|
Bilkis Malek
© Bilkis Malek 2008
I want to offer three observations that strike me as warranting critical consideration within current debates about re-building a left politics.
Dis-entangling
economic and social justice
The first is examining how conversations and ideas for resolving social
injustice lapse into the need to address economic or material injustice.
There are valid reasons for this that we all recognise. For example,
many of us are perhaps sympathetic to the position that living in areas
of high unemployment and poor housing increases the risks of poor mental
health. Many of us would also accept that the rate of incidence of youth
crime rises for those from lower income families and with few education
and employment opportunities. Most of us appreciate that material and
economic disadvantage is not the only cause - nor reducing it the only
solution - of mental illness and youth crime. But we would expect addressing
economic disadvantage to feature centrally in effective strategies for
reducing crime and mental illness. And there are many other scenarios
where improving economic or material realities for addressing social
situations is desirable such as in the cases of poor diet, life expectancy
and so on. However, there are times when such linkage between 'the economic/material'
and 'the social' serves as a hindrance to sedimenting a progressive
left politics. This is a feature of Jon Cruddas's otherwise well-reasoned
analysis of the rise in popularity of the BNP amongst some of his Dagenham
constituents.
In several interviews and written contributions over the past year Cruddas has carefully articulated the complex dynamics behind the notable support of the BNP in Dagenham. He highlights the combined effect of insufficient investment in local public services, in particular health and housing, and the demographic changes due largely to recent labour migrants in search of affordable housing. Cruddas is clear that New Labour's inability to 'enunciate a clear set of principles that embrace the notion of immigration and its associated economic and social benefits' has left migrants vulnerable to attack from the BNP and from local people wanting to reason with their declining standards of living. Cruddas's solution for addressing the situation is, as he puts it in his interview with Jonathan Rutherford, 'to contextualise materially the shared experience of different people'. This may well have the desired effect of improving the living conditions of his constituents as well as lessening the popularity of the BNP. However, focusing solely on 'the material' leaves the 'racist' sensibilities embedded in the situation untouched, and so also the potential for their revival in the future. We need to think through and develop strategies for ensuring that when similar situations arise in the future, the inclination of local people is not to be drawn into the politics of far right groups, but to develop more reasoned understandings of the causes of their situation and make demands on their MP and government accordingly.
The point about how the focus on 'the economic/material' can lead to narrow or incomplete solutions to a given situation has been more forcefully established (though by no means resolved) in the area of sex equality where, for example, women's improved access to employment opportunities does not in itself make them more fulfilled citizens if they then feel pressured to choose between a career and family, or are unable to enjoy the role of motherhood due to expectations to earn a joint or principal wage. This kind of example also begins to get us a closer to the roots of what's been termed the social recession; disentangling 'the social' and 'the economic' would appear to be a start in the process of reversing its impact.
The nagging
question of religion
The inclination to focus on 'economic/material' solutions has also come
in the way of developing meaningful alliances between sections of the
left and the wider Muslim community in the fallout since '9/11'. For
a while, lack of education and employment opportunities dominated the
thinking of some who wanted to develop a more reasoned understanding
of why British Muslims might be drawn to support a terrorists' agenda.
This line of thought is pursued less now that a number of reports and
investigations have revealed that many of those linked to recent terrorist
acts come from stable family backgrounds with good educational records
and qualifications. In its place we hear much about the failure of multiculturalism
and the self-segregation of Muslim communities. Yet we are also reminded
of how the vast majority of Muslims are decent, law abiding citizens
with a desire to contribute to a successful British society enriched
by its diversity. It is the space to explore this interlinking narrative
that is missing, and this highlights the need to develop a more critical
position on religion.
We are familiar with evidence of religious dictatorships creating hostile environments for women, for gay people, for people from 'other' religious beliefs. We are aware too of the dogma of religious belief imposing cultures of thinking that belie a variety of everyday realities - for example domestic violence - and place restrictions on artistic creativity, or inter-ethnic relationships. As long as we hold these realities at the fore, we cannot allow those speaking from a position of religion a voice in building a shared vision for the future. But religion in any of its oppressive forms is not the starting point for religious negotiation and expression for 'ordinary' law-abiding Muslim citizens (the kind that we like!). Here we are not talking about 'migrants' arriving with a set of beliefs and practices from another land that are inappropriate for modern Britain. The most common profile of British Muslims is British born and under the age of 30. The majority have been through the British education system and experienced first hand the realities of living in a western capitalist democracy. Many will tell you about their negative experiences of religion at the mosque and at home when they were growing up, an experience they would not wish to see repeated for their own children. And they have no desire to turn Britain into an Islamic state, but they would like to see the end of 'Islamic fundamentalism' and terrorism.
What is often interpreted as a retreat to religion in response to racism or anti-Western feeling is in fact a reaction to experiences of social and political trends in Britain over the last three decades. And the story is not confined to Britons of Muslim parentage but also applies to a growing number of indigenous white British converts to Islam. For these 'ordinary Muslims' religion occupies a very different point of orientation and interaction than that proposed by the old slogan 'religion is the opium of the people'. In fact, there is a lot of common ground between the dynamics behind the 'turn to religion' amongst Muslims and the unfolding social realities drawing sections of the left to seek an alternative to the neo-liberal political direction of New Labour. It is on this terrain that the isolation from mainstream politics felt by many Muslims can be meaningfully bridged.
There are of course legitimate anxieties about mixing religion with politics, but we should also learn from the actions of those self-appointed sons of God, Blair and Bush, that consigning religion to the private does not rid its influence on politics and governance. It becomes a silent, but still potent, actor that is subject to little if any public scrutiny for its influence on political decision making. As such, entering into political dialogue with any religious grouping needs to be openly framed as a two-way process. Just as sections of Cruddas's Dagenham constituents should be confronted for their ill-reasoned support for the BNP, so too religious groups, including Muslims, need to be challenged for their stance on specific issues of human equality and freedom. What these challenges demand is a critical approach to identity politics.
Identity politics
There are political implications to be confronted in drawing alliances
with groups that have emerged out of the era of identity politics if
their political concerns are confined to their own group. This is not
a reason to avoid drawing alliances with such groups. In fact lack of
serious political interaction with these groups has led to damaging
misconceptions about their lifestyles, cultural practices and political
allegiances -which is nowhere more prominently highlighted than in the
current anxieties around 'multiculturalism'. It is precisely this kind
of situation that has resulted in mainstream politicians reducing the
choice for 'ordinary Muslims' to one of you are either with 'us' or
with 'them.' And this is precisely the kind of political ultimatum on
which 'fundamentalist' politics of the type promoted by 'religious extremists'
and the BNP thrive.
We also have this ludicrous situation where large sections of the left have campaigned against human rights abuses integral to the 'war on terror', in particular the treatment of Guantanamo detainees, but there is little inclination to engage with the central issue pivotal to many of the victims' sense of self-dignity, essentially their religious identification with Islam.
What is lacking is some kind of political coherency, which could be provided by the left, to enable alliances to be nurtured for the long term and without risk of being accused of being an apologist for this or that group. A starting point might be to thrash out some central principles around, as indicated by Ben Little, social and economic justice, through which we can begin to build meaningful alliances. It might also begin to address the fact that at present it is difficult to articulate what the left actually stands for.
For a more detailed treatment of some of the arguments in this piece, see Bilkis's essay in the Soundings book, Race Identity and Belonging.
Subscribe to Soundings a journal of politics and culture
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
