Identity and Violence- The Illusion of Destiny by Amartya Kumar Sen, Penguin Books, New Delhi, pp. XX + 215.

Review by Dr. Vibhuti Patel

This is an extremely important contribution by the Nobel laureate, Prof. A.K. Sen addressed to global civil society with a strong plea for reason and choice. It is written in a lucid and persuasive style to make a convincing case in favour of recognition of multiple identities determined on bonds of class, caste, ethnicity, race, gender, faith, profession, interest in science, fine arts, music so on and so forth. It is not an ivory tower philosophical work but it delves on real life issues faced by human civilization through out the history. It makes a point, as advertised in the blurb of the book, that brutalities are driven as much by confusion as by inescapable hatred. Conflict and violence have been sustained by the illusion of unique identity as witnessed in savagery in the contemporary period in Bosnia, Rwanda, Palestine, Afghanistan, Sudan and India.

This book provides wealth of material sourced from interdisciplinary streams of knowledge and belief construction- history, economics, literature, anthropology, science and sports to convey that on the one hand ‘a sense of identity can be source not merely of pride and joy, but also of strength and confidence’; at the same time, ‘identity can also kill- and kill with abandon’. (p.1)

The book begins and ends with poignant deconstruction of the author’s painful childhood memories of hatred that spiraled towards violence and killing at the time of partition of India and Pakistan. He vividly describes ‘the massive identity shifts that followed divisive politics’. (p.9)

In his scathing criticism of Samuel Huntington’s controversial book, The Clash of Civilisations and the Remaking of the World Order for its foggy perception of world History, Prof. Sen shows the limitations of unique categorization along so called civilisational lines (p.11) and makes us see ourselves not as people with ‘diverse diversities’ but as ‘federation of religions and civilisations’. (p. 13) As against this, he emphasizes that the people of the world can be classified with systems that have ‘far reaching relevance in our lives such as nationalities, locations, classes, occupations, social status, languages, politics and many others.’ (p.10)

While explaining the plight of immigrants, he makes an apt remark, “The adversity of exclusion can be made to go hand in hand with the gift of inclusion.” (p.3)

The author succinctly exposes hollowness of the term “the moderate Muslim” and with historical examples of Emperor Akbar and his grandson Emperor Aurangzeb shows that though both had strong faith in Islam, the former was tolerant and respectful of other religions while the later was intolerant and hostile towards other religious faiths. He poses important question, why do we use such adjective only for Muslim politicians? Is moderation in political beliefs co-terminus with moderateness of religious faith?

He pleads for, ‘A recognition that identities are robustly plural’(p.19) as a sense of belonging and loyalty among human beings come from different groups generated as a result of birth in a particular family, neighbourhood association, affiliation with professional groups, religious communities and political alliances. These plural identities can be either ‘contrasting’ or ‘non-contrasting’ depending on conflicting or complimentary nature of the priorities and demands of different identities. (P. 29)

In a chapter on ‘Civilizational Confinement’ he exposes sectarian approach that describes India as a “Hindu civilization” and Pakistan as “the Muslim world” and tells us the futility of dividing civilization on a communal line. Numerically speaking, India has 145 million Muslims, which is more than the whole French and British populations put together. Moreover, ‘the nature and range of Indian art, literature, music, films or food’ are the result of ‘contributions coming from both Hindus and Muslims in a thoroughly intermingled way.’ (p.47) He also proves with historically accurate data that democracy has global roots with contribution of Greek, African, the Middle Eastern and oriental societies that encouraged public debates and propagation of ideas.

He also explains how the bogey of ‘civilizing mission’ imposed by the West in Afghanistan, Iraq and several Latin American & Central Asian countries has created media machinery in which ‘democracy is seen as a quintessentially Western idea which is alien to the non-Western world.(p. 51). History of science touted by the Western world does not project contribution of non-Western scholars from Chinese, Indian, Iranian, Arab world in development of mathematics (decimal system in the early centuries of the first millennium in India), science, technology (printing, irrigation and dam construction developed in the Arab world ), medicine and philosophy. He is intellectually honest in acknowledging the occidental world for renaissance, enlightenment and the 19^th century industrial revolution.

Some less known information on ‘Religious Affiliation and Muslim History’ is worth mentioning as it helps to counter xenophobia against the Muslims.

– It was Chicago based Engineer from Bangladesh, Fazlur Rahman Khan, who used tubular concept in designing World Trade Centre (building with 110 floors that was attacked on 11^th September, 2001 by the terrorists), John Hancock Centre (100-story) and Sears Tower (110-story) of the USA.

– Muslim engineers, both Arab and Berber, were responsible for the development and use of the irrigation technology when Spain was ruled by the Muslim rulers during the second millennium.

– Muslim mathematicians and scientists (Arab and Iranian) globalised technical knowledge of decimal system, trigonometry through two distinct steps, going first from Sanskrit (theories of Aryabhatta, Varahamihira and Brahmagupta) to Arabic and then to Latin.

– Prof. Mahbul ul Haq, a Pakistani economist and former finance minister of Pakistan propounded Human Development Approach (popularized by the UNDP) to assess the deficiencies of public policies pursued by the nation states.

Narrowly defined Islamic identity nullifies wide range of contributions made by the Muslims for peace, prosperity and constructive efforts. The religion centered political approach bolsters and strengthens ‘the voice of religious authorities’ while downgrades civil society initiatives and social movements (p.77) and paves the way for terrorism.

Religious revivalism, cultural nationalism and anti-west feelings should be understood in the context of last three hundred years of history of slavery in Africa and two hundred years history of colonization of Asian and Latin American countries by Europe. Devastating effects of humiliation as a result of racial insults, physical and social injury of slave trade and colonial rule is seen in terms of destruction of social confidence in Africa. The Independent Commission on Africa has declared this phenomenon as ‘the war against Africa’. We can say the same about ‘Dalits /the untouchables’ in India with an uphill task being “winning the war against humiliation”. (p. 86)

‘Dialectics of Colonized Mind’ is such that global ideas of democracy and personal liberty are labeled as “Western ideas”, intellectual and scientific history of the world that has mixed heritage gets distorted and touted as “Western” and religious fundamentalism and international terrorism play havoc with people’s lives and use innocent youth as cannon fodder in attempts to “get even” with the West. ‘The Western leaders have facilitated authoritarianism and militarism, a breakdown of civil order and educational and health services, and a veritable explosion of local conflicts, intercommunity strife and civil wars’ not only thro’ diplomatic moves but also thro’ macro economic policies that ensure super-profit (thro’ neo-colonial exploitation of the poor economies) for the Transnational and multinational corporations controlled by G8. Poverty and inequality within and between the nations escalated by economic globalization are creating massive recruiting grounds for the foot soldiers of the terrorist camp. (p.145)

The author brings out bitter truth of ‘art of blaming the victims’ (105) by giving examples from the history of colonization of Ireland and Nazi Germany. British projection of Irish population as lazy, alcoholic, slothful thro’ jokes, stories, humorous narratives and media portrayals is not an isolated example. The Nazis did the same with the Jews. Victorious nations always trivialized and marginalised the vanquished nations by using similar tactics. Jingoism thrives on racial superiority.

Prof. Sen provides some praiseworthy examples of public policies in S. Korea and Japan. Both the countries drew inspiration from concept of enlightenment in Buddhism to encourage educational expansion. “Between 1906-1911, education consumed as much as 43 percent of budgets of the towns and villages for Japan as a whole.” (p. 111)

While talking about culture, the author says that culture is not uniquely significant in determining our lives and identities; class, race, gender, profession, politics also matter. There are great variations in the same cultural milieu (p.112) Culture does not sit still, it changes. Culture interacts with other determinants of social perception and action. There is a need to examine the exact relation between cultural liberty and the priorities of multiculturalism. (p.113) Cultural captivity does not help. “There is a great need for broadening the horizon of understanding of the other people and other group….” (p. 117)

The author admires inclusive multiculturalism-full voting rights in Britain immediately even without British citizenship, non-discriminatory treatment of immigrants in health care, schooling and social security promoted by the British government. At the same time he sees problems of plural monoculturalism as seen in cases such as “faith schools”. He reminds us not to confuse ‘multiculturalism with cultural liberty’ with ‘plural monoculturalism with faith based separatism’. (p.165) He criticizes the British policy of ‘Divide and Rule’ during colonial period that treated Gandhiji, Zinnah, Sarojini Naidu, Dr. Babasaheb Ambedkar as a representatives of Hindus, Muslims, Women and Untouchables respectively. ‘The disastrous consequences of this policy of defining people by their religious ethnicity and giving predetermined priority to the community based perspective over all other identities’ (p. 169) were seen in partition in 1947 between India and Pakistan; according to Gandhiji, ‘vivisection of a nation’.

In the last chapter titled ‘Freedom to Think’, the author emphasizes need for theoretical and conceptual clarity. Theories can influence social thought, political action and public policy. Conceptual confusion about people’s identities turns multidimensional human beings into one dimensional creature.

The only limitation, I find with the book is neglect of gender concerns in the meta narratives. Women’s rights groups in all parts of the globe have taken up issues playing havoc with women’s lives as a result of identity politics. The Family laws based on religion are discriminatory towards women in matters such as marriage, divorce, custody of child, maintenance, alimony, land rights, right to stay in matrimonial and parental home. African feminists have fought against genital mutilation. Indian women’s rights organizations fought against Sati (widow-burning).Even while describing wars Bangladesh (1971), Somalia (1993), Bosnia (1993) and communal riots in India, Prof. Sen does not mention how women were brutalized/ repeatedly raped and forcibly made pregnant by the ‘men from enemy camp’ as a target for ethnic cleansing.

According to Prof. Sen 85% of arms sold internationally in the recent years were sold by G 8.( p.140) and the international women’s movement has been at the forefront of anti-war struggle. Currently wars are waged in 200 places on this planet and for G8 wars have been the most profitable venture.

The insightful book has come to us at a right moment with right perspective. It will be eye-opener for all socially concerned citizens- students and scholars, decision-makers (in governance, criminal justice system, politics and diplomacy), human rights workers and the UN officials

Contact address:

Dr. Vibhuti Patel,

DIRECTOR, P.G.S. R.

Prof. & HOD, University Department of Economics,

SNDT Women’s University, Smt. N. Thakersey Road, Churchgate, Mumbai-20

Phone-26770227®, 22031879 Ext. 243(O) Mobile-9321040048

E mail: vibhuti.np gmail.com