It
is true that the ideal of equality and justice may not go hand
in hand with the pragmatic objective of optimal and productive
allocation of resources. But that problem has been staring at
humanity since time immemorial. With efficient use of technology
and committed political management we must be
able to bring justice to the suffering humanity.
What
saddens an average individual is the death of inspiring humanistic
ideologies and the wanton misuse of ideas to further sectarian
objectives of powerful groups and nations. Leadership is purposeful
action to lift human beings from the state of nature to a state
of culture. In the state of nature inequality and the rule of
might prevails. But in a state of culture the equilibrium favorable
to equality and individual freedom are promoted. To inspire human
beings to think on those lines and initiate social action based
on those principles require imaginative leadership, a leadership
based on spiritual and ethical commitment and concerns. The gradual
extinction of such leadership from world stage and the sneaky
emergence of shameless leaders who pursue power, money and pleasures
for themselves and their legions are the causes of alarm. The
utopia of material prosperity that they sell acts like an opium
on the masses.
A vast network of hierarchical control and the disproportional
and often undeserved boons that they receive keep the machinery
of exploitation efficient and well greased. The unexpected collapse
of an inefficient socialist system and along with that egalitarian
ideals and the resultant intellectual confusion and anarchy have
put the world in a downward spin. The ideal of a new world order
and human rights and principle of self determination have become
just smoke screens for the ruling class to pursue their agenda
silently and systematically. It looks as though a heartless robot
have taken over the destinies of nations and human beings. Added
on to that are the specters of oil crisis, aids menace and terrorist
violence. The cumulative effect will not only be unimaginable
suffering to humanity but also increased confusion and opportunities
for global exploitation.
I
find that the year just passed by has brought more problems than
solutions and the idealism of the 1950-s and 1960-s and the optimism
of the 1970-s and 1980-s have all come to a natural death and
the puny leaders of the world- the Bushes and the Blairs, the
Jintaos and the Putins -are all groping in darkness and are forced
to take irrationally fundamental positions in search for elusive
clarity and certitude.
From
this bleakness I can project only a bleaker 2005. There will be
more of everything foreboding -more terrorist attacks, more aids
related deaths, more corporate greed, more superpower arrogance,
more religious and ethnic intolerance, more leadership gaffes,
more fruitless and costly research in the field of science and
more unemployment and mass discontent and general drift, both
in the developed and developing world. We are on the eve of a
terrible world crisis. And the end of the socialist world will
not end without the end of the western hegemony and the politics
of top-down social engineering.
My hope is that out of the womb of this darkening crisis will
emerge a new dawn of hope and human possibilities. Thinking people
all over the world must turn their attention on this impending
crisis and its vast potentialities, rather than harping on old
mantras and slogans.
As the Katha Upanishad exhorts: Arise, Awake, stop not till the
goal is reached.
May that be the message for the New Year 2005.
