Recovering the Republic - I : Recovering Power from a cynical use of the Law

The column a couple of weeks ago asserting that the centenary of the declaration of the Portuguese Republic was also a Goan event, received a few responses that convinced me of the need to follow that argument with an explanation of some sort. These responses were shocked by the connection made between Dalit and Bahujan consciousness in Goa and the declaration of the Portuguese Republic. The Portuguese Republic, they were at pains to explain, was not an angelic affair committed to equality throughout the Portuguese empire. It had dictatorial tendencies, was entirely concerned with issues in the metropole (that is continental Portugal) and in fact laid the foundations for the persecutions of the Estado Novo under Salazar.

To be fair to these responses, I must admit that they were rightly triggered by my use of the word ‘celebration’ in the context of the Declaration of the Portuguese Republic. Celebration suggests an uncritical appreciation of an event. Commemoration would be a more appropriate term, given that it requires solemn stock-taking of an event, weighing both pros and cons.

Having acknowledged the error in choice of words, I believe that I have gone some distance toward assuaging the outrage of my interlocutors. However, I would now like to address the question that they put to me, whether one can be justified in laying claim to an event that did not have the liberation of the Goan Bahujan in mind. Surely, one critic suggested, this Bahujan activist was mistaken?

The original column that sparked off this response, indicated rather clearly the two edged, cynical use of ideas of liberty and equality that marked the inauguration of the European republics. The bourgeois classes that spearheaded these revolutions made a cynical use of these ideas, largely to ensure a larger support base as they attacked the feudal regime. However, having done so, they were now hostage to the idea that was then implemented by the masses in the slow progress of democracy. Suhas Palshikar, in his essay in the must-read book titled ‘Humiliation: Claims and Context’, edited by Gopal Guru sums it up rather aptly. ‘Democracy’ he says, ‘even only a very formal democracy - cannot be stopped from infusing some amount of democratization’. The moment the bourgeoisie introduced the rather novel idea of ‘power to the people’ they were inviting a group, hitherto outside of the frame of power politics, into its very heart. Once invoked and legitimized in the course of the French Revolution, the roll of democracy was unstoppable, as formerly disenfranchised masses seized the opportunity to rid themselves of inequality.

To understand the complex and cynical politics of Republicanism, have a look at the history of Haiti. The French Revolution was marked by the slogan of equality for all, a slogan taken seriously by the black slaves in Haiti, who declared their freedom and independence. This was, to be sure, hardly the intention of forces dominating the Revolution. The resistance of the French to this declaration led to the Haitian Revolution that eventually saw the declaration of independence of this territory. Equality in republican Europe, was not intended for people of colour, nor for the colonies. Not in France, nor in Portugal. But this should not blind us to the fact that the mere declaration did in fact result in a legal change that allowed people to assert claims that could never be legitimately made until then.

Palshikar extends this logic to nationalist struggles in colonial settings as well. He points out, no doubt referring to the nationalist history of British-India, that ‘similarly, the moment the nationalists in colonial societies departed from exclusively conspiratorial and secret methods and waged ‘people’s struggles’, they were running the risk of their nations being claimed by ordinary people’. Large portions of the Indian elite were not comfortable with the idea of the unwashed masses gaining a say in the governance of the country. This discomfort continues today in such assertions as made by the ‘Friends of the BJP’ when they stress that we as educated know better than the rest of the ‘illiterate’ population.

Clearly then, once the democratic idea is invoked, it fundamentally changes the rules of the game. People who formerly could not even imagine themselves as equal, now begin to hear the powerful voice of the law tell them that they are equal. This powerful voice may be cynical, not meaning what it says, but having uttered these magical words, is now powerless against the influence of its own logic.

A legal history of the territory of Goa would have to necessarily recognize that the Declaration of the Portuguese Republic, that extended equality to all citizens, as a significant moment in this history. To argue that the Portuguese never intended Goans to be equal, is to raise silly nationalist arguments that seek to begin a history of this territory post-1961, or prior to the start of the colonial period. Its purpose is precisely to obscure the fact that this declaration had profound impacts on a far away territory, and was a significant moment in its legal history. A legal history is built on recognition of legal pronouncements, and the job of a legal historian is to probe the impacts that this law has had on different segments of the subject population. In such a history, while we highlight the intention of the law, we also inquire into its consequences intended or otherwise. When we commemorate the events marked out in such a legal history, it is necessary for us to dwell on all facets of this moment.

In the companion piece to this column, I would like to argue, why it is not nostalgia of the Portuguese that motivates the commemoration of the declaration of the Portuguese Republic, but in fact a more domestic agenda of Dalit empowerment. This agenda is least concerned with the predilections of other segments of Goan society. These segments wish to either brand the colonial period as one long, dark, nightmare, without any redeeming feature; or on the other hand, as a glorious dazzling history that sadly ended in 1961. This agenda is interested in unshackling Goa’s colonial history from the shackles that these two groups have placed on it and open up new and democratic ways in which we can imagine and empower ourselves.

(A version of this column was first published in the Gomantak Times 3 March 2010)

Ballot gone Bust: Contemplating the ‘Wasted’ Vote

When on the 23^rd of March I informed friends and family that I had voted for the Communist Party of India as my choice of representative in the Lok Sabha, a number took it on themselves to inform me that I had ‘wasted my’ vote. The Communists stood no chance at winning either in Goa, or forming the Government at the Centre. It is to this notion of ‘waste’ that I would like to attend to today. Is voting in an election only about voting for a candidate who is likely to win, or is it about making other statements as well?

At the time when Al Gore stood as the Presidential Candidate for the Democrats against George W. Bush Jr. a number of my friends expressed some amount of anguish that the Green Party insisted on fielding a candidate of their own. Al Gore they believed was as green a President as they would ever get, and fielding a Green Party candidate merely divided the loyalties of those who would otherwise vote for Al Gore. To this general position, another held the opinion that regardless of how green Gore was, it was necessary for the Greens to field a candidate merely to make a statement about the viability and seriousness of the Green Party as an electoral option. I believe I am able to appreciate that position only today, subsequent to this general election in India.

Increasingly I have come to believe that in a democracy one does not vote only to win, and place one’s candidate of choice in Government. One votes also to express one’s choice. This choice may not be a popular one, but it nevertheless needs to be expressed for reasons that I will discuss below. This association of elections with getting one’s party into power we can perhaps trace to two tendencies within our democracy. The first is one where getting one’s work done has come to mean everything. By any means, fair or foul, one must obtain one’s objective. The second is the tendency to assume that coalition politics of the kind we have seen in the last few Parliaments is a problem, and we should move toward a two party system. It is in the expression of support for this shift towards dual party politics, that the full significance of ‘choice’ becomes evident.

The two-party system is, at least in today’s world, no choice at all! Is there a significant difference between the Republican and Democrat Party? Some would argue not really. Is there a difference between the Congress and the BJP? I believe that the choice between the two is a false one, both playing pretty much the same game. These parties (and especially the BJP) welcome a two party system, because coalition politics requires you to balance the interests of the diverse segments of the polity. A two-party system where a single party has a significant majority, allows greater leeway in simply pushing agendas through. A two-party system in fact allows for majoritarianism (the rule of the majority). In India t

oday, by and large democracy has been understood to be majoritarianism. However, democracy is really about securing the rights and interests of the minority groups, a political truth that most of us would rather ignore. The creation of multiple electoral choices is therefore a crucial aspect of rescuing the Indian democracy from the morass into which it seems to be sliding.

Over the past few years, and especially in Goa, we have been encouraged to think that electing representatives to create the government is our sole democratic responsibility. Subsequent to the election, these representatives take over and we need to exercise ourselves only in another five years. This situation has led to the almost oligarchic tyranny that prevails both in Goa and in the rest of India. Voting in this scenario must also be about the active creation of political choices, voting for parties despite their dim chances, because this vote may encourage them to refashion themselves. A ‘wasted’ vote this year, could result in a ‘serious’ option opening up at the next election.

None of these possibilities make sense however, in an environment where ideologies, principles and dreams (all variations of Hope) have perished under the glare of cynicism. The crisis we face today, the same crisis that allows us to consider a vote ‘wasted’, is fundamentally a spiritual crisis. The early secular republics in separating the Church from the State, also set up a spiritual realm for the citizens of the God-absent polity. The Nation was deity in the Republic, and the dreams of liberty, fraternity, equality were its religious creed. Like the religious vision it replaced, Republicanism also believed in a paradise. The only distinction was that this Paradise would be achieved not through the coming of the Deity on earth, but through the political labours of (hu)man. Voting in the elections was therefore just one of the citizen’s many actions towards committing to the realization of Paradise on earth. Citizenship called for (and still does) a total commitment of human endeavour toward the realization of this perfect polity. The election, if only one, was nevertheless an important mystical ritual in the life of the secular Republic. In the glare of the cynical sun of contemporary politics, this vision has all but burned away.

A return to the mystical in politics therefore would not be out of place and the ‘wasted’ vote has a fine tradition to fall back on. One thread in this tradition is that of Nishkama Karma, where the action is performed without the expectation of the fruit of the action. One performs the action merely because it is the right thing to do, not because of the fruit of the action. Another elaborate argument is present by Pope Benedict XVI in his Encyclical titled Spe Salvi. Spe Salvi presents an argument in favour of Hope, arguing against the cynicism of our times, against the selfish individualism that marks our times and our pursuit of justice. A reading of Spe Salvi, in the context of political action would present to us a scenario where voting for a party most likely to come to power is not an option at all. On the contrary he argues that Hope would ‘give us the courage to place ourselves on the side of good even in hopeless situations, aware that, as far as the external course of history is concerned, the power of sin will continue to be a terrible presence’. The ‘wasted’ vote then, has also a mystical dimension, where it is a symbol of our commitment to Hope, a refusal to participate in the ‘sin’ of ‘pragmatic’ politics. Where the BJP is marked by ‘sin’, the option for us is not the Congress, marked as it is by similar and other ‘sins’. We are charged with creating the option for choice, even if this means our preferred candidate does not win, and the exercise of this vote will place us in a seemingly hopeless situation. When the ballot is exercised with Hope, and our participation in democracy extends beyond participation in a quinquennial ritual, the ‘wasted’ ballot in fact lays the foundation for the emergence of a stronger democracy in the future.

(Published in the Gomantak Times 6th May 2009)