Campaign Against Ideology

An idea pursued with unusual vigour by the postmodernist camp was the alleged ‘end of ideology’, which actually masked the deadly contradictions of the capitalist system during a period of deceptive stability and prosperity.Though not peddled as such in the market of ideas it got re-branded as ‘the end of all grand narratives’. However, in a couple of decades the technological revolutions did not result in an assurance of uninterrupted peaceful transition or reduce serious contradictions between the haves and have-nots.

Ideological conflicts re-surfaced with renewed energy along with social turbulence. The very idea of a painless politics turned out to have been a mirage. The idea is far from oven fresh.Way back in 1960,when following the postwar boom in US business and the disciplining of their trade unions by the MacArthy gang,and fat bargains between labour leaders and corporate groups,class war seemed like a bad dream best forgotten by peace-loving folks.

America basked in decades of uninterrupted sunny weather for profitable production and trade, and lectured the world on how to win success and happiness.At that moment( 1960 to be precise)sociologist Daniel Bell had held the attention of the West with calm assurance as he held forth on the same prospects of crisis-proof capitalism with a Keynesian stress on state management of economy in his influential book END OF IDEOLOGY.In 1992 Francis Fukuyama sang the same time with his END OF HISTORY.The variation in words is telling,as ideology invokes social contradiction which in turn motivates change and history.But both had patently missed the mark as an ersatz version of Fascism has got its favourite on the president’s seat in America.In India a similar ideological turn around has transpired when old ideas of social democracy appeared to have run out of steam.Where is this mythical end or exhaustion?

It is a pity that such an intelligent and well-read man as Congress leader Jairam Ramesh has fallen for it.He is reported to have told the press that we live in a post-ideology era.Such an anaesthetic idea may turn out to be inadvertently subversive of Congress aims and interests.Its hope of revival lies only in a rediscovery of its ideology of Gandhian social democracy.If it chooses to shun such a course,it will have to adopt that of mass manipulation,the preferred path of capitalist oligarchs,and in consequence suffer total eclipse. For it cannot abandon its embrace of compassion and welcome the scorching gleam of ‘nafrat’ or hate. True,power of mass manipulation has been increased manifold by the media revolution.But there is a limit to it and people do come up smack against a blind wall at the end of its road.As followers of Hitler had done and those of Trump in their turn also will one day.

The great vision of Nehru and other socialist leaders of Congress was an alliance of all sections of Indian society for achievement of peace,inclusive progress and cultural enlightenment.The intended harmony did not exclude the use of compulsion from time to time,as in the consistent endeavour by Nehru in Parliament to de-link property of social means of production from pursuit of equality as guaranteed by the constitution.For example his advocacy of the removal of the right of property from the fundamental rights thus leading to abolition of Zemindary system and at least partial land reform.Likewise the income of the richest family-owned businesses came under ruthless income tax rates so as to enable redistribution of resources of the state.

What we witness at work today is an exact reversal of that vision ,and a backing by powerful plutocrats of the most misanthropic of ideologies, embodying anti-farmer,anti-worker and radically in-egalitarian social and mental attitudes. Against its stifling stranglehold on society Rahul Gandhi explicitly stands for compassion for the exploited and the downtrodden.He denounces Savarkar(whose breath-taking lies and chicaneries in successfully projecting an image of noble heroism have been recently exposed in glaring detail by several authors) whose portrait faces that of Gandhi in the gallery of national leaders in Parliament.He also has advocated caste census tirelessly against entrenched vested interests of social and ideological orthodoxy.

So far so good.Only the future will show how sincere and consistent he is in leading the nation towards effacement of immemorial abuse and humiliation and disempowerment imposed on millions of our countrymen.And how consistently and forcefully he fights against the obscene accumulation of wealth and power by a few people at the cost of grinding poverty of the masses.Democracy in the true sense,and not populism through rhetoric and manipulation,should be his party’s ideological choice.

Hiren Gohain is a political commentator