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Why dissent fails

By Supriya RoyChowdhury

The close intermeshing of capitalism and war is recognised but that recognition never becomes a paradigmatic foundation of the critique of such military actions.

ALTHOUGH ALL wars — — in so far as they are, primarily, creators of great human suffering and pain — are in principle unjust, in the affairs of nations the distinction between just and unjust wars is not irrelevant. Seemingly, self-defence, the destruction of evil tyrants and aiding a helpless ally are the conditions which underlie the concept of a just war.

In the case of the present crisis in Iraq, the overwhelming weight of international public opinion has established beyond debate the unjust character of the Anglo-American invasion of Iraq. Popular anti-war demonstrations have been staged on a scale unprecedented in recent history. But if indeed this invasion could take place in a manner whereby power-holders could so easily brush aside popular opinion and international institutional obstructions, what is the role of the public, of critique? What value, then, to ascribe to dissent?

This question is not meant to detract from the positive value of dissent, however ephemeral its impact, and whether felt in the immediate present or in the future. Indeed, spontaneous and organised expressions of dissent in all corners of the world have provided the only anchor for the global repugnance towards the invasion of Iraq.

No matter how small the gathering of protesters, how fragile the voices raised, and how disparate the political contexts in which these protests have been voiced, it is that collective voice, indeed, which holds out the only hope that such an astounding denial of democratic norms, a stunning parade of hypocrisy, would not happen in future on the international stage. But how real is that hope?

What is the framework within which, in the future, the global critique of the Anglo-American invasion of Iraq would find its instruments? As the invasion consolidates itself, we need to definitively confront the fact that the dissenting opposition failed. Therefore, the most imperative need now is to examine the possibility of developing institutional and ideological instruments that could address such a situation more effectively in the future.

Here, there are basically two questions that face us at the present time. First, the issue that we really need to address is, what is the relationship between dissent and democracy in a context where the logic of numbers provides Governments the necessary sanction to pursue a course of action that is widely opposed by large numbers of the critical public. Thus, in the United Kingdom, thousands of people walked in anti-war demonstrations, and key members of the Cabinet resigned in protest against the aggression. Nevertheless, the majority in Tony Blair's Labour Party, as well as the Conservative Opposition, gave him the necessary mandate to join with the invasion.

Thus, even as the political establishment was vertically divided on the question of the invasion, and public opposition to the invasion resounded strongly within British society, the fact that Mr. Blair was going ahead, strictly speaking, with the mandate of Parliament, dramatically highlighted the failure of the democratic apparatus to reflect the spirit of a society on a most crucial issue of war and peace.

In the United States, public demonstrations lacked the vigour of the storm of protests that were witnessed in Europe. And yet, much that has happened in the U.S. by way of reasoned critique — by and large missed by the print media — has come across powerfully over the electronic media, through websites and newsletters representing America's progressive forces. Women's groups, dozens of religious leaders, including winners of the Nobel peace prize, a large number of journalists, intellectuals, NGOs, have voiced protests. This is only to be expected in a highly plural society. But even within the political establishment, there have been voices of dissent, from elder statesmen with an international peace profile, such as Jimmy Carter, as also from politicians within the current political mainstream. Thus in a speech delivered on the floor of the U.S. Senate on March 19, Senator Robert Byrd of the Democratic Party put forth one of the severest indictments of U.S. aggression, highlighting both the foundations of it in American political arrogance, and the pitfalls of such politics for America's future international image. His speech ended with the statement "today I weep for my country". Edward Kennedy, another senior Democrat, asked "we will certainly win the war, but how do we win the peace"?

Such voices, many and varied, have of course been ineffective in confronting the pro-invasion forces. It is not clear what is reflected in the widely publicised figure that 70 per cent of the U.S. public supports the invasion, but certainly the dissenting voices do detract from the impression that the political establishment — which has presented the appearance of a tightly knit, impenetrable rock of unabashed, hardcore imperialism — is homogeneous and united in supporting the war. What needs to be underlined once more, however, is the failure of the democratic apparatus to effectively carry these dissenting voices, in a context where the logic of numbers legitimised the invasion.

What democratic theory and practice must now address, then, is the uneven relationship between a society's numbers and its conscience. Second, anti-invasion protests in many developing countries have taken the form of anti-U.S. sentiment. The demise of communism and the onset of globalisation have indeed brought the U.S. closer to many erstwhile Left-leaning countries such as India. Here, the Iraq invasion has provided an opportunity for a somewhat nostalgic harping back to anti-imperialist slogans, including, for example, calls to boycott American goods such as Kellogg's cornflakes, Pepsi and the like. The weakness of such protestations needs to be underlined. No voice has been raised against our continuing openness to American multinationals, to loans from the World Bank, and other deep structural dimensions of a poor nation's dependence on American capitalism, which intensify the vulnerabilities of the poorest sections, while enhancing the opportunities of the privileged. For the latter, giving up on Kellogg's cornflakes and Pepsi would represent a quaint, short-term symbolic critique of the U.S., without endangering the multiple points of contact with the U.S. economy and culture on which we thrive. Also, this kind of pseudo anti-imperialism is based on a completely inadequate understanding of the anti-Western foundations on which much of the pan-Islamic movement, however misguided its impulses, is premised.

Thus, the genuineness of the spirit of dissent in contexts such as ours can perhaps not be doubted; but given the complete bondage of elite sections here, economically and culturally, to the enticements of U.S.' capitalism, we need to recognise the highly inadequate character of our dissent, shaded with a little bit of self-righteous hypocrisy. In the end, of course, the reality of the power of American capitalism and military might is what underlines the weakness of dissent, whether in the U.S., Europe or India. To the extent that the invasion is driven by U.S.' interests in Iraq's oil, the close intermeshing of capitalism and war is recognised but that recognition never becomes a paradigmatic foundation of the critique of such military actions.

Dissent thus remains confined to expressions of moral indignation, but can hardly take a definitive step towards attacking a complex system of accumulation and its justificatory ideas from which such aggression naturally stems.

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