As I was having lunch with
an American colleague of mine, the topic of discussion naturally veered towards
the American Primaries. I was pretty keen to know as to how an
anti-establishment, anti-foreigners and anti-minorities person like Donald
Trump is surging ahead in the Republican primaries and looks well set to get
the nomination from the GOP to run for the Presidential elections in November.
The simple reason, as my colleague told , was “Trump`s views
resonate with most of the popular views in USA now”. Closer to home we saw the
events in JNU wherein some students were arrested for anti-nationalism slogans
and a major debate is on as to whether people from a particular section will
say “Bharat Mata ki Jai”. Thus, the last few weeks have seen some interesting
events and trends which may redefine the global dynamics the years to come.
Why is it that suddenly, in
so called vibrant democracies like India and USA, we see suddenly see such
upsurges of nationalist fervour suddenly. As the saying goes “There is no
smoke without fire”. No doubt there has been some external instigation for the
events in the JNU and other campuses for these acts of anti-nationalists
however all these external forces tap into the pool of discontent. Similarly,
in a secular, multi-cultural society like in the USA why have Trump`s views
been lapped up by many people despite even the opposition by the Republican party?
I feel the answers lie in
the political dynamics that lie behind these issues which has caused lots of
heartburn amongst the various sections of the people. Looking at the issue in
India, the anti-establishment slogans have been raised by people who are
aligned not with the development agenda of the country but only purely with
political issues. Many sections of the society feel alienated from the
mainstream development agenda which fuels their angst over the lack of
improvement in their livelihood. One of the major reasons for this type of
inequality is the role played by the vested politicians who are interested in
using this “angst” to develop their vote banks and not essentially work for the
development. This is akin to a situation
of a “socialist” struggle wherein the oppressed fight against the wealthy
oppressors. The Communists made inroads into Bengal by supporting the causes of
the farmers against the landowners which helped rule the state for a very long
time. Similarly the communists sided with the trade unions against
industrialists in Kerala and thus ensured minimal industrialization. The
Congress party won an election using “Garibi Hatao” (remove poverty) about 45
years back but we still have poverty! Secondly, people have also seen massive
corruption eroding the development agenda.
Where does the answer lie
to resolve these problems? Simple, the government needs to pursue aggressively
the development agenda and ensure that development reaches to all sections of
the society which includes to all sections of various religions as well.
Weeding out of corruption by using effective and technology based solutions
like Aadhar, DBT, etc. will certainly help. The development agenda should
create jobs which will ensure that the youth will have productive work rather
than fall prey to unscrupulous parties which feed on the wavering mind of the
unemployed youth and lead them to unproductive ways.
The World Bank measures the
equality of development in a country using the term “Gini co-efficient” (GCE).
A higher GCE reflects more inequality in the society. A look at the GCE of
BRICS countries, USA and UK shows some interesting statistics. India has one of
the lowest GCE`s amongst the BRICS nations and has a better value than the USA
too!
Even though the GCE might
be an indicative economic number, the USA GCE figures probably explains the
reasons for the popularity of Trump whose election platform has been built on a
plank of American nationalism and re- building the USA to its past glory as a
true leader in the world. Average Americans are wary of not having enough jobs
being created for them with many jobs getting shipped out of America. They are skeptical of the rich getting richer like Wall Street operators, I Bankers, etc. On top of that their safety has also been
compromised with terror attacks linked to various religion based outfits like
Al - Qaeda and ISIS. These issues have been capitalized on by Trump who wants
to take the USA to glory for the Americans.
The Indian and US events
have a common solution – economic development and more jobs. Secondly, create a
platform by which the economic development reaches all sections of the society.
This might sound Socialist but it’s not. The key essence is to use a mix a
policy and systems to ensure development touches all aspects of the society.
To conclude, the debate on
nationalism will always be there in some form or other. However, it can be
mitigated with a powerful tool – economic development.
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