The descendants

At one level,it seems absurd and indulgent to even consider this a problem with their recognisable names and ready-made networks,they have a clear head start. Their career is theirs to squander. But what does the great overhang of parental accomplishment do to you psychologically?

In India,its hard to even pretend youre self-made,if kindergarten onwards,someone has exerted influence on your behalf. Elite advantage stubbornly perpetuates itself,from the very first point of open competition. Successful,eager parents tend to script every step of your early life,help with internships,recommendations and resume-padding.

And whats more,in many cases,you dont even want to set yourself on some new and uphill path. Your interests often come from the environment you are pitched in,because you know more about something better than your peers do,and have access to a specialised chatter all of which makes you much more likely to choose a familiar career.

In India,family remains the biggest shaper and influencer of professional inclinations sure,maybe your parents are historians and you choose to do work at a non-profit,but thats just the narcissism of small differences.

And yet,having things set up for you makes you scared to mess up,given to looking over your shoulder,sensitive to comparisons. It deprives you of that careless zest thats so often a part of creativity. You may value schmoozing more than you strictly need to. Maybe everyone needs that Freudian face-off to discover the dimensions of their own talent and drive. If youre on uncle-aunty terms with the establishment,its hard to blow it a raspberry. Sometimes,rarely,it works the other way around you rebel by doing exactly what doesnt come naturally,like being a starlet when your parents are boldface academics,or becoming a Maoist when your family runs an ice-cream business.

And then,in this favour-mongering nation of ours,theres the nepotism question. Nepotism,in the Middle Ages,meant placing papal nephews read: illegitimate children in high positions. It thrives across the world,to greater or lesser degree. Adam Bellow son of Saul,incidentally,has written a provocative book called In Praise of Nepotism: A Natural History,where he tries to soften the distaste for the concept somewhat. Even the US,so much more militantly individual and meritocratic than India,is beset by a new kind of family branding,he says not just in businesses where hereditary succession is taken for granted,but also in the arts,television,Hollywood. Its not the classic pick-up-your-phone-and-dial-your-unworthy-child-a-contract kind of nepotism,but a subtler one where the children mould themselves to be the right candidates. They combine merit and family advantage making it hard to argue with their being chosen but its still the same phenomenon.

Bellow suggests that we act adult about this softer kind of nepotism,and stop seeing it exclusively as a form of social cheating while practising it non-stop and admit that wanting to pass on social capital to your children,like wealth or anything else,is a natural urge,and the engine of capitalism. All social species,from elephants to ants,want to help out family. Even communist regimes,which replaced narrow family bonds with larger solidarities,have been sunk in nepotism.

But just because its natural or even practical doesnt mean its not obnoxious and unfair. It may be wishful to imagine that each generation can have a clean,uncorrupted start,but maybe we can still refuse to make use of chances that arent wholly deserved and trust our own talents.

amulya.gopalakrishnanexpressindia.com