While explaining primitive communism, Marx and Engels described the pre-agrarian form of communism; which was based on the principles of egalitarianism in social relationships, collective right to basic resources, and absence of authoritarian rule and hierarchy. We can think of similar scenario among indigenous people in pre-Aryan India.
But, in the last 3000 years; we have seen evidences and incidents of oppression and marginalization of tribal people that took place in India in various forms. We may call it ‘cast system’, ‘colonial rule’ or ‘neoliberal agenda’. In all the cases the ‘powerful’ adopt a contemporary, contextual and aggressive strategy to de-legitimize the ‘powerless’. And in all the cases, economic and material dialectics played crucial roles. Therefore, ‘neo’ of ‘neoliberalism’ is not fundamentally a ‘new’ approach/ model of dominance; but it is just an old wine in a new bottle. Fundamentally, the face remain the same, only new masks (in various forms) are adopted/ cultivated/ generated to serve the purpose; some of the masks are Corporate Social Responsibility, Special Economic Zones, Transatlantic and other Business Talks.
In Indian society an indigenous people have several (simultaneous) identities: Shudra or Untouchable (courtesy Brahminical rule), Scheduled tribe or primitive (courtesy Colonial rule), Underdeveloped or underserved (neoliberal lingo). After accomplishing socio-religious (Brahminical rule), politico-economic (Colonial rule) marginalization they are now planning and implementing geo-demographical displacement (if not extinction) of tribal people.
Therefore it is not surprising when scholars claimed approximately 90% language (mostly indigenous)will be lost in the next 40 years i.e. by the year 2050 (Graddol D., 2004). Last month, we have experienced loss of one such language- 65,000 years old ‘Bo’ language extinct with the death of Boa Sr, a resident of Andaman island of India.
Are these issues really relevant/important? Really? Oh…come on. Don’t forget the words of Darwin- Survival of the fittest! Indigenous people are underdeveloped and primitive; therefore they are not ‘FIT’. And as they are not 'fit', how they can have the right/ claim to survive in this progressive world of 21st century? After all it is exiting and enjoyable to watch extinct aboriginal tribes in museums along with fossilized creatures of pre-historic age!
Long live neoliberalism!
But, in the last 3000 years; we have seen evidences and incidents of oppression and marginalization of tribal people that took place in India in various forms. We may call it ‘cast system’, ‘colonial rule’ or ‘neoliberal agenda’. In all the cases the ‘powerful’ adopt a contemporary, contextual and aggressive strategy to de-legitimize the ‘powerless’. And in all the cases, economic and material dialectics played crucial roles. Therefore, ‘neo’ of ‘neoliberalism’ is not fundamentally a ‘new’ approach/ model of dominance; but it is just an old wine in a new bottle. Fundamentally, the face remain the same, only new masks (in various forms) are adopted/ cultivated/ generated to serve the purpose; some of the masks are Corporate Social Responsibility, Special Economic Zones, Transatlantic and other Business Talks.
In Indian society an indigenous people have several (simultaneous) identities: Shudra or Untouchable (courtesy Brahminical rule), Scheduled tribe or primitive (courtesy Colonial rule), Underdeveloped or underserved (neoliberal lingo). After accomplishing socio-religious (Brahminical rule), politico-economic (Colonial rule) marginalization they are now planning and implementing geo-demographical displacement (if not extinction) of tribal people.
Therefore it is not surprising when scholars claimed approximately 90% language (mostly indigenous)will be lost in the next 40 years i.e. by the year 2050 (Graddol D., 2004). Last month, we have experienced loss of one such language- 65,000 years old ‘Bo’ language extinct with the death of Boa Sr, a resident of Andaman island of India.
Are these issues really relevant/important? Really? Oh…come on. Don’t forget the words of Darwin- Survival of the fittest! Indigenous people are underdeveloped and primitive; therefore they are not ‘FIT’. And as they are not 'fit', how they can have the right/ claim to survive in this progressive world of 21st century? After all it is exiting and enjoyable to watch extinct aboriginal tribes in museums along with fossilized creatures of pre-historic age!
Long live neoliberalism!
Comments
We shouldn't treat neoliberalism as some exclusive concept that we must be joined against. If the corporatists didn't come up with neoliberalism after a period of relative economic stability, they would have found some other ideology to justify the use of economic and military warfare. It just suited the times.