Filed under: Indian Subcontinent | Tags: Adivasis, Afghanistan, Armenian Genocide, Arundhati Roy, Authoritarian, Ayodhya, Babri Masjid, BJP, Capitalism, Chhattisgarh, Communalism, Dalits, Developing Countries, Fascism, Free Market, ganga, George Bush, Gujarat, Hindu, Hindutva, India, Jharkhand, Kashmir, L.K. Advani, liberal democracy, Mohammed Afzal, Mumbai Attacks, Muslim, Narendra Modi, Non-Aligned Movement, Orissa, P. CHidambaram, Pakistan, Ram Janmabhoomi, Soviet Union, Totalitarian, West Bengal
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3 July 2009
Source: Outlook India
While we’re still arguing about whether there’s life after death, can we add another question to the cart? Is there life after democracy? What sort of life will it be? By democracy I don’t mean democracy as an ideal or an aspiration. I mean the working model: Western liberal democracy, and its variants, such as they are.
So, is there life after democracy?
Attempts to answer this question often turn into a comparison of different systems of governance, and end with a somewhat prickly, combative defence of democracy. It’s flawed, we say. It isn’t perfect, but it’s better than everything else that’s on offer. Inevitably, someone in the room will say: ‘Afghanistan, Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, Somalia…is that what you would prefer?’
Whether democracy should be the utopia that all ‘developing’ societies aspire to is a separate question altogether. (I think it should. The early, idealistic phase can be quite heady.) The question about life after democracy is addressed to those of us who already live in democracies, or in countries that pretend to be democracies. It isn’t meant to suggest that we lapse into older, discredited models of totalitarian or authoritarian governance. It’s meant to suggest that the system of representative democracy-too much representation, too little democracy-needs some structural adjustment.
The question here, really, is: what have we done to democracy? What have we turned it into? What happens once democracy has been used up? When it has been hollowed out and emptied of meaning? What happens when each of its institutions has metastasised into something dangerous? What happens now that democracy and the Free Market have fused into a single predatory organism with a thin, constricted imagination that revolves almost entirely around the idea of (more…)
Filed under: Indian Subcontinent, North America | Tags: Afghan Refugees, Afghan Warlords, Afghanistan, Anastasio Somoza, Benazir Bhutto, Charlie Wilson, CIA, Condi Rice, Dictatorship, Extra-Judicial Killings, Fatima Bhutto, Fundamentalist, Fundamnetalism, India, ISI< Mujahideen, Karachi, Mumbai Attacks, Naserullah Babar, Nepotism, Nicaraguan Dictator, Northern City of Swat, Nuclear-Armed State, Pakistan, Pakistan Military, Pakistan Studies, Pakistani Diplomatic Mission, Patriarchy, Pentagon, Peshawar Model School, Right-Wing, saudi Arabia, Senator John McCain, Soviet Invasion, Taliban, Taliban-Style Justice, Texan Socialites, Third World, U.S. Congressman, United Arab Emirates, University of Texas, US Congress, Women's Struggle
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8 January 2009
Source: The Daily Beast
Why is the University of Texas naming a chair of Pakistan Studies after the notorious U.S. congressman who helped destabilize that country? Fatima Bhutto—niece of the late Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto—demands an answer.
Pakistan’s new government, the only in the world headed by two former convicts—who have their fingers on the button of a nuclear-armed state, no less—is nothing if not a keen purveyor of irony.
There’s currently an effort underway by the Pakistani diplomatic mission in Texas to raise funds for a chair of Pakistan Studies at the University of Texas in Austin. The chair, a dream of the Pakistani diplomatic community, is to be named after Charlie Wilson. For those who missed the movie, it’s worth noting that of all the people to name a chair of Pakistani Studies after, Charlie Wilson is possibly the stupidest.
Why Pakistan would chose to honor Wilson is beyond everyone, even the Texans.
“Good-Time Charlie,” as Wilson was affectionately known by Afghan warlords and Texan socialites alike, has the dubious reputation of being the godfather of what would later be known as the Taliban in Afghanistan. (He was also buddies with Nicaraguan dictator Anastasio Somoza.) In the 1980s, Wilson led Congress into supporting the CIA covert (more…)
Filed under: Indian Subcontinent, Middle East, North America | Tags: Al Jazeera, Anti-Imperialist, Arabs, Ariel Sharon, Collective Punishment, Colonialism, Counterinsurgency, Diplomatic Relations, fundamentalism, Gaza, Hindu, Hindutva, Imperialism, India, Indian government, Indian Troops, Israel, Israeli Weapons, Kashmir, Massacre, Massive Bombardment, Mumbai, Mumbai Attacks, Mumbai Terrorists, New Delhi, Non-Alignment, Obama, Obama's Silence, Pakistan, Pakistan's Foreign Policy, Pakistani Leftists, Palestine, Palestinians, Paletinian, Racism, Targeted Assissinations, Tel Aviv, Underdeveloped World, Underdevelopment, United States, Vietnam War, Warsaw Ghetto, Washington, White Supremacy, Zionist
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11 January 2009
Source: Counterpunch
The horror and the massacres continue in Gaza. The scenes of carnage being broadcast by Al-Jazeera are unbearably painful. Police stations, schools, universities, ministries, houses, crowded mosques, ambulances, paramedics, etc. were and are being targeted by the Israeli air force and now ground troops have entered to “finish the job” as the Israelis call it. Hundreds of innocents have been killed and thousands injured and there seems to be no end in sight. This is not a war but a massacre of a population that has been deprived of everything for more than 18 months by the Israeli embargo and is now being bombed to oblivion. The nearest equivalent is the massacre of the Jews in (more…)
