76. MAN WITHOUT SOCIETY
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ARISTOTLE defined man as a social animal. In his treatise Politics, he said:
“Man is by nature a social animal; an individual who is unsocial naturally and not accidentally is either beneath our notice or more than human. Society is something that precedes the individual. Anyone who either cannot lead the common life or is so self-sufficient as not to need to, and therefore does not partake of society, is either a beast or a god. ”
May be we may refine it a bit. We know that even wild beasts live in company. And even gods are in groups: we have 11 Rudras, 12 Adityas, 8 Vasus, and minimum 2 Aswins. Those who shun society are exalted sadhus or madcaps. But Sadhus too need others to care for them!
Such quotations have to be studied in context. Aristotle did not say that man was totally social. In his Nicomachean Ethics, Aristotle concluded that the good life for man consisted of philosophical reflection in solitude, and also in the exercise of social virtues in the company of people.
Aristotle also said that man is a political animal.(or he is an outcaste). In essence, this too stresses man's social or gregarious aspect. For Aristotle, state was a creature of nature and so man was naturally political- he had to belong to the polity, or he would be an outcaste!
Society precedes individual
The really important point that Aristotle made is that society precedes the individual. Man does not form society, really. He finds himself in a society. He is born into a society: this is as true of a tribal society as of the so called advanced society that we take ours to be. Man may not like the society he is born in and may attempt to reform it, and many do; but he cannot avoid society. So far, no one has succeeded in reforming a society, either. But one can learn to rise above the norms or practices of a society, without disturbing it. This is the Hindu idea of Sanyasa. In the West, a dissatisfied person seeks to change society; in India he changes himself! He drops out of society But it too is very much a social institution. As Tiruvalluvar says, (Kural 41), the householder remains the support of even the Sanyasi.
Society imposes its terms on man.It is daily experienced in linguistic India. If you are a Marathi or Odiya and live in Chennai, you live on its terms: you have already lost your linguistic freedom! You may have colleagues at the work place, or select friends, or company at parties, but you have no society! When we are part of a functioning society, we do not mind its ways. We fall in line.
This is an important feature in India. Our society may appear rigid. But this is on the outside. Our religion does not enforce a single system of worship or theology or philosophy on everyone. One may believe in any god or no god; one may believe anything about god. It is his business; but he has no business to disturb others. All that the society requires is that you conform to its external norms, while holding your own opinion on everything! All our revolutions are in the intellectual, philosophical fields. It was the other way in the West. Vivekananda pointed this out. It is only now that people in the West have the freedom to believe in anything - or no thing! But for that they have had to dump organised religion and rigid theology!
This is an important feature in India. Our society may appear rigid. But this is on the outside. Our religion does not enforce a single system of worship or theology or philosophy on everyone. One may believe in any god or no god; one may believe anything about god. It is his business; but he has no business to disturb others. All that the society requires is that you conform to its external norms, while holding your own opinion on everything! All our revolutions are in the intellectual, philosophical fields. It was the other way in the West. Vivekananda pointed this out. It is only now that people in the West have the freedom to believe in anything - or no thing! But for that they have had to dump organised religion and rigid theology!
Seen thus, society not only precedes man- it protects him too. We have not realised the full impact of this. The modern tendency is to highlight the deviations.They have reformed society so much and so repeatedly, it is now fully deformed!
Old societies
Those of us who are 70+ recall our life in our small towns and villages, where everyone knew everyone else; where everyone was an uncle or aunt! No one was a stranger except a visitor or traveller. Those were the days before electricity, before telephone. The only means of communication was direct face to face contact. We learned things like how to address elders ; what gestures or tone was appropriate,when; we observed how the elders moved with each other- we observed their friendliness as also their occasional enmity and indifference. We moved with all sorts of people- inevitable in a small place. Taking all together, we felt there was an invisible human wall of protection around us- no matter where we went or what we did, some one would be watching and we would be accountable.
One may say this must have been so constrictive- so suffocating. Come on, just think about it. Now one has a number- mobile number, Aadhar number etc. He is traceable, 24 x7. Then he is watched by CCTV/ hidden cameras whether on the road, in a shopping mall, in the bank, at the ATM. Are people really more free now? At least we were watched by individuals who had some concern for us; today, we are watched by systems which are not human and have no concern for us! In fact they watch us because they think we may all be criminals or extremists! The system cannot deal with normal people!
Social contract ?
Contrast Aristotle's words with the following:
This is the reversal of the Aristotelian idea. Man's freedom is an inner spiritual freedom. Rousseau talked of a return to nature and living a natural life. This can never be formulated or understood. It must remain a vague idea. It is an abstraction.
Communities within community
People of like types tended to live together- community within community. Their dwellings were also their work places. Thus we had a street where tobacco-sellers would live. As you entered the street, you would see rows of cured or treated tobacco stems left to dry in sun- on the raised platform in front of the house, on the road, on the sloping tiled roof, etc. The whole area would be full of that aroma- rather nice, if you liked it! If you entered the weavers' area, you would see the yarn being dyed, the dyed yarn being dried, and the sound of the handloom working. The whole family would be engaged in it. That sound too was nice, with a certain rhythm which was soothing when you got used to it- it had to be experienced! If you had a classmate from these communities, you could go with them to their house and observe them as long as you liked. We had a street for goldsmiths, for potters, for bamboo-weavers, which was called in Tamil "Vedakaaran street"! வேதகாரன் தெரு! The Brahmin agraharam too had its own atmosphere, with its sights, sounds and smells!
If one spent time observing the people at their occupations, one tended to develop respect for the people and their professions- no matter what it was. They were independent artisans- not workers, and each had his work ethic. They all (except the Brahmins ) had a strong sense of community.
If one spent time observing the people at their occupations, one tended to develop respect for the people and their professions- no matter what it was. They were independent artisans- not workers, and each had his work ethic. They all (except the Brahmins ) had a strong sense of community.
The essence of such social life was the informal intimacy. One might be a big lawyer,but when we had to go to him with some message, he was lawyer uncle so and so! So with the doctor, so with anyone-except the teacher! He was always Sir, never uncle! We could enter any house any time.
And these elders would not keep idle or merely stick to business. After we had conveyed the message or collected the information or completed the work, they would not simply let us go. They would ask what class we were in or what subject we were studying and would start asking questions. The generation gap was not allowed to show its head! And some feedback would reach our elders in due course! We belonged together.
By AlsosforestCyprus(Own work) CC BY-SA 3.0 Wikimedia commons.
How many such nighbourhoods still remain in India?
Economic changes destroy society
With the rise of the cult of economic development, search for employment, social mobility, and expansion of towns, the old neighbourhoods have largely disappeared in India. In the beginning, colonies or neighbourhoods sprang up which were mainly linguistic ( linguistic/ethnic in the US). They served a variety of useful functions and provided the first real sense of society to people. For instance when a Madrasi bachelor went to Delhi, Bombay or Nagpur on employment, he would immediately find a Madrasi atmosphere in Karol Bagh/R.K.Puram; Matunga; Dhantoli/ Sita Buldi areas in those cities. Even in cities like Chennai, different areas had distinct neighbourhoods. With the economic and social changes all these have changed- it is vulgar commercialism everywhere.
With the rise of communal and linguistic politics, such neighburhoods could become sitting targets. So, people now feel safe in being scattered, and in anonymity!
Our towns and cities , where we now live have changed beyond recognition. Independent houses have given place to huge highrises and commercial places. The new professions have changed norms of social contact: no one speaks to a neighbour freely. Even in one block, no one knows who occupy the other flats. Only some senior citizens move around in such places if they find others like them. People have become insufferably snobbish. The IT boom has given them, at a young age, income many times over the average earning of the others, and this has spoiled them.It is unbelievable: many youngsters today earn per month what their parents used to earn per year, after two decades of service! The income disparity was never greater than it is today. The youngsters do not have a sense of the value of money- partly also due to uncontrolled and continuous inflation. This reflects in reckless spending. Money has displaced manners.
We now have gated communities- but these are not really neighbourhoods. They are like the social clubs of the privileged- to enforce exclusion. Even within the community, the feeling of belonging is absent.
The old community feeling we may still find in some old areas of old cities like Old Delhi, some parts of Bangalore or Chennai. The new extensions have so such pretensions.
Peter Drucker, the pioneer
Almost the first person to study this deeply was Peter Drucker. He noticed that by the 30s, the sense of society or community was gone. He understood it to be due to the changes brought about by technology: the industrial culture was replacing the old commercial culture. But the institutions were lagging behind.
Man works in bureaucracies- whether industrial, private business (corporates) or govt.With that he not only loses his freedom, he also loses his sense of community/society. He works with many others like him in a closed atmosphere , but it does not breed a feeling of society.
Drucker proposed that the big organization had become the new institution of society, in addition to the old businesses and the govt. But it had not understood the sources of its legitimacy and its responsibility to society. [ It is this insight that gave Drucker the impetus to articulate his management theory which in essence was that the new organization/ management must provide not only employment ,but confer dignity, value and a feeling of community on the workers.] This is the theme he developed in the first two books he ever wrote: The End of Economic Man, (1939) and 'The Future of Industrial Man' (1942)The blue collar workers of those days have become the knowledge workers of today, but the problem remains as valid. Thus for Drucker, management is not a matter of techniques, but the very art of creating a society of free citizens.
The bonds which created society in the past were not purely or even mainly economic. Today, people know no other relationship. The old social connections and celebrations have become occasions for commercial exploitation.
Do such technologies promote community?
The core of a society is always a transcendental value. It may not be clearly stated, but is shared in practice. In the Western societies before the Second World War, these could be easily identified as their religious belief ( monotheism ), moral dimension ( that each one is individually accountable to the Creator or some Power after death- in afterlife), and a dependence on natural law/justice. The two world wars (fought mainly among Christian nations) completely shattered the religious faith of the West. They sought salvation in secular paradise- Fascism, Nazism, Communism.
[ For a fascinating account of these ideas, please see: "Peter Drucker: Shaping The Managerial Mind " by John E.Flaherty, John Wiley&Sons, 1999, chapter 4]
These isms destroyed the autonomous/voluntary association of people like churches and local communities, and made everyone directly dependent on the state. Churches were unable to realise and adapt to the changes brought about by technology. Societies were gone. That the communities still function at all is due to remnants of old religious values, however distorted. as David Cameron, the British Prime Minister recently reminded his people. Abstract secular ideals have not provided practical guidance in real life.
Society and its demise in India
In India too we can see the parallel, though with a time gap. Our concept of Dharma- which even the beggar understands- doubles up for both morality and natural justice. Our religion gave us a practical formula of the four aims of life: dharma, artha, kama and moksha. Rebirth- not just afterlife- was a certainty and its quality depended upon how we lived now. This held largely till Independence: Gandhi was still invoking his vision of Ram Rajya!
With Independence came Nehru, his socialism with its promise of secular salvation, dumping of religion, especially Hinduism, and a bulging bureaucracy which became a super power. Politicians and bureaucrats between themselves have destroyed all forms of voluntary social effort and asserted their total dominance. With the rise of communal politics, all bases of social cohesion have been destroyed. People are pathetically dependent on govt- from essential supplies to education. In most cases their freedom for voluntary enterprise is subject in practice to heavy govt restriction and arbitrary bureaucratic action. : eg a private school cannot even have its own way in admitting students or choosing the languages it will teach!
www.dw.com
Consider an average educated Indian. His secular education has deprived him of active religious identity. His joint family has disintegrated. He is probably working in a different state, where he is an outsider. He has company in the workplace but that is during working hours. To which society does he belong?
In this respect, the Muslims and Christians in India do still have their sense of community. Above all they have the privilege of Constitutional protection of all their ways. Is it not odd that the so called Secular Constitution protects the Muslim and Christian by religion, and discriminates against Hindus?
Political parties do give a sense of society to their own active members. But this is obtained by preaching hatred against 'others'- as the Shiv Sena, DMK and others did. Most political parties in India are based on interests of specific communities and are no more than caste outfits. Now they combine linguistic fanaticism with it. By their very proliferation, they have destroyed the roots of common Indian social life. Even small villages have lost their social soul.
BANGALORE: An engineering student from the northeastern state of Manipur was attacked in Bangalore last night by men who allegedly demanded that he "speak in the Kannada language or get out". "They said you are eating Karnataka food, living in Karnataka. If you don't speak Kannada please get out. We ignored them, but they took it as an insult. They picked up stones and attacked us and I got injured," Michael told NDTV, showing a bandaged head and blood-splattered clothes.
from: www,ndtv.com 16 Octber, 2014.
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