Review: The Clash Within

Abstract

THE CLASH WITHIN Democracy, Religious Violence, and India's Future Martha C. Nussbaum Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2007. 403PP, US$29.95 cloth (ISBN 978-0674024823)The acts of genocide that were the Gujarat pogroms of 2002 are arguably the most shameful events in India's recent past. In response to a fire that had consumed a railway coach and killed 58 Hindu passengers returning from a religious pilgrimage, Hindus set out on a horrendously brutal rampage. In an organized and orchestrated manner, Hindu nationalists, with the blessing of the ruling party, targeted Muslim neighbourhoods, killing more than a thousand Muslims, raping and sexually torturing Muslim women, and burning and looting Muslim houses. The cause of the railway coach fire is still unknown, but while initially there were rumours that it had been set by Muslims, it is now speculated that kerosene oil stoves used by the pilgrims themselves were likely to blame. In her most recent book, Martha Nussbaum centres two important arguments around this particular episode: one relating to the resiliency of Indian democracy in the face of a crisis of religious minority accommodation, and the other suggesting that North American and European democracies might learn from India's experiences of accepting its pluralism and the complexities and tensions embedded in accommodating differences. In a perceptive examination of the Indian case, she points out that Huntington's thesis of a clash of civilizations - Islam versus the west - does not hold. Instead, she argues that the clash is fundamentally at two levels: at the macro level of the nation and at the micro level of the individual. In all nations, according to this view, there is a constant tension between those who accept differences and accord equal respect to others, and those, particularly among the majority, who seek homogenization and a single worldview. For the individual, the clash is between, on the one hand, the desire and urge to dominate and, on the other, the willingness and the obligation to live with others on equal terms, respecting differences whatever the consequences.In this passionately written and engaging book, Nussbaum takes us through a thorough analysis of the Gujarat pogroms. She explains why Gujarat was the site of this tragedy: it borders on Pakistan, has a more educated and urbanized Muslim population compared with the rest of India, was experiencing increased foreign investment and a weak labour movement, and had a poor education system of rote learning that failed to encourage critical thinking. In the course of her analysis, we are made familiar with different faces of the Hindu right; India's three founding fathers - Gandhi, Tagore, and Nehru; Indian constitutional principles enshrining both individual rights and group rights and the contradictions emerging out of these paradoxical principles; and the rise and dominance of the Hindu right and its assault on Indian history text books and scholars both within and outside India who did not support so-called authentic Indian history and the so-called positive image of the Hindu religion abroad.Although Nussbaum does not overtly posit a theoretical linkage between political institutions and the role of the political leadership and their vision, the resilience of Indian democracy can be attributed to the vision of the founding fathers (Gandhi the spiritual visionary, Tagore the educator, and Nehru the statesman with practical skills); the successful construction of its constitution; and the implementation of its various basic principles such as fundamental rights, judicial review, federalism, and the parliamentary system. …