->Olden Creed at 16:43, 9 August 2021

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{{Use dmy dates|date=November 2020}}
{{Use British English|date=May 2016}}
{{Infobox academic
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| birth_name = Geoffrey Nielsen Ostergaard
| birth_date = {{birth date|df=yes|1926|07|25}}
| birth_place = Near [[Huntingdon]], England
| death_date = {{death date and age|df=yes|1990|03|22|1926|07|25}}
| death_place = [[Birmingham]], England
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| nationality = British
| citizenship =
| other_names = Gaston Gerard (pseudonym)
| occupation =
| period =
| known_for = Work on the connections between [[Gandhism]] and anarchism, on the [[British co-operative movement]], and on [[syndicalism]] and [[workers' control]]
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| spouse = Eva Dryden
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| children = Magnus
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| education = [[Huntingdon Grammar School]]; [[Peterhouse, Cambridge]]; [[Nuffield College, Oxford]]
| alma_mater = [[Nuffield College, Oxford]]
| thesis_title = Public Ownership in Great Britain: A Study in the Development of Socialist Ideas
| thesis_url =
| thesis_year = 1953
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| doctoral_advisor = [[G. D. H. Cole]]
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| discipline = Political science
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| workplaces = [[University of Birmingham]]
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| notable_works = ''Latter-day Anarchism: The Politics of the American Beat Generation'' (1964), ''The Gentle Anarchists: A Study of the Sarvodaya Movement for Non-Violent Revolution in India'' (1971), ''Nonviolent Revolution in India'' (1985)
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'''Geoffrey Nielsen Ostergaard''' (25 July 1926 – 22 March 1990)<ref name=bamford7>{{cite book|contributor-first=Brian|contributor-last=Bamford|contribution=Geoffrey Ostergaard: The Official Life|title=The Tradition of Workers' Control: Selected Writings|first=Geoffrey|last=Ostergaard|editor-first=Brian|editor-last=Bamford|publisher=[[Freedom Press]]|year=1997|page=7}}</ref> was a British [[political scientist]] best known for his work on the connections between [[Gandhism]] and [[anarchism]], on the [[British co-operative movement]], and on [[syndicalism]] and [[workers' control]].<ref name=goodway/><ref name=ward>{{cite news|first=Colin|last=Ward|author-link=Colin Ward|title=Obituary: Geoffrey Ostergaard – Anarchism Via Gandhi|work=[[The Guardian]]|date=28 March 1990|page=47}}</ref> His books included ''The Gentle Anarchists: A Study of the Sarvodaya Movement for Non-Violent Revolution in India'' (1971), coauthored with Melville Currell, and ''Nonviolent Revolution in India'' (1985), both dealing with the [[Sarvodaya]] movement. He spent the majority of his academic career at the [[University of Birmingham]].

==Early life==
Geoffrey Nielsen Ostergaard was born on 25 July 1926 near [[Huntingdon]], the son of a Danish immigrant. He attended [[Huntingdon Grammar School]] and [[Peterhouse, Cambridge]], where he studied [[philosophy, politics and economics]], graduating in 1950.<ref name=bamford7/> Ostergaard became an anarchist while serving in the [[Royal Air Force]] during the [[Second World War]] after reading [[Herbert Read]]'s ''[[Poetry and Anarchism]]''.<ref name=goodway>{{cite book|last=Goodway|first=David|author-link=David Goodway|title=[[Anarchist Seeds Beneath the Snow: Left-Libertarian Thought and British Writers from William Morris to Colin Ward]]|publisher=[[Liverpool University Press]]|year=2006|page=210}}</ref>

==Work and career==
===Overview===
Ostergaard taught and conducted research at the [[University of Birmingham]] from 1953 until his death.<ref name=ward/> He was also a [[Rockefeller Foundation]] fellow at the [[University of California, Berkeley]], and a visiting professor at [[Osmania University]], [[Hyderabad]].<ref name=bamford7/> [[Colin Ward]] wrote that "in his quiet, ironical way [Ostergaard] always relished the absurdities of the job he held" at Birmingham.<ref name=ward/> Ward described Ostergaard as "a rock-like defender of [[academic freedom]]", and noted his "moral staunchness" in his support for the [[student revolts]] of the 1960s and for [[David Selbourne]] in his conflict with [[Ruskin College]].<ref name=ward/>

Ostergaard regularly contributed to anarchist and pacifist periodicals, sometimes publishing under the name Gaston Gerard (an anagram of G. N. Ostergaard), and was a trustee of ''[[Peace News]]'' and the Friends of [[Freedom Press]].{{sfn|Bamford|1997|p=8}} He was one of a number of writers who contributed to the development of [[anarcho-pacifist]] thought and action during and shortly after the [[Second World War]]; others included Read, [[Alex Comfort]], [[Nicolas Walter]], [[David Thoreau Wieck]], [[Dorothy Day]], and [[Paul Goodman]].<ref>{{cite journal|last=Pauli|first=Benjamin J.|title=Pacifism, Nonviolence, and the Reinvention of Anarchist Tactics in the Twentieth Century|journal=Journal for the Study of Radicalism|volume=9|issue=1|year=2015|page=66|doi=10.14321/jstudradi.9.1.0061|s2cid=161935227}}</ref> Drawing on [[Gandhism]], he argued that [[nonviolence]] offered a way to reconcile political principles with tactics and to envision of a society without organized coercion.{{sfn|Pauli|2015|p=65}}

===Early career===
Ostergaard pursued doctoral studies under [[G. D. H. Cole]] at the [[Nuffield College, Oxford]], completing a thesis entitled ''Public Ownership in Great Britain: A Study in the Development of Socialist Ideas'' in 1953.<ref name=bamford7/>

In the 1950s Ostergaard published a series of articles on the [[co-operative movement]].<ref name=ward/> In ''Latter-day Anarchism: The Politics of the American Beat Generation'' (1964) he identified [[Beat Generation|beats]], [[beatnik]]s and [[hipster (1940s subculture)|hipster]]s as "latter-day [[anarchists]]" sharing an [[eschatological]] or apocalyptic, rather than utopian, outlook, and the practice of [[Zen]], which he described as "an intensely personal, subjective religion".<ref>{{cite book|last=Van Dyke|first=Michael T.|chapter=Kenneth Rexroth’s Integrative Vision: Anarchism, Poetry and the Religious Experience in Post-World War II San Francisco|title=Religious Anarchism: New Perspectives|editor-first=Alexandre J. M. E.|editor-last=Christoyannopoulos|publisher=Cambridge Scholars Press|year=2009|page=239}}</ref>

===Work on the Sarvodaya movement===
Ostergaard was a lifelong [[Gandhian]].<ref name=goodway/> His work on Gandhism sought to reframe the thought of [[Mohandas Gandhi]], [[Vinoba Bhave]] and [[Jayaprakash Narayan]] in terms of anarchism.<ref name=ward/>

''The Gentle Anarchists: A Study of the Sarvodaya Movement for Non-Violent Revolution in India'' (1971), coauthored with Melville Currell, is a comprehensive study of the [[Sarvodaya]] movement. Ostergaard and Currell identify Sarvodaya as an Indian form of anarchism or [[communitarian]] socialism and identify points of continuity between Sarvodaya and the anarchist tradition, including rejection of [[private property]] and [[representative government]], belief in [[decentralization]] and a synthesis of freedom and equality, emphasis on local communities, and support for [[direct action]].<ref>{{cite book|last=Clark|first=John P.|title=The Impossible Community: Realizing Communitarian Anarchism|publisher=Bloomsbury|year=2013|page=221}}</ref> The bulk of the book is based on the findings from a survey of the movement's leaders, inquiring into their backgrounds, motivations, political beliefs and attitudes.<ref name=conlon>{{cite journal|first=Frank F.|last=Conlon|title=Review of ''The Gentle Anarchists: A Study of the Sarvodaya Movement for Non-Violent Revolution in India'' by Geoffrey Ostergaard and Melville Currell|journal=[[Journal of Asian and African Studies]]|volume=10|issue=1–2|year=1975|doi=10.1163/156852175X00145|page=95}}</ref> Reviewing the book in the ''[[India Quarterly]]'', [[Usha Mehta]] wrote that it evinced "the authors' deep understanding of Indian society and people and of their sympathy for the Sarvodaya movement."<ref>{{cite journal|first=Usha|last=Mehta|author-link=Usha Mehta|title=Review of ''The Gentle Anarchists: A Study of the Sarvodaya Movement for Non-Violent Revolution in India'' by Geoffrey Ostergaard and Melville Currell|journal=[[India Quarterly]]|volume=28|issue=3|year=1972|page=280|doi=10.1177/097492847202800327|s2cid=151044376|doi-access=free}}</ref> In his review for ''[[The Journal of Asian Studies]]'', [[Anthony Parel]] described ''The Gentle Anarchists'' as "a most welcome addition to the literature of modern Indian politics in general and to Gandhian politics in particular".<ref>{{cite journal|first=Anthony|last=Parel|author-link=Anthony Parel|title=Review of ''The Gentle Anarchists: A Study of the Sarvodaya Movement for Non-Violent Revolution in India'' by Geoffrey Ostergaard and Melville Currell|journal=[[The Journal of Asian Studies]]|volume=32|issue=3|year=1973|page=527|doi=10.2307/2052707|jstor=2052707}}</ref> In a review in the ''[[Journal of Asian and African Studies]]'', Frank F. Conlon questioned Ostergaard and Currell's methodology but identified the book as "an important first step" that would "reveal much about the condition of ''sarvodaya'' in contemporary India and ... stimulate further historical and sociological lines of enquiry."<ref name=conlon/> Marvin Dicker, reviewing in ''[[Social Forces]]'', similarly questioned Ostergaard and Currell's methodology and noted their sympathy for the movement as a further weakness, but described the book as "a valuable contribution to the literature on social movements."<ref>{{cite journal|first=Marvin|last=Dicker|title=Review of ''The Gentle Anarchists: A Study of the Sarvodaya Movement for Non-Violent Revolution in India'' by Geoffrey Ostergaard and Melville Currell|journal=[[Social Forces]]|volume=50|issue=4|year=1972|pages=549–550|doi=10.1093/sf/50.4.549}}</ref>

''The Gentle Anarchists'' was followed by ''Nonviolent Revolution in India'' (1985).<ref name=ward/> Ostergaard's account of the Sarvodaya movement here focuses on the period from 1969 to 1977 and on the figures of Bhave and Narayan and their differences, including their respective approaches to [[The Emergency (India)|the Emergency]] of 1975–77 and the premiership of [[Indira Gandhi]].<ref>{{cite journal|first=A. R. H.|last=Copley|author-link=Antony Copley|title=Review of ''Nonviolent Revolution in India'' by Geoffrey Ostergaard|journal=[[The Round Table (journal)|The Round Table]]|volume=76|issue=304|year=1987|doi=10.1080/00358538708453846|pages=531–2}}</ref> Ostergaard argues for the superiority of Narayan's approach over Bhave's, though with significant caveats.{{sfn|Copley|1987|p=532}} Ostergaard also identifies the Sarvodaya movement as the only significant social movement motivated by the belief in [[nonviolent revolution]].<ref>{{cite journal|first=Robert|last=Graham|author-link=Robert Graham (historian)|title=Review of ''Nonviolent Revolution in India'' by Geoffrey Ostergaard|journal=[[Our Generation (journal)|Our Generation]]|volume=19|issue=2|year=1988|url=https://s3.amazonaws.com/xlsuite_production/assets/9349021/VOL_19_02.pdf|page=117B}}</ref> Looking to the movement's future, he argues the movement ought to adopt a more overtly anarchistic position including [[election boycott]]s and the construction of alternative political institutions from below.{{sfn|Graham|1988|p=121B}} Reviewing the book in ''[[The Round Table (journal)|The Round Table]]'', [[Antony Copley]] described the book as "scrupulously fair" and likely to "establish itself as amongst the most important books to appear on the extraordinary drama of Mrs Gandhi's India."{{sfn|Copley|1987|p=531}} In his review for ''[[Our Generation (journal)|Our Generation]]'', [[Robert Graham (historian)|Robert Graham]] wrote that "Ostergaard has provided a great service to all those interested in nonvolent social revolution by writing such a thorough and thoughtful analysis", but argued the book fails to provide sufficient background on Indian politics and political groupings.{{sfn|Graham|1988|pp=122B–123B}}

==Personal life==
Ostergaard married Eva Dryden in 1948.<ref name=bamford7/> He and Eva spent several years living in India while he researched and wrote about Gandhism.<ref name=ward/> They had a son, Magnus.<ref name=bamford7/>

==Death and legacy==
Ostergaard died of [[leukaemia]] in Birmingham on 22 March 1990.<ref name=ward/>{{sfn|Bamford|1997|p=8}} His papers are held at the [[University of Bradford]] Library.<ref>{{cite web|url=https://www.bradford.ac.uk/library/special-collections/collections/papers-of-geoffrey-ostergaard/|title=Papers of Geoffrey Ostergaard|publisher=[[University of Bradford]]|access-date=31 July 2020}}</ref>

==See also==
* [[List of peace activists]]

==List of works==
* ''Latter-day Anarchism: The Politics of the American Beat Generation'' (1964)
* ''Power in Co-operatives: A Study of the Internal Politics of British Retail Societies'' (1965), coauthored with [[A. H. Halsey]]
* ''The Gentle Anarchists: A Study of the Sarvodaya Movement for Non-Violent Revolution in India'' (1971), coauthored with Melville Currell
* ''Nonviolent Revolution in India'' (1985)
* ''Resisting the Nation State: The Pacifist and Anarchist Tradition'' (1985)
* ''The Tradition of Workers' Control: Selected Writings by Geoffrey Ostergaard'' (1997)

==References==
{{reflist}}

==External links==
* [https://libcom.org/tags/geoffrey-ostergaard Works by Geoffrey Ostergaard] hosted by Libcom.org
* [http://www.satyagrahafoundation.org/author/geoffreyostergaard/ Works by Geoffrey Ostergaard] hosted by the Satyagraha Foundation for Nonviolence Studies

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{{DEFAULTSORT:Ostergaard, Geoffrey}}
[[Category:1926 births]]
[[Category:1990 deaths]]
[[Category:British political scientists]]
[[Category:British anarchists]]
[[Category:Anarcho-pacifists]]
[[Category:British political writers]]
[[Category:Academics of the University of Birmingham]]
[[Category:Anarchist writers]]
[[Category:Alumni of Peterhouse, Cambridge]]
[[Category:Alumni of Nuffield College, Oxford]]
[[Category:Royal Air Force personnel of World War II]]
[[Category:University of California, Berkeley faculty]]
[[Category:Osmania University faculty]]
[[Category:Nonviolence advocates]]
[[Category:Gandhians]]
[[Category:Non-Indian Gandhians]]

Geoffrey Ostergaard - Revision history

->Olden Creed at 16:43, 9 August 2021