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Anti-revolutionary Discourse Theory
What unifies all trends of Post-Modernism is that there can be no grand
narrative about matter, life and society. They think that the Discourse
that tries to bind everything under a single head is faulty Discourse.
There is no master discourse in the World. If someone refers to Hegelian
dialectics or Marxism as a grand discourse Post-Modernists will reject
it outright. For argument’s sake, if there are separate discourses
concerning feudalism, capitalism, etc. it is simply foolish to have a
generalised discourse like historical materialism.
Post-Modernists think that in a society there exist multiple separate
discourses of religion, caste, gender, family, etc. And in every
discourse there will remain a hegemonistic part along with possibilities
of generating one or more discourses. Through the deconstruction of
hegemonistic discourse such counter discourses emerge. As for example in
India the Dalits build up counter discourse against domination of the
priviledged. So also in the gender discourse men constitute the
dominating discourse. In both cases the counter discourse of the Dalits
or Women deconstructs the dominating discourse making room for
democratic space of the Dalits or Women.
The relevant question comes up immediately as to the possibility of
interrelation of unity or alliance of all the dominated parts of various
discourses. At this Post-Modernists smell the tendency towards forming a
meta-narrative. Thus while the discourse of men is deconstructed by
discourse of women, even if the discourse of men is the discourse of
working men it is also dominating. Post-Modernists here adduce the
argument that if efforts are made to unify on the basis of labour,
feminism, etc. they will invariably turn into a sort of servility to the
discourse of men.
The ideology of this Discourse accepts certain preconditions. Firstly,
truth has no existence independent of Discourse. What dominating
Discourse will pronounce as the truth that is truth. In the works of
Post-Modernists truth is text-based. In the 19 th
century such view was condemned as idealism by the materialist thinkers.
Secondly, the multiple types of discourses as pointed to by the
Post-Modernists do not have any inter-relationship. They do so because
they simply reject the rational efforts of the European Enlightenment
period to establish cause-effect relationship in the material or animal
world. Post-modernists don’t bother as to why there exist gender, caste
or such divisions in a society and why there is class division and such
relevant questions. Their queries are confined to the genealogy of a
particular Discourse. Whether inter-relationships can be found among the
discourses or whether some discourse can be accorded the status of a
fundamental or an unimportant one is not the concern of the
post-modernists. In their consideration the efforts at finding out such
inter-relationships will impose determinism and essentialism. Actually,
they announce, nothing can be determined by something else. They reject
that the discourse of economy ultimately determines the discourse of
politics. They do not consider it essential that the discourse of class
will have any determining role in the law-making of a state. Instead of
considering inter-relationship between the discourses, the
Post-modernists think it wise to address a Discourse which assumes some
importance at a given moment. It is actually a policy meant for
contingent demand. This does not mean the fading away of other
discourses. They lose their importance for a temporary period.
However, it will be mistaken to think that like the Marxists
Post-Modernists also differentiate between primary and secondary
importance of discourses. For the Post-Modernists society itself is the
arena of war for multiple constructions and deconstructions. In this war
he who constructs a Discourse deconstructs it in another discourse. This
refers to the multiple identities of the persons concerned. In this
sense on one occasion the same category of people is both target of
attack and targeting some aim.
Thus there is an unremitting war of all against all with no question of
discrimination between important and unimportant aspects. It is
downright anarchism. Actually the politics of Post-Modernism is the
politics of subversion. In a given period against a dominating Discourse
there emerges a counter discourse through the deconstruction of the
former. However, the deconstruction of the dominant discourse by the
dominated does not end repression or domination by a certain Discourse.
Post-Modernists generally agree that whatever discourse comes up
displacing another discourse the erstwhile dominated now starts wielding
power over others. So there is unending process of domination through
power politics with no hope of emancipation. The space of democracy
formed by the struggle of the counter discourse against a dominating
discourse shall ultimately lead back to square one. So the discourse
analysis passes into an anarchic state with the total neglect by
Post-Modernists to build up a concrete programme against such bleak
prospect of humanity. Marxists also admit aspects of multiple identities
but lay stress on essential aspects for the destruction of main sources
of exploitation and domination taking into consideration inter-relations
of various contradiction. Despite immense success in the Russian or
Chinese Revolution there remained numerous loopholes as regards
resolution of certain other contradiction in a proper way. But this does
not teach us to reject the rich experiences of the socialist revolution
and to go about courting anarchism.
While preaching discourses in a society based on power, Post-Modernists
conveniently avoid delving deeper into the facts that difference does
not invariably mean bossing or domination and that a society can move
forward having many differences, some are open to change with
fundamental changes in a society. This however, does not preclude the
conscious efforts on the part of revolutionaries from the beginning to
address various types of domination and exploitation while spearheading
the attack against the principal forms of exploitation and domination.
This was one of the crucial theoretical mistakes of the C.P.I. and
C.P.I.(M) leadership to shelve struggles against caste system and such
other questions with the fond hope that a socialist society shall
automatically erase them from the Indian society. Such a fatalistic
approach based on Discourse is clearly anti-Marxist, and hence harmful
to the revolutionary struggle. It only poses a question whose
post-modernist solution is embedded in anarchy, passivity and also
running away from the actual struggle against any type of domination.
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