2010 Presidential Election: Nationalism or Liberalism?

By ‘kathika’ study circle

(January 21, Colombo, Sri Lanka Guardian) The 2010 Presidential election is a critical juncture in Sri Lankan history. The people have realised this as well, as is seen by the sheer density of discourse that has taken place over the past days and weeks. As it appears, the Sri Lankan public has sharply divided itself between the two main contending camps in the election, and it is our position that the severe conflict that can be seen between the two main camps is based on the discourses of nationalism and liberalism which are taken to be antithetical to each other. Analysing these belief systems, and the ways of life built on them are pre-requisites of truly understanding this election.

If the nationalists believed that nationalism was established as the dominant ideology in Sri Lanka following the victory in the war against the terrorism of the LTTE, arguably, this election clearly shows that liberalism has established itself in Sri Lanka as a force that is capable of levelling a serious challenge to nationalism.

Whichever of the two camps win the election, the victorious side may seek to impose its ideological hegemony on the opposing camp. In such instances, the clash between nationalism and liberalism may be aggravated, giving rise to long drawn out antagonism in our society. This in turn will further strengthen the autocratic tendencies prevalent in our society thereby exposing us to the danger of massive social instability in the long run.

We believe that the responsibility of those who, at this moment, wish the well being of Sri Lankan society, is to direct our social imagination to avoid this impending threat. As free thinking citizens, it is our job to go beyond acting for the victory of the camp to which we are partial.

Liberalism establishes itself

That liberalism has been able to pose a severe challenge to Sinhala nationalism in the Presidential election shows that the liberal ideology has entrenched itself in Sri Lankan society, and that a new social class that has embraced the liberal way of life and is capable of exerting a heavy influence on Sri Lankan society has established itself in our society.

It is this new, urban, middle class that has been able to inject a new lease of life into the bourgeois class of Sri Lankan society that first emerged on the basis of the capitalist economy and the bourgeois liberal democratic institutional system established in the country under colonialism. The conservative social strata provided a solid political support base for them.

On the other hand, this new class consists of a group that aspires for and values the individual freedom that is necessary to improve their economic and social status within the market economy. The most immediate reasons for the emergence of this social class can be found in the economic and social changes that were brought about by the 1977 J.R. Jayewardene regime that undermined all democratic institutions of the country and established an autocratic constitution. A foundation for these transformations was provided by the private sector displacing the state sector, the establishment of a liberalised economy and a market, and the encouraged growth of the NGO sector.

The children of the urban and suburban middle classes that emerged on the basis of a liberalised economy embraced the entertainment industry intellectualized under the term “popular culture” that has been globalized with the help of satellite technology, and made their theory a “post modernism” that presented a nihilism, rejecting liberal humanism, however, only to retreat to liberalism later.

Nationalism: anxiety over capitalism?

Consumerism and the social organisation unleashed by capitalism threatens the collective foundation of human society. Nationalism in the present era utilises for their gain the need on the part of the people to resist this threat. Therefore, given the aspirations of the people who support nationalism, it is not a mere manifestation of the anxieties generated due to the conditions released by capitalism, but is a representation of a sense of collectivity, community. When there is a threat to the cultural basis of one’s collective life, when the market logic of capitalism begins to take hold of everything social including art and culture, the people’s aspirations to resist it, is utilised by nationalism for its political gain.

While Sinhala Nationalism experienced a resurgence in recent times as a reaction to globalisation, with the war, nationalism presented to our political scene the idea of thinking about the country or the common good, instead of only the stomach or other felt needs.

After the 2005 presidential election all the efforts of Sinhala nationalism were geared to support the state to defeat the terrorism of the LTTE. In the context of the war, nationalism established its hegemony over the Sri Lankan political scene. However, Sinhala Nationalism has not been able to formulate and affirm a future vision for Sri Lankan society beyond committing itself to gain victory in the war. Since the war ended nationalism has not been able to present to the people with significant reasons to give priority to the common good over the felt needs.

That consumerism accompanying capitalism has taken root among the strata of rural people supporting Sinhala nationalism shows that Sinhala nationalism has not been able to formulate a convincing alternative to capitalism or consumerism. It seems that its purpose is also building the nation on the basis of capitalist economic development.

It appears that nationalism has placed its faith on strengthening the state as an alternative to liberalism, and that it acts on the basis that state centred mega development projects would bring about common economic prosperity. Nationalism emphasises expanding employment opportunities in the state sector, minimising the abuse of alcohol and drugs, and protecting the well being of the children with the view that such measures will challenge liberalism and strengthen nationalism.

The concept of the national economy or the Jathika Arthikaya as presented by the nationalists amounts to following modernist theories that take the economy as the foundation of society at the expense of the realm of ideas, that is, culture and politics. Taking the model of Burma or any other country as an alternative to liberalism is similar to the modern thinking of the liberals who take Singapore, Malaysia or some such country as their model.

The modernist discourse on “social problems”

What underlies the idea of fighting corruption, fraud, waste and lack of discipline, all of which are a vital part of the liberal camp’s election promises, is the sense that the freedom of the individual based on the rule of law has been taken hostage by the state. Legislating and enforcing strict laws against fraud and misuse of public funds and the abuse of state power by politicians and bureaucrats are necessary for affirming the freedom of the individual based on the rule of law.

If fighting corruption and wastage, and lack of discipline is taken as a mere issue of management what is required to solve them is stern rule enforced from above. Instead, if they are taken to be social phenomena then we have to reflect on how we can collectively become disciplined, law abiding, and honest people by ourselves.

That we are inclined to make men good by an autocratic rule imposed from above is a consequence of the absence of a political dialogue among the public. It is the result of a society which is unable to cultivate collective ethical judgment for our own actions. It is this ethical dimension that is missing in the liberal political agenda which views social phenomena as problems to be solved by improved management practices. It is the same issue that nationalism fails to address within its model of state centred development.

Liberalism, in its project to restrain the state, considers establishing good governance under the rule of law by formulating the correct constitution and safeguarding the rights and freedoms, as the essence of politics. Therefore, it does not place its faith in a politics based on the active participation of the public. Liberalism simply wants the public to collect its votes.

Interestingly, in the run up to these elections, the discourse on discipline first came from the direction of the nationalist state, particularly in the aftermath of the war. It was said that development needs strict discipline. Experts came forward to say that the priority should go to discipline and not democracy. Thereafter, recently, the discourse on discipline helped to formulate the main slogan of the opposition camp.

We need to reflect upon why we have come to the position where people seem to accept that even a dictator will be good to salvage us from the problems we face in our inability to act on behalf of our collective good. By praising military dictators for their role in bringing about economic development and thus ignoring all the repression of political freedoms they carried out, are we saying that we are ready to forgo political freedom in order to achieve economic development?

The belief in a development programme or a leader who will deliver us from all our “social problems” arise from the modern belief that “social problems” have simple, easy solutions, and from the modern sociological discourse that simplifies social phenomena as mere “social problems.”

Nationalism? Or Liberalism? “Yes, Please!”

It is a characteristic of the human condition that humans desire to bring one’s unique individuality to a level of excellence as a part of something higher than oneself, that is, a collective or community that gives meaning to one’s life. Modern man and woman cannot satisfactorily fulfil this need from either liberalism or nationalism.
The social phenomenon released but not addressed by liberalism is the individual alienated from the world. Liberalism is indifferent to the idea that there are things in this world higher than the individual. Nationalist on the other hand is unable to address the fact that under the changed conditions in the world, the freedom of the individual, social plurality and diversity have to be essential components of modern communities.

It is our view that we can imagine a way of reconciling the conflict between liberalism and nationalism, by treating them not as enemies but as representing supplementary elements in their essence, and thus allowing the two ideologies to enrich each other.

Instead of simplifying the notion of the free individual to a self-oriented individual completely free of society (or a deontological individual as critics of liberalism would say), we could consider the free individual as the one who tries to achieve excellence within the community within the freedom available to manifest one’s unique individuality, that is, as an active citizen. Similarly, we could consider the space that enables the individual to achieve excellence in public life as the community. In this manner we could cultivate a social imagination that would address the dual social phenomena faced by liberalism and nationalism. If the individual is independent of the community and has no ties to the community, his/her relationship to the community may become one of mere commerce, thus endangering the fate of the community.

The notion of community represented by nationalism has a future not in the notion of ‘development’ but in the idea of active citizenship. The objections to the idea of community as such, seems to be raised from the perspective that it is necessarily homogenising. Nationalism expects such a homogenisation. Under the changed conditions of the world, if nationalism suppresses the (ethnic, religious and other forms of ) plurality and diversity that is the basis for the freedom of the individual, then such nationalism will be rejected by the people.

What is the common good we desire?

Liberalism and nationalism each in its essence manifests two different ways of organising our collective life. While liberalism desires the establishment of a social organisation centring on the individual, the essence of people’s aspirations that support nationalism lie in an idea of a social organisation centred on the collective.

We have to ask ourselves whether the common good we desire for our collective existence is one centred on the individual or the collective. This is the main point on which we must have a consensus, and not on what economic or social policies will be followed by us, for these are mere details we can discuss once we reach agreement on the idea of the common good.

The issues we confront in relation to democracy are tied with the bourgeois, liberal, representative democracy we have embraced as a manifestation of our modernity which stems from our legacy of colonialism. We need not take liberal democracy as the end of historical, universal, political evolution. History does not determine our existence. On the contrary, it is we who determine our existence. We can organise the world in which we live in a different manner.

The problem modernity faces with regard to the state is that the modern state has become the tool of collective economic management. Hence, the politics of liberalism is the politics of restricting the state. If we accept that ‘the state is the union of citizens,’ then the responsibility of the state becomes organizing the space of political discussion for its citizens.

With apologies to Slavoj Zizek from whom, the formulation underlying the title (Nationalism Or Liberalism? “Yes, Please!”) of this article is derived.

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