Ord&Bild explores the long relationship between India and Europe;
Il Mulino asks what happened to democratic socialism;
and Esprit debates populism in power.
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Ord&Bild
1–2/2020
(Sweden)
Ord&Bild explores the long relationship between India and Europe
Ord&Bild publishes a big issue on India and Europe, guest-edited by novelist and essayist Anjum Hasan. The result of an unusually interactive and collaborative editorial process, the issue explores literary, aesthetic and philosophical aspects of a long relationship, to which colonial and post-colonial experiences are central. How does migration affect one as an Indian artist? What does European film mean to someone who has lived in Delhi all their life? What was Hermann Hesse’s grandfather doing in Kerala? Who translated Kundera into Hindi?
Literary biography: The answer to the last question is given by Vineet Gill in his portrait of Indian novelist Nirmal Verma (1929–2005). Verma spent most of the 1960s in Prague (leaving just before the Soviet invasion) and for him the city was the gateway to a European sensibility. Even after his ‘homecoming’ in the 1970s and growing interest in Indian identity, European culture and literature remained central to Verma’s work.
‘Not unlike the European Orientalist who heads to the East on a quest for spiritual self-discovery, Verma styled himself as an Indian Occidentalist, learning to see the self through, and in relation to, the West,’ writes Gill. ‘Europe was a stepping-stone for the Indian writer in the making. The history and literary legacy of Europe had to be reckoned with if one wished to become an Indian writer.’
Multiculturalism: Interest in Hindu and Buddhist spirituality from the 18th and 19th centuries fostered the notion ‘that India had much to offer Europe spiritually, but could contribute little by way of political ideas’, writes Girish Shahane. The Mughal emperor Akbar’s enlightened and inclusive view of society and religion, developed in the late sixteenth century and revived in the 1950 constitution, tends to be forgotten — and not only in the West.
‘Between assimilationism and vulgar relativism lies a realm of multiculturalism that throws up difficult questions about the balance between group rights and individual rights, which parallels the balance between sulh-i-kul, the impulse to harmonise cultures, and rah-i-aql, the path of reason that occasionally compels the rejection of traditions and customs. Sadly, histories of multiculturalism, which have proliferated in recent years, pay little heed to the example of Akbar or the history of the Indian republic, treating multiculturalism as a recent development within affluent societies.’
Art in exile: Journalist Taran N. Khan tells the story of a Kabul filmmaker living as a refugee in Hamburg. ‘To create things, to make films, to feel beauty and pain like all artists do — all this had acquired great significance to Masoud and others like him. Being an artist was a large part of what made Masoud himself. It was that part that had fallen silent since he had arrived in Germany.’
Also: Anjum Hasan on existentialism in Indian literature, and Jai Arjun Singh on faith in Hindi cinema.
More articles from Ord&Bild in Eurozine; Ord&Bild’s website
il Mulino
1/2020
(Italy)
il Mulino asks what happened to democratic socialism
The end of the Cold War marked a new beginning for western Europe just as much as for the former Soviet countries. In western Europe particularly, ’89 was ‘interpreted not only as the defeat of communism, but also of social democracy’, write the editors of Il Mulino. In Italy, the Mani pulite political corruption earthquake that terminated the First Republic in the early 90s ‘marked the end of democratic socialism as a significant presence’.
Split left: Across continental Europe and the Anglo-Saxon world, socialist and social democratic parties have lost the allegiance of their traditional electorate. In Italy, support for the centre-left is now positively correlated with per capita wealth. The left is split between former communist hardliners and reformists without a clear political identity. In the face of rising populism, the choice for social democratic parties is between political renewal and marginalization, write Luciano Fasano and Paolo Natale.
Welfare: ‘The assumption that the poor are at the very least spendthrift seems to prevail, even on the left’, write Marcello Anselmo, Enrica Morlicchio and Enrico Pugliese. The Italian case is no exception: the basic income, received by over one million households as of January 2020, is often regarded as the emblem of welfarism and clientelism in the south. Drawing on biographical stories, the authors show how stereotypes cannot account for complex family realities, in which, despite its imperfections, basic income can help keep children away from paths of deviance.
Education: Impoverishment and social disarticulation make school’s inclusive role more crucial than ever. Andrea Morniroli and Annamaria Palmieri look at projects addressing school drop-out in Naples. The role of the state is not simply to provide funds, but to engage in dialogue with local actors: ‘Bridges need to be built among classrooms, services and local communities, to ensure that the latter are transformed into actual “educational communities”’.
More articles from il Mulino in Eurozine; il Mulino’s website
Esprit
4/2020
(France)
Esprit debates populism in power
There were notable absences among the list of signatories to the statement issued by members of the European People’s Party on 7 April, calling for the expulsion of Fidesz. This lack of unanimity in the EPP on the question of illiberal populism is becoming increasingly untenable, writes Jacques Rupnik in Esprit.
‘For years, the EPP was seen as a pillar of the European project under Franco-German influence. Now, however, the party is finding that central Europe — with Orbán in Hungary, Kurz in Austria and Tusk from Poland — is forcing it to re-examine its political choices.’
Religion: Christians around the world are addressed by populist leaders as custodians of national traditions, and even of the natural order. Yann Raison du Cleuziou argues that the alliance between Christian communities and anti-establishment populists may reveal the roots of the populist turn. Both feel betrayed by mainstream parties and political elites, and both warn against the promotion of sexual diversity and a perceived increased influence of Islam.
At a deeper level, there are ‘profound affinities between populist rhetoric and certain political theologies’. The real promise of populism may be the replenishment of ‘a sacred symbolism of power that has been hollowed out … by the dynamic of political liberalism’.
Political science: Populism emerges in parallel with a transformation of democracy itself, as trust in party representation is eroded and dissent deprecated, argues Nadia Urbinati. Triumphant populist movements exalt national identity over the abstract ideal of human rights, roll back the liberal agenda, dismantle technocratic governance and maintain supremacy through propaganda. Ultimately, ‘populism is not an ideology’ but ‘a “vehicle” to get into power’, yet it is one that invariably leaves its mark on whatever agenda it is supposed to deliver.
Film and TV: The carnivalesque mask of the comic-book villain the Joker, popularized by the recent film, has entered the globalized political imaginary, writes Nicolas Léger. What could be more symbolic of contemporary populism than this ‘contagious and disquieting image’ of a figure riven by ‘nihilistic impulses and desires for change’? Anonymous discontents fighting the political machine are a staple of US popular culture, as Ghislain Benhessa and Nathalie Bittinger show in their history of populism in American films and TV, from D.W. Griffith and Frank Capra to House of Cards and Mr. Robot.
More articles from Esprit in Eurozine; Esprit’s website
