Totalitarian political behaviour and the traditional social system

The heads of social institutions interpret the rules and regulations, and the common masses take this class of people as extraordinarily knowledgeable, and differentiate their level of understanding as far superior and not to be challenged, Md Saidur Rahman Political culture can be defined as the orientation of the citizens of a nation toward politics, their perceptions of political legitimacy and the traditions of political practice, and the feelings expressed by individuals in the position of the elected offices. Wyn Grant, Professor of Politics, University of Warwick, UK, defines political culture as: "The attitudes, beliefs, and values which underpin the operation of a particular political system. These were seen as including knowledge and skills about the operation of the political system, positive and negative emotional feelings towards it, and evaluative judgments about the system... Cultural explanations can, nevertheless, assist the understanding of how reactions to political events and developments may vary in different societies, while the analysis of subcultures remains important in understanding tensions and cleavages within particular societies." Political scientist Sidney Verba, describes political culture as a "system of empirical beliefs, expressive symbols, and values, which defines the situation in which political action takes place." In consideration of citizen's participation in the government system, Gabriel Almond and Sidney Verba outlined three pure types of political culture:(i) parochial - where citizens are only remotely aware of the presence of central government, and live their lives near enough regardless of the decisions taken by the state; (ii) subject - where citizens are aware of central government, and are heavily subjected to its decisions with little scope for dissent; and (iii) participant - where citizens are able to influence the government in various ways and they are affected by it. With more illustrations, we can understand the inter-communication between people and the state in Bangladesh. To understand Bangladesh society and its organisations, let us consider a significant cultural dimension that is power distance. Power distance is the extent to which the less powerful members of institutions and organisations within a country expect and accept that power is distributed unequally. Institutions are the basic elements of society, such as family, the school, and the community; organisations are the places where people work. Inequality in Bangladesh society is seen in different social classes: upper, middle, and lower. Classes differ in their access to the opportunities and advantages of the society. Power distance can be seen in the family life of our society. Children are expected to be obedient towards their parents. There is an order of authority among the children themselves, younger children being expected to yield to older children. Independent behavior on the part of a child is not encouraged. Respect for parents and other elders are seen as a basic virtue, children see others showing respect and soon acquire it themselves. Respect for parents and older relatives last through adulthood. As the family is the source of our very social mental programming, its impact is extremely strong, and programs set at this stage are difficult to change. Hofstede distinguishes four types of institutions: the family, the school, the job and the community. He goes on to state that they 'interact, so that, for example, patterns of parentchild interaction in a society are carried over into teacherstudent . relationships'. Basically, it is said that models, which are used, have been created and are present in the society for years, have been transferred from one institution to another. Therefore, the practice of not differing from the elders in the family and society flows into other organisations of the country, including the political parties in which arguing with and questioning the activities of the superiors is seen as misconduct. This practice is indeed the detrimental to democratic development of the society and its constituent organisations. The society of Bangladesh is basically a hierarchic system based on a person's social position, caste, status, educational background, seniority, and gender. The principle of hierarchy in interpersonal relationship, is, and for hundreds of years has been accepted as necessary and morally right in rural Bangladesh, even among the Muslims. In a hierarchic system, roles and duties in relation to others are defined in details. If these are not followed, chaos and conflict are expected to result. This traditional rigid samaj system rarely was convenient to the people, and mostly was utterly inconvenient. Fortunately enough if the lords or masters were kind-hearted and philanthropic; the masses could expect their sympathy and justice, whereas if the lords or masters were unfeeling and unmerciful, the common masses would face lot of difficulties, sometimes, intolerable sufferings, which were more commonly known. [Ishtiaq Jamil, 2007, Administrative Culture in Bangladesh] Depending on their interests, the middlemen or the councilors or the mediators connected to the landlords, mostly the fortune seekers and flatterers would make the rule harsh or intolerable for the masses. This system was very much undemocratic, which was more commonly a kind of despotism. Poor peasants would unquestionably trust the judgment of the landlords or masters. They would very often take this judgment as their fate, and so never would they challenge the ruling. In case of any challenge or violation, the peasants would have a misfortune. Because of this strong hierarchy, loyalty and submissive mindset of the common masses, there were hardly any violations of law and order, however inhuman or insensitive, imposed upon them. In a sense, people used to say this tough hierarchic system as a peaceful society. Gradually, this landlord dominated single-authority samaj (social) system was replaced by an elite class dominated multi-authority samaj system. The basic social structure remained the same - the common masses depended on the heads, mostly the land lords and moneyed people of the samaj for support in their living, work and justice. The heads of samaj interpret the rules and regulations, and the common masses take this class of people as extraordinarily knowledgeable, and differentiate their level of understanding as far superior and not to be challenged. So, the common masses remain loyal to them. Our current political culture represents the same hierarchism of society in which the local level party leaders deserve favor and sympathy because of their social class, muscle power, excessive eulogy for their respective party chiefs, and unquestioned submission to the party decisions whatever totalitarian be those. The writer can be reached at E-mail: msaidurbd@yahoo.com