Voice of the people!

Though India’s chief economic adviser and officials in the finance ministry see opportunity in adversity, Brexit threatens to be a much bigger crisis than the financial crisis of 2008. With rising xenophobia, unstoppable march of Europe’s little Trumps, increasing frequency of global terrorism and dwindling benefits from neo-liberal capitalism, it appears that the world may plunge into perhaps an existential crisis if the domino effect of Brexit spreads like wild fire. Make no mistake that EU — a political-economic union of 28 states with 508 million people that has helped Europe to leave behind ravages of two world wars and maintained peace for more than half a century — appears vulnerable. Not less significantly, United Kingdom (UK) has almost splintered along region, age, class, ethnicity and religious denomination with Scotland, Northern Ireland and London voting in favour of remaining, and England and Wales voting to leave. Seems like the adage ‘Great Britain is dead and ‘Long Live London’ has gained currency!

I recently travelled from Johannesburg in South Africa to Europe before the referendum. Broken highways, bankrupt cities, rusted bridges, failed schools, and the large army of unemployed, the underpaid and the old and retiree population welcomed me everywhere.  Much worse. From the sleepy college café in Cambridge to bustling infamous terror streets of Molenbeek  and charming spas in Budapest, the only thing that resonated in every conversation was immigration and more precisely fear of strangers. My policy researcher friends were as much troubled as poets and writers about strangers allegedly taking away their land, jobs, welfare benefits and also culture and identity. Perhaps Brexit could have been averted if David Cameron, the Conservative Prime Minister, had succeeded in persuading English voters that migrants contribute to the English Exchequer. Or Brexit could have been delayed if the leader of the labour party Jeremy Corbyn had not   inexplicably abandoned the English working class and the ageing middle-class population.  In other words, both the Right and the Left wittingly or unwittingly played havoc with the collective destiny of British people.

With 71.8% turn-out and more than 30 million people voting in the referendum, the Leave group won by 51.9% (1,74,10,742 votes) against the 48.1% (1,61,41,241 votes) of Remain group. That such a small margin could lead to the birth of what Hannah Arendt in her hauntingly seductive phrase called ‘the horror of dark times’ really makes democracy a strange creature. Paradoxical it may sound or may be a bit idiosyncratic, I, however, read it as a tragic case of democracy (majoritarian) vs democracy (republican), capitalism (neo- liberal) against capitalism (classical) and globalization (progressive) vs globalization (regressive), aggravated by exceptional world-historical circumstances of furies of populism. It also shows increasingly the illegitimacy of the idea of a welfare state. In other words, a rare convergence of regressive features of democracy, capitalism and globalization has made Europe the breeding grounds for anti-European Union backlash. It is this ‘new nationalism’ arising out of a new globalism of xenophobia, racism and intolerance that has become the rallying point for populist insurgents in Europe. There is no denying that if globalization has enabled some labour-rich countries in the South to take advantage of the freer capital movements, larger markets and the new opportunities opened up by outsourcing, it has also made previously secure old working class white men in the rich North economically insecure and culturally vulnerable. In other words, we need to recognise that the system that has failed both ‘Remain’ and ‘Leave’ groups in UK is globalization of capitalism. Though ‘greed is good’ is often attributed to Adam Smith’s theory of invisible hands of market yet people forget that he also asserted that we are mutually sympathetic beings and capitalism had a moral and virtuous face as well. In short, capitalism in its classical version was deeply libertarian, humanistic and wondrously productive. No doubt, its finance capitalism phase had bred colonialism and imperialism of various sorts, but it still retained its liberal edge over alternative economic systems. But since globalisation began in the early 1990s, neo-liberal variety of capitalism that is based on the survival of the fittest and unregulated greed and lust of investment bankers and crony capitalists,  has become hugely problematic and highly inegalitarian. This version of capitalism is morally bankrupt, politically decrepit and utterly dystopian. It is this capitalism that has led to angry populism all over Europe. 

Ironically, on a positive note, there is a greater lesson for democratic politicians. Having recklessly called the referendum and led a botched up campaign, the outgoing British PM David Cameron has shown ‘catastrophic misjudgment’ in understanding the dangers of populism in ‘pure democracy’. In India, populist politicians and demagogues might learn from how Nigel Farage, UKIP Leader and supporter of the ‘leave’ camp, who declared that his victory will be the victory of ‘decent people’, ‘real’, ‘ordinary people’ has led the world to the brink of disaster. Referendum is a great ultimate weapon in the hands of the people to assert their sovereignty. But Brexit has shown that simplistic, uninformed and prejudicial yes or no answer-based referendum is too dangerous for democracy. Thus, a risk-taking radical politician or leader must think twice before evoking the name of the “ordinary people” or the “country wants to know” since the expression of collective/general will of undifferentiated people is myth in both theory and practice of democracy and is often the road to totalitarianism and serfdom. It is instructive to recall here why James Madison, one of the leading architects of American democracy, preferred republic (representative democracy) over direct democracy. Sounding caution against tyranny of majority or cabals of a few in pure democracy in his most celebrated federalist paper number 10, titled The Union as a Safeguard Against Domestic Faction and Insurrection, he asserted the need for an extensive Union to safeguard the public from the dangers of parochial attachments. 

To conclude, we need not fear the collapse of a unique and audacious idea of ‘Union’ of divergent countries, cultures, economies and identities with histories of mutual distrust and violence. What we must fear is the rise of xenophobia, blood-soaked casino-capitalism, populist Nietzschean politicians and arrogant bureaucrats of transnational governance. Though I was not readily amused when a quirky Facebook posts suggested that ‘Cameron needs to immediately apply for Britain to become a Union Territory of the Republic of India’, I do acknowledge that the time has come for bureaucratic European cosmopolitans to ‘embrace the 21st Century and Swap Brussels’ for Delhi, Patna and Bangalore. And ‘Say Goodbye to Little Europe and Namaste to Incredible India’! Perhaps the experience of India in managing contradictions of ‘ unity in diversity’ can be helpful to both ‘remain’ or ‘ leave’ groups, to make not only Britain, but also the world a more globalized, inclusive, egalitarian  and prosperous habitat!.   

The author is a professor of development studies at Tata Institute of Social Sciences,( Mumbai) and currently Senior Fellow of Indian Council of Social Science Research and one of the co-editors of Power Shifts and Global Governance; Challenges from South and North (Anthem Press; London)