by Amartya Sen
Even though Gārgī, as an intellectual and pedagogue, is no military leader (in the mode, for example, of the Rani of Jhansi – another feminine hero – who fought valiantly along with the ‘mutineers’ in the middle of the nineteenth century against British rule – one of the great ‘warrior-queens’ of the world, as Antonia Fraser describes her9), her use of imagery is strikingly militant: ‘Yājñavalkya, I have two questions for you. Like the ruler of Videha or Kāśī [Benares], coming from a heroic line, who strings his unstrung bow, takes in hand two penetrating arrows and approaches the enemy, so do I approach you with two questions, which you have to answer.’ Yājñavalkya does, however, manage to satisfy Gārgī with his answers (I am not competent to examine the theological merits of this interchange and will refrain from commenting on the substantive content of their discussion). Gārgī acknowledges this handsomely, but again without undue modesty: ‘Venerable Brahmins, you should consider it an achievement if you can get away after bowing to him. Certainly, none of you can ever defeat him in expounding the nature of God.’
Interestingly, Yājñavalkya’s wife Maitreyī raises a profoundly important motivational question when the two discuss the reach of wealth in the context of the problems and predicaments of human life, in particular what wealth can or cannot do for us. Maitreyī wonders whether it could be the case that if ‘the whole earth, full of wealth’ were to belong just to her, she could achieve immortality through it. ‘No,’ responds Yājñavalkya, ‘like the life of rich people will be your life. But there is no hope of immortality by wealth.’ Maitreyī remarks: ‘What should I do with that by which I do not become immortal?’10
Maitreyī’s rhetorical question has been repeatedly cited in Indian religious philosophy to illustrate both the nature of the human predicament and the limitations of the material world. But there is another aspect of this exchange that has, in some ways, more immediate interest. This concerns the relation – and the distance – between income and achievement, between the commodities we can buy and the actual capabilities we can enjoy, between our economic wealth and our ability to live as we would like.* While there is a connection between opulence and our ability to achieve what we value, the linkage may or may not be very close. Maitreyī’s worldly worries might well have some transcendental relevance (as Indian religious commentators have discussed over many centuries), but they certainly have worldly interest as well. If we are concerned with the freedom to live long and live well, our focus has to be directly on life and death, and not just on wealth and economic opulence.
The arguments presented by women speakers in epics and classical tales, or in recorded history, do not always conform to the tender and peace-loving image that is often assigned to women. In the epic story of the Mahābhārata, the good King Yudhiṣṭhira, reluctant to engage in a bloody battle, is encouraged to fight the usurpers of his throne with ‘appropriate anger’, and the most eloquent instigator is his wife, Draupadī.11
In the sixth-century version of this dialogue, presented in the Kirātārjunīya by Bhāravi, Draupadī speaks thus:
For a woman to advise men like you
is almost an insult.
And yet, my deep troubles compel me
to overstep the limits of womanly conduct,
make me speak up.
The kings of your race, brave as Indra,
have for a long time ruled the earth without a break.
But now with your own hand
you have thrown it away,
like a rutting elephant tearing off
his garland with his trunk….
If you choose to reject heroic action
and see forbearance as the road to future happiness,
then throw away your bow, the symbol of royalty,
wear your hair matted in knots,
stay here and make offerings in the sacred fire!12
It is not hard to see which side Draupadī was on in the Arjuna-Krishna debate, which deals with a later stage of the same sequence of events, by which time Yudhiṣṭhira had made his choice to fight (rather than embrace the life of a local hermit, mockingly assigned to him by his wife, with unconcealed derision).
If it is important not to see the Indian argumentative tradition as the exclusive preserve of men, it is also necessary to understand that the use of argumentative encounters has frequently crossed the barriers of class and caste. Indeed, the challenge to religious orthodoxy has often come from spokesmen of socially disadvantaged groups. Disadvantage is, of course, a comparative concept. When Brahminical orthodoxy was disputed in ancient India by members of other groups (including merchants and craftsmen), the fact that the protesters were often quite affluent should not distract attention from the fact that, in the context of Brahmin-dominated orthodoxy, they were indeed distinctly underprivileged. This may be particularly significant in understanding the class basis of the rapid spread of Buddhism, in particular, in India. The undermining of the superiority of the priestly caste played quite a big part in these initially rebellious religious movements, which include Jainism as well as Buddhism. It included a ‘levelling’ feature that is not only reflected in the message of human equality for which these movements stood, but is also captured in the nature of the arguments used to undermine the claim to superiority of those occupying exalted positions. Substantial parts of early Buddhist and Jain literatures contain expositions of protest and resistance.
Movements against caste divisions that have figured repeatedly in Indian history, with varying degrees of success, have made good use of engaging arguments to question orthodox beliefs. Many of these counterarguments are recorded in the epics, indicating that opposition to hierarchy was not absent even in the early days of caste arrangements. We do not know whether the authors to whom the sceptical arguments are attributed were the real originators of the doubts expressed, or mere vehicles of exposition of already established questioning, but the prominent presence of these anti-inequality arguments in the epics as well as in other classical documents gives us a fuller insight into the reach of the argumentative tradition than a monolithic exposition of the so-called ‘Hindu point of view’ can possibly provide.
For example, when, in the Mahābhārata, Bhrigu tells Bharadvāja that caste divisions relate to differences in physical attributes of different human beings, reflected in skin colour, Bharadvāja responds not only by pointing to the considerable variations in skin colour within every caste (‘if different colours indicate different castes, then all castes are mixed castes’), but also by the more profound question: ‘We all seem to be affected by desire, anger, fear, sorrow, worry, hunger, and labour; how do we have caste differences then?’13 There is also a genealogical scepticism expressed in another ancient document, the Bhaviṣya Purāṇa: ‘Since members of all the four castes are children of God, they all belong to the same caste. All human beings have the same father, and children of the same father cannot have different castes.’ These doubts do not win the day, but nor are their expressions obliterated in the classical account of the debates between different points of view.
To look at a much later period, the tradition of ‘medieval mystical poets’, well established by the fifteenth century, included exponents who were influenced both by the egalitarianism of the Hindu Bhakti movement and by that of the Muslim Sufis, and their far-reaching rejection of social barriers brings out sharply the reach of arguments across the divisions of caste and class. Many of these poets came from economically and socially humble backgrounds, and their questioning of social divisions as well as of the barriers of disparate religions reflected a profound attempt to deny the relevance of these artificial restrictions. It is remarkable how many of the exponents of these heretical points of views came from the working class: Kabir, perhaps the greatest poet of them all, was a weaver, Dadu a cotton-carder, Ravi-das a shoe-maker, Sena a barber, and so on. * Also, many leading figures in these movements were women, including of course the famous Mira Bai (whose songs are still very popular, afte
r four hundred years), but also Andal, Daya-bai, Sahajo-bai and Ksema, among others.
In dealing with issues of contemporary inequality, which will be discussed in the next essay, the relevance and reach of the argumentative tradition must be examined in terms of the contribution it can make today in resisting and undermining these inequities which characterize so much of contemporary Indian society. It would be a great mistake in that context to assume that because of the possible effectiveness of well-tutored and disciplined arguments, the argumentative tradition must, in general, favour the privileged and the well-educated, rather than the dispossessed and the deprived. Some of the most powerful arguments in Indian intellectual history have, in fact, been about the lives of the least privileged groups, which have drawn on the substantive force of these claims, rather than on the cultivated brilliance of well-trained dialectics.
Democracy as Public Reasoning
Does the richness of the tradition of argument make much difference to subcontinental lives today? I would argue it does, and in a great many different ways. It shapes our social world and the nature of our culture. It has helped to make heterodoxy the natural state of affairs in India (more on this presently): persistent arguments are an important part of our public life. It deeply influences Indian politics, and is particularly relevant, I would argue, to the development of democracy in India and the emergence of its secular priorities.
The historical roots of democracy in India are well worth considering, if only because the connection with public argument is often missed, through the temptation to attribute the Indian commitment to democracy simply to the impact of British influence (despite the fact that such an influence should have worked similarly for a hundred other countries that emerged from an empire on which the sun used not to set). The point at issue, however, is not specific to India only: in general, the tradition of public reasoning is closely related to the roots of democracy across the globe. But since India has been especially fortunate in having a long tradition of public arguments, with toleration of intellectual heterodoxy, this general connection has been particularly effective in India. When, more than half a century ago, independent India became the first country in the non-Western world to choose a resolutely democratic constitution, it not only used what it had learned from the institutional experiences in Europe and America (particularly Great Britain), it also drew on its own tradition of public reasoning and argumentative heterodoxy.
India’s unusual record as a robust, non-Western democracy includes not just its popular endorsement, following independence from the British Raj, of the democratic form of government, but also the tenacious persistence of that system, in contrast to many other countries where democracy has intermittently made cameo appearances. It includes, importantly in this context, the comprehensive acceptance by the armed forces (differently from the military in many other countries in Asia and Africa) as well as by the political parties (from the Communist left to the Hindu right, across the political spectrum) of the priority of civilian rule – no matter how inefficient and awkward (and how temptingly replaceable) democratic governance might have seemed.
The decisive experiences in India also include the unequivocal rejection by the Indian electorate of a very prominent attempt, in the 1970s, to dilute democratic guarantees in India (on the alleged ground of the seriousness of the ‘emergency’ that India then faced). The officially sponsored proposal was massively rebuffed in the polls in 1977.14 Even though Indian democracy remains imperfect and flawed in several different ways (more on that later, in Essays 9–12), the ways and means of overcoming those faults can draw powerfully on the argumentational tradition.
It is very important to avoid the twin pitfalls of (1) taking democracy to be just a gift of the Western world that India simply accepted when it became independent, and (2) assuming that there is something unique in Indian history that makes the country singularly suited to democracy. The point, rather, is that democracy is intimately connected with public discussion and interactive reasoning. Traditions of public discussion exist across the world, not just in the West.15 And to the extent that such a tradition can be drawn on, democracy becomes easier to institute and also to preserve.
Even though it is very often repeated that democracy is a quintessentially Western idea and practice, that view is extremely limited because of its neglect of the intimate connections between public reasoning and the development of democracy – a connection that has been profoundly explored by contemporary philosophers, most notably John Rawls.16 Public reasoning includes the opportunity for citizens to participate in political discussions and to influence public choice. Balloting can be seen as only one of the ways – albeit a very important way – to make public discussions effective, when the opportunity to vote is combined with the opportunity to speak and listen, without fear. The reach – and effectiveness – of voting depend critically on the opportunity for open public discussion.
A broader understanding of democracy – going well beyond the freedom of elections and ballots – has emerged powerfully, not only in contemporary political philosophy, but also in the new disciplines of ‘social choice theory’ and ‘public choice theory’, influenced by economic reasoning as well as by political ideas.* In addition to the fact that open discussions on important public decisions can vastly enhance information about society and about our respective priorities, they can also provide the opportunity for revising the chosen priorities in response to public discussion. Indeed, as James Buchanan, the founder of the contemporary discipline of public choice theory, has argued: ‘the definition of democracy as “government by discussion” implies that individual values can and do change in the process of decision-making.’17 The role of the argumentative tradition of India applies not merely to the public expression of values, but also to the interactive formation of values, illustrated for example by the emergence of the Indian form of secularism (to be discussed in the next section).
Long traditions of public discussion can be found across the world, in many different cultures, as I have discussed elsewhere.18 But here India does have some claim to distinction – not unrelated to the major theme of this essay. The Greek and Roman heritage on public discussion is, of course, rightly celebrated, but the importance attached to public deliberation also has a remarkable history in India. As it happens, even the world-conquering Alexander received some political lecturing as he roamed around north-west India in the fourth century BCE. For example, when Alexander asked a group of Jain philosophers why they were paying so little attention to the great conqueror, he got the following – broadly anti-imperial – reply (as reported by Arrian):
King Alexander, every man can possess only so much of the earth’s surface as this we are standing on. You are but human like the rest of us, save that you are always busy and up to no good, travelling so many miles from your home, a nuisance to yourself and to others! … You will soon be dead, and then you will own just as much of the earth as will suffice to bury you.*
In the history of public reasoning in India, considerable credit must be given to the early Indian Buddhists, who had a great commitment to discussion as a means of social progress. That commitment produced, among other results, some of the earliest open general meetings in the world. The so-called ‘Buddhist councils’, which aimed at settling disputes between different points of view, drew delegates from different places and from different schools of thought. The first of the four principal councils was held in Rājagriha shortly after Gautama Buddha’s death; the second about a century later in Vaiśālī; and the last occurred in Kashmir in the second century CE. But the third – the largest and the best known of these councils – occurred under the patronage of Emperor Ashoka in the third century BCE, in the then capital of India, Pāṭaliputra (now called Patna).19 These councils were primarily concerned with resolving differences in religious principles and practices, but they evidently also addressed the demands of social and civic duties, and furthermore helped, in a gener
al way, to consolidate and promote the tradition of open discussion on contentious issues.
The association of Ashoka, who ruled over the bulk of the Indian subcontinent (stretching into what is now Afghanistan), with the largest of these councils is of particular interest, since he was strongly committed to making sure that public discussion could take place without animosity or violence. Ashoka tried to codify and propagate what must have been among the earliest formulations of rules for public discussion – a kind of ancient version of the nineteenth-century ‘Robert’s Rules of Order’.20 He demanded, for example, ‘restraint in regard to speech, so that there should be no extolment of one’s own sect or disparagement of other sects on inappropriate occasions, and it should be moderate even on appropriate occasions’. Even when engaged in arguing, ‘other sects should be duly honoured in every way on all occasions’.
Ashoka’s championing of public discussion has had echoes in the later history of India, but none perhaps as strong as the Moghal Emperor Akbar’s sponsorship and support for dialogues between adherents of different faiths, nearly two thousand years later. Akbar’s overarching thesis that ‘the pursuit of reason’ rather than ‘reliance on tradition’ is the way to address difficult problems of social harmony included a robust celebration of reasoned dialogues.21 A royal sponsorship is not essential for the practice of public reasoning, but it adds another dimension to the reach of the argumentative history of India. In the deliberative conception of democracy, the role of open discussion, with or without sponsorship by the state, has a clear relevance. While democracy must also demand much else,22 public reasoning, which is central to participatory governance, is an important part of a bigger picture. I shall have occasion to return to this connection later.