Opinion Someone like Suu Kyi

Aung San Suu Kyi’s release may not prove to be a decisive moment in Myanmar’s march to freedom. But it nevertheless is a poignant reminder of the enduring power of idealism. Stalin’s question,“How many divisions has the Pope got?” often reverberates with those who command mighty armies,and hard-headed pragmatists. It would be foolish to underestimate the power of those who do have the divisions behind them. These regimes can snuff out revolt; they can govern by inducing fear,and many have long endured.But the enduring power of individuals to reverse the question — “How secure can those many divisions make you?” — is equally striking. Nothing reveals the potential brittleness of authoritarian regimes more than the power of particular individuals who come to symbolise challenges to a regime. The measure of their success is not always that they can induce change. The measure of their success is simply their being. Their very presence is always a potential incitement to speak truth to power. It questions the legitimacy of those who have nothing but the power of divisions behind them. And the way these regimes treat them constantly exposes their potential brittleness and fear. They exile them,they imprison them,and they often fear even killing them. It is as if these individual talk back by saying,“Why do you fear me,if I don’t have the divisions behind me?”There is a long line of individuals who acquired,in different ways,this status from Gandhi to Mandela. Even in our times there are rather curious illustrations of the power of those without divisions. Mighty China still thinks of the Dalai Lama as a far more potent threat that several armies. The Dalai Lama may not achieve his goals,but his ability to make power look fragile is not a mean achievement. Think also of the reverse. So many worthy causes that have floundered because they have not generated that individual who becomes the locus of moral authority,whose presence personifies the value they are defending. The Palestinian cause has always suffered by the inability of the movement to generate such a sympathetic figure. And several states have struggled because they have not generated a figure who could be a locus of national reconciliation; just think of Pakistan or Nepal. What makes such figures important is a complicated matter. It involves everything from charisma,articulacy,an aura of martyrdom,and an ability to create a mythology. Sometimes circumstances and geopolitics provide other powers with a reason to invest in these individuals. Often these individuals are far from perfect. Their very strength can be a source of weakness; idealism can question the claims of power,but it is not itself a substitute for political judgment. And there is often much to quibble about their sense of political judgment. But these individuals are often powerful in a foundational sense: they hold out the fleeting hope that we can indeed make our own history and dislodge the binding constraints of power.Suu Kyi has,undoubtedly,become one such figure. The extraordinary personal sympathy she generates,the depth of her engagement with two traditions of political thought (Myanmarese and Western) which she has melded in a distinctive Myanmarese vision of democracy,made her a central figure of our times. Her role in Myanmarese politics is complicated,and how the script unfolds from now remains to be seen. But she has articulately kept alive one simple thought: that freedom of expression is the core of democracy; and it is this thought she returned to in her first speech after her release. Her most quoted line squarely puts her in the tradition of those who know that the only way to feel empowered is to speak truth to power: “It is not power that corrupts but fear. Fear of losing power corrupts those who wield it and fear of the scourge of power corrupts those who are subject to it.” In her writings there is not a trace of demagoguery or populism; democracy is in the service of freedom,not the other way round.India’s role in Myanmar will have to await full analysis. But there is something grating about the self-congratulation we have exuded on our so-called pragmatism on Myanmar,often to the point where our support for Suu Kyi was unconscionably tepid. Dealing with dictators is no easy matter. But countries are,in the final analysis,judged by whether they are on the side of the future or whether they help perpetuate a dark past. On this criterion,we should admit,India often did not measure up. When Obama lectured us on Myanmar we were offended. The US is by no means an exemplary power when it comes to dealing with dictators. We were right to point that out. Obama’s references were partly attempts to throw a bone to those in the US sceptical of India,particularly in light of the fact that our voting record in the UN is at more than 80 per cent variance with the US. But there is a disquieting way in which our newfound realist macho mentality has made us tone deaf to the deepest compliments offered to us. The real compliment Obama offered us was not backing for a UNSC seat. It was a reminder about our own history,through the figure Gandhi,to whom he repeatedly turned. What he seemed to be saying,with utter sincerity,was: you have already powerfully shaped history,including my own personal history. You shaped that history without the equivalent “divisions”. He wasn’t so much lecturing,as wistfully projecting idealism onto us. The source of our power is the fact that we are one of the few powers onto which the world still wants to project a sense of idealism. Of course we need our “divisions”. But we can still acknowledge that being held to higher moral standards is the big compliment; not just the seat at the High Table. There is prudence in taking on board the sordid realities of power politics,as we ordinarily understand it. But a political culture where idealism is not even a distant gleam in the eye has also divested itself of any real understanding of deeper forms of power. Those moments of idealism come rarely,and in a cynical age are personified even more rarely. But in the heroic battles for democracy,figures like Suu Kyi,for all their limitations,still remind us that freedom and the power of example are a force that can still corrode those with armies behind them.

The writer is president,Centre for Policy Research,Delhi

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