THE much-punted possible merger between the Democratic Alliance (DA) and the Congress of the People (COPE) will succeed only if two fundamental issues are successfully negotiated. The one is leadership — who should be the face of the merged party? The other is ideological — should the merger continue in the DA’s libertarian vein or carve out a more progressive, social justice foundation?
The leadership question is easier to resolve — in theory. A lofty desire to make the world a better place is never the sole source of motivation for entering politics. Politics is ultimately about gaining power. Both the DA and COPE presumably desire at some point actually to govern SA. A crafty mixture of principle and pragmatism is needed to get there. This means accepting that the South African electorate would vote only a black-led party into power in the foreseeable future. Whether this is good or bad is neither here nor there. It is a fact. The implication is that a merger between the DA and COPE must have a black face.
This may be a bitter pill to swallow for some of the current DA leadership. After all, they are the official opposition with a much larger support base than COPE. However, they would be naive to negotiate a merger with COPE solely on the basis of this year’s election results. They must take account of likely patterns of voter behaviour in the future. But once you venture into that kind of crystal ball gazing — which itself, of course, requires some analysis of past voter behaviour — one inevitably faces the truth that racialism remains an important strand in voter decision-making. This means that if the senior leadership within the DA really cares about maximising the chances of a merger being bigger and better than both the DA and COPE, they must accept the strategic necessity of a black-led merger.
Fortunately — if reliable political sources close to the action are to be believed — most senior leaders within the DA understand this, including the parliamentary leader, Athol Trollip. It is not so clear that DA leader Helen Zille understands or accepts this. One cannot blame her. She has done well to keep the DA on an upward trajectory in its post-Leon phase and no doubt she would therefore want to cling to the personal power and career success that she has amassed.
But unless she, and other like-minded leaders close to her, can put the goal of maximising party success at the top of political priorities, a merger will be doomed. The white-led DA has reached a glass ceiling. A black-led merger presents the only chance of further growth.
Of course, even if it is accepted that a black leadership is important for strategic reasons, complications will remain. Who, exactly, among black leaders within both the DA and COPE could lead a merged party? Certainly not Mvume Dandala or Mosiuoa Lekota . Dandala has been a shoddy parliamentary leader for COPE. He should exit the political stage. Lekota, in his turn, has failed to build COPE structures on the ground and has lost all political fizz over the past months.
The only serious candidate within COPE for leading a merged party is Mbhazima Shilowa . Even then, Shilowa does not exactly have gigantic gravitas and needs to become a much better and more charismatic leader. If he were to lead a merger, a team of communications experts and political consultants would be a necessary part of the toolkit.
A black leader from within the DA ranks would be preferable, as that would mitigate against legitimate fears among the DA leadership that COPE stands to gain more than the DA from a merged opposition. The problem, of course, is that the DA has been shoddy at successfully nurturing or attracting senior black leadership.
How all this plays out will determine the success of a new outfit. For the sake of SA, it is necessary that the ruling party finally be given a serious run for its liberation money. Only a black-led merger can fulfil that role.
On the ideological front there may be even deeper disagreement. The DA has already made it clear it will merge only with parties that are willing to buy into its mantra of an open, equal-opportunity society for all.
Of course, that phrase sounds rather inviting but it is, in the first instance, vague and uninformative.
With deeper knowledge of the DA’s character, however, we can translate the notion of an “open, equal opportunities society for all” into simpler English. What it really means is that formal equality, such as equal treatment of all persons with no regards to cumbersome things such as social histories, are much more important than substantive equality. It means social justice interventions in the sociopolitical life of the country, which demand unequal treatment in order to ensure equitable outcomes and adequate redress of past, systemic inequalities, should be viewed with scepticism. This cannot be stated baldly and so Zille has to resort to euphemistic political phrases — but the libertarian undertones fool no one.
It is perfectly acceptable for any political party to be centre-right in its economic or social thinking. Political pluralism is not to be scoffed at. But such an ideological outlook will not see the light of day in SA in our lifetime. It is a recipe for remaining in the opposition benches. And, in fact, rightly so — it is callous to be ahistorical in crafting an ideological foundation for a country.
You must take account of the fact that Sipho Soap cannot pull himself up by his bootstraps because he does not have bootstraps. It is easy for his Caucasian competitor, Joe Soap, to do so — after all, Joe was born with bootstraps on his feet courtesy of the apartheid legacy of skewed, racially distributed economic and social goods.
The point is simple. A merged opposition would have to adopt a different tone and political identity from what some within the DA leadership would be comfortable with. That will prove the greatest stumbling block in creating a successful opposition to the African National Congress. It does not help that COPE still has no clear ideological foundation, let alone specific policies that flow from such a foundation. So it has little to bring to the negotiating table. When it does hastily put something together, it is to be hoped social justice principles will prevail and that all parties to the negotiation of a merged opposition can accept this alternative character for an opposition merger.
Perhaps most importantly, these two issues — who should be the face of the merger and what should be the character of the merger — should be discussed with detailed input from DA and COPE members and supporters to ensure legitimacy and grassroots buy-in. For the sake of defeating one-party domination, we should all hope an opposition merger is successfully negotiated before the next set of parliamentary elections.
http://www.businessday.co.za/articles/Content.aspx?id=89650
Tuesday, December 15, 2009
Friday, December 11, 2009
Context is no excuse for a leader's moral failure
THABO Mbeki deserves every bit of criticism for the unnecessary and costly mistakes he made during his presidency. These mistakes cannot be wished away by overemphasising the context within which they were made. We should, of course, give each other moral discount under appropriate circumstances for making mistakes. Equally, however, we are all responsible agents, who can rightly be blamed for wrongdoing as much as we should be praised for achievement.
This is why I disagree profoundly with an argument by Jonny Steinberg on this page earlier this week, in which he takes many to task for conveniently casting Mbeki as an “ogre” after his political death. This is a rather evocative accusation but one that does not stand up to critical scrutiny.
Steinberg does not claim Mbeki should be exonerated for all his errors. Instead, he engages in the increasingly popular activity of psychobiography writing — “situating” the man or woman within the “context” in which their decisions were taken. In this vein, Steinberg opines that it was always going to be difficult for Mbeki to succeed because “ he inherited a nation whose character and condition few had foreseen”. With this contextual picture of deep developmental and identity challenges richly painted, he argues that “Mbeki’s AIDS denialism is inseparable from this situation”.
The conclusion is that those who criticise Mbeki without due regard for the furniture in the universe within which he acted, “ have made him into an ogre … because (they) wish that what has departed with him is a country ill at ease with itself”. By implication, this says more about our “ wishful thinking ” than about Mbeki deserving the tag “ogre”.
This analysis is not convincing. There is a wide logical gap between understanding the context within which Mbeki acted and understanding the decisions he took. The implicit assumption is that Mbeki may have behaved differently but for these contextual facts. It cannot be a matter of psychological necessity that the facts about the country Mbeki inherited entailed AIDS denialism. No doubt Steinberg does not intend to imply this, but excessive contextualising can lead to this kind of unintended exoneration of political and moral wrongdoing.
Mark Gevisser made a similar mistake in his work on Mbeki. Unlike Steinberg, who looks to the facts of the country to explain Mbeki, Gevisser took the more inviting path of pop-psychologising about Mbeki’s early life. The short man had grown up in exile, without a biological father at hand, negotiating his way into adulthood without regular familial structural support and, lo and behold, could therefore not help himself to later make policy choices that included scepticism about orthodox science. Gevisser, like Steinberg, needs to mind the logical gap. Should we really believe that, but for these biographical facts, Mbeki would have acted differently? Is Govan Mbeki really the ultimate explanation for Thabo’s leadership sins?
Many world leaders had difficult childhoods but we do not routinely absolve them from moral responsibility for their mistakes. This points to a second weakness in Steinberg’s analysis. We are urged to understand Mbeki but understanding, in its turn, is not related to moral and political accountability. We can take a closer look at Mbeki’s AIDS denialism as a case in point.
Pop psychoanalysis may well succeed in offering us an explanation of Mbeki’s attitudes and actions. Assume, for sake of argument, some speculative facts. Imagine he was the victim of racial insults from white British students at Sussex. Imagine he was the victim of a racist hate crime or two, which further embedded a set of acrimonious attitudes towards his uncaring host country. A well- written story that digs up the full set of related facts, such as was attempted by Gevisser, is of great voyeuristic interest. Such a project certainly helps us as citizens to understand our leaders. In Mbeki’s case, we know many of his fellow cadres returned from exile with less racial baggage than him. This means we must look to the unique personal facts of Mbeki’s life to understand him. To that extent, I endorse a project such as Gevisser’s.
But — and this is the crux of the matter — does knowing the life history of Mbeki justify his poor political leadership on AIDS? Does it exonerate him, or even demand we give him some moral discount for bad behaviour? Does it justify Steinberg urging us to footnote the contextual facts about this ogre, including the forgotten silence of others around him? Surely not.
Mbeki is a deeply intelligent person, able to engage in reasoned decision making. He freely chose AIDS denialism. He is therefore morally and politically culpable. We may somewhat understand how he came to make these mistakes but understanding does not displace blame. Too many people died because of his needless self-indulgence, absent father or not. Mbeki earned the ogre tag. It certainly was not thrust upon him.
http://www.businessday.co.za/articles/Content.aspx?id=89369
This is why I disagree profoundly with an argument by Jonny Steinberg on this page earlier this week, in which he takes many to task for conveniently casting Mbeki as an “ogre” after his political death. This is a rather evocative accusation but one that does not stand up to critical scrutiny.
Steinberg does not claim Mbeki should be exonerated for all his errors. Instead, he engages in the increasingly popular activity of psychobiography writing — “situating” the man or woman within the “context” in which their decisions were taken. In this vein, Steinberg opines that it was always going to be difficult for Mbeki to succeed because “ he inherited a nation whose character and condition few had foreseen”. With this contextual picture of deep developmental and identity challenges richly painted, he argues that “Mbeki’s AIDS denialism is inseparable from this situation”.
The conclusion is that those who criticise Mbeki without due regard for the furniture in the universe within which he acted, “ have made him into an ogre … because (they) wish that what has departed with him is a country ill at ease with itself”. By implication, this says more about our “ wishful thinking ” than about Mbeki deserving the tag “ogre”.
This analysis is not convincing. There is a wide logical gap between understanding the context within which Mbeki acted and understanding the decisions he took. The implicit assumption is that Mbeki may have behaved differently but for these contextual facts. It cannot be a matter of psychological necessity that the facts about the country Mbeki inherited entailed AIDS denialism. No doubt Steinberg does not intend to imply this, but excessive contextualising can lead to this kind of unintended exoneration of political and moral wrongdoing.
Mark Gevisser made a similar mistake in his work on Mbeki. Unlike Steinberg, who looks to the facts of the country to explain Mbeki, Gevisser took the more inviting path of pop-psychologising about Mbeki’s early life. The short man had grown up in exile, without a biological father at hand, negotiating his way into adulthood without regular familial structural support and, lo and behold, could therefore not help himself to later make policy choices that included scepticism about orthodox science. Gevisser, like Steinberg, needs to mind the logical gap. Should we really believe that, but for these biographical facts, Mbeki would have acted differently? Is Govan Mbeki really the ultimate explanation for Thabo’s leadership sins?
Many world leaders had difficult childhoods but we do not routinely absolve them from moral responsibility for their mistakes. This points to a second weakness in Steinberg’s analysis. We are urged to understand Mbeki but understanding, in its turn, is not related to moral and political accountability. We can take a closer look at Mbeki’s AIDS denialism as a case in point.
Pop psychoanalysis may well succeed in offering us an explanation of Mbeki’s attitudes and actions. Assume, for sake of argument, some speculative facts. Imagine he was the victim of racial insults from white British students at Sussex. Imagine he was the victim of a racist hate crime or two, which further embedded a set of acrimonious attitudes towards his uncaring host country. A well- written story that digs up the full set of related facts, such as was attempted by Gevisser, is of great voyeuristic interest. Such a project certainly helps us as citizens to understand our leaders. In Mbeki’s case, we know many of his fellow cadres returned from exile with less racial baggage than him. This means we must look to the unique personal facts of Mbeki’s life to understand him. To that extent, I endorse a project such as Gevisser’s.
But — and this is the crux of the matter — does knowing the life history of Mbeki justify his poor political leadership on AIDS? Does it exonerate him, or even demand we give him some moral discount for bad behaviour? Does it justify Steinberg urging us to footnote the contextual facts about this ogre, including the forgotten silence of others around him? Surely not.
Mbeki is a deeply intelligent person, able to engage in reasoned decision making. He freely chose AIDS denialism. He is therefore morally and politically culpable. We may somewhat understand how he came to make these mistakes but understanding does not displace blame. Too many people died because of his needless self-indulgence, absent father or not. Mbeki earned the ogre tag. It certainly was not thrust upon him.
http://www.businessday.co.za/articles/Content.aspx?id=89369
Tuesday, December 8, 2009
Wicked irony in politicians painting themselves saviours
THERE is something abhorrent and disturbingly ironic about the Gauteng legislature’s portfolio committee on health and social development trying to take the moral high ground in answering the tough humanitarian question of what to do with Zimbabwean refugees at the Central Methodist Church (CMC) in downtown Johannesburg.
Removing children from the site seems to be their hasty short-term solution. A longer- term solution is not clear but a recommended closure is not ruled out. What is ironic and abhorrent about all this is the shameless attempt by the politicians to rock up with moral platitudes at hand and, with the help of a bevy of broadcast journalists, send out a message of deep and genuine care about the refugees’ wellbeing. How convenient — as if the crisis happened overnight and they did not or could not have reasonably been aware of it. The truth is that the nature and causes of the unfolding humanitarian crisis in downtown Johannesburg are more complex.
Unsurprisingly, the most appropriate interventions are not so obvious either.
First, Bishop Paul Verryn, who runs the place, is doing what the state is not doing but should be doing — attempting to give practical meaning to the human rights of refugees. Instead of acknowledging that this worsening crisis is symptomatic of a tissue of policy failures on the government’s part, the portfolio committee is trying to get brownie points for wanting to remove the most vulnerable among the refugees, the children.
But what is needed is not the arrangement of a photo opportunity. This, to be sure, will gain the state some political mileage. After all, who in their right mind would want to see children living in such desperately unsafe conditions? Objectively speaking, the unpleasant conditions at the church are not even appropriate for confident, healthy adults capable of looking after themselves, let alone vulnerable children who are exposed to potential sexual abuse and other forms of human rights violations.
However, recognising the nature of a problem is only the first step towards solving it. The second step is to understand the causes of the problem. These are , at least, twofold.
On the one hand, refugees are by definition foreign nationals who have escaped their country of origin because they are threatened in some or other way. The political violence that has been perpetrated in Zimbabwe by President Robert Mugabe for many years now has, as is well known, morphed into an equally, if not worse, protracted economic and social crisis.
The situation in Zimbabwe, despite the Global Political Agreement between the main parties, has not changed materially. In the absence of a safe political environment and one that is socioeconomically attractive by minimal standards of decency in terms of international humanitarian law, there is little reason for refugees to return. It would be imprudent and we would be immoral to compel them to.
On the other hand, government responses fuelled by a mixture of systemic xenophobia and sheer incompetence have worsened the conditions under which refugees survive in spaces such as the rough streets of Johannesburg. The simple fact is that harassment by police (well documented) of refugees living on the streets have forced many of them to seek shelter inside places such as the CMC.
Rightly or wrongly, the CMC responded to the moral dilemma by housing the large numbers of needy people rather than pushing them back into the den of an uncaring, xenophobic police force and local city. And herein lies the deep hypocrisy, abhorrence and irony of the Johnny-come-lately attitude of the politicians: they failed to show responsible political leadership in dealing with the refugee crisis in the first place and now attempt to look like moral saints while people with no political or legal responsibility to care about refugees, such as Verryn, come across inadvertently as unthinking citizens worsening the plight of foreign nationals.
In reality, but for the actions of people such as Verryn and spaces such as the CMC — imperfect though they are — the refugee crisis would be even worse.
So, with two major causes identified — continuing political instability within Zimbabwe and continued ill-considered state responses to refugees within SA’s borders — what are the best possible interventions?
First, the government should acknowledge that it would worsen the plight of the refugees to have them pushed out on to the streets. Doing so is not a feasible short-term intervention.
A feasible short-term intervention would be to make the space more safe, sanitary and secure by assisting the CMC with more effective security and material aid to meet the needs of the refugees while a more long-term solution is sought.
This commitment to not immediately shut the facility or to push people out must include a commitment to remove only children from the site in accordance with a properly drawn- up plan that includes a mechanism for independent oversight.
Second, a more permanent solution should then be sought. This cannot not be done in haste if the solution sought is to be sustainable. It might therefore entail the same politicians hitting the pause button and setting up an investigative committee with relevant stakeholders, who could come up with fact-based recommendations.
Crucially, the habit in social justice work of superimposing solutions on vulnerable groups can be sidestepped by involving the refugees in such a consultative process. This will ensure that their needs are reflected in the solutions that are developed.
Verryn and the CMC have made mistakes. No doubt it is overly ambitious to offer so many people shelter, but this situation did not come about intentionally. It resulted in part from the fact that after the July 3 arrests of refugees on the streets, these vulnerable people naturally felt it safer to seek accommodation within the CMC.
Further, it is possible that the CMC could have been more vigilant and open about potential abuses that such an undesirable space might enable. But to conclude from these facts that a quick visit, some tough words and removal of children to an unknown place will solve the underlying drivers of the crisis is unforgivably short-sighted.
Instead, the church should be helped to improve conditions in the short term and the very same politicians can prove their sincerity beyond that by putting their energies into seeking longer-term solutions through trustworthy consultative processes involving all the stakeholders.
http://www.businessday.co.za/articles/Content.aspx?id=88963
Removing children from the site seems to be their hasty short-term solution. A longer- term solution is not clear but a recommended closure is not ruled out. What is ironic and abhorrent about all this is the shameless attempt by the politicians to rock up with moral platitudes at hand and, with the help of a bevy of broadcast journalists, send out a message of deep and genuine care about the refugees’ wellbeing. How convenient — as if the crisis happened overnight and they did not or could not have reasonably been aware of it. The truth is that the nature and causes of the unfolding humanitarian crisis in downtown Johannesburg are more complex.
Unsurprisingly, the most appropriate interventions are not so obvious either.
First, Bishop Paul Verryn, who runs the place, is doing what the state is not doing but should be doing — attempting to give practical meaning to the human rights of refugees. Instead of acknowledging that this worsening crisis is symptomatic of a tissue of policy failures on the government’s part, the portfolio committee is trying to get brownie points for wanting to remove the most vulnerable among the refugees, the children.
But what is needed is not the arrangement of a photo opportunity. This, to be sure, will gain the state some political mileage. After all, who in their right mind would want to see children living in such desperately unsafe conditions? Objectively speaking, the unpleasant conditions at the church are not even appropriate for confident, healthy adults capable of looking after themselves, let alone vulnerable children who are exposed to potential sexual abuse and other forms of human rights violations.
However, recognising the nature of a problem is only the first step towards solving it. The second step is to understand the causes of the problem. These are , at least, twofold.
On the one hand, refugees are by definition foreign nationals who have escaped their country of origin because they are threatened in some or other way. The political violence that has been perpetrated in Zimbabwe by President Robert Mugabe for many years now has, as is well known, morphed into an equally, if not worse, protracted economic and social crisis.
The situation in Zimbabwe, despite the Global Political Agreement between the main parties, has not changed materially. In the absence of a safe political environment and one that is socioeconomically attractive by minimal standards of decency in terms of international humanitarian law, there is little reason for refugees to return. It would be imprudent and we would be immoral to compel them to.
On the other hand, government responses fuelled by a mixture of systemic xenophobia and sheer incompetence have worsened the conditions under which refugees survive in spaces such as the rough streets of Johannesburg. The simple fact is that harassment by police (well documented) of refugees living on the streets have forced many of them to seek shelter inside places such as the CMC.
Rightly or wrongly, the CMC responded to the moral dilemma by housing the large numbers of needy people rather than pushing them back into the den of an uncaring, xenophobic police force and local city. And herein lies the deep hypocrisy, abhorrence and irony of the Johnny-come-lately attitude of the politicians: they failed to show responsible political leadership in dealing with the refugee crisis in the first place and now attempt to look like moral saints while people with no political or legal responsibility to care about refugees, such as Verryn, come across inadvertently as unthinking citizens worsening the plight of foreign nationals.
In reality, but for the actions of people such as Verryn and spaces such as the CMC — imperfect though they are — the refugee crisis would be even worse.
So, with two major causes identified — continuing political instability within Zimbabwe and continued ill-considered state responses to refugees within SA’s borders — what are the best possible interventions?
First, the government should acknowledge that it would worsen the plight of the refugees to have them pushed out on to the streets. Doing so is not a feasible short-term intervention.
A feasible short-term intervention would be to make the space more safe, sanitary and secure by assisting the CMC with more effective security and material aid to meet the needs of the refugees while a more long-term solution is sought.
This commitment to not immediately shut the facility or to push people out must include a commitment to remove only children from the site in accordance with a properly drawn- up plan that includes a mechanism for independent oversight.
Second, a more permanent solution should then be sought. This cannot not be done in haste if the solution sought is to be sustainable. It might therefore entail the same politicians hitting the pause button and setting up an investigative committee with relevant stakeholders, who could come up with fact-based recommendations.
Crucially, the habit in social justice work of superimposing solutions on vulnerable groups can be sidestepped by involving the refugees in such a consultative process. This will ensure that their needs are reflected in the solutions that are developed.
Verryn and the CMC have made mistakes. No doubt it is overly ambitious to offer so many people shelter, but this situation did not come about intentionally. It resulted in part from the fact that after the July 3 arrests of refugees on the streets, these vulnerable people naturally felt it safer to seek accommodation within the CMC.
Further, it is possible that the CMC could have been more vigilant and open about potential abuses that such an undesirable space might enable. But to conclude from these facts that a quick visit, some tough words and removal of children to an unknown place will solve the underlying drivers of the crisis is unforgivably short-sighted.
Instead, the church should be helped to improve conditions in the short term and the very same politicians can prove their sincerity beyond that by putting their energies into seeking longer-term solutions through trustworthy consultative processes involving all the stakeholders.
http://www.businessday.co.za/articles/Content.aspx?id=88963
Friday, December 4, 2009
Deciding which experts to follow can be a puzzle
HOW should we respond to our own ignorance? If you are ignorant about a technical subject — such as the efficacy of antiretroviral drugs — and experts disagree about the issue, then how should you, as a lay person, decide whose views to follow?
The question is brought into even sharper focus when you imagine being a president at the end of the ’90s — say, for example, one who is short, smokes a pipe, and has a penchant for Shakespeare — who is forced by the nature of your job to decide who among disagreeing experts to follow.
The mainstream AIDS lobby thinks it is obvious for a leader to take a decision on technical issues. Yet, this is not so and it is worth understanding why.
But first one should note that the puzzle of which experts to follow does not arise when the experts are fake. I am therefore not referring to traditional healers on the streets of Cape Town selling nonsense as remedies for HIV, or the likes of Matthias Rath who, despite being a medical doctor, is not a medical expert on HIV/AIDS.
No leader should take seriously someone like Rath, who says vitamin tablets will cure HIV. We can set aside those who promote quack remedies as unethical egomaniacs. One can’t imagine why a government would want to take them seriously. To the extent that our government humoured these folks, it displayed inexcusably poor leadership.
However, among the AIDS dissidents, there are many award-winning international scientists, as much as many of us do not like them. These include Prof Peter Duesberg and Dr David Rasnick. Now, before anyone gets upset after the satisfying display of rationality on President Jacob Zuma ’s part on World AIDS Day, it is worth stating that the point, in the first instance, is not that these dissidents are right in their convictions about the relationship between HIV and AIDS or the efficacy of antiretroviral drugs.
The point is that many of us, myself most definitely included, know very little or nothing about science and so have no honest basis for adjudicating these disputes. I hardly understand more than one or two lines in the articles that flow between orthodox scientists and these dissidents. That is the heart of my own nonexpertise and ignorance. And, truth be told, this extends to the ultimate policy chiefs very often, including the minister of health and the president.
All of this implies that it was acceptable for former president Thabo Mbeki to take seriously the existence of expert dissidents on an issue of such magnitude as an unfolding pandemic. Of course, only Mbeki’s shrink would know whether this kind of leadership angst, based on an appreciation of the existence of expert disagreement , was the actual reason for his denialism.
More than likely — though here I am speculating — the real drivers of Mbeki’s dalliance with denialism had to do with the now well-rehearsed pop theories about his irrational concern that negative stereotypes about African sexuality motivate the case for the virus’s presence.
Still, the general point remains: it is proper for a responsible leader who knows nothing about a technical issue to reflect on how to respond to disagreement among experts. The situation is not unique to AIDS policy. No leader anywhere in the world will be an expert on more than one or two out of a thousand issues on which he or she will have to adopt a view and policy.
A sensible principle to follow in such circumstances is surely the following: adopt the view endorsed by the majority of experts. This principle is obviously somewhat dissatisfying. It suggests that numbers are indicative of academic or intellectual strength. There is no reason in principle that the majority of scientists cannot be wrong on an issue. So the application of the principle can, indeed, lead to the odd disastrous result. This is particularly serious in the context of a pandemic where the wrong intervention can cause society massive harm.
However, the point about one’s own ignorance necessitates this principle. Given that I have no basis for assessing the challenges of Rasnick or Duesberg as an outsider, I cannot but accept that for purposes of decision-making, the best procedure is to trust that there is a higher likelihood (even if no guarantee) that the majority of experts are right. Even if this turns out false, as a leader my decision to follow the majority remains rational, even with hindsight.
So, given this principle, Mbeki ought to have followed orthodox views on HIV/AIDS rather than to give dissidents a platform. After all, such a platform would not have improved Mbeki’s own chances of deciding who to follow. Presidents are not experts on these issues and so they had better get on with trusting the majority of experts.
History will forgive them if the majority of experts turn out wrong. As it happens, history will not forgive Mbeki for the alternative attitude he settled for.
http://www.businessday.co.za/articles/Content.aspx?id=88803
The question is brought into even sharper focus when you imagine being a president at the end of the ’90s — say, for example, one who is short, smokes a pipe, and has a penchant for Shakespeare — who is forced by the nature of your job to decide who among disagreeing experts to follow.
The mainstream AIDS lobby thinks it is obvious for a leader to take a decision on technical issues. Yet, this is not so and it is worth understanding why.
But first one should note that the puzzle of which experts to follow does not arise when the experts are fake. I am therefore not referring to traditional healers on the streets of Cape Town selling nonsense as remedies for HIV, or the likes of Matthias Rath who, despite being a medical doctor, is not a medical expert on HIV/AIDS.
No leader should take seriously someone like Rath, who says vitamin tablets will cure HIV. We can set aside those who promote quack remedies as unethical egomaniacs. One can’t imagine why a government would want to take them seriously. To the extent that our government humoured these folks, it displayed inexcusably poor leadership.
However, among the AIDS dissidents, there are many award-winning international scientists, as much as many of us do not like them. These include Prof Peter Duesberg and Dr David Rasnick. Now, before anyone gets upset after the satisfying display of rationality on President Jacob Zuma ’s part on World AIDS Day, it is worth stating that the point, in the first instance, is not that these dissidents are right in their convictions about the relationship between HIV and AIDS or the efficacy of antiretroviral drugs.
The point is that many of us, myself most definitely included, know very little or nothing about science and so have no honest basis for adjudicating these disputes. I hardly understand more than one or two lines in the articles that flow between orthodox scientists and these dissidents. That is the heart of my own nonexpertise and ignorance. And, truth be told, this extends to the ultimate policy chiefs very often, including the minister of health and the president.
All of this implies that it was acceptable for former president Thabo Mbeki to take seriously the existence of expert dissidents on an issue of such magnitude as an unfolding pandemic. Of course, only Mbeki’s shrink would know whether this kind of leadership angst, based on an appreciation of the existence of expert disagreement , was the actual reason for his denialism.
More than likely — though here I am speculating — the real drivers of Mbeki’s dalliance with denialism had to do with the now well-rehearsed pop theories about his irrational concern that negative stereotypes about African sexuality motivate the case for the virus’s presence.
Still, the general point remains: it is proper for a responsible leader who knows nothing about a technical issue to reflect on how to respond to disagreement among experts. The situation is not unique to AIDS policy. No leader anywhere in the world will be an expert on more than one or two out of a thousand issues on which he or she will have to adopt a view and policy.
A sensible principle to follow in such circumstances is surely the following: adopt the view endorsed by the majority of experts. This principle is obviously somewhat dissatisfying. It suggests that numbers are indicative of academic or intellectual strength. There is no reason in principle that the majority of scientists cannot be wrong on an issue. So the application of the principle can, indeed, lead to the odd disastrous result. This is particularly serious in the context of a pandemic where the wrong intervention can cause society massive harm.
However, the point about one’s own ignorance necessitates this principle. Given that I have no basis for assessing the challenges of Rasnick or Duesberg as an outsider, I cannot but accept that for purposes of decision-making, the best procedure is to trust that there is a higher likelihood (even if no guarantee) that the majority of experts are right. Even if this turns out false, as a leader my decision to follow the majority remains rational, even with hindsight.
So, given this principle, Mbeki ought to have followed orthodox views on HIV/AIDS rather than to give dissidents a platform. After all, such a platform would not have improved Mbeki’s own chances of deciding who to follow. Presidents are not experts on these issues and so they had better get on with trusting the majority of experts.
History will forgive them if the majority of experts turn out wrong. As it happens, history will not forgive Mbeki for the alternative attitude he settled for.
http://www.businessday.co.za/articles/Content.aspx?id=88803
Tuesday, December 1, 2009
Now is not the time for inaction on AIDS
Democracy is both irritating and rewarding. This is brought into sharp focus when one talks about democracy in the context of a pandemic like HIV/AIDS. On the one hand, the norms of deliberative democracy require that all stakeholders be consulted in the policy formation processes. On the other, such consultation processes, if not managed properly, deliver us democracy at the expense of necessary action.
That, in a nutshell, is the state of the South African National Aids Council (SANAC), the most important body that is meant to help President Zuma in his visible and justified quest to depart from years of Mbeki denialism. But in order to succeed he must think through how to avoid a democratic deficit that will haunt him at the polls (should he not consult widely) while, nonetheless, showcasing decisive leadership by making sure policy decisions get taken and implemented (by learning when to stop consulting).
The problem is this. Many policies get debated at a forum like SANAC. The body, comprising various stakeholders including both government and civil society, is supposed to make recommendations that could eventually become policy. Unfortunately, SANAC's efficacy is increasingly being hampered. The bottleneck is a tough one to complain about - deliberative democracy. Or so it would seem.
First, it is important that all voices be heard in processes that can lead to policy outcomes. Civil society organisations have fought in our courts to reverse policy processes undertaken by government that failed to do so. It would be bizarre to suddenly moan that citizens are getting too much attention from government.
Second, input from various organisations have substantive merit in designing policies. As a citizen of a country you have a legal and political entitlement to influencing policy to reflect your wishes. If that means lobbying government to prevent the legalisation of sex work then so be it.
Furthermore, policy processes are not perfect. It is only through having tough, open debate and disagreement that we can maximise the chances of decisions being taken that are based both in fact and which reflects the ideological convictions of the population. A process that does not have these elements does not have full legitimacy.
These qualifications about the need for deliberation are important to avert any misinterpretation of this article's contention that too much of a good thing can be bad. The fact of the matter is that public deliberation is not an end in itself. It is a means to the various ends outlined. If, for example, deliberation results in policy inertia, then deliberation has become a pointless exercise. So it is important that we gauge deliberation's success relative to practical standards such as whether or not, in the case of an outfit like SANAC, practical goals and legal mandates are achieved. This, unfortunately, does not seem to be the case.
Two examples are illustrative. Male circumcision can reduce a man's chances of contracting HIV by about 60%. It also slightly reduces the chances of infecting another person. These are established medical facts. They are the basis for why other countries in the region such as Botswana, Zimbabwe and Swaziland are promoting circumcision.
In SA, no policy on circumcisions exists. One objection is located within initiatives to fight the pandemic. It is the fear that more irresponsible behaviour, such as abandoning condom use, will follow.
Another objection is delivered through a wider socio-cultural prism: traditional circumcision is important on the cultural landscape of SA and publically promoted medical circumcision will simply subvert rights to cultural practise. If, for example, a Xhosa boy were circumcised when very young, in the name of fighting the AIDS pandemic, that would make it impossible for him to also undergo traditional circumcision later in life.
The objections to publically promoting medical circumcisions are not sound. However, it is less interesting to rehearse the weaknesses of these objections than it is to ask the question at the heart of this analysis. How much deliberation should a leader preside over? The answer, as challenging as it might be for someone who enjoys coming across as ‘giving a hearing' to all who want to listen to him or her, is that in the context of a pandemic, your context practically demands of you to take urgent action - any action.
This means that an organisation like SANAC, and its ultimate political head, president Zuma, must get on with deciding whether or not it will go with a fact-based intervention to help reduce the HIV transmissions rate or whether it will consider the surrounding socio-cultural sensitivities as overriding. Whatever the decision, inaction is symptomatic of crippling leadership.
The second example is that of sex work. The SA law reform commission has long ago made available a very comprehensive report into different possible responses to sex work ranging from retaining the status quo to having controlled areas within which sex work can legally take place.
In terms of the AIDS pandemic, there is unquestionable evidence that the criminalisation of sex work exacerbates the AIDS pandemic. This logically implies that one of the many tools needed to reduce the transmission of HIV is to bring sex workers into the legal fold so that the state can empower them and their industry to be better equipped to practise their work while taking the best possible precautions to minimise the contraction and spreading of the virus.
Obviously it is not politically easy to endorse this policy. If the success criterion is only the reduction of HIV transmission then it would be a no-brainer. Politicians are right, however, to take into account moral and social sensitivities. The debate on sex work is as much about HIV/AIDS as it is about whether or not sex work is morally acceptable and whether or not the SA government should take account of the views of the majority.
Again, however, the critical issue is not what position is ultimately taken on these substantive areas of disagreement. Some of us would lobby for a liberal attitude based in part on medical fact and in part on liberal ideologies. Others are entitled to lobby for more conservative decisions. As with circumcision, however, leadership inertia with respect to taking a position - any position - is unacceptable.
A body such as SANAC needs a political head that can pull together the strands of different viewpoints that have been debated, lay them on the table, and propose a solid policy position that can then be developed. Failure to do will reduce SANAC to a high school debate chamber: fun, but with no impact.
Deliberative processes are crucial for developing our democracy. We should continue to hear all views on major policy issues. But when facing a pandemic, sensible political leadership requires someone - call him Jacob Zuma or Kgalema Mothlanthe? - to demonstrate an understanding of the need to balance deliberation with urgent action. Time is not on our side.
http://www.politicsweb.co.za/politicsweb/view/politicsweb/en/page71619?oid=152986&sn=Detail
That, in a nutshell, is the state of the South African National Aids Council (SANAC), the most important body that is meant to help President Zuma in his visible and justified quest to depart from years of Mbeki denialism. But in order to succeed he must think through how to avoid a democratic deficit that will haunt him at the polls (should he not consult widely) while, nonetheless, showcasing decisive leadership by making sure policy decisions get taken and implemented (by learning when to stop consulting).
The problem is this. Many policies get debated at a forum like SANAC. The body, comprising various stakeholders including both government and civil society, is supposed to make recommendations that could eventually become policy. Unfortunately, SANAC's efficacy is increasingly being hampered. The bottleneck is a tough one to complain about - deliberative democracy. Or so it would seem.
First, it is important that all voices be heard in processes that can lead to policy outcomes. Civil society organisations have fought in our courts to reverse policy processes undertaken by government that failed to do so. It would be bizarre to suddenly moan that citizens are getting too much attention from government.
Second, input from various organisations have substantive merit in designing policies. As a citizen of a country you have a legal and political entitlement to influencing policy to reflect your wishes. If that means lobbying government to prevent the legalisation of sex work then so be it.
Furthermore, policy processes are not perfect. It is only through having tough, open debate and disagreement that we can maximise the chances of decisions being taken that are based both in fact and which reflects the ideological convictions of the population. A process that does not have these elements does not have full legitimacy.
These qualifications about the need for deliberation are important to avert any misinterpretation of this article's contention that too much of a good thing can be bad. The fact of the matter is that public deliberation is not an end in itself. It is a means to the various ends outlined. If, for example, deliberation results in policy inertia, then deliberation has become a pointless exercise. So it is important that we gauge deliberation's success relative to practical standards such as whether or not, in the case of an outfit like SANAC, practical goals and legal mandates are achieved. This, unfortunately, does not seem to be the case.
Two examples are illustrative. Male circumcision can reduce a man's chances of contracting HIV by about 60%. It also slightly reduces the chances of infecting another person. These are established medical facts. They are the basis for why other countries in the region such as Botswana, Zimbabwe and Swaziland are promoting circumcision.
In SA, no policy on circumcisions exists. One objection is located within initiatives to fight the pandemic. It is the fear that more irresponsible behaviour, such as abandoning condom use, will follow.
Another objection is delivered through a wider socio-cultural prism: traditional circumcision is important on the cultural landscape of SA and publically promoted medical circumcision will simply subvert rights to cultural practise. If, for example, a Xhosa boy were circumcised when very young, in the name of fighting the AIDS pandemic, that would make it impossible for him to also undergo traditional circumcision later in life.
The objections to publically promoting medical circumcisions are not sound. However, it is less interesting to rehearse the weaknesses of these objections than it is to ask the question at the heart of this analysis. How much deliberation should a leader preside over? The answer, as challenging as it might be for someone who enjoys coming across as ‘giving a hearing' to all who want to listen to him or her, is that in the context of a pandemic, your context practically demands of you to take urgent action - any action.
This means that an organisation like SANAC, and its ultimate political head, president Zuma, must get on with deciding whether or not it will go with a fact-based intervention to help reduce the HIV transmissions rate or whether it will consider the surrounding socio-cultural sensitivities as overriding. Whatever the decision, inaction is symptomatic of crippling leadership.
The second example is that of sex work. The SA law reform commission has long ago made available a very comprehensive report into different possible responses to sex work ranging from retaining the status quo to having controlled areas within which sex work can legally take place.
In terms of the AIDS pandemic, there is unquestionable evidence that the criminalisation of sex work exacerbates the AIDS pandemic. This logically implies that one of the many tools needed to reduce the transmission of HIV is to bring sex workers into the legal fold so that the state can empower them and their industry to be better equipped to practise their work while taking the best possible precautions to minimise the contraction and spreading of the virus.
Obviously it is not politically easy to endorse this policy. If the success criterion is only the reduction of HIV transmission then it would be a no-brainer. Politicians are right, however, to take into account moral and social sensitivities. The debate on sex work is as much about HIV/AIDS as it is about whether or not sex work is morally acceptable and whether or not the SA government should take account of the views of the majority.
Again, however, the critical issue is not what position is ultimately taken on these substantive areas of disagreement. Some of us would lobby for a liberal attitude based in part on medical fact and in part on liberal ideologies. Others are entitled to lobby for more conservative decisions. As with circumcision, however, leadership inertia with respect to taking a position - any position - is unacceptable.
A body such as SANAC needs a political head that can pull together the strands of different viewpoints that have been debated, lay them on the table, and propose a solid policy position that can then be developed. Failure to do will reduce SANAC to a high school debate chamber: fun, but with no impact.
Deliberative processes are crucial for developing our democracy. We should continue to hear all views on major policy issues. But when facing a pandemic, sensible political leadership requires someone - call him Jacob Zuma or Kgalema Mothlanthe? - to demonstrate an understanding of the need to balance deliberation with urgent action. Time is not on our side.
http://www.politicsweb.co.za/politicsweb/view/politicsweb/en/page71619?oid=152986&sn=Detail
Sunday, November 29, 2009
Remembering apartheid with fondness
What does it mean for black South Africans to remember life under apartheid with fondness? This is the question Jacob Dlamini explores in his debut book aptly entitled Native Nostalgia. Dlamini is the most lyrical South African writer since Johnny Steinberg drifted off to New York. Like Steinberg, he delivers reflective insights with rhythmic beauty. It is worth reflecting on his main claim - which will surely stimulate debate in the months ahead - that many black South Africans harbour nostalgic memories of life under Verwoerd's government.
His key premise is that life within South African townships during apartheid was rich and complex, contrary to widespread descriptions of them as mere sites of socioeconomic depravity. Life happened in the township both despite apartheid and in complex relation to apartheid. Fond recollections by blacks are not an inadvertent legitimation of an immoral political system. Of course, fear of being seen to retrospectively endorse apartheid explains why a book like Dlamini's might not have been written before - it invites a lazy accusation that the writer wishes apartheid had never ended.
By arguing that not all aspects of life in townships were hell, Native Nostalgia humanises township residents. It recognises that township residents have always exhibited complex agencies with which they built and negotiated daily life during apartheid. These lived realities - lying at the heart of nostalgic recollections by blacks - include music, art, games, partying and other markers of normalcy that showcase the human spirit's defiance of the psychological insult that was apartheid. Dlamini adds to this rich characterisation with a number of thought provoking related claims.
He claims that Afrikaans is the language of nostalgia for many black South Africans. Phrases such as a ‘Waar was jy?' - which also became the title of a hit song for the outfit Skeem - and ‘Toeka!' and many others instantly evoke a litany of fond memories. A jazz track may invite a lover or friend, for example, to implore another to ‘Hoor net daar!' The appearance of Afrikaans across the cultural landscape of township life means that there is an Afrikaans cultural grammar that white Afrikaans speakers might never recognise. This is not to deny the fact that Afrikaans still has an oppressive resonance for many black South Africans. The salient point is that the relationship between black South Africans and the ‘oppressors' language' is more ambiguous than simplistic accounts of that relationship that start and stop with the 1976 Soweto uprisings.
There are interesting academic insights too that flow from this analysis. There is often a temptation in the social sciences to trot out an overarching narrative that can explain human behaviour particularly at a group level. This is why many liberal researchers mistakenly think they are doing township inhabitants a favour by viewing the township as an object of pity. It is, as Dlamini points out, telling that townships are often referred to as ‘sites' to be examined rather than as ‘places' to be experienced. Sites can be placed under an outsider's microscope for a couple of weeks and then written about as a social science thesis project.
Places, on the other hand, are a challenge to be avoided. They imply the existence of irreducible complexities in the details of a community's life and the lives of its individual members. Few theses and books engage South African townships as places of ordinariness. Even contemporary black writers like Eric Miyeni unreflectively assume that the ultimate marker of upward mobility is whether one can run from a Johannesburg township to Melville or Sandton more quickly than one's township friends can kill one of those township rats that look like a cat.
A moment of critical reflection should reveal an implicit assumption that township life is one dimensional. As Dlamini puts it, many wrongly assume that township life is poor just because many of those who live in the township are poor. He urges researchers to put the senses at the heart of their research methodology. In order to understand the inner lives of communities, it is important to live with them- through the senses.
One cannot help but feel, smell, listen, touch and see with Dlamini as he locates us successfully within his world. It reminded me of Fhazel Johennesse's poem Living in a flat in Eldorado Park which also succeeds in using mere words on a page to evoke in the reader the full range of experiences that constitute the messy, busy life in the block of flats in Eldorado Park that the poem focuses on.
Dlamini recounts his stories with the same kind of linguistic magic. He also describes it with honesty reminiscent of Dambudzo Marechera's account of Zimbabwean township life in the classic novella House of Hunger. Unlike Marachera, we are painted a picture of South African township life in nonviolent language that helps to keep an ignorant reader's prejudices at bay. Academics chipping away in the social sciences would do well to take Dlamini's methodological challenge seriously.
The overall analysis suffers two shortcomings. First, Dlamini promised too much. The book initially gives the impression that hard answers will be provided to the question of why many black South Africans remember life under apartheid with fondness. We never quite arrive at an actual answer. The book is better described as a bouquet of insightful anecdotes that render township lives more complex and more human than countless outsiders assume.
Of course, it was always going to be difficult to step back from such an account of township life and ask, "Have I succeeded in accounting for native nostalgia or did I create something else?" The answer is, "Something else of equal value." That "something else" just is a rich narration of life in the township. But that is very different from delving into philosophical and psychological territory about memory which a more genuine account of nostalgia anywhere would have to provide.
This connects with the second weakness. Dlamini does not explore the real possibility that there is ultimately nothing special or puzzling about black South Africans remembering the past with fondness. It may simply be a universal human tendency. The English saying "the summers were hotter when we were kids!" captures that universal tendency to think nostalgically about the past. Of course, in the context of life under an oppressive regime, this tendency seems somewhat bizarre. But ultimately it might still say more about the general psychology of remembering than about anything peculiar about black South Africans.
No doubt many Germans have fond memories of life before the fall of the Berlin wall. And it would not take long to elicit some charming stories from Ugandans about elements of normal life during Idi Amin's reign. The thrust of Dlamini's book provide material for ‘remembering' to be explored. But the full exploration of the act of remembering, with all its conceptual, psychological and philosophical complexity, awaits another day.
These weaknesses are not jarring. It is a magnificent achievement to detail the tapestry of township life so completely. Dlamini forces us to ponder uncomfortable truths. In the end many of these truths do not (as some readers will wrongly claim) invite us to review our moral assessment of apartheid.
Instead, these uncomfortable truths disturb the racist spirit of Verwoerd by adding to his defeat with memories that scream, "Despite your violent apartheid evil, we've got news for you! Our humanity and agencies were never entirely within your racist control!" We have no reason to fear native nostalgia.
http://www.politicsweb.co.za/politicsweb/view/politicsweb/en/page71619?oid=152786&sn=Detail
His key premise is that life within South African townships during apartheid was rich and complex, contrary to widespread descriptions of them as mere sites of socioeconomic depravity. Life happened in the township both despite apartheid and in complex relation to apartheid. Fond recollections by blacks are not an inadvertent legitimation of an immoral political system. Of course, fear of being seen to retrospectively endorse apartheid explains why a book like Dlamini's might not have been written before - it invites a lazy accusation that the writer wishes apartheid had never ended.
By arguing that not all aspects of life in townships were hell, Native Nostalgia humanises township residents. It recognises that township residents have always exhibited complex agencies with which they built and negotiated daily life during apartheid. These lived realities - lying at the heart of nostalgic recollections by blacks - include music, art, games, partying and other markers of normalcy that showcase the human spirit's defiance of the psychological insult that was apartheid. Dlamini adds to this rich characterisation with a number of thought provoking related claims.
He claims that Afrikaans is the language of nostalgia for many black South Africans. Phrases such as a ‘Waar was jy?' - which also became the title of a hit song for the outfit Skeem - and ‘Toeka!' and many others instantly evoke a litany of fond memories. A jazz track may invite a lover or friend, for example, to implore another to ‘Hoor net daar!' The appearance of Afrikaans across the cultural landscape of township life means that there is an Afrikaans cultural grammar that white Afrikaans speakers might never recognise. This is not to deny the fact that Afrikaans still has an oppressive resonance for many black South Africans. The salient point is that the relationship between black South Africans and the ‘oppressors' language' is more ambiguous than simplistic accounts of that relationship that start and stop with the 1976 Soweto uprisings.
There are interesting academic insights too that flow from this analysis. There is often a temptation in the social sciences to trot out an overarching narrative that can explain human behaviour particularly at a group level. This is why many liberal researchers mistakenly think they are doing township inhabitants a favour by viewing the township as an object of pity. It is, as Dlamini points out, telling that townships are often referred to as ‘sites' to be examined rather than as ‘places' to be experienced. Sites can be placed under an outsider's microscope for a couple of weeks and then written about as a social science thesis project.
Places, on the other hand, are a challenge to be avoided. They imply the existence of irreducible complexities in the details of a community's life and the lives of its individual members. Few theses and books engage South African townships as places of ordinariness. Even contemporary black writers like Eric Miyeni unreflectively assume that the ultimate marker of upward mobility is whether one can run from a Johannesburg township to Melville or Sandton more quickly than one's township friends can kill one of those township rats that look like a cat.
A moment of critical reflection should reveal an implicit assumption that township life is one dimensional. As Dlamini puts it, many wrongly assume that township life is poor just because many of those who live in the township are poor. He urges researchers to put the senses at the heart of their research methodology. In order to understand the inner lives of communities, it is important to live with them- through the senses.
One cannot help but feel, smell, listen, touch and see with Dlamini as he locates us successfully within his world. It reminded me of Fhazel Johennesse's poem Living in a flat in Eldorado Park which also succeeds in using mere words on a page to evoke in the reader the full range of experiences that constitute the messy, busy life in the block of flats in Eldorado Park that the poem focuses on.
Dlamini recounts his stories with the same kind of linguistic magic. He also describes it with honesty reminiscent of Dambudzo Marechera's account of Zimbabwean township life in the classic novella House of Hunger. Unlike Marachera, we are painted a picture of South African township life in nonviolent language that helps to keep an ignorant reader's prejudices at bay. Academics chipping away in the social sciences would do well to take Dlamini's methodological challenge seriously.
The overall analysis suffers two shortcomings. First, Dlamini promised too much. The book initially gives the impression that hard answers will be provided to the question of why many black South Africans remember life under apartheid with fondness. We never quite arrive at an actual answer. The book is better described as a bouquet of insightful anecdotes that render township lives more complex and more human than countless outsiders assume.
Of course, it was always going to be difficult to step back from such an account of township life and ask, "Have I succeeded in accounting for native nostalgia or did I create something else?" The answer is, "Something else of equal value." That "something else" just is a rich narration of life in the township. But that is very different from delving into philosophical and psychological territory about memory which a more genuine account of nostalgia anywhere would have to provide.
This connects with the second weakness. Dlamini does not explore the real possibility that there is ultimately nothing special or puzzling about black South Africans remembering the past with fondness. It may simply be a universal human tendency. The English saying "the summers were hotter when we were kids!" captures that universal tendency to think nostalgically about the past. Of course, in the context of life under an oppressive regime, this tendency seems somewhat bizarre. But ultimately it might still say more about the general psychology of remembering than about anything peculiar about black South Africans.
No doubt many Germans have fond memories of life before the fall of the Berlin wall. And it would not take long to elicit some charming stories from Ugandans about elements of normal life during Idi Amin's reign. The thrust of Dlamini's book provide material for ‘remembering' to be explored. But the full exploration of the act of remembering, with all its conceptual, psychological and philosophical complexity, awaits another day.
These weaknesses are not jarring. It is a magnificent achievement to detail the tapestry of township life so completely. Dlamini forces us to ponder uncomfortable truths. In the end many of these truths do not (as some readers will wrongly claim) invite us to review our moral assessment of apartheid.
Instead, these uncomfortable truths disturb the racist spirit of Verwoerd by adding to his defeat with memories that scream, "Despite your violent apartheid evil, we've got news for you! Our humanity and agencies were never entirely within your racist control!" We have no reason to fear native nostalgia.
http://www.politicsweb.co.za/politicsweb/view/politicsweb/en/page71619?oid=152786&sn=Detail
Friday, November 27, 2009
Even a multiculturalist must sometimes say no
WHY would anyone in their right mind try to kill a bull with their bare hands? I am not Zulu enough to know the answer. I am certainly not brave enough to have a go either. But this ritual appears to be a part of the fresh fruits festival called Ukweshwana, which takes place in early December in Nongoma, northern KwaZulu-Natal.
Animal rights groups, such as People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals and Animal Rights Africa, are predictably up in arms. They are desperately trying to convince the courts and the government that animals are people too. Or rather that animals have feelings too. The government is responding with loud silence. The silence is not surprising. How does one decide between upholding cultural rights and criticising the deliberate infliction of violent pain against animals?
The answer, in fact, is simple. Cultural practices that are unethical should not be allowed. They should be banned rather than being protected just because we are too cowardly to admit that ethical relativism is a poor moral theory from which to take our cue for what is right and what is wrong.
Ethical relativism does not flow logically from multiculturalism. People wrongly think that if they are committed to diversity then they have no basis for criticising the cultural norms of others. We need to look at each cultural practice independently and determine objectively whether or not the moral arguments for that cultural practice are sound.
The relationship between relativism and multiculturalism needs to be unpacked. Ethical relativism is the view that there are no objective moral truths. When you and I express ethical views, we are simply reflecting our individual moral preferences or those of the society within which we were raised.
Multiculturalism is a description of a society in which there are diverse cultural groups. It can be also be a moral principle that says we should respect these different cultural outfits.
So here is the critical question. Does a commitment to multiculturalism mean that we must be ethical relativists? No. I can respect the right of cultural groups to exist while also criticising the content of particular norms and practices that are objectively wrong. Respect for difference does not translate into “anything goes”. Torture, for example, is immoral because all people have an equal entitlement to respect. This implies that we have equal rights to freedom from the deliberate infliction of pain.
One can be a multiculturalist and still engage in crosscultural moral criticism. Such criticism just needs to be based in sound moral reasoning, such as the example of why torture is bad, in order for it to be valid. A grand theory of moral objectivity is not necessary for particular instances of moral criticism to get off the ground.
Furthermore, if we took ethical relativism too seriously, moral criticism would never be possible. So we had better make sense of how to make progress in moral debate while still respecting differences between groups.
With the right to criticise firmly established, what can we say about the business of killing bulls? Is this a cultural practice that can be defended on grounds of the general right to cultural practice?
It is important to note that the general right to participate in cultural practices is not actually at stake here. Such rights are very important. This must be the case because cultural practices constitute a critically important part of the identities of millions of South Africans. However, just as the right to free speech can reasonably be infringed, so too can the right to cultural practice.
In this case, animal rights activists are right to demand a moral entitlement to dignified treatment on behalf of bulls against Zulus. The basis for why you and I demand that we treat each other decently is because we can experience pain and pleasure. We have sentience. Nothing more, nothing less. If it was about much more than sentience, then some human beings would be in trouble. Yet if sentience is the basis of our moral status, then why do animals not have equal right to be treated decently? A failure to extend such moral entitlement to nonhuman animals is an arbitrary exclusion of those animals from the group entitled to moral consideration.
This exclusion is logically identical to racism. Just as it is arbitrary and therefore wrong to spend less on a black kid’s public education than a white kid’s, so too it is arbitrary to regard some sentient creatures as less worthy of moral concern than others — “just because”.
It is patently clear then that the deliberate infliction of pain against a bull amounts to not respecting its moral entitlement as a sentient creature to be treated with dignity. This makes the Zulu practice of bull killing during Ukweshwana unethical. Since it is unethical, it is a reasonable infringement on the general right to cultural practice to stop this unethical infliction of violence.
Animal rights activists may be the last remaining hippies but this is no reason to dismiss their arguments as equally dated or uncool. Those who think that these kinds of cultural practices are acceptable are hereby challenged to offer me an ethical rejoinder instead.
http://www.businessday.co.za/articles/Content.aspx?id=88254
Animal rights groups, such as People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals and Animal Rights Africa, are predictably up in arms. They are desperately trying to convince the courts and the government that animals are people too. Or rather that animals have feelings too. The government is responding with loud silence. The silence is not surprising. How does one decide between upholding cultural rights and criticising the deliberate infliction of violent pain against animals?
The answer, in fact, is simple. Cultural practices that are unethical should not be allowed. They should be banned rather than being protected just because we are too cowardly to admit that ethical relativism is a poor moral theory from which to take our cue for what is right and what is wrong.
Ethical relativism does not flow logically from multiculturalism. People wrongly think that if they are committed to diversity then they have no basis for criticising the cultural norms of others. We need to look at each cultural practice independently and determine objectively whether or not the moral arguments for that cultural practice are sound.
The relationship between relativism and multiculturalism needs to be unpacked. Ethical relativism is the view that there are no objective moral truths. When you and I express ethical views, we are simply reflecting our individual moral preferences or those of the society within which we were raised.
Multiculturalism is a description of a society in which there are diverse cultural groups. It can be also be a moral principle that says we should respect these different cultural outfits.
So here is the critical question. Does a commitment to multiculturalism mean that we must be ethical relativists? No. I can respect the right of cultural groups to exist while also criticising the content of particular norms and practices that are objectively wrong. Respect for difference does not translate into “anything goes”. Torture, for example, is immoral because all people have an equal entitlement to respect. This implies that we have equal rights to freedom from the deliberate infliction of pain.
One can be a multiculturalist and still engage in crosscultural moral criticism. Such criticism just needs to be based in sound moral reasoning, such as the example of why torture is bad, in order for it to be valid. A grand theory of moral objectivity is not necessary for particular instances of moral criticism to get off the ground.
Furthermore, if we took ethical relativism too seriously, moral criticism would never be possible. So we had better make sense of how to make progress in moral debate while still respecting differences between groups.
With the right to criticise firmly established, what can we say about the business of killing bulls? Is this a cultural practice that can be defended on grounds of the general right to cultural practice?
It is important to note that the general right to participate in cultural practices is not actually at stake here. Such rights are very important. This must be the case because cultural practices constitute a critically important part of the identities of millions of South Africans. However, just as the right to free speech can reasonably be infringed, so too can the right to cultural practice.
In this case, animal rights activists are right to demand a moral entitlement to dignified treatment on behalf of bulls against Zulus. The basis for why you and I demand that we treat each other decently is because we can experience pain and pleasure. We have sentience. Nothing more, nothing less. If it was about much more than sentience, then some human beings would be in trouble. Yet if sentience is the basis of our moral status, then why do animals not have equal right to be treated decently? A failure to extend such moral entitlement to nonhuman animals is an arbitrary exclusion of those animals from the group entitled to moral consideration.
This exclusion is logically identical to racism. Just as it is arbitrary and therefore wrong to spend less on a black kid’s public education than a white kid’s, so too it is arbitrary to regard some sentient creatures as less worthy of moral concern than others — “just because”.
It is patently clear then that the deliberate infliction of pain against a bull amounts to not respecting its moral entitlement as a sentient creature to be treated with dignity. This makes the Zulu practice of bull killing during Ukweshwana unethical. Since it is unethical, it is a reasonable infringement on the general right to cultural practice to stop this unethical infliction of violence.
Animal rights activists may be the last remaining hippies but this is no reason to dismiss their arguments as equally dated or uncool. Those who think that these kinds of cultural practices are acceptable are hereby challenged to offer me an ethical rejoinder instead.
http://www.businessday.co.za/articles/Content.aspx?id=88254
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