Miscellaneous
A coterie of unequals
So far, we have had a Madhesi and a woman President. But these efforts amount to little when it comes to addressing issues surrounding poverty and rectifying the asymmetrical distribution of power in our country.You just have to look at the student statistics of elite American universities to see it. The US lags behind Nepal, a country with a historically lopsided wealth-distribution system, in the GINI index (the former scores .41 as opposed to the latter’s .328), which measures a country’s economic inequality, but some of the best institutions in the US, which are meant to nurture and support the best and brightest minds in the world, give an opposite impression.Abhinawa Devkota
So far, we have had a Madhesi and a woman President. But these efforts amount to little when it comes to addressing issues surrounding poverty and rectifying the asymmetrical distribution of power in our country.You just have to look at the student statistics of elite American universities to see it. The US lags behind Nepal, a country with a historically lopsided wealth-distribution system, in the GINI index (the former scores .41 as opposed to the latter’s .328), which measures a country’s economic inequality, but some of the best institutions in the US, which are meant to nurture and support the best and brightest minds in the world, give an opposite impression.
With a well-proportioned agglomeration of African-Americans, Whites, Chinese, South Asians, Hispanics and students from countries around the globe, as well as a near equal ratio of male and female students, these swanky citadels of learning look like tiny, seemingly egalitarian islands of prosperity and diversity, where one might be forgiven for thinking that the barriers created by race, religion and ethnicity have ceased to exist, unless one examines the facts closely. True, the markers of inequality are not as immediately visible in these institutions as they are in the larger society. But that does little to change the fact that American society is among the most economically divided in the world.
Excluding those that are exceptionally hardworking or wealthy enough to land into these places (which entails better job opportunities and social prestige), minorities still occupy the bottom of the American social pyramid. African-Americans and Hispanics, who represent nearly a third of the American population, comprise more than 70 percent of its prison inmates. Further, the unemployment rate among the African-American population is nearly twice the national average, with a quarter of those unemployed having some sort of college education. Creating coteries of like-minded, affluent people from diverse ethnic and racial groups has done little to solve the problem.
This is something that seems to be becoming increasingly true for Nepal as well. Although we have already started the process of challenging the dubious social roles and positions founded on dogmatic religious and socio-cultural mores by introducing various forms of positive discrimination, it is not hard to see that we are merely chipping away at the tip of an iceberg.
So far we have had a Madhesi President and Vice President. Our current President is the first woman in the country to hold the position (which many consider to be a big symbolic leap, given the worldwide dearth of female politicians in positions of power), while the incumbent Vice President comes from a marginalised Janjati community, and once led the war against the state (and let’s not even start counting those hailing from diverse ethnic and caste backgrounds who occupy influential positions and play active roles in politics, civil society and bureaucracy). But these efforts amount to little when it comes to addressing issues surrounding poverty and rectifying the asymmetrical distribution of resources and power that exists in our country. (Almost a third of Nepal reels under poverty, the majority of them from Dalit and Janjati groups).
Thus, before we start basking in the glory of this newfound equality, it’s worth considering if all we need to find an egalitarian society is the mere installation of a handful of representatives from previously disenfranchised groups into positions of power and influence.
Our southern neighbour, India, can also provide us with some valuable examples when it comes to the exercise of such tokenism.Examples set by powerful female political leaders have done little to change the fortune of women in the country. Despite having had four Muslim presidents, Muslims in India still perform very poorly across various social and economic indicators.
Similarly, although it has been two-and-a-half decades since the implementation of the Mandal Commission Report, which initiated affirmative action practices to end the historic discrimination of lower caste and margianalised groups and tribes in the hinterlands of the country (particularly in the states of Orissa, Jharkhand, West Bengal and Madhya Pradesh, among others) and those at the bottom of the caste hierarchy are yet to benefit from it.
At best, the act of elevating a handful of people from marginalised groups to the position of power and authority is a badge of honour for these groups; at worst it reinforces the idea that those at the bottom of society are helpless on their own and need to be uplifted by those above.
Tokenism is meaningful only when accompanied by substantive policies that work to eliminate the root cause of the discriminations that exist in any society. Else it ends up creating a new set of hierarchy, which propagates an ideology that is as dogmatic, flawed, and dubious as the one it replaced.
Although I do not support our current president’s views on women or the fact that our vice president was responsible for destroying the lives of hundreds of thousands of school-going children, now that they are in positions of power, I sincerely hope that they take proper measures to reduce the yawning gap between the haves and the have nots in the country. If not, I am not too optimistic that the current political changes are going to last. Those who have dethroned a king will rise again to remove the hundred kings that this system might end up creating.