"If deliberative/discursive democratic politics are to be feasible, then two conditions would have to hold: (i) those who have more need to recognise that they would have to take less, and give up a significant part of their "usurped" (whether justified by Lockean theories, bastardised Lockean theories or any other metric/ism/theory). Modern predatory capitalism is based on a patent falsehood: that environmental spoilage is neither irreversible, nor threatening to survival. The hubris is that technological progress is definitive and will forestall environmental disasters, thereby enabling ever increasing consumption of nature, and eventually all or everybody would get a suitable slice of the pie (not necessarily equal). Remove the assumption of inevitability of technological progress, and the ability to forestall environmental disaster, and one would be left with inevitability of redistribution. Unless those with much are willing to come to the table with a perceptible commitment to some measure of equalisation, the second condition will not be forthcoming. (ii) the second condition is that those with less have to believe that they will, within foreseeable future get more than what they have. Now one can say that the discussion has to veer away from "consumption", and to some spiritual plane. That would be possible if and only if the first condition holds. Otherwise, it would be a lot of hand wringing on those proposing deliberations (and I don't mean you Satish - but in general). The last three decades of "I, Me, Mine" has substantially torn apart a lot of social ties, and destroyed the potential for discursive politics". - Pramod
I hope my friend Pramod doesn't mind my putting the above passage here. There has been a conversation between him and me after I advertised my previous post on Facebook. The conversation took place on Facebook itself, with a few people chipping in their views as well. I thought I should put this part here on the blog because here I thought was a very important point being made, one that could not be ignored and had to be answered (I am not patronizing Pramod here). What I have put above is only a part of a much longer post that Pramod had made and there were a couple of posts before this as well. ( If any of you is interested in the entire conversation please see it on my wall at www.facebook.com/avsatishchandra). Below this paragraph is my response to Pramod (and it seems as if the response is quite weak). But I hope to build on that response further and hope to make it a little stronger. I claim no ability to surmount all problems since I am only just human, albeit a very large one. But I can assure you that in matters such as these size just doesn't matter.
"Pramod, I would say we have started deliberating on what is wrong with our politics. I take that as a start. More people and especially the leaders do the same, then we may have a beginning of a process. Perhaps I am unduly optimistic here. Talking of the usurpers, Rawls claims that the rich of the society should allow for a more equitable distribution of "primary social goods" (education being one of them) so that the traditionally backward can come into the sphere where they can compete with others and survive. That for him is justice and in more ways than one his whole writing is an extension of Lockean liberalism through Rousseau and Kant". - This response was from me.
The response as I said is quite weak. But as I also said it can be developed further. Before that development can take place, let me make one point very clear. That for anything to improve in Indian politics and society the one thing that is mandatory is that there should be more participation from people in the political process. The political process is not just the holding of placards or participating in demonstrations or rasta rokos or courting arrest. The political process is one that is around as all the time, like air, and we just have to take cognizance of it. The sad part is most of us refuse to do that because we are either so caught up in our individual selves that we do not care about the political process or some of us seem to think that it is somehow infra-dig to get involved in something as "crass" as politics. What has made politics so crass is precisely this unwillingness to consider the political process. It seems we either believe that the brave new world will take care of us or simply karma which will decide what is what. Any which one looks at it, an attitude that smacks of disinterest in our own well being. The political process can be changed by all of us talking about it or deliberating and making ourselves heard. Today the world is teeming with media, and democratic ones at that such as the World Wide Web. We seem to waste the power vested in us by the media by conversing about banalities such as "I am feeling sleepy" or "KFC sucks". In fact, a few days ago to my utter disbelief I saw that 9 people had marked "like" to my message on Facebook requesting all fans of Roger Waters and Pink Floyd to petition him on his Facebook page to bring the Wall Live to India and Hyderabad. Only one actually bothered to petition Waters. The rest simply liked. This attitude is what stands in the way of our starting deliberations upon our society and its requirements and how we can devise ways of meeting them ethically, morally and effectively. This lack of consciousness about ourselves and the unwillingness to develop it is pushing us into this depraved situation that we find ourselves vis a vis politics.
I have been saying that I am an optimist and in that very spirit of optimism I shall carry on with the point that I made to my friend Pramod's response. I had invoked John Rawls and Immanuel Kant towards the end. Let me elaborate on that a bit. Since the sixteenth century of the Common Era, when politics found themselves relatively free of religious control in the West, political philosophers have been trying to find ways of defining good and also finding ways to reaching it. All philosophers have believed that a realization of a common good could happen only through participation of people at different levels to different extents. However, in all that there are some outstanding examples. Jean Jacques Rousseau is one of them. Rousseau was perhaps the first philosopher to identify one big problem with the capitalist civilisation; the creation of poverty amidst plenty. Rousseau and later Kant, another striking example of a philosopher looking for solutions to find a good society, correctly identified that good could only be established through a will of the people. Rousseau called it the "General Will" (not a majority will) and this would be a Will that would include in itself the "General Good" of "ALL" and not just a majority. This point of his has evaded the comprehension of many and it was up to Kant to clarify it better. Kant made the "moral realm" transcendental, in the sense that it was not governed by temporal considerations such as time and space. The moral is the categorical imperative, on which there can be no discussion. It is up to every individual to follow the moral in all actions thereby establishing a Will that is Good in its intention since it aims for the benefit of all. The Good Will of Kant is very similar to the General Will of Rousseau. Capitalism however has successfully evaded all attempts at the establishment of a Good Will, since it is driven by one motive - profit. When profit is paramount, then everything else is secondary, including morality. That is the reason why Noam Chomsky bemoans the fact that liberal democracy has been hijacked by the agenda of capitalist corporations.
For a very long time liberal thinkers and philosophers never addressed themselves seriously to the moral aspects of private property. In my view the first liberal thinker to address that aspect is John Rawls. Rawls is very much a liberal, one who supports the idea of private property. But unlike the libertarians who believe that all private property is the extension of the most primary property which is natural ability, Rawls argued that where one was born in society played an important role in the opportunities that were available to an individual for self development. A person born in a poor ghetto is not in possession of the same kind and number of opportunities that a person born into a well to do family has access to. Therefore Rawls called upon the propertied to part with "primary social goods" so that they become available to the traditionally deprived. The access to primary social goods is what determines a person's ability to make good of opportunities. It is also that which makes the opportunities available in the first place. Top on the list of the primary social goods is education, which is true empowerment. I have argued time and again in various forums that it is high time we start demanding a meaningful free education from the government instead of meaningless sops that ultimately work more to the benefit of politicians than to common people. It is here that we have miserably failed. Even those who are holders of degrees in our country can hardly be called educated. They have no perspective on anything and this lack of perspective coupled with an insatiable urge to earn truckloads of money is a most dangerous trend. For most people in my generation people such as Mahatma Gandhi, Mother Theresa, Nelson Mandela etc were heroes. The present generation of urban college going youngsters want to be the next Bill Gates, Azim Premji and Mukesh Ambani. Sadly they do not know what it takes to be any of these people also. This lack of enlightened perspective is what stands in the way of the realization of a good will or the parting of primary social goods by the propertied to enable the dis-empowered to make good on opportunities and empower themselves socially and politically.
Then the question is about the way out of this situation. What I have as a remedy is not something which is in the way of an easy solution. What needs to be done is that all people interested in changing the society for the better should at every possible opportunity open a dialogue that takes people into discussions about how one can change things. It should be a deliberative process in the sense that people should be encouraged to think and find solutions rather than telling them what to do. The second approach, used by activists of many causes is likely to produce results contrary to what is required and push people more into an aversion for all things political. The dialogue should be exactly that, as opposed to a monologue where one speaks and expects the others to listen. I would like to point out here that the idea of a "public sphere" enunciated by Jurgen Habermas, can become a reality. The public sphere comes into being, for Habermas only if there is a communication process that is "dialogical". Habermas says that two people or more can be involved in a conversation but it could still be "monological" if only person understands the logic of what he/she is saying and that is not transmitted to the others. A dialogical conversation on the other hand implies that people understand each other the way they want to be understood and this creates a public sphere where people intelligently deliberate amongst themselves about what is good for them and for their society. This ensures less dependence on politicians to come out with programmes of action and also puts them under pressure to deliver what people want. For this to happen, a process has to begin and that can only happen when people are optimistic and have the perseverance to pursue a "good" goal based in "good will". It is a time consuming process and daunting, but the history of humanity has demonstrated that when people want to change things they ultimately will. It took more than a hundred years for India to attain its independence. But the great thing is it did. That is why I am optimistic.
P.S; This is a long post, interrupted by several phone calls. I am too tired to proof read it now. Please excuse me for all the grammar and spelling errors. I shall proof read it later and rectify them. As always, thank you.
No comments:
Post a Comment