From the perspectives of expatriates all that a civilian Government would achieve would be that the hands of a relative of some and not the others will be on the till.
Should we opt for NGOs? Remember NGO’s function as the covert arm of the Imperium, distracting attention from failure of the state to do its job. The edge of conflict is dulled. People are de-politicized. The march to revolution is slowed. The incentive to confront the jackals is diminished. But for the NGO band-aid, people might rise in desperation. “Marta Na To Karta Kya” (roughly do or die).
We must not ignore the fact that most NGOs are funded by corporations. There is no free lunch. If you accept money, you follow the dicta. NGO’s in South Asia are if any thing more beholden to the US government, the overt arm of Global Capital. States have interests and not friends. Human rights are not even their medium priority, even in their own country. Why would they put themselves out for Vani (barter of daughters), Gang Rape and honor killing in Pakistan? They condone even worse in Saudi Arabia, Egypt and Indonesia. They will topple dictators only when the latter defy them, when they calculate that they can get away with it, over running Iraq, bombing Libya and Somalia, invading Granada and Panama, subverting Iran, Haiti, Honduras, Chile, Venezuela, Guatemala, Nicaragua and El Salvador. They will only pay lip service to human rights when their strategic interests are not at stake; example North Korea. They will not even slap the wrists of tin pot dictators of client states. Banking on them is akin to living in a fool’s paradise.
But we have to use the available instruments. We participated in Student union affairs, as it was the easily accessible vehicle at hand. While looking for a more dynamic way we should not discount the NGO path taking care that they do not hijack our agenda. True and lasting social justice will be obtained through a political party of workers, the dispossessed and the politically aware intellectuals. Academic criticism of small groups of people over a period of time contributed significantly to mass and popular movements as happened in anti slavery, feminist and civil rights movements. We should do so with all the vigor at our command. Our rallies, protests and seminars might be worth it, if they resulted in heightened consciousness.
Let us, though, not forget that the movements were led by a vanguard with fire in their belly, and they were not funded by Governments. In any case no NGO has yet lighted the flame of an anti-establishment conflagration.
Does that leave us in a morass of ever deepening depression? Are south Asia, Mid East and Africa hopeless? Will Far East never emerge out of the slough of client statism? Will Palestinians be Red Indianised?
We live in a very small world and are no longer isolated. What ever affects one part of humanity has an impact on all of our species. The fate of Red Indians, indigenous people in New Zealand, Australia and the “primitive” tribes in Africa are, unfortunately, norms of history. Humans are believed to have dealt with near human Neanderthals in a similar manner. They became extinct. (Fascism is a throw back too. It tried to exterminate Jews. Zionists are ironically enough trying to follow suit).
But times have changed. There is hope. In the era of instant communications, the Imperium and its agents can not get away with what the Europeans, mainly the British, the pioneers of biological warfare, got away with, in the preceding several centuries. (In return for the hospitality, shelter and protection native Indians offered them, they gave their hosts blankets impregnated with small pox exudates. With no immunity, they died like flies). Poison gas was used by the British against the Iraqis post WWI. Churchill, in charge of the offensive openly declared that use of gas against inferior races was justifiable.
Palestinians and Bosnians have not been exterminated. They have, indeed, been transplanted, as the Jews did, to the West and give sustenance to the parent tree.
Historical process is on the side of the people of Pakistan. It and the rest of under developed world, is groaning under the burden of the Imperium and their toadies. They will progress from the current feudal/tribal, fascist dispensations to a Capitalist society. Democracy will follow. Remember, it took European capitalism several centuries to break the shackles of the Royalty-feudal combine; the latter actually helped the demise by fighting the former. Capitalism inevitably leads to exploitation of the workers. They will eventually rise, not with standing the insidious impact of reformers and half hearted social supports systems. Capitalists sense the impending conflict and throw crumbs; witness the welfarism in post depression USA, post WWII Europe and post civil rights reforms in the USA again. Social justice will inevitably prevail.
The problem with this scenario is that it will take a long time. An unfortunate aspect of attempts at short cuts is that they not been very successful. One was the late and not much lamented Soviet Union. But they did not faithfully follow their prophet. Marx envisioned a fully industrialized society with acute class conflict where workers will rise and annihilate the oppressors. Lenin and Trotsky and their cohorts did manage to wipe out the feudal-royal oppressors. But they did not have a substantial working class. Russia was any thing but industrialized. They had to, in the first place, overthrow the socialist Government, abolish all the socialist measures introduced by that Government and impose a dictatorship. The process was subverted by machinations of international capital and nearly annihilated by fascist onslaught It is a not true that socialism failed in the Soviet Union. It was never introduced there.
The other attempt at accelerating the historical process was Mao’s revolution in China. China wan an agrarian society, ruled by feudal warlords engaged in incessant skirmishes. The country was in fiduciary bondage to imperial powers. Japanese aggression, take over by Chiang Kai Shek an under study of the colonizers and WWII, weakened the grip of the overlords. That gave Mao and his comrades a window of opportunity. They overcame the opposition. But they did not have an industrial base or workers either and had to impose a dictatorship as well. It had a more human face, though. Mao sent his opponents to farms rather than to gallows, as Stalin did.
The third rather more promising example is Cuba, which has so far been steadfast in a socialist path in spite of all the subversions and aggressions. It has inspired revolutionaries in Venezuela, Bolivia and many other countries.
A common thread that ran through all the “socialist” countries was that they overcame internal and external opposition, and made tremendous and fast headway in material progress. They were able to institute a welfare state, providing basic necessities, food, clothes, shelter, health care, education and jobs to all. That cannot be said of the richest and most developed countries. Capitalist democratic Russia had to withdraw all the social welfare supports. Capitalist countries were so frightened that third world countries would follow the development model of socialist countries that they poured aid into India to develop it as a showcase to rival China. This they did with obvious distaste, as they hated Nehru for his independent ways.
The current overwhelming trend at Globalization may be Marx’s dream come true. In the last several centuries it has been the national capital, marauding the colonies and warring with each other for the spoils. All the European countries, not excluding even the lowly Portugal, boasted of vast territories in their possession. But the character of Capitalism is changing fast. Now a conglomeration of national capital is emerging. Like divine religions they do not recognize national boundaries. They do not even pay lip service to the concept of nationality. At one time they used to allow a “trickle” down to their own countrymen. They do not any more. The components of International Capital have always invested in all countries, Japanese in the USA, the USA in the UK and so on. Now they are taking over water, and other resources and the land all over the world. They have patents on crops and manufactories, and they own mineral rights everywhere. Client states are crushed under the burden of loans euphemistically called aid; they have to accept IMF and World Bank dicta-reduce subsidies, increase interest rates, take harsh austerity measures, augment foreign currency reserves and make the life of their citizens miserable. At the end of the day they force client governments to hand over control of natural resources. If any demur, an explosion in the air, an insurgency, and if worse comes to the worst, a coup will take care of them.
But what distinguishes Global Capitalism from national capitalism is that the former does not even pretend to be solicitous of the welfare of the people of the first world. The new mantra is out sourcing. They had to pay a living wage, health benefits, unemployment and pension to workers in the USA. General Motors paid an average of $28.00 an hour to its workers. They pay $4.00 an hour to a South American worker for doing the same job -with no fringe benefits. Delphi, a GM subsidiary offered its workers $9.00 per hour instead of the current $27.00 per hour or lose their jobs. Welfare benefits do does not last long. Workers have to accept lower pay. Numerous other industries, airlines the foremost, have forced their workers to accept a drastic cut in their wages. Countless others have moved out of the country. Ninety percent of software industry is now in India. Shorn of the disguise of reduced wages and benefits, unemployment would be rampant in the USA.
I lived in the UK in 2001-2002. The same situation obtains there. They have a smaller economy so their unemployment rate is much higher. All the European countries are busy whittling away at the social support system introduced after WWII. The recent riots in France, at the moment affecting only the immigrants, are portentous of worse to come.
My submission is that when the ordinary humans of the first world will become economically destitute, and will be reduced to the state of the third world, they will rise in solidarity with all the dispossessed. Only then would the long and tortuous historical process will be shortened. And Marx may turn out to be a true prophet after all.
