Lund UniversityDepartment of Sociology Division of Social Anthropology

A Multinational Township as a Revitalization Movement:A Case Study on Auroville in South India

Author: Magnus ThorDepartment of Social Anthropology Bachelor Thesis / Minor Field StudyJanuary 2010 Supervisor: Steven Sampson

Abstract

Auroville is a spiritual intentional community in South India. It consists mainly of

Westerners and Indians and they share a common belief in the philosophy of Sri

Aurobindo and the Mother, a philosophy that has clear references to the New

Age Movement in the West. I have in this thesis pointed to the cultural exchange

that has taken place between the Western world and India, resulting in an

influence of Hindu attributes in the West, and Western ideas in India. This

acculturation process has resulted in the formation of the neo-Hindu movement

(which Aurobindo is a part of) in India and the New Age movement in the West,

both sharing common key ideas. This cultural exchange has also resulted in

Westerners seeking to India and Auroville, in relation to hegemonic decline, in a

way to construct new identities and find new loyalties, thus promoting a new

socio-cultural system to the West. Auroville is here seen as a social space from

where to direct culture critique, through international engagement, and diffusion

by example. It is also a social space uphold financially and legally by the Indian

government, thus make it possible for Westerners to mobilize in complex

multinational formations as a comprehensive force, and can thus be understood

through the lens of revitalization theory. The Purpose with this thesis has been

to answer to Anthony Wallace’s suggestion for further elaboration with

revitalization theory, in a way to increase our understanding of this special kind

of culture change.

Keywords: Revitalization movements, Auroville, Sri Aurobindo, hegemonic

decline, cognitive anthropology, New Age, acculturation

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Table of Contents

Abstract................................................................................................................................ 1

Summary.............................................................................................................................. 4The Red Line................................................................................................................................. 4

1. Introduction................................................................................................................... 71.1. Coming To Auroville – A Brief Presentation..............................................................71.2. Facts About Auroville........................................................................................................91.3. Problem Formulation.....................................................................................................101.4. Purpose................................................................................................................................ 12

2. Method........................................................................................................................... 142.1. The Field.............................................................................................................................. 14

2.1.1. Observation..................................................................................................................................142.1.2. Participant Observation..........................................................................................................142.1.3. Interviews.....................................................................................................................................15

2.2. Unexpected Events in the Field...................................................................................162.3. Secondary Data................................................................................................................. 172.4. Delimitations..................................................................................................................... 17

3. Theory............................................................................................................................ 193.1. Anthony Wallace and the Concept of Revitalization............................................19

3.1.1. The Uniform Structure of the Revitalization Process................................................213.1.2. Culture Definition and the Variations of Movements................................................23

3.2. Culture and Identity – Schema Theory......................................................................253.2.1. Schema Theory...........................................................................................................................253.2.2. The Hierarchy of the Schemas.............................................................................................26

3.3. World-System Theory and Revitalization Movements........................................273.3.1. Hegemonic Decline and the Rise of Cultural Movements........................................27

4. The History of Auroville - Mazeway Reformulation.......................................304.1. Aurobindo Ghose – Sri Aurobindo..............................................................................30

4.1.1. Integral Yoga................................................................................................................................314.1.2. Aurobindo and Evolution.......................................................................................................32

4.2. Mirra Alfassa - The Mother........................................................................................... 334.2.1. Mirra Alfassa the Mystic.........................................................................................................334.2.2. Mirra Alfassa Meets Sri Aurobindo....................................................................................344.2.3. The Mother on Auroville........................................................................................................34

4.3. Auroville and the Philosophy.......................................................................................36

5. A Movement Becomes – Communication and Organization.........................385.1. Communication.................................................................................................................38

5.1.1. Aurobindo and Communication..........................................................................................385.1.2. The Mother and Communication........................................................................................405.1.3. The Official Support..................................................................................................................405.1.4. Promoting the Auroville Brand...........................................................................................41

5.4. Organization...................................................................................................................... 435.4.1. The Period Before Auroville.................................................................................................435.4.2. Auroville........................................................................................................................................445.4.3. The Indian Government as the Legal Authority...........................................................455.4.4. The Organizational Structure of Auroville.....................................................................46

6. A Living Movement: Adaptation, Cultural Transformation, and Routinization.................................................................................................................... 48

6.1. Adaptation.......................................................................................................................... 48

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6.1.1. The Big Clash...............................................................................................................................486.1.2. The Solution.................................................................................................................................496.1.3. Adaptation Strategies..............................................................................................................506.1.4. Auroville as an Eco-Village....................................................................................................51

6.2. Cultural Transformation............................................................................................... 526.2.1. Individual Cultural Transformation..................................................................................536.2.2. Auroville as a Transition Site...............................................................................................53

6.3. Routinization..................................................................................................................... 566.3.1. Impact on India...........................................................................................................................576.3.2. International Aspirations.......................................................................................................58

7. Discussion and Conclusions....................................................................................597.1 Discussion on Mazeway Reformulation.....................................................................59

7.1.1. The Connection Between Auroville and the New Age Movement.......................607.1.2. The History of the New Age Movement...........................................................................617.1.3. Hindu Influences in the West...............................................................................................617.1.4. Western Impact on India........................................................................................................637.1.5. New Age Characteristics.........................................................................................................64

7.2. Discussion on Communication....................................................................................657.2.1. Aurobindo, the Mother, and Western Receivers..........................................................66

7.3. Discussion on Organization..........................................................................................687.3.1. Auroville and the World-System.........................................................................................697.3.2. Hegemonic Decline...................................................................................................................707.3.3. The Rise of Cultural Movements.........................................................................................717.3.4. Auroville and the Prevalence of Hindu Attributes in the West.............................72

7.4. Discussion on Adaptation..............................................................................................747.4.1. Government Support................................................................................................................747.4.2. Modification of Doctrine.........................................................................................................75

7.5. Discussion on Cultural Transformation...................................................................767.6. Discussion on Routinization.........................................................................................77

7.6.1. Cultural Deprivation versus Material Deprivation.....................................................777.6.2. Cultural Deprivation in the Core-States...........................................................................78

8. Bibliography................................................................................................................................... 80

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Summary and Final Conclusion

I have tried to make clear and discuss about the connection between Auroville;

the World-System and hegemonic decline; the construction of culture (Schema-

Theory); and the formations of revitalization movements. Below I will make a

short summary on these connections, to clarify how Auroville can be understood

as a revitalization movement, in relation to hegemonic decline.

The Red LineMy ethnographic data from the field in Auroville have been used as a way to

strengthen arguments with relation to above-mentioned theoretical conceptions,

with the purpose to increase our understanding of culture change during

revitalization, in a particular situation when the world-system is experiencing a

crisis in relation to hegemonic decline. This is the conclusion of my results:

When individuals are experiencing dramatic social and cultural changes, as when

the World-System is reaching a systemic crisis or hegemonic decline, on the way

to systemic bifurcation (Wallerstein 2007:124-125), they will search for new

identities and loyalties. Some will form, or join, spiritual movements or secular

social movements, but to be able to choose, one has to be aware. The fact that

Hindu attributes has already attained currency in the Western societies since

centuries back in time, and especially more recently through the formation of the

New Age movement, makes it possible for individuals to take a stand for and join

these kinds of social formations. The presence of these attributes in the minds of

individuals, placing them on a sub-level in the individual’s cognitive schema,

opens up for discussions and common preferences, in relation to common

experiences where they have been exposed for these ideas. When these ideas are

reaching mainstream society, and society itself is experiencing cultural distortion

and dramatic changes, the receivers will naturally become more in numbers, as a

result of more individuals seeking new identities and loyalties. As the cultural

distortion is increasing, and individuals are experiencing an increased amount of

stress, the experiences of New Age beliefs will supposedly place itself higher up

in the hierarchy of sub-levels within the cognitive schema, and more individuals

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will be able to relate to the same experiences. This means: more potential

recruits for movements such as Auroville. In case of material deprivation, the

field is open even for revitalization movements in massive sizes. Those

individuals who join movements such as Auroville may do it for revitalizing

reasons, even if the movement is situated outside their own society. This seems

to be the case for many Western Aurovillians, where individuals join the

movement as a way to make a difference, to try to implement their new mazeway

on their society of origin, not just to dropout from society. Aurovillians talk about

transformation, spiritual and material, personal and earthly, a simultaneously

transformation of the human mind and consciousness, and of society and culture,

relying on the societal and cultural system based on the philosophy of Sri

Aurobindo and the Mother. This is a result of the special kind of culture change

that has taken place through the interaction between the West and the East, but

still not affecting the whole social organism until reaching both material and

cultural deprivation. The residents are steadily increasing in numbers, while the

West is experiencing an increasing cultural distortion in relation to hegemonic

decline. Globalization, the ability for transnational movement of individuals

coming from the core-states, opens up for possibilities of multinational

formations of revitalization movements, which I believe Auroville is a result of,

and give life to what I would like to call complex multinational revitalization

movements. Western individuals join Auroville for revitalizing reasons, as a

reaction to hegemonic decline, and as an available alternative in the awareness

of the individual (the presence of New Age attributes in the cognitive schemas),

and therefore acts as agents in the acculturation process that takes place during

the interaction between the West and the East. Their impact on their societies of

origin belongs to another study, and first when this interaction is determined,

one can examine the routinization of Auroville on the Western hemisphere in the

capitalist World-System. In this way, instead of looking at one singular society as

a social organism, one could also look at the core-states as a social organism due

to their common preferences in relation to capitalist modernity, and the

Westerners formation in Auroville as an attempt to change the social organism of

the West.

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So, what have we learned?

I have in this presentation showed that individuals from the core-states of the

World-System, in relation to globalization and hegemonic decline, and because of

the acculturation process that has taken place between the West and the East,

has the motivation and ability to mobilize in different forms in contrast to

Wallace’s original concept of “classic” revitalization movements, and instead of

joining a national movement aiming for a socio-cultural revival, they mobilize

together in multinational formations such as Auroville, as a comprehensive force

with the same purpose as for a national revitalization movement. I have in other

words pointed to an extended understanding of revitalization, put focus outside

the social organism of a single nation-state, and instead changed focus to

sections in the world-system, as for example the core-states as one social

organism in this context. Therefore, when studying revitalization as a

phenomenon of culture change, one should also put focus on movements located

outside the social organism of a particular society, and add multinational

compounds for the study of cultural revival.

As a second step for the understanding on how this culture change occur, and as

a suggestion for further research, the study of the intercommunication between

these multinational formations, composed by individuals from presumably the

core-states, would be fruitful for our understanding of revitalization. Other with

Auroville common compounds are other spiritual multinational eco-villages and

intentional communities such as Damanhur and Findhorn in Europe, which has

significant key ideas that corresponds with the New Age movement and the neo-

Hindu movement in India. It would also be of value to examine what kind of

impact these movements has on mainstream Western society and the leaders of

these nations, to evaluate their success or failure considering their socio-cultural

revival purposes.

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1. Introduction

Auroville is an intentional community. Its members settle here voluntarily, in

order to fulfil and seek out some personal goal, and remain only insofar as these

goals are fulfilled. The community has attracted members from all over the

world, but mainly from the West and India. This thesis explores the nature of the

community in relation to the state of the capitalist World-System, trying to

clarify how Auroville can be understood through the lens of revitalization.

1.1. Coming To Auroville – A Brief PresentationI got off the bus in the middle of the busy road, auto-drivers, cyclists, pedestrians,

cars, busses, motorcycles, and cows, all sharing the space of the road trying to

reach their destinations. I’ve just been on a train for twelve hours before

reaching Chennai, and then another three hours on the local bus to Pondicherry,

full of fever dizziness in my mind and a weak body, but now I am there, finally.

Auroville is just around the corner, so I catch an auto to take me to my hostel

were I have booked a room. On the way to Pondicherry from Chennai, on the East

Coast Road, the landscape was pretty rough and dry, but now I meet tight

vegetation and hear the sounds of birds and insects all around me. It is almost a

jungle I drive through before reaching the hostel. I am amazed how the

Aurovillians have been able to restore the environment in such a grade,

considering that this place was like a desert forty years ago, consisting of a few

Mango, Banyan and Neem trees spread out in the dry red sand. According to

themselves, they have planted more than one million trees since the

inauguration of Auroville, and still until today some individuals have as their

primary activity to plant trees, from morning till evening, every day.

My auto driver lives in Kottakarai, one of the thirteen villages within the area of

Auroville. He tells me that he appreciates Auroville very much because it has

given him opportunity to make money due to all tourists who needs a ride with

his auto. “But they are very special people, you will see my friend”, he tells me

and continues the drive along the dusty jungle roads that leads to my hostel.

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I get welcomed by my host when reaching the hostel, and walk up to my bed in a

dorm for six people. It is already evening and the stillness covers the atmosphere

of the place, so different from how it sounds and feels in other places I have

visited in India. And it is clean, even along the roads, no beggars on the streets

and no smell from urine and waste. This is not India in its pure essence, I

remember thinking when I had placed my stuff at the bed and climbed up to the

rooftop to enjoy the silence and the view. I soon get company from the night

guard, a young Nepali who have come to Auroville to make some money to bring

home to his family in Nepal. Like foreign workers elsewhere, foreign workers in

India are also looked down upon. Many Indians expressed disgust for these guest

workers, claiming that they are nothing more than criminals.

The next day I rent a bike and drive around in the township, visiting some of the

hundreds of settlements and workshops. There are settlements spread out all

over the area, some in the centre close to Matrimandir, where my hostel was, and

others more distanced located in the Green-belt or by the beach. I see houses

that look like Star Wars inspired clay huts, advanced concrete beautiful

buildings, and primitive wooden huts with straw roofs. The variety is astonishing

and there are not two houses that look the same. The physical arrangement of

the township resonates strongly with a Fourier inspired web of phalanxes, and

Auroville itself as a kind of unifying umbrella organization.

I drive on the roads and make the sand create a red cloud behind me, watching

the beautiful scenery around me. Small sandy trails from the Main Road lead to

settlements, workshops, research centres, restaurants, and commercial units.

There is a sign showing the direction to CSR – the Centre for Scientific Research,

and the Earth-Centre is located at the same site too. In the neighbourhood are

also Upasana Design Studio and Colours-of-Nature, designing clothes and

accessories, and dying fabrics, all in sustainable ways with respect for the

environment.

I talk to people on the roads and at different sites in the township, explaining

who I am and what I am doing there. All are very welcoming and some invite me

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to their homes or working sites. There are more than forty nationalities, but

most of whom I meet are Westerners, even if I know that one third of the around

two thousand residents consists of Tamil people. The activity during the day is

relatively high and everybody seems to be occupied with one or another project,

or just basic work. This is Auroville after one day.

1.2. Facts About AurovilleThe present population in Auroville is estimated to 2109 residents, where 1686

are adults above eighteen. The population has increased from 1564 residents in

19991, and according to an informant from the Residents Assembly Service in

Auroville, more newcomers have been coming the last year, in contrast to former

years, so the growth in population will probably go on. In 1972 the population

was 320 residents, and doubled its population to 676 in 19802.

Auroville was inaugurated in 1968 and is at present composed of around forty

nationalities. The larges group are the Indians (mostly local Tamils who have

become Aurovillians) and constitutes at present of 914 residents. The largest

Western population are the French, who constitutes of 320 residents, followed

by the Germans: 242, Italian: 107, and U.S. Americans: 77 residents. Residents

from outside India and the Western world are relatively few in the township, and

comprises of around fifty residents (including thirty residents from South

Korea), which are Brazilians, Nepalis, Ethiopians, and Colombians, just to name a

few3.

The physical construction of Auroville is made up from inspiration of a galaxy.

From the middle point in this 25 km2 land areal, the Peace Centre, should four

zones radiate outwards. In each zone should a special kind of atmosphere,

vibration, be nurtured. There should be a residential, a cultural, an industrial,

1 Website no.41: http://www.auroville.info/ACUR/masterplan/demographic.htm (last access 2010-01-13)

2 Website no.41: http://www.auroville.info/ACUR/masterplan/demographic.htm (last access 2010-01-13)

3 Website no.40: http://www.auroville.org/society/av_population.htm (last access 2010-01-13)

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and an international zone. Outside these zones should be a Green-belt, which

should provide the township with food4.

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1.3. Problem FormulationTo understand the acculturation process that takes place within the capitalist

World-System, I suggest that one should promote a systemic and holistic

perspective. Wallace has limited his model to apply it on clear demarcated

culture groups where it has been much easier to identify the very interaction

that takes place among the members of the group, in contrast to an analysis of

the acculturation process that takes place during interaction between culturally

diverse groups and how they mobilize in relation to the capitalist World-System

(Wallace 1956:264). My hypothesis is that the formation of revitalization

movements can occur even outside the social organism of the individual, which

means that individuals mobilize together in revitalization movements and create

multinational compounds, as a common reaction against the properties of

modernity and capitalism, in relation to hegemonic decline. The very interaction

that takes place between transnational revitalization movements and

mainstream society, the actual acculturation process (Barfield 2006:1), has a

multi-sited dimension, for Auroville it means that one has to follow the project;

follow the people; follow the things, etc. But before this fieldwork can take place,

one has to be sure about which actors are to be examined. As far as I know, no

studies have been done on revitalization movements as transnational entities in

relation to systemic changes.

4 Website no.42: http://www.auroville.org/thecity/galaxyplan.htm (last access 2010-01-13)

5 Website no.43: http://www.auroville.org/av_brief.htm (last access 2010-01-13)

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Therefore, my goal with this thesis is to examine Auroville as a revitalization

movement, with particular focus on its Western members, to make arguments on

how and why Auroville should be understood out of revitalization, not only as an

intentional community or an international township, but also as a revitalization

movement, and not only as a movement that grows out of one single culture

group, but a movement that directs culture critique to various cultures and

particularly modernization itself, but acting as a comprehensive force, as I

believe may be the case with Auroville. By looking at some specific transnational

movements, such as Auroville, as revitalization movements, one can then better

understand the acculturation process that takes place within the World-System,

in the interplay between cultural diverse actors on a cultural heterogenic level.

Auroville could in turn, for further research, be examined as one part in a bigger

transnational informal revitalization movement, which is comprised of different

kinds of groups, movements that share some basic common properties, family

resemblances to use Wittgenstein’s term (Harkin 2004:XXV), that directs critique

against the contemporary capitalist World-System, promoting an alternative

cultural and societal system, in opposition of consumerism, resource demanding

ways of production, materialism and secularism, individualism, loss of traditions,

etc. Auroville is here seen as a case in relation to common compounds such as

Findhorn in Scotland and Damanhur in Italy. These other multinational

movements have now also branches in other countries and tries to implement

their ideas on the external world, particularly their host state, but even

worldwide through international collaboration6.

Therefore, my question is:

In what ways can Auroville be understood as a revitalization movement

within the capitalist World-System, in relation to hegemonic decline?

To answer this question, I have chosen to first present Auroville with the help of

Wallace’s revitalization model. I will describe the structural process of Auroville,

following each step of the revitalization period. The emphasis in this 6 Website no.44: http://www.damanhur.org/ (last access 2010-01-13); Website no.45: http://www.findhorn.org (last access 2010-01-13)

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presentation will be on those properties that can relate Auroville with

hegemonic decline, which is of relevance for the understanding of the

recruitment of Westerners. This presentation will secondly provide the reader

with enough insight in Auroville, making it possible for the reader to make his or

her own conclusions about Auroville as a revitalization movement, but mainly to

show that the structural process of Auroville is in accordance with Wallace’s

revitalization model. In the section for discussion, I will tie this presentation to

World-System Theory, and to Schema-Theory, while making arguments on how,

and why, even transnational and multinational compounds like Auroville can be

understood with the use of revitalization theory.

1.4. PurposeAs mentioned above, when Wallace constructed his theory of revitalization, the

focus was on movements that grow out of demarcated culture groups, such as

nativistic movements and Cargo-Cults, during interaction with other culture

groups, as a very special kind of culture change (Wallace 1956:265). But Wallace

was already at this time, in 1956 when his first article was published (Ibid.),

aware that revitalization movements denotes a very large class of phenomena

(Ibid.:267), including movements that goes under the category of “Utopian

Community”, “Social Movements”, and “Millenarian Movements”. In “Reassessing

Revitalization Movements” (Harkin 2004), Wallace invites in the Foreword to

further elaboration with the theory of revitalization, meaning that the concept

may be adopter to other fields of research, not only to use the theory on culture

groups such as the case with the Seneca Indians (Wallace 2004:IX). Wallace also

points to the militant Christian Right in the U.S., who takes on ideas from

Christian revitalization movements, aiming of restoring the American culture, as

a contemporary phenomenon that could be understood with the use of

revitalization theory (Ibid.:X).

In the introduction to “Reassessing Revitalization Movements” (Harkin 2004),

Harkin points to the New Age movement as a revitalization phenomena, and

continues by making a distinction between Wallace’s “classic” revitalization

movements, and new more complex entities of research, meaning that the

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weakness in Wallace’s model lies in its reliance on a linear, stochastic model of

social process, and that more complex phenomena may need new ways of

explanations, still using revitalization as the lens from where to view these

phenomena (Ibid.:XVII).

Therefore, the purpose with my thesis is to increase our understanding of

culture change by responding to Wallace’s and Harkin’s invitation to further

elaboration with the concept of revitalization. I believe that it could be of value to

look at even complex multicultural and transnational compounds such as

Auroville, to examine their potential as revitalization movements. In relation to

my experiences from the field, I have made observations that relate the activity

of Auroville and its reasons for existence with systemic changes such as

hegemonic decline, the emergence of new identities and the need of a new social

and cultural system. I will therefore discuss these connections and try to clarify

in what sense Auroville can be understood out of revitalization.

2. Method

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This deductive (Hylland Eriksen 2004:29) thesis is both empirical and

theoretical, based upon collected ethnographic data from the field in Auroville,

and on second-hand data from books, journals, articles, and Internet. It is also a

qualitative case study, meant to provide brief insights about the conditions in

Auroville.

The collected data from the field are meant to strengthen the theoretical

arguments related to my question, not so much to provide one with deep insights

about this particular site. Auroville is used as a case of other similar entities, not

as a case itself.

2.1. The FieldDuring my field study, I have primarily used pure observation, participant

observation, and interviews. I have also been forced to adapt my field study to

unexpected events that I will describe below in more details.

2.1.1. Observation

During my time in Auroville, some of the data I have been collected has been out

of pure observation, without necessarily participating in the activities. For

example, in the communal dining hall, Solar-Kitchen, one can observe how the

residents interact with each other, and many times what their conversations are

about. This gives one an understanding about what the Aurovillians seems to

have at heart, to discuss “around the dining table”. Even so at other public spaces

within Auroville, such as the restaurants and cafés, one is able to observe the

interaction between Aurovillians and the subjects of conversation.

2.1.2. Participant Observation

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Auroville is divided into more than hundred different settlements, or

communities, within the township. In some of the settlements, outsiders are able

to participate in the daily activities. This means presumably the farm settlements

in the Green-belt, which works with some kind of agriculture. I had the

opportunity to participate in the work in one of these farm settlements, and to

interact with the residents in a way so they could share their inner thoughts, and

how they contemplate Auroville and their role on the world arena.

In some settlements, I had the opportunity to participate during weekly

meetings, where I was able to obtain an insight in the collective management of

the settlements, and to understand what kind of issues that need to be discussed

and solved, and also the decision making procedure.

A large proportion of my data has been collected when spontaneously visiting

different sites within Auroville and made informal conversations with the

residents and other individuals visiting the township.

As a temporary visitor, it has been difficult to blend in unnoticeable in the daily

activities of the Aurovillians (Hylland Eriksen 2004:26). Even if one participates

in their activities, one is still a visitor and a relation; resident/visitor establishes.

This has probably its deficiencies, especially for studies that concern intra-

conditions, but in relation to my questions I believe I got enough material to

strengthen my arguments.

2.1.3. Interviews

My main method for gathering of data has been through interviews and

spontaneous conversations. By visiting commercial units and research centres I

had, apart from spontaneously talk with various amount of individuals, the

opportunity to interview around twenty-five individuals important for the

township and regular residents, visitors such as students, volunteers, and

researchers. Some of my interviews have been informal and spontaneous,

merged out during my visits to various different sites within Auroville. Others

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have been more formal, foremost during interviews with key persons in the

township, and “representatives” for different sections such as age-span,

nationality, newcomer, and long-time residents. When interviewing these key

persons, I have been careful to include some universal questions, such as:

reasons for joining Auroville; social, political, and religious background;

participation in collective gatherings; contemplation of the external world; and

contemporary interaction with the external world.

During my interviews I assured my interview subjects that all information that I

received would be totally confidential, and that no names would show up in my

report. I gave this assurance in case some issues would be too sensitive to

discuss if they knew that I would publish their names. On an early stage during

my stay in Auroville, some informants, mostly other students from the hostel,

told me that some issues were not being discussed here and held in the

background, for example issues concerning the relation with the locals, intra-

violence, and in some cases division out of class. During my interviews I never

encountered any of these things. Only later on, just before leaving the field, did it

become clear that some issues were not open for discussion. This particular

issue concerned a murder case in Auroville, based upon a conflict between a

Western Aurovillian man, and a local Tamil woman along with her family

members, where the woman’s family members murdered the man.

2.2. Unexpected Events in the FieldBefore coming to India, I knew from former visits that physical illness is

something that happens to most Western travellers. The almost mandatory

stomach disorder, along with various insect bites that can cause consequences,

are issues that almost all Western visitors will experience. During my stay in

India I was exposed for a series of illnesses, such as lung-infection, urine

infection, inflammation in my kidneys, and lost 17 kg, before I decided to quit my

job at field and take a flight back home for medical treatment.

Due to these issues, I was not able to collect enough data that concerned my

original purpose, to gain insight in the commitment process in the township. For

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example, I had to cancel interviews with key persons responsible for education

and kindergarten centres, along with some major community meetings that I

missed. But in relation to the question of this thesis, I think I have been able to

obtain enough insight and to find pattern of behaviour that can support my

arguments.

2.3. Secondary DataEven though the data I was able to collect during my field study gave me an

insight and understanding of what the township is about, the historical process

of Auroville and other required data were to be found in written material from

secondary observations, and from Internet. Googling “Auroville” provides one

with 262.000 matches. Auroville’s official webpage: Auroville.org, offers a

significant amount of written material on the township. There is a huge amount

of material that is written in relation to Auroville, and a massive interest from

the external world in the experiment. Dozens of volumes have also been written

on, and by, Aurobindo and his philosophy of Integral Yoga, and dozens of books

written by the Mother herself7. Most of the latter seem to contain the same

things, that is: the necessity of a new world order, based upon the ideals of Sri

Aurobindo.

2.4. DelimitationsI have delimited my discussion to comprise mainly its Western residents, and to

make arguments on how, and why, Auroville has the function as a revitalization

movement for these individuals, especially during hegemonic decline. With

regard to Aurovillians who come from South-Asia or other non-Western

countries, the township may even provide them with a platform and a social

space from where to direct culture critique against their countries of origin, even

though this needs different explanations due to different systemic impacts on

local variations. During hegemonic decline, individuals in the West will react

differently from those coming from the periphery. The latter, according to

Friedman, will more likely form national movements to challenge the hegemon,

7 http://www.sriaurobindoashram.org/works/index.php, provides most of Aurobindo’s and the Mother’s writings.

17

while the former, beyond the fact that they may have the resources for

transnational movement, will look for models in the periphery (Friedman

1994:81-88).

Another dimension, which would be of interest to apply on my study, would be

the cultural significance of movements such as Auroville, but I have chosen to

leave this aspect outside of my study, as a suggestion for further research.

3. Theory

The main theory for this thesis is the concept of revitalization, made by the

American anthropologist Anthony F.C. Wallace. Wallace has been focusing mainly

18

on historical movements to gather data about such to be able to draw

conclusions from patterned behaviour. His conclusions make clear that there is a

uniform structure in all these movements, considering the development of each

of them, and the success-failure continuum (Wallace 1956 :264).

Of main importance in all anthropological studies is the conception of culture,

which makes the researcher put his subjects into a cultural frame from where to

draw conclusions. My understanding of culture and cultural behaviour is one

that lies in the domains of Schema-Theory (D’Andrade 2008), which I will

discuss later in more details. By giving an account of my conception of culture,

the transparency of this thesis will increase so that opponents can take position

and make their own conclusions, and it will assist my discussion on Auroville as

a revitalization movement.

To increase the understanding of the formation of complex revitalization

movements, and to understand its complexity and their goals, one must look at

the systemic processes within the capitalist World-System and the emergence of

new cultural identities and loyalties. I have therefore chosen to use discussions

made by Jonathan Friedman, mainly taken from his book “Cultural Identity &

Global Process” (Friedman 1994) together with Wallerstein’s conception of the

capitalist World-System (Wallerstein 2007).

3.1. Anthony Wallace and the Concept of RevitalizationThrough comparative studies of several hundreds of historical religious

movements, Anthony F.C. Wallace draws the conclusion that a uniform structural

process, which he calls “revitalization” –a special kind of culture change as a

result of the interplay between two or more cultures -, characterizes them all

(Wallace 1956:265). This process of revitalization not only includes pure

religious movements, but also socio-cultural movements as some intentional

communities can be characterized as, according to Wallace (Ibid:267). A

revitalization movement is a “deliberate, organized, conscious effort by members

of a society to construct a more satisfying culture” (Ibid:265). At this time,

Wallace’s main interest was among the Native Americans, and it was while he

19

was studying the Seneca people, that later resulted in the book “Death and

Rebirth of the Seneca” (Wallace 1972) that he constructed the revitalization

model.

Since Wallace first published his revitalization theory in 1956, the concept of

revitalization has been delimited for studies of movements like the Cargo-Cults

in Oceania, and different charismatic groups among Native American people.

The revitalization model has been a tool to show how these movements have

been formed, and how they have been able to promote alternative values,

reaching the mainstream society and re-shaping the culture and society to a New

Steady State (Harkin 2004:XXVI). In this sense, the revitalization model seems to

have served well to picture the actual acculturation process that takes place and

how cultures are able to change even during one single generation (Wallace

1956:265).

Many anthropologists has put attention to revitalization theory since Wallace’s

first publication on the concept (Harkin, et al 2004; Brown 2002; Lucas 1992),

and Wallace himself asks for elaboration with the concept, not to only include

studies of people who are, or have recently been, under oppression of a foreign

culture, but even to examine revitalization that occurs, as he himself puts it, even

“in the belly of the beast” (Wallace 2004:IX). Wallace continues by arguing that

the concept of revitalization could fit for the studies of revitalization movements

that occur even in “large, hegemonic, imperial systems that disequilibrate not

just from the external impact of alien cultural hegemony or natural disaster but

from internal social, ideological, and economic conflicts of interest intensifying

over time and in due course generating revitalization movement” (Ibid.:XI).

According to Wallerstein and Friedman, all actors within the capitalist World-

System respond to the impact on their cultures that capitalist development has.

During hegemonic decline and instability, this results in individuals looking for a

more satisfying socio-cultural order to replace the old one with (Friedman 1994;

Friedman & Chase-Dunn 2005; Wallerstein 2004). Their answers may be in

joining a revitalization movement at hand, may it be located within their physical

20

national border, or as in Auroville’s case located in a physical distanced country

but acting on a transnational level. What I would like to examine in this thesis is

then how Auroville can be said to inhabit this function, as a part in the

acculturation process that takes place on a systemic level in the World-System,

as a revitalization movement and presumably considering its Western residents

during times of hegemonic decline.

According to Wallace, the origin of revitalization movements lies in the stress of

the individual during a time of cultural distortion, when the stress has increased

to an intolerable level and the individual is looking for a way to cope with the

situation. Either he uses different cultural techniques to handle the stress, or he

reformulates his image of his society and culture, his mazeway, to give birth to a

new socio-cultural order, which can satisfy his needs and provide him with

meaning (Wallace 1956:269). Right below I will describe how Wallace articulates

this structural process.

3.1.1. The Uniform Structure of the Revitalization Process

Wallace begins the process of revitalization with a Steady State. The Steady State

has tolerable levels of stress and the members of the society are able to cope

with this stress and satisfy their basic needs. After the Steady State follows a

period of Increased Individual Stress, which Wallace describes as a “continuous

diminution in its efficiency in satisfying needs”(Ibid:269). Members of the society

are able to handle the stress on this level and find suitable techniques for this

purpose. Next period is one of Cultural Distortion, in which the culture is

internally distorted and “the elements are not harmoniously related but are

mutually inconsistent and interfering. For this reason alone, stress continues to

rise” (Ibid.:269). Members of the society now start to look for alternatives to the

contemporary cultural and societal order. Some rigid persons may accept this

stress rather than looking for alternatives, while others may not be able to

handle this stress at all (Ibid.:269). This is followed by a Period of Revitalization,

which includes six steps that need to be taken for the movement to be successful.

Those individuals who have not been able to cope with the reality of their culture

21

and society feel the urge to find an alternative way of living. Wallace means that

during serious cultural stress the uprising of prophets is present and some of

them can provide other individuals with a new image of culture and society, of

themselves and their physical environment. This process is what Wallace calls

Mazeway Reformulation. The prophet receives visions that help him to define a

New Steady State, a mental image of society, nature, culture, personality and

body image. This mental image is the Mazeway, as seen by one person (Ibid.:266,

270-273). The second step that needs to be taken is Communication, where the

individual who has received visions becomes a prophet by communicating his

ideas and visions to potential followers (Ibid.:273). The third step is

Organization, where converts are made by the prophet, and he gathers disciples

around him, which in turn has other followers under them in a new hierarchic

social organisation. The movement begin with this step to become more political

in character and many converts undergoes revitalizing personality changes

during this phase (Ibid.:274). Wallace relies on a Weberian sense of a charismatic

leadership when describing the relationship between followers and the prophet.

The prophet legitimates his authority through his charismatic personality and,

most often, it is the followers who create the image of a prophet with divine

powers. During this phase, it is also critical for the future of the movement that

the prophet creates some kind of comprehensive ideology and distributes some

of his authority to other levels of the movement. Otherwise, the movement is

more or less destined to end with the death of the leader, according to Weber

(Weber 1983:169-171). The fourth step, Adaptation, is about how well the

movement adapts to different conditions, such as external threats, most

commonly directed from the larger society, or internal division in the movement

itself. This is a phase of modification and the movement has to constantly change

and modify the original doctrine (Wallace 1956:274-275). The Cultural

Transformation step, which follows, consists of a period where social

revitalization occurs. This is a result of cultural changes, which has begun to

change the mental state of each individual as a result of enthusiastic group action

programs, which in turn provide the individuals with meaning (Ibid.:275). The

last step is the Routinization of the movement. During this phase, the movement

start to become normal for the larger society that surrounds the movement.

22

Wallace describes this phase as one where the movement becomes established in

society, in the same way as a church is being established out of a religious

movement. When the movement has succeeded in each step of the revitalization

process, a New Steady State will proceed, different from that Steady State during

cultural distortion (Ibid.:275).

3.1.2. Culture Definition and the Variations of Movements

The culture concept of Wallace is one that belongs to the school of Culture and

Personality, where individuals in a given culture to a certain degree share a

common image of the culture, a so-called culture modality, which includes codes

for conceptions and behaviour (Wallace 2004b:15). Wallace, in turn, relates the

process of revitalization to one of acculturation, when a period of culture change

appears and the common cultural image modifies or takes totally new

appearances. This process of acculturation has been related mostly to nativistic

movements such as many indigenous movements, and accomodationist

movements such as Cargo-Cults, and less attention has been given to movements

in large-scale complex societies and multicultural movements such as many

contemporary intentional communities (Wallace 1956:275-278; Harkin

2004:XV-XVI).

Wallace narrows his analysis of revitalization movements when only including

members of a particular society that undergo a process of acculturation.

Members of a given society feel the need to reconstruct their culture and the

process that follows is what Wallace calls the revitalization process (Wallace

1956). How, then, would Wallace’s theory be applicable on revitalization

movements which includes members of different cultures and societies, seen

from a systemic perspective, which I believe is the case with Auroville?

According to Wallace, the common source-characteristic of all revitalization

movements seems to be the deprivation of meaning and the sense of stress that

affect some members of the culture (Wallace 1956:265). Cargo-Cults appear as

movements that bring together the new and the old in a process of acculturation,

23

during times when the deprivation of meaning is acute (Barfield 2006:49-50;

Wallace 1956:267). In modern complex societies, many social-cultural

movements such as intentional communities are uprising due to the lack of

meaning for many individuals (Brown 2002:154). Using the culture concept of

Wallace, about the shared image of culture and society (Wallace 1956:266), one

can understand that some individuals are getting lost and feel stressed when not

knowing anymore about what “highway” to choose to move onward, in a time of

cultural distortion and deprivation of meaning.

Wallace’s notion that every culture has its own personality, or modal type

(Wallace 2004b:15), plays an important role in his analysis of revitalization

movements. He looks at society as a living organism, defined as a network of

intercommunication (Wallace 1956:266). When parts of this social organism is

being threatened with serious damage, some individuals will feel an intolerable

amount of stress and as a result they take action to reduce the amount of stress

to a tolerable level (Ibid.:269). Wallace means that these individuals join

together in a revitalization movement with the purpose to change the whole

social organism that they belong to, following the reformulated mazeway of a

prophet/leader (Ibid.:266,269). In the case of Auroville, Western members

cannot then be understood as a collective effort to re-shape the Steady State of

origin by direct action on the home ground, when establishing a movement

geographically distanced to their culture and society of origin. But it could be

seen as a collective effort, sprung out of intercommunication on a global level,

with the common purpose to invent a more satisfying cultural and societal

organisation and revitalize their cultures on a systemic level. According to

Wallace, individuals join together in revitalization movements when reacting to

the same phenomenon and the mazeway reformulation “depends on a

restructuring of elements and subsystems which have already attained currency

in the society and may even be in use” (Ibid.:268). Susan Love Brown uses the

revitalization theory to analyze the development of a new age community:

Ananda Village in the U.S. She discusses how members of Ananda Village

reformulated their mazeway out of elements and subsystems that already

existed in the U.S., such as an interest in eastern religions and New Age beliefs

24

(Brown 2002:166). Brown’s study seems in this way to be a good comparative

case to use in the understanding of Auroville as a revitalization movement, even

if Ananda does not have a multinational character and is comprised of only

Americans.

3.2. Culture and Identity – Schema TheoryMy perception of culture is that it is a cognitive process that lasts throughout

ones whole life. It is something you learn, to be able to reason and communicate

with your fellow members in your group, and to organize yourself in the world.

Culture can be said to be the specific exclusivist behavioural character of each

group (Wallace 2004b:15). The cognitive process creates a schema in the mind of

the individual, making him able to understand and associate with his fellow

members (D’Andrade 2008:48).

3.2.1. Schema Theory

Roy G. D’Andrade (D’Andrade 2008) concretizes how a cognitive schema

interacts with the individual’s ability to reason and solve problems. In a test to

examine individual’s abilities to figure out specific problems, it was made clear

that there is a connection with the individual’s cognitive structure and his

problem-solving ability. The stronger association the individual had with the

material in the test (a Pepsi bottle in this specific test), the greater ability the

individual had to reason and solve the problem. This test also shows how our

ability to make interpretations about the world depends on how our schema is

constituted (Ibid.:50).

I agree with D’Andrade’s discussion on how the goals, actions, and even

emotions of individuals in a cultural group will depend on the cultural schema

that they have acquired through their cognitive process. He means that for every

individual “certain cultural and idiosyncratic schemas sit at the top of their

interpretative system”. He calls this schema “a person’s master motives – for

Americans, things like love, success, security and fun” (Ibid.:55).

25

D’Andrade continues with a discussion on how new sub-schemas apply to

already existing ones and create a hierarchy between them. The sub-schemas

further down the hierarchy, middle-level schemas, are those that consist of

motives that are less general, such as marriage, job and hobbies, while those

motives belonging to the top-level schemas are more general in character. The

lowest schemas in the hierarchy are those with motives that only generate

during interaction with higher-level schemas, which D’Andrade concretize with

the example of the motive of cleaning up dirt, which is most often triggered when

schemas having to do with, for example, health and beauty are invoked

(Ibid.:55).

3.2.2. The Hierarchy of the Schemas

I view, with the inspiration of D’Andrade’s illustration of Schema-Theory

individuals as cultural blank pages, as tabula rasas, at the time of birth. Each

individual goes through a socialization process in which he learns how to

interpret the world with the help of his group and his environment. The

experiences shape the individual, which is a dual process of uniformity and

differentiation. Each individual in a given group will most probably share some

basic experiences, which will provide them with common associations and a

cultural schema that characterizes a large part of the group - the top-level

schema, or culture modality as Wallace defines it (Wallace 2004b:13,15). At the

same time, this process of uniformity is parallel with a differentiation process

that distinguishes different sub-groups from each other and therefore creates

sub-schemas in the individual that differentiate him from other individuals in the

larger group, but make it possible for him to make the same associations as

others belonging to the same sub-group – middle-level schemas. Following this

logic of the cognitive process, one could start with the human race as the largest

group, followed by a differentiation process that distinguishes each sub-groups

from each other, where individuals can belong to many different sub-groups all

together. The significant characteristics of the human cultural group would then

logically be those patterns of behaviour that are common for all human groups,

26

for example the incest taboo, following the differentiation process down through

regional, national, local, and local sub-groups with sub-groups within the sub-

groups, to finally reach the individual character.

D’Andrade describes this cultural constitution of a person similarly: “Each

individual’s life history can be viewed as the building of new schematic

organizations through processes of accommodating to experiences and

assimilating these experiences to previous schematic organizations. The final

result is a complex layering and interpenetration of cultural and idiosyncratic

schemas which contains some degree of conflict” (D’Andrade 2008:56).

3.3. World-System Theory and Revitalization MovementsUsing the connection between global processes and cultural identity, which

Friedman discusses in his book Cultural Identity & Global Process, will provide

one with explanations about reasons behind revitalization movements, and why

some of them seem to occur in larger quantities during particular systemic

changes within the capitalist World-System (Brown 2002:164). I believe that this

connection is of uttermost importance for the understanding of the nature of

these kinds of movements, especially when following the development of a

multicultural movement. It is of importance, I believe, because one has to put a

township like Auroville in a global context to really understand its implications.

3.3.1. Hegemonic Decline and the Rise of Cultural Movements

Friedman discusses how the emergence of new cultural identities are increasing

during hegemonic decline out of following premises: When the centre of the

World-System, its core states that constitutes the hegemonic power, are

challenged by other regions within the system, individuals will review their

present cultural identification and look for alternatives that will suit them better

(Friedman 1994:86). In the centre, many individuals will question the modern

identity when they feel that this identity, which is characterized by a sense of

continued development, progress and movement, and individualism, no longer

27

agree with the present economic development and its position within the

system. They will search for lost cultural roots or find an increased interest in

the exotic, searching for a cultural state that will provide them with meaning

(Ibid.:81-88). Another aspect of this is the constitution of modern identity and

capitalism itself, where capitalism can be seen as the negation of culture, “a

system of abstract roles and functions” (Ibid.:92), which does not have the power

to provide the individuals with meaning and to make them “experience

themselves as parts of a cosmological realm”. This all together creates an identity

crisis in the centre, and with this an emergence of new cultural identities, which

in some cases results in the formations of intentional communities (Ibid.:81,91).

At the same time, in the periphery many people will now question the former

hegemonic identity, which is decreasing in power, status and influence. In this

way, hegemonic decline can be connected to the rise of new cultural movements

even in these areas, movements that are aiming for cultural, and many times

even national sovereignty, in other words “classic” revitalization movements in

relation to Wallace’s original use of the concept (Friedman 1994:86; Wallace

1956; Harkin 2004:XXX).

Wallerstein explains how the world revolutions of 1968 signalled a new era for

the capitalist World-System, an era where more people starts to question the

route of market economy, and particularly the hegemony of the United States.

The revolutions of 1968 also mark the beginning of an increase of new social

movements, protesting against the properties of the capitalist world order. I

believe that this development can be connected to the establishment of Auroville,

especially concerning its Western residents, which I will discuss later in more

details (Wallerstein 1989)

Phillip E. Wegner does a similar connection when examining the connection

between modernity and the emergence of utopian ideas, particularly in the

literary genres. He means that the interest for narrative utopia has increased in

recent time as a reaction to modernity, which is in the middle of a thoroughgoing

transformation (Wegner 2002:XVI).

28

In this thesis I will tie together revitalization theory with culture construction

understood through schema-theory, World-System Theory and the rise of

cultural movements in relation to hegemonic decline, in the section for

Discussion, while making arguments on how Auroville can be understood

through the lens of revitalization. Below I will start the thesis by delineating the

history and formation of Auroville. In this presentation lies the construction of a

mazeway, uphold by Sri Aurobindo, the Mother, and contemporary by the

Aurovillians themselves, a new socio-cultural gestalt which has attracted

thousands of Western individuals, made them chose to live a life in Auroville, as a

way of directing culture critique towards their societies of origin. The mazeway

presented by Aurobindo and the Mother to Western receivers, has a clear

connection with present sub-elements in the Western world; the so-called New

Age movement, and this connection is important for the understanding on how

Western individuals are able to mobilize in revitalization movements outside

their own social organism.

4. The History of Auroville - Mazeway Reformulation

29

The origin of Auroville begins with the teaching of Sri Aurobindo and his

successor Mirra Alfassa, better known as the Mother. Wallace describes how

revitalization movements most often originate through visions, or hallucinations,

received by one person during stress, and this person’s further construction of a

new socio-cultural gestalt (Wallace 1956:267). In Auroville’s case, the movement

has two prophets, both sharing the same visions derived through Aurobindo’s

philosophy. Below I will describe the history and origin of Auroville. I will then

show how these events can be interpreted using Wallace’s theory of mazeway, in

which a new social and cultural system replaced the old, creating the foundation

of the Sri Aurobindo Ashram, and Auroville.

The story begins with the Indian nationalist activist Aurobindo Ghose.

4.1. Aurobindo Ghose – Sri AurobindoAurobindo Akroyd Ghose (1872-1950) became from early years very influenced

by Western thoughts. Irish nuns in Darjeeling conducted his early education, and

in England he received first a primary school education and then a college

graduation from King’s College in Cambridge. Through his time in England

Western understanding of historical evolution, nationalism, poetry, and science

inspired him and McDermott describes how Aurobindo came to develop his own

philosophy as a blend of Western intellectualism and Hindu spirituality

(McDermott 2001:15-16).

Soon after his return to India in 1893 he got involved in the Indian nationalist

movement, held speeches and founded two weekly nationalistic newspapers. In

1910, after receiving a vision while being in jail for conspiracy against the British

Empire, he moved to Pondicherry and left his active life in the Independent

movement (Minor 1999:18). According to Aurobindo, this vision was a

realization of the eternal truth, manifested through lord Krishna and with

inspiration from Swami Vivekananda. In Pondicherry individuals started to

gather around him and in 1926 an Ashram was to be founded.

30

Aurobindo´s struggle for Indian independence was mainly rooted in his spiritual

beliefs about the Supreme Truth, which has its foundation in Hindu philosophy

(McDermott 2001:16, Minor 1999:145). Aurobindo started early on to develop

his ideas about the Supreme Truth with inspiration from neo-Hindu thinkers

such as Vivekananda and Rhadakrishnan. He believed that India was the most

spiritual developed nation on earth and that the independent India would

present itself to the world as a spiritual teacher – as a guru for the world (Minor

1999:20). Therefore, India was also the best suited place on earth, where to

nurture and mature a spirituality that will harmonize all religions and all creeds

in the world and to create true human unity, fulfilled by the Divine Truth. He saw

himself and Indian spirituality as agents of historical evolution (McDermott

2001:21).

The Western understanding of human history and evolution is central to his

understanding of this development. Aurobindo meant that true human evolution

has to start in one’s mind and one’s intellectual level, and take its way up to the

Supermind (Ibid.:173). Man also has the ability to speed up the progress of

evolution by using these special methods. He came to create his own

understanding of these methods as Integral Yoga; a synthesized yoga consisted

of all elements of life (Minor 1999:32).

4.1.1. Integral Yoga

In many of Aurobindo’s works, he gives an account of a world in crisis, a world

dominated by war, division, materialism and fragmentation. The root of this

madness, which Aurobindo contemplated it as, is to be found in the lack of

spirituality (McDermott 2001:22,180, Aurobindo 2003:14-15, 36-37). To clarify

this picture he made up a dichotomization between the West and the East

(India), and promoted an accomodationist philosophy where humanity should

take inspiration from European progress in science and intellectualism, but put it

in a Hindu spiritual context (Minor 1999:30-33). This philosophy was named

Integral Yoga and consists of a synthesis of all ancient yoga techniques,

promoting a full life of yoga – yoga of work, a yoga that will speed up the

31

evolution of humanity. When accelerating the evolution of each individual, the

earth consciousness would get affected and so transform into perfection with

time. And each individual has to find his own way to perfection; there is not only

one-way for all to reach higher levels of consciousness. This is true yoga,

according to Aurobindo (Minor 1999:28). He was teaching that the key to truth

was through intuition and not through intellectual intelligence. Spirituality has to

be experienced and not understood out of dogmatic intellectualism (Aurobindo

2003b:21-23). .

4.1.2. Aurobindo and Evolution

In his work “The Future Evolution of Man-The Divine Life Upon Earth”,

Aurobindo described man as the crest of evolution and meant, “An evolution of

consciousness is the central motive of terrestrial existence. The evolutionary

working of Nature has a double process: an evolution of forms, an evolution of

the soul” (Aurobindo 2003:5). He believed that he himself had reached higher

levels of consciousness through yoga, meditation, and intuition. This higher level

he used to call Overmind. This is the first step towards completion and

perfection. The goal is to reach the Supermind and become one with the divine

(Minor 1999:37). Present Man is just a transitional being, waiting for divinization

(McDermott 2001:64-67).

Robert McDermott describes how Aurobindo came to develop a full systematic

philosophy during his lifetime, based on 29 encyclopaedic volumes that he wrote

mainly during his time in Pondicherry until his death in 1950. The most famous

one is Savitri-A Legend and a Symbol, which is a 23 thousand line epic poem

(Ibid.:23). According to McDermott, Aurobindo says to be one of the four great

modern Indian thinkers, next to Gandhi, Vivekananda and Tagore (Ibid.:13).

Because his works were written in English, he also became known in the

Western world with an increase of interest from the 1960’s (Ibid.:32). Many of

32

his Western readers founded their own centres with inspiration from

Aurobindo’s teachings, or became disciples at his ashram in Pondicherry8.

In 1926 Aurobindo decided to leave his public life and live an ascetic secluded

subsistence in a meditative state – Sádhana. The successor of the movement

became Mirra Alfassa, who started to shape an organizational structure and

attract new followers, mainly from the Western world. Below I will describe her

role in the movement.

4.2. Mirra Alfassa - The MotherIntegral yoga could also be manifested collectively, where people could come

together and create a suitable environment for the acceleration of human

evolution. This idea came to be fully developed through Alfassa who extended

the movement to include new departments, organizations, and finally the

collective realization of the philosophy – Auroville (Minor 1999:36-37).

4.2.1. Mirra Alfassa the Mystic

Mirra Alfassa was born in Paris in 1878 from an Egyptian father and a Turkish

mother. Early on in her life, an interest in mysticism and spirituality grew in her

and in 1905 she went to Algeria to study occultism for one year. Alfassa

continued her spiritual searching and development back in France and in 1912

she established a spiritual group known as “Cosmique”. She introduced many

Indian ancient texts such the Bhagavadgita and the Upanisads to the group and

during the following years her interest in these texts grew (McDermott 2001:27,

Minor 1999:38).

8 Website no.1: http://www.auroville-international.org/avi-centres.html (last access 2010-01-13); no.2:

http://www.collaboration.org/ (last access 2010-01-13); no.3: http://home.kabelfoon.nl/~biedel/ (last access 2010-01-

13); Website no.4: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sri_Aurobindo (last access 2010-01-13)

33

4.2.2. Mirra Alfassa Meets Sri Aurobindo

In 1914 she came to Pondicherry to meet Aurobindo (McDermott 2001:27).

Aurobindo saw in Alfassa the natural successor of the movement and began a

period of passing on the authority to her. He even believed that the Mother,

which he started to call Alfassa early on after meeting her, has gone beyond his

own mental development and that she was a descent of the Supermind. The

Mother was the divine appearing to be human (Minor 1999:40-41). In 1956

Alfassa announced that the Supermind had descended through her (McDermott

2001:24). The concept of the Mother – or shakti, which means divine energy – is

a traditional Indian title referring to spiritual eminence in female form, especially

as a complement to a male spiritual personality or force (e.g., Sita to Rama,

Radha to Krishna) (McDermott 2001:286-287).

The Mother carried on the teachings of Sri Aurobindo and did not include much

to it. Her big legacy for the Sri Aurobindo movement lies in the establishment of

the physical environment where Man was supposed to grew and develops, both

materially and spiritually, with the aim of reaching perfection – to be one with

the divine. In short - to realize the vision of Sri Aurobindo. She named this place

Auroville (McDermott 2001:227).

4.2.3. The Mother on Auroville

Auroville should be a social collective experiment where people from all cultures

and religions could unite and nurture a society based on the principals from the

teachings of Sri Aurobindo and the Mother. It should be “a place where the needs

of the spirit and the concern for progress would take precedence over the

satisfaction of desires and passions, the search for pleasure and material

enjoyment” (Minor 1999:46).

In 1967 she constructed a Charter for the township that should comprise the

vision of Sri Aurobindo and so act as a guideline for the residents to relate to.

34

The Charter of Auroville9:

1. Auroville belongs to nobody in particular. Auroville belongs to humanity as a

whole. But to live in Auroville, one must be the willing servitor of the Divine

Consciousness.

2. Auroville will be the place of an unending education, of constant progress, and a

youth that never ages.

3. Auroville wants to be the bridge between the past and the future. Taking

advantage of all discoveries from without and from within, Auroville will boldly

spring towards future realisations.

4. Auroville will be a site of material and spiritual researches for a living

embodiment of an actual Human Unity.

Auroville should be free from all social, political and religious convictions, and

instead a place where individuals could join together for the practice of integral

yoga, which she never considered as a religion. Integral yoga was, according to

the Mother, a compression of years or decades of evolution into a short period

(Minor 1999:51). The highest authority is that of the supreme Truth. The

Supermind itself should provide individuals with motivations and directions so

that they can go their own way in their personal mental development. She called

this a divine anarchy, where Man’s ego is set besides the higher motives

(Ibid.:55). But until humanity is able to handle this divine anarchy with sincerity,

she made up a few social regulations, such as: no marriages in Auroville, no

drugs, no religions, no begging, and no money10.

She explained once that intuitive intelligence has its seat around the solar plexus

in the human body, and individuals with a high intuitive intelligence has access

to this part to know whether which way to go and what decisions are to be taken

(Aurobindo and the Mother 2002:158). She promoted a kind of government by a

few, between four to eight individuals, who all act out of intuitive intelligence.

9 Website no.5: http://www.auroville.org/vision/charter.htm (last access 2010-01-13)

10 Website no.6: http://www.theuniversityoftomorrow.org/journal_of_is/new_race_feb08/new_race4.html (last access 2010-01-13)

35

The others have to submit to the top and follow the guidance of the best suited.

Democracy, according to the Mother, is ruling through the greatest number of the

lowest rung11.

4.3. Auroville and the PhilosophyOne can see texts filled with the words of the Mother and Aurobindo practically

all over the township. Especially the Charter is put up as a reminder in many

public places, such as the communal dining hall the Solar Kitchen and in the

Financial Centre in the Town Hall building. At my hostel, every morning the

manager wrote a quote from the Mother or Aurobindo on the black board in the

dining hall. The Aurovillians themselves very often cites parts of the philosophy

when speaking with them about their aim in life. It seems as they have totally

adopted the mazeway and shaped an existence with inspiration from Integral

Yoga. They have also founded study circles where to discuss and interpret the

philosophy, and how to implement the ideas in Auroville.

According to my resident informants, the philosophy explains life holistically and

provides one with instructions on how to live a life in perfection. One is only in

need of sincere aspiration to fulfill this aim. They were also aware that present

humanity has its deficiencies and that the vision of human unity and perfection

will take time to reach. They felt, as they were the pioneers of this mission, a

mission that would be accomplished through future generations.

One example of the Aurovillians adoption of the mazeway is the many references

to the Mother while having a conversation with them. It happened frequently

when I asked about their own contemplation of life, and it could sound like this:

Me: “How do you find meaning in life?”

Informant x: “In the words of the Mother. She once said that, for humanity to

reach unity, above all creeds and all religions, one has to find his or her own path

to truth. Spiritual realization and material realization are two things of the same,

and we have to work hard to realize material matters, otherwise we can’t reach

11 Website no.6: http://www.theuniversityoftomorrow.org/journal_of_is/new_race_feb08/new_race4.html (last access 2010-01-13)

36

our spiritual realization. Mother said that yoga is to work, so I find meaning in

life through hard work, but as a way to realize myself, not just to earn my

livelihood”.

My informants held the Mother as the prime inspiration source, especially when

quoting parts from the philosophy. This can probably be explained due to the

fact that she alone was the founder of the township and make it came true, while

Aurobindo is in the background, inspiring as the original source of the

philosophy.

Above I have explained how first Sri Aurobindo came to develop a

comprehensive philosophy as a blend between Western intellectualism and

Hindu spirituality, and how the Mother carried on his legacy through the

realization of the philosophy: Auroville. At present, the members of the

movement are upholding the philosophy while trying to implement the ideas in

Auroville. What is of relevance here, except the fact that Aurobindo’s mazeway

reformulation goes in line with Wallace’s theory of the same as was explained in

the section of Theory, is the common characteristic of Aurobindo’s philosophy

with key ideas in the New Age movement in the Western world. These features

will be discussed later in this thesis, while making arguments on how Auroville

can be understood with the help of revitalization theory. Below I will first

describe the second phase of the period of revitalization, Communication, where

the vision-holder, in this case Sri Aurobindo, become a prophet by preaching his

realizations to potential followers, and how the movement is carrying on the task

of communication to attract new members (Wallace 1956:273. This is of

importance to understand how Auroville has been able to gather two thirds of its

population from the Western world, and in the lengthening for the

understanding of the revitalization aspects of the movement. The third phase,

Organization, describes how an organization structure takes form, and how the

case with authority is solved.

5. A Movement Becomes – Communication and Organization

37

Wallace describes how “the dreamer” becomes a prophet during the phase of

communication. He becomes a prophet through the gathering of disciples and

followers, as he spread his prophecy. In other words, through his public

announcement of his new mazeway, some individuals who are also suffering

from stress due to the unsatisfactory cultural and societal order they experience

will listen to his preaching and maybe adopt his mazeway as their own mental

image of a new Steady State (Wallace 1956:273).

5.1. CommunicationIn Auroville’s case, this has of course two phases; the first consists of the

preaching by Aurobindo and his disciples and followers, and the second consists

of the preaching by the Mother and her followers. I will therefore start with the

communication of Sri Aurobindo and how he came to attract members to his

ashram in Pondicherry, followed by a discussion of the Mother’s influence on the

recruitment of members to the movement. Wallace tells that communication will

continue to be a vital part of the movement during later phases, therefore the

communication of Auroville at present is of concern and will be taken up in the

end of the chapter (Ibid.:273).

5.1.1. Aurobindo and Communication

When coming to Pondicherry in 1910, Aurobindo started to shape a group

around him through his preaching. He made darshans, spiritual public meetings,

on a regular basis that attracted people from all over India, but primarily from

North India (Minor 1999:37). But his primary method to attract followers was

through his literary works. He left dozens of publications after him, many of

them compiled of correspondence between Aurobindo and his closest disciples12.

Aurobindo was able to gather disciples and followers in India because of his fame

as a spiritual freedom fighter and his engagement for a reformed and revitalized

form of Hinduism (Minor 1999:24). During his active time until 1926 as a

teacher and a prophet in Pondicherry, Aurobindo was able to gather a group of

around twenty individuals that were living in the city, while some came there 12 Website no.7: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Collected_Works_of_Sri_Aurobindo (last access 2010-01-13)

38

temporarily to receive teaching and to take part in darshans (Ibid.:37). When

first coming to Pondicherry, he shared accommodation with four to five

disciples, but with time more and more people got aware of his preaching and

came to Pondicherry, and soon a community of sadhaks, devoted disciples, was

to be established around him, which became the foundation of the Sri Aurobindo

Ashram (Ibid.:39). As Wallace points out, for the prophet to be able to preach and

spread his ideas to the public, he has to hand over some of the teachings to his

disciples (Wallace 1956:273). Therefore, as the amount of followers increased,

more of the responsibility concerned teaching and maintenance of the group

came to depend on the activity of his closest disciples (Minor 1999:39).

Even though he wrote all his publications in English, he did not become known to

the public audience in the Western world until the 1960s, according to

McDermott (McDermott 2001:32, 226). Until this time, the Sri Aurobindo

Ashram was a relatively isolated phenomenon in India, mainly consisting of

Indians with neo-Hindu values that were concerned with the re-shaping of

Indian spirituality, along with a few Western spiritual seekers (Minor 1999:37).

Outside India, especially in the United States and in Europe, the writings of

Aurobindo inspired intellectuals such as Mircea Eliade, Paul Brunton, Frederich

Spiegelberg, and Karlheinz Stockhausen. At this time, until the 1960s, the

teachings of Aurobindo was reserved to intellectuals, and occult and mystic

groups in Europe and in the U.S. Through the years, the writings of Aurobindo

came to inspire many more in the Western world and become more accessible to

the public, especially through the engagement of groups that were formed

through inspiration from Aurobindo’s integral philosophy, such as the Human

Potential Movement and familiar movements such as the Self-Realization

Fellowship in California13. From 1926 and onwards, with the authority of the

Mother, the ashram increased successively in members and with the attraction of

more Westerners it began to take shape as a full-scale movement (Minor

1999:39-40).

13 Website no.8: http://www.scribd.com/doc/17714396/Sri-Aurobindo (last access 2010-01-13)

39

5.1.2. The Mother and Communication

When the Mother took charge over the ashram in 1926, a new era began with the

recruitment of more Westerners to the movement and the establishment of

branches both in India and abroad. This was a progress that began to take shape

when the teachings of Aurobindo became accessible to the public in Europe and

the U.S. and people started to make “pilgrimage” to the ashram in Pondicherry

(Ibid.:39-40). Pondicherry, which is a part of the former French India, hosted

many French citizens that became aware of Aurobindo and the Mother.

According to informants in Auroville, these French citizens spread the words of

Aurobindo in France and elsewhere in Europe, but were still restricted to

mystical and spiritual subgroups. Not until the 1960s, when different groups

started to take form out of inspiration of Aurobindo and other neo-Hindu

thinkers such as Swami Vivekananda and Swami Paramahansa Yogananda, the

author of the bestselling book “An Autobiography of a Yogi” (Yogananda 2007),

even Western mainstream society started to get in touch with the ideas of this

new kind of spiritualism (Diem and Lewis 2002:49).

5.1.3. The Official Support

The Mother was very active in the recruitment process and the legitimization

and credibility process, which came to mainly concern Auroville. She had mail

correspondence with Indian government officials, so as with other national

authorities all over the world. Two examples are the relations she established

with the Tibetan people’s spiritual leader Dalai lama, and the former emperor of

Ethiopia, Haile Selassie. Both came to actively support the experiment of

Auroville and the philosophy of Aurobindo14. Through active engagement, and

the handover of communication tasks to close disciples such as the devotee

Satprem15, who wrote down many of his conversations with the Mother and later

on published them for the access of the public, and the General Secretary of the

14 Website no.9: http://www.auroville.org/thecity/africa/african_pavilion.htm (last access 2010-01-13)Website no.10: http://www.auroville.org/thecity/tibet_pavilion/dalailama_in_av.htm (last access 2010-01-13)

15 Website no.11: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Satprem (last access 2010-01-13)

40

Sri Aurobindo Society, Sri Navajata16, the Mother succeeded with the task of

achieving support, both national and international, for the establishment of

Auroville. Except financial and moral support from the Indian Government, along

with the common support from many Indian State Governments, the United

Nations Educational, Scientific, and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) passed

resolutions 1966,1968 and 1970, for a support of Auroville as a very important

contribution for the future of humanity, concerning questions of international

understanding, culture exchange, and human unity17 (Minor 1999:58-59). Even

though some Westerners found their way to the ashram, it was not until the

inauguration of Auroville that more Westerners started to seriously discuss the

possibilities of moving to India, and Auroville.

5.1.4. Promoting the Auroville Brand

According to many informants, the awareness of Auroville’s existence for them

was either through friends, or from Internet and/or traditional media such as

newspapers and television. In one-way or another, they became aware of

Auroville and continued to read about the experiment. Every individual who

wants to reside in Auroville has to visit Auroville first, before being able to

become a newcomer, which consists of a period of at least one year, finishing

with an approval from the Auroville Entry Group after several interviews. During

the visit, the guest will have the opportunity to partake in some of the activities

that are managed by the township, and to meet and talk with Aurovillians. This

will give him an insight in the life of the township, making it easier to know if it

suits himself, if he is to become a convert. To recruit new members to the

township, active engagement on an international level is therefore necessary, to

make Auroville known to the public and to recruit members from volunteers,

researchers, and regular visitors such as tourists.

Apart from the activity within Auroville itself, the township operates

internationally through member associations and liaisons in twenty-four

16 Website no.12: http://www.sriaurobindosociety.org.in/onsas.htm (last access 2010-01-13)17 Website no.13: http://www.auroville.org/organisation/supp_statements_unesco.htm (last access 2010-01-13)

41

different countries. In 1983, Auroville International (AVI), which is a worldwide

network, was founded to co-ordinate the international support of Auroville and

to promote its ideas on an international level18. These branches are

communicating the ideals of Auroville to the world, and actively working with

seeking up potential donors to support the township financially. The main

objective of the network is to “making known the existence, activities, aims and

ideals of Auroville”19. Members of Auroville International represent Auroville to

national, international, government, and non-government organizations. They

also hold workshops at various kinds of happenings, such as festivals, spiritual

and/or sustainability trade fairs, etc20.

Another source for Auroville to promote their ideas today is through the Global

EcoVillage Network [GEN], which Auroville is a member of. Auroville was

actually designated officially in 1997 as an eco-village, even if its promotion of

sustainable methods with care for the environment started already from its

inauguration21.

Above, I have described how Aurobindo was able to gather followers due to his

fame as a cultural hero, how he handed over some of the movements

responsibilities to his disciples, to finally let the Mother take charge over the

movement. I have also explained how he was able to attract followers from the

West, and how these receivers became more in numbers from the 1960s under

the Mother’s leadership. This is of importance if one wants to understand how

Auroville can be understood through the lens of revitalization, and in relation to

hegemonic decline. The support that the Mother gained for the movement is also

of significant value to understand the revitalization aspects of the movement,

why Western individuals have chosen Auroville in front of other movements in

the West, as a way of directing culture critique against their own societies by the

critique they direct against the capitalist order of the World-System, promoting

Aurobindo’s philosophy as an alternative. Below I will describe how an

18 Website no.14: http://www.auroville-international.org/ (last access 2010-01-13)19 Website no.15: http://www.auroville-international.org/avi/who-are-we.html (last access 2010-01-13)20 Website no.16: http://www.aviusa.org/calendar_main.html (last access 2010-01-13)21 Website no.17: http://www.livingroutes.org/programs/e_auroville.htm (last access 2010-01-13)

42

organizational structure started to take form around the movement, and how the

handover of the leadership was achieved.

5.4. OrganizationDuring the phase of organization the prophet, according to Wallace, makes

converts. It develops a kind of campaign organization with three orders of

personnel: the prophet, the disciples, and the followers. It is the routinization of

charisma that is of main importance during this phase, where the prophet has to

administer and distribute his power to different levels within a stable

institutional structure. If he fails, the movement is most likely to collapse with

the death of the prophet (Wallace 1956:274).

5.4.1. The Period Before Auroville

Aurobindo had international aspirations, to create a perfect world inhabited by

spiritual individuals living in harmony with the supramental consciousness. The

first thing he needed to do to fulfil this goal was to establish a separate

community where dwellers could live and develop their own spiritual being in a

balanced environment. This community of higher spiritual beings would in turn

affect the earth-consciousness, by providing an example of living and through its

involvement in the common consciousness ,which will transform and divinize

humanity (McDermott 2001:41, Minor 1999:27). In 1926, when he announced

that he had reached the Overmind, he decided to hand over all public and internal

affairs to his successor, the Mother. The disciples at this time who had gathered

around him numbered only a twenty or so (Minor 1999:37).

Minor describes in details this handover of the leadership, which has clear

references to Weber’s notion of the handover of charismatic properties (Weber

1985:202-206). As the followers that came to Pondicherry increased in numbers,

an ashram was established around Aurobindo in 1926, which was managed by

the Mother (Minor 1999:36-37).

43

With time Aurobindo succeeded with the handover of the charismatic leadership

and the disciples saw in the Mother the way to salvation. From 1926 and

onwards until her death in 1973, she authorized everything that concerned the

movement, from purchase of land, printing of books and journals, starting up

schools, new centers and branches in India and abroad, and recruitment of new

members. Everything, every single decision, had to go through the Mother

(Minor 1999:39-45, 58-65). All her actions were seen as profound statements of

the nature of reality and some disciples started to see her in their dreams and in

visions, in accordance with Wallace’s notion on how converts are made (Minor

1999:42, Wallace 1956:274).

Since the Mother took charge of the movement, beginning with the foundation of

the ashram in 1926, she ambitiously extended its activities to include an

international school - Sri Aurobindo International Centre of Education (SAICE),

the Sri Aurobindo Society (SAS), The Mother’s Service Society (MSS), and

Auroville. She also started branches of the ashram in India and abroad, all under

the supervision of the Mother. In 1930, the disciples had increased in numbers to

around 150 and the recruitment of members increased even more with time

(Minor 1999:39).

5.4.2. Auroville

While the ashram should be a site for pure spiritual realization, Auroville was

meant to be the collective social realization of the philosophy of Sri Aurobindo

(Minor 1999:54). When she was setting up the township, created rules and

regulations and made up plans about its development, she also handed over

some of its managements to the Sri Aurobindo Society, which she created already

in 196022. But the Mother was the sole authority of Auroville, also the honorary

president of the Society until her pass away in 1973, and all decisions related to

the township had to go through her (Minor 1999:56). The purpose of the Society

was to “coordinate and administer the institutions of the Aurobindo movement

22 Website no.12: http://www.sriaurobindosociety.org.in/onsas.htm (last access 2010-01-13)

44

worldwide and to collect funds for the ashram” (Minor 1999:58). It also became

responsible for the legal managements of Auroville in the beginning. In 1968, the

Mother made the Society the official overseer of the finances of Auroville23.

From 1926 and until her death in 1973, the Mother was the movement’s sole

authority, but had created a hierarchical organization with close disciples that

managed some activities, but with the supervision of the Mother. The closest

disciples received in turn authority from other followers while they were

representations of the Mother and only acted out of her will (Minor 1999:56).

5.4.3. The Indian Government as the Legal Authority

While the ashram had created an institutional organization with a trustee

committee who took over the management, when the Mother passed away there

were no institutions, nor any individual that was prepared to take control over

the township. At this time Auroville consisted of just around four hundred

inhabitants, excluded the many local Tamil villages that was located within the

area of the township. The Aurovillians were scattered in autonomous

settlements over the land, each working by themselves in various projects

mainly concerning water erosion, reforestation of the barren land, and the

common project with the construction of Matrimandir (in Hindi=Temple of the

Mother), which she said should be the soul of the city, and the Mother was

holding it as very important for the aspirations and unity of the Aurovillians

(Ibid.:61,66).

A phase of anarchy and conflicts between different factions took place and lasted

until 1980, when finally the Indian Government, through “the Auroville

(Emergency Provisions) Act”, took over the legal authority of Auroville, and in

1988 the Indian Government created the permanent “Auroville Foundation Act”,

promising that the charter of Auroville should be the main guidance for the

management of the township (Ibid.:112).

23 Website no.19: http://www.sriaurobindosociety.org.in/onsas.htm#hist (last access 2010-01-13)

45

5.4.4. The Organizational Structure of Auroville

The process that followed the construction of an organizational structure of

Auroville has been one of experimentation and negotiation. The Mother made

clear that any organization in Auroville has to be plastic and flexible, in order to

progress continually and to be able to adapt and modify according to needs24.

The Indian Government constructed an organizational “frame” in collaboration

with the Aurovillians in which the structure and the construction of new

institutions could take form. This was formed out of the separate legal entity

“Auroville Foundation”, which consists of educational, research, service, and

commercial units which all should promote the ideals of Auroville25. The

Governing Board consists of seven members, nominated by the Indian Central

Government. These members have to be somehow involved in the experiment of

Auroville. The International Advisory Council consists of five members that are

nominated by the UNESCO unit of the HRD Ministry of the Indian Government.

Its role is to advice the Governing Board in Auroville related matters. The

Residents Assembly consists of all Aurovillians aged eighteen and above, and has

an advisory and proposal role towards the Governing Board26.

Through the years the Aurovillians has elaborated and experimented with

various kinds of economic systems and organizational methods27. A large amount

of relatively autonomous organizations and institutions have been established

within the township, schools for both Aurovillians and Tamil children have been

founded and the ever-going challenge of the organization of every day life seems

to continue (The Auroville handbook 2007).

24 Website no.20: http://www.auroville.org/organisation/internalorganisation.htm (last access 2010-01-13)25 Website no.21: http://www.auroville.org/organisation/aurovillefoundation.htm (last access 2010-01-13)26 Website no.22: http://www.auroville.org/organisation/aurovillefoundationact.htm (last access 2010-01-13)

27 Website no.23: http://www.auroville.org/journals&media/avtoday/june_july_2002/economy_whitepaper.htm (last access 2010-01-13)

Website no.24: http://www.auroville.org/journals&media/avtoday/March_2009/AV_economy.htm (last access 2010-01-13)

46

In this chapter I have described how Aurobindo and the Mother were able to

make converts, and how the charismatic leadership was passed over from

Aurobindo to the Mother. This is an important phase for the revitalization

movement to survive the death of a leader, which indicates in the Mother’s own

failure with her hand-over of the leadership, and which was solved by the legal

take-over by the Indian Government. This will be discussed in more details in the

chapter of Discussion. But the relation between Auroville and the Indian

Government is important for the understanding of the movement’s ability to

exist and for the international promotion of Auroville, which attract Western

individuals to the movement. Below I will describe how the movement has

adapted itself to internal and external conditions, and what kinds of strategies

that have been used, and still are utilized today. I will continue with describing

the cultural transformation that has taken place, and a brief description of

routinization.

6. A Living Movement: Adaptation, Cultural Transformation, and Routinization

According to Wallace, the movement is most likely to encounter both internal

and external threats, because of its revolutionary nature. Therefore, the

movement has to use various strategies of adaptation, such as doctrinal

modification, political and diplomatic maneuver, and force (Wallace 1956:274-

275).

47

6.1. AdaptationSince Auroville has not had any identified leader since the death of the Mother,

there seems to have been a lot of issues going on that can be related to every

single aspect of the township. There was no more authority to manage and guide

everyday routines. Instead, the Aurovillians have been left alone with what the

Mother sometimes called divine anarchy, and in the absence of divinity there is

only anarchy, but in a somehow organized manner28. A part of the solution was

made in 1988 when the Indian Government passed an act through the

parliament, which made the government the legal authority of Auroville (Minor

1999:76).

6.1.1. The Big Clash

The most critical conflict in Auroville has been that between the Sri Aurobindo

Society (mostly Indians), and the Aurovillian community (mostly Westerners at

the beginning in 1973-75). Right after the death of the Mother, no single

individual or any kind of organization was identified as the prime authority of

the township, neither from the Mother herself, nor from the Aurovillians

themselves. The Society, under the authority of its General Secretary Navajata,

claimed the rights to further manage the finances, and to supervise and guide the

development of the township (Ibid.:68). Immediately outbursts of conflicts took

place between the Society and a group who called themselves the rebels. In-

between was a group of residents who did not wanted to take part in the conflict,

and who are mostly referred to as the neutrals (Patenaude 2003).

The members of the Society never moved to live in Auroville themselves, while

no Aurovillian was personally represented in the committee that managed the

economic future of Auroville. This created a big clash between the two groups,

which sometimes even took physical appearance (Minor 1999:66). One old

resident told me that, when he moved to Auroville in 1976 the township was in a

nearly anarchic state. Some Aurovillians occupied houses and land that belonged

to members of the Society, the Society answered by calling the police who

28 Website no.25: http://www.auroville.org/vision/maonav_selected.htm (last access 2010-01-13)

48

sometimes arrested Aurovillians, and the lack of food during the conflict made

many desperate and some left because of the critical situation.

6.1.2. The Solution

The conflict between the Society and the Aurovillians lasted until December 17,

1980, when the Indian Government responded to the critical situation in

Auroville and constructed “The Auroville (Emergency Provisions) act” who made

the Indian Government temporarily responsible for the management of the

township (Minor 1999:75). Some Aurovillian rebels had made friends with some

Indian Government Officials from the Congress Party. These officials, who were

called the friends from Delhi, used their privileges and power to put the conflict

into debate in the Central Parliament in 1976. A debate took place to investigate

the Society’s management of Auroville. As a result, many financial irregularities

caused by the Society were founded which lead to the conclusion that the Society

were irresponsible in their management of the township and did not have any

more right to govern. Even followers of Aurobindo and the Mother abroad were

protesting and demanded that the rights to govern and manage Auroville could

only be in the hands of the Aurovillians themselves, especially according to the

Charter which proclaims that Auroville belongs to nobody in particular. Due to

the international aspiration of Auroville, being endorsed as an important social

experiment by UNESCO, and also promoted internationally by the Indian

Government since its inauguration, made it clear to the government officials that

a solution has to be found. The fact that Aurobindo is considered as a national

hero in India and well-known outside India, made it even more acute to solve the

conflict, not to put shame in his name (Ibid.:79,83). The government finally, after

many years of debate in the parliament, reached a final conclusion in 1988. The

result was the “Auroville Foundation Act” that made the Indian Central

Government the legal authority of the township29.

6.1.3. Adaptation Strategies

29 Website no.22: http://www.auroville.org/organisation/aurovillefoundationact.htm (last access 2010-01-13)

49

For the Aurovillians, a life of constant change is every-day routine. Auroville is an

experiment and therefore needs to modify its organization and doctrine in

relation to its needs. It does not have any clear recipe on how to run the

township. Most of the problems are openly discussed and debated on daily basis

and most Aurovillians seems to willingly participate in these discussions. At the

communal lunch dwelling, Solar-kitchen, discussions are made around the tables

that seem to concern every aspect of the township. But at present, according to

some informants, many of the discussions are not made through physical

interaction between the residents as before, instead one can follow the debates

in the weekly journal Auroville Today, or at one of the information walls around

the township. This may indicate a turnover to Gesellshaft, an issue that could be

interesting to follow up in another study.

Instead of looking at the external society as an enemy, Auroville has chosen, or

has been forced to choose, to ally with the Indian Government, and to create

affiliations with other external institutions such as the UN, European Union, and

several non-government organizations. The moral and financial support

Auroville has been granted from these institutions has made the township able

to develop a large amount of research projects, some with local dimensions and

others with international aspirations, but all in relation to sustainable

development30.

6.1.4. Auroville as an Eco-Village

The most obvious modification of doctrine and the township’s strategy for the

interaction with the external world has probably been its change of focus:

shifting from a main focus on spiritual development and self-realization, to a

focus on Auroville as a model for sustainable living. This adaptation strategy

seems to be a side effect since Auroville came under the authority of the Indian

government. Minor describes this process in relation to the debates that were

held in the Central Indian Parliament, discussions if Auroville was to be defined

30 Website no.26: http://www.auroville.org/research/reseachinav.htm (last access 2010-01-13)

50

as a secular or a religious project31. The conclusion is a result of the Indian

Government’s own interest in the project, according to Minor. He means that the

Indian Government is supporting Auroville in a way to promote India nationally

and internationally. In India, Aurobindo is well known and often presented as a

cultural hero. Important Indian persons such as Tagore, Nehru, and

Rhadakrishnan, have turned to Aurobindo for inspiration. If Auroville fail, then

the very realization of Aurobindo’s aim would also fail, which should be a defeat

for the Indian nation as a whole (Minor 1999:77-82). Auroville is also presented

to the world through the Indian Government as “an international cultural

township”, supported by the UNESCO. According to Minor, the Indian state “is

thinking of promoting Auroville as a model community on Indian soil that will

become an example to the world of the unity of peoples” (Ibid.:92). The close

relationship between India and UNESCO has a clear role in this promotion, both

emphasising Auroville as their own very project (Ibid.:83). As a result, the

international promotion of Auroville from the Aurovillians themselves has been

an emphasis of the township as an international project of human unity, as an

example for sustainable living. Informants told me that, if Auroville wants to

generate more money from outside donors, they should continue with promoting

the township as a secular place who experiments with different ways of

sustainable living, and not talk too much about divine consciousness and

spirituality. The world is not ready for that yet, according to these informants.

Above I have described how the Aurovillians have solved the most serious threat

to the movement, by handing over the legal authority of the township to the

Indian Government. This strategy has resulted in the promotion of Auroville,

both on a national and an international level, which in turn has been able to

attract more Western individuals to the movement through its many

international affiliations. The Indian Government also provides these Western

individuals with a social space from where to direct culture critique against their

societies of origin, and a place where to live in accordance with their new socio-

cultural system. Western individuals mobilize together in a comprehensive force

to promote their ideas through Auroville. Below I will describe how Western

31 According to the Indian constitution; the Government has no rights to intervene in religious associations

51

residents have been exposed for an individual culture change by joining

Auroville, and how Auroville is trying to make an impact on the external world,

reaching a global culture change.

6.2. Cultural TransformationIf the movement is successful in its activities, a noticeable social revitalization

will occur, according to Wallace. This change is signalized by “the reduction of

personal deterioration symptoms of individuals, by extensive cultural changes,

and by an enthusiastic embarkation on some organized program of group action”

(Wallace 1956:275).

In terms of cultural transformation of the residents of Auroville, many

dimensions have to be applied. Even though Auroville is supposed to be an

international township, some nationalities are living and working together in

kind of national colonies within the township. Auroville is also a very

individualistic experiment, meant that each individual will find his own way of

personal and spiritual development. The creation of an Auroville culture is far

from reached, but the awareness of being a part of an important experiment for

humanity brings the residents together in their aspirations. Just to live in

Auroville is to participate in an organized program of group action: to affect the

external world through international engagement, and to present a model of

living. Secondary, this impact is meant to change the state of each individual’s

own society, to revitalize their particular socio-cultural system.

6.2.1. Individual Cultural Transformation

While speaking with Aurovillians on how they contemplate their personal

transformation since joining Auroville, most of them declared that they now have

the ability to be themselves, to be authentic individuals, and that they have found

a meaning in life which was far reached before joining Auroville. Some

informants reported former depressions or drug abuse, and that they now have

found a way of life that is more in line with their own personality type. Most

52

informants reported that they, before joining Auroville, was unsatisfied with the

direction of the society, but instead of joining a political party or any national

organization, they thought that the best way to make an impact was by joining

Auroville, to provide an example of living and to work internationally through

different Auroville-related activities. Even though these informants have chosen

to leave their countries, they still feel that by joining Auroville they have the

opportunity to make a difference, to make an impact on a transnational level,

which will affect their own countries of origin.

Many informants told me that, when joining Auroville they could progress in

their profession in a way they were not able to do before, and even to try out

professions that they were not trained in. Especially many architects and

individuals somehow engaged in the town planning of the township expressed

this view, meaning that when living in their home-countries they were bonded to

rules and norms, which hindered them in their professional development. In

Auroville they had the opportunity to realize their dreams, in relation to their

profession.

6.2.2. Auroville as a Transition Site

For many individuals, Auroville has the function of a transition site. In general,

according to one informant from the Residents Assembly Service, Aurovillians

chose to leave the township after eight years. Those individuals who join

Auroville for comfort reasons, to use Auroville as a free state and to hide away

from their personal problems, are the first to leave, according to the same

informant. These individuals realize that one cannot escape from the world by

joining Auroville. Instead, Auroville is an ongoing experiment that participates in

the business of the world, and active engagement and awareness of the situation

of the world have become norm in Auroville. And it is easy to see what he means.

Auroville has set up a few hundred different Service Units and Working Groups,

and more than hundred different Commercial Units, many of them related to art

and craft (The Auroville Handbook 2007). On an international level, Auroville is

managing, many times in collaboration with other international and national

53

organizations, multiple different kinds of projects32. In this way, Auroville is a

very active site, providing a space for individuals to express themselves in ways

that they, many times, felt they could not do before joining Auroville. So-called

free-riders are therefore prevented to be established within the township, even

though some join Auroville out of sceptical reasons (Minor 1999:56-57), to fulfil

their selfish desires or for example to make commercial business out of self-

interest. The same informant also explained that those individuals, who are not

enough committed to work for the idea of the township, soon get tired and chose

to repatriate. But for the rest, the individuals who choose to stay for years, one

can assume that a cultural transformation has taken place through active

engagement in some way. Many of my informants have told me that they have

felt a stress relief when joining Auroville, that they have become much more

open minded and understanding in relation to other cultures, and that their

capacity of empathy have increased. To examine weather this cultural

transformation has actually taken place, one have to study the subjects both

before and after coming to Auroville to identify the transformation process

empirically.

When speaking with informants who have chosen to soon leave the township

after spending some years there, and asking them about the reasons, a clear

pattern appeared which indicated that these individuals often chose to leave for

reasons other than social or material deficiencies of the township. Even though

to live in Auroville is to participate in the experiment, those individuals I have

talked with expressed that they wanted to do other things in life, which they

could not do in Auroville. Some wanted to do voluntary work for different NGOs,

university studies (which I heard during my stay that Auroville in present is in

the process of realizing by establishing a University), or just to travel the world.

None of them said that they would never return again to Auroville, even though I

heard that some actually leave with the intention of no return. Some newcomers

even told me that their intentions were to live in Auroville for a foreseeable time,

and then find somewhere else to live. When asking them about the reasons,

another pattern appeared to me, indicated that these individuals want to do

32 Website no.27: www.auroville.org (last access 2010-01-13)

54

active engagement to change the world, and that Auroville is only one of many

options from where to operate. They thought that Auroville, at the moment,

could provide them with insights and meaning, but in the lengthening Auroville

was a too isolated place. One newcomer girl from South Korea expressed it like

this: “I want to be free as a bird, and Auroville demands total commitment and

involvement, which I may be ready for now, but maybe later I want to go outside

Auroville and then I have to leave”. The same girl had her parents living in

Auroville since a few years, and that was a main reason for joining.

On the first page at Auroville’s official Website, Auroville.org, one can read “a

universal city in the making”33, which signalize what it is to live in Auroville. To

live in Auroville is to participate in the experiment, on how to reach human unity

and perfection, as a social lab. In this way, all active life in Auroville is an

engagement in an organized group action, to realize the ideals of Sri Aurobindo

and the Mother. This program will not end until the ideals are realized, which

means that for the Aurovillians, every-day routines is an engagement in different

kinds of social, political and economic experiments, and for a vast majority it also

means to be a part of one or many of the projects that are managed in Auroville.

I have here described how some informants have reported to me an individual

culture change that has taken place since joining Auroville. It seems as this

change has taken place as a result from their engagement in the activities within

the township. These activities includes both a socio-cultural elaboration within

Auroville, and secondly an international promotion of their ideas. As a result,

some individuals chose to engage through other organizations outside Auroville,

but still with the same goal, to change the state of their society of origin, trying to

replace the contemporary state with the socio-cultural system provided by

Aurobindo and the Mother. Below I will briefly point to, in what grade Auroville

have succeeded with the implementation of their ideas on the external world,

resulting in the movement’s establishment as a normal institution within the

larger society.

33 Website no.27: www.auroville.org (last access 2010-01-13)

55

6.3. Routinization“If the group action program in nonritual spheres is effective in reducing stress-

generating situations, it becomes established as normal in various economic,

social, and political institutions and customs” The end-result of routinization is

that the movement transforms and becomes as a church, within the larger

society, upholding the doctrine and rituals (Wallace 1956:275).

The interaction between Auroville and the external world is much more complex

than the interaction that takes place between a classic revitalization movement

such as a Cargo-Cult, and its external society. In Auroville’s case, the interaction

takes place on many levels simultaneously, nationally and internationally. In

India, Auroville has a wide network of contacts, many times through its legal

holder, the Indian Government, and are managing numbers of development

projects in the country, especially in the state of Tamil Nadu. They export a

multitude of sustainable products and techniques, to India and abroad, such as

clothes and handicrafts, incenses, organic food, dietary supplements such as

Spirulina, and sustainable techniques such as the earth-compressor from Earth

Institute (exported to more than forty countries34), windmill techniques35 and

solar panel techniques36. They have also established international collaborations

for different kinds of projects in relation to sustainable development37.

6.3.1. Impact on India

In a small society, where one single revitalization movement can occupy a large

percentage of the population, the result of routinization can easily be identified.

In Auroville’s case, the result of routinization, the impact of the movement on the

larger society, or societies, is not visible in the same way as for Wallace’s classic

revitalization movements. And even though one cannot say that Auroville has

34 Website no.28: http://business.in.com/article/work-in-progress/commerce-in-a-cocoon/3722/2 (last access 2010-01-13)35 Website no.29: http://www.auroville.org/journals&media/avtoday/August_2009/Windpower.htm (last access 2010-01-13)36 Website no.30: http://www.auroville.org/research/ren_energy/solar.htm (last access 2010-01-13)

37 Website no.31: http://www.auroville.org/research/src.htm (last access 2010-01-13)

56

become normal in various institutions, it definitely has an impact on the external

world. The relation between India and Auroville is much more visible than the

relation it has with countries abroad, not only through the different kinds of

domestic projects that Auroville runs, but also as a site of interest for domestic

tourists, and for school classes and students to come and visit or to do research.

During my stay, which was in the low season, every day came busses with

children from different schools around India to get a brief insight in the

experiment of Auroville. Hundreds of students from different universities and

colleges in India conduct research for shorter periods in Auroville every year38.

Auroville gets government grants every year for different kinds of projects that

are not related directly to the maintenance of the township, a majority of them

has to do with sustainable development in the region of Tamil Nadu. In this way,

Auroville has a direct impact on the surrounding area, resulting in an

advancement of agriculture, setup of schools and health centres, and

empowerment projects for Indian women39. To be able to examine this direct

impact empirically, one has to conduct fieldwork among these receiving people.

6.3.2. International Aspirations

Auroville is not considered as normal, neither in India or abroad. It has

established itself within the larger society, but as a deviant in relation to the

contemporary Steady State. Auroville seems to be relatively well known in India,

especially around educated groups. When talking with Indian academics, who do

not have any personal relation to Auroville, most of them are aware of the

township and seems to have an opinion about the experiment. Some say it is a

very important project for India and the world to find a better way of living,

while other means that it is a white man’s project and a neo-colonial attempt,

and still others view it as a strange spiritual hippie community. The direct impact

of Auroville on those individuals is difficult to measure, but still it is not

perceived as a normal institution within the larger society.

38 Website no.32: http://www.auroville.org/research.htm (last access 2010-01-13)39 Website no.33: http://www.auroville.org/environment/villages/economic_impact.htm (last access 2010-01-13)

57

According to what I have described above, Auroville cannot be said to have

established itself as a normal institution within the larger society. I have above

made clear that the routinization of Auroville is not over until the state of the

World-System is changed, resulting in a change of the socio-cultural state of each

society within the system. Below I will start my discussion on the matter, trying

to identify the connection between the state of the capitalist World-System, and

how this has affected Western individuals in such a grade as they have chosen to

live in and act from Auroville, in a common attempt to revitalize each particular

society. By using Wallace’s revitalization model as a frame for the development

of Auroville, I will show that Auroville has the same developmental characters as

other revitalization movements, and each step in the revitalization period

provides an opportunity to tie theoretical understandings to my conclusions.

7. Discussion and Conclusions

This analysis is highly theoretical, while empirical data from the field will mainly

be used as a way to strengthen arguments, and to highlight particularities, on

how Auroville can be understood with the help of revitalization theory. My aim is

to clarify the connection between the state of the World-System, the cultural

exchange between the West and the East (India), which have provided

Westerners with an insight in Hindu spirituality, how this insight has resulted in

new formations of the cognitive schema of each individual, and as a result

shaped a revitalization movement located in India and comprised of both Indians

and Westerners, where the latter directs culture critique to each particular

society of origin by acting on an international level.

58

7.1 Discussion on Mazeway ReformulationWallace describes how individuals reformulate their mazeway during stress,

shaping a more satisfying view of culture and society. No one can know about the

stress that Aurobindo felt, one could only imagine through his own works and

other’s accountants. But it is easy to imagine the stress that Aurobindo probably

felt, living in a world that he contemplated as madness. During his educational

life in England, one can imagine how he must have felt alienated when spending

his time with the people who oppressed his own people. Being able to receive a

Western education, both in India and in England, also shows that he came from a

wealthy family. This cultural duality probably shaped the way to his nationalistic

engagement, urging for a return to his cultural roots and traditional society. At

the same time, Aurobindo’s aspiration of creating something new and unique, as

a blend of Hindu spirituality and Western intellectualism, symbolize his

accomodationist formulation of a new Utopia.

Wallace also distinct three different choices of identification for the movement:

Movements with the purpose to revive a traditional culture; movements who

wants to replace the present cultural order with a foreign one; and those

movements who wants to create a new culture, something different from that of

the ancestors, and from that of the foreigners, with other words – Utopia

(Wallace 1956:275). In this case, Aurobindo’s incitement seems to be a blend of

all three aspects. He wants to uphold ancient Hindu traditions through the use of

ancient scripts like the Bhagavad-Gita and the Upanishads, and to actively use

ancient Indian techniques as yoga to realise his visions, simultaneously as he

take use of Western understanding of historical evolution and history to describe

the process which human has to go to reach divinity. But the endstate is neither

one that belongs to traditional Indian spiritualism or Western intellectualism, it

is the final chapter of humanity, when Humanity has reached perfection and

being able to work with the divine to shape the ultimate culture and society,

different from that of India and different from that of the West.

59

Being familiar with the concept of revitalization, one can easily see how

Aurobindo can be understood as a typical prophet for a revitalization movement,

considering his aim of Hindu revival, but as an accomodationist synthesis

between Hindu and Western thoughts, contemplating the world as insane and

experiencing both cultural and material deprivation in India. But for anyone to

understand why his movement, or his and the Mother’s offspring – Auroville,

also can be understood as a revitalization movement, especially considering the

Western hemisphere within the township, I will have to give an account of the

relations between Aurobindo, the Mother, and the Western receivers. The most

obvious connection lies around the growth of new religious movements in the

West, particularly those that can be placed under the category New Age.

7.1.1. The Connection Between Auroville and the New Age Movement

The philosophy of Sri Aurobindo and the Mother has many parallels with the

contemporary New Age movement. Even so, the material attempt of the

philosophy - Auroville, maintain these values and help reproducing them by, for

example, putting up prints with the words of Aurobindo and the Mother all over

the township, helping the residents to remind themselves about the intentional

reason for coming together. Below I will discuss some basic properties of the

New Age movement, the connection between New Age and neo-Hinduism, and

link them to the philosophy of Aurobindo and the Mother, and contemporary

Auroville.

7.1.2. The History of the New Age Movement

The New Age movement often characterizes as a synthesis of traditional

religions such as Hinduism, Shamanism, Native American religions, together with

Western modernism (Lewis and Melton 1992:XI). What is of main importance in

this discussion is the relation between Hindu philosophy and the Western world.

This relation has a dual dimension, meant that Hindu philosophy has influenced

the Western world, while the Western world, simultaneously, have made a

60

contribution to the formation of the neo-Hindu movement. Diem and Lewis

describes this cultural exchange, tracing Hindu influences to the West as early as

the Seventeenth-century when the British East Indian Company brought back

Hindu scripts to Europe, and later to the U.S. At this time, these scripts were

delimited to sophisticated groups who liked to discuss foreign religions, often as

contrasts to their own civilization. The British Orientalists of this time claimed

that India have had a golden past, characterized by an ancient understanding of

the Vedantic scripts, meaning that contemporary India has lost that virtue and

now was in need of guidance into a new golden era, hence as a way of

legitimizing the British intrusion on the Indian sub-continent (Diem and Lewis

1992:53).

7.1.3. Hindu Influences in the West

The great impact on Western Cultures came with the influence of Swami

Vivekananda, when he was invited as a speaker at the World’s Parliament of

Religions in Chicago in 1893. He came to establish the Vedanta Society in New

York shortly after his speak at the Parliament in Chicago (Diem and Lewis

1992:48-49). Vivekananda promoted a highly idealized Hinduism to his listeners,

adopted the one described by the British Orientalists, and used it as an

ideological weapon for the Indian reformative movements while referring to a

Hindu Golden Age, and offered a prescription for a renaissance of “true”

Hinduism (Diem and Lewis 1992:53,55). Vivekananda was a fellow member with

Aurobindo in the neo-Hindu movement in India, working for a revival of a true

Vedantic philosophy, and Minor goes through the very similarities between

Vivekananda’s and Aurobindo’s philosophies (Minor 1999:8,10,12).

Vivekananda’s own pupil, Swami Paramahansa Yogananda, founded the Self-

realization movement in California in early Twentieth-century, continuing the

preaching of a romanticized Hinduism in the West (Diem and Lewis 1992:49).

In Europe, eminent persons such as Voltaire and Rousseau used this idealized,

and what seems to be an iconoclastic image of the East, which was provided by

the British Orientalists, when criticising their own civilization (Ibid.:52). Even

61

during later centuries, Arthur Schopenhauer, Max Muller, Romain Rolland, and

Leo Tolstoy became highly inspired by this conceptualization of Hinduism, and

talked about the necessity of the development of the consciousness, reaching the

divine40.

The prevalence of Hindu philosophy in the West seems to have continuity from

many centuries back in time, while in the beginning only to be present in the

minds of the educated. Diem and Lewis claim that this romanticized image of

India gradually filtered out into the Western cultures, and particularly in

American culture through literary impact with the help from authors such as

Whitman, Emerson, and Thoreau (Diem and Lewis 1992:54). This image became

thus available for the beat generation in the U.S., the counterculture movement,

and their successor - the New Age movement. Diem and Lewis means that the

reasons for Western movements to use this iconoclastic image of a Hindu golden

age has a social-psychological dimension, as a protest against one’s own society

and culture (Ibid.:58).

One of the predecessors of the New Age movement is the Theosophical

Movement (Lewis and Melton 1992:XI). It was initially founded by Helena

Petrovna Blavatsky (1831-1891). Blavatsky herself moved to India in 1879 for a

“spiritual quest”. She was, already before the foundation of the movement in New

York in 1875, highly interested in Hindu philosophy, and the movement became

a mix of Western occultism and Hindu mysticism. At the same time, the neo-

Hindu reform movements in India, which Aurobindo was a part of, took

inspiration from the Theosophical movement when re-shaping the Hindu

philosophy41. Even the Mother, also fashioned early on by Hindu philosophy,

have a clear connection to the Theosophical Movement, while studying occultism

with Max Theon in Algeria, whom in turn had worked with Blavatsky. Minor

recounts that the Theosophical movement had a strong impact on the Mother’s

later interpretation of Aurobindo’s philosophy (Minor 1999:38).

40 Website no.34: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ramakrishna%27s_impact (last access 2010-01-13)41 Website no.35: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_Hinduism (last access 2010-01-13)

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Sociologists, anthropologists, and scholars in religious science, traces the modern

roots of the New Age movement to the counterculture movement and the world

revolutions of 1968 (Lewis and Melton 1992:Chapter 1,7, and 8; Brown

2002:Chapter 8). Even until today, according to Brown, a typical American New

Ager is an unconventional spiritual seeker, and former hippie from the baby-

boom generation (Brown 1992:91). The movement started its expansion in Great

Britain, then in the 1970s spread down the continent and over to the U.S., where

it was received by spiritual seekers from the counterculture movement (Poggi

1992:272).

7.1.4. Western Impact on India

Aurobindo’s education in England along with Western values certainly made an

impact on his formulation of a new mazeway, as I gave an account of above in

this thesis. He contemplated the world as insane, trying to find a solution to this

madness. The solution was to be found in the revival of an idealized version of

the Indian past. Great neo-Hindu thinkers such as Tagore, Vivekananda, and

Aurobindo, had some kind of relation to each other (Minor 1999:15, 118). Both

Tagore and Vivekananda had mail correspondence with Aurobindo, discussing

the emergence of a new Hindu spirituality, and an independent India. They were

all influenced by Western thoughts, constructed their own mazeways as a blend

of old Hindu beliefs and modern Western science, nationalism, and history. The

synthesis became neo-Hinduism, which prophesized an enchanting future for

India, and humanity as a whole, if the people were willing to follow this new

paradigm, resulting in the transformation of the world into a golden era – a New

Age42.

It seems that, when neo-Hindu reformists such as Vivekananda and Aurobindo

formulated their philosophies and world agendas with inspiration from the

West, individuals and movements in the West formulated their own ideas in

relation to romanticized Hindu influences. In this way, both neo-Hinduism, which

can be seen as a reaction against the dogmatization of Hinduism and the

42 Website no.35: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_Hinduism (last access 2010-01-13)

63

intrusion of the British Empire, and some new religious movements in the West

such as the New Age movement, are outcomes of a cultural exchange and

iconoclastic use of religions and cultures. They also inhabit preferences for the

creation of revitalization movements, in accordance with Wallace’s notion of

mazeway reformulation, being a creation out of the interaction between two or

more cultures, out of elements that has already attained currency in the own

society. (Wallace 1956:267).

7.1.5. New Age Characteristics

Then, what kind of characteristics does the philosophy of Aurobindo have in

common with the New Age movement?

The New Age movement contains certain key elements that are equal to the

philosophy of Aurobindo, such as the belief in a planetary consciousness (Lewis

and Melton 1992:5), that Mother Earth has her own consciousness and that

humans are able to tap into this consciousness. New Agers also believe that the

divine is in everything alive and that God is within human alone and one has to

live a spiritual life to be able to connect with this divinity and become one with

the divine consciousness (Brown 1992:87). For New Agers, the individual is the

ultimate locus for the determination of Truth (Lewis and Melton 1992:7), which

leads to a focus on experience, instead of doctrine (Diem and Lewis 1992:48). It

puts emphasis on learning and contemplates life as a long learning process,

unending education (Lewis and Melton 1992:8). Another characteristic is its

millenarian aspects, that we are now living in a time of transition, awaiting a new

era which is in the hands of humanity itself and means paradise or destruction

(the age of Aquarius, to use the phrase from the counterculture movement)

(Lewis and Melton 1992:12). For New Agers, typical ceremonies are workshops,

lectures, and classes, instead of worship ceremonies (Lewis and Melton 1992:8).

Above-mentioned key characteristics of the New Age movement are equal to key

features in Aurobindo’s philosophy mentioned above, and the worldview

explained by the Aurovillians. It is easy to see the connection with the New Age

64

movement and neo-Hindu philosophies such as Aurobindo’s, that the outcome of

each belief is a result from the interaction between the West and the East. One

can therefore draw the conclusion that the prevalence of Hindu inspired

thoughts in the West are made available for Western spiritual seekers, especially

in times of social change and cultural distortion. During increased individual

stress, to return to Wallace, Western individuals has then the ability to

reformulate their own mazeway in accordance with Aurobindo’s and the

Mother’s philosophy, shaping a new mental image of culture and society out of

sub-elements already present in society (Wallace 1956:270).

7.2. Discussion on CommunicationReferring to my text on Communication, it is easy to see how Aurobindo Ghose

became the prophet Sri Aurobindo, a person of spiritual eminence. As Wallace

describes this process, the prophet and his disciples will communicate the “good

word” to the world, so as to gather new members to the movement (Ibid.:273).

The philosophy of Aurobindo gave promises of a better future for India, and

humanity as a whole, and his ashram were able to provide the members with

their material needs. Aurobindo also promised that supernatural forces, the

divine consciousness, was accessible to Man if he practiced Integral Yoga with

enough aspiration (Ibid.:273). According to Wallace’s understanding of

communication and the revitalization movement, I believe that Aurobindo and

his ashram inhabits all those properties that a revitalization movement must

have to be adequately. What is of main importance in this thesis is to make sure

on how Aurobindo, and the Mother, also could become prophets for non-Indian

receivers, particularly Westerners. I will discuss this below in relation to those

Hindu influences that have become established in the Western world, and the

state of the capitalist World-System. In my discussion on Organization I will

return to this subject and also assist my argumentation by relating it to Schema-

Theory.

7.2.1. Aurobindo, the Mother, and Western Receivers

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One can see the difference between the response of the communication of

Aurobindo, and that of the Mother. When Aurobindo was preaching his

philosophy, and thus became a prophet, he was only able to gather a very limited

amount of followers, mostly educated men from Northern India (Minor

1999:37), around him in Pondicherry. Probably much gratitude has to be applied

to his fame as a freedom fighter. But still, Western spiritual seekers such as the

Mother found their way to him, helped him communicating the words of his new

religion (Ibid.:34). Not until the 1960s, when the words of Aurobindo had spread

to larger masses in the West, more people came to join the movement in

Pondicherry. But why were those individuals more receptive then, than before?

One answer may lie in the social and cultural situation the world experienced at

this time. Some claim that the world revolutions of 1968 signalled a new attitude

against the capitalist World-System (Wallerstein 2007:124-125; Brown

2002:163). The left movements began to establish certain key elements in

mainstream society, especially those related to race and gender, and started to

promote alternative ideas, outside the system (Wallerstein 2007:135). More

individuals became sceptical to the social and cultural order of that time, and

then naturally started to search for alternatives. When confronting Aurobindo’s

philosophy, certain key elements in that philosophy were already present in

society through the influence of Hindu beliefs, and Western receivers could

relate to terms such as transformation of mind and earth, a planetary

consciousness, and so on. Terms not that alien anymore to mainstream society,

thanks to the influence of Hinduism in the West. Statistic results, though pretty

old, that indicate this prevalence are some Gallup Poll statistics that have been

conducted in the U.S., and in Great Britain in early 1990s. They showed that 20

percent of American citizens believe in reincarnation, while the prevalence in

Great Britain is 30-35 percent. In San Francisco Bay, 25 percent believed in

certain key New Age ideas such as a planetary consciousness (Lewis and Melton

1992:4-5). But one only has to look around in society to see the prevalence of

New Age attributes with Hindu influences. A very fresh example in Sweden is the

Christmas gift of the year, the Indian spike-mat. In Swedish newspapers one can

read about their astrological signs, visit a bookstore and buy books from the

spirit-body-mind section, watch My Name Is Earl on TV and think about Karma,

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watch popular documentaries such as The Secret or Zeitgeist Addendum, visit a

so-called spiritual trade fair, receive Ayurvedic therapy, or go and participate in a

yoga class. The prevalence of New Age attributes in contemporary society seems

to be huge, many times offering an alternative paradigm for the world, such as

the one that Aurobindo, the Mother, and the Aurovillians are preaching.

Instead of joining a movement within the border of one’s own nation-state, one

was now able to join a movement in India, probably feeling a sense of higher

authenticity than joining a common movement in the West, and definitely as a

response to the large numbers of Western travellers in India at that time in late

1960s and early 1970s. Those individuals that were not able to cope with the

stress they experienced, found a way to revitalize their own society and culture,

and the world as a whole, by joining Auroville. And Auroville is today still

experiencing an increase of recruits43, individuals are coming with the aim of

becoming newcomers, but are denied membership due to lack of housing44. This

increase in newcomers indicates that Auroville still provides itself as an

alternative movement for individuals with revitalizing purposes, making an

impact on their former culture and society without having to join a movement

within its own society’s borders. Instead they work and live in Auroville, giving

the world an example of living, and acts internationally through a diverse

amount of channels, for example, UNESCO, EU-financed Asia-Urbs projects,

Global Ecovillage Network (GEN), or through Auroville’s many liaisons and

centres worldwide.

7.3. Discussion on OrganizationThis is a critical phase for the revitalization movement, considering the necessity

of making a kind of organization that will continue to campaign for the

movement and attract new members, converts. Most likely, according to Wallace,

the movement, under the leadership of the prophet, a hierarchical organizational

43 Website no.36: http://74.125.77.132/search?q=cache:84_4tf463ZsJ:www.auroville-international.org/docs/AVI_meeting_Venwoude_2009.pdf+newcomer+increas+auroville&cd=6&hl=sv&ct=clnk&client=safari (last access 2010-01-13)44 Website no.37: http://www.auroville.org/journals&media/avtoday/jan_03/sadaca.htm (last access 2010-01-13)

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structure will take place with the prophet on the top, followed by close disciples

and followers below (Wallace 1956:273-274).

According to my texts on Mazeway Reformulation and Organization, it is obvious

that the structural organization of first the Ashram and later Auroville did not

take place until the leadership came under the authority of the Mother. Until

then, as it is described, the movement, and particularly the authority of

Aurobindo, had the character of what Weber calls “in natu nascendi”, which

means charismatic authority in pure form. But for the movement to last in the

long run, this authority has to transform itself into an organizational structure,

so that its members can organize their own lives in a suitable way (Weber

1983:169).

Around 1926, when the Ashram was established, the Mother started to more

actively create an organization around the movement, and successively created

sub-organizations such as the Sri Aurobindo International Centre of Education,

and the Sri Aurobindo Society. One can say that the success of the Mother

depended on the successful handover of charismatic properties from Aurobindo

to the Mother, a process that Weber discuss in great details under the term

routinization of charisma (Ibid.:169-175), and which is critical in relation to the

success or failure continuum for the movement. In 1968, after the inauguration

of Auroville, the Mother along with some Aurovillians started to create a kind of

organization for Auroville, even if her intention was to let the divine Supermind

guide this development.

With time, the Aurovillians has created a highly complex organization for the

township, which I have described above. They have formed hundreds of separate

institutions within the township, and they are also active on the international

arena through different affiliations and liaisons, promoting their ideas of a

sustainable way of life and trying to revitalize the cultures of the West in

particular, and the rest of the world in general.

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The organization of Auroville took place when the Mother was able to gather

enough converts to the movement, and so on identified a site for its construction.

Therefore, I want to elaborate on how the Mother was able to make converts,

and why these, particularly the Westerners, were susceptible for her vision and

the philosophy. My understanding on this is both related to the capitalist World-

System, and to my understanding on the construction of culture. Wallace

describes the psychological process that takes place when converts are made, on

how some undergoes hysterical seizures or receive ecstatic visions, and he

relates this process to discussions made by Weber (Wallace 1956:274). Instead, I

want to discuss why these Western individuals were able to undergo this

process, why they turned to Auroville and India instead of joining a look-alike

movement or intentional community in their own country?

7.3.1. Auroville and the World-System

According to Wallerstein, the World-System is right now in a period of transition,

on its way to systemic bifurcation, which means that the solution of this systemic

crisis can only be solved outside the system. During these periods, the system is

characterized by instability and anxiety of its people. This contemporary crisis

began around 1968, along with the world revolutions, according to Wallerstein

(Wallerstein 2007:124-125). 1968 also marks the beginning for the anti-

systemic movements to grow in strength and popularity, and become political

key-actors (Wallerstein 2007:104-105). As a response to this crisis, and the

increasing decline of Western hegemony, an emergence of new identities arise

and opens up social space for new movements to flourish, often anti-systemic in

character (Hall and Fenelon 2005:209). Hall and Fenelon means that there is a

difference between what they call “pure” anti-systemic movements such as

nativistic movements who want to escape from the World-System and Western

impact, living their own traditional lives, while left movements have a second

agenda for their anti-systemic approach, trying to find a better position within

the system (Ibid.:208). Even though Auroville partly seems to play by the rules of

the system, they also promote a clear anti-systemic approach, not to find a better

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position within the system as a reformist movement, but to replace the system

itself with a more satisfying socio-cultural system.

7.3.2. Hegemonic Decline

Relying on arguments which incline that the capitalist World-System, along with

modernism, make such an impact on cultures so that they change in character,

make it much easier to see how Auroville can have the function as a

revitalization movement, in this case considering the residents coming from

core-states. Friedman describes the process of modernization and

commercialization, and how it makes an impact on individual’s identity

construction. He means that cultural identity has no role in modern society, and

instead weaker forms of identity constructions takes form, such as lifestyle

properties or modernist identity itself (Friedman 1994:39). Along with

hegemonic decline, these weak identities will be replaced by new ones, maybe

identity constructions through ethnic fragmentation, or through models from the

periphery (Ibid.:80). Modernity also increase the individual’s independence and

mobility, making it easier to reproduce economically, and a dissolution of kinship

comes as a result of this process (Ibid.:25-26). In this way, modernity fights

forms such as family, community, and religion (Ibid.:94). So what happens then

when the hegemony is questioned, and the sense of progress is lacking in

inspiration for the citizens to continue the same way as before? New

constructions of identities and a rise of cultural movements will assist this

development, according to Friedman (Ibid.:78). When the system was stabile,

and the hegemony of the West was secured, especially during the peak in the

1950s, the construction of identities followed the cultural diffusion in relation to

the hierarchical structure of the World-System, which means that modernist

identities became attractive for people in the periphery, identifying themselves

with the successful hegemon (Ibid.:32). During hegemonic decline, the opposite

reaction seems to take place, and people in the periphery start to re-construct

their own former suppressed identities, while people in the core-states are

constructing new identities, sometimes with inspiration from exotic peripheral

states or by searching for their own traditional identities that have been lost due

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to modernization. For the core-states, this implies a longing back to what have

been lost, the opposites of modernism – culture and nature, and a growing need

of religion, and with that an emergence of new religious movements

(Ibid.:39,79).

7.3.3. The Rise of Cultural Movements

The loss of a cultural strong identity has cleared the way for new identity

constructions and the rise of new cultural movements. I presume that many

individuals in the core-states of a declining hegemon will search for identities

outside their own cultural frame and find models in cultures that represent the

opposition of their object of criticism. 1968 marked a new beginning for the

World-System, and an increase in new religious movements. Many of these

movements were shaped out of inspiration from eastern religions (Brown

2002:164-165). Since then, many movements have failed in their attempts, while

some has survived and many more new movements have emerged. Some of the

movements represents by the back-to-the-land movement, trying to distance

themselves from civilization and living a life in harmony with nature, while

others such as Auroville, Findhorn, or Damanhur, are trying to create new forms

of social, economic, and political organizations, finding sustainable methods for

living, and an emphasis on spirituality, which acts as a protest against

materialistic rational modernism. Individuals who have constructed new

identities out of inspiration from the East, and particularly Hindu philosophy

inhabit these latter movements. They are also many times classified as New Age

communities, due to their many spiritual attributes that one can find under this

classification (Lewis and Melton 1992:19). I believe that they are formed as a

direct result of modernism itself, and hegemonic decline, which makes them rise

in numbers and strength. The current rise of cultural movements such as

intentional communities began simultaneously with the world revolutions of

1968 (Brown 2002:7-8; Friedman 1994:78). In Auroville’s case, Western

spiritual seekers seem to have found a platform out from where to direct critique

against the capitalist World-System, but not civilization as a whole. They have

also found a site where they can live their lives in community, characterized by

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gemeinshaft45 and spirituality, trying to elaborate with different forms of

organizations in an attempt to create a more satisfying one. But they are there

for revitalizing reasons, promoting a new socio-cultural system, not to escape

from the world.

7.3.4. Auroville and the Prevalence of Hindu Attributes in the West

Hegemonic decline and the decline of modernist identity lead to a rise of

revitalization movements, as mentioned above. But how does individuals getting

aware about experiments like Auroville, and what makes them choose this

movement, in front of others? I find one explanation in the constitution of culture

itself, how it manifests in the individual.

According to cognitive anthropology and Schema-Theory, culture is shaped

through the individual’s experiences, forming a cognitive schema in the

individual’s mind, where each experience is placed in order of precedence in a

hierarchical structure, which I explained in more details in the chapter of Theory

in this thesis. In relation to my discussion on how Hindu beliefs has influenced

Western cultures through centuries, not reaching mainstream society until the

beginning of the contemporary systemic crisis, this process of diffusion is of

absolute relevance for the understanding of why individuals turn to movements

like Auroville.

When the system is stabile and the hegemon, the core-states, seize world

domination, setting the standards for the world through the capitalist market, a

modernist identity is prevailed, according to Friedman (Friedman 1994:89-90.

Even if Hindu beliefs has made an impact on Western societies, they have been

delimited to small educated groups within society, diffused with time through for

example great authors and poets. In other words, even if individuals have

experienced these influences, they have been placed far down in the hierarchical

order of the cognitive schema in most individuals, representing mainstream

society. When criticism of modern identity is getting more widespread, as during

45 See, Ferdinand Tönnies for more info on the relation between Gemeinshaft and Gesellshaft

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hegemonic decline, and more individuals are getting attracted by exoticism, then

Hindu attributes are being placed higher up in the hierarchy of the individual’s

cognitive schema. More individuals will with time be able to relate to the same

things, when talking about these attributes, and so on takes a stand for, or

against. Along comes the distribution of goods through the capitalist market,

making things and services available to the public, things such as spike-maths,

incenses, books on spirituality and Hindu philosophy, courses in self-realization,

yoga classes, etc, together with influence from celebrities such as Richard Gere’s

Buddhism and Madonna’s Kabala. The spectrum seems to be unlimited today.

This distribution of goods indicates the demand for these products and services,

as it also produce new demands by their very existence on the market.

According to Friedman’s understanding of “weak” modern identity through

lifestyle (Friedman:30), many individuals who are contemplating the system as

wrong will demonstrate this attitude by their way of presenting themselves,

through choice of clothes, and attributes as spiritual jewellery, or through the

books they put in their bookshelves at home. In the lengthening, these

individuals who were susceptible for these influences are probably those

individuals who also reacts the strongest to cultural distortion during hegemonic

decline. When subjects such as Auroville comes up for discussion, or a

documentary on the township is presented on TV, more individuals will today be

able to relate to the experiment, as opposed to before when the prevalence of

New Age attributes or Hindu beliefs was not that wide spread in society. I also

suggest the possibility that more individuals will be able to relate to experiments

like Auroville in connection with an increase of cultural distortion, placing these

at present seemingly relative unimportant properties higher up in the

individual’s hierarchical structure of his cognitive schema.

7.4. Discussion on AdaptationAs Wallace noticed, for revitalization movements to succeed with their aims, they

have to adapt to internal and external conditions, not to rely on any static and

non-flexible doctrine, and they have to continuously modify its doctrine (Wallace

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1956:274-275). This notion has even been realized in Auroville, resulting in an

ongoing elaboration with both organizational and ideological matters.

The most serious conflict, and definitely the most long-lasting one, was that

between the Society and the Aurovillian community. This conflict was a result of

the lack of any clear leadership in the township after the pass away of the

Mother.

7.4.1. Government Support

Because of the movement’s revolutionary character, it will encounter resistance

from external forces such as the larger society, according to Wallace (Wallace

Ibid.:274-275). The case with Auroville is different in this matter, but could have

had another outcome. Minor describes how the support for Auroville has

changed with different government settings in India. The strongest supporter

has been the Congress Party, while some political opposition and some Indian

State Governments has opposed the idea of Auroville. (Minor 1999:15, 73). But

Auroville has been able to gather support pretty regularly from the Indian

Government. How this support came true has been explained above, but there

lies an important component in this support, which is of value to take up for

discussion in relation to Auroville as a revitalization movement. One can say that

Auroville would have huge problems to survive financially without Government

grants, and therefore the very existence of Auroville is in the hands of the

Government. As long as the township does not involve a big threat to the Indian

state, they will most likely continue receiving financial support, especially if

Auroville will continue to present itself internationally as an important

experiment in human unity and sustainable living. I draw this conclusion in

relation to current trends where national governments grant financial support to

experiment sites such as eco-villages and similar intentional communities46. This

trend may digress from its current position, which will result in harsher

46 Website no.38: http://www.greenbuildingpress.co.uk/article.php?category_id=1&article_id=444 (last access 2010-01-13)

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conditions for revitalization movements such as some intentional communities,

in case they encounter resistance from the larger society.

In Auroville’s case, concerning its Western residents, the township provides a

social space from where to direct critique to their societies of origin, and is being

uphold financially with the help of a “foreign” state, in this case the Indian state.

7.4.2. Modification of Doctrine

The modification of the doctrine started already with the Mother, even if she

never modified the philosophy itself. The change has been one of strategy,

concerning the outcome of the township in organizational and social matters.

The most obvious modification has been its way of presenting itself to the world.

From its main focus on spiritual development, to an emphasis on its secular

aspects such as sustainable development and environmental projects, Auroville

has changed profile from a spiritual hippie community to a serious experiment

for a sustainable world. Wallace means that this process is necessary for the

movement so as to modify its doctrine to fit “to the population’s cultural and

personality patterns, and may take account of the changes occurring in the

general milieu” (Wallace 1956:275). Auroville’s response in this matter goes in

line with the current trend of an increase of eco-villages on the global arena,

particularly in the West47. To profile itself as an eco-village, one can assume that

Auroville is able to receive more financial, and moral, support, than if it would

have put an emphasis on its spiritual aspects. On a systemic level, Auroville is

adapting itself to current changes in the general milieu, changing its ideological

focus for the external world by presenting itself as a legitimate social

experiment, legitimate in regard of current trends of experiments in sustainable

methods for development. In this change lie also the danger of

institutionalization, and the danger of being absorbed by the larger society in a

way as it “forgets” it original doctrine and its critique against the larger society

and culture, which in Auroville’s case is its resistance against modernity and

47 Website no.39: http://gen.ecovillage.org/ (last access 2010-01-13)

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capitalism itself. Another way of looking at it, is the role movements such as

Auroville has on the change of perception – the current trend of eco-villages and

alternative methods for a sustainable world. But this is another discussion.

7.5. Discussion on Cultural TransformationWhen Brown examined Ananda Village in the U.S. as a revitalization movement,

using the revitalization model, she put emphasis on the cultural transformation

of the members of the movement, not the general cultural transformation of the

population in the larger society (Brown 202:171). When reading Wallace’s

article on revitalization (Wallace 1956), and particularly the part of cultural

transformation, it becomes clear that cultural transformation is a result of the

interaction between the movement and the larger society, along with the internal

success of the movement itself, in relation to the program of group action. But

the cultural transformation of the external society, which in Auroville’s case

would be India and countries related to other nationalities, as a result of

Auroville’s impact belongs to another thesis. I have chosen to put emphasis on

the cultural transformation of the members of the movement with inspiration

from Brown’s study (Brown 2002:Chapter 8).

As mentioned above in the chapter of Cultural Transformation, a kind of social

revitalization has occurred in the movement itself. The sense of stress-relief

seems to be present, along with a construction of norms to regulate the “new”

behaviour of the residents through socialization. But the fact that some members

are using Auroville as a transition site points to its systemic properties, that the

township operates in an informal network of different movements who all

together directs culture critique to their societies, and many times to all societies

and agents who uphold the capitalist World-System. The informants I talked to

are convinced about the truth of Aurobindo’s and the Mother’s philosophy, and

the need to spread the ideas to the world and as a result also change the very

construction of their own culture and society. In this way of looking, all cultures

are interconnected through the World-System and one cannot successfully

change one culture without changing the system itself. Therefore, by directing

critique on an international level means to direct critique to their particular

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culture, in relation to the impact that capitalism and modernity has on their

societies. As informants told me and mentioned above, some stay consciously in

Auroville for a limited period of time, taking parts of the activity and the projects

in the township, learning and increasing their knowledge about the philosophy

and practical issues for a sustainable world. In this way a cultural transformation

occur in these individuals through their experiences in Auroville, and also

providing them with recourses in knowledge to use in other ways, maybe by

joining another movement elsewhere.

7.6. Discussion on RoutinizationOne can immediately take the conclusion that Auroville has not reached to the

level of being a church within the larger society, in this case India, in relation to

the degree of routinization they have achieved. On a systemic level, the same

conclusion can be drawn. What I would like to stress in this matter, the degree of

impact that Auroville has on the external world, should be seen in relation to the

degree of attraction that the township has, to be able to recruit members.

7.6.1. Cultural Deprivation versus Material Deprivation

Wallace’s concept of revitalization is mainly a product of the study of traditional

cultures, Native American groups and Oceanic cultures, cultures that many times

have been oppressed by colonizers, and still until today are getting subjected by

the capitalist World-System (Wallace 1956:264). These peripheral cultures have

been deprived of both material and cultural matters, while cultures belonging to

the core-states within the World-System are mainly opposed to cultural

deprivation, even if material deprivation happens in limited degree during

economic depression. I would therefore like to make a distinction between

“classic” revitalization movements and revitalization movements in their infancy,

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and between “classic” revitalization movements and “complex” revitalization

movements that compounds of many nationalities and cultures. Classic

revitalization movements are results of both material and cultural deprivation,

and constitutes of one single culture group, most likely to occur in the periphery,

while infancy revitalization movements occur in the “belly of the beast” (Wallace

2004:IX), or as in Auroville’s case outside the core-states, but still composes

partly of people belonging to the core-states. Complex revitalization movements

can in turn occur in any country and are defined by their multinational

composition.

7.6.2. Cultural Deprivation in the Core-States

As I have discussed above, all cultures that are being subjected by the capitalist

World-System will be affected, for the core-states presumably cultural

deprivation, considering the effects that capitalism and modernity has on our

cultures and identity constructions: loss of traditions, dissolution of kinship, lack

of respect for the environment etc. During hegemonic decline these properties

are being questioned by individuals in the core-states and those who are not able

to handle the stress looks for alternatives to replace the unsatisfying culture with

(Friedman 1994:95). Other more “rigid” persons will find techniques to handle

this stress, according to Wallace (Wallace 1956:269). Therefore, the amounts of

individuals who are potential receivers of a new mazeway are related to the

degree of cultural deprivation, and they will grow in numbers during hegemonic

decline when the system is getting questioned more widely. For revitalization

movements to grow in large numbers and create mass movements such as the

Nazi mass-movement in Germany, I believe that they have to experience a

massive material deprivation together with cultural deprivation48, just as the

extreme economic depression that Germany was exposed to in the 1920s and

1930s, when “real development is jeopardized by systemic crisis”, as Friedman

defines it (Friedman 1994:26). Therefore, the Nazi movement represent rather a

complex revitalization movement due to its multinational character, while small

48 The critical situation for Germany during this time has been explained as a result of Germany’s sonderweg in the period before World War I, which you can read about in more details in A.J.P. Taylors book ”The Origins of the Second World War” from 1961.

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movements such as Auroville represent complex infancy revitalization

movements in their beginning of expansion.

Now, return to the Summary and Final Conclusion, to get the whole picture.

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