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Mainstream, VOL LI, No 34, August 10, 2013

Missing Greens the European Way: Ideology - based Politics

Monday 12 August 2013, by Sheetal Sharma

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With less than a year for Lok Sabha elections and only a few months left for Delhi State Assembly elections, politics and party dynamics have accelerated and soon would be in full momentum as soon the campaign begins. There are many ifs and buts related to seen and unforeseen consequences of who wins and who does not. Campaigning in India usually looks more like a drama to woo voters rather than a serious effort to sensitise the masses about the real issues. Once the campaign starts one will find that from hiring bar dancers to singing jai ho and versions of kolaveri di, all types of songs and dances are being pressed into service. However, it seems that the largest democracy of the world and the nation with the second largest population is just not rising above the level of retrograde caste and communal politics. Besides the never-fulfilled promise for bijli-paani-sadak along with the recently added corruption issue in a very small proportion, some of the important and urgent issues are never debated, discussed or even raised.

One such concern is environmentalism. India faces some of the serious ecological crises which are on the verge of turning into disaster and have already become so. The recent example of the Kedarnath disaster cannot be ignored or forgotten without learning due lessons from it. Apart from the recent tragedy in the hills we can take the example of the holy river Ganga turning into a drain in its journey from the holy city of Haridwar (where it enters UP) to Birpur (where it leaves UP). Yamuna and many other main rivers too meet the same fate. The industrial affluents discharged into these rivers pose a threat to plant and animal species in and around the river. Ganga dolphins are on the verge of extinction. At Varanasi the condition of the river becomes unimaginable with semi-burnt bodies of people cremated at ghats flowing in the dying river.

Some other environmental challenges that India faces include land degradation, declining soil fertility, overutilisation of underground water sources, air pollution, deforestation. According to the India State of Forest Report, 2011, released by the Forest Survey of India (FSI), India has lost 367 square kilometres of forest cover in the past two years. As per the estimates, the total forest cover in the country is now at 6,92,027 sq km. This accounts for 21.05 per cent of the total geographical area of India. The report also mentions that the North-Eastern States and tribal districts particularly have witnessed unprecedented loss of forest which happens to be their prime source of livelihood and sustenance. The threat has almost reached the tipping point, and already crossed the danger-mark in some cases.

According to the statistics released by Water.org, a non-profit organisation working in the field of water and sanitation worldwide, approximately 97 million people lack safe drinking water and 814 million have no sanitation facility in India. But none of the political parties or groups will take up the issue of fighting for one of the most basic needs for human survival, that is, water. Almost all the States and regions in India have specific problems related to environment that cannot be ignored. We cannot remain immune to environ-mental issues as they pose a serious challenge to the economic development of our nation. The struggle for survival and fight over finite resources is also leading to extreme conflict and violence in certain parts of the country. Some immediate steps are required to address the basic issues related to people’s survival and management of environment, and find sustainable solutions to the problems.

In representative democracies like India, people are represented through political parties. Political parties are organised groups of citizens who profess to share the same political views and who by acting as a political unit are oriented towards achieving legitimate control of the government through an electoral process. Political parties are based on certain under-standing of society, how it ought to be structured and raise issues of national, local or global concern; they serve as a link between the people and government. But members of different political parties in India—those who aspire to win seats of power and become legislators—are least interested in the issues that affect the people’s lives indeed, such as the one discussed above: of the basic needs of access to and availability of safe drinking water.

If the fundamental issue for any society is the growth and development of its people, then we cannot perceive growth independent of environ-ment. Growth and development are dependent upon the nature of environment and availability of natural resources. At the same time growth and development also have an impact upon the environment in terms of how we use/abuse our resources, and/or how sustainable our growth is. The Indian polity needs to address issues pertaining to people’s survival and their relationship with the environment. At the most, environmental issues appear in a line in glossy manifestos printed by the parties. It’s high time to realise that being one of the growing economies in the world sooner or later we will have to address the issues that affect the people’s actual living conditions and livelihood rather than his socio-cultural identity and religion. There is a need for the ideology of the Greens to entre Indian politics.

The Ideology of the Greens

The Green ideology is a critique of the relentless growth of the capitalist economy. The Greens hold the ‘Left’-wing ideology in the political spectrum offering a criticism of unmindful growth of the capitalist economy at the cost of social justice, equality and environment. According to Caroline Lucas, the “infinitely growing capitalist economy is destroying nature, fuelling injustice and leading to an alienated way of life. Since we threaten our future if we try to live beyond what the Earth can provide, we must build a sustainable society that guarantees our long-term survival. Everyone should be entitled to basic material security. In Green politics, basic needs are classed as not only the physiological needs of food, water, and shelter, but also the need for love, respect, autonomy, security, and meaningful activity within communities. The fact that many people’s basic needs are not met has far-reaching consequences, expressed as anxiety, insecurity, and aggressive behaviour towards others, and exploitation of the environment. These personal factors give rise to, and are perpetuated by, social institutions which actively encourage oppression, pollution, resource depletion, poverty and military conflict.”

With such philosophy at its core, the first Green parties were founded during the early 1970s. The Values Party of New Zealand was the world’s first countrywide Green party to contest parliamentary seats nationally in 1972. In 1973 Europe’s first Green party, the UK’s Ecology Party, was established. The German Green Party has been an example of electoral success as one of the most significant parties winning 27 seats in the Bundestag in the 1983 federal elections in Germany. There have been more than eighty parties the world over constituted around the ideology of the Greens. In the last two decades around seven per cent of votes in the European parliamentary elections went in favour of Greens/Green parties committed to the ideology of Green politics. Despite being criticised for a number of factors, in the last parliamentary elections the European Green Party won fortytwo seats, which is so far the best performance by the party in the European parliamentary elections although, as experience from the West indicates, the Green parties may find it difficult to garner substantial share of votes or a majority on the issue of environmentalism alone.

Even though the ideology of the Greens encompasses or combines philosophies of social equality, justice, equal distribution, and peaceful co-existence, prima facie it is known for its association with issues pertaining to nature alone. No matter what is at the core of the philosophy of the Greens, environmental issues are a subject of common concern. National or regional parties in developing countries like India can incorporate the fundamental agenda of the Greens along with other equally important agendas like caste, community or secularism and make it a mainstream concern.

The ruling class gains easily by playing the simple cards of identity politics based on caste, communalism, (pseudo-)secularism, language, and keep the masses in mental slumber. A large section of society too seems to enjoy the frivolous unyielding dance and drama over caste and identity politics. In the process certain sections of society are gradually getting alienated with the electoral process and losing faith in democracy. There is a need that parties or people take cognisance of environmental issues and environmentally sustainable development and sensitise the people about the impending environmental threats.

If this sounds uncontestable, then the masses must be assured of access to basic minimum resources required for survival that are derived from nature. Amidst blue, saffron, tricolour and other hues, we are missing the Greens. Once the elections are over, the new government will barely look into their interests as it has happened in the past. The common man or aam admi will be back on the streets confronting hardships in daily life. Women will walk miles to fetch drinking water irrespective of their caste, creed, community, language and identity.

What and how much will be done to alleviate the problems of the people only time will testify. But politics in India should mature and move at least to a level where parties represent ideo-logies concerning issues that are related to the basic existence of the people and their struggle for survival on a daily basis.

Reference

Lucas, Caroline (2013), Green Politics, available at http://www.ethicalpolitics.net/index.php/Green_Politics, accessed on July 16, 2013.

Dr Sheetal Sharma is an Assistant Professor at the Jawaharlal Nehru University, New Delhi. She can be contacted at sheetal88@gmail.com

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