CHAPTER Why Do We Need Political Theory? Rajeev Bhargava CHAPTER OUTLINE Introduction The Big Questions of Human Life The Emergence of Western Modernity Explaining Human and Non-human Nature Understanding Humans The Difference Between the Human and Non-human Worlds Decline of Political Theory? Types of Political Theories Little Theories, Grand Theories Cosmologies and Political Theory History of Political Thought and Political Theory Points for Discussion 19 19 21 21 23WHY DO WE NEED POLITICAL THEORY? INTRODUCTION ‘What in general are theories meant to do? What are the functtons of theory? In the first chapter, some of these functions have already been listed. However, here we ask a different, deeper question. Do we really need political theory? One may ask how this question is different from the one mentioned in the previous line? Consider then the following: doctors of modern, Western, allopathic medicine undeniably perform a function in our society. However, we might ask, in the critical spirit of Gandhi’s Hind Swara), if we really need doctors who practise modern Western medicine? Can the function of healing and restoration of health not be performed by other practices and their practitioners? Analogously, we might ask: can the function of political theory be better performed by something else, say ideologies or cosmologies? Why do we need political theory? I propose that this question cannot be answered unless we ask the big questions of human existence and collective life. I suggest that many of these answers are now provided, though not exhaustively, by natural-scientific theories and the social sciences. However, this was not always the case. Most of these answers were once provided only by religions, cosmologies and philosophy. Moreover, political philosophy simultaneously performed both explanatory and normative functions. In what follows, I suggest that political theory now performs three key separate functions. It explains at the most general level possible, it evaluates and tells us what we should do and it speculates about our current and future condition. It also tells us who we are. In some sense, these functions are no different from the tasks performed by cosmologies and ideologies. Yet, I argue that political theory is distinct from both, | also try to claim that political theory has a special function under modem conditions. Far from being dead, it not only lives but needs to flourish. m> THE BIG QUESTIONS OF HUMAN LIFE m Consider the following abstract but significant questions: + What is there/going on in the world? (Understanding) + Why are things there/going on in the world? (Explanation) + Will something that is currently going on continue to go on in the future? (Prediction) + Is that which is there/going on good or bad, right or wrong? (Ethics) + What am I to do? What is to be done? (Normative) + Who am P Who are we? (Metaphysical self-knowledge) Human life is virtually impossible without the availability of answers to each of these questions. One might say that one becomes a human being, or at least a certain kind of Jhuman being, as answers to these questions are learnt. Humans can live in a society only if they have some understanding of what the nature of the society is. For example, it is 1920 POLITICAL THEORY; AN INTRODUCTION crucial that in a hierarchical society a person has an understanding of his own rank as well as the social standing of others. A person who is part of the ‘lower’ order has a practical understanding of this status and knows that he must be deferential to someone superior to him. A member of this society understands what is going on when a person stands bowing his head and lowering his eyes before another man. He also understands why this is going on; he knows that a person must bow before another person because he is inferior. Such, understandings and explanations are part of common sense and crucial to the functioning of the society. Similarly, members of such a society have some idea of what is in store for them in the future, indeed what they can hope for. For the lower castes, practically nothing. For the upper castes, the permanence of privilege. And all this is linked further to a fairly common understanding of what is right and wrong, good and bad in that society and to a certain self-understanding. Given that | am a member of the lowest caste and therefore in- ferior, I must perform this action, In a properly functioning hierarchical society, the person deemed inferior believes that bowing before his superiors is the right thing to do, that it would be wrong to violate this norm, Thus, the possession of answers to all these questions is vital to the working of a hierarchical society: The availability of different answers to roughly the same questions makes possible a functioning egalitarian society Of course, to possess a fairly comprehensive understanding of one’s society does not mean that this knowledge is available as answers to questions. As a matter of fact, we do not first have questions for which we seek answers. We begin to have an understanding of our world that is reformulated as answers to these big questions when, as reflective creatures, we learn to raise these questions. But what are the circumstances in which we learn to raise these questions? There are many reasons why this might happen. T mention three. Tt might happen first if, for whatever reason, an individual or a group is alienated from the rest of the community. It might then be asked by alienated persons: do I really belong here? Who really am I? This estrangement leads to a crisis of mutual understanding. Second, this could. occur with the entry of the stranger whose opaque actions provoke curiosity and internal dissonance. Why is that man doing whatever itis that he is doing? How should we relate to him and others like him? Third, it may be caused by unpredictable changes in the natural world: disease, flood, earthquake, any natural disaster. Why do such dramatic changes occur in nature? Why do they cause suffering in this world? Why is there suffering in the world? Why are we born at all if we must suffer? Now, I want to suggest that small communities develop their own local cosmologies in. the face of any of the three changes mentioned above. Unpredictable changes in nature, the coming of the stranger, the possibility of the break-up of the community—all of these lead human beings to seek re-familiarization with what has become unfamiliar. In order to make a fresh sense of the world and their own place within it or to lend larger, deeper significance to our somewhat shaken existence, revisions in common sense become necessary. Cosmologies perform this function and help us tell a story about ourselves and our re- lations to others and to nature and make sense of the existing chaos. By making sense of something that is going out of control, becoming meaningless or discordant, they help in endowing it with meaning, make it harmonious with other things and bring it under some semblance of control. Cosmologies inform and re-fashion common sense. They frequentlyWHY DO WE NEED POLITICAL THEORY? extend and even challenge the common sense of the day by raising some of these questions afresh. Is the world that is apprehended by our senses real? (A question remarkably similarin form to: is the chalk that is crumbling and falling through my fingers really a piece of chalk?) Does life end with the physical destruction of the body? Am I to be identified exclusively with the physical body? Several cosmologies provide negative answers to these questions and thereby oppose our common sense. The world of senses is illusory or there is a life of the soul after death, they say. Whatever the case, cosmologies are never identical with common sense. m™ THE EMERGENCE OF WESTERN MODERNITY m Several ancient cosmologies tied to relatively small communities tended to see these ques- tions as pertaining to one unified universe. A distinction between the human and the natural world was neither drawn sharply nor seemed significant. Metaphysical self-knowledge was believed to be related to an understanding of the whole universe including nature, As Charles Taylor points out, identities in these worlds were not self-defining but defined in relation to the rest of the universe. Moreover, ethics frequently pertained not merely to human action but also to natural events. There was no distinction between science and philosophy and certainly no clear lines were drawn between a philosophy of the natural and the human world. This judgement might seem over-simplistic about all cosmologies. But it is certainly true of several European cosmologies and Aristotelian sciences and it is not to0 off-the-mark to claim that elements of such cosmologies are present in virtually every ‘pre-modem’ cosmol- ogy, including in several world religions. Let me stick, however, to ‘pre-modem’ European cosmologies. For example, before the rise of modern science, much of what we call the West- em world believed that the universe is a meaningful whole signifying something higher than humans or embodying some important purpose, goal or final cause and that everything which exists was moving towards the fulfilment of that cause. This was the great design or pattern in the world. Moreover, some cosmologies believed that this design was part of the Intention of a transcendent God. To find fulfilment, human beings simply had to relate to this pattem, one that existed in society, nature and the whole of the universe. This pattern could be known either by revelation, by the grace of God, or by pure reason. m™ EXPLAINING HUMAN AND NON-HUMAN NATURE Around the 15th century, a change began to occur in the intellectual climate of several ‘Western societies. For many of its members, nature no longer appeared to be meaningful It expressed neither an idea nor perhaps the intention of some transhuman subject, Aristotelian physics was challenged by a new perspective. The elements of nature were no longer believed to be purposeful. Fire does not move upwards because this is its purpose; likewise water does not flow downwards to serve this purpose. Itis mistaken to understand 2122 POLITICAL THEORY; AN INTRODUCTION nature in terms of final causes, as if its design was pre-ordained. Rather, for the moderns, nature was composed of discrete things, in themselves meaningless and independent of one another. They were not related to one another by virtue of some overall design. If related, this relation was more accidental. A ball moves because one hits it with one’s foot, not because it is destined to fit into some larger cosmic pattern. Its movement in a particular direction is not pre-ordained. It is due to a variety of contingent reasons, ie, that a person. happened to hit it with his foot and the ball remains hit, keeps moving till some other for stops it. How does one find this out? Not, by relying on cosmologies that talk of deeper significance. This interpretative move, the ‘modems’ felt, must first be jettisoned. Instead, one discovers this by ‘seeing’ the world unmediated by these meanings. One observes what an entity is like, how it happens to relate to other entities. If they happen to relate regularly, then this observed, de-facto regularity is what constitutes causation. There are no final causes at work here. Explanation is nothing but recording this pattem of regularity By recording regularities one can explain not only why something occurred in the past but also why it is likely to occur in the future, If you go near the fire and feel warm and this happens each time you have been there, then this is also likely to happen at a future time. This fact can be predicted. Thus, these new sciences are not just telling stories about nature but, so it appeared to modern thinkers, also explaining and predicting it Before the birth of modern empirical sciences, the only form of rational enquiry abroad. was philosophy, which used the a priori method of reasoning to arrive at answers to each of the six important questions concerning both the worlds taken together. In other words, a speculative, largely non-empirical mode of enquiry was expected to answer all the ques- tions. With the birth of modem natural science, the traditional role of philosophy was. transformed. For it now transpired that reason by itself can not arrive at knowledge of the natural world, It could not by itself answer questions concerning the nature and activity of the physical world, nor to explain or predict what goes on within it. This could be done only with some partnership with the human senses. Some considered this a partnership between unequals, with reason playing a subsidiary role. Others thought that reason and the senses were joint authors of our cognitive world. What the precise nature of this par- ‘nership is remained contested but the sole authority of reason had been permanently de- bunked. This meant that philosophy became, in the now famous words of John Locke, ‘a hand maiden of science’ Several thinkers—Hobbes, for example—iried to apply to human behaviour what was earlier applied to natural phenomena. Hobbes tried to replicate the idea of unified universe, by talking of an all-embracing materialism. To him, it appeared that what held true for the physical world was also true of the socio-historical world. Later, some philosophers drew the conclusion from this Hobbesian standpoint that a rational enquiry of the moral world or the self was impossible. As in the natural world, the task of the rational enquirer was to seek the guidance of the senses, to gather data about the social world and to try and understand its structure, and to explain and predict all the manifold events that take place within it. Theory was a more generalized form of explanation, rooted in and dependent upon data-based enquiry into the particular, Direct observation yielded a knowledge of particular things. Reason saw connections between all these different things and offeredWHY DO WE NEED POLITICAL THEORY? generalized explanations and predictions, These generalized explanations were theories of both the natural and the social world m UNDERSTANDING HUMANS m& However, soon a second perspective emerged in which the universe began to be segmented into at least two worlds. Though some questions were relevant to each, their form became different. Other questions could be raised only in relation to one of these worlds and not to the other. Modern understanding allows for a much sharper distinction between at least two worlds: the non-human natural world—the world of physical and chemical objects, and the world of plants and animals—and the world of humans that is already constituted by pre-reflective and reflective understanding. To admit the existence of two worlds does not imply that they are completely disconnected from one another But no matter how deep the relationship between the two, there also exist some fundamental differences m_ THE DIFFERENCE BETWEEN THE mt HUMAN AND NON-HUMAN WORLDS One such difference is this; while the natural world in principle exists independently of human beings, the human world is largely constituted by and is therefore dependent on human action. The force of gravity is not contingent on whether or not we exist. Neither is the movement of planets. Even if the entire human species were to perish tomorrow, rainfall, thunder, a flash of lightening will still occur. Not only are these independent of our actions, they are also independent of our thoughts. There is rainfall whether or not it is apprehended by us, whether o not we have a concept of it, This is not the case with the human world, which is both action-dependent and concept-dependent. Let me explain. Consider the act of raising one’s arm, This is already different from the expression, ‘the upward movement of the limb’. The latter is a purely physical description, while the former is an intentional act, a movement guided by or possessing an intention. To raise my arm, I must already be in possession of the concept of an arm and I must know what it means to raises something. The concept of raising something is constitutive of the physical movement of the hand going upwards. Now focus on the phrase ‘raising my arm’. This, in turn, may mean different things in different settings, i. in different conceptual worlds. Im the classroom it means that the student wishes to raise a question or offer a comment on what she has heard. In the board meeting it may signal the act of voting on an issue. On the cricket field it signals a bye and so on, Outside these settings itis simply the raising of the arm. In other settings, it signifies questioning, voting or signalling a bye. In each of these settings, therefore, the relevant concept of questioning or voting or signalling a bye is con- stitutive of the purely physical upward movement of the arm and involves an enrichment of the simple idea of raising one’s arm. 2324 POLITICAL THEORY; AN INTRODUCTION All human actions, practices and situations are constituted by concepts, To understand them is to understand these concepts. This is why an interpretative component is crucial to what we mean by the empirical in the human sciences. Understanding the human world is to grasp the complicated structure of concepts that partly constitute it. This is not true of the understanding of the natural world. So, this is the first qualitative difference beween empirical social sciences and natural sciences; indeed, the word ‘empirical’ itself has an en- tirely different connotation in the human sciences. The term ‘empirical’ is related to experi- ence but the nature of our experience of the natural world is different from experience in the human world, The natural world cannot be apprehended without concepts but itis not constituted by them, In this sense, the natural world exists independently of the concepts wwe have of them, As I said, it existed even before we had any concepts of them, before we even existed on this earth. This is not true of human or social phenomena. ‘What is true of human sciences in general is also true of social and political studies. The state is not just an ensemble of material things and movements. To describe it materially is absurd, Besides, such a purely physical understanding fails to distinguish the state from other social and political institutions. The modem state is a form of public power, relatively independent of the ruler and the ruled, embodied in an apparatus that has vi tual monopoly of violence in a particular community or territory and that functions to re- produce the conditions of existence and perpetuation of that community. This is just one way of understanding of the state but notice how many different types of concepts we must have already learnt in order to grasp the concept of the state: power, ruling, the distinction between ruler and ruled, monopoly, violence, community, conditions of existence and so con, Take a relatively simple example: A man called John F Kennedy has just died. Physically speaking, a living body has turned into non-living matter. But we humans describe this event as death. The person in question was no ordinary man, however. He was the President of the United States. To understand this fact about Kennedy is to already grasp a complex institutional setting. Moreover, we must ask: is it true that President John F Kennedy simply died? Yes, and No. To say that he has died does not convey that he has been killed. Indeed, to say that he was killed still does not capture what has happened. For one can be killed in an accident, Would it then be right to say that he was murdered? This, too, is true but only. up toa point. For Kennedy was a President of the United States of America and his murder had a political motive. He was murdered probably by a network of rival political groups, state agencies and the mafia, His was a political assassination. When a person says that Kennedy was assassinated, we assume that he understands the distinction between dying, being killed, murdered or assassinated. Each of these concepts and the distinctions among them are part of, and implicit in the event of Kennedy losing his life. Thus, we arrive at the following conclusions: + The question of understanding, explanation and prediction about the non-human natural world is answered by the natural sciences. + Given the difference between human and non-human nature, the question pertaining to the understanding, explanation and prediction about the human world is answered by the human sciences (by political science, sociology, anthropology, economics, etc), though always aided by humanities and the arts.WHY DO WE NEED POLITICAL THEORY? What then is the proper tole of social and political theory? Why we do need it? Let me straightaway elucidate two functions of political theory which it shares with social theory: Indeed, the first is not a separate function but an integral feature of all social sciences, including political science. If all human phenomena are constituted by pre-reflective or conceptual understanding and if philosophy/theory helps us understand this and make it explicit, then given the first feature mentioned above of political philosophy or political theory, the latter is an integral part of empirical social science. You can neither identify what you wish to explain nor what you are to explain it by unless you have a conceptual grasp of what these are. Philosophy is not merely a handmaiden of the human sciences but its integral feature. This is the interpretative and explanatory role of political theory. The second function of political theory is this. Some social and political phenomenon have such a large scale that no specific empirical enquiry can do justice to it, Nor ean it result from a collection of all the empirical detail. Data gathering and controlled enquiry can never suffice for the understanding of large social formations and for the explanation of changes within them or changes from one type to another. So the explanation of the rise of capitalism or the transition from feudalism to capitalism can never be understood or explained without some degree of speculation which is independent of empirical enquiry: Nor can we fully understand the nature of modernity or the variety of human predicaments in the modern world or the general attributes of subordination in a society that is colonized by another society merely by controlled empirical enquiry. This job is best done by social and political theory The object of this enquiry itself is identified at a very general level and its fuller understanding or explanation cannot be properly controlled by empirical data but requires a speculative jump. Political theories must perform this second function of providing insight and understanding into the most general pattemn of human practices and social change. Bhikhu Parekh calls this the contemplative role of political theory. To grasp the third function of political theory, it is important to register the second quali- tative difference between the natural and the social world and therefore between the natural and the human sciences. It makes no sense to ask moral and self-related questions about the physical world. It is no longer sensible to ask: how do we morally evaluate the force of gravity? Is there anything good or right about the laws of motion? Do chemical compounds have self-knowledge? However, such ethical and normative questions are at the heart of the human world. Why is this so? Consider once again our claim concerning the action-dependence of the human world, Also, consider any human action. It is true that human action can be explained and to explain it is to provide the reason for why it was done, In this respect explaining an action is no different than explaining any natural event. But in the case of human action we could ask another question. Is the reason for action a good one? Now, to say that it is a good reason is to endorse the action, to justify it. An action is not merely explained, it is also justified and as I said this justification is always accomplished in the light of some idea of good and bad, right and wrong This idea of justification can be explained in another way Take the example from cricket, again, When a batsman faces a ball bowled outside his off stump, he also faces a number of, distinct possibilities. He can leave the ball alone or flash at it. If he decides to hit the ball, 2526 POLITICAL THEORY; AN INTRODUCTION he must make a quick decision whether to drive, slice or cut it, to hit the ball towards long. aff, to cover drive or square cut. If he is audacious, he can even pull it towards midwicket. This judgement must be made on the spot, within a split second. Now suppose, the bal is a perfect out swinger, the batsman flashes at it, gets an edge and is caught behind. He must, ask himself if he had good reason to go after the ball, whether or not he made a correct judgement, Could he justify what he did to himself, to his captain, his team, the team’ coach? Indeed, he is answerable to a much wider public. He is answerable because he could have acted otherwise, There is a reason why he got out, But itis not a good reason. His rash act can be explained but it cannot be justified. Now, I want to draw a general conclusion from this example. To say that the human world is action-dependent is to say that it is grounded in one set of reasons from among several available and that the choice to act on one rather than another is made in the light of the person’ own understanding and judgement of what is good or right for the agent in the context, This understanding can be evaluated by others. We can ask if the person’ judgement of what is good is really so. Moreover, what is true of human action is also true cof the state of affairs it brings about. Any thing which is a result of human action is out there from among many possibilities and part of the reason why itis there is because the agent or agents in question undertook it in the light of their own understanding of what is good or right, Human action and the world it creates must be necessarily evaluated because a normative component is an integral part of it. The example I took involves an evaluative but not an ethical dimension, But cricket does possess an ethical aspect, too, Consider once again a bowler who has been hit for three consecutive fours. This assault is not merely on his bowling but on his own reckoning also on his sense of self-esteem and dignity. As he goes towards his bowling mark, he is angry and resentful. Indeed, he is so angry that he cannot contain himself. It occurs to him that to avenge the treatment meted out to him, he should bowl a beamer, Should he, really? He has a second to decide whether to do so or not. Should he use unfair means to remove the batsman from the crease? This is not all. A bookie has offered that if he is hit for four consecutive fours, he would earn twice the match fee paid to him by the Board. Should he succumb to this temptation? He must assess these reasons in the light of some conception. of the good life, some idea of right or wrong. A cricketer has this choice. So do all other human beings in their respective contexts. In short, a human being has some degree of ethical or moral autonomy Similar ethical considerations also arise in politics. Consider that the state is withdrawing from the public sector, say public educational institutions. The policy of reservations is predicated upon the availability of seats or jobs in the public sector. If admission or em- ployment opporiunities get limited in this way, the policy of reservations becomes practically. toothless. What must now be done for those who have been historically disadvantaged? At least two options are available. One is to pretend helplessness and to become indifferent to the plight of the ‘Scheduled Castes’. The other is to compel the private sector to have, for example, a proportion of seats or jobs reserved for them. Whatever policy the stateWHY DO WE NEED POLITICAL THEORY? adopts will be guided by some reason, The question is whether the reason guiding the policy is a good one. And whether it is really good or not must take into account the policy makers’ understanding of what is good or bad, right or wrong and the assessment of this understanding by others. It will depend upon whether these considerations are given any weight at all, which itself is a matter of ethics. To fail to assess one’s reason in the light of any ethics is itself unethical, if ethics has a bearing on these issues. m > DECLINE OF POLITICAL THEORY? This view that all human actions including public policy can be evaluated in the light of ethical considerations was not accepted by scientific-minded early modemists and resistance to it has somehow persisted to this day. A number of persons believe that a rational evaluation or enquiry of the moral world is impossible. The moral and political philosophy of yesteryears expressed merely the opinions, tastes and preferences of the indi- vidual enquirer and did not deserve the status of knowledge. Our experience yielded a wide variety of forms of self-understandings and moral opinions which can not be rationally evaluated. If they come into conflict, reason cannot arbitrate between them. Perhaps for this reason, several philosophers in the Anglo-Saxon world began to claim. that political theory was in an irretrievable decline. If political theory is a rational and normative enterprise, as indeed classical political philosophy from Plato to Hegel had. sought to be, then after the ‘new discovery’ about the impossibility of such an enterprise and the rise of the empirical sciences, political theory was believed to have no future. In- deed, as someone put it, it was already ‘dead’ This view, associated with Positivism, is now widely believed to be deeply mistaken. Everything seen, heard or touched by human beings is already constituted by concepts and therefore everything in the human world has to be properly understood even as it is observed. Moreover, most of these concepts carry a normative import. The human world hhas to be, to some degree and extent, good or bad and human action, right or wrong, There is no feature of the human world entirely free from evaluative significance. Of course, from this we could draw two different conclusions. If values are impervious to reason but constitute the human world, then all we can have is subjective opinion of this world. This means the impossibility of social sciences. This is a radical conclusion that the positivists did not reach because they rejected the first premise, namely, that facts and values are intertwined. Alternatively, we must abandon the assumption that values are beyond reason, and that therefore, itis possible to have objective knowledge of the human world. If values can be known and rationally assessed, then their permeation in the human world is no barrier to its understanding or rational assessment. This not only brings out the difference between the character and method of the natural and social sciences but also paves the way for a kind of systematic reflection that is exclusive to the human world, namely normative, moral or ethical theorizing 2728 POLITICAL THEORY; AN INTRODUCTION So, in addition to two functions of political theory mentioned above, we have a third function, one that is special because exclusive to human phenomena: to bring out the nor- mative import of concepts embedded in social practices and used in social sciences and. to subject them to detailed critical reasoning. Indeed, for some people this has become the defining, perhaps even the sole function of political theory. Much of Anglo-Saxon pol- itical theory focuses only on the normative at a sufficient level of generality: In contrast, political theory on the Continent refuses to separate the normative from the explanatory/ interpretative and the contemplative. Continental political theory has a broader scope for another reason which needs ex- plication and brings into relief the fourth function of political theory; to tell us who we are. Recall the point made earlier that in a hierarchical society, people perform actions in accordance with their social role, what in contemporary parlance we might call their identity. A person stands bowed with folded hands or walks at a safe distance from others, given that he is from a lower caste and the other has a much higher rank in the caste hierarchy, What he does now depends on what goes on in society and who he is. More generally, almost everywhere what one should do and who one is are related issues. When wwe ask the question, what are we to do? There is another question that we do not always ask. The implicit form of the question is: given that this is what we are, what are we to do? Classical political philosophers almost always asked these questions together: given the essence or purpose of human beings, what should they do? In contemporary theory, these questions are separated. Thus, political philosophy remains both a practical philosophy, i.e, one that has an action-guiding character and a systematic enquiry into the self, a kind cof metaphysical self-knowledge At the cost of repetition, let me once again answer the question: What is the function of political theory? Given that empirical political science is meant primarily to understand, describe and explain how decisions are taken in a society and how some individuals, groups cor classes are excluded from such decision making, one task of political theory is to help empirical political science to perform this role. However, it performs three roles not under- taken by the social sciences. First, to offer a general reflection on ‘the human condition’, con the predicament of modern societies, on who we are and so on (in Chapter 1, see point [e}). Second, a general reflection on a relatively narrow topic: the exercise of power in so- Gieties and the mechanisms by which power, ie. domination is exercised by some over thers. This includes the most general reflection on state power but if power resides in the capillaries of a society, then political theory is a reflection not only on the state but on the myriad capillaries in society (in Chapter 1, points [b], [c] and (dl). Third, itis the study of how this power should be wielded, by whom and why, and in the light of which values and ideas of the good life. This is a prescriptive, normative and broadly ethical enterprise (In Chapter 1, point [f] and partly [a]). These three constitute the distinctive functions of political theory, ‘We can put the point differently by once again examining the six big questions. If the first three are answered primarily by the natural and the human sciences, the next three questions, of ethics and normativity and of metaphysical self-knowledge are answered by normative political theory along with philosophy, humanities and the artsWHY DO WE NEED POLITICAL THEORY? m™ TYPES OF POLITICAL THEORIES Allow me to elaborate in somewhat greater detail these three different types of political theory. Explanatory Suppose that we wish to understand the birth of capitalist socio-economic formations. In the social sciences we have several different explanations, For example, Marx offered a general theory of fundamental social change. In one version of this theory humans have a fundamental interest in improving their material well-being and, therefore, in raising their level of productivity. Thus, Marx believed that this interest explains why there is a constant improvement in the level of productive forces. However, he also believed that a thing be- came a productive force only in use, and the use of productive forces presupposes that human beings relate to each other in particular ways. Marx called these relations social relations of production. Marx proposed the thesis that a certain type of social relations of production is appropriate, roughly speaking, to a particular level of development of produc- tive forces. For Marx, a particular type of social relations of production facilitates the devel- opment of productive forces. However, beyond point these very relations begin to hinder the farther development of these forces. The level of productivity fails to rise, productive forces get into crises and yet the human urge for better material well-being does not cease. In short, a contradiction develops between the ever-developing productive forces and the existing but outdated relations of production. This contradiction, according to Marx, is resolved not by preserving the level of the development of productive forces but rather by changing the social relations of production. The new set of social relations of production comes into existence in order to facilitate the further development of productive forces. Marx developed this general theory to explain the rise of capitalism, which he defined largely in terms of the relation be- tween capital and labour mediated by a free market. Such relations had to come into ex- istence in order to increase human productivity at the time of the emergence of capitalism, Other thinkers offered different explanations. For example, Weber argued that capitalism could not have come into existence without a change in the cultural climate, in the attitudes of aspecific set of people. This change of attitude was a component of and was brought about by a transformation in the dominant religion of particular societies. For Weber, the Pro- testant ethic that emphasized a certain degree of this-worldly asceticism and disciplined work was crucial both for the accumulation of capital and an efficient labour force, both of which were crucial for the emergence of capitalism, Normative Suppose that in a poverty-stricken country such as India, there is a demand that the right to work and therefore, that the right to an adequate minimum income be entrenched not just as a desirable goal but as a legal guarantee, Suppose also that there is a great 2930 POLITICAL THEORY; AN INTRODUCTION deal of resistance to this idea, For example, it might be argued that while social justice is important, it should not take precedence over the decisions of elected representatives and that therefore the government of the day, backed by the parliament may, from time to time, decide to have welfare schemes for the poor, and no welfare measure should be guaranteed by law: Thus, we have two broad positions on this issue, one for the right to work and the other against it. How do we break the deadlock? How do we advance further to resolve this dispute? We can settle the dispute in a number of ways. One, by a simple recourse to power. A position that is backed by greater power may override the other, irrespective ofits moral strength. A pro-poor government may enact a law that entrenches the right to work. as.ajudiciable right, Alternatively, a coalition of wealthy classes may buy off the fence sitters and block the constitutional entrenchment of this right. Both sides may arouse passion and. let the matter be decided in the heat of the moment. In all such cases, a decision is made in favour of one or the other position without examining the merits of the case, without a detailed review of possible justifications in favour of either of the two positions. Normative political theory does not accept this way of proceeding on this issue, While it does not dis- regard the importance of emotion, rhetoric, negotiation and even power, it begins with the assumption that rational argument, in whatever form, must play a pivotal role in decisions ‘on such matters, So how would a normative political theorist proceed? A brief account may be as follows. The normative political theorist must begin with assumptions that most people can en- dorse. For example, few would deny that all citizens have a basic interest in living a min- mally decent life, Nor would anyone deny that absence of physical suffering is part of a minimally decent existence. Thus, a modicum of material well-being is important for everyone, regardless of caste, religion, gender, inherited wealth and so on. We all have an equal moral right to a minimally decent existence. Once these assumptions are accepted, wwe are left with the more contentious issues. Does minimal well-being include simply the absence of physical suffering that can be remedied by welfare schemes or does it include the guarantee of work? Here we have to bring in two further issues. First, whether or not the democratically elected government of the day can be relied upon for initiating these schemes? Second, whether apart from the avoidance of physical sufferance, dignity is also an important component of well-being? What psychological impact does merely receiving benefits have on the poor? Is it not important that even the poor feel not that they are living con charity but that they have eared what they receive? Once dignity is included in the concept of well-being, which, if we think of humans not just as biological organisms but as persons, we must, we are committed to the view that, atleast in modem societies, work is crucial for well-being. Therefore, a right to well-being, a right to be free from suffering ‘must include the right to work To go to the second issue now: can we rely on democratically elected governments of the day to guarantee well-being? This is to be decided partly by the political history of so- cieties and our understanding of the behaviour of people with wealth and power. My own answer is that the government of the day cannot be relied upon for such guarantees. This may be true even for governments with the best of intentions, Indeed, this assurance isWHY DO WE NEED POLITICAL THEORY? even less likely in democratic societies where governments may change every four to five years, and people have to live with a government that might initiate policies that go against their interests. Democratic governments cannot be trusted with the promises they keep, no mater how sincere they are. Ifso, stich guarantees must be made an integral part of the constitution so that every democratically elected government is constrained to ensure the fulfilment of the right to work. An argument such as this neither undervalues democracy nor presents itself as the final word on the matter. It shows that this is one way in which we might proceed in democratic societies. nthe last instance, itis meant to take a brief glance at and to illustrate how normative political theory may be done. Contemplative In her famous book, The Human Condition, Hannah Arendt begins by drawing our attention towards how in 1957, a satellite, an earth-born, man-made object stayed in skies, circled the earth and ‘dwelt and moved in the proximity of the heavenly bodies as though it had been admitted tentatively to their sublime company’. She spoke of how for many this was the first ‘step toward escape from men’s imprisonment to the earth’. She also spoke of other new developments: the splitting of the atom as well as of the birth of a new language of mathematical symbols that contains statements which cannot be translated back into speech. With these introductory remarks, she proposed that in her new book she would offer a ‘reconsideration of the human condition from the vantage point of our newest experiences and our most recent feats’, For Arendt, political theory was not reducible to its explanatory or normative functions, although clearly these functions are part of its defining. features. Political theory for her, as indeed for many others, continues to be what it was for classical thinkers: a deeply contemplative enquiry into the general condition of human kind either over a very long period or at a certain stage of their changing existence m LITTLE THEORIES, GRAND THEORIES I have claimed that there are three types of political theories, explanatory/interpretative, normative and contemplative. All theories contain each of these dimensions. However, most of them implicitly emphasize either the explanatory (e.g, Weber’ theory on the rise of capitalism or Marx historical materialism) or the normative dimension (e-g., liberalism). ‘These might be called litdle theories. On the other hand, some explicitly possess both. Let these as well as deeply contemplative theories be called grand theories (e.g., there are traditions of Marxism that claim to have each of the three features). Grand theories need to be distinguished from ideologies, worldviews and cosmologies that possess one of the six features mentioned above, namely, generality. In addition they may possess one or two other features, but rarely all. For example, they may attempt conceptual clarity or possess a rational structure but simply ignore the requirement to unearth hidden presuppositions. 3132 POLITICAL THEORY; AN INTRODUCTION Besides, unlike theory, their commitment even to these is half-hearted, They may start off with conceptual elaboration or the construction of an argument but stop mid-way— arbitrarily and abruptly. Almost always, they bypass controlled enquiry into the particular and are, therefore, largely speculative. Theory and Ideology The relationship of normative political theory and by implication of grand theories to modem ideology is particularly complex. Both try to persuade—in a crude sense, if we believe that we are roughly equal, we all try to convert one another to our own viewpoint. But there are important differences. While political theory tries to give the fullest possible reason for why a certain stand-point must be adopted, or why an act must be performed con the basis of one set of principles rather than another, ideology lacks a commitment to spell out all reasons. Reason is short-circuited and principles reduced to formulae. This is true of nationalism and fascism but also of liberalism and Marxism when they function as ideologies ‘The case of liberal and Marxist ideologies shows that an ideology need not be entirely disconnected from reason. It may have a strategic connection. But itis in the nature of strategic connection that it is snapped if it no longer serves a specified end. As explained above, theory has an intrinsic commitment to reason that an ideology does not have, When liberalism and Marxism function as ideologies, they have merely a strategic connection with reason, This is not so when they function as political theories. It is possible then for Marxist or liberal political theory to come into conflict with Marxist or liberal ideology. If all that I have said above is true, then political philosophy is even more different from another mode of persuasion and conversion, i e. propaganda, For in propaganda, conversion is sought by opaque, manipulative methods. Advertising is a good example because here anything goes. Not only is transparency abandoned and reason short-circuited but every- thing hinges on pure rhetoric. Lies are permitted, so are half-truths. The bad points of a product are never mentioned and the good ones are exaggerated. Refore I end this section, one misunderstanding must he dispelled. Grand theories do share with ideologies and cosmologies another feature; they all perform one function—all of them attempt to formulate a common understanding of the world as well as provide a common normative orientation. When they do both, they provide a common self- definition, an identity. In the performance of this function, grand theories, ideologies and cosmologies may on the one hand compete with, rival, and substitute one another and on the other hand be mutually complementary. Thus, I am not suggesting that ideologies should be replaced by political theory: This can never happen. Ideologies have a function in society. Nor am I saying that we must always be rational and that there should be no place in the public sphere for emotion, rhetoric, or even condensed statements or formulae, But none of these should have such an overwhelming place in society that political theory is seen or made to be entirely redundant.WHY DO WE NEED POLITICAL THEORY? m COSMOLOGIES AND POLITICAL THEORY I have proposed that there is something distinctive about political theory and implied that something socially valuable is lost without it. In other words, I have suggested that we all need political theory. This might seem an odd claim. After all, many societies have lived without political philosophy or theory At least, political philosophy has not existed as a separate entity in most societies. At best, we might say with hindsight that it lies hidden within cosmologies. My claim would be more defensible if it was made in favour of cosmologies for it is hard to imagine any soctety that is not accompanied by a cosmology. ‘One might then ask why cosmologies alone cannot suffice forthe functions I have claimed for social and political theory? This brings us to the question of the difference between cosmologies and theories. And to why in modem societies, cosmologies probably do not suffice, I have three reasons to offer in support of theories, First, cosmologies are local and. too tightly tied to contexts. Under modern conditions, however, we live in several contexts at once. Moreover, these contexts are not insulated from one another. They interact, intersect, inter-communicate. In these circumstances, anything with a purely local significance will not do. We need inter-contextual thinking. We need something which does not merely pretend to be general but is really so. Since theories possess this inter-contextual generality, they are better likely to serve us in these conditions. Furthermore, we live in times and in places where people with remarkably different cultural backgrounds and cosmologies have been thrown together. This has happened not merely with globalization but much eatlier with the formation of nation-states. Despite their claims of cultural homogeneity, nation-states have had to deal with diverse local traditions and deep cultural heterogeneity. Nation-states bring together strangers. Recall my point that cosmologies are required to re-familiarize what was once familiar and is currently not. Now, this condition of almost permanent unfamiliarity with everything around us, including other human beings with ‘whom we interact, is pervasive in modern societies where, frequently, the very distinction between insiders and outsiders collapses. Second, the situation in our times is one of anear-permanent crisis of mutual understand- ing and common agreement, Nation-states are built around a rough consensus on some issues, a mixture of indifference and forgetting on the part of its members, a fair amount of illegitimate force and huge areas of difference and disagreement. Such large societies can hardly be stable. But they are unlikely to survive without a good deal of open communication among its diverse people. Conceptual clarity enables better communication. Through argu- ment, differences which are the norm in our societies can be managed if not resolved. ‘We need to give reasons to one another for and against why some policy isto be initiated. We need to be more critically self-aware of why we are doing what we do. The rational structure embedded in theories appears to offer some hope towards a possible resolution of some of the most significant differences that remain between us. Third, modem societies no longer have one locus of authority. In the past, community-based cosmologies frequently gave an- swers in a manner that gave the impression that they were emanating a single authoritative 3334 POLITICAL THEORY; AN INTRODUCTION source, Some theories which imitate these cosmologies give the same impression. But the truth is that such a source does not exist anymore. We have multiple sources of authority and to communicate amongst them, we need a space where reasons ate offered, examined, questioned, challenged, endorsed, rebutted or mediated. A theory provides such a space which local cosmologies may be unable to provide, Apart from these, there is a wholly separate reason: Questions answered by normative political theory need to be urgently addressed. There are no easy answers to the questions: ‘how are we to live? What am 1 "What are we to do? These questions have acquired urgency because old certainties are gone, everything is up for grabs and therefore, everything needs to be justified. Nothing today can be taken for granted. Secularism, democracy and equality cannot simply be assumed. Their ethical importance will always be questioned. Their value has to be justi- fied not only to those who oppose but also to those who defend them. Besides, these con- cepts do not come in one unique form, Therefore, we have to justily which conception of secularism or democracy or equality is worth having in our context. Normative political theory is meant to do just that ‘To sum up, both the task of general understanding and prescribing are crucial in modern societies. A theory of both how power is really exercised and how it should be used is crucial for two reasons. First, because modernity disperses communities and yet connects societies in such an intensified manner that understanding and explanations of specific groups and societies will never yield a relevant, comprehensive understanding of any issue. Disparate but related phenomena must be brought together under a general rubric to give us a satisfactory knowledge of them. Second, traditional knowledge systems and older cos mologies are unable to tell us what we need to do and in the light of which values. Modern political theory appears to have the potential to do so, as long as it performs this task with modesty and with the help of social science, humanities and the arts. more ™ HISTORY OF POLITICAL THOUGHT ™ AND POLITICAL THEORY Ineed to address one final issue before bringing this discussion to a close. I have written of political theory as if its history is irrelevant. If T have given that impression, itis because of paucity of time and space. Let me address it very briefly. Consider a social practice. Sup- pose that itis being challenged by a group but you are not among those who oppose it. You wish to defend the practice and therefore ask the legitimate question: what is the good. embedded in the practice. In fact, you may be more neutral and may wish to examine and evaluate the practice so that it may be critiqued or endorsed. But before you begin to do so you must identify it, You need to articulate both what it is and the underlying point behind. it, This, however, is not as easy as it seems. Sometimes that with which you are excessively familiar, that which appears to you to be obviously valuable is among the least understood. Ic is not properly understood because it has receded into the background, almost mergedWHY DO WE NEED POLITICAL THEORY? with it, is so much taken for granted that one does not even notice that it exists. After all, this is precisely what is meant by taking something for granted. This excessive familiarity hhas then become an obstruction to its proper understanding and to an understanding of its underlying values. If we are to better understand it, a change of stance towards it becomes mandatory. To begin to notice it, we need to make it unfamiliar, to defamiliarize it. Some strategy of radical estrangement is required to counter an already existing familiarity. We need to introduce a part-existential and part-reflective disquiet about the practice. Only then will we begin to better recognize it, Among the strategies of estrangement and re- familiarization isto place the practice along with other similar yet related practices. Locating a practice among others may be accomplished either by the use of one’s imagination or by cross-cultural comparison, When this is done one gains the awareness that it is one among several practices, one of the several ways in which the objective or value underlying the practice is accomplished. One realizes that what had appeared natural, what one had taken for granted is one of the many possible ways of doing roughly the same thing and that it is not a natural, permanent phenomenon but a social construction carved out of one set of choices, Now, this defamiliarization can be accomplished not just by travelling in space, thatis, by moving from one cultural location to another existing at the same time but also by moving back in time. In short, by asking the question: what were the analogues of this practice in the past that achieved if not the same, other similar values, values that belong roughly to the same family? Or else, we can go back not to the very distant past where we would find entirely different practices for comparison but to that moment of transition when this very practice began to first take shape? Indeed, to go back to its moment of origin is useful for another reason. It is useful because when the practice was born, there may have been something startlingly new about it. Therefore, it must have been noticed by everyone. This is precisely the time when it was least taken for granted, when those in favour of it were keen to offer a fully explicit defence on its behalf and those opposed to it were equally keen to rebut it, At that period and in that context itis likely that a very rich set of arguments surrounded the practice, one that by now is forgotten. By going back in time, we retrieve those arguments, that one must remember, are once again desperately needed, now that it hhas become contentious. Rather than put all our labour into a de novo articulation of the conceptual and normative structure of the practice, understanding the history of the practice is a more economical way of achieving the same result, We re-articulate what is currently in a hopeless condition of inarticulacy. This remembering is also a process of recovery of the richness of that practice, This is why a proper political argument about rights must take us back to the writings of John Locke, a proper understanding of nationalism must compel us to return to Herder, and in order to properly debate about Western modernity and colo- nialism, we cannot set aside Gandhi's Hind Swara). For a full disclosure of all the complex reasons for and against a practice, for the values that inspired it and the murk in which it was entangled we need to uncover the origins of that practice and to fully grasp these origins we need to do the history of political philosophy. 35Im this chapter, I tried to answer the question what theories in general are meant to do. I suggested that, in their own distinctive way, theories also answer the big questions of human existence. I then suggested that some of these answers are now best provided by systematic empirical enquiry and natural-scientific theories. The natural sciences under- stand, explain and predict events and processes in the non-human natural world. Scientific theories do the same at the most general level. The social sciences—including political science—understand, explain and seek to predict events and processes in the human world. Political theory is then left to perform three important functions: the explanatory function. at the most general level, but more distinctively the contemplative and the normative. In. this chapter, lalso (a) distinguished between political theory on the one hand, and ideologies and propaganda on the other; (h) claimed that political theory may be able to respond to cour needs under conditions of modernity somewhat better than cosmologies do; (c) briefly explained why in the 1950s, there was widespread belief that political theory was either dead or in decline, and; (d) explained the relationship between contemporary political theory and the history of political thought. 1. Charles Taylor has called humans ‘selF-interpretating animals’. Gadamer says that interpretation is the distinctively human mode of being. What sense can you make of these statements in the light of what you have read in this chapter? 2. ‘There is a widespread belief that all evaluations are subjective. Good and bad, right and wrong ate relative to each individual, at least to every society. This makes normative political theory impossible. Discuss 3. Icosmologies can explain, understand, evaluate and give ellective answers to questions about who wwe are, then modern politcal theory is redundant. Discuss. 4, Deep down, political theories are ideologies. Therefore, political theory is an intellectual passion of the elite. Discuss. Arendt, Hannah, The Human Condition (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1958) ‘Cohen, G. A., Karl Mans Theory of History (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1978). Macintyre, Alisdair, ‘The Indispensability of Political Theory’, in David Miller and Lary Siedentop (eds), The Nature of Political Theory (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1983). Parekh, Bhikhu, ‘Political Theory: Traditions in Political Philosophy’, in Robert Goodin and Hans- Dieter Klingemann (eds), A New Handbook of Political Science (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1966). Plamenatz, John, ‘The Use of Political Theory’, in A. Quinton (ed.), Political Philosophy (London: Oxford University Press, 1967)WHY DO WE NEED POLITICAL THEORY? 37 Taylor, Charles, ‘Philosophy and its History’, in Richard Rorty.J. B. Schneewind and Quentin Skinner (eds), Philosophy in History (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1984) Philosophical Papers [ (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1985a), Philosophical Papers Il (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1985b). Weber, Max, The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism (London: George Allen and Unwin, 1930).