —
to a much more relaxed system with decisions being made locally —
often resulting in corruption and dissipation of effort. In religions in
particular this tension can be seen as one of the most prominent
features of religious life in the past century. In almost every religious
group there is some degree of conflict between those who hold to a
strict central doctrinal and organisational authority in the religion
(often associated with religious fundamentalism) and those who want
to free the individual believers to think freely about religious ideas
and to experience the religion in ways that suit each individual (often
described as religious liberalism).
In the Bahá’í Faith there are several aspects to achieving the right
balance between individual liberty and centralized authority. While
Bahá’u’lláh on the one hand applauds democracy and commends
Queen Victoria for having “entrusted the reins of counsel into the
hands of the representatives of the people” [PB 34],7 he also, on the
other hand, condemns the excess of liberty that leads to
libertarianism and states that it will “exercise a pernicious influence
upon men” [GWB 216]. Shoghi Effendi summarises this by stating that
“The Bahá’í conception of social life... neither suppresses the
individual nor does it exalt him to the point of making him an
anti-social creature, a menace to society. As in everything, it follows
the ‘golden mean’” [UD 435-436].
As in the case of achieving a more egalitarian society, there are
many groups and movements other than the Bahá’ís who agree with
Shoghi Effendi's view that the ideal is to achieve this ‘golden mean’.
However in practice, we find that societies and groups either
gravitate towards one extreme or the other or else they swing like a
Power and the Bahá’í Community 223
pendulum between the two extremes. It appears that no society or
large group has succeeded in finding a way of remaining at the
‘golden mean’. It is in the practicalities of how to achieve this state
that they have failed.
Once again, the Bahá’í community provides a model of how to
achieve this balance. This is achieved in the Bahá’í community
through an innovative separation between power and authority. In
most societies, organisation and groups, it is taken for granted that
those in authority should also be given the power to enforce their
authority. Thus mechanisms of enforcement are enacted to compel
those who are members of that society or group to follow the
directives of those that are in authority. These may be laws for a
society or codes of discipline in organisations or rules in the case of
groups. Those who are in authority are given the power to sanction
whoever fails to follow their directives.
In the Bahá’í community, however, there is an attempt to separate
authority and power to some extent. We have noted above that
individuals have neither authority nor power in the Bahá’í
community. The elected institutions of the Bahá’í community have
the authority to direct the affairs of the community, but their
obligation is to try to achieve their objectives through winning the
support of the individual Bahá’ís. Shoghi Effendi addressing primarily
the members of the elected Bahá’í institutions states:
Let us also bear in mind that the keynote of the Cause of God
is not dictatorial authority but humble fellowship, not
arbitrary power, but the spirit of frank and loving
consultation. Nothing short of the spirit of a true Bahá’í can
hope to reconcile the principles of mercy and justice, of
freedom and submission, of the sanctity of the right of the
individual and of self-surrender, of vigilance, discretion and
prudence on the one hand, and fellowship, candor, and
courage on the other. [BA 63-64]
The elected Bahá’í institutions have, in effect, very little power to
enforce their authority in many areas when compared with the central
authorities of other religions. They have no doctrinal authority; no
authority to determine correct doctrine or to create new doctrine or
theological teachings, nor to interpret the texts of the scripture. Thus
they hold no power in many areas over which religious leadership has
224 Lights of Irfán vol. 19
traditionally held both power and authority. They have the authority
to direct the Bahá’í community by laying out plans of action for the
Bahá’ís, but they have no sanctions or other means of compelling the
Bahá’ís to carry out these plans. If any Bahá’í, for example, wants to
completely ignore the present Five Year Plan of the Universal House
of Justice, they are free to do so without any fear of sanctions
against them. The general situation is summed up in the words of the
Universal House of Justice thus:
Authority and direction flow from the Assemblies, whereas
the power to accomplish the tasks resides primarily in the
entire body of the believers.8
The power that the elected institutions have over the believers can
only be exercised in extreme situations and is thus rarely encountered
by the average Bahá’í. This power involves Bahá’ís who actions go
outside certain limits. These include for example administrative
sanctions against Bahá’ís who bring the Bahá’í Faith into disrepute,
perhaps by their disregard for the moral code of society (however
what Bahá’ís do privately is not usually a cause of action by the
Bahá’í institutions). More severe sanctions are taken towards those
who seek to create division and sectarianism in the Bahá’í community
(however holding differing opinions is not sanctionable, it is only
when an individual attempts to create a sect or grouping around such
an opinion that sanctions may be applied). The overwhelming
majority of Bahá’ís will not however experience this.
If Bahá’ís have such freedom of thought and freedom to disregard
the exhortations of their institutions, what is it then that preserves
the unity of the Bahá’í community (for if the Bahá’í Faith is to
achieve its stated goal of uniting humanity, it is obvious that it itself
must remain united). The principal mechanism whereby the individual
is granted freedom of thought in the Bahá’í Faith and yet unity is
maintained is that of the Covenant. In the Bahá’í Faith, there is no
doctrine or creed about the nature of God or the nature of
Bahá’u’lláh to which the individual is obliged to assent. Bahá’ís are
free to read the scriptures for themselves and to come to their
understanding of theological matters. The only limit on Bahá’ís is
that they cannot claim that their understanding of theological matters
is authoritative or binding on any other Bahá’í (and thereby attempt
to set up a cabal or sectarian grouping). Only the interpretations of
Power and the Bahá’í Community 225
‘Abdu’l-Bahá and Shoghi Effendi are authoritative. Since both
‘Abdu’l-Bahá and Shoghi Effendi are deceased, their writings have
effectively become part of the scripture or authoritative text. There
is no longer any living authoritative interpretation in the Bahá’í
Faith. What preserves the unity of the Bahá’í community in the face
of this ideological individualism is the concept of the Covenant —
that all Bahá’ís pledge themselves to obeying the instructions of the
Focal Centre of the Covenant, which since 1963 has been the
Universal House of Justice. Since the Universal House of Justice is
not a body that creates doctrine or dogma but rather a body that
directs the affairs of the Bahá’í community, obedience to the
instructions of the Focal Centre of the Covenant does not limit the
individual's freedom to think whatever they wish about theological
matters, but only their freedom to act in ways that would set up sects
and cliques around such individual interpretation.
Another aspect of the balance between centralized authority and
local democracy in the Bahá’í community is the fact that the
authority and powers of the local governing councils of the Bahá’í
community have been laid down in authoritative Bahá’í texts. The
local governing councils have inherent rights over matters that are
purely confined to their locality, an authority that cannot be
removed by the decision of the national body. Thus one cannot have
the situation that has occurred in many countries where the local
governing authorities have had their rights stripped away by the
desire of the national government to centralize and control all
aspects of the nation's life.
In all aspects of Bahá’í community life, the emphasis is on
decentralization — handing down to the local level everything that
can appropriately be administered at the local level. “It [the
world-wide Law of Bahá’u’lláh) repudiates excessive centralization on
one hand, and disclaims all attempts at uniformity on the other. Its
watchword is unity in diversity” [WOB 42]. But to offset problems
that may arise from such decentralization — where local prejudices may
discriminate against some individuals or groups, individual Bahá’ís
are given substantial powers to appeal the decisions of their local
body to the national and even, if necessary, to the international level.
In the pre-modern period, individuals, except for the elite in
society were given a script at birth which they were expected to
226 Lights of Irfán vol. 19
follow and which severely limited their choices in all aspects of their
lives. This script however, as long as they followed, gave them a
socially-recognised identity, a guaranteed place in society and made
them feel included in the workings of their community. The
individualism of contemporary society means that people are free to
tear up the script that they are given at birth and write their own
script in terms of their individual choices. This individualism,
however, leaves most individuals with no assigned or recognized
social interactions that can make them feel part of a community, an
anomie resulting in no social structure to which a person can relate.
Throughout most of human history it has been religion that formed
the glue binding individuals to their communities. Having cast
religion aside, most individuals in the twentieth century experimented
with various social and political ideologies, such as communism,
nationalism and racism, which tried to take the place of religion in
linking the individual into a community. All of ideologies failed with
disastrous consequences for the societies that tried to adopt them.
What the Bahá’í Faith offers is a modern religion, free of the
superstition and irrationality that marks much of traditional religion,
and offering a pathway for the individual to link into a community
united in constructive action and service; giving that individual
interpersonal links that can give that person a feeling of belonging
and interconnectedness.
The Maturity of Humanity
I would like to suggest that these two aspects of the social
dynamics of the Bahá’í community which we have discussed, the
removal of hierarchies of power and the achievement of a balance
between society and the individual, can be thought of as related to
the statement that has been made by Bahá’u’lláh, ‘Abdu’l-Bahá and Shoghi
Effendi: that humanity is just entering its collective stage of maturity.
No sooner had mankind attained the stage of maturity, than the
Word revealed to men's eyes the latent energies with which it
had been endowed — energies which manifested themselves in
the plenitude of their glory when the Ancient Beauty
appeared, in the year sixty, in the person of `Alí-Muhammad,
the Báb. [Bahá’u’lláh: GWB 77-78]
Power and the Bahá’í Community 227
Similarly, there are periods and stages in the life of the
aggregate world of humanity, which at one time was passing
through its degree of childhood, at another its time of youth
but now has entered its long presaged period of maturity, the
evidences of which are everywhere visible and apparent.
Therefore, the requirements and conditions of former
periods have changed and merged into exigencies which
distinctly characterize the present age of the world of
mankind ... The gifts and graces of the period of youth,
although timely and sufficient during the adolescence of the
world of mankind, are now incapable of meeting the
requirements of its maturity. The playthings of childhood and
infancy no longer satisfy or interest the adult mind. [‘Abdu’l-
Bahá: PUP 438-439]
Such is the stage to which an evolving humanity is
collectively approaching. The Revelation entrusted by the
Almighty Ordainer to Bahá’u’lláh, His followers firmly
believe, has been endowed with such potentialities as are
commensurate with the maturity of the human race — the
crowning and most momentous stage in its evolution from
infancy to manhood. [Shoghi Effendi: WOB 165]
If one considers this metaphor, then it can be seen that what we
have been discussing in this paper fits this metaphor well. When one
is dealing with children, one imposes a hierarchy of power over them
and instructs them as what they should do and not do. One has both
power and authority over them. In the same way, in accordance with
the Bahá’í model of progressive revelation, the religions that came
during the collective infancy of humanity encouraged and resulted in
hierarchical forms of society where people who had power and
learning dominated those who did not. As a child grows into
adolescence and eventually to maturity, the wise parents will
gradually reduce the orders and instructions given to the child and
increasingly allow the child to take responsibility for itself. They
hand the power that they exerted over the individual as a child over
to that individual once he or she reaches adolescence and maturity.
This flattening of hierarchies and handing over power to mature
responsible individuals can be seen as the appropriate response as
humanity reaches its collective maturity. The Bahá’í teachings
maintain that this is now the stage in the evolution of humanity's
228 Lights of Irfán vol. 19
social life where this collective maturity is occurring and a new social
order is needed to accommodate this change.
Conclusion
One objection that can be raised is that while these considerations
may be true of the Bahá’í community, can they be applied to society
as a whole. Can one, for example, really run a society in which the
local or national administrative authorities do not have power? Of
course, one has to say immediately that where extremes of human
behaviour are concerned — criminal activity, for example — then the
authorities must also have the power to arrest, try and punish such
individuals. But the Bahá’í administrative institutions have those
powers to deal with such extreme individuals also, as mentioned
above. However, in the lives of ordinary people going about their
everyday activities, the Bahá’í teachings would point towards a
greater reliance on the maturity and sense of responsibility of
individuals to be given the power to regulate their own affairs. This
would involve the handing over by national government to local
authorities of a greater degree of the responsibility for the conduct
of all local matters such as education, health and policing. But it
would in turn mean a far greater involvement, through genuine
consultative processes, of the individual citizens in the running of
their local communities. Individual citizens would in turn have to
take the responsibility of educating themselves in local issues so that
they are not manipulated by single-issue pressure groups or vested
commercial and financial interests.
This approach has wide-ranging implications in many aspects of
social life beyond just that of the political system. In relationship to
employment practices, this approach would also mean the rolling
back of the present trend towards ever greater management control
of workers in both the public and private sector, allowing people to
do their jobs without incessantly seeking to control the way they do
their jobs and setting targets and requiring paper-work which both
consumes time and distorts activity.
Of course such rolling back of the power of both individuals and
institutions cannot occur without a corresponding advance in the
sense of responsibility and the maturity of individuals so that the
Power and the Bahá’í Community 229
vacuum created is adequately filled. This requires individuals who are
mature enough to participate in social activity in a constructive and
balanced manner. It requires an uprightness of conduct and a
commitment to social involvement by all of the individuals in a
society well in excess of what is the current norm. This in turn
requires spiritual resources in the individual which is, of course, a
subject that is too large to go into in this paper.
The whole process can envisaged as a disempowerment of the
hierarchy of power and an empowerment of individuals to take over
many of the essential social functions at present being carried out, in
an unsatisfactory and unjust manner, by the power hierarchy. There
will undoubtedly be a continuing need for an authority structure to
coordinate more complex social functions at the local level and also
those activities that are better managed at a regional and national
level. Such institutions, which will of course be elected bodies, will
also need to have powers of last resort in matters of criminality and
social deviance. But the principle of de-centralization means that
these wider social functions and powers will be kept to a minimum.
At present, most activities that affect the lives of ordinary Bahá’ís
are consulted upon and decided at the local level at reflection
meetings by the people involved themselves. It seems likely then that
in government also most activities that affect the lives of ordinary
people will be consulted upon, agreed and carried out by the people
involved themselves. The present Bahá’í administrative order
provides a model for the functioning of such a social structure.
It is, however, worth pointing out that the Bahá’í community as a
whole, after several decades of concentrating upon the geographical
expansion of the Bahá’í Faith is now engaged, in the latest Five-Year
Plans upon activities which are designed to create precisely the sort
of human resources that would be needed for the successful
application of such a model of community and society: training
programmes to help individuals to take part in consultative decision-
making. This is moreover, not just a training programme for Bahá’ís;
rather it is thrown open to all to both participate in the training and
participate in the programmes of social action that emerge from the
training. The stated aim of the present plans in the Bahá’í community
is to move from the type of community characterised by the passivity
230 Lights of Irfán vol. 19
of the congregation to one where the brunt of the activity and
responsibilities are borne by the membership as a whole.
Of course the Bahá’í community is only at the very beginning of
this process. At present, the Bahá’í community still largely reflects
the wider society. Most Bahá’í communities are still run by a handful
of individuals. But during the twentieth century, great strides were
taken in transferring power and authority from individuals to
institutions, followed by a process of devolving power and authority
from central institutions to local institutions. The final part of this
process — developing the capabilities of the generality of the community
so that power can be handed on to them and they will take up this
responsibility — is the aims of the current series of Five-Year Plans.
Lastly, I think all of this also has great implications for the way in
which Bahá’ís present themselves. Bahá’ís have been used to
presenting the Bahá’í Faith as having the answers to all of society's
ills. This can seem arrogant to some and naive to others. It would
seem preferable and closer to reality to present the Bahá’í community
as one that has a mechanism through which all, whether Bahá’ís or
merely interested individuals, can gather, consult and create together
plans of social action designed to solve problems of society.
In the West, the Bahá’ís are facing a situation where there is a new
religious scene that is affecting them very negatively. The main
feature of this scene is the fact that, while an interest in spiritual
matters is undoubtedly increasing, the type of religiosity that is on
the increase is not assisting the Bahá’í Faith. There are two main areas
in which religion is on the rise:
1. Ultra-traditionalist religion — in almost all parts of the world,
the traditional religion of each area is seeing a resurgence of what is
usually called fundamentalism. The uncertainties and bewildering
choices open to people in modern life together with the
accompanying decline in morals and standards as people take
advantage of the freedoms given to them by modern society has
caused a reaction whereby people are turning back to the certainties
and what they perceive to have been the higher moral standards of
traditional religion. Such people want to turn the clock back two or
three hundred years and return to a world where traditional religion
and its accompanying traditional values and morals were the centre of
Power and the Bahá’í Community 231
society. Clearly the Bahá’í Faith, representing as it does in every part
of the world a new religion that is in competition with the traditional
religion, is not going to find favour with such religiosity. (Of course
the Bahá’í Faith does itself have very high moral and ethical standards
and does agree with traditional religion in many areas and this is
certainly an avenue that can be explored in presenting the Bahá’í Faith
to people from such a background.)
2. New Age religiosity — people are increasingly rejecting formal
affiliation with any organised and established religion in favour of a
highly-individualised pick-and-mix type of religiosity. They take ideas
from every type of religion, (often from Eastern religions: chakras,
reincarnation, astrology, etc.) and dabble in various types of religious
practice (such as meditation or repetitive chanting), ending up with a
medley of ideas and practices that is to their liking. Such people will
often attend Bahá’í meetings, express their admiration for some
Bahá’í ideas, but they will refrain from actually joining the Bahá’í
community, either because they firmly believe in some idea, such as
reincarnation, that is rejected in the Bahá’í teachings or because they
just do not feel comfortable joining an organised religious group.
Perhaps a deeper underlying reason that many such people do not join
the Bahá’í community is that the Bahá’ís do not offer the sort of
quick-fix spirituality that is the claim made by many groups. To join
the Bahá’í community involves oneself in commitment and a long
hard spiritual struggle and such a prospect may not be enticing for
such people. Also the Bahá’í community does not offer the sort of
immediate experiential religion offered by many successful religious
groups.
The result of all this is that the Bahá’í Faith is not benefiting from
the resurgence of interest in things spiritual that has been occurring.
It is neither a traditional religion to be able to benefit from the rise
in fundamentalism, while people who are engaged in the New Age
movement may express appreciation of its teachings and may adopt
them into their personal spirituality, they are not likely to want to
make the commitments that becoming a Bahá’í entails.
Therefore in relation to the question of the presentation of the
Bahá’í Faith, what the above analysis is intended to demonstrate is
that the Bahá’í community is addressing and has developed ways of
tackling some of the major problems that beset human society.
232 Lights of Irfán vol. 19
Therefore it may be that in the present climate of pick-and-mix
religiosity, of people not being willing to commit themselves to
organised religion, it may be more productive to try to bring to
people’s attention the nature of the sort of society that the Bahá’í
Faith is seeking to bring about and the steps the Bahá’í community is
taking to bring this about — to show that this sort of society can deal
with the social problems that we face and to demonstrate that this
sort of society can resolve some of the tensions in modern society.
The implication of this presentation of the Bahá’í Faith is of course
that if one wishes to tackle these problems, the most effective way to
do so would be to become part of a process that has a pattern of
social dynamics with at least a potential for solving some of these
problems, whether that be as a fully committed member of the Bahá’í
Faith or as someone who merely wishes to participate in the
processes, plans and activities being carried out.
N OTES
Shoghi Effendi, in “The Importance of Deepening,” Compilation of
Compilations, p. 230
See analysis of this in Marilyn French, Beyond Power, London: Abacus,
1985.
See the analysis of this in John Holloway, Change The World Without
Taking Power. The Meaning of Revolution Today, London: Pluto Press
2002, pp. 13-18
George Orwell's Animal Farm brilliantly describes this process.
Translated from the Persian. The Universal House of Justice, Messages
1963 to 1986, pp. 216-7
Bahá’u’lláh quoted by ‘Abdu’l-Bahá in A Traveller's Narrative, trans. E.G.
Browne, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1891, vol. 2, p. 114
cf. Kitab-i-Aqdas vs. 123-4
From a letter of the Universal House of Justice to Continental Boards of
Counsellors and National Spiritual Assemblies, October 1, 1969, in The
Continental Boards of Counsellors, Wilmette, 1981, pp. 37-38
──────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────
Power and the Bahá’í community
Moojan Momen
Bahá’ís frequently claim that the Bahá’í teachings have the ability
to create a new social order, a new way of organising human society
such that individuals could develop themselves physically, mentally
and spiritually to the utmost of their capability. When trying to
explain what this new social order is, they present the list of social
teachings that was enunciated by ‘Abdu’l-Bahá during his journeys to
the West a hundred years ago: the oneness of humanity, the equality
of women and men, the need for harmony and balance between
religion and science, the importance of education and so on. While
these social teachings may have sounded new and exciting a century
ago, that is no longer the case today. Even in the middle of the last
century, in 1949, Shoghi Effendi was making this point:
The world has — at least the thinking world — caught up by
now with all the great and universal principles enunciated by
Bahá’u’lláh over 70 years ago, and so of course it does not
sound “new” to them.1
Many other groups are now promoting these social teachings that
‘Abdu’l-Bahá spoke about a century ago. The majority of thinking
people accept them. The problem for humanity now is not accepting
these teachings, but how to implement them. Most people have
accepted the need for the eradication of poverty, for the equality of
women and men, for the removal of racial and other prejudices, and
so on, but despite the fact that this has been well accepted for many
decades, there has been little success in implementing these aims: the
gap between the rich and poor is not closing, women are still unable
210 Lights of Irfán vol. 19
to progress in society as easily as men, racism still exists in all areas
of social life.
So the problem the world faces is not in the principles that would
lead to a better society but in the application. In its 1985 statement,
The Promise of World Peace, the Universal House of Justice offered
up the Bahá’í community as a model for the world to examine:
The experience of the Bahá’í community may be seen as an
example of this enlarging unity. It is a community of some
three to four million people drawn from many nations,
cultures, classes and creeds, engaged in a wide range of
activities serving the spiritual, social and economic needs of
the peoples of many lands. It is a single social organism,
representative of the diversity of the human family,
conducting its affairs through a system of commonly
accepted consultative principles, and cherishing equally all
the great outpourings of divine guidance in human history.
Its existence is yet another convincing proof of the
practicality of its Founder's vision of a united world, another
evidence that humanity can live as one global society, equal
to whatever challenges its coming of age may entail. If the
Bahá’í experience can contribute in whatever measure to
reinforcing hope in the unity of the human race, we are
happy to offer it as a model for study.
In this passage, the Universal House of Justice is holding up the
Bahá’í community as a model of a new society for study. So the
question arises: in what way is the functioning of the Bahá’í
community as a solution to the problems that society now faces?
What aspects of Bahá’í community life are answers to these
problems? What we need to do is to look at our present society and
try to determine what are the root causes of the problems that it
faces and then to see in what practical ways the functioning of the
Bahá’í community tackles these problems. I am going to deal mainly
with Western societies since these are the only ones about which I
feel I can speak, but what I say may well be also true of other
societies since the conditions I will be describing are by no means
confined to the West and, in any case, the problems the West faces
are gradually seeping out to other parts of the world.
There are of course many problems that the world is facing but I
am going to focus on two partly inter-related problems: first the fact
Power and the Bahá’í Community 211
that a large proportion of people in our societies feel that they are
excluded because they have no power within society or that they are
unable to participate fully in society because barriers exist that
prevent this. They feel unable to develop fully on account of this and
feel a sense of injustice and consequent resentment. The second
problem is that the balance between individual freedom and central
authority in society has not been satisfactorily resolved. While
authoritarian regimes have been overthrown and democracy
established in many parts of the world, many are now saying that the
balance has shifted too far towards individualism and a lack of
central authority, that the rampant freedom of the capitalist market
has led to a danger of falling into a situation of the 'rule of the
jungle', where the wealthiest and most powerful have free reign to do
what they like. The same situation prevails within religions where
fundamentalists and liberals are locked in conflict over the question
of whether society should be subservient to the authority of
traditional religious forms or whether religion should change and
adapt to accommodate social realities.
Hierarchical, Hegemonic, Patriarchal Society
Returning to the first of these two problems that society faces,
the fact that a large number of people feel excluded from society to
some extent, so pervasive is this that in fact, in most societies, the
majority of people find that they face barriers of one sort or another.
These may be barriers of gender, race, social class or even such things
as the accent with which one speaks. But in all, it means that the
majority of every society faces barriers to some degree, which mean
that they are not treated equally, cannot advance in their occupation,
cannot obtain the same services, cannot live in the same areas and
cannot join in some activities in society. The barriers that are put up
can be minor, such as just having to wait longer than others for the
same service or they can be major such as finding that one’s chosen
occupation is barred to one.
Although there is lip service to equality in many Western societies,
the reality that most people experience is one of constantly coming
up against these barriers. Thus for example, in most Western nations,
the principle of the equality between men and women has been
acknowledged for almost a century and yet women say that they
212 Lights of Irfán vol. 19
experience what has been called a “glass ceiling” as they develop
professionally and try to advance in their careers. They reach a point
at which further progress seems to be denied them despite their
having the qualifications for it. They see male colleagues with less
experience and perhaps even fewer qualifications being promoted
ahead of them.
This same experience of facing barriers to progress is also
experienced by people from racial and ethnic minorities, from the
lower social classes and by many other groups. In fact the only people
who do not experience this and who therefore obtain the full benefits
of society are, in Western societies, educated white males from the
upper strata of society. It is usually these people who are in positions
where they are analysing their society in an authoritative manner and
initiating change. Thus the social structure is hierarchical and highly
competitive. That which is given the highest value in such societies
are power, authority, control, victory, ownership, courage, strength.
The main interactions are power struggles and competition. The ends
justify the means. Results are expressed in terms of victory or defeat.
There are only rewards for the winners in such a society, none for the
runners-ups. It is epitomised by tradition, institutions, civilisation,
law, and control over the natural world. Those who have power and
wealth are valued, considered important, are consulted about major
decisions and are listened to when they protest. Those who have no
power or wealth are not valued, not considered important, are not
consulted on major decisions and not listened to when they protest.
As a result of having their ideas disparaged and discounted as they
grow up, they often cease to have ideas of their own and merely
repeat what the newspapers and political demagogues tell them is
true. Decisions in such societies are made by just one man or a small
group of men and are then handed down to be carried out. The social
structures in these societies are pyramidal with one or a few people at
the top and increasing numbers as one goes down. This is what is
meant by a hierarchical society.
The fundamental problem underlying this situation is the fact that
we live in societies that are patriarchal or hegemonic. The word
patriarchy means ‘rule by men’ and implies a domination of society
by men. The majority of positions of power and authority whether
this be in government, business, professional or even in recreational
and informal groups and societies are held by men. The concept of a
patriarchal society goes, however, beyond just the fact of the gender
Power and the Bahá’í Community 213
of those in authority. For example Britain went through a period of
almost two decades when there was a female sovereign and female
Prime Minister, but this did not change the fact that Britain was a
patriarchal society. If a woman wants to reach the higher echelons of
society, she must masculinize herself, become competitive and
aggressive, become more male than the men. There is considerable
evidence that girls are inherently less competitive and more co-
operative than boys. Therefore in any society where power is the
highest value and there are no other constraints, girls/women will
usually be dominated by boys/men. In modern Western societies
where almost all positions of power are awarded on the basis of
competitiveness (either in the form of outright competition for the
post or through interviews where competitiveness is given the highest
value), the inevitable result is that men dominate most positions of
power in the society. This is the patriarchal society.2
One might think that the sorts of totalitarian regimes that existed
in Europe in the inter-war years of the twentieth century or which
exist today in many parts of the world are the only remaining
hierarchical societies and that democratic Western societies are not
hierarchical but there is just as much of a hidden hierarchy in
Western societies as in any totalitarian state. The relatively small
number of people at the top of the hierarchy in Western states
control the political process, the newspapers and other media, the
education system, the justice system and all other important areas of
life. Through this control, they also control the discourse of society.
It is their opinions that are heard on the television, read in the
newspapers and put into the textbooks studied at schools and
universities; theirs is the only discourse that gets publicity and is thus
regarded as the norm for the society; they have a hegemony over the
norms, values and discourses of society. The voices of those lower
down the hierarchy are ignored, considered unimportant and
marginal; their experiences of social barriers and prejudice are
regarded as the “rumblings of social malcontents”. This is the
hegemonic society.
Thus our modern societies, no matter where we live in the world,
are hierarchical, patriarchal hegemonic societies. In the West, there
may not be tanks in the streets enforcing the hierarchy, but all such
societies depend upon force to maintain the pyramid of power. In the
West, this compulsion is maintained through the law and the police
force. This situation is not one that is easy to change. Those with
214 Lights of Irfán vol. 19
authority and power control the communications media and
education. They therefore are in a position to impose their worldview
on others. Women and other groups low down the hierarchy have one
of two alternatives in this situation. They can accept the system and
continue to hold a lower place in society. If they wish to try to beat
the system can only do so by competing with those already in power.
Power is thus corrosive and subversive. Even in a democratic
process, the attempt to gain power is itself corrosive. If a group
wants to bring about social justice and a more egalitarian society, it
has to gain power in order to bring this about. It thinks that if it
gains power, it will control the state and then it can use the state to
achieve its goals of social justice and a more egalitarian society. It
forms a political party and starts to campaign to gain votes. But in
this process, it is being diverted from its goal of achieving social
justice and a more egalitarian society and its goal is now achieving
power. Everything becomes subordinated to this goal. Achieving
power now becomes the main goal of the group and other goals such
as social justice become secondary. What happens in practice is that
once the party is successful and has achieved power, the hierarchy
remains the same B remaining in power has the highest priority. To
this priority the lower goals such as social justice and a more
egalitarian society are readily sacrificed. The people who voted for
the party feel betrayed as they see the party chasing after those who
wield influence and have social power and failing to implement
anything that benefits them.3
Thus the values of the patriarchal, hierarchical hegemonic society
are subversive; they subvert those that try to defeat them. This has
been what successive revolutions from the 18th century onwards have
found. The French Revolution and the various Communist
Revolutions that have occurred have all been in the name of creating
a more egalitarian society, where power is no longer the highest value.
Those that led these revolutions were however forced to seize power
and in doing so found their initial values subverted. The result was a
society that was just as hierarchical as before, but with merely a
different set of people in power.4
All groups that are low in the social hierarchy, whether women,
racial and ethnic minorities or people of lower social class or status
face much the same sorts of barriers and problems. Indeed if one
considers that half of society is women and then adds in the various
Power and the Bahá’í Community 215
ethnic and class groups who are also dominated by the white upper
and middle class males who are at the top of the social hierarchy, one
can see that in Western societies where we are all supposed to be equal,
it is only a small percentage who have full access to the benefits and
opportunities and the majority are a good deal less “equal” than them.
A further fact that makes it difficult to achieve any change is that
in patriarchal societies, it is very difficult to even gain an
acknowledgement of the fact that a problem exists. It is men from
the dominant group who control the communications media and the
education system; it they who are the journalists, the newspaper
editors, the social analysts, the professors of social sciences and these
men experience no barriers and therefore see no problem. The
rhetoric coming from these leaders of society is that their societies
are fair and democratic with equal opportunities for all. These
individuals at the top of the hierarchy have not experienced life in the
lower levels of the hierarchy, they have not come across any social
barriers or obstacles in their careers or faced prejudice and injustice.
They therefore can truthfully say that “ours is an open society; people
get to the top through merit alone” — and therefore there is no need
for any change.
The Bahá’í Answer to the Hierarchical,
Hegemonic, Patriarchal Society
It can be seen that because of its unseen barriers and subversive
nature, it is not a very easy matter to contemplate changing such a
society. The question then arises as to whether the Bahá’í Faith has
any answers to this difficult situation. Since the Bahá’í Faith aims for
equality between men and women and to bring into being a more
egalitarian society, how does the Bahá’í Faith seek to resolve this
problem? It can be seen from the above that a very radical change is
needed and furthermore it must be a change that does not inherently
find itself subverted.
Firstly of course, a set of values is needed that does not place
power and wealth at the highest level; but this is perhaps the easiest
part of the process. Most religions offer a set of values that
emphasise the importance of values such as love, service, humility
etc. and indeed most religions teach that wealth can be a barrier to
spiritual progress. The Bahá’í Faith has similar teachings. There are a
216 Lights of Irfán vol. 19
large number of quotations from the Bahá’í scriptures asserting the
equality of all human beings, for example, and others that assert the
equality of men and women.
Even in the earliest stages of its history, the Bábí and Bahá’í Faiths
have been engaged in overturning the power structures that formed
the foundations of society. When the Báb praised a simple sifter of
wheat for having discerned the truth and recognized him before all of
the learned class of Isfahan, when the Báb and Bahá’u’lláh asserted
that understanding religious truth did not depend on the years of
book learning that the Islamic learned classes engaged upon at their
religious colleges but rather on purity and spiritual discernment that
could be cultivated by anyone, they were in effect laying an axe to
the foundations of the hegemonic social structure that prized the
book learning of the religious class and gave them authority and
privileges on account of that.
In a letter written on 14 March 1927 to the Spiritual Assembly of
the Bahá’ís of Istanbul, the Guardian's Secretary explained, on his
behalf, the principle in the Cause of action by majority vote. He
pointed out how, in the past, it was certain individuals who
“accounted themselves as superior in knowledge and elevated in
position” who caused division, and that it was those “who pretended
to be the most distinguished of all” who “always proved themselves to
be the source of contention.” “But praise be to God,” he continued,
“that the Pen of Glory has done away with the unyielding and
dictatorial views of the learned and the wise, dismissed the assertions
of individuals as an authoritative criterion, even though they were
recognized as the most accomplished and learned among men and
ordained that all matters be referred to authorized centres and specified
Assemblies. Even so, no Assembly has been invested with the absolute
authority to deal with such general matters as affect the interests of
nations. Nay rather, He has brought all the assemblies together under
the shadow of one House of Justice, one divinely appointed Centre,
so that there would be only one Centre and all the rest integrated into
a single body, revolving around one expressly designated Pivot, thus
making them all proof against schism and division.”5
‘Abdu’l-Bahá carried this process forward defining some of the
words associated with the hegemonic push towards competitiveness
in such a way as to subvert their meanings. Thus for example,
Power and the Bahá’í Community 217
regarding the word “victory”, ‘Abdu’l-Bahá writes that for the Bahá’í
Cause: “its victory is to submit and yield” [SWAB 256] and he quotes
Bahá’u’lláh as stating: “Therefore, today, `victory' neither hath been,
nor will be opposition to anyone, nor strife with any person; but
rather what is well-pleasing—this is, that the cities of men's hearts,
which are under the dominion of the hosts of selfishness and lust,
should be subdued by the sword of the Word of Wisdom, and of
Exhortation.”6 Similarly, ‘Abdu’l-Bahá subverts the concept of
competition from its usual role in a masculine society, that of gaining
power, and instead promotes it as an approach in the arena of
service: “Vie ye with each other in the service of God and of His
Cause. This is indeed what profiteth you in this world, and in that
which is to come” [qtd in ADJ 83]. The goal of personal ambition and
the source of greatest glory do not belong, in ‘Abdu’l-Bahá’s
estimation, to the person who seizes power but to the person who
excels in service to “human uplift and betterment” [PUP 353] and to
“the cause of the Most Great Peace” [PUP 123].
It is all very well to have egalitarian values and to subvert the
foundations of the hegemonic society, but the question remains of
what you put in its place. Many individuals and groups have had these
principles but have not been able to transform them into practice
because of the subversive nature of power. What is needed is to have
some way to get these values prevalent in society without having
them subverted. How does one set up a community that is more
egalitarian? The Bahá’í community in fact provides a model for just
such a social system.
First, the Bahá’í community does not contend for power. Those
who have wanted to change society have always thought that the way
to do this is to seize control of the state and that it would then be
possible to use the power of the state to change society. They have
therefore either taken the revolutionary road to power (as in the
French Revolution and the various communist revolutions) or they
have tried the democratic route, as with various democratic socialist
parties. Apart from the pitfall of the subversion of their egalitarian
values which has been discussed above and which they all suffered,
what they have failed to appreciate is that the power of the state is
largely illusionary. The state is but one element in a nexus of actors and
by itself, it has only a limited ability to make changes. It cannot by itself
218 Lights of Irfán vol. 19
change the social structure, for example, since it is the social structure
that is supporting the state and to try to change it risks destabilizing
the state itself. The Bahá’í community eschews the route to power as
a means of effecting a change in society. It refrains from all
involvement in partisan politics, recognising that any such involvement
risks subverting its values and ultimately frustrating its goals.
Second, in the Bahá’í community power does not rest with
individuals. There are no priests or any other religious professionals
with any special power or authority by virtue of their position.
Authority rests with institutions acting as institutions. It is true of
course that individuals are elected onto these institutions but these
individuals hold no power or authority in their own right. Even the
chairman of a National Spiritual Assembly, the national governing
body of the Bahá’ís in an area, has no individual authority. A member
of the National Spiritual Assembly is still subject to the authority of
the local governing board, the Local Spiritual Assembly, in the area
where he or she lives. All authority rests with the institutions making
decisions as a body. There are individual appointments made to
positions such as the Boards of Counsellors and the Auxiliary Board,
but these appointees play only an exhortatory and advisory role. They
hold no authority or power.
Third, decisions are made in the Bahá’í community through
consultation. The Bahá’í process of consultation is one which
encourages all those taking part to participate. This helps to draw out
members of minority groups and races as well as lower social classes
who do not feel confident enough to speak in group settings. The
Bahá’í ideal of consultation provides a safe and encouraging
environment for such people to express their views. Indeed, just as
men are better at competition, women are inherently better in the co-
operative environment produced by the consultation process. In such
an environment, they therefore feel comfortable in putting forward
their views (which is not the case in a highly competitive
environment) and they are able to play a major role in Bahá’í
community life.
There are also other provisions in Bahá’í community life which are
aimed at encouraging minorities. The Bahá’í Faith has been spread
through planned action. In these plans, a deliberate effort has been
made to bring into the community every type of minority living in a
Power and the Bahá’í Community 219
particular area. This has been assisted by having, as part of these same
plans, Bahá’í literature translated into as many languages as possible.
Another example is the fact that, in Bahá’í elections, if there is a tied
vote, then if one of those tied is from a minority, that person is
automatically declared the winner of the tie.
A Practical Path to a Different Society
It is however, in the last two decades that the Bahá’í community
has produced a practical path forward that all, whether Bahá’í or not,
can follow in creating a more egalitarian society. Since about 1996,
the Bahá’í community has been engaged in a programme of action
that works to mitigate and counter many of the worst features of the
hierarchical society. The central feature of this programme is a course
of participatory learning designed to develop the human resources
within a community. The course encourages people, especially those
at the base of the power pyramid who have been used to having their
ideas disparaged and discounted and have ceased to think for
themselves, to start to think, to develop ideas, and, in the protected
consultative environment of the course, to start to have the
confidence to express those ideas. Furthermore, the course focuses
on the spiritual aspects of the human being, encouraging the growth
of a spirit of selflessness and service. As a result, people are
encouraged to engage in acts of service. They are initially trained to
do such service as organising children’s moral education classes,
junior youth empowerment programmes, devotional meetings, home
visits and accompanying others in their path of service. These acts of
service then enable participants to have ideas about the needs of the
community and how to address these. Thus participants in the courses
are trained not only to develop their own ideas and have the
confidence to express them but also, through acts of service, they
begin to see the reality around them and to have thoughts about how
to address the problems of their community.
All of this is then brought to the cluster reflection meetings where
those attending reflect on what has occurred previously and with
input from Bahá’í administrative bodies and from ideas arising from
their own study groups and service projects, they consult upon the
needs of the area and how these can be addressed realistically with the
resources available. These study courses and reflection meetings are
220 Lights of Irfán vol. 19
not confined to Bahá’ís. Anyone interested can engage with this
process, can take part in the study courses, can carry out the acts of
service and can participate in the reflection meetings. In this way, the
power to change their own community is devolved down in a
meaningful way to the members of that community.
If we were to create in this way more egalitarian societies, this
would not just solve the problem that large numbers of people feel
alienated and unjustly treated by the structures of the hierarchical
society, it would help towards resolving other social problems as well.
To reduce the competitiveness and aggressiveness associated with the
patriarchal, hegemonic society would also be a major step towards
world peace since this competitiveness and aggressiveness also feeds
across from a society's internal affairs into its external foreign
affairs and results in undue aggressiveness and lack of co-operation
at the international level. A higher value being placed on co-
operation within our societies would result in a higher level of co-
operation in global affairs and in resolving global problems. The
greater involvement of women in social affairs would in itself also be
conducive to world peace according to the Bahá’í teachings.
The competitiveness of the business world is a major contributor
to pollution and environmental degradation. The competitiveness
that the patriarchal society demands results in an inexorable pressure
to reduce costs often with the result of increased pollution. If local
environmental regulations prevent this pollution then modern
business instead of accepting this as a price worth paying moves its
factories to elsewhere in the world where the environmental
regulations are not so strict. Unfortunately although the
environmental regulations are local in their effects, the pollution
caused by these companies respects no borders and is world-wide in
its effects. A society that is not so driven by the urge to be
competitive would also be inherently less polluting.
Thus to produce more egalitarian less hierarchical societies would
help in the resolution of many of the problems that the world faces
from the alienation and sense of injustice that breeds civil unrest,
vandalism and violence to global problems such as war and
environmental pollution.
Power and the Bahá’í Community 221
Individualism and Authority
A second area that is causing a deal of turmoil for many because it
is a problem that has not been successfully resolved in any society is
the balance between individuality and authority in society and the
associated problem of how to maintain a balance between centralised
national or international authority and local initiative and
independence. The balance between these has not been successfully
achieved in any society. In those societies that have swung too far
towards individuality, the cult of the individual threatens the
cohesion and moral order of society. Using the pretext of personal
freedom, some individuals are subjecting others to virtual slavery
(driving the poor into financial debt that makes them virtual slaves of
the owners of their debts), sexual abuse, and the physical and sexual
abuse of children. The opposite extreme is that of the sort of
collectivism seen in communist societies, where the individual is
suppressed completely, supposedly for the benefit of the community.
Neither extreme allows either full human development or human
prosperity. Of course, all human beings are individuals and must be
given the freedom to develop their talents and potential, but to allow
that freedom to go to excess, where human beings are given the
freedom to sink to the level of animal behaviour and to oppress
others stunts human development and causes society to fall apart in
corruption and moral decadence. Similarly excessive centralized
control stifles human initiative and leads to loss of morale and
enthusiasm for projects because people do not feel involved in the
decisions that affect their lives.
These two extremes of excessive individualism and excessive
control can be seen operating in many situations in the world.
Broadly speaking, the United States of America leans towards the
extreme of individualism and rights to liberty in all areas. In practice,
this means that those with money and power use this liberty to
control the communications media and the political process to their
advantage and in order to impose their aims on society. Thus
paradoxically, in precisely those societies where the most freedom is
given to the individual, the result is that the individual is most
manipulated by commercial and other interests. Western Europe has,
on the other hand, moved towards centralized control and many
aspects of daily life are regulated by the centralized authority of the
222 Lights of Irfán vol. 19
European Union. The result is that people feel remote from the
decision-making process and therefore feel increasingly justified in
rebelling against it or ignoring it. There are of course many areas of
the world where centralized authoritarian political regimes go much
further than Europe and these regimes suppress individual initiative
even more and result in a loss of morale and initiative in their populations.
These extremes are not confined to political structures however.
Matters such as international aid have swung across the pendulum
from a strict centralised control of methods and means of deploying
international aid — often leading to inappropriate aid being given
because the people at the centre do not know what is appropriate —
to a much more relaxed system with decisions being made locally —
often resulting in corruption and dissipation of effort. In religions in
particular this tension can be seen as one of the most prominent
features of religious life in the past century. In almost every religious
group there is some degree of conflict between those who hold to a
strict central doctrinal and organisational authority in the religion
(often associated with religious fundamentalism) and those who want
to free the individual believers to think freely about religious ideas
and to experience the religion in ways that suit each individual (often
described as religious liberalism).
In the Bahá’í Faith there are several aspects to achieving the right
balance between individual liberty and centralized authority. While
Bahá’u’lláh on the one hand applauds democracy and commends
Queen Victoria for having “entrusted the reins of counsel into the
hands of the representatives of the people” [PB 34],7 he also, on the
other hand, condemns the excess of liberty that leads to
libertarianism and states that it will “exercise a pernicious influence
upon men” [GWB 216]. Shoghi Effendi summarises this by stating that
“The Bahá’í conception of social life... neither suppresses the
individual nor does it exalt him to the point of making him an
anti-social creature, a menace to society. As in everything, it follows
the ‘golden mean’” [UD 435-436].
As in the case of achieving a more egalitarian society, there are
many groups and movements other than the Bahá’ís who agree with
Shoghi Effendi's view that the ideal is to achieve this ‘golden mean’.
However in practice, we find that societies and groups either
gravitate towards one extreme or the other or else they swing like a
Power and the Bahá’í Community 223
pendulum between the two extremes. It appears that no society or
large group has succeeded in finding a way of remaining at the
‘golden mean’. It is in the practicalities of how to achieve this state
that they have failed.
Once again, the Bahá’í community provides a model of how to
achieve this balance. This is achieved in the Bahá’í community
through an innovative separation between power and authority. In
most societies, organisation and groups, it is taken for granted that
those in authority should also be given the power to enforce their
authority. Thus mechanisms of enforcement are enacted to compel
those who are members of that society or group to follow the
directives of those that are in authority. These may be laws for a
society or codes of discipline in organisations or rules in the case of
groups. Those who are in authority are given the power to sanction
whoever fails to follow their directives.
In the Bahá’í community, however, there is an attempt to separate
authority and power to some extent. We have noted above that
individuals have neither authority nor power in the Bahá’í
community. The elected institutions of the Bahá’í community have
the authority to direct the affairs of the community, but their
obligation is to try to achieve their objectives through winning the
support of the individual Bahá’ís. Shoghi Effendi addressing primarily
the members of the elected Bahá’í institutions states:
Let us also bear in mind that the keynote of the Cause of God
is not dictatorial authority but humble fellowship, not
arbitrary power, but the spirit of frank and loving
consultation. Nothing short of the spirit of a true Bahá’í can
hope to reconcile the principles of mercy and justice, of
freedom and submission, of the sanctity of the right of the
individual and of self-surrender, of vigilance, discretion and
prudence on the one hand, and fellowship, candor, and
courage on the other. [BA 63-64]
The elected Bahá’í institutions have, in effect, very little power to
enforce their authority in many areas when compared with the central
authorities of other religions. They have no doctrinal authority; no
authority to determine correct doctrine or to create new doctrine or
theological teachings, nor to interpret the texts of the scripture. Thus
they hold no power in many areas over which religious leadership has
224 Lights of Irfán vol. 19
traditionally held both power and authority. They have the authority
to direct the Bahá’í community by laying out plans of action for the
Bahá’ís, but they have no sanctions or other means of compelling the
Bahá’ís to carry out these plans. If any Bahá’í, for example, wants to
completely ignore the present Five Year Plan of the Universal House
of Justice, they are free to do so without any fear of sanctions
against them. The general situation is summed up in the words of the
Universal House of Justice thus:
Authority and direction flow from the Assemblies, whereas
the power to accomplish the tasks resides primarily in the
entire body of the believers.8
The power that the elected institutions have over the believers can
only be exercised in extreme situations and is thus rarely encountered
by the average Bahá’í. This power involves Bahá’ís who actions go
outside certain limits. These include for example administrative
sanctions against Bahá’ís who bring the Bahá’í Faith into disrepute,
perhaps by their disregard for the moral code of society (however
what Bahá’ís do privately is not usually a cause of action by the
Bahá’í institutions). More severe sanctions are taken towards those
who seek to create division and sectarianism in the Bahá’í community
(however holding differing opinions is not sanctionable, it is only
when an individual attempts to create a sect or grouping around such
an opinion that sanctions may be applied). The overwhelming
majority of Bahá’ís will not however experience this.
If Bahá’ís have such freedom of thought and freedom to disregard
the exhortations of their institutions, what is it then that preserves
the unity of the Bahá’í community (for if the Bahá’í Faith is to
achieve its stated goal of uniting humanity, it is obvious that it itself
must remain united). The principal mechanism whereby the individual
is granted freedom of thought in the Bahá’í Faith and yet unity is
maintained is that of the Covenant. In the Bahá’í Faith, there is no
doctrine or creed about the nature of God or the nature of
Bahá’u’lláh to which the individual is obliged to assent. Bahá’ís are
free to read the scriptures for themselves and to come to their
understanding of theological matters. The only limit on Bahá’ís is
that they cannot claim that their understanding of theological matters
is authoritative or binding on any other Bahá’í (and thereby attempt
to set up a cabal or sectarian grouping). Only the interpretations of
Power and the Bahá’í Community 225
‘Abdu’l-Bahá and Shoghi Effendi are authoritative. Since both
‘Abdu’l-Bahá and Shoghi Effendi are deceased, their writings have
effectively become part of the scripture or authoritative text. There
is no longer any living authoritative interpretation in the Bahá’í
Faith. What preserves the unity of the Bahá’í community in the face
of this ideological individualism is the concept of the Covenant —
that all Bahá’ís pledge themselves to obeying the instructions of the
Focal Centre of the Covenant, which since 1963 has been the
Universal House of Justice. Since the Universal House of Justice is
not a body that creates doctrine or dogma but rather a body that
directs the affairs of the Bahá’í community, obedience to the
instructions of the Focal Centre of the Covenant does not limit the
individual's freedom to think whatever they wish about theological
matters, but only their freedom to act in ways that would set up sects
and cliques around such individual interpretation.
Another aspect of the balance between centralized authority and
local democracy in the Bahá’í community is the fact that the
authority and powers of the local governing councils of the Bahá’í
community have been laid down in authoritative Bahá’í texts. The
local governing councils have inherent rights over matters that are
purely confined to their locality, an authority that cannot be
removed by the decision of the national body. Thus one cannot have
the situation that has occurred in many countries where the local
governing authorities have had their rights stripped away by the
desire of the national government to centralize and control all
aspects of the nation's life.
In all aspects of Bahá’í community life, the emphasis is on
decentralization — handing down to the local level everything that
can appropriately be administered at the local level. “It [the
world-wide Law of Bahá’u’lláh) repudiates excessive centralization on
one hand, and disclaims all attempts at uniformity on the other. Its
watchword is unity in diversity” [WOB 42]. But to offset problems
that may arise from such decentralization — where local prejudices may
discriminate against some individuals or groups, individual Bahá’ís
are given substantial powers to appeal the decisions of their local
body to the national and even, if necessary, to the international level.
In the pre-modern period, individuals, except for the elite in
society were given a script at birth which they were expected to
226 Lights of Irfán vol. 19
follow and which severely limited their choices in all aspects of their
lives. This script however, as long as they followed, gave them a
socially-recognised identity, a guaranteed place in society and made
them feel included in the workings of their community. The
individualism of contemporary society means that people are free to
tear up the script that they are given at birth and write their own
script in terms of their individual choices. This individualism,
however, leaves most individuals with no assigned or recognized
social interactions that can make them feel part of a community, an
anomie resulting in no social structure to which a person can relate.
Throughout most of human history it has been religion that formed
the glue binding individuals to their communities. Having cast
religion aside, most individuals in the twentieth century experimented
with various social and political ideologies, such as communism,
nationalism and racism, which tried to take the place of religion in
linking the individual into a community. All of ideologies failed with
disastrous consequences for the societies that tried to adopt them.
What the Bahá’í Faith offers is a modern religion, free of the
superstition and irrationality that marks much of traditional religion,
and offering a pathway for the individual to link into a community
united in constructive action and service; giving that individual
interpersonal links that can give that person a feeling of belonging
and interconnectedness.
The Maturity of Humanity
I would like to suggest that these two aspects of the social
dynamics of the Bahá’í community which we have discussed, the
removal of hierarchies of power and the achievement of a balance
between society and the individual, can be thought of as related to
the statement that has been made by Bahá’u’lláh, ‘Abdu’l-Bahá and Shoghi
Effendi: that humanity is just entering its collective stage of maturity.
No sooner had mankind attained the stage of maturity, than the
Word revealed to men's eyes the latent energies with which it
had been endowed — energies which manifested themselves in
the plenitude of their glory when the Ancient Beauty
appeared, in the year sixty, in the person of `Alí-Muhammad,
the Báb. [Bahá’u’lláh: GWB 77-78]
Power and the Bahá’í Community 227
Similarly, there are periods and stages in the life of the
aggregate world of humanity, which at one time was passing
through its degree of childhood, at another its time of youth
but now has entered its long presaged period of maturity, the
evidences of which are everywhere visible and apparent.
Therefore, the requirements and conditions of former
periods have changed and merged into exigencies which
distinctly characterize the present age of the world of
mankind ... The gifts and graces of the period of youth,
although timely and sufficient during the adolescence of the
world of mankind, are now incapable of meeting the
requirements of its maturity. The playthings of childhood and
infancy no longer satisfy or interest the adult mind. [‘Abdu’l-
Bahá: PUP 438-439]
Such is the stage to which an evolving humanity is
collectively approaching. The Revelation entrusted by the
Almighty Ordainer to Bahá’u’lláh, His followers firmly
believe, has been endowed with such potentialities as are
commensurate with the maturity of the human race — the
crowning and most momentous stage in its evolution from
infancy to manhood. [Shoghi Effendi: WOB 165]
If one considers this metaphor, then it can be seen that what we
have been discussing in this paper fits this metaphor well. When one
is dealing with children, one imposes a hierarchy of power over them
and instructs them as what they should do and not do. One has both
power and authority over them. In the same way, in accordance with
the Bahá’í model of progressive revelation, the religions that came
during the collective infancy of humanity encouraged and resulted in
hierarchical forms of society where people who had power and
learning dominated those who did not. As a child grows into
adolescence and eventually to maturity, the wise parents will
gradually reduce the orders and instructions given to the child and
increasingly allow the child to take responsibility for itself. They
hand the power that they exerted over the individual as a child over
to that individual once he or she reaches adolescence and maturity.
This flattening of hierarchies and handing over power to mature
responsible individuals can be seen as the appropriate response as
humanity reaches its collective maturity. The Bahá’í teachings
maintain that this is now the stage in the evolution of humanity's
228 Lights of Irfán vol. 19
social life where this collective maturity is occurring and a new social
order is needed to accommodate this change.
Conclusion
One objection that can be raised is that while these considerations
may be true of the Bahá’í community, can they be applied to society
as a whole. Can one, for example, really run a society in which the
local or national administrative authorities do not have power? Of
course, one has to say immediately that where extremes of human
behaviour are concerned — criminal activity, for example — then the
authorities must also have the power to arrest, try and punish such
individuals. But the Bahá’í administrative institutions have those
powers to deal with such extreme individuals also, as mentioned
above. However, in the lives of ordinary people going about their
everyday activities, the Bahá’í teachings would point towards a
greater reliance on the maturity and sense of responsibility of
individuals to be given the power to regulate their own affairs. This
would involve the handing over by national government to local
authorities of a greater degree of the responsibility for the conduct
of all local matters such as education, health and policing. But it
would in turn mean a far greater involvement, through genuine
consultative processes, of the individual citizens in the running of
their local communities. Individual citizens would in turn have to
take the responsibility of educating themselves in local issues so that
they are not manipulated by single-issue pressure groups or vested
commercial and financial interests.
This approach has wide-ranging implications in many aspects of
social life beyond just that of the political system. In relationship to
employment practices, this approach would also mean the rolling
back of the present trend towards ever greater management control
of workers in both the public and private sector, allowing people to
do their jobs without incessantly seeking to control the way they do
their jobs and setting targets and requiring paper-work which both
consumes time and distorts activity.
Of course such rolling back of the power of both individuals and
institutions cannot occur without a corresponding advance in the
sense of responsibility and the maturity of individuals so that the
Power and the Bahá’í Community 229
vacuum created is adequately filled. This requires individuals who are
mature enough to participate in social activity in a constructive and
balanced manner. It requires an uprightness of conduct and a
commitment to social involvement by all of the individuals in a
society well in excess of what is the current norm. This in turn
requires spiritual resources in the individual which is, of course, a
subject that is too large to go into in this paper.
The whole process can envisaged as a disempowerment of the
hierarchy of power and an empowerment of individuals to take over
many of the essential social functions at present being carried out, in
an unsatisfactory and unjust manner, by the power hierarchy. There
will undoubtedly be a continuing need for an authority structure to
coordinate more complex social functions at the local level and also
those activities that are better managed at a regional and national
level. Such institutions, which will of course be elected bodies, will
also need to have powers of last resort in matters of criminality and
social deviance. But the principle of de-centralization means that
these wider social functions and powers will be kept to a minimum.
At present, most activities that affect the lives of ordinary Bahá’ís
are consulted upon and decided at the local level at reflection
meetings by the people involved themselves. It seems likely then that
in government also most activities that affect the lives of ordinary
people will be consulted upon, agreed and carried out by the people
involved themselves. The present Bahá’í administrative order
provides a model for the functioning of such a social structure.
It is, however, worth pointing out that the Bahá’í community as a
whole, after several decades of concentrating upon the geographical
expansion of the Bahá’í Faith is now engaged, in the latest Five-Year
Plans upon activities which are designed to create precisely the sort
of human resources that would be needed for the successful
application of such a model of community and society: training
programmes to help individuals to take part in consultative decision-
making. This is moreover, not just a training programme for Bahá’ís;
rather it is thrown open to all to both participate in the training and
participate in the programmes of social action that emerge from the
training. The stated aim of the present plans in the Bahá’í community
is to move from the type of community characterised by the passivity
230 Lights of Irfán vol. 19
of the congregation to one where the brunt of the activity and
responsibilities are borne by the membership as a whole.
Of course the Bahá’í community is only at the very beginning of
this process. At present, the Bahá’í community still largely reflects
the wider society. Most Bahá’í communities are still run by a handful
of individuals. But during the twentieth century, great strides were
taken in transferring power and authority from individuals to
institutions, followed by a process of devolving power and authority
from central institutions to local institutions. The final part of this
process — developing the capabilities of the generality of the community
so that power can be handed on to them and they will take up this
responsibility — is the aims of the current series of Five-Year Plans.
Lastly, I think all of this also has great implications for the way in
which Bahá’ís present themselves. Bahá’ís have been used to
presenting the Bahá’í Faith as having the answers to all of society's
ills. This can seem arrogant to some and naive to others. It would
seem preferable and closer to reality to present the Bahá’í community
as one that has a mechanism through which all, whether Bahá’ís or
merely interested individuals, can gather, consult and create together
plans of social action designed to solve problems of society.
In the West, the Bahá’ís are facing a situation where there is a new
religious scene that is affecting them very negatively. The main
feature of this scene is the fact that, while an interest in spiritual
matters is undoubtedly increasing, the type of religiosity that is on
the increase is not assisting the Bahá’í Faith. There are two main areas
in which religion is on the rise:
1. Ultra-traditionalist religion — in almost all parts of the world,
the traditional religion of each area is seeing a resurgence of what is
usually called fundamentalism. The uncertainties and bewildering
choices open to people in modern life together with the
accompanying decline in morals and standards as people take
advantage of the freedoms given to them by modern society has
caused a reaction whereby people are turning back to the certainties
and what they perceive to have been the higher moral standards of
traditional religion. Such people want to turn the clock back two or
three hundred years and return to a world where traditional religion
and its accompanying traditional values and morals were the centre of
Power and the Bahá’í Community 231
society. Clearly the Bahá’í Faith, representing as it does in every part
of the world a new religion that is in competition with the traditional
religion, is not going to find favour with such religiosity. (Of course
the Bahá’í Faith does itself have very high moral and ethical standards
and does agree with traditional religion in many areas and this is
certainly an avenue that can be explored in presenting the Bahá’í Faith
to people from such a background.)
2. New Age religiosity — people are increasingly rejecting formal
affiliation with any organised and established religion in favour of a
highly-individualised pick-and-mix type of religiosity. They take ideas
from every type of religion, (often from Eastern religions: chakras,
reincarnation, astrology, etc.) and dabble in various types of religious
practice (such as meditation or repetitive chanting), ending up with a
medley of ideas and practices that is to their liking. Such people will
often attend Bahá’í meetings, express their admiration for some
Bahá’í ideas, but they will refrain from actually joining the Bahá’í
community, either because they firmly believe in some idea, such as
reincarnation, that is rejected in the Bahá’í teachings or because they
just do not feel comfortable joining an organised religious group.
Perhaps a deeper underlying reason that many such people do not join
the Bahá’í community is that the Bahá’ís do not offer the sort of
quick-fix spirituality that is the claim made by many groups. To join
the Bahá’í community involves oneself in commitment and a long
hard spiritual struggle and such a prospect may not be enticing for
such people. Also the Bahá’í community does not offer the sort of
immediate experiential religion offered by many successful religious
groups.
The result of all this is that the Bahá’í Faith is not benefiting from
the resurgence of interest in things spiritual that has been occurring.
It is neither a traditional religion to be able to benefit from the rise
in fundamentalism, while people who are engaged in the New Age
movement may express appreciation of its teachings and may adopt
them into their personal spirituality, they are not likely to want to
make the commitments that becoming a Bahá’í entails.
Therefore in relation to the question of the presentation of the
Bahá’í Faith, what the above analysis is intended to demonstrate is
that the Bahá’í community is addressing and has developed ways of
tackling some of the major problems that beset human society.
232 Lights of Irfán vol. 19
Therefore it may be that in the present climate of pick-and-mix
religiosity, of people not being willing to commit themselves to
organised religion, it may be more productive to try to bring to
people’s attention the nature of the sort of society that the Bahá’í
Faith is seeking to bring about and the steps the Bahá’í community is
taking to bring this about — to show that this sort of society can deal
with the social problems that we face and to demonstrate that this
sort of society can resolve some of the tensions in modern society.
The implication of this presentation of the Bahá’í Faith is of course
that if one wishes to tackle these problems, the most effective way to
do so would be to become part of a process that has a pattern of
social dynamics with at least a potential for solving some of these
problems, whether that be as a fully committed member of the Bahá’í
Faith or as someone who merely wishes to participate in the
processes, plans and activities being carried out.
N OTES
Shoghi Effendi, in “The Importance of Deepening,” Compilation of
Compilations, p. 230
See analysis of this in Marilyn French, Beyond Power, London: Abacus,
1985.
See the analysis of this in John Holloway, Change The World Without
Taking Power. The Meaning of Revolution Today, London: Pluto Press
2002, pp. 13-18
George Orwell's Animal Farm brilliantly describes this process.
Translated from the Persian. The Universal House of Justice, Messages
1963 to 1986, pp. 216-7
Bahá’u’lláh quoted by ‘Abdu’l-Bahá in A Traveller's Narrative, trans. E.G.
Browne, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1891, vol. 2, p. 114
cf. Kitab-i-Aqdas vs. 123-4
From a letter of the Universal House of Justice to Continental Boards of
Counsellors and National Spiritual Assemblies, October 1, 1969, in The
Continental Boards of Counsellors, Wilmette, 1981, pp. 37-38
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