Session 3: Community in India: Postcolonial Theory and Subaltern Studies (Summary and Qs)

Introduction:

This week’s readings lead us to engage with the Subaltern school of historiography that emerged under the mentorship of Ranajit Guha in the 1980’s.

While influenced by the works of Gramsci, British Marxists and other scholars, Guha and others argued for the need to re-examine existing historical narratives of anti-colonialism, nationalism etc. that were produced largely by elites (colonial, nationalist historians, south Asian historians at Cambridge) and Marxists, who did not account for the ways in which ‘subalterns’ (as opposed to proletariats) or marginalised people facilitated transformations in society. These dominant narratives seemed Eurocentric, a view from the top, and unable to account for identities and politics outside the framework of class and capitalism (such as caste and religion) thus overlooking various historical events – peasant insurgencies and mobilisations, sources of history and the lived experiences of people.

The school  thus pushed for the need to recognise  a domain of politics that was autonomous  and differently structured from that of the elites – ‘it neither originated nor depended on the elites’.(Guha, 1982)

The context in which the school of thought evolved was marked by insurgencies, rebellions, revolutions in India and as well as globally. The importance of nationality came to be of crucial concern and questions like the role of culture and popular forces in national ideals came to the forefront. The limits of capitalist expansion and its universalising tendencies were being questioned based on events around the world. 

The term proletariat could not capture or explain what was happening in India in the 80’s  - the growth of a developing industrial working class but still predominantly agrarian. Hence the growth  and popularity of the subaltern school.

While Subaltern studies as a school of thought has undergone various shifts and changes globally, and been criticised on the questions they raise, their theoretical underpinnings etc., the pieces for this week focus on the initial position of asserting for an autonomy of lower class insurgency and subaltern resistance. Responses and criticisms of this position come to from Vivek Chibber.

Points to discuss:

1.The role/relationship of culture and political economy

2. Diverging notions of nationality

3. Problems with who the subaltern is - where are the fragments and episodes today?

Summary of Readings:

1) Ranajit Guha -  On some aspects of the historiography of colonial India

Guha lays out his issues with the elitism of nationalist narratives and historiography that claim nationalism was a project and achievement of the elite. He refers to both narratives by British colonisers and administrators as well as Indian elite personalities and institutions.  Colonisers saw nationalism as a response to opportunities they generated i.e. they taught Indian elites about governance and administration. The other narrative indicates that the indigenous elite led people to freedom based on altruism (rather than because of an expectation of power and rewards). Such narratives fail to take in to account the role that ‘people’ played (independent/autonomous of the elite) and the mass articulations and mobilisations they engaged in (it was often seen as a law and order problem or a diversion from the real ‘political’ problem). Guha argues that such politics were never addressed by mainstream historiography.  He goes on to talk about the differences in elite and mass mobilisations which sometimes overlapped with the latter getting integrated into the former (such as in the anti-imperial struggles). Guha criticises the national bourgeoisie and their failure to speak for the nation but also states that it was the failings of both the bourgeoisie and the working class to lead the movement with a singular purpose to gain freedom from the British thus resulting in a diluted vision for a free nation.

2) Partha Chatterjee – Agrarian relations and communalism in Bengal

Chatterjee highlights the existence of unorganised peasant politics alongside organised bourgeois politics and the ways in which the former engaged with the formal state. Chatterjee discusses the differentiation within the peasantry and the multiple communities within which their identity is ensconced. The ideological significance of different identities was dependent on specific elements of politics. This is in fact the most important feature of agrarian society. Rather than cross-cutting identities like in a pluralist society, here each layer of community identity is encapsulated in another larger community identity. Peasants are not passive and subject to the manipulations of the elite. Further, he highlighted that they did not revolt out of primordial urges but because of specific issues with the moneylenders, elites, colonialists. This was often with a religious lens and organised along caste and community lines.

3) Dipesh Chakrabarty- Radical histories……..

The paper, presented in three parts, aims to provide a critique of Indian Marxist historians in their failure to look outside the rationalistic framework, a legacy of European enlightenment, which rests on modernity and reason.

In the first part, Chakrabarty argues that religion, very inherent to India, has not been understood by Indian Marxists due to latter being influenced by hyper-rationalism, which is rooted in colonial modernity. Chakrabarty argues that Marxists historians like Sarkar have failed to incorporate religious consciousness in their historiography of India. Where Sarkar is failing, is to not grant religion its place in history as an end to itself and, grasp the concept that religion could be the end in itself and that religious sensibilities used political tools as means to get to its end.

In the second part to his paper, through the example of some excerpts from Rushdie’s Midnight’s Children, Chakrabarty is seeking to elaborate on the unreasonable origins of reason, where violence become legible for the cause of modernity and rationality. The modern, through the use of violence and coercion, tries to instill reason into the yet-to-be-modern (subaltern) and this use of violence is not questioned but becomes the necessary evil. He is trying to highlight here the violence of rationality which gets legitimacy in the argument for the end it is seeking and the process of modernity is not a benign process. Chakrabarty, using some examples from western countries, brings out the irony in the project of modernity where the modern society, in order to free the subaltern class of their barbaric past, uses certain kinds of violence. In the pursuit of the progress, beginnings do not matter.

In the last part of the paper, Chakrabarty explores ways in which a subaltern history can be written, a dialogic manner with the subaltern. Here, a comprehensive reversal is required in the relationship of powers in the exploitative society. Subaltern, as Gramsci defined, was incapable of thinking the state and once the subaltern could think of the state, he transcended the conditions of subalternity. Subalterns exist in fragments and episodes and thus their history should be fragmented.

4) Partha Chatterjee - Community in the East

The central argument Chatterjee makes is the need to locate the idea of community within practices of modern (individual-centric) politics in non-western countries, even though the two seem fundamentally opposed. Chatterjee sets out the terms of this opposition as voiced by Communitarians and Liberal Individuals. The communitarians opine that the construct of the individual self is untrue as they are not sovereign subjects who are free to choose options in society based on their preferences. Communitarians holding their stance that these preferences which seem to be individual selections are actually shaped by larger social attachments into which the individual is born and also that communities gave individuals moral meaning in their lives. They refute the liberal premise that individual freedom should be held above questions over the common good. In fact, the notion of common good is the basis for participatory politics in modern times. Giving prominence to individual freedom will lead to divisive and manipulative politics by powerful interests in liberal democracies .

In a retort by Liberal individualists to the claims made communitarians said that it is acceptable that the image of the individual is shaped within the community and the concept of common good is also a theoretical construction. There will not be any common agreement on a common good and this will invariably lead to deep fissures in society. The liberal individualists did not out rightly dismiss communitarianism which they accepted was important for individual living. However, they cautioned communitarian tendency to undermine the liberal system of rights, which could lead to a proliferation of majoritarian intolerance, and forced conformist ideologies.

Similar opposing ideas frame world ideologies which divide the west and the east into two contrasting camps – western individualism versus eastern traditionalism- which get mapped on to modern capitalist society and structures and traditional pre-capitalist community in the east.

While western individualism gained huge popularity and was largely emulated by the world’s leading economies it had some lacunae. The isolated and individualist way of life lacked a connect with social obligations and mutual dependence among members of the community. Eastern tradition seemed to come to the rescue as they had a spiritual aspect which encouraged social networks and cooperation among members of the community. Contrary to popular opinion of modernisers, Ashish Nandy says that community structures are flexible and have better and more organised resources to deal with society related conflicts, resolve disputes and tolerate differences better people. Nandy said that western narrative of modern thought has become so deeply embedded that nations are being built ‘on the ruins of one civilizational selfhood’ . Gandhi waged a passive war by resisting the Colonial dictates shaped by the involvement of indigenous cultural modes of collective action. In spite of this being the largest exercise in political mobilisation , it was threatened by the rise of modernisation. The Gandhian position while was able to polarise people from different walks of life for a common political agitation stubbornly rejected the modern state entirely.

Chatterjee argues for a language to explain processes and practices of conceptualising a different kind of modernity. This must be done without sounding like a lack or imitation of the western modernity. Chatterjee illustrates this with the study of community formations among poor migrants in an Indian city. A group of migrants were living dangerously close to a railway tract in shanties in Calcutta. Since they had occupied state-owned railway land they were considered as illegal occupants. Their settlements had grown steadily since the 1950s with people who had moved there from different places. It is important to note that their survival impinged upon their collective community living. Several attempts of eviction by government authorities have proved futile as the migrants refer to their community as a family. In the many years of habitation, the migrants found jobs as construction labourers etc. and this lead to them participating in the regular motions of modern living.

The conceptual problems raised by this study were many. The collective form that these settlers ascribed on themselves was out of the judicial framework where law agencies could not legitimise their identity as their occupation of that land was a direct violation of property rights. Despite, this the state machinery cannot ignore the collective claims of livelihood and habitation . With such state of affairs these groups of people come to be categorised as marginal or underprivileged. While such concessions are made the state agencies while performing a moral duty do bear in mind that due to the lack of resources cannot deliver such concessions very often. Like the example stated the most used survival strategies adopted by other such marginal groups comes from the power of community identity.

As there has been enough motivation and need to write a new history of the Eastern modernity maybe there will be a possibility for capital to find a resting place with community.

5) Partha Chatterjee - The Nation and Its Pasts 

Bankimchandra Proclaimed ‘’We have no history! We must have a history!”. This statement is telling about the state of affairs with respect to historical writing in India. Bankimchandra’s contestation was that the history of Bengal was written by the English based on the testimonies of Muslim chroniclers; the fear was that Bengal may not be represented authentically in these accounts. 

With referring to the traditional history, Mrityunjay Vidyalankar whose book Rajabali was an account of the history of India. The author says that he did not undertake ‘research’ while writing about the Rajas , Badshahs and Nawabs who occupied the throne in Delhi and Bengal as they were only writing about what was happening in society at that time. Mrityunjay’s book consisted of experiences of the Brahmin scholars in 18th century Bengal. 

Whatever were the differences between ‘progressives’ and ‘conservatives’ among the new intellectuals , the beliefs of the old society must give way to reform in framing a new modern world. This view was evident in the writings of many in the 19th century which was reflected in their language of politics that writers employed to explain the political climate of the country. 

6) Partha Chatterjee - After Subaltern Studies  

The author argues in this paper that questions raised by Subaltern Studies are neither out rightly ignored nor has it been completely addressed. What is needed is a fresh perspective outside the framework of Subaltern Studies with new actors that have not previously not worked in the area of Subaltern Studies. Several young scholars such as Dipesh Chakrabarthy and Ranajit Guha came together in the 1970s to start Subaltern Studies this created an atmosphere of naive eclecticism and did not feel obliged to adhere to any particular school of historical writing.

The Author says that they created an environment filled with intense and sustained debates about their philosophical and methodological positions about Subaltern Studies. Their exploratory selves allowed them to engage in fierce debates but yet not develop fully formed positions which they would have to guard aggressively. They were able to treat intellectual brickbats and bouquets with equanimity. Their attempts at organising conferences on Subaltern Studies was met with no cooperation and sometimes conspicuous resentment but this did not sap their enthusiasm. Dipesh Chakrabarty comments that the Subaltern Studies consists of a group of men which is ironical. It is rather unfortunate that the group is devoid of women. This has reflected in obvious omissions of the subject of gender in the early editions of Subaltern Studies. Another implication of being young while research this subject was using unconventional methodologies that would allow anyone to read in extraordinary ways. For this reason, the writers required to bolster their writings with best theoretical arguments. Initially the author recollects that the depiction of the Subaltern as a sovereign subject was not palatable. However, the choice was made to toe the line and not outright rebel against the critics but to embrace their criticism of the depiction of the Subaltern by not entirely giving up the position the author held.

The emergency that was imposed in the 1970s was followed by the terrorist strikes in Punjab and Assam in the 1980s, followed by the announcement of the liberalisation policy in the 1990s. The resultant effect of all these events made administration more active as they began involving themselves by reaching out to people  in their everyday lives. Capital generated in the corporate sector gained legitimacy within urban civil society. The subaltern rebel which was the construction of the authors seemed a distant creation in the times of the British Raj. Therefore, the subaltern required reformulation and redefinition in a rapidly changing societal structure.

The author draws the reader’s attention to the mass-political subject in India and wonders if he has to be redefined. During Colonial India, the state operated outside the framework of the structure of rebellion within the peasant community. Now the workings of the government have seeped deep into the lives of the rural people like affecting matters like supply of water to agricultural fields, electricity in homes, access to public roads, schools and colleges etc. Within the same context lie the recent farmer loans that have been unpaid due to successive crop failures that have led to several suicides.

Thus, even though the subject of the Subaltern studies was begun 30 years ago and its image was reframed, reinvented and inserted into several projects the question of whether this term which is a construction of time will just continue to be subsumed in the narratives and discourse of the government and state machinery or individual interest groups or will it rise as an autonomous stream of consciousness. 

7) Partha Chatterjee - Subaltern and Capital
Chatterjee address key criticism levelled at the subaltern school by sociologist Vivek Chibber in this piece. Starting with Guha’s work Dominance without Hegemony, Chibber refutes Guha’s criticism of liberal ideology which is the universalising tendency of capitalism, or in other words the idea that the new social order established by the bourgeoisie enjoyed the consent of all classes in society and was therefore hegemonic in its power. Guha concludes that the hegemony is spurious and its rule is more coercion than consent.  Chibber counters this claim by arguing that no bourgeoisie revolution was hegemonic in the way Guha defined it. Chatterjee argues that  Chibber has misunderstood the concept of hegemony as defined by Gramsci.

Chibber criticises Chakrabarty when he argues that the consciousness of religious, caste and other cultural differences among the industrial working class is a limit that colonial capital was unable to surpass in that it could not transform them into abstract labour. For Chibber these features are compatible with capitalism and accuses Chakrabarty of  reinforcing Orientalism. 

Chatterjee argues that  Chibber overlooks the very important notion of how labour is abstracted and in turn measured. Chatterjee also takes on Chibber when Chibber talks of the ‘psychology’ of peasants and workers. Chatterjee argues that subaltern studies speaks in terms of consciousness (not psychology)  as understood anthropologically and as demonstrated in daily practices of people. Chatterjee emphasise the importance of the diversity of practices that people engage in within larger structures and the need to introduce this to Marxist debates over the nature of the post-colonial state and transition to capitalism.

Chibber refutes Chatterjee’s idea that  Indian peasants were motivated to act based on group interests with little or no consideration of their individual interests. Chatterjee argues that this attribution is incorrect and that peasants were aware of both individual self-interest and community and that community relates to political struggles while self-interest is more to do  with daily social and economic life. The moments of confrontation between peasants and formal structures of state were driven out of a sense of collective solidarity.

Chatterjee’s biggest issue with Chibber is that he insists that capitalism or the struggles of subaltern classes must be the same everywhere and that his work is a plea for continued faith in the universal values of European Enlightenment.

8) Vivek Chibber - Revisiting Subaltern Studies

Chibber, in his riposte to Chatterjee , argues that  Guha is drawing on a discredited historiography of European revolutions to start with and hence the gap between Indian and Western capitalists is entirely fictional. Chibber finds the ways in which bourgeoisie is defined by Guha as problematic. Who does Guha actually refer to? Chibber denies that he has misunderstood the notion of abstract labour or that he deems it irrelevant. He argues that Chatterjee and Chakrabarty resurrect an Orientalist view of the East.

Anu, Keya and Priya