Britain, AFED Organise! #82 - Review: Decolonizing Anarchism: An antiauthoritarian history of India?s liberation struggle

Maia Ramnath. AK Press/Institute of Anarchist Studies. 294 pages ?12.00 ---- I tried to 
like this book but in the end I couldn?t. ---- Maia Ramnath makes it clear from the start 
that she is not looking towards describing what she calls big-A anarchism in South Asia. 
?The big A covers a specific part of the Western Left tradition dating from key 
ideological debates in the midnineteenth century and factional rivalries in the 
International Working men?s Association. ...the big A opposed not only capitalism but also 
the centralized state along with all other systems of concentrated power and hierarchy.? 
She states that the motivation for the book was to bring an anarchist approach to 
anti-colonialism, and an anti-colonial approach to anarchism.

Therefore what she describes
are ideas and actions inspired by
what she calls little-a anarchism:
?towards more dispersed and
less concentrated powers; less
top-down hierarchy and more
self-determination through
bottom-up participation? and so
forth.

The book is useful for descriptions
of social movements and
thinkers who opposed the British
Raj and sought for emancipation
from it, with many figures I had
little or no knowledge of.

However there are some
problems here. All of the thinkers
described came from upper
castes, and the caste system
in India, intertwined with a
class system, is very important
in acting as a force against
equality. Again, all of the thinkers
described are male. She herself
admits that ?the narrative is
dominated by male upper-caste
voices?. Another problem is
her alternative use of the term
?Western anarchism? to describe
what she otherwise calls the
big-A anarchism. Now, whilst
it is clear that the present day
anarchist movement originated
in Western Europe exactly
as is described, it managed
to spread to Asia, not least to
China, Japan, and Korea, where
there were quite considerable
movements. Anarchists in these
places related to local conditions
and social problems through
an anarchist lens, adapting
the key ideas and analysis of
anarchism to their own specific
circumstances, just as happened
with anarchist movements in
Latin America.

A specific? big A? anarchist, or
rather one who was moving
throughout his life towards such
a stance was J.P.T. Acharya,
and he is given some pages
in this book. But as Milan Rai
notes in a review of the book for
Peace News ?A more accurate
title would be: ?Random portraits
of some Indian nationalists
and radicals who were called
?anarchists? by their enemies,
and of other Indian nationalists
and radicals who called
themselves ?anarchists?.? And
indeed Ramnath includes the life
and ideas of Vinayak Damodar
Savarkar, who whilst he read
and dabbled with anarchist ideas
in his youth, went on to found the
far right Hindu supremacist party
Akhil Bharat Hindu Mahasabha
(All-Indian Hindu Assembly).
Ramnath signally fails to mention
Savarkar?s later poisonous
career, only touching on the
early libertarian influences in his
life.

At the same time the Dravidian
activist E.V. Ramasamy- usually
known as Periyar- is excluded
from this book. Now, Periyar?s
politics are problematic but then
so are the politics of the majority
of those included in this book.
But Periyar was a consistent
critic of Brahmin domination,
especially when his fears about
its continuation in the post-Raj
Indian state came true. He was
also a champion of women?s
rights, and his last speech
before his death enunciated an
increasingly anti-State position.
Yet no mention of him in the book.
Similarly the various women?s
movements that have developed
in the sub-continent in response
to oppression are not dealt with.
Neither is the social organisation
of various tribal groups, which
bear some consideration.
Brian Morris has dealt with the
south Indian forest foragers,
the Malaipantaram, and their
egalitarian and collectivist forms
of organisation for example, but
there is no mention of such
forms of organisation in this
book. Similarly a serious study
of the various land occupation
movements has been omitted.
Ramnath states emphatically
that for her, decolonialisation
should not be linked to the
construction of new nation
states and nationalism, and
she repeats this several times.
However in the fake interview at
the end of her book where she
poses questions to herself, she
answers the questions about
how as an anarchist she is seen
as supporting national liberation
movements by saying ?I don?t
support demands for statehood,
per se.... It?s not the task of
an ally to decide what the best
alternative is...anarchist allies
of anticolonial struggles have
to recognise that the people
in question must decide for
themselves?. To the following
question: ?.Isn?t that a na?ve
cop-out, knowing that they plan
to create a state?? she fudges
the issue by replying: ?well,
the facts remains that they?re
forced to operate within a world
of states?. But then aren?t we
all, and wouldn?t anarchists on
the ground in countries where
such a process is happening not
raise their voices against such a
development.
As I said at the start of this
review, I really did try to engage
with this book in a positive way.
In the end, whilst there is much
of interest here, the book is
inadequate in both its analysis
and its omissions.