The ascent of anti-intellectualism

The world stands at a worrying historical juncture.  In Britain we recently saw popular rejection of pan Europeanism despite spirited attempts by its intelligentsia to persuade a decidedly cynical public about the perils of this course of action.

The European integration project that has underwritten among the more peaceful epochs of a historically warlike continent, now confronts some of its sternest tests. It must contend with smouldering populist undercurrents that could only have been emboldened by Brexit.

Across the pond we watch with bated breath as Americans dally with the possibility of electing as president, a man with the temerity to not only publically disrespect women and entire people groups, but one who has expressed unmistakable admiration for Vladimir Putin, a fellow who has never been accused of possessing effusive affections for democratic values.

Who would have thought that we would find within a whisker of the American presidency a person whose commitment to NATO, an organisation that has stood as an unwavering bastion of post-Second World War global stability, is flimsy at best?

We are justified to be a little troubled by the disquieting implications for the global world order as it confronts the grim prospect of a dark and unpredictable era not entirely unlike the infamous nineteen thirties.

The thread running through much of what I have described is a disconcerting preference for emotional ventilation regardless of its standing in relation to sound judgement. The zeitgeist was aptly captured by erstwhile British minister of Justice Michael Gove, whose simplistic but effective rebuttal of his Brexit opponents, captured the sentiments of millions of his compatriots – we are tired of the experts!

As a South African I observe these developments with a curious if not a wary sense of déjà vu.  The script seems eerily familiar as I have a distinct memory that hearkens back barely a decade ago, of watching with helpless terror as a wave of anti-intellectualism threatened and succeeded to sweep away some of the hard-earned gains of the post-apartheid era in my country.

Disappointment with the Mbeki administration, led by a man with an well-earned reputation for intellectualism as well as many real and perceived flaws, came to convince a large section of the South African population that it was the intellectualism he represented that was the problem.

A disturbing consensus gradually coalesced that nothing but his polar antithesis would do. Zuma came to be the obliging incarnation, complete with a colourful personally and a singing voice go with. And thus began a grim epoch in our country’s history with its ubiquitous, well-documented, tragic and at times embarrassing travails. It is fair to say that the country has already paid an incalculable price for its flirtation with anti-intellectualism.

The difficulty with the surge of popular anti-intellectualism is its intrinsic imperviousness to reason, precisely as it casts as its archenemy, reason itself. In the ensuing inverted script, unreason is crowned as the new reason. Fools become the new sages. The discerning are rendered completely impotent as idiocy becomes the only respected currency of engagement even in the loftiest of corridors of political power.

As with Mbeki, intellectuals are usually not entirely innocent in creating the dismal state of affairs that accounts for their eventual demise. They are ultimately hoist by their own petard.

Intellectualism has the tendency to breed elitism and paternalism instead of serving as a weapon to advance the general good. At worst, as we saw in the recent financial crisis, it can also be used to advance the crudest form of self-interest that carries scant concern for the consequent cost to the general public.

Intellectuals are those with the penchant for disciplined and rational thought. Thought attested to by the scientific method or well tested wisdom, along with the necessary demonstrable benefits.  Their ranks are swelled necessarily by those who by virtue of the value of their contribution to society, become prominent, successful or even wealthy.

All of this is very desirable. Indeed, it is a perverse and self-sabotaging society that discourages the legitimate success of its citizens. It can only be impoverished by their inevitable flight to places where their talent is embraced and celebrated.

The successful nevertheless ultimately undermine their own long-term interests, as we are seeing in the prevailing climate in the West, when they do not consciously employ their intellectualism toward the advancement of the greater good. There are after all only so many places they can wander to.

This unfortunate state of affairs is crudely captured by the yawning economic inequalities in parts of the West and the accompanying popular resentment. Western intellectuals are guilty of creating a socio-economic environment that is increasingly hostile to the socio-economic upward mobility of the rest.

The resulting resentment can spawn a wholesale rejection of the establishment along with the values it represents, to the ultimate ruin of everyone. Such as the very idea of intellectualism.

The rise of Trump occurs upon the crest of this rising tide of anti-intellectualism. In times past it swept into the mainstream the French revolution and the ghoulish Reign of Terror. On a different occasion it swept into oblivion the Russian Romanov dynasty bringing with it Marxist Leninism replete with its show trials and gulags.

It is yet unclear what the current iteration of anti-intellectualism brings for the West but the prognosis is hardly glowing.

Civil society, arise!

Recent events in the judicial and political environments of our country betray a curious duality – the strength as well as the fragility of our constitutional democracy.

It has been heartening to see that despite the alarming decay witnessed in two of the three arms of government, the judiciary is as robust and effective as it has ever been. 

The fact that we are celebrating Justice Mogoeng’s seminal constitutional ruling is nevertheless instructive. In dark times the faintest ray of light does much to inspire flagging hope. Not least when a grim sense of despair casts a forbidding shadow, as it has over our once hopeful nation.

Not unlike the proverbial deer under headlights, we seemed as those incapacitated by the advance of emboldened purveyors of corruption, along with the accompanying sense of impunity.

Though we are by no means out of the woods, civil society has been given a propitious platform upon which to mount a spirited counter offensive against those intent on destroying our blood-wrought democracy.

If anything, what the Zuma administration has given us is a needed wake-up call from the post-apartheid slumber that naively relinquished all civic power to politicians who are universally known for their corruptibility.

Citizens of our fledgling democracy would do well to pay attention to the words often mistakenly attributed to Thomas Jefferson – eternal vigilance is the price of liberty!

Jefferson’s sobriety about the delicacy of democracy is further reinforced by his prescient caution - “the tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time with the blood of patriots and tyrants”. 

The devastating civil war that almost tore apart the US only a few decades after his death underlines the breadth of his perception.

Thankfully we are yet to arrive at that place. We would nevertheless be well advised to abandon our misplaced sense of exceptionalism that imagines us impervious to such misadventure. 

It is time for civil society to wake up from its untimely slumber, lest we wake up to find one-day a howling wasteland where a promising country once promised to bloom.

Random thoughts on social organisation

I will start by enumerating a few observations:

1. Marxist-Leninism is a demonstrably failed economic ideology that has been exposed by history as at best impractical and thus only enforceable only by the application of tyrannical government force.

2. The prevailing western economic orthodoxy - Capitalism - has survived so far but that survival should not be mistaken for sustainability. It has significant flaws such that the absence of major reform almost certainly guarantees its eventual demise.

3. The free market and capitalism, though they share some important characteristics, ought not be confused.

4. The Free Market is preferable to Capitalism and societies prosper to the extent that they are free.

These observations lead me to the following conclusions:

• Humankind is possessed of inestimable worth, beauty, potential, intelligence and creativity. This is amply demonstrated, among other things, by how much has been harnessed from land, water, air and vegetation, along with their constituents. Apart from scientific and technological accomplishments, her moral capacity is abundantly displayed by ubiquitous daily acts of unheralded kindness, love, self-sacrifice and magnanimity that all can attest. 

• There is nevertheless a darker side to the human persona that has necessitated the evolution of government as we have come to know it. The undeniable tendency towards taciturn individualism (selfishness) epitomises this reality. Thus, conflicting interests and anti-social behaviour have conferred a destructive blight to his otherwise recognisable grandeur. 

• This dark bent manifests in his family relations, inter-ethnic interactions, business dealings and many of his social interactions. He lies, steals, murders, cheats and bullies. He colonises, enslaves, objectifies, wages unjust wars and stubbornly clings to irrational prejudices. 

• This state of affairs naturally lends itself to lawlessness such that weak or non-existent government has always been associated with social chaos and ultimately the destruction of community, wellbeing and the suppression of his immense potential. This brings to mind the ominous spectre of the failed state that is painfully endured by some societies. 

• The most effective form of government has been demonstrated to be the selection of trusted individuals by the society in question, for the primary purpose of preventing the anti-social behaviour of individuals from undermining the interests of the group. Democracy as generally understood seeks, with imperfection, to advance this ideal. The chosen individuals must then govern to the best of their ability with integrity and justice and in keeping with the ideals, values and aspirations of the governed. 

• By virtue of their status as a sample of broader humanity, the chosen leaders are inescapably subject to the same spectrum of virtues and vices of the human population. This recognition necessitates the circumscription of their powers as well as accountability to the same laws that govern the broader population. In other words they are not above the law.

• Because of these realities, the ideal of completely unfettered markets can realistically only exist in degrees. The government must inevitably intervene one way or the other in trade and social dealings, either to enforce justice, to establish firm boundaries or otherwise to prevent some form of collective catastrophe against which disparate individual action is powerless. 

• While there is value in developing simplified organising principles, models or ideologies around which the world can be understood, there is nevertheless the danger of dogmatism and oversimplification. The ideology trap thus lends itself to the unhelpful proclivity to fit the world into predetermined ideological moulds, even when it scarcely fits. It seems discerning that leadership is exercised with the kind of wisdom that takes account of the complexity and multidimensionality of the world and takes principled action keeping with the demands of the challenges at hand.

I am, therefore I do

The drama of individual and by extension national histories occurs before the overarching quest to answer the questions: “who am I?” and “what is my worth?”

These are the great ontological and axiological questions that haunt all of us. 

In fact I will be bold and propose that the broad vista of human history is defined by multifarious attempts to answer them. 

Seeking to deal with these questions, among the leading philosophers of the Age of Enlightenment, Rene Descartes, is credited with having said, “I think, therefore I am”. These simple words captured, like no other, the spirit of his age. 

I would like to proffer my own variation: I am, therefore I do. The order is deliberate and important. 

It is self-evident that human beings are of inestimable value, even though all of us, to varying degrees, are assailed by vexing self-doubt, from birth. 

The nature of this value is intrinsic. That is, it does not depend on any external parameters. 

This is no less self-evident than our inherent understanding that kindness is preferable to cruelty. I will not venture to justify this view. For now I will simply take it as self-evident. 

Even though that may be the case, it is corroborated by a sweeping glance across the glistening waters of history. 

The lesson from history is that we step onto precarious terrain whenever we define the value of human beings in extrinsic terms. 

Gender, economic status, beliefs, culture, educational achievements, physical beauty, charm, intelligence, actions and accomplishments of any kind are entirely inadmissible gauges of value. 

It is on this basis that the words of the great philosopher trouble me somewhat. An inference can be drawn from them, that to be or to exist, one must first think. 

Following that line of reasoning brings us to the problematic conclusion that the greater one’s intellectual powers, the more human they are and vice versa, because humanity is supposedly justified by the capacity to think. 

All its positives notwithstanding, it is easy to see how intellectual chauvinism came to be among the unfortunate residues of the Enlightenment. 

Let me come to one of the towering injustices of our time: racism. 

The injustice of racism consists in its answer to the axiological question according to extrinsic parameters, such as colour, origin or culture. 

Its cruelty is that it judges people according to things over which they have absolutely no control, such as where and by whom they were born. 

Its roots and justifications are deep, including the supposed “delay” or “incapacity” by certain parts of the world, not least Africa, to join the galloping march of “modernity” - a concept steeped in Eurocentric culture and thought. 

Entire societies and people groups have therefore been condemned to the status of perpetual inferiority on the basis of spurious measures, such as their level of technological advancement. 

“Christianity, commerce and civilisation”[1], David Livingstone’s rallying cry, was to be brought to them by the more “civilised”, for their own good, even if at gunpoint. Presumably, they would say their thank yous later. 

While neither endorsing nor disputing generally accepted definitions of progress, I do have a few questions. 

For one, can it be definitely confirmed that the level of personal fulfilment, contentment and happiness of the average New Yorker today is vastly superior to that of the erstwhile “savages”?

You ask, “What gives you the authority to use these measures as the basis of human advancement?” I ask you, in turn, what gives you the authority to consider economic and technological achievements as the true measures of progress?

The point is, whenever we use extrinsic measures to assess human value, we run into countless problems because we invariably use standards informed by our own myopic worldviews that are rooted in our unique cultures and histories. 

Their logical weaknesses notwithstanding, the impact of these views continues to afflict those from supposedly less developed societies, who must constantly prove their worth to an intransigently unconvinced world. 

I will spare you my thoughts about the hypocrisy of these perspectives for now, even when assessed within the confines of a disputable view of what truly constitutes progress. 

I’m therefore left deeply unsettled by the well-meaning but problematic view that the way Africans must dislodge these deeply embedded racist ideas is by first demonstrating equal or superior economic or technological capabilities to the West. As Japan and more recently China and the so-called Asian tigers have done, according to the argument.

While I have no problem with technological and economic advancement, in fact quite the contrary, we risk endorsing a deeply problematic premise when we suggest that the worth of Africans or anyone consists in the sum of their achievements. This stems from the inverted premise that to be, we must first do. 

I insist that the indisputable acceptance of our intrinsic value as human beings requires no extrinsic justification. 

In fact I argue that only when we refuse to accept the bigoted question marks about our worth, will our natural talents begin to freely find expression in innovations and economic progress, reflecting our unique history and cultures, which will astound the world. 

Both China and Japan, not unlike their European counterparts, built their achievements on deeply embedded mythologies about their supposed inherent superiority to other cultures. 

For them, from the onset, the question of worth was settled, even if on questionable grounds. 

This sense of worth naturally flowed into great economic and technological advancements. 

They were, first, and therefore they did. Not the other way round. 

Because of our (Africans) late entrance into a foreign socio-economic framework, with its own established rules that we had no part in creating, we have suffered too long from a misplaced sense of worth, which is rooted in the bigoted and deeply flawed ideas that still sadly thrive in the dark shadows of contemporary consciousness. 

This diminished sense of worth was systematised and concretised through historical crimes such as colonialism, slavery, apartheid, among other forms of servitude. Given the relative historical proximity of these injustices, it is understandable that Africans are still battling to extricate itself from their deleterious after-effects. 

It is up to us not only to refuse to accept these ideas, but to continue doing the hard work of immersing ourselves deeply in the truth that we are beautiful and worthy of dignity, honour and respect. 

Just as we are. Before we do anything. 

Otherwise, we risk placing ourselves on the perpetual treadmill of justifying our existence, on the basis of standards upon which there is no universal consensus and that are inherently unquantifiable. 

Among the weaknesses that accounted for our well documented historical reversals was that we took it for granted that humanity belongs to a common brotherhood that extolls neighbourliness as a virtue.

There is no need to forsake this “weakness”, as our worth as people should not be measured in relation to other people. It derives from no other pillar than our humanity. 

From this platform, as others have done, we cannot but naturally demonstrate by our lives that we are no less gifted, intelligent and innovative than any other people group. 

As we do that, the world will one day marvel as it witnesses the true glory of Africa emerging from its ashes.

Thus the battle cry must proceed from our beautiful continent. It must bellow and refuse to be restrained: We are, therefore we do!

[1] Those who personally know me may attest my deep commitment to Christ and his cause in the world. Though I have deep respect for great missionaries such as Livingstone, some of their beliefs left much to be desired. Among these is the inability to distinguish the message of the gospel from jingoistic cultural notions. To some of them Christianity equalled eurocentrism. I forgive them because, not unlike me, they too were prisoners of their times. This does not lessen the damage to the cause of the gospel as a result of these mind-sets, which lingers even to this day.

The curious phenomenon of black outrage

Let me confess that I was not personally offended by Zelda le Grange's twitter outburst. That it caused some offence in sections of South African society is, however, understandable.

Recently we have seen the re-emergence of racism from the shadows back into mainstream South African society, with ever increasing impudence.

The politeness (I will not say "pretence") of the 1990s, the halcyon era of Rainbowism, seems to have lost its guilt-embalming appeal.

Those days seem ages ago, when everyone, black and white, were supposedly always the biggest opponents of Apartheid. One always wondered how it was that the system endured as long as it did when exactly no one had supported it! But that is a digression.

The point is that true colours are increasingly difficult to conceal. The Internet and social media in particular have played no small part in this needed expose.

This is welcome because genuine dialogue on perhaps the defining problem facing South African society can finally ensue in earnest. Ultimately we can only fell the giants that we identify and acknowledge.

It is this new candour that would have emboldened Zelda to make her ill-considered comments with the expectation of the usual social impunity.

It is unfortunate that Zelda came to bear the sharp edge of a simmering volcano of black indignance for her comparatively innocuous tweets, particularly in view of the daily and ubiquitous bigotry endured by black South Africans in cyberspace and other social spaces.

Though I may not agree with what seems an unfair singling out of Zelda, I do hope we are witnessing the moment when black South Africans finally discover their cyber voice.

An impoverished soul is defined by its acceptance of abnormality. Bitter experience has taught it that suffering and injustice are its star-scripted lot in life.

Familiarity with powerlessness teaches the afflicted party that any action is futile. An outrage is either excused or silently borne. This is the world that has been inhabited by black South Africans for decades.

A low estimation of their own value, as a result of systemic injustice, designed to emboss that very message, is responsible for a troubling tendency for black South Africans to see the world through the eyes of the other. This renders them susceptible, at times, to the jarring habit of silently grumbling, at best. At worst, justifying behaviour that should never be tolerated.

This mentality was entrenched during the apogee of colonial and apartheid power. In particular the period between the last of the frontier wars in 1878 and the emergence of the black consciousness movement in the late 1960s.

This was a dismal period characterised by the towering might of the apartheid-colonial machinery over a largely defeated African population. The consensus against racism, at least at the rhetorical level, only came to capture the mainstream of western public opinion during the latter stages of the 20th century. The struggle against South Africa institutional racism last century was therefore mostly a forlorn voice in a desolate wilderness.

Though there was some black resistance, notably the momentous formation of what came to be known as the ANC in 1912, all of it was nevertheless before the silhouette of a gold-crusted power constellation of English capital and Afrikaner nationalism that loomed imperiously over the conquered natives.

The crucial element imbued by the black consciousness movement was a new appreciation of the power of black agency. It gave them a new voice. Its distinction from the ANC was the mass influence it wielded.

It infused a new confidence that the sheer volume of the black population could triumph over their nuclear- armed adversary. It became the intellectual backbone behind the class of 1976. The un-governability movement of the 1980s that finally toppled apartheid was spawned by this new found agency.

The democratic dispensation was the culmination of a number of factors, not least this rediscovered agency. It had a violent and chaotic edge to it, which was ideal in contending with a political system that was organised, sophisticated and well versed in the language of violence.

The instruments that were employed successfully against apartheid have become somewhat blunt if not destructive in a democratic landscape that rewards social confidence and education. A new environment calls for a new approach, not least the ability to engage in cyber space as a means of rebalancing the skewed socio-cultural power equation.

Discovering this cyber voice is crucial for the continuing normalisation of South African society that is still characterised by an asymmetric distribution of socio-economic power along apartheid constructed lines.

Apart from the political power conferred by sheer numerical volume, socio-cultural power continues to inordinately favour those with the general advantage of language, education, economic connections and resources. In other words white South Africans, who have hitherto used it effectively to guide the contours and flow of popular opinion. This advantage manifests indubitably in the increasingly important arena of cyber discourse.

This is a function of a lopsided economic environment and jarring educational disparities inherited from Apartheid but tragically perpetuated by the post-apartheid ANC government.

The outrage from “black twitter”, though it unfairly chose a “soft” target, must develop into a constant readiness to apply social pressure on those who align themselves with bigoted ideas. Their freedom of speech must be matched by the freedom to show commensurate displeasure.

To be a self-respecting human being comes with the capacity to be outraged by a suffered injustice. It is heartening to see that black South Africans are learning this too.