Witoubou Newmai
There is a compelling need to start asking today as to why issues after issues are being engaged without the demand for ‘thought-through processes.’
As we notice that many of the issues are being dealt with without defining them properly, the thin line between illusion and reality is gradually diminishing. That is why we seem to have been communicating things while compromising the implications of real issues.
By way of informing, this writer has chosen to go for the broad reach as in this small space of editorial it will not be able to capture the whole gamut if the specifics are engaged.
To begin with, we would like to cite that case where, for so long, the illusion has also been invoked in our society “for the purpose of dividing people into uniquely hardened categories…” which are often “exploited in support of fomenting intergroup strife,” as discussed by Amartya Sen in one of his books.
When those “our rights” and “injustices,” which we often include in our menu of discourses, are well defined, room for rational engagements of the issues will prevail. However, since we have been getting illusionary questions, we have been getting away with illusionary answers for all this while. As such, there have not been effective communications. Because of this, narrow politics finds room to weigh in on almost every issue. This trend has been dividing us. And the larger problem is we are not talking about this to the required degree.
As we are placed in sequestered realms, and as we continue to embrace illusions, we do not have much room for effective communications. As such, our “local allegiances and loyalties” are virulently getting prominence every passing day, thereby even decimating all available scopes of progress at any rate rather than enlarging them, as had discussed in this column last week.
We believe that “local allegiances and loyalties” will be boons if effective communications prevail. Sen’s view can be reflected here as a way of illustrating the point discussed.
In his book, Identity and Violence (The Illusion of Destiny), the Nobel Laureate writes that the contemporary world needs to “ask questions not only about the economics and politics of globalization, but also about the values, ethics, and sense of belonging that shape our conception of the global world”. He continues by saying that, “In a nonsolitarist understanding of human identity, involvement with such issues need not demand that our national allegiances and local loyalties be altogether replaced by a global sense of belonging, to be reflected in the working of a colossal ‘world state’”. He added succinctly by saying, “In fact, global identity can begin to receive its due without eliminating our other loyalties.”
Given the issues of Global Warming or Climate Change and the virus issues such as the COVID-19 pandemic, the view of Sen is becoming even more relevant today.
By extrapolating this view to the context and situation of our small society here, we need to explore ways and means so that effective communications are involved to address the issue of persistent ‘sequestered realms' within our society which are virulent in manner.
The whole point is: Unless we think through the issues confronting us, effective communications cannot prevail, and we will continue to have illusionary answers to our problems.
