Democracy: Slide or Surge

Observers note that there is a democratic slide globally. This I find a misdirected approach. Such observers fallaciously identify democracy with the values and norms of a particular ideology, the parameters of political correctness of a historical period. On the contrary, what I see across continents is a populist swell. Demos become more demanding. The reality is that there is a democratic surge around the world. 

At the same time, one can not deny that problems are getting severe internationally and within nation-states. Climate change, for instance, poses an existential challenge for many people. Among states, irredentism is back in fashion. There are strifes and upheavals in many corners, and even metropoles see fires blazing frequently. 

The problem is not with democracy but with the global political-economic ecology. The autonomous and logical trajectory of democratic evolution, which led to the collapse of Communism and was channelling human agency through LPG to international harmony and prosperity, was stalled rather deliberately. Democracy was riding neoliberalism to become global, but as it threatened the entrenched forces and vested interests, the threatened ones broke the vehicle to which the naive academia lent moral support.  

Aspirations that neoliberalism led to rise now become pent-up feelings seeking outlets. 

Niraj Kumar Jha 

Neoliberalism

 The joining years of the twentieth and the twenty-first centuries were the finest years in the history of humanity. The world was integrating and people, in general, were prospering. People had better ease of life and livelihood. More and more people could relish facilities like dining out, driving long, and flying, a preserve of the rich only earlier. The so-called poor were feeding themselves better and had access to better things which make living worthwhile. More pertinently, everyone had got clarity about the means of moving ahead, and a fair number of examples before them. The humanity momentum, which was bringing forth this, was designated as neoliberalism. Indeed, it was the revival of the suppressed wisdom of humanity gained over the millennia-old struggle for the common good. Let me clarify this, neoliberalism is not primarily an ideological construct, it is a general sentiment for living better, peacefully and harmoniously, which gets vented in different theoretical formulations. 

This state of affairs was not to the liking of everyone. The cumulative heartburns of the privileged on seeing the hitherto underclass sharing spaces with them erupted in many holy forms. They were ever hateful of neoliberalism but rallied to crush it seeing its outcome. They have succeeded but gains are not lost wholly. The underclass needs to see the reason and voice their understanding. 

Niraj Kumar Jha  

Neoliberalism

Liberalism, let me reiterate, is not an ideology. It is an ecology created by the secular play of human faculty and agency. The great theorists who dwelt on the liberal ideas and institutions were mostly articulating what was already happening. This is to say that liberalism is a phenomenon unfolding without the help of any doctrine. It is the manifestation of the common human drive for property and autonomy. In other words, men and women in their pursuit of dignity and happiness create the ecology of liberalism. Neoliberalism was its phase when it corrected itself from its welfarist drift. But, the lordships and their devotees prevailed and the world is again under their glorious spell.

Niraj Kumar Jha

Neoliberalism or Neoabsolutisms

Literati's incessant cannonade reduced neoliberalism to rubble. And thus, they decided the fate of the twenty-first century. For the first time in human history, literati had got the opportunity solely to set the course of humanity.

Niraj Kumar Jha