Saturday, October 13, 2007

God is dead, Marxism is undergoing crisis and Bangladesh is tottering

These are the multinationals, like General Motors and Nestle; these are the big industrial groups that weigh, on the monetary scale, much more than big countries like Egypt.
Ahmed Ben Bella

Since Nietzsche declared the death of God, Allah or the Over-Soul as Emerson puts it, the world has seen the fall of the Berlin Wall, the sad demise of communism, China’s rapid march towards market economy as well as the brisk rise of US militaristic imperialism. While the public tentatively accepted these changes the market gave rise to the vulgar cult of Madonna, Britney Spears and Anna Kournikova. Today the market encourage obscenity on one hand while on the other, states continually devise firm laws (both religious and secular) to impose subtle control on the population. Human dignity in this Mammon driven age has also sunk to the lowest. Societies are obsessed with the fetish, frolic and food. The states are forebodingly Kafkaesque more than ever. This situation is more relevant to the Third world countries.

Man’s greed for personal wealth, jealousy towards the Other and a primal urge to dominate gave rise to capitalism as early as the times of the Pharaoh. Feudalism soon took over. Renaissance and colonization established a deft capitalist system. Then came advanced industrial capitalism fuelling the economy of major Western European nations. All these countries had colonies scattered round the globe and their industries were fuelled by raw materials produced by the native labors of the colonies.

Marx had argued that communist revolution spearheaded by the working class (or the proletariat) was inevitable in advanced industrial nations. It was in the rational self-interest of that class to create such revolution and alter what Marx called the ‘relations of production’ to keep pace with the ‘means of production’. He felt people were led to misrecognize reality by false ideas which were put into circulation. Marxism did triumph and the 20th century saw the rise of egalitarian states as dreamt by previous visionaries. The capitalist forces stumbled across the globe giving rise to states based on the concept of communism.

Capitalist counter-revolutions were also sweeping the globe with the United States leading the party. Finally, religious fundamentalism (who are only but allies of capitalist ruling class) and CIA conspiracy aided by Pentagon made to survival difficult for the Leftist block. Of course, there were irregularities and corruption within the state system of the Communist bloc that made it difficult to survive. However, some communist nations still survive as pariah nations. Ferocious market economy has made the very conception of Communism obsolete. One might go as far to say that the former communist nations are themselves to blame since they had everything in common with the modern day military regimes (with censorship, totalitarianism, state-sponsored oppression). As military regimes around the world are the finest examples of the American policy of ‘regime change’, states were forcefully turned communistic by the Soviet Union. Former Czechoslovakia is the finest example of that.

People often fail to distinguish between Marx and Lenin. Antonio Gramsci comes to their aid distinguishing intellectuals as traditional and organic with the organic prioritized because he is able to change the society through revolution. Lenin was an organic intellectual who implemented Marxist theory while Marx remained an intellectual in the traditional sense. Of course, there is no denying the role Ché Guevara, Mao Tse-Tung or any other great revolutionaries in shaping the history of proletarian struggle. “Revolution” is what made Marx’s ideas come to reality. Such revolutionaries now only seem a mere shadow of the bygone century. What the 21st century has in store for us?
Bangladesh as many argues has experienced “revolution” with the present CG govt. taking control of the state after the political parties failed to hold on to a crippling democracy that ran for almost sixteen years. Bengalis fought a glorious war of liberation to free themselves from imperial hegemony, religious fundamentalism and oppression of the poor and helpless by the rich. But soon a system was erected to ensure a permanent military-bureaucratic exploitation of the masses. Is the current govt. at the helm is truly ‘revolutionary’? A rational mind will say it is not; a military-elitist (sushil samaj) takeover aided by the bourgeoisie can never be a revolution.

Moreover, democracy has been dormant for months now. As the days are galloping by it seems the naughty elite has finally got a firm grip upon the state. Begging for advice from the ADB and WB has become regularity. Privatization has become one of the ways to make the rich richer. And then there is the army to instill fear upon the public. The arrests of the DU teachers plainly serve as a better example.

True, our democracy failed partially due to the short-sighted politicians. They not only failed to bolster the parliament with hotly contested constructive debates but also indulged in rampant corruption irrespective of the ruling party or the opposition. The nation has failed to grasp the immense potential it has in terms of manpower as well as national wealth (gas, coal etc). The bully-boy BNP-Jamaat alliance govt. left no stones unturned to sell the gas and coal to the multinationals waiting to pounce upon the Third World wealth. The AL govt. was not an exception either. Now where will the Bangladeshi public go from here? Is there no way out for them or they are just stranded in the cul-de-sac of dirty oligarchic politics?

The questions asked will only be answered in the future. In the meantime, we can only hope for a similar U-turn taken by many Latin American rulers to lessen American hegemony. But that too seems impossible for us. The rise of Islamist neo-cons is an eerie sign. They have extended their complete support to the present state of the nation. It’s a heaven for them to promote religious laws to subjugate, oppress the masses further and they have grabbed their opportunity to the fullest only to serve the rulers’ interests. But the most beneficiary is the business community. That’s why syndicates still exist to raise price of the essentials. New multinationals are also flocking to exploit our weaknesses to the fullest. The beneficiaries again are the elite and a certain section of the growing middle-class. Others are just busy trifling and aimless loitering in the murky waters of globalization in the false hope of shaping their future.

The solution lies within the public. They must rise to explore their potential to the fullest. History is full of impetus with the recent Phulbari & Kansat uprising, the glories of 1969, 1971 and the 1990 uprising to bring an end to military dictatorship. This road to freedom is by no means easy. They must stand up to the ill motives of the elitists, religious fundamentalists and their perfect ally “the good for nothing bourgeoisie”. The military-bureaucratic forces might prove difficult to beat but their ignominy in the face of mass uprising is a part of the glorious history of mankind. The people must beat out the burden of history to re-create history itself.