A systematic tackle

Theatres Of Democracy
Shiv Visvanathan,
edited by Chandan Gowda
Harper Collins
2016, pp 426, Rs 699

It is not often that one comes across a work that is intellectually stimulating, ethically intransigent and politically honest and fearless.

Shiv Visvanathan’s Theatres of Democracy is not a mere collection of essays on diverse themes and topics, but is, in a real sense, a public intellectual’s confrontations with culture, politics, systems of knowledge, and the nature of the economic order of the globalised world of recent times.

The best way to comprehend Shiv’s writings is by invoking Jacques Derrida’s idea of  ‘negotiations’, which Shiv himself does in his work. His idea suggests the nature of true enquiries that are dynamic, that move to and fro, and do not become static at any point. ‘Negotiations’ is a concept that infuses life into epistemological practices, ethical choices and democratic aspirations — all three being equally central and vital to the destinies of individuals, communities and societies. What needs to be underlined right here is that it is, fundamentally, an interrogation of the dark realities of all forms of power and authority, especially of nation states and the ugly spirit of nationalism it fosters and nourishes. Shiv’s lifelong preoccupation as a thinker and an activist has been with all “grand narratives” of political, epistemological and scientific establishments that are essentially against free and open enquiries of any kind.

To understand Shiv’s intellectual and moral trajectories, the metaphor of ‘Rhizome’ thrown up by thinkers like Gilles Deleuze and Felix Guattari becomes very helpful. The two philosophers show that to behold the fullness of a plant or a tree, it is necessary to be acutely aware of what holds, sustains and nourishes it below the earth — of how the roots and the shoots down below spread out in all directions in multiple ways. To extend this idea is to apprehend cultures, ideas, modes of knowledge by recognising discontinuities, irregularities, divergences, contraries and paradoxes of human consciousness. This demands a juxtaposition of the horizontal nature of human experiences and realities, and the moral imagination and will to discard the oppressive singularity of the vertical.

 What is outstanding in Shiv is his ability to work out ideas drawing from experiential realities that, at times, do not match one another, and, quite often, seem to belong to different existential realms. Shiv’s pieces on oral cultures and traditions, especially of tribal locations, glow with brilliant metaphors and images that the so-called precise “scientific method of proper social science” may not approve of (One only needs to go through one of Claude Lévi-Strauss’s later piece, Race and History, to grasp this point).

Shiv is not a sentimental anti-science humanist ignorant of the contributions of great scientists and innovative technologists. His anti-science and technology stances come from the need to understand the two in relation to the authority and power of the ruling state, fully aided by morally neutral scientists, and, more significantly, the ethnicide that is engendered by them in the name of social advancement and progress. The illusions created by the political state and the inhuman and contemptuous dismissal of individuals and societies outside the scientific establishment raise basic questions about scientific and technological knowledge and research, and the incontrovertible rights of communities to livelihood. At the heart of Shiv’s engagement is the deep commitment to principles of justice and equality, reflected in his pieces on the Kudankulam agitation, the Human Genome Project and on nuclear energy.

Accompanying the analysis of the unholy relationship between nation states and modern science & technology is Shiv’s attempt to foreground the value of alternative/ indigenous science and technology. It is with great passion that he argues for an understanding of, and the need to support, indigenous science and technology. One of our most creative thinkers, Shiv is in the tradition of first rate scholars of science and society like Joseph Needham, J D Bernal, Martin Bernal, Ivan Illich and Dhruv Raina.

One of the most ethical debates in the contemporary world has been about the nature of state power and its many manifestations. The severe indictment of the authority of the ruling state constitutes the moral centre of thinkers, creative writers and artists who uphold the autonomy of the individual self and the spirit of conviviality in social life. The tyrannical attitudes of all ruling states — leftist, rightist or centrist making no difference — lie in consolidating their political power by unilaterally determining ideas of patriotism and sedition.
The only aim of every ruling state is to centralise power in the name of national security and safety. Any act of brutality, savagery on its part is legitimised by the state arguing that it is “...for reasons of state.”

Right from classical anarchists like Bakunin to contemporary thinkers like Noam Chomsky and Edward Said, the designs and manipulative schemes of the state in destroying values of justice and equality have been clearly exposed with irrefutable evidence. In the Indian context, both Tagore and Gandhi, in the early decades of the 20th century, wrote extensively on the monstrous nature of modern nation-states.

In his scathing attacks on the machinations of the state — whether it was during the Delhi anti-Sikh riots of 1984, or the Gujarat massacre over a decade ago, or the emergency of the mid-70s — Shiv clearly reveals the treacherous nature of the nation state in annihilating the core values of democratic life. Moving to recent times, the author is unsparing in his criticism of Hindutva nationalism and the face it projects at the political level — Narendra Modi .

What is of equal importance is his trenchant criticism of the apathy, the indifference of the opportunistic middle class which could make any compromise to protect its own interest and welfare. Amidst all these there are the rich, strong voices of Truth, Sanity and Goodness that belong to those who care for a human civilisation that’s built on truth, justice and equality. Theatres of Democracy truly symbolises the search for health and sanity in a morbid world.