As of October 26th2019, Front Independent Driver Online, a loose association of Grab drivers, have been practicing hunger strike since October 22nd2019. They are protesting, inter alia, against the discriminative & nontransparent scheme and demanding the Grabcar feature in the airport area. Some people responded on Twitter, wondering why would these drivers starve themselves? Some argued that this hunger strike means nothing but hurting the protesters themselves and does not do anything to the intended target. So, what do the protesters really think when they perform hunger strike? (Link: https://tirto.id/tuntutan-tak-dipenuhi-mogok-makan-driver-grab-yogya-sudah-5-hari-ekoR)
The hunger strike takes us to the 198 Nonviolent Action by Gene Sharp. As the name suggests, Gene Sharp came up with 198 different methods of nonviolent action, which is broken down into 3 categories; protest and persuasion, noncooperation and intervention. Hunger strike falls into the last category. The idea behind nonviolent action is to weaken the government by taking the sources of its power. Gene Sharp argued that the source of government’s power is legitimacy and popular support. These two highly dependent on co-operation and obedience of the people. The absence of people’s co-operation and cooperation will deprive the government of power and thus regime will fall. (Link: https://www.brandeis.edu/peace-conflict/pdfs/198-methods-non-violent-action.pdf)
Hunger strike represents a deprivation of people’s basic needs. Hunger strike plays role in the psychological part. The limitation of daily intake varies. It can be water only or accompanied by glucose, salt, vitamin or low-carbs fasts. Those who take more than water have an advantage to fast for longer days which is expected to put more pressure on the party they protest against.
Hunger strike has been used worldwide by activists to bring about changes, for instance by César Chávez the American labor leader, Thomas Ashe the Irish revolutionary, Sharmila the Indian activist (world’s longest hunger strike of 16 years!), American actress Mia Farrow in solidarity with people in Darfur, prisoners in Cuban Guantanamo Bay and recently by the anti-extradition bill activists in Hong Kong. Rolling hunger strike (people take turn on a scheduled time to fast instead of a group of people with individuals respectively having to fast for days/weeks) has also taken place such as in China.
To quote the historian Peter Quinn, hunger strike is “a legitimate tool of the powerless against the powerful.” This speaks a lot about how hunger strike is often times used by the prisoners, like Chávez and Ashe. The prisoners do not have any other power and there is not much that prisoners can do behind bars. But, the livelihood of the prisoners (life and death) is the responsibility of the government. Only in this sense that the prisoners actually have power to put pressure on the government. However, theologians’ take on hunger strike is how it is such a sin to starve ourselves. Basically, any harmful practices to oneself is regarded as a sin. Let alone if people die from starving themselves, which some consider as a suicidal act.
Unfortunately, hunger strike is also related to other issue. Some government focuses on ending the hunger strike instantly. Instead of considering the protesters’ demands, government chooses to force-feed the protesters, be it nasogastric (through the nose) or orogastric (through the mouth). This force-feeding practices have been prohibited by the Declaration on Tokyo on degrading treatment in imprisonment.
