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Apropos of this thread, and an exchange with the good @KrantiSaran. A thread of my own on the events in India w.r.t Kashmir. A thread on how I see things normatively - as opposed to constitutionally. Do freely use the mute button if this is either trivial or uninteresting. 1/n
@KrantiSaran I begin by acknowledging that the Union of India – a Union of States - made an unprecedented historical achievement. It it committed itself to being a constitutional regime. Call this a commitment to Political Liberalism, a la Rawls. But this achievement has to be qualified 2/n
@KrantiSaran It was unprecedented because: i) it was a post-colonial achievement; and ii) low levels of what you might call social primary goods – income, wealth, education, and the social basis of self respect (India is after all a Caste society) 2a/n
@KrantiSaran It is not a ‘pure’ achievement. India is what you might call a “warts and all liberal regime.” This is obvious enough to anyone who knows India, but it needs to be emphasized because claims to the contrary have often been made by establishment intellectuals. 2b/n
@KrantiSaran Nevertheless, and even conceding these qualifications, constituting a liberal democracy is a credible achievement. Now, the source of my own anger and frustration at the events in India is that this achievement has been *quite decisively* undermined. How so? 3/n
@KrantiSaran Political Liberalism consists in a Rights based regime with certain Egalitarian provisions. Crucially, its legitimacy derives from the consent – take your pick on which account of consent matters – of those persons that the regime takes as its citizens 4/n
@KrantiSaran Further still, Political Liberalism takes the Right to be prior to the Good. What does this mean? 5/n
@KrantiSaran The bumper sticker version of this is of course those great opening lines from a Theory of Justice. For a more nuanced version of what this means, here, read the great man himself. homepage.univie.ac.at/herbert.preiss…
@KrantiSaran In the light of these two points, ie. consent and the priority of the right over the good, it is easy to see why the commitment to Political Liberalism that the Union of India made – its unprecedented historical achievement – has been quite decisively undermined. 7/n
@KrantiSaran This is because the Republic of India reneged on a constitutional commitment it made without the consent of those it would apply to, and it did so in a wrong way! This may need to be qualified and explained. 8/n
@KrantiSaran There is no way you are acting in good faith if you claim that what Modi and Shah have done - what agents of the Republic of India have done - was based on the consent of those being governed. 8a/n
@KrantiSaran As the good @pbmehta put this, “This is not the dawn of a new constitutional settlement, designed to elicit free allegiance. It is repression, plain and simple, reminiscent of the Reichstag or Chinese constitutional ideology” 8b/n
@KrantiSaran @pbmehta Crucially, it was wrong but - constitutionally speaking - legal. This is the crux of the issue of my claim that a commitment to Political Liberalism has been decisively undermined. If a constitution can mandate this then there is no way it can be a liberal democracy. 8c/n
@KrantiSaran @pbmehta Now, to be sure, one justification for what has happened is indeed to challenge the Priority of the Right over the Good. This seems to be the challenge that comes from the Govt, & those partial to the Govt. These are people I respect (despite our other differences). 9/n
@KrantiSaran @pbmehta Simply put (and this is indeed too simply put) the justification here is this: as long as we may bring about a good state of affairs, then we should not be to bothered about procedural issues - what makes something Right or Wrong. Let's scrutinise this claim. 10/n
@KrantiSaran @pbmehta There are many goods in public and private life. It is good to be a vegetarian, for example. But the question here is whether the State should use its power to enforce a good and stop you from doing bad things. Should it coerce you into doing what it takes to be good? 9a/n
@KrantiSaran @pbmehta There is a further issue. It is not obvious enough that what has taken place is in fact good (or even strictly better than the status quo). The burden of proof here is on the State, and thus far the argument seems to be “development”. 9b/n
@KrantiSaran @pbmehta How do we scrutinise this claim? Take two competing visions of development that played itself out in full public view in quite a nasty way a few years back in India. The Bhagwati-Sen affair. Let's not even take sides here. 9c/n
@KrantiSaran @pbmehta i) If you think development is freedom a la Sen, then there is no way this move expands the freedoms that Kashmiris enjoy. If anything, it curtails them further. 9d/n
@KrantiSaran @pbmehta ii) If you think development is all the Bhagwati stuff then, once again Kashmir is one of the most developed regions in the country. Per both accounts of development, there is no justification here. We have not moved to a good or strictly better states of affairs. 9e/n
@KrantiSaran @pbmehta But let us not put too fine a print on this undermining of Political Liberalism by challenging the Priority of the Right over the Good. Indeed, I take this challenge to be the most cynical and evil challenge that the political rise of the BJP represents. Let me explain. 10/n
@KrantiSaran @pbmehta A committed Hindutvawadi sees their historical mission to be one that reconstitutes a sacred geography. That is the good (or what is taken to be the good) that the political project of Hindutva wants to achieve. 11/n
@KrantiSaran @pbmehta Associated with achieving this good is a fundamental reconfiguration of the social relations. Persons are not to be seen as free and equal. They are Hindus & Muslims. Men & Women. Etc. Each identity has its own social position, & its associated social role in a hierarchy! 12/n
@KrantiSaran @pbmehta A promotion (or realisation) of this good instrumentalises every aspect of public life! We are all – Shah and Modi included – mere instruments in this political project of achieving this good of a reconstituted sacred geography and social relations within this geography! 13/n
@KrantiSaran @pbmehta It is this instrumentalisation of everyone and everything that explains the emergence of “if P, then what about Q” as a principle of Hindutva logic! It is not the truth that matters. It’s the goal of a sacred geography that matters, even epistemic norms will be violated for it!
@KrantiSaran @pbmehta This reconstitution of the Union of India to achieve the good of a sacred geography is the evil that I hope even those sympathetic to the BJP and RSS - but not committed to this vision of society - will acknowledge as a political project that needs to be resisted. 15/n
@KrantiSaran @pbmehta Finally, and it's worth emphasizing. I am not holding a candle for the ancien regime. That corrupt order represented by the Congress is on its last legs. This is about whether we hold on to Political Liberalism, ie. certain principles about how we organize our society. 16/16 End!
