The rise of counter-revolution

The basic values on which modern civilisation rests are facing challenges across the world. How this will be resolved is one of the most pressing questions of our time

The common thread stitching together the great revolutions of the modern era, such as the English, American, French, Russian, Chinese and anti-imperial (including the Indian freedom movement) was a virtuous paradigm of basic values on which modern civilisation rests. 

This paradigm comprises reason and the scientific method (which accelerated material well-being), individual freedoms (on which democracy rests), the equality of all humans irrespective of colour or creed (which spawned the rule of law and socialist experiments), fraternity (the basis of modern nation states), humanism (which elevates human beings above the supernatural and divine) and secularity (the belief that all religions are equally valid, the end of the divine right of rulers and the separation of Church and State). At the philosophical level, free trade and markets were an application of the concept of individual liberty to economic activity.

The ancient and medieval world embraced some of these basic values, such as logical reasoning (the Socratic method of classical antiquity, the Ajnana school of scepticism in ancient India, and the medieval Islamic Mutazilite rationalist school) and individual liberty (Athenian democracy). These were, however, not part of a virtuous paradigm, resulting in contradictory outcomes. Thus, you had the coexistence of Athenian democracy with slavery. Logic without the experimental approach could not lead to a systematic scientific method that accelerated material well-being. 

It bears reiteration that the great divergence between east (China and India) and west (Europe and the “white” settler colonies) opened up only after the west embraced this virtuous paradigm, collectively known as the “European enlightenment”. The movement towards convergence between east and west commenced when the former started adopting this paradigm. 

Bringing down the Berlin wall. The fall of the wall thirty years ago led to an influential belief in the “end of history”, meaning that civilisational values had triumphed, not just once, but for all time

Not all these values were adopted in equal measure in all western societies, and later modern eastern societies, at all times. There were also unresolved tensions between the basic values. Social Darwinism legitimised slavery and imperialism. The Russian and Chinese revolutions rejected individual freedom and free markets. The political and social structures arising from such tensions, such as slavery, empire, and dictatorships, ultimately failed, or reformed radically, as these tensions were resolved. Social Darwinism was a travesty of the scientific method, which was quite different in the physical and human sciences. Imperialism privileged economic freedom over political liberty and fraternity, while Left wing dictatorships privileged equality over individual liberty.

These values are basic and not arranged in any hierarchy. The resolution of these tensions, first with the end of imperialism in the mid-twentieth century, and later following the fall of the Berlin wall towards its end, infamously led to an influential belief in the “end of history” — meaning that this virtuous paradigm had triumphed not once, or on multiple occasions, but for all time. Some tensions however remained unresolved.

While most political groupings, from the left to the centre to the conservative right, have accepted the virtuous paradigm, it has not gone unchallenged. The counter-revolutionary far right comprehensively rejected the basic values of the European enlightenment. It seeks to benefit from the fruits of modern science without genuflecting to either reason or the scientific method; it holds the concepts of individual liberty and equality in contempt; it disregards humanism, and where its beliefs are secular, it elevates the leader to a god-like status. 

Mostly seen as a lunatic fringe through much of the last two centuries, there are two historical phases where it appeared that the counter-revolution might turn the clock back. The first attempt during the interwar period in Europe failed spectacularly. The concept of Hindutva, an extension of this counter-revolution in India, could not also prevail over the revolutionary movement led by Mahatma Gandhi. Over the last two decades radical Islam has gone down the same path.

This paradigm is again under major attack, including in India, for the second time since the nineteenth century. This belies the belief in the end of history, as it is by no means self-evident that the virtuous paradigm will prevail. Unlike the interwar period, the major challenge this time round comes not from newly established countries like Germany and Italy, but long-established democracies such as Western Europe and the United States, where the paradigm originated, and the oldest major democracy in the former colonies, India. As before, the philosophical roots of this challenge lie in tensions among the basic values of the virtuous paradigm, this time not between but within two basic values.

The first tension is between political liberty and economic liberty, manifested through trade and markets. Once considered indivisible, and vindicated by the fall of the Berlin wall, the attractiveness of the East Asian — including the reformed Chinese — model (which privileges economic freedom over political freedom) has steadily grown, as western capitalism flounders with declining growth and widening inequalities. 

The second tension lies within the basic value of fraternity, between the inclusive and exclusive aspects of nationalism. The former gave rise to modern nation states on the back of the breakup of the old-world empires, and later to the nationalist revolt against imperialism, itself an expression of the exclusive aspect of fraternity. Whereas the tension between liberty and equality was resolved through social democracy, even though inclusive nationalism had a synergy with humanism (which exclusive nationalism did not), this tension was never resolved despite the end of imperialism. This tension has unsurprisingly resurfaced, as the rising tide of migration pitches residents against non-residents.

Ironically, even as classical socialism got the balance between liberty and equality wrong, it got the balance between inclusive and exclusive nationalism right, as its original impulse was to strive for “permanent revolution”, which did away with nation states. Might this permanent revolution apply to its bête noire, capitalism, which remains unstable with national borders? 

Both the major challenges to the virtuous paradigm arose in the wake of heightened globalisation accompanied by major crises of capitalism, the first following the Great Depression of the 1930s, and the second following the Great Recession a decade ago. There is, however, a fundamental difference between the globalisation of the late nineteenth century and that of a century later. The former was not virtuous as it was enforced, being violative of both liberty and fraternity. The latter is virtuous, based on both economic and political freedom, and fraternal in every sense. 

The first major challenge was resolved after a devastating war. How might the tensions underlying the second end, or be resolved, is arguably one of the most pressing questions of our time.    

The writer is RBI Chair Professor at ICRIER. These views are personal