The New Human Revolution is an ongoing historical novel in which Daisaku Ikeda, as third president of the Soka Gakkai lay Buddhist organization, documents its development from the time he assumed the helm in 1960. It is essentially a story of how “human revolution”—the calling forth of the “limitless inherent power” of the human spirit—can build a movement for world peace and individual empowerment, a dynamic process of betterment referred to within the Soka Gakkai as kosen-rufu. Ikeda expects The New Human Revolution to eventually reach 30 volumes by the time it is completed, which, having started the novel at the age of 65, he regards as a personal duty and a supreme lifelong challenge. English editions of The New Human Revolution are published by World Tribune Press in the USA, the SGI-UK in the UK, the Eternal Ganges Press in India and the Singapore Soka Association in Singapore. It is also available in booklet form in Malaysia and in the Philippines, published respectively by Soka Gakkai Malaysia and Soka Gakkai International of the Philippines.
Author
Daisaku Ikeda is a Buddhist philosopher, peacebuilder, educator, author and poet. He is the third president of the Soka Gakkai lay Buddhist organization and the founding president of the Soka Gakkai International (SGI), which is today one of the world's largest and most diverse lay Buddhist organizations, promoting a philosophy of character development and social engagement for peace. Ikeda is the founder of the Soka (value-creation) schools, a nondenominational school system based on an ideal of fostering each student's unique creative potential and cultivating an ethic of peace, social contribution and global consciousness. The school system runs from kindergarten through graduate study and includes a university in Tokyo, Japan, and another in California, U.S.A. Ikeda is a staunch proponent of dialogue as the foundation of peace. Since the 1970s he has pursued dialogue with a wide range of individuals around the world in political, cultural, educational and academic fields. Over 50 of these have been published in book form, with people such as Mikhail Gorbachev, Elise Boulding, Joseph Rotblat and André Malraux. In furtherance of his vision of fostering dialogue and solidarity for peace, Ikeda has founded a number of independent, nonprofit research institutes that develop cross-cultural, interdisciplinary collaboration on diverse issues: the Boston Research Center for the 21st Century, the Toda Institute for Global Peace and Policy Research and the Institute of Oriental Philosophy. The Min-On Concert Association and the Tokyo Fuji Art Museum promote mutual understanding and friendship between different national cultures through the arts. Ikeda is a prolific writer who has published more than 100 works, ranging from Buddhist philosophy to biographical essays, poetry, children's stories and photographic collections.
