Liberals Are Dead! Long Live The Liberals!
Posted: March 11, 2011 Filed under: Humour | Tags: Class, Pakistan, Taliban, The Left 2 Comments »I’m not sure if you’ve heard but word on the street is that there’s an important species about to become extinct in Pakistan.
Even if you’ve not seen one yourself, chances are you hear about them every single day. Nary a day goes by without reading about this particular breed of being in every single newspaper and magazine published here. We’re collectively bombarded about this group’s existential crisis so much that it seems that it is perhaps the most important group in Pakistan.
If it’s not obvious enough, I’m talking about the so-called death of liberals in Pakistan. Liberals as a species are dying and soon enough will be extinct. I should know because I am one. Suddenly we seem to have woken up to the idea that our existence is under threat because of some amorphous, intractable, violent monster also known as the “Other”.
Because we are the educated, well-heeled lot, having had access to all institutions this country has to offer, we obviously know better than “all of them” who are the illogical, dangerous lot out to kill us. Of course we do not blame anyone but them for their lack of education, opportunity and “middle class” mindset. Had they just tried hard enough like we all did, they too would have been smarter, successful and better smelling. And of course to ‘us’, they are a unified, homogenous entity with an agenda: the liberals versus the non-liberals, the hoity-toity versus the hoi polloi, the You-and-Me’s versus the All-of-Them’s. There’s no one left in between ‘us’, the enlightened, and ‘them’, the emboldened!
The audacity of these non-liberal sorts is getting appalling. Why, just the other day I was at the signal waiting for the red light to turn green, when the pesky little kid started cleaning the windshield of my car without my consent! Have they no manners? And that irritating lady who simultaneously continued rapping at my car window while I was just trying to listen to my music in peace? The woman had no sense of privacy or decency! How dare they intrude on my life? I certainly do not intrude on theirs, do I?
What could possibly be more ridiculous than forty thousand of these illiterate buffoons showing up on the streets to celebrate the murder of one of us? Is there a more stark proof of how utterly outnumbered we are on the streets of Pakistan? Our once impervious, protected space has been hit by a stampede, and now ‘they’ are not taking no for an answer.
As if that wasn’t enough, now more and more of them want better wages. Worker strikes have become commonplace due to some bizarre imagination on their part. (That must be it, right?) They have suddenly realized that they should get the sort of wages us liberals do without getting even remotely more educated or talented.
I went to a meeting recently where concerned liberals who owned these companies were discussing how to get rid of their employees with minimum inconvenience. One of the smartest liberals in the meeting said that we should tell these workers to “suck it up”. Because this particular clever liberal owns an NGO and had obviously thought a lot about poor, ignorant people, we all thought it was indeed an astute observation.
I’m not sure when we ceded political space to these goons we love to hate, but I have a dreaded feeling we never really participated in the national conversation in the first place. This intellectually superior group of ours (or the most recent mutation of it anyway) was always too busy to attend a political rally, too pensive to distribute pamphlets door-to-door, and far too wise to mingle with the masses. It is beneath us to persuade the proletariat, dahlin’.
So how do we escape this horrible situation? How do we ensure that our dying breed survives? We’re not willing to reproduce as much as them. We’re not willing to become less intelligent or attractive either. We don’t even want to meet these people to learn about their survival instincts. (Natural selection, anyone?)
The only way we can overcome this existential threat is to utilize a three-pronged approach. First we need to build an even more robust infrastructure that keeps the non-liberals out of our space. We need to have more clubs, hotels, restaurants and airports that are exclusive and inaccessible to anyone who does not subscribe to our liberal lifestyle. Secondly, we need to make private education and private healthcare even more expensive. The former will ensure our liberals are smarter and richer, and at least a few them can employ critical thinking if there is an extreme need for it. The latter will ensure that non-liberals die out by way of natural selection. Lastly, we need to continue writing and ranting in English newspapers (like this one) so that fellow liberals are aware of our dilemma. Everyone needs to know just how bad things are for us now that we can’t even publicly announce that we will not fast or pray at work.
I’ve done my part in helping to save us by letting you know what’s really plaguing our country. I can now relax in liberal complacency and enjoy being the cleverest liberal on the block.
Speak now or forever hold your piece.
This piece was published in The Friday Times on 11 March 2011 and also be read here.
The Nouveau Elite
Posted: March 9, 2011 Filed under: Academia | Tags: Books, Class, Pakistan, Post-Colonialism 1 Comment »Standard textbook Economics tells us that when a price of good ‘X’ increases, quantity of good ‘X’ demanded by consumers should decrease. In practice we see that inflation generally should and does force people into consuming less.
While teaching ‘History of Economic Thought’ last semester I introduced my students to Thorstein Veblen’s concept of ‘conspicuous consumption’ from his seminal work The Theory of the Leisure Class.
Veblen describes how in some cases, the perceived status of another good ‘Y’ would make us buy more of it the more the price of ‘Y’ increased. Calling it the ‘snob effect’, he described for preference for expensive goods rises for consumers who want to use (or at least want to appear to be using) exclusive products. Price, therefore, has an opposite affect for products such as expensive wines, branded hand-bags and luxury cars. A decrease in the price of these high-status goods would make the global elite not want them anymore. Veblen also talks about the ‘band-wagon effect’ whereby the more people around you purchase ‘Y’ the more you would want to purchase it too, regardless of its affordability. Case in point, iPods and Blackberries perhaps.
What is interesting is that although this describes a phenomenon that would presumably be ascribed to the exceptionally wealthy, Veblen argues that this is occurs in every class of people. It is a psychological experience that no class can honestly deny.
If this true then it would mean that everyone in this world wants to emulate the wealthiest class as closely as possible by consuming what the elite consume, dining where the elite dine, wearing what the elite wear and so on and so forth. Everyone would soak up he privilege and class power at the first opportunity presented.
The point of this academic prologue is to be able to read Rafia Zakaria’s op-ed in Dawn today a little more closely. I will not get into the definitions of who qualifies as the elite and who does not in Pakistan, since Umair Javed has done it brilliantly and comprehensively here. Whether those who aspire to be the elite are actually the elite, almost the elite or mostly elite can quantified in the ways Umair enumerates and more.
I want to get to something else here that Rafia’s piece insufficiently hinted at but first I will present a synopsis of her argument. Since Umair has put in a lot of labour in that, I will point you towards his words where he says:
“The basic crux of her argument, as I understood it, was that there is a class of people in Pakistan that do not belong to the landed elite, nor to the industrial elite, but somehow possess enough wealth to purchase branded clothes and accessories, live in roughly the same neighborhoods, attend the same parties, be seen on the same social pages, and generally hang around with the actual elite. She labels them, interestingly enough, as the ‘almost elite’. Their roots and social rise is not from land or industrial wealth, but rather on their abilities to dispense mental labor or artistic talent.
The article places this almost-elite, completely westernized (for the lack of a better word) in world-view and practice, as part of the country’s middle class formation. The proposed tragedy is that they actively label themselves as part of the upper class, and in the process shrug off all the responsibilities that a constituent group of the middle class would have in a developing country like ours. The proposed solution, however, is that an honest appraisal of reality is badly needed, which would ultimately direct the talents of the almost-elite towards the betterment of Pakistan.”
What I want to get at goes a bit further than the definitions that set up class analysis in Pakistan. What is even more problematic (and I can only hope Zakaria also meant this) is that this nouveau riche refuses to exercises meritocracy in the same way that is exemplar of the ultra rich. Once the economic and social gains have been made, this group of Pakistan elite goes on reproduce privilege and inequality in every sphere of their existence. There is that same hatred for the poor, the conceit in their own intellectual capacity and the belief that only they are the saviors of the nation. This very group, then, decries democracy as being incompatible with the structural problems of Pakistan.
One can argue that this is inevitable and this only indicates that more people have joined the ranks of the elite. As per Veblen’s analysis, this group of newly oriented elite has no reason to not act wholly and solely in ways that protect and enshrine their own power and privilege. I, however, feel it is deeply troubling and worth noting how socio-economic advancements enable these almost-elite (or mostly elite) to embody privilege in the most repulsive ways possible.
Coincidentally, it was just today that I came across Shamus Khan’s book Privilege: The Making of an Adolescent Elite at St. Paul’s School which was recently released in the United States. The introduction to the book divulges a promising read not very impertinent to this discussion:
“As one of the most prestigious high schools in the nation, St. Paul’s School in Concord, New Hampshire, has long been the exclusive domain of America’s wealthiest sons. But times have changed. Today, a new elite of boys and girls is being molded at St. Paul’s, one that reflects the hope of openness but also the persistence of inequality.
In Privilege, Shamus Khan returns to his alma mater to provide an inside look at an institution that has been the private realm of the elite for the past 150 years. He shows that St. Paul’s students continue to learn what they always have–how to embody privilege. Yet, while students once leveraged the trappings of upper-class entitlement, family connections, and high culture, current St. Paul’s students learn to succeed in a more diverse environment. To be the future leaders of a more democratic world, they must be at ease with everything from highbrow art to everyday life–from Beowulf to Jaws–and view hierarchies as ladders to scale. Through deft portrayals of the relationships among students, faculty, and staff, Khan shows how members of the new elite face the opening of society while still preserving the advantages that allow them to rule.”
Members of the new elite face the opening of society while still preserving the advantages that allow them to rule.
In all of this, ladies and gentlemen, this is what I see as the problem.
—
[Note: This isn't to say that there aren't more problems to Rafia's piece. Right now, I won't go into the several inconsistencies and biases she's betrayed in her analysis.]
Independence Day
Posted: August 14, 2010 Filed under: Personal, Political | Tags: Class, Economic Development, Marx, Post-Colonialism, Rants, The Left 3 Comments »A lot of well-intentioned, albeit far too emotional and
superficial, initiatives have come forth in the aftermath of
the worst floods to have hit Pakistan in the last two weeks.
Every day I get countless text messages, invites to Facebook
pages, groups, events and e-mails informing me about where
to donate and how to volunteer at relief efforts. All of this
very important and I hope that most of it eventually ends up
where it is needed the most.
But it’s not enough if the effect of future disasters is to be
mitigated. We cannot prevent earthquakes or floods but we
can strive towards a more equitable society that doesn’t
discriminate against the poorest sections when a disaster
hits. A more forceful engagement with the state is required,
one that is marked more by political resistance and less by
emotional and reactionary philanthropy. A friend recently
conjectured that what Pakistan needs right now is a massive
class revolt but it’s not likely that it’s going to happen. Most
of us are content with donating just enough so our own
lifestyle goes unchanged and eventually leaving the affected
majority to its own misfortune to pick up the pieces. That is
enough to placate our conscious and ignore our guilt for
unchecked consumption and spending that goes on
uninterrupted. It is a masked hypocrisy that capitalism
necessitates.
Perhaps Žižek can explain this better.The Starbucks ‘ ethical ‘
coffee consumption example, in particular, is brilliant.
It’s almost nauseating to see how many people loved(sic) this
Ufone ad on the Independence Day
celebrations in Pakistan. One friend on Facebook even went
on
to say it was the most amazing ad he’d seen.
What ‘ azaadi ‘? Thank you for what? Exactly who has this
state benefitted? We’re not free in Pakistan. We’ve not been
free since we were colonised, and today we’re enslaved by the
hatred(s) we’ve internalised and the destructive capitalism
coupled with a militaristic rule that we’re learning to
worship. There is NOTHING romantic or glorious about the
partition. There is nothing independent about Pakistan
today.
Instead of proliferating these ridiculous ads that tug at the
nation’s heartstrings by blatantly using people with
disabilities, we should be talking more about the grassroots
victories that the working class underbelly of Pakistan is
achieving . A class revolt may not be in our future but let us
not delude ourselves with a farcical project that is Pakistan.
(This is probably my most indulgent and selfish post and I
can’t promise that it will read as coherently as it appears in
my mind.)
Frantz Fanon: A Life
Posted: June 29, 2010 Filed under: Academia | Tags: Books, Class, Post-Colonialism, Race Leave a comment »Disconnected excerpts from Meghan Vaughan’s review in the London Review of Books of David Macey’s book “Frantz Fanon: A Life”:
Outside France, Fanon was regarded as a leading intellectual associated with the doctrine of ‘Third Worldism’, which had begun to emerge in the 1950s. At the Bandung conference of 1955, leaders of the newly independent post-colonial states in Africa and Asia, disillusioned with orthodox Marxism, sought to articulate an alternative, non-aligned socialist vision.
In France, from about 1948 onwards, Sartre had been insisting on the central importance of Third World issues for the Left. The Wretched of the Earth has become known as the ‘Bible of decolonisation’, but Fanon’s relationship with ‘Third Worldism’ was complex.
He was deeply sceptical of Pan-Africanism, for example, and well aware of the pitfalls of nationalism. Unlike many of his contemporaries, he had little interest in the relationship between local cultures and the larger forces of colonialism and capitalism. Above all, he was unsympathetic to non-violent action. For Fanon, anti-colonial violence was not only necessary but virtuous.
The recent resurgence of ‘Fanonism’ has tiptoed uneasily around the issue of revolutionary violence. The Fanon of post-colonial theory in the English-speaking world is not the Third World revolutionary so much as the author of Black Skin, White Masks, his first book, published soon after he qualified as a psychiatrist in Lyon. Not much read in its time, it is now required reading for thousands of students of literary criticism in the Anglophone world.
As Macey sees it, the Third-Worldist Fanon of The Wretched of the Earth was celebrated for his apocalyptic vision of rightful violence and revolution, while the ‘Americanised’ Fanon worried instead about identity politics. Fanon, the theorist of the ‘psychopathology of colonialism’, is now the subject of analysis, supine on a post-colonial couch.
For Fanon (who denied the existence of an Oedipus complex, or anything like it, in Martinican society), this was the black man’s foundational trauma – a trauma which reverberates in a number of his unforgettable, uncompromising phrases: ‘the Negro is comparison,’ he is ‘sealed into crushing objecthood’, the ‘black man must be black in relation to the white man’, and so on.
The primary psychological dynamic of the colonial situation, then, is one of ‘othering’ – the black man becomes the repository of the most fundamental feelings of hatred and desire on the part of whites. And he is paralysed by these projections, paralysed by the child’s shout of ‘Look, a Negro!’, ‘stricken and immobilised’ by white psychic needs.
In Fanon’s formulation, the colonial relation is not a dialectical one; indeed, it is not a relation at all, but a one-way projection. Under these circumstances, Fanon writes, the black man has no independent existence.
Fanon believed that the way to relieve the suffering of his patients was to end their alienation. He did not break the chains and open the doors of the asylum. Central to his practice of social therapy was a belief in the importance of inducing even the most disturbed patients to participate in the life of the confining institutions of which they were, willingly or unwillingly, a part. Within the larger institution of the hospital were smaller, patient-run institutions (the film club, the book club, the newspaper), through which patients would be involved in the symbolic exchanges which go to make up a society. Before they knew it, they would find themselves part of a group, integrated.
Macey makes it clear that Fanon worked tirelessly to this end, even as the violence escalated and entered the hospital gates of Blida-Joinville. Yet there is something ironic in his pursuit of this kind of social psychiatry with its ‘civilising’ mission according to which the violence and rupture of madness could be papered over by the rituals of tea-drinking and the writing of film reviews – an unconscious mimicry, perhaps, of the French colonial project of assimilation.
For Fanon, ‘race’ always took precedence over class in any colonial situation. In essence the colonial world could be divided into two halves: black and white. What unified the ‘wretched of the earth’ was violence. Fanon argued that the violence perpetrated by colonialism had had a profound atomising effect on colonised societies, which could be overcome only through a correspondingly violent reaction – those who took part becoming, in Sartre’s terminology, members of a ‘group-in-fusion’, united by a common purpose. Violence was cathartic and unifying, transforming disempowered and atomised colonial subjects into a powerful political force.
Macey argues that though this is a ‘brutal, even blood-curdling’ vision, Fanon stops short of glorifying violence for its own sake. It is impossible, however, to read Fanon today without also being aware of the bloodshed which continues to characterise modern Algeria. Macey tells us that his revolutionary writings are now invoked by the Islamic Salvation Front – the FIS – as a justification for violence.
The war with France, they argue, is not over, and violence is still required to ‘redeem’ the Algerian population. Yet as the conflict in Algeria and many other contemporary wars make clear, the post-colonial world does not fall conveniently into Fanon’s categories of black and white, victim and perpetrator. Thousands of Algerians die in the crossfire between the FIS and the Algerian Government. In this context, Fanon’s espousal of the purifying qualities of violence has a hollow ring.
And I would have succeeded too, if it wasn’t for those pesky, meddlin’ kids.
Posted: October 30, 2009 Filed under: Political | Tags: Class, Pakistan, Rants Leave a comment »The quintessential upper-class, privileged Pakistani loves to hate beggars outside his/her car. Never mind the fact he/she is inside a (usually) comfortable car with air-conditioning more often than not. Never mind the fact that the little kid has probably been standing there in the vicinity for hours doing his job which he/she did NOT choose and would gladly give up if he/she could. Never mind the fact that the said privileged Pakistani would never trade positions with the beggar and the beggar would in an instant. No, never mind that. How dare that little kid disturb my drive, waving his little stick to wipe my windshield! The nerve of that evil monster, wanting my money and envying my life!
How easy is it to chastise the “beggar mafia” (which by the way happens to be the favourite raison d’être for said privileged Pakistani for not parting with his/her money) for being the root of all evil and purveyor of all oppression? How astonishingly comfortable is it to have that privilege to chastise another in the first place? I’m not denying that the so-called mafia does not make money or does not feed the children it forces into beggary. Probably happens. Moreover, how clever of the privileged class to award agency to the children in this case, perceiving them to be agents exercising free choice when they select professional beggary for a living.
You and the child outside your window did not START from the same place in life and were not bestowed with the same opportunities; therefore you automatically gain absolute power over him. You can deride him, slap him, shrug him off, ignore him, or give him an angry look. You have the power to affect how he feels. And you probably make him feel like the scum of the earth for daring to bother you again. I’m not advocating that anyone part with their money when they don’t want to. But I am asking people to show a little respect and a little humanity in their response to beggars on the street every day. They’re having a pretty tough life too, you’re not the victim here.
Disclaimer: I apologise for the pronoun inconsistency; I was trying to be gender-neutral.
